Clarity,
Office 17622,
PO Box 6945,
London.
W1A 6US
United Kingdom
Phone/ Voicemail:
+44 (0)20 3287 3053 (UK)
+1 (561) 459-4758 (US).
You ask a question, you consult the Yi, you get your hexagram and maybe some changing lines. But what do you do with the results? I've always approached it this way: I've assumed that the more I understand the basic meanings of the hexagrams and lines, the more I understand what they symbolize, the better I'll be able to match that to the particulars and details of the situation I'm enquiring about. But I'm moving away from that model now. The shift is analogous to the difference between the way old webpages were generated from html and the way new web pages are generated from php code, if that's any use.
For instance, yesterday I asked a question and got my result - the same issue approached from two different angles gave me a 33 in one case, a 21 in the other. I was none the wiser though, because all that happened was each result just produced more questions in my mind. "Okay, 33 - but withdraw from WHAT?" "Sure thing, 21 - but bite through WHAT?" And yet asking these questions with a certain amount of energy and repetition started to yield results. Not conscious results, either. It was as if, by asking the questions that came into my conscious mind when I got the Yi results, life responded by dealing with the situation UNCONSCIOUSLY TO ME. Do you have the same reaction to this as me? It's astounding.
"Dobro, you don't know, and in this case at least, you don't need to know. You just have to do the work of wondering about what came into your mind when you got your Yi results."
Sometimes the Yi gives you something that generates understanding and answers. But sometimes it gives you something that generates no understanding, more questions, and a grain of sand in your oyster.
php code is a variant of data base search query code such as MySQL, not really about web pages in general but some technical details of putting database search results up on web pages. Cf. http://www.weberdev.com/ViewArticle/Beginners-guide-to-PHP-and-MySQLThe shift is analogous to the difference between the way old webpages were generated from html and the way new web pages are generated from php code, if that's any use.
A simple way of looking at it is that any text or work of art that is sourced from higher knowledge contains "sacred energy". Any part of it evokes the whole at one time. In the case of the Yi one line or one hexagram includes all the others. We may think it is like a "museum" with many objects to study and compare. But it doesn't work that way. It is a unity, we are not. We can experience a relation to unity although we aren't unified. Every sacred text or art is there to be a guide to relating to higher knowledge "as we are." "All must be called," as the Bible says. There is one teaching, but there are different versions to serve different groups at different times. The obligation to pray 5 times a day disciplined and united a collection of pagan Arab tribes. This provided the conditions for higher knowledge to be transmitted. The Yi has its cultural history, but the same source. Divination is a universal art and science, one the Buddha claims to have mastered in the Flower Ornament Scripture, among many other things. The practice of divining is one way to learn to relate to higher knowledge. So is any other art or science.
But I'm moving away from that model now.
I was none the wiser though, because all that happened was each result just produced more questions in my mind. "Okay, 33 - but withdraw from WHAT?" "Sure thing, 21 - but bite through WHAT?" And yet asking these questions with a certain amount of energy and repetition started to yield results. Not conscious results, either. It was as if, by asking the questions that came into my conscious mind when I got the Yi results, life responded by dealing with the situation UNCONSCIOUSLY TO ME. Do you have the same reaction to this as me? It's astounding.
A simple way of looking at it is that any text or work of art that is sourced from higher knowledge contains "sacred energy". ...The Yi has its cultural history, but the same source. Divination is a universal art and science...The practice of divining is one way to learn to relate to higher knowledge. So is any other art or science.
You ask a question, you consult the Yi, you get your hexagram and maybe some changing lines. But what do you do with the results? I've always approached it this way: I've assumed that the more I understand the basic meanings of the hexagrams and lines, the more I understand what they symbolize, the better I'll be able to match that to the particulars and details of the situation I'm enquiring about. But I'm moving away from that model now. The shift is analogous to the difference between the way old webpages were generated from html and the way new web pages are generated from php code, if that's any use.
For instance, yesterday I asked a question and got my result - the same issue approached from two different angles gave me a 33 in one case, a 21 in the other. I was none the wiser though, because all that happened was each result just produced more questions in my mind. "Okay, 33 - but withdraw from WHAT?" "Sure thing, 21 - but bite through WHAT?" And yet asking these questions with a certain amount of energy and repetition started to yield results. Not conscious results, either. It was as if, by asking the questions that came into my conscious mind when I got the Yi results, life responded by dealing with the situation UNCONSCIOUSLY TO ME. Do you have the same reaction to this as me? It's astounding.
