Eigenprint Sky: what a twelve-part cycle says about what draws you

What does Eigenprint Sky measure?

I use Sky for what keeps you going. Some people are good at their work and still dread Sunday night. Skill explains why you were hired and promoted. Skill does not always explain what draws you in.

I’m Robert Russell, a career and identity coach, and I run QuantumThrive Hub in South Africa. I build an artefact by hand for each client who is deciding about work, a business or studies. The artefact rests on four lenses of you. Together the four lenses are your Eigenprint, the full picture of you that I build. Eigenprint Sky is one of the four. The focused build uses three of them: Type, Path and Sky.

I work out Sky from your birth date, as a position in a twelve-part cycle. You read the position as a pointer to the kind of work that tends to draw you and what tends to get you moving. You get a question to ask about yourself, such as “Am I happiest starting things or keeping them running?” You then test that question against what you have done, and keep what holds up.

What Sky rests on, and where it stops

Sky rests on tradition and symbols, not on scientific testing. Nobody has proved that your birth date says anything about what you will do, and I do not say it does. You will not learn your future from Sky.

I offer you words for what draws you. Some people know the job is fine and the fit is off, and cannot say more than that.

So I treat a Sky lens as a guess to test. The guess is that people with your lens tend to say they are drawn to a certain kind of work. You check the guess against your own life. If the lens fits what you have done, you keep it as one part of your Eigenprint. If you cannot find one time it fit, you set it aside.

An example: a promotion you are unsure about

Take a professional three years into a role they are good at. Their manager offers a promotion: a bigger team, a better package and the title they have wanted.

They say thank you and mean it. On the drive home they notice they are not looking forward to the job.

Nothing is wrong with the offer. They earned it by running a department well. What first drew them in may have been a different pull, such as building a new department from nothing.

Say their Sky lens points to a pull towards starting things rather than keeping them running. With that in mind they can ask a sharper question than “Do I want this promotion?” They can ask when they were last most absorbed at work, and whether they were starting new work or keeping existing work running.

Then they test the question against their own life. They list three of their best work memories from the last five years. They mark each one as starting new work or keeping existing work running. If all three are starting, they have a reason to trust their Sky. They can count it as one reason when they decide about the promotion. If the three are mixed, they set Sky aside and decide using the other lenses.

A school leaver can run the same test. Take a learner weighing accounting against a broad arts degree. The learner lists the three school tasks that held their attention longest, and marks each one as a new task or a set task. A parent can sit with their child and make the list together, and each of them can mark their own answers.

Where Sky sits in your Eigenprint

An Eigenprint is made of four lenses. Here is each lens, what it rests on and where it stops.

• Eigenprint Type is a description of your personality. Type comes from a questionnaire I wrote, based on the work of Carl Jung, a Swiss psychologist. Type shows how you take things in, decide and handle pressure.
• Eigenprint Path is a number’s position in a count, worked out from your birth date. Path names a theme that tends to come back across a life, such as being the one who organises others. Sky points at what draws you, and Path points at a theme that recurs.
• Eigenprint Sky is the subject of this post. I use Sky to describe what draws you and what gets you moving.
• Eigenprint Name is where your first name and surname come from, looked up in dictionaries and name histories that you can check yourself. Name is part of the comprehensive build only.

Do not rely on one lens. You trust a pattern less when one lens shows it than when three lenses show it. When several lenses agree, you have the strongest sign available.

How you start

Your Eigenprint Type result is free. You create an account, answer a short questionnaire in one sitting and see your result before you pay anything. Once you have your result, you can book a paid session with me. In that session, before you decide on a build, we go through your Sky and Path.

Questions people ask

Does Eigenprint Sky predict your future?

It does not. I make no claim about your future. Sky describes what draws you, and you decide whether the description fits your life.

Do you have to believe in Sky for it to work?

You do not. The test is whether the question Sky raises is a good one for you. If the question shows you what draws you, Sky has done its job, whether or not you accept its basis.

Do two people with the same Sky lens get the same Eigenprint?

No. Sky is one of four lenses, and the others draw on your answers, your birth date and your name. Two people with the same Sky lens usually end up with different Eigenprints.

If you are choosing what to study

Write down which subjects, projects or jobs held your attention for hours, and look for what they share. You can check that list against one idea from Sky, and you own the list.

What Sky leaves open

Sky is one lens. To decide, you also need to know how you work day to day. You need to know which theme comes back across your life and where your name comes from. You also need a next step.

The focused build combines Type, Path and Sky and scores where you stand now on five weighted dimensions. The comprehensive build adds Eigenprint Name and the timing work, which puts dates on your roadmap.

Your artefact holds a roadmap, the steps you will take. In the timing work I use your birth date to place each step on a calendar. The roadmap then says March where it would otherwise say in three months. The dates suggest a sensible order for your steps. They do not predict what will happen.

A coaching session is the smallest paid step: you and I go through one of your lenses together, online by video call.

See the focused build or the comprehensive build. To start with what is free, create an account and see your Eigenprint Type.