 Clarity's I Ching Newsletter: Issue 62 "If you dont like how things are, change it!" Jim Rohn |
Letter from the Editor Here's the audio message - click the blue 'play' button below, or if that doesn't work use this link to open your usual media player. (Transcript here.) No, you haven't clicked through to 'fruit bushes monthly', honestly. Sorry... did I mention I need a holiday...? "Dear Hilary,
I've been using the I Ching for about 15 years now, and it always seems to give me excellent advice. However, just recently I have noticed something beginning to happen which concerns me.
Whenever I am experiencing strong emotions and throw the coins asking for advice, the answer nearly always comes up as the hexagram of what I am feeling at the time. However, the hexagram does not always correspond with the objective situation. For instance, I was feeling very insecure about a new relationship and when I asked for advice the hexagram was 54 The Marrying Maiden (with no changes). This hexagram described exactly how I was feeling, but shortly afterwards I discovered that my new partner was in no way treating me like the hexagram suggests. So, was the hexagram 'advice', or just a reflection? Another time, I was feeling upset about something that had happened with someone and got the hexagram 33 Retreat (with 9 in 5th place changing to 56 The Wanderer). The hexagram seemed to show exactly how I felt like responding at the time - I really thought I should retreat. However, when I found out a bit more information about the situation, retreating appeared definitely not necessary after all.
Now I'm getting concerned that the I Ching is not really offering advice to me anymore, but is merely showing me how I feel. Am I doing something wrong? Is there a way around this?
Many thanks
Sandra"
(I've emailed Sandra to suggest that the best way to find out what is really going on here might be to ask Yi (the I Ching). Also that she may be asking about things she is meant to find out in some other way, eg by talking with people. I'm waiting and hoping to hear back from her about this!
But this isn't something I've experienced at all. I often find the opposite - that Yi challenges the way I feel to drag me back to the real world - but I've never had it just reflect my feelings back to me. So I'm hoping you might have some experiences or thoughts to share about this...)
DIY Corner: Questions about questions How can you be sure your line of questioning will lead you anywhere? Well, you could ask...
Click the blue 'play' button below to listen, or if that doesn't work click here to listen with your usual media player. (Transcript here.)
™Subscriber's reading: Career progress ˜ "Hi Clarity friends:
My question is about work.
I've worked as an English teacher for years. Right now I've starting to do translations (From Spanish to English) for some of the outsourcing needs of an editorial in Spain. So far the work is fine and I enjoy it a lot, since it's challenging and offers better income than teaching. I would like to ask I Ching about my future possibilities in this area and for suggestions on how to improve it.
I believe it's a pretty simple question, but let me know if you need any further info.
Thank you
Laura"
Where can I go from here with my translation work?
Yi answered with Hexagram 9, Small Taming, changing to Hexagram 42, Increase and Blessing. I think the second hexagram indicates the potential here and the enthusiastic attitude with which you're entering in on it. The first one, Small Taming, indicates that it will not all be smooth sailing, though I doubt you will meet any insuperable problems.
Relating hexagram: 42, Increase
To start with the big picture, and what you are looking towards: of course, you're quite right that translation work offers a far better income than teaching. Hexagram 42 indicates that you have the chance to step into a flow of blessing. The more involved and committed you are, the greater the rewards. This follows on as the 'other side of the coin' from Decrease or Offering - you don't mention what you have had to give up in order to pursue translation work, but whatever 'offerings' you've made can be rewarded here.
'Blessing, harvest in having a direction to go.
Harvest in crossing the great river.'
To get the most out of the potential in this new use for your skills, you need to 'have a direction to go' - to know the goal you're aiming for - and to be prepared to venture into new territory. When looking at the advice of this hexagram you have to bear in mind that it's describing the broader canvas, the longer term - but in the longer term, at least, you can afford to plan a long way ahead and to take risks.
'Wind and thunder. Increase.
The noble one sees improvement, and so she changes.
When there is excess, she corrects it.'
