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How can I learn? 42.1.6 > 8

precision grace

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I received this hexagram twice - for unrelated questions (I thought) but on reflection..


Anyway, I had asked, the second time: How can I learn to recognise when something (situation/relation etc) is past it's sell by date so I can move on in good time?

answer 42.1.6. > 8

I asked this because I have a well recognised tendency to linger in a situation that is no longer viable. This happens in my jobs, my relationships (with partners or romantic interests), my relationship with friends, the ways I approach whatever and so on and so forth. It is a massive blind spot with me and it is a bit weird because I have not always been this way. I was the opposite - always leaving at the first sign of trouble. I guess I wanted to learn how not to do that and ended up at the opposite end of the spectrum.
so, there you have it, a bit of a background to frame the question.

Now, I don't understand this answer AT ALL. I mean, I have asked how to learn to recognise the signs that something is no longer sustainable so that I know it's time to move on, and got increase to holding together. The lines are a bit more illuminating, but only just. 42.1 is about making great movement without blame (what I am aiming for I suppose) but 42.6 is about selfishness (I think) and an unsteady character - someone who doesn't know their own mind - which I guess is what I am asking about. But where is the advice on how to overcome? Halp!
 

Lavalamp

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How can I learn to recognize when ... "it's time to move on?"

42.1
By living for the sake of others.

41.6.
Rest before you move; think before you speak; serve others before you ask for anything; in this you will find true security. (This is Confucius's advice, for this line.)

> 8
Unite with what is good, (as opposed to always having to move on from what is not, I guess.)

HTH.

LL
 
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Hi PG,

I have this problem as well and am trying to accept when to "bow out". It is great that you are self evaluating.

For this reading, maybe 8 is a picture of the situation. You are trying to told on to the relationship. To keep connected to something. Sometimes I do this in a struggle to understand what went wrong more clearly. Or sometimes I don't trust my instincts that the situation is wrong. I second guess myself in an attempt to fulfill an unattainable wish. A fantasy.

42, in general, is about sharing, giving, being generous etc. and also about being able to decipher when to do that. When to discern a good situation from a bad situation.
From Wilhelm's Image of 42:
Wind and thunder: the image of INCREASE.
Thus the superior man:
If he sees good, he imitates it;
If he has faults, he rids himself of them.
If a situation is 'good', then it is something you would want to continue interacting with. If a situation is where there are 'faults' (such as a relationship that is not working etc), then it is positive advice to recognize this and walk away or not surround yourself in the situation. In other words, you simply have to recognize what is good and what is not, and act upon recognition. 42 also seems to be painting a deeper picture of what your question is about. It really isn't telling you how to recognize but I think the lines might.

Because it is easy to stay connected to something that is good, and your question was how to recognize when to move on in good time, the line advice could be about how to recognize the negative situations.

Line 1 says to undertake something. Maybe this is a confidence boosting line saying, have confidence in your feelings to walk away once you realize something is not worth furthering. A lot of the commentaries for this line talk about making sure you have selfless motives. So maybe ask yourself why you are sticking around? This is just me, but I have been in situations where I know it is not going to work or progress, but my stubbornness, and sort of selfishness, motivates me to push on with it. Sort of in a secret wish for things to change to my liking, although I know deep down they will not.

Line 6 speaks of inconsistantly. Maybe that we know what to do, yet we do the selfish thing instead. The inconsistancy lying in the fact that what we 'know' and what we 'do' are two different things.

I really hope I haven't over stepped my bounds in this interpretation. I could be possibly way off the mark on this. I am seeing so much advice for myself in this reading that it is actually hard to have an outside view.

Take care,
AQ
 

Lavalamp

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Well presumably it is good fortune that PG would like to move on to.
So in the context of fortune;

42.1 says:
"Great good fortune is produced by selflessness, and in bringing about great good fortune, he
remains free of reproach."
And as for 42.6, the previous advice I mentioned from Confucius refers to how to keep one's heart steady, and thereby avoid misfortune.

> 8 says Unity with others and taking care of them brings good fortune, and attending to developing our character; "sublimity, constancy, and perseverance." Leading others into Unity as well, in a timely manner.

By being what we are seeking, we don't even have to seek to know when to move I guess, we will be drawn to good fortune, or it will just happen.
 
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Well presumably it is good fortune that PG would like to move on to.
So in the context of fortune;
....

Hi LL,

Good day to you. In this last post, are you speaking to me directly? It is not clear. I would think you would be speaking directly to the querent, but it does not seem to be this way, instead you seem to be speaking about her to someone. Is it me?
:hide:

Take care,
AQ
 

Lavalamp

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And everyone else in the class. :) Musing, expanding on thoughts, it's process sometimes.

Call me "Al" - Pacino! ( "You talkin' to me?" )

:bows:
 

precision grace

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Thank you both. I'm not sure I really get it still. Because I stick around Inspite of my selfish motives to move on. Because I have been told SO MANY times that I give up too easily and that I have to learn how to stick with something so that I now keep persisting with things thinking I am being too self absorbed to notice how it's a good thing and if I just stick with it it will eventually become a good thing but it never does and then it's years later and I am kicking myself and my self confidence and self belief had sunk even lower than before and then Finally, I say **** This and walk away and let the years pass and each day I am more and more grateful that I did walk away and beat myself up that I didn't do it sooner.

