Here’s an email I can’t resist quoting:

“I logged in finally the other day and peeked at the emerging WikiWing.

WOW!

This is just brilliant and I agree with everyone that it is something I would happily pay for in book form!

I just browsed a bit on hexagram 5 that I had received previously and had a whole new aha on the answer in 5 minutes or less.

Wow—

But I also have to add that it is entirely consistent with the quality and practical usefulness of your I Ching course itself. Much more than I even expected or hoped for and I have pretty high expectations (My colleagues diplomatically call it “high standards” ;-). Chock full of inspiring and useful information, but in a form that makes it approachable, immediately applicable, and almost step-by-step without being a simplistic cookbook approach. How did you do that??

I am so looking forward to the Change Circle to keep me going and learning and connected…

Wow one more time. Very impressive indeed!

Karen”

Thanks, Karen!

Karen (of BrainandHealth.com) just took the Yijing class with me, so she has access to the WikiWing while it’s under development. It was lucky that she happened to be looking for Hexagram 5, since at the time hexagrams 1 through 5 were the only ones I’d posted online…

I just added 6 through 10 (coming slowly, slowly, indeed!) and thought now would be a good time to give you another excerpt to download.

So here it is: notes on Hexagram 9. (A more careful choice of hexagram after doing 47 last time!) It’s a pdf file, so right-click and choose ’save target as’ or the equivalent to download.  Hope you enjoy, and can think of lots of things to discuss, add and improve - which will all become possible in a couple of weeks’ time.

I’m chortling in a wry sort of way over my reading for this week.

I’ve spent the past umpteen weeks labouring faithfully over Change Circle. Planning, choosing technology and dreaming about what wonderful things it makes possible, fighting said technology, winning battles but losing the war. Starting over with different technology and its own set of battles. Finally getting a framework I feel really proud of, that gives me warm fuzzy feelings when I look at it. Remembering I still have about 40 hexagrams to add to the Wikiwing. (Gulp.)

I’d thought I was going to be writing to people by now to announce the doors were open. Not so… in fact, I looked at the ever-growing to-do list (I’m sure someone’s watering the blessed thing) and realised I have to postpone until the beginning of next month. This is Not What I Had Planned. Do I really have to leave it that long? Yes, I realise, if I want it to be complete and clear, I do.

Into this mix of delight that I’m getting there, and exasperation that it’s taking so unspeakably long, comes the reading for the week. Hexagram 47, Confined, changing at the fourth place to Hexagram 29, Repeating Chasm.

Hexagram 47 means ‘Confined’, ‘Exhausted’, ‘Oppressed’. If I think about the pressure of work, all these things are an overwhelmingly good fit.

‘Coming slowly, slowly,
Confined in a bronze chariot.
Shame.
There is completion.’

Chariots would be decorated with great quantities of bronze ornamentation for important occasions. (There’s a whole set of such decorations on display at the British Museum.) So on the one hand a bronze(d) chariot marks out the journey as unusually important. On the other hand, it’s not very fast or agile - not a very practical proposition if you’re in a hurry. I end up ashamed of being so slow (true).

The chariot is a perfect image of the work I’m doing, which is all about setting up the framework. I want it sleek and shiny, something that indicates how much I value the project and its future members, but this means the embarrassment of coming slowly, slowly. It’s not helping anyone while it’s still in development. But still… I’ll get there in the end. Lumbering great bronze chariots do have momentum.

You could say that the first objective of divination is to be more aware - have more insight, connect intuitively with the way, be more completely present. That would be true for any reading, even if it’s not the first goal that comes to mind. It’s especially, true, though, of readings done as a regular practice, whether or not you ‘have a question’. I do tend to come back to this theme from time to time , I know - but then, there’s something remarkable about divining simply as an awareness practice, and without any objective of your own in mind. You’re letting yourself be tuned in to other dimensions of experience, or enrolling for a course of intensive study with your life as the syllabus. True, this enrollment will inevitably mean learning at the feet of Prof. Hindsight from time to time. But for the most part it keeps you from falling asleep in your daily routine. I find that if I fall out of the habit of weekly readings, life tends to go on auto-pilot; eventually, I wake up and realise I’m not going anywhere. When I’m in closer contact with Yi, experience is deeper, richer and more intense. Of course, divination isn’t essential to any of this. There are probably at least as many ways of staying awake as there are people on the planet; talking with an oracle is just one of those resilient old ways. And - also ‘of course’ - enhanced awareness is only one of many reasons to adopt a regular reading practice. For instance…

• you build your experience of individual hexagrams and lines; with a few examples, you get a sense of the inner quality of a line or hexagram - its ‘time’. This is not something you can get from books.
• you develop a sense of relationship with Yi and with your own intuition, so you can recognise moments of insight rather than second-guessing them. (Another thing that’s more easily learned than taught.)
• and you get help in staying - more or less - on your path. Not that readings alone can do this: the oracle speaks quite softly, for the most part, and is easily drowned out by highly-charged emotions, or choices already made. But it is a constant corrective and reality check.

