Inner li as vision

This is just a speculative post, or a starting point for speculation…

I’ve started thinking of the trigram li – fire and light – as being like eyes, particularly when it’s the inner trigram. Then sometimes it seems to look out at the outer trigram, and sometimes it seems to look through the outer trigram, as through a lens or a filter to perception.

Hexagram 49, Radical Change: fire in the lake. I think of the tiger change and leopard change, and the trigrams start to look like the shaman’s eyes shining through the new mask. You could imagine how awareness is radically changed by its new way of relating and being; you could imagine how the way of being and relating (that is, the ‘form of government’ on a personal level) is transformed by a new awareness that lights it up from within.

Hexagram 36, Brightness Hiding: fire hidden away under the earth. It’s night-time; perhaps the eyes are closed, and the light of awareness is earthed up like a charcoal-burner’s fire.You might be hiding the extent of your insight (often what 36 seems to be advising); you might be seeing in an earth-like way: open, receptive, not doing anything to change what you see, just being aware.

Hexagram 63, Already Across: fire under water, the picture of a pot on the boil, and of awareness firmly trained on change, flow and risk. The noble one ‘reflects on distress and prepares to defend against it.’

Hexagram 13, People in Harmony, fire under heaven. I imagine the people gathered round the fire and looking up at the night sky, each tribe identifying one constellation as the image of their own ancestor, seeing how all the different shapes are part of one sky.

Hexagram 22, Beauty: fire under the mountain. The noble one is ‘bringing light to the many standards’, looking at the rules and boundaries, solid as rock, that contain human life. Perhaps she watches the changing patterns of light flickering over the rock, or perhaps she sees the mountain as if from the inside, observing how even this grows and changes. And perhaps she notices how the mountain stands in the way of her vision and limits how far she can see. She ‘does not venture to pass judgement.’

Hexagram 55, Abundance, Feng, the moment of decision: thunder and lightning culminate as one. The world is seen in terms of responsibility, what must be done. Swiftly, decisively, immediately, vision translates into action. (In contrast with Hexagram 21, where the trigrams are reversed, and action and experience translate into understanding.)

Hexagram 37, People the Home, fire inside and wind/wood outside. It could be that the family are looking out through the wooden structure of their home, seeing with the influence and mores of the home as their filter. It also suggests bringing clear awareness to your influence: the noble one’s  ‘words have substance and her actions are consistent.’

Hexagram 30, Clarity, fire within fire and spreading illumination, is harder to write about. I’ve an idea this may be because it refers to a kind of awareness that’s completely outside my experience.

Anyway, that’s one way to interpret li on the inside, as eyes and a place to see from.

(Does it play a similar role on the outside? Certainly in 64 it seems to be the eyes and ears of the fox crossing the river, li above kan…)