I’ve never found Hexagram 56 particularly inspiring. (I wasn’t over the moon last December to receive it as my primary hexagram for this year.) Travelling means you’re ‘passing through’; that wherever you are, it’s not where you belong, and there’s not so much you can do there. Its trigrams suggest a campfire lit on a mountain: lit today, the ashes scattered and cold tomorrow, as the travellers move on. You keep your eyes on the goal – which, whatever it is, is not here – and keep moving.
Only I get the feeling, now, that’s only half the picture. I was listening to a talk yesterday that began with a brief guided meditation for grounding: feel the ground that supports you, feel where your feet connect to it, notice the strength of gravity keeping you there securely…
Well… I was at the kitchen sink washing up as I listened, and the particular piece of ground supporting me was the grey-and-green, 1960s-lino-covered floor of the kitchen in this house we rent. It is not my ideal home, and that is not my ideal floor, and I used to spend quite a lot of my time imagining and yearning for the ideal. Only now I noticed to the full that this was, in fact, the floor supporting my feet in this moment.
This morning I read this nugget from Richard Reeve about spiritual stations, which are not just where you wait to be elsewhere. And travelling, also, is not only about looking to the destination and not belonging here. It doesn’t just mean looking forward to lighting a real hearth fire somewhere else, sometime in the future. It also means lighting your fire here on this mountain.
I’ve been immersed for most of today in packing for a 4-week trip to Canada … and in the process, had occasion to read this poem by William Stafford, which seems to resonate:
You Reading This, Be Ready
Starting here, what do you want to remember?
How sunlight creeps across a shining floor?
What scent of old wood hovers, what softened
sound from outside fills the air?
Will you ever bring a better gift for the world
than the breathing respect that you carry
wherever you go right now? Are you waiting
for time to show you some better thoughts?
When you turn around, starting here, lift this
new glimpse that you found; carry into evening
all that you want from this day. This interval you spent
reading or hearing this – keep it for life;
What can anyone give you greater than now,
starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?
Lovely, thank you.
We should remember too, that we are all travelers and wanderers in a place that is not our own. The earth beneath us is merely loaned to us as we traverse this life. Understanding this should lead to an extreme humility as we understand that we are from somewhere else, and need to get back there as the “Prodigal Son” concluded after finding out what this life is all about. We are strangers in this world, and that is why we have to have the necessary humility, (hexagram fifteen and fifty six) and the necessary receptivity (hexagram two and four) to learn how to find our way back home.
Gene
Ah… that’s where we differ. I feel we belong here, that we’re fundamentally at home in time and space, on this earth, in these bodies. (But I am aware a lot of people don’t feel that way.)
That’s my view too; as Alan Watts said:
“You did not come into this world
You came out of it
Like a wave comes out of the ocean
You are not a stranger here”
And for me, humility arises from the awareness that everything that is, or ever was, is necessary for me to be “me” now. Every person, every particle, every mite and mitochrondrium — all of it comprises the conditions for my existence.
To a certain extent it is a matter of semantics here. It is certainly true that we as bodies, on the physical level are certainly part of the earth. In that sense we truly belong here. But our spirit is from the heavenly spheres. As such we are travelers and wanderers upon the earth. We do not know “who we are.” We are in a state of amnesia. Hexagram three sums up our dilemma perfectly, because we are “hunters in a forest who have lost our way.” And it is only from the heavenly sphere that we can get our answers and our direction, and until we submit ourselves to the heavenly sphere, we will continue to be lost and not know who we are.
The ancients all said, “man, know thyself,” but none of us ever do.
Gene
And I might add that hexagrams one and two make this very clear in that hexagram one relates to time, to the heavenly sphere, and to spirit. Hexagram two relates to the earth sphere, to space, and to matter. They are eternal, and part of a continuous interaction, a cosmic drama. We need to realize that they are both a part of us, and that they cannot be distinguished. For every positive there is a negative, and etc..
Gene
Mm. And where are they? Somewhere else? Not here?