I’m not - of course - suggesting that weekly readings as awareness practice is a one-size-fits-all solution, the ‘Right Way’ to divine. Only that it can be useful, and in particular, that it’s worth getting past the fear of ‘consulting too much’ to try it. Yes, it’s possible to sabotage your conversation with Yi by asking too much (and/or listening too little), but no, you can’t ‘offend’ the oracle or wear it out. And yes, there are enlightened people who don’t need to seek guidance, but it absolutely does not follow that you ’shouldn’t need this by now.’ I suppose what I’m actually, respectfully, suggesting, is that the advice that ‘You shouldn’t consult the I Ching unless it’s for something really important, when you’re absolutely sure you need it,’ is about as useful as saying that, ‘You shouldn’t look at that map until you’re absolutely sure you’re lost’…

Acomplia and Phentermine Online

There are two lines in Hexagram 20 that differ by just one word:

Line 5 -

‘Seeing my own life.
The noble one is without mistake.’

Line 6 -

‘Seeing their lives.
The noble one is without mistake.’

Seeing ‘my own’ life, or seeing ‘his, her or their’ life. How to understand the difference between these two perspectives? One possibility is to look at them through the lens of different spiritual teachings.

Wilhelm says of line 5 that one should ‘examine the effects one produces.’ Take this advice a step or two further, and you have the whole idea of creating your own reality. Since the ‘law of attraction’ was popularised as The Secret, it’s not an unfamiliar concept: everything you see in your life at this moment is your own creation. You attracted it all, including other people’s behaviour.

Changing this line alone points you towards Hexagram 23, and this can certainly be ‘Seeing’s Stripping Away’. If you see your life as the real image of who you are, any better-looking self image you might have been hanging onto will be torn away. This can be very disillusioning - and it can also have 23’s effect of clearing the space for a fresh, more authentic start.

Is this an anachronistically modern, new-age-y idea? In a way, yes… but there is a Chinese parallel. Line 5 is the ruler’s place in the hexagram, and the ruler had responsibility for everything in his realm.

When there was a seven-year drought, the first Shang king, Cheng Tang, offered himself as a human sacrifice to appease heaven. He said,

“The fault is mine and mine alone. Please do not punish my subjects. If my subjects had done anything wrong that might contribute to the drought, I must be the root cause for their wrongdoings. Heaven and ghost spirits, please do not hurt my subjects because I failed to guide them properly due to my insufficient capability.”

(from Reflections on History)

So if you receive 20.5 you can see your life from the king’s perspective, and own it all as your own work. (But it’s in the nature of the Yijing, as an oracle, that there’s no ‘Law’ to say you must always see things this way…)

Then at line 6, the personal element is removed altogether. Once again, Wilhelm points the way: ‘here in the highest place, everything that is personal, related to the ego, is excluded.’ The ‘ego’ is a modern notion, of course, but the sage who retreats from the world to the highest place really isn’t.

From here, the view is towards Hexagram 8 - you’re Seeing the quest for union, the human patterns of relationship and affinity. How does the world look from up here? Eckhart Tolle describes this shift from ‘my life’ to ‘his/her/their life’ in A New Earth:

“To become free of the ego is not really a big job but a very small one. All you need to do is be aware of your thoughts and emotions - as they happen. This is not really a “doing,” but an alert “seeing.” …When that shift happens, which is the shift from thinking to awareness, an intelligence far greater than the ego’s cleverness begins to operate in your life. Emotions and even thoughts become depersonalized through awareness. Their impersonal nature is recognized, there is no longer a self in them. They are just human emotions, human thoughts. Your entire personal history, which is ultimately no more than a story, a bundle of thoughts and emotions, becomes of secondary importance and no longer occupies the forefront of your consciousness. It no longer forms the basis for your sense of identity. You are the light of Presence, the awareness that is prior to and deeper than any thoughts and emotions.”

These two lines seem natural alternatives - you can recognise your whole life as ‘your own’, or you can have no ’self’ with which to own anything. Which is better? Yi offers no hint at all: each line is a way for the noble one to be without fault. (And maybe anyone not a noble one would be quite likely to make mistakes in trying either of these.) Unlike the first line, for instance, both are acceptable perspectives for him to adopt; both are an imaginative expansion of vision. And it would be possible, of course, to have both lines change together, and See absolutely receptively, as open as the earth.

Since I’m up to my neck in the technical stuff for Change Circle - irritating but necessary, as the last thing I want is technology getting in the way for people - I need to bow to the inevitable for a week, fill my head with templates and cascading style sheets and suchlike, and not take on more reading work for a while. I’m guessing that I can get through it all and be back to normal in a week - I certainly hope so.

