Hands are mirrors

What are your hands trying to tell you? Hands speak volumes. Knowing and understanding the language of hands is like having a user manual for your own life.

Odyssey Magazine recently interviewed Jena Griffiths, a certified hand analyst of the International Institute of hand Analysis. 

A lot of people are fearful of hand analysis because they don’t know what it is. They immediately think of fortune telling. Do you do divination?

Jena: Turning this mindset around is the biggest challenge hand analysts face these days. People have preconceived ideas about hand analysis because historically fortune telling is what ‘hand readers’ attempted to do. Hands are mirrors not crystal balls. Hand Analysis does not tell you how long you are going to live or how many children you are going to have. Your hands provide a detailed map of your inner landscape. The map can’t tell you where you are going to go, it can simply show you what routes are available, where the rocky ground is, or the breaks in the pass. Its task is simply to provide clarity or to show you what your options are.

So what do one’s hands reveal?
Hands reveal one’s pure potential. They also indicate issues that might be blocking this potential. Most people don’t realise how gifted they really are and they go through life not using all the gifts they have to offer the world.

Hand Analysis reveals these talents and therefore is usually a very empowering experience.


How do you go about analysing someone’s hands?
There are two parts to hand analysis, fingerprints (dermatoglyphs) and hand shape/lines. Fingerprints are fixed 5 months before birth and cannot change. They represent one’s soul psychology, or soul agenda. Hand shape (chirognomy) and lines indicate temperament and issues related to one’s personality psychology. When I look at hands I look at how the two interact. One’s soul agenda has to be played out though personality. Dermatoglyphic input is the significant difference between hand analysis as practiced by certified members of the International Institute of Hand Analysis and other systems of chirognomy. The other significant difference has to do with gift markers. Gift markings indicate not only extraordinary talents but also where a person may be challenged or psychologically blocked.

Who first decoded fingerprints?
This is the life work of Richard Unger, founder of the International Institute of Hand Analysis. Richard and his team at the institute have spent the last 30 years testing and fine tuning the system. Well over 200 000 hands have been assessed by Richard and his graduate students in Europe and the US. The system has helped many people to unblock their lives.
Issues seem to unravel fast when one can see them from a higher perspective. Many psychotherapists, depth psychologists and even coaches are starting to use hand analysis as a diagnostic tool. For the layperson it’s a powerful self expansion tool.



What about religious persuasion?

It doesn’t matter what you believe, information about your pure potential is available to you, and you can choose either use this information or ignore it.


Can you tell us more about fingerprints and soul psychology?

Interesting research is being done at the moment regarding DNA activation, specifically the +90% of DNA that was previously thought of as superfluous. Human DNA is 173cm long but only 3 cm is used for genetic coding. Until recently, the rest was labelled ‘junk DNA’ because it didn't seem to have a purpose. Now scientists are finding that this may have to do with maximum human potential and also with records of family patterns and collective human experience (Jung’s archetypes and the collective unconscious).

It seems that as a species, we’re designed to move toward DNA activation, but we each have to do the work ourselves. It’s as if each of us is born with a bag of Lego, something partially built and with no instructions how to proceed. Some people build a masterpiece, other people go round in circles, lose half their Lego pieces or give them all away and leave this life without having really achieved anything. This is where fingerprints come in. Your fingerprints are the ‘package insert’ for your particular bag of Lego. They indicate what you are supposed to be working on. You can call this healing karmic wounds or you can call it healing patterns that exist within your biological family, depending on what you believe. The outcome is the same. Your fingerprints show what trips you up; what causes you to go round in circles or give half your bag of Lego away. They also indicate the masterpiece intended.

Does this system presuppose past lives?
It is important to realize that the system can stand on its own without the concept of previous lives. Unger uses a language that people can best understand and his work is infused with his own philosophy. One might just as well say ‘inherited family issues’ or ‘God’s intentions’. People do themselves a disservice by getting tripped up at this level. I think DNA activation research will help to provide more neutral ways of discussing this.
Richard uses an acorn analogy to help understand this principle. When one looks at an acorn one knows this is not going to turn into a rose bush or a fir tree no matter what soil it lands on. It might become a bonsai or a huge magnificent tree, either way it will still be an oak tree.
"Like an acorn containing within it the potential oak tree, your fingerprints are your life's natural blueprint." Says Richard Unger

Can one analyse one’s own fingerprints?
Fingerprints are relatively easy to interpret. I teach the basics of Unger’s system in a one-day course. The other part of hand analysis, hand form and lines, takes years to master. It’s like learning another language and requires a lot of practice and constant use.

Could you give us some tips about how to interpret one’s own fingerprints?
You can interpret your umbrella consciousness quite easily using a magnifying glass to examine all 10 of your fingerprints. The type of fingerprints you mostly have indicate the broad backdrop consciousness that you are attempting to master.
Unger talks about 4 different Earth schools. I find this way of describing the differences in overall consciousness very elegant and easy for people to understand.

What then are the 4 different Earth schools?
The 4 schools of consciousness are school of service, school of wisdom, school of peace and school of love. There are four main types of fingerprint: the whorl, the loop, the tented arch and the arch. There are also combinations of these four main types, such as the peacock, which is half whorl, half loop. To find out what group you belong to you need to add up the total number of each type of print you have on both hands.


School of service (3 or more whorls)


If you have three or more whorls among your fingerprints you are in the school of service. This means that you are here to develop your ability to be of service. The objective is to become a master of service consciousness; to learn to serve joyfully without an agenda; to help, not control; to service others without neglecting yourself. Typical service student errors are servitude, burdensome obligation, resentful control, self-sacrifice or the reverse: self indulgence or selfishness.

School of Love (7 or more loops)

If you have 7 or more loops you are in the school of love. This means you are here to learn emotional mastery. The challenge is to stay present with one’s feelings no matter the circumstance; not to stuff one’s emotions, withdraw or go out of control. There are three areas to consider: feeling that one does in fact have feelings, expressing these feelings appropriately and eventually releasing them. Issues are to do with closeness and emotional authenticity.

School of Wisdom (1 or more tented arches)

If you have one or more tented arch you are here to learn to be a participant, not just an observer, to move from evaluation to action, to take the plunge, to be at stake. Issues are to do with commitment. It also has to do with good judgement without judgementalness, insight without over rationalisation, learning to laugh at oneself/ lightness of spirit.
School of Peace (1 or more arch)


If you have one or more arch in your hand you are here to learn to feel safe in your body and on the planet. This implies moving from adrenal addiction to finding a deep sense of peace within yourself. It requires balancing work and play, moving from struggle, body based fear or numbness to alert stillfulness, joy in being alive. This includes dealing with responsibilities without creating an endless chain of emergencies.


Obviously this is just the very basics of the system. Which fingers these prints are on in relation to one another determines in what in what area of your life these issues tend to manifest. Their position and ranking enables one to determine dominant life lesson as well as highest actualisation path (life purpose).


To find more visit www.handanalysisonline.com