"Dobro, you don't know, and in this case at least, you don't need to know. You just have to do the work of wondering about what came into your mind when you got your Yi results."
Sometimes the Yi gives you something that generates understanding and answers. But sometimes it gives you something that generates no understanding, more questions, and a grain of sand in your oyster.
For instance, yesterday I asked a question and got my result - the same issue approached from two different angles gave me a 33 in one case, a 21 in the other. I was none the wiser though, because all that happened was each result just produced more questions in my mind. "Okay, 33 - but withdraw from WHAT?" "Sure thing, 21 - but bite through WHAT?" ".
And yet asking these questions with a certain amount of energy and repetition started to yield results. Not conscious results, either. It was as if, by asking the questions that came into my conscious mind when I got the Yi results, life responded by dealing with the situation UNCONSCIOUSLY TO ME. Do you have the same reaction to this as me? It's astounding.
"Dobro, you don't know, and in this case at least, you don't need to know. You just have to do the work of wondering about what came into your mind when you got your Yi results."
Sometimes the Yi gives you something that generates understanding and answers. But sometimes it gives you something that generates no understanding, more questions, and a grain of sand in your oyster.
hello
...
in other words, what I'm asking here is
Do you think you would be able to interact with answers in this particular way if it hadn't been for lot's of -seemingly- unproductive, mind-bogging, very logical and maybe sometimes incomprehensible studying?
Should one avoid getting too much into studying, attempting to rationally process information (learn in the traditional way)
or is this a kind of 'chopping wood' phase?
I meant "relate to higher knowledge" in this sense. We have an inner space we often forget because our thoughts, feelings and -sensations take most of our attention as though they are "all of us." Learning to be a good diviner using the Yi as a guide can be a challenge to be more whole and complete humans.
Yes, its not easy to describe it though. Its like consciously you try to fill a glass with water but “unconsciously” you know that its already filled. Like someone/something has take care of it. Hmmm, maybe not a good analogy but this is how it feels.
And about "more question" sometimes , to me, is new questions.Like Yi push me, in a way, to focus somewhere else. Like a catalyst, Yi answers, initiate new chemical reactions.
the reason I ask is because I've had a strange experience related to reading in general -and studying in particular. Up to a point I was one of these people who read voraciously. Then something happened, I came across ideas that shook me to my bones and caused me to stop reading altogether for about 9-10 years. The funny thing is, that after about 3 years of starting to read again, I begun realizing that the way I approached my new readings, the way my mind processed information and reached conclusions, was very much unconsciously guided by everything I had read before my 'reading ban' . .
Do you have the same reaction to this as me? It's astounding.
"Dobro, you don't know, and in this case at least, you don't need to know. You just have to do the work of wondering about what came into your mind when you got your Yi results."
Sometimes the Yi gives you something that generates understanding and answers. But sometimes it gives you something that generates no understanding, more questions, and a grain of sand in your oyster.
hello
there's something I'd like to ask people here . . do you think that all the reading you've done had a role in the maturing of this wonderful process?
the reason I ask is because I've had a strange experience related to reading in general -and studying in particular. Up to a point I was one of these people who read voraciously. Then something happened, I came across ideas that shook me to my bones and caused me to stop reading altogether for about 9-10 years. The funny thing is, that after about 3 years of starting to read again, I begun realizing that the way I approached my new readings, the way my mind processed information and reached conclusions, was very much unconsciously guided by everything I had read before my 'reading ban' . .
I was utterly surprised to find out that what I had read was not washed away by oblivion, but rather was silently processed and flourished as innate, by now, understanding.
That thing has put my current way of studying into whole new perspectives . . I tend to be too keen in reading more and more about whatever I'm fascinated with, only nowadays, even though often indulging my cravings, I am more aware that reading and comprehending is not necessarily knowing . . well, it can be, if my thought is ready to fully incorporate the new info, but many things will take much more time to digest and resurface . .
in other words, what I'm asking here is
Do you think you would be able to interact with answers in this particular way if it hadn't been for lot's of -seemingly- unproductive, mind-bogging, very logical and maybe sometimes incomprehensible studying?
Should one avoid getting too much into studying, attempting to rationally process information (learn in the traditional way)
or is this a kind of 'chopping wood' phase?
just to make clear, I'm not talking about reading in order to convince that you know, not reading as a way to instantly gratify our need for knowing, but rather studying for the sake of studying, without always demanding results . .