To get the full benefit of Increase, you need an improvisatory, flexible approach. It's not about setting rules or creating routines. Does this mean less job security than in teaching? Perhaps; it certainly means less predictability. So rather than having rules for yourself that you abide by regardless of circumstances, it's better to make improvements and correct mistakes whenever the opportunity arises. (Also good advice in translation work, of course...)
Primary hexagram: 9, Small Taming
This is the immediate challenge that confronts you here, and it does present difficulties. Blessing is what you are looking for, and can very probably find, but Small Taming may be all you can do with it at present. There is a 'great divide' here between the full potential available, and your own ability to get 'on top of things' and get the most out of it. It could be thoroughly frustrating for you.
To 'tame' has multiple meanings: it means to build up or accumulate, and to nurture, but also to keep something in check or restrain it. Think of your position in the translation 'industry' as like a farmer trying to work with the forces of nature - taming and nurturing at the same time. Specifically, you're the 'small' farmer, one who has just entered into whole new land of possibilities (with hexagram 8), but who faces practical difficulties as she learns how to come to grips with it. So she can expect lean times at first, enforced improvisation as she tries to get beyond the subsistence level.
‘Small taming, creating success.
Dense clouds without rain
Come from our Western altars.’
The dense clouds represent stored-up potential: they are what you need in order to get to work. But do they rain? Not quite. This is the kind of frustration you can expect - I wonder whether this might not represent work opportunities that are there, but don't quite materialise. At all events, you can expect to encounter small setbacks. You can have a very clear vision of the possibilities, and yet still be frustrated in practice - inner division is just part of the experience of Small Taming. The earnings potential is definitely greater than in teaching, but judging from both hexagrams, the job security is probably less.
By the way, if you ask further questions about this as you go on, do look out for Hexagram 26, Great Taming. This is the master farmer, who has sufficient strength and experience to harness all the potential at her disposal. The difference between the two is well expressed in the trigrams, those three-line figures that interact within each hexagram. The master farmer is represented by the weight of a mountain, checking and storing up the creative power of heaven. As the 'small tamer', you only have the power of the wind at your disposal, and this calls for a different strategy altogether. You cannot stamp your identity on the circumstances or bring them under your control. What you can do is to influence things indirectly, by adapting and shaping your own skills to what the situation demands.
Small Taming is preparation for Treading - walking behind the tiger, trying to get the full benefit of its energy without being mauled. In both situations, you are dealing with forces bigger than you are, that you cannot altogether master. So instead you have to adapt. Before you go out to follow the tiger (of market forces? competition?) you need to prepare, to gather your resources and learn new skills.
‘Wind moves above heaven. Small taming.
A noble one cultivates the natural pattern of de.’
This is about working with what you find rather than trying to change it. It's actually quite a lot like the work of translation: shaping your own expressions to fit another person's mind. And this also means working on your own de - your strength and character. Diplomacy, tact, and above all flexibility will be called for!
Change
I think the two changing lines are each in their own way to do with building up that de, that ability to make the most of the opportunities on offer, step by small step.
Line 2:
'Pulled back onto the path. Good fortune.'
This suggests that your first steps may be decided for you by circumstances - it's literally about being pulled, like an animal on a leash. But this is not a bad thing at all. Before you start fighting against the restraints, look to see whether they're not actually leading you to what you need. Maybe what gets in your way guides you to where you belong... maybe what you need will come to you so that you don't miss anything after all... maybe you can even claim this path proudly as your own...
I don't, of course, know what this path might be that you're pulled onto. Further training, maybe?
Line 3:
'The spokes come loose from the cart wheel.
Husband and wife avert their gaze.'
'Husband and wife' can point to any kind of partnership, between people or between people and circumstances. (It once even described a failure of computer programming to connect.) But the first question for you has to be, are you sure that your relationships are strong enough to carry this new weight? You need - urgently - to make sure that everyone involved is travelling willingly in the same direction - it's all too possible to get so wrapped up in your own perceptions that you fail to notice the other person's. Make sure it all fits together - make sure the vehicle is strong enough to bear the weight over this new and considerably bumpier road.