I’ll pass on any further discussion on this topic. I’ll post on the next one, I suppose.
Gene
Sounds good. Thanks for the comments!
Hexagram 56 i ve found Hilary to be a sad hexagram (a person may feel like circle among squares or a square among circles) or experience temporary fleeting happiness but not substantial eg a person may have wiped slate clean being unknown in a new environment but with no allies or faithful contacts 56=sojourner alien wanderer traveller with no real friends or family links for support its restlessness where only real security is not hanging around too long in one place & not getting too deeply involved in other peoples problems or lives plus not revealing too much of oneself either
It’s true – there is a real melancholy to that feeling of not belonging, and not being able to be of service. But I’ve just seen that there is this other side to the hexagram, too: being decisively, consciously present where you are, even though you can’t put down roots there.
I agree with you Gene; each one of your words resound the tremendous spiritual growth I experienced when working with the peoples from South Mexico and Central America (almost make me cry). As a matter of fact, here it is a poem (made into a song) from the region; clearly evokes the spirit of this ancient people; it establishes a passionate and melancholic connection with the culture that forever will live in everyone’s heart. If you are as sensitive as I am get a handkerchief ready (especially if you want to listen to the song). It really brings out your ideas.
Caminante del Mayab
(Wanderer in Maya Land)
http://youtu.be/4MEM0lLRa_c
English
Wanderer…
Going along the roads
Through the Old Maya paths…
The Mayab…
You will witness ablaze at dusk
The eyes of the “cocay” (firefly)
At night you will glimpse shining
The wings of the ixtacay
Traveler… traveler…
You will perceive the sad song
Of the blue dove,
And the fearful cry
Of the bird called “pujuy”
Wanderer…
You must tell me if you saw something appear
Like a white cloud
That is always here, but is no more
It is long gone away
And if you heard the sounds resembling a song
Like a voice of a woman
Wanderer…
Also in my journey
I saw the white cloud…
I also heard the song…
Poor me…
Spanish
Caminante… caminante…
Que vas por los caminos…
Por los viejos caminos…
Del Mayab…
Que ves arder de tarde
Los ojos del “cocay”
Que ves brillar de noche
Las alas de “ixtacay”…
Caminante… caminante…
Que oyes el canto triste
De la paloma azul,
Y el grito tembloroso
Del pájaro “pujuy”
Caminante… caminante
Me has de decir si viste aparecer
Como una nube blanca
Que vino y que se fue
Y si escuchaste un canto
Como voz de mujer
Caminante… caminante
También en mi camino
La nube blanca vi
También escuche el canto
Pobrecito de mí…
Sometimes though being aware that ‘there is more than this’, or that ‘this too shall pass’ can reveal whole new clusters of meaning in one’s presence . . These days I cam across and started reading B.H. Clow’s book ‘Liquid Light of Sex’ which speaks of the effects of the Uranus Opposition (aka ‘mid-life crisis’ ‘kundalini rising’ etc). I’m in my mid thirties now and this usually is the last phase before U opp. occurs (at about 42). Reading Clow’s descriptions of these larger cycles, gaining new insight about the paths my physical and energy bodies travel, suddenly made my world a greater place and my -transitory- present a part of a bigger story – this is not all there is, sounds very much like 56 . . maybe there’s a delicate balance there between the two that I still haven’t figured out – thanks for the food for thought
Got this one in relation to a particularly stubborn plantar wart ..feeling the groundlessness of that experience makes more sense .. Ta
It is not the first time that I cast 56, The Wanderer. This time It was 56.4. I was feeling not at home in my home because of some noise disturbance by the neighbours en the increasing traintrafic near my garden. A perfect match. Also on a deeper level it is a mach. Hit, right between the eyes by the words of the Fan Yao (52.4) and comments by Bradford Hatcher. The Yijing can be truly amazing!
Yes, that sounds like 56.4. Sometimes I think we find ourselves unwillingly compelled to pick up that axe to defend the space.