Themes are so often misunderstood… and I get why. The little rhymes Ra came up with are easy to remember but can be heard in different ways by the mind.

Themes are the most surface-y mechanic of any relationship. When two individual designs connect, they sort of superpose, and each time one person has one gate and the other has the gate from the other side of a channel they activate the centers at both end of the channel, like it happens in individual charts.

The numbers describe how many centers are defined (first number, like 9 in 9-0) and how many stay open (second number, like 0 in 9-0) in the bond.

Themes don’t say anything about wether or not a bond will work

That’d be the most important part to keep in mind. Only one thing defines true compatibility : whether a bond was entered correctly (both people following their Strategy & Authority). Note : a bond can also be re-entered correctly.

If it’s not (re-)entered correctly, the bond is entered in not-self, we don’t access its potential, we live its worse version, full of resistance and suffering, even if on paper it could be amazing. If entered correctly, all mechanics bring us what we need, no matter how difficult they look on paper.

The two bonds that currently bring me the most Success, the juiciest and most meaningful invitations and recognition are both split definition and quite a few compromises and detriments brought to the table for example. Mechanics are not about compatibility, they inform us how the bond works when it’s entered correctly and where the pain points will be.

Ra put it that way :

“Think about it this way: you’ve got two ways in which it’s going to work.

• You are going to enter into the bond as not-self which means you are going to be drawn by the conditioning, whatever the conditioning happens to be and you can see that there are all kinds of mutual conditioning that goes on in this relationship.

• The other side is – you are going to enter into correctly this relationship. Now that’s something totally different. It really is. Because you enter in as yourself and as such you are able to take in the other.

It is something that is so important to understand about being yourself and that you can make a decision that is correct for you, in terms of who you bring into your aura. Most people don’t. So you end up in configurations when they are not correct that become deeply distorted.”

What themes do inform us about the best is how they work, what needs to be surrendered to in order to take the best out of the relationship.

9-0 : nowhere to go

When a 9-0 is pleasant, it’s so warm and cozy. Those are the bonds where you can feel like you’re in a bubble together and there’s no room for anyone else. When it gets unpleasant, like when you fight for example, it feels sticky and stuffy, like it’s hard to get away.

“Now think about how uncomfortable that can be and think about how wonderful that can be. I mean, after all it is about this and that, isn’t it? But it’s a 9 and 0. It means that when the two of you are together, nobody else can get in. Not only that but when the two of you are together, it’s hard to get away. You get locked into each other in a way that can be healthy or not. It depends on the level of awareness in the relationship. But there isn’t anything you can do about that. A 9 and 0 is a 9 and 0.

You end up in a 9 and 0 relationship with somebody who is difficult and abusive, whatever the case may be, not such an easy thing to get out. You end up in a 9 and 0 relationship and all of those friends that you seem to have had in your life, who were part of your social dynamics, suddenly disappear because you are caught in a 9 and 0.

These are mechanisms. You can’t do anything about it. You can’t be in a 9 and 0 and the whole theme of your relationship is `Let’s make room for somebody else’ - because it does not work. It’s just a mechanical thing.

If you are not meant for that, if you get drawn into a relationship through the conditioning, through the way in which homogenized relationships work and you end up in a relationship that you discover very quickly isn’t necessarily for you - this is very difficult. Not only that but you often end up with partners that can be deeply disturbed by having the relationship come to an end. It is something to recognize. You see, to be helpless in one of these relationships – this is a very painful thing. It is. It has the capacity to really altering the way in which that couple is going to operate. It does not just have to be a couple. It can be those beings that are friends and everybody else can’t get in. It can be those working associates that really bond deeply to each other and trade off their own stuff together and there are all these levels that it works at.”

“If you’ve got a 9 and 0 relationship with a friend, no sense inviting somebody else to join you to go out. It’s not the kind of thing that is going to work. It just isn’t. It’s like trying to break up a friendship of one of your kids with somebody because you don’t particularly like them, or whatever the case may be – and they are a 9 and 0. You watch and see what kind of a dilemma that’s going to bring. So it’s a mechanical thing to be aware of.”

“The 9 and 0s have to be totally locked in. So you have to see that there has to be a fundamental dynamic in your design, that this is part of what your cognitive exploration is on this plane – so deeply connected to another human being to take in that deep experience of the other.”