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Hello - I hope you're enjoying the summer. Or not summer, of course, if you're in the other hemisphere. We're having a classic English one here, but inbetween torrential rainstorms I've picked vats of raspberries from the jungle that is our garden. Oh, and I went out yesterday to look at the blackcurrant bushes, see if the blackbirds had left us any this year, and found they were absolutely loaded. The blackbirds must have gone off them or something... which is nice of them :-)... Now I just need a good recipe for blackcurrant icecream...
The past week's been a bit different as my Mum-in-law has been staying with us, bless her. The dishes mysteriously wash themselves every night, cheese sandwiches appear from nowhere, and even the pile of ironing has shrunk. And no, she is not available for hire. Sorry!
Anyway...
I've put together a full-length newsletter this time. If you don't have time for it all, do have a look at Sandra's letter. It's baffling to me - but maybe you've had an experience like that yourself, and can help her to make sense of it?
I've put some of my own recent divination experiences in the DIY corner this time, and hopefully you'll like the idea of getting the oracle to act as a kind of expert coach in divination. And all being well, the 'hexagram of the month' will be back in the next issue.
However - there may be a pause before the next issue! I definitely need a holiday. We won't be going away, as Mum-in-law needs us around at the moment, but I'm going to give myself a week or so of 'sanity break' all the same. I'm not sure yet exactly when I'll stop work - it depends on how long it takes me now to clear my Inbox. I'll put notices up on the site nearer the time. Meanwhile if you need a reading urgently, please order it within the next couple of days!
So, until next time, then... I'll speak to you soon.
This may not sound very relevant to you at first, but bear with me! You may never find yourself having to choose which readings to do for other people, but you choose which reading to do for yourself every time you pick up your coins or beads. So - see what you think of this approach.
When I had several free reading requests to choose from for the reading-marathon webinar last Sunday, I turned to Yi for help to find which would be best to do. I asked, 'What could Joe - or Joanna, whoever was asking the question - 'What could Joe gain from a reading?'
Well, this seemed to be a better idea than just picking readings at random, and Yi also seems to like the idea: when I asked for a comment, it said hexagram 19, Nearing, changing to Hexagram 51, Shock. That sounds to me like the kind, strong presence of Yi coming through in the midst of the emotional storms that usually surround readings. The moving lines are very encouraging as well.
Also, the answers I've been getting in response to this question have all been very clear. Some really promising ones, like Articulating, or Persevering - hexagram 32, that is, unchanging.
What's startled me, actually, is how many of the answers are clearly bad. The number of ways Yi has of saying 'divination would be a lousy idea' is pretty stunning, really. Let's see, we have:
50, line 4
‘The vessel’s legs break off,
The prince’s stew is upset,
Dignity soiled.
Pitfall.’
32, line 4:
‘In the fields, no game.’
21, line 6:
'Why wear a cangue obliterating the ears? Pitfall'
27, line 1:
‘Putting away the spirit tortoise,
Gazing at me with jaws hanging down.
Pitfall.’
And finally 57, 3
'Pressing penetration, shame.'
and 57,6
Line 6:
'Penetrating down under the stand.
Losing your property and symbol axe.
Constancy, pitfall.'
Every diviner knows that you get some situations where reading doesn't help - and really, this lot sounds like a list of all the reasons why not. I'd never quite realised how many there were: misdirected questions, not being ready to hear the answer, giving up your own innate knowledge by looking for an answer from outside...
Anyway - of course this kind of questioning is not only useful if you're divining for other people. You can use it to enlist the oracle itself as your coach and mentor in divination. 'What could I learn from asking about this?' 'How far could I get by concentrating on asking for advice?' - that kind of thing. I haven't tried this in any detail yet, but you could also try using it 'retrospectively', as it were - asking what kind of thing you were meant to learn from some especially enigmatic answer.
Well, I hope this is a helpful suggestion. If you try it, I'd be very interested to hear how it works out for you.
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