Also called: Overlapping ends · Absorbed break · Managed transition
Where on the hand: At any point along any line where the line breaks — most often on the life, heart and fate lines.
What it looks like: The line stops, and the next segment begins slightly beside and behind the end of the first, so the two run parallel and overlapping for several millimetres before the new one carries on. Nothing is missing; the track simply shifts sideways.
The benign form of a break, and the mildest of the four break variants. Benham lists overlapping ends first among the repair signs: it means the change is absorbed — the transition is managed, not a rupture.
On each line
- **Life line** — a major life change (relocation, career shift, children) carried through without a gap in vitality; one of the four repair signs that decide the reading of a life-line break.
- **Heart line** — one of the three repair signs showing that “the condition won't become fatal.”
- **Fate line** — a change of course achieved without collapse.
- **Head line** — mental continuity maintained across a shift in outlook.
- **Sun line** — recognition re-established on a new footing.
- **Health line** — a shift in the health picture rather than a decline; contrast the terraced or ladder-like break, which the Chinese reading treats as worsening.
- **Marriage line** — the mildest form of the marriage-line break, as against the substantial gap that indicates deterioration and probable separation.
On each mount
- **Rahu (centre)** — where a fate-line break falls here, an overlap converts “an abrupt change of course” into a navigated one.
- **Jupiter or Saturn** — Benham notes a broken heart line may deviate toward one of these mounts, naming the external influence; an overlap means the influence is absorbed.
- **Not otherwise a mount mark** — the overlapping break belongs to lines.
Where it is positive
- **Everywhere it occurs** — this is a repair sign by definition, not a defect.
- **Its place in the hierarchy** — fourth and mildest of Benham's four repairs (square, sister line, bar across the gap, overlapping ends), but the commonest.
- **Combined with other repairs** — an overlap plus a square or sister line is the strongest available reading of a broken line.
Palmistry is a traditional interpretive art, not a science. Offered for reflection and self-understanding — not medical, legal or financial advice.