“After all, these names—9 and 0 nowhere to go—if you have the right person, why go anywhere? You can be locked into them forever. There is great potential in that.”

8-1 : have some fun

Same here. 8-1 are often misconceptualized as fun in essence. I entered my 8-1 partnership incorrectly, believe me the fun didn’t last and insured years of suffering until we re-entered the bond correctly and slowly got to see the fun of the beginnings flourishing again and develop. It can shift, but it’s not a given.

When it’s pleasant, it’s fun and airy. There’s a space there’s not in the 9-0. When it’s unpleasant, the open center become

The fun of an 8-1 is so precious when it’s correct and feels desperately lacking when it’s not, the difference is quite impressive to experience with the awareness the mechanics offer us.

“Now why `have some fun’? You know, the thing to recognize about being a couple and you have an open center is that you’ve got something that the two of you can be open to together. You are going to be able to develop areas of common interest and those areas of common interest are something that bind you to the outside world together.

So in this case the two of you are taking in the Splenic phenomena of the world and your own particular designs in relationship to that because together you have an undefined Spleen. But the moment that you have this single window, there’s a way of getting out of the relationship and into something else. Something that they can share from their different perspectives, not like the 9 and 0 where you are locked in so deeply. You know but here’s that place where you can do things together, you can go out together, you can work together and discover things together. The 8 and 1 is something that is a very healthy kind of bond between two beings.”

“You can see that in the 8 and 1 you have something very different. What you have is the beginning of this kind of generational interest field. This window is open for couples to go out into the world to join others, to do things and all that stuff. You know, to be involved with each other at that level to gain that appreciation of each other. Obviously there are very positive things in that.”

“The beauty of being an 8 and 1 is that you have the possibility of going out the same door or the same win- dow together. In other words, that single openness you share can become a way in which you integrate on the outside.”

“for the 8 and 1 it's learning how to have fun together”

“8 and 1 have some fun, yeah, good; the two of you exploring the world together, fighting the good cause together, and doing things together, whatever the case may be.”

7-2 : work to do

Another common misconception. “Work to do” doesn’t mean the relationship got to be hard or will have to be worked on, that’s actually a way to make it much more difficult than it needs to be. It means we are not meant to constantly be “over each other”. The centers act as windows to get out of the relationship when it gets hard through the world each partner has to have on the side.

The work is not solving what doesn’t connect us, it’s about the surrender to the dynamics and letting the other be themselves. It can be so transformative to go through this together.

7-2 get hard when we try to make them 9-0 or 8-1, being all the time together and solving every problems that arise. 7-2 that are working the way they’re supposed to are not the kind of bond where we’re meant to have someone “be our whole world”. Once we’re surrendering to that, we get to meet very pleasantly, and then to live “for work” or anything else until it’s time to be together again. It’s way out of the bond that should ideally be honored and embraced so we get the beauty of the mechanics.

“The moment you have two centers open, it means that the couple can end up having different interests that ultimately send them apart from each other. So the moment this kind of relationship has a problem, one partner goes out this window and one partner goes out that window. These are partnerships where partners learn how to escape each other most of the time. And they escape each other most of the time with their particular interest. ’No. Sorry, I’ve gotta work’ or ’I’ve gotta do this thing’ or blah blah blah, whatever the case may be. There is a window they go out of in order to NOT get into this.”

“See, this is mechanics. We are helpless in these mechanics. It’s not like you can do anything about this, that this one is going to go out here and that one’s going to go there. But if the bond between them is healthy and aware, this will be part of their relationship. Yes, they do have these separate interests but these separate interests aren’t separating them because it isn’t an issue. That one is over here and the other one is over there. It’s not `You are over there to avoid me’ or `You are over there to be away from me’. Because it isn’t. It’s just what this kind of relationship offers.”

“7 and 2s don't learn how to have fun together; they learn how to survive each other.”

Only when our minds manipulate us into believing that that being away from each other means we don’t love each other enough or should be solved does this actually becomes a painful issue, and the other becomes “hard to survive”.

“You can see on the mundane level the characteristics of the way in which people meet. The moment you have areas of Compromise, you always have the attempt of escape. There is always this "I have to get away from this." Whether it's "I have to get away from this" so you go early to work and you come home late, or whether it's "I have to get away from this" and you lie in bed and pretend you don't feel good, the fact of the matter is the 'work to do' means that the relationship is not something that is guaranteed. It means there is going to have to be effort. If the effort isn't made, then the relationship won't survive.”