The contact and order forms are still open as usual, so if you send me a message or place an order I’ll be able to get back to you just as soon as I’m clear of all the techie stuff. Oh, and if we already have an appointment, it isn’t affected by this, of course.

Each Sunday, I cast a reading for the week ahead - sometimes just asking for something to be aware of, sometimes asking for advice. This week I asked for advice, and received Hexagram 4, Not Knowing, with no changing lines.

This was pretty baffling. Lately I’ve been working very intensely and intentionally, focussed in on the targets for the day, which lead towards the target for the month, which builds towards the target for the year… and so on. It’s a wonderful way to ensure that I’m not just drifting through ‘busy work’, and I always know what I’m doing from moment to moment.

But I’m feeling the pressure of time more intensely than ever, and I’ve got into the distressing habit of reacting like a cat with its tail trapped when anything comes up that’s not in The Plan for the day. Hm… could be something out of balance here…

So the question behind the question was, ‘How can I get it all done?’ Now how - on earth - is ‘not knowing’ any kind of guidance for dealing with a to-do list as long as your arm?

Oddly enough, it turned out to have a good practical application right away. Two technical snafus came up that I had no clue how to fix. Under these circumstances I could either a) try to work it out myself through trial and error or b) explain the problem to the helpdesk and wait to see if they come up with something. So I looked at this…

‘Not knowing, creating success.
I do not seek the young ignoramus, the young ignoramus seeks me.
The first consultation is clearly informative.
The second and third muddy the waters,
Confusing, and hence not informative.
Harvest in constancy.’

…and sent the first question to the helpdesk. They replied with the hour, and the problem was solved.

The remaining snafu was one of those things the helpdesk officially don’t support (and they get miffed if you try it on). I resisted the strong temptation to ask them anyway - more for the sake of having someone to complain to than out of any particular hope they’d solve the problem for me - and settled down to trial and error. And, hallelujah, solved the problem - all while Not Knowing the first thing about the Cascading StyleSheet complexities that were causing it.

I think there’s an element of ‘trial and error’ in the Image. As so often, it helps to elucidate the original oracle. If asking again and again won’t help, what will?

‘Below the mountain, spring water comes forth. Not knowing.
The noble one with the fruits of action, nurtures de.’

Sometimes you can build up your own capacity and resourcefulness just by doing, carving your own course - making it up as you go along.

So there was one layer of the reading, and it turned out that following its advice actually saved me a good-sized chunk of precious time.

Later, I was listening to Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth while I cooked. My ears pricked up when he started talking about the inner protestation, ‘But I don’t know who I am!’ He responds to this:

‘If you can be absolutely comfortable with not knowing who you are, then what’s left is who you are.’

It seems there could be another layer to this week’s advice. After the meal, I followed links at random and found myself at the wonderful blog, Practical Spirituality, by Staci Boden. (Isn’t the hyperlink a great new instrument of synchronicity?)

At bottom, I think this is saying the same thing that Tolle said:

“Spirituality is a relationship with the unknown mystery of life; an energy that is difficult to quantify or touch. It’s not something we can use to get what we want so we can feel more in control over life’s challenges.”

Oh…

…this is what the reading is about. Hexagram 4 is how you relate to everything you don’t know - including the things that aren’t knowable. And the other side of this coin is that if I know all about everything I’m working with, then there’s a whole lot that I’m not relating to at all.

More from Staci:

“Goals and dreams are the way the unknown—some might even say God—speaks to us and works through us. An intention is a guide in navigating the unknown. But it is important to look closely at what lies underneath and around intentions to find what motivates them. It’s possible to hold focus for a dream or goal, but in an open way, so that there is room for the intention to become a sounding board in a conversation with the unknown. It’s also possible to invite (and invoke!) help from the unknown in order to refine intentions as a way to learn and grow.”

There’s nothing wrong with being the young ignoramus, or having this insistent desire to learn, and flow further and deeper. The problems only start when this tips over into a desire to know it all already, to eliminate the unknown.

Of course, I ‘already knew’ all this. Odd how ‘revising’ it gives me the sense that I’m breathing freely again.

And to cap it all, after I wrote the draft for this post I watched a short ‘inspirational movie’ before bed. It turned out to be platitudinous and not especially inspiring - but it just happened to contain the phrase,

“Just because you don’t know how to attain it, doesn’t mean it is not possible.”

You’ll want to subscribe to the Quoteable I Ching blog, if you haven’t already. Despite the title, it doesn’t just contain quotations from the I Ching, but lovely lucid thoughts on how other things - poems, images, quotations - reflect the hexagrams. Or how the hexagrams reflect in other things.

I enjoyed all the posts so far (this is a bouncing infant blog, just a few months old), but I think my favourite is probably the one on hexagram 23, which turns up reflected in what JK Rowling has to say about failure. (The only thing I’d add is that while pretty much anything we can hold onto is ‘inessential’, it isn’t necessarily going to feel that way when the time comes for it to be stripped away!)