Reading a book about healing, I came across two diagrams of the relationships between external events and emotional response. The first, very simple, diagram, showed our common misconception. It had two boxes, one for ‘external events’ and one for ’emotional response’, and an arrow pointing from events to response. That’s… Read more »Where readings happen
From its first appearance in the first words of the Yi, the creative flow through the four characters yuan heng li zhen is tangible. Its power is felt in the other five hexagrams with the whole, uninterrupted formula. But the natural cohesion of the four-word formula can also be felt… Read more »Theme and variations
Hexagram 1 says yuan heng li zhen – from the source, creating success, constancy bears fruit. Hexagram 2 says yuan heng li pinma zhi zhen – from the source, creating success, a mare’s constancy bears fruit The remaining hexagrams can be seen as ‘children’ of these two – 62 ways of blending… Read more »Yuan heng li zhen
También disponible en español Hexagram 1 is so simple it’s tremendously hard to get to grips with. The simplicity starts with its shape – – six solid, ‘yang’ lines, pure and whole, light with no shade, no nuances, no spaces, no ‘picture’. The significance of those six solid lines is… Read more »The elusively simple Hexagram 1
Complementary hexagrams are paradoxical things. On the one hand, there is no hexagram more different from 21, Biting Through than 48, the Well: Every line is changed, so they have nothing in common. If it’s time to bite through, then it is exactly not time for well-maintenance. And on the other… Read more »A shared dao of 21 and 48
I’ve just made Language of Change available separately. It’s a Yijing glossary covering common phrases, words and omens (‘crossing the great river’, ‘feudal lords’, ‘regrets vanish’…) and also some key concepts (centrality, offerings, marriage…), and it’s available in pdf (digital) format for £7, here. This is the same glossary that’s included… Read more »‘Language of Change’ Yijing glossary
(Or – how I learned that while there are problems inherent in asking for a prediction, there are even more problems with trying to make rules about what kind of question is best.) The well-known problems with asking for a prediction It’s not what we want to know Often, wanting… Read more »I just want to know if it’s going to happen