Hi Dobro,
You could consider the alternative answer, that it wasn't that the Yi changed on you, but the timing is different. Eclipses tend to be major end of a timing era transitions, so the old ways are being swept away NOW and hopefully, new stuff will appear soon.
I would note that your reference to HTML coding is a bit too last century. When the Internet was just changing from Al Gore's network for Federal Research Institutions to share their formal papers into the hyperlink web surfing of short attention span multi-taskers, HTML coding was a serious challenge with thick books on the topic published. Then hope spread amongst tech bubble folks that they could catch the wave of the future. Then it became clear HTML coding is just format codes that are easier done in word processing packages as a minor detail of file formats. Web sites are done in web authoring software included in every word processor or any other text package now without folks paying much if any attention to any details of it.
So, I wonder what you thought you were referencing in your comment
php code is a variant of data base search query code such as MySQL, not really about web pages in general but some technical details of putting database search results up on web pages. Cf. http://www.weberdev.com/ViewArticle/Beginners-guide-to-PHP-and-MySQL
But let me comment upon your two Yi Oracles to try to help you out of your quagmire:
Hex 33 is not just the notion of "Withdraw" it is also the contemporary notion of Flight in the sense of taking off in your private airplane and getting up into the air.
In ancient Chinese terms, (cf. Sun Tzu The Art of War) a good general uses retreat not just as a tactical necessity but also as a strategic technique to take personal command of the war situation (not just the battle of the day) and create some artistry of expression at the expense of the static and timid old style army commanders.
As for hex 21, this isn't about gnawing upon anything really. The pattern of the Yin and Yang lines looks that way, so it becomes a convenient metaphor, but this is the hexagram of Karma, Justice or Cause-and-Effect (thunder and lightning always appear one after another, the powerful metaphor for the Divine Power of Consequences).
Together your two Oracle answers would suggest you need to focus upon what you are doing to express yourSelf and what are the consequences of such actions.
Hopefully, those alternative views of your mentioned hexagrams will help your interpretation process return to consciousness.
Hilary goes on about giving things time and sitting with the "not knowing". Do you think this is what she's getting at?
Well, like I said in my original post, the whole process seemed to bypass consciousness completely, except for my consciousness of the Yi result, my incomprehension and emotion.
After a while these things seem to flatten into a "background". They can still do their work, though individual thoughts are not accessible any more. So when you do something new they inform/form how you react, but more as part of you than as some separate understanding. Is that like what you were referring to?
Dobro:
I'm not sure. I got into the Yi because I wanted more context than my conscious mind was providing me in times of uncertainty (most times in my life lol) and because I wanted a way to relate to and dialogue with the unknown, if that makes any sense.
- so...no, I don't think all the studying was a waste of time, if it was a ripening process. But if it was just serving to block a new and better way of reading, then maybe.
But I have to return to 'I don't know'. You know, at the end of the session I described above, I was sitting there feeling stuck and stupid and I addressed the Yi again and said what was in me: "I don't understand." I tossed the coins and got 19 unchanging. I think the Yi was encouraging me in not knowing.
You ask a question, you consult the Yi, you get your hexagram and maybe some changing lines. But what do you do with the results? I've always approached it this way: I've assumed that the more I understand the basic meanings of the hexagrams and lines, the more I understand what they symbolize, the better I'll be able to match that to the particulars and details of the situation I'm enquiring about. But I'm moving away from that model now. The shift is analogous to the difference between the way old webpages were generated from html and the way new web pages are generated from php code, if that's any use.
For instance, yesterday I asked a question and got my result - the same issue approached from two different angles gave me a 33 in one case, a 21 in the other. I was none the wiser though, because all that happened was each result just produced more questions in my mind. "Okay, 33 - but withdraw from WHAT?" "Sure thing, 21 - but bite through WHAT?" And yet asking these questions with a certain amount of energy and repetition started to yield results. Not conscious results, either. It was as if, by asking the questions that came into my conscious mind when I got the Yi results, life responded by dealing with the situation UNCONSCIOUSLY TO ME. Do you have the same reaction to this as me? It's astounding.
"Dobro, you don't know, and in this case at least, you don't need to know. You just have to do the work of wondering about what came into your mind when you got your Yi results."
Sometimes the Yi gives you something that generates understanding and answers. But sometimes it gives you something that generates no understanding, more questions, and a grain of sand in your oyster.
Clarity,
Office 17622,
PO Box 6945,
London.
W1A 6US
United Kingdom
Phone/ Voicemail:
+44 (0)20 3287 3053 (UK)
+1 (561) 459-4758 (US).