“The comment about a failed 7 and 2 relationship where you say, “I hated it but I learned a lot.” That's true. 7 and 2 relationships are often the kinds of relationships where if you do walk away from them, you feel like you blew it the rest of your life, regardless of whatever happens to you after- wards, whether you enter into other relationships or whatever. There is always a part of you that understands that more could have been done, that it could have been worked out. Of course, that's given that with the 7 and 2, the other configurations in the design are actually something that contribute to their being a potentially good relationship.”

“The 7 and 2 'work to do,' well, doing the work is very satisfying. You ask any couple that is a 7 and 2 who survive long enough and they'll tell you it was worth it and it was interesting to go through that process because they end up probing each other much more deeply, as an example.”

6-3 : better to be free

The misconception I hear the most about this one is that it means people shouldn’t be together or have a polyamorous bond or alike. That’s simply untrue. I’m sure it’s correct for some, but it’s incorrect to assume themes tell us how to live the bond besides accepting its dynamics.

Centers that are defined in a bond is like glue, and the more they are, the more people are meant to experience total closeness with each other *overall*. But closeness like this is only meaningful and pleasant if it’s in the mechanics. When we try to force it, it never happens and it makes the bond painful. And that closeness doesn’t mean we can only be intimate, feel close to each other when we have a lot of centers defined. It’s just a different form of closeness.

I have a 6-3 we someone I deeply enjoy. When we are together, the experience is incredible. I feel quite close to her but our connection is not strong in the same way, it’s just different. The only times our 6-3 becomes an issue is when our minds convince us we should be closer. When we let all that freedom between, our bond is just as meaningful as my other more defined bonds, just different. I actually loved learning that with her in the chaos of our beginnings, feeling the resistance, going back to our composite and having that “oh my gooodness, my mind wants to make this into the airy coziness of a 8-1.” My fear of not being close enough completely dissolved quite quickly after that.

“For the not-self it’s always a problem. There are so many ways to go, there’s so much distraction in the relationship that it’s very difficult for these couples to pay much attention to each other.

Then again, if it is really in your nature to have that kind of a relationship where you can spend a great deal of time in your own thing, in your own space and only connect every once in a while for the value of that connection – then this is something that can be perfect for you.”

If we enter correctly a 6-3, the only thing we need is to surrender to how much freedom there is in those mechanics and not try to make one of those bonds the world tell us are the only ways to love (cozy 9-0 and fun 8-1), those bonds that are romanticized and homogenized. Once we have ways to enjoy that freedom, those bonds can be just as fulfilling as any bond.

“It doesn't mean you have to be free. It doesn't mean that at all. But what it means is that you're going to have to look at a different kind of relationship. Basically the 'better to be free' kind of relationship is you can almost see that in this trend over the last 25 years to move away from formal marriage. That is, the formal bond. The 7 and 2s tend to be formally bonded. They need something to hold them together while they do their work.

But the 6 and 3 don't like that at all. And as long as they can have, through awareness, a relationship where you really don't need to have a strong connection to the other, then I suppose it's possible.”

“And 6 and 3s, yeah, sure it's better to be free, but it doesn't mean you have to be free. But it does say that you're going to have to do even more work than the 7 and 2, and you're going to have to do that work in a way in which you're not going to have the same quality of dependency that will arise in different kinds of configurations.”

5-4 : not a relationship anymore

Another one even more confused with an hypothetical injonction to not be in a relationship anymore. This one is very similar to the 6-3 in the sense that to function adequately, it only needs us to surrender to how much freedom from each other it requires.

The mind will probably pretend it should be different or that we don’t necessarily enjoy each other as much as we “should”, when. Really, if it’s correctly entered, and we don’t find the dynamic, again, it will be fulfilling in its unique way.

“There is no such thing as a negative configuration. But the not-self in and of itself is negative. This is the beginning of the problem. Every single aspect, every design, I can look at any design and I can describe it as if Jesus Christ was walking again, because quite frankly, every design is like that. But the reality is that we don't live that. We don't live the correctness of the potential. We are not surren- dered. So, all of these things turn out to be quagmires.”

| Sources from our dude Ra - How we connect & Partnership analysis