So really, the lines are not making any sense to me at all. :/ Sorry.
 

precision grace

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Well, I think I get the 8 - move towards the good and the 42.1 - selfless conduct, but 42.6 gives me a lot of trouble. I do understand its a line of an unsteady heart and as you say, the point is to steady the heart and from a steady heart you can know the right thing to do - be it to move away towards the good things that are new or stay a bit longer with present things which don't look so good but might turn out to be with some work. And maybe 42.6 is really about being selfish and Yi is telling me I am being selfish even when I think I'm not. I keep worrying about being taken advantage of and exploited, but a person with a steady heart cannot be taken advantage of or exploited! A bit of a chicken and egg situation this. How to steady the heart so that one can act unselfishly when in order to act unselfishly, one needs a steady heart?

how am I doing?
 
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Well, I think I get the 8 - move towards the good and the 42.1 - selfless conduct, but 42.6 gives me a lot of trouble. I do understand its a line of an unsteady heart and as you say, the point is to steady the heart and from a steady heart you can know the right thing to do - be it to move away towards the good things that are new or stay a bit longer with present things which don't look so good but might turn out to be with some work. And maybe 42.6 is really about being selfish and Yi is telling me I am being selfish even when I think I'm not. I keep worrying about being taken advantage of and exploited, but a person with a steady heart cannot be taken advantage of or exploited! A bit of a chicken and egg situation this. How to steady the heart so that one can act unselfishly when in order to act unselfishly, one needs a steady heart?

how am I doing?
I think you are doing just fine. Eventually you will work it all out.
Maybe ask, "How to steady the heart?" Eh?
 

precision grace

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well, if I go by Wilhem or even Bradford, I have no hope to accomplish this, at least not for another three years. Which sucks tbh. I am somewhat comforted by Lise's version which talks about having to renew your life purpose each day anew and in that way I would take it to mean that whenever the heart grows unsteady to do my best to get it back on course.

What I'm not so sure about is whether it talks about next three years or previous three years because I've already had three years of this. Hmm
 
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well, if I go by Wilhem or even Bradford, I have no hope to accomplish this, at least not for another three years. Which sucks tbh. I am somewhat comforted by Lise's version which talks about having to renew your life purpose each day anew and in that way I would take it to mean that whenever the heart grows unsteady to do my best to get it back on course.

What I'm not so sure about is whether it talks about next three years or previous three years because I've already had three years of this. Hmm

I tend to think the Yi speaks about now. So, I would think it is saying 'three more years'. Can anyone chime in as to what this might mean? I am not sure about the three year meaning.

PG, what does 59 say to you? Maybe that is where some of the advice is held.
 

precision grace

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Good call AQ. I think, on reflection, that the 29.6 > 59 may point to a need to resolve some inhibiting ancestral ties that are keeping me prisoner. It would make a lot of sense if that were the case.
 

Lavalamp

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How do I steady the heart?

29.6 > 59
Bound and contained > Dispersion/Dissolution of selfishness through Religious Forces.

PG, I think the Yi is saying you have to surrender to God.

Someone told me too, just the other day they thought my biggest problem was not leaving enough room in my life for God to work. Oprah tells a compelling story about what she wanted most was a role in The Color Purple, and only after surrendering herself in tears to whatever God had in store for her in her life, did everything turn around and she get the call for her heart's desire.

To let God work, you have to open up the space in your life so he can act and change and work his transformative powers. When you hold tightly to control all the time, it limits what the Spirit can do in your heart, your love, life and personal circumstances.

As for the rest of your reading, I think it's about being the change you want to see, focusing on being what it is you want in your life, rather than chasing after it or looking for it somewhere else.

I should be giving this reading to myself, actually.
 

precision grace

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I don't believe in God. But I do believe in going with the Flow, so that's what I'll take from this.

I do like 'being the change that you want to see and focusing on what I want' that's definitely a prevailing theme with me.

Thanks. :bows:
 

Lavalamp

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Well that would make it more difficult to let go of having to always be the one "doing," rather then to just let things just happen for you sometimes, without you controlling everything.

I read somewhere that it's more important that God believes in you, than if you believe in God.
 

precision grace

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I may be an Aries but I don't think I'm suited to being a sheep. Although there is something to be said for making room for life to move you so thank you for that thought, but God has no room in discussions about Yi, he hadn't been invented when the Yi was written, for one thing.
 

Lavalamp

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Well in Chinese Astrology the Sheep and Goat are the same sign I think.

But I read many references to God in the iChing, so that sounds like a pretty arbitrary rule to be laying down here. Maybe if you could create God yourself as a concept, as you put it, you might better understand what the Yi is telling you. Just a thought...
 

precision grace

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edited because i woke up grumpy and was needlesly contentious. thanks for your help lavalamp
 

GoldenN

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If I may lend my 2 cents though I'm sure you've since learned and have more insight.

I now see 42 very much speaks of remuneration for good works. It's one of the hexagrams that points out the importance of time and timing. I see 42 saying that if you are always in a process of weighing, getting rid of the bad, bringing in the good, as you learn, you begin to augment yourself to a healthy, steady heart that indicates why line 6 is there as warning.

Every new or longer term but uncertain union is an 8. You come together, conditionally, each with a 42 mind (that is with potential for increase in the time presented) giving and receiving and weighing the good with the bad, taking on what feels good and eliminating bad. If the latter is more effort that what the former gives, the union can't hold.

So the Yi says, in every relationship or situation, the process of uniting is key. How much bad to eliminate, how much good is found. Use the time to determine whether the union is sound.
 

Mira72

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Hello all.

I relate very much to the condition described by PG...and as such the yi's answer is beautiful. I am contributing my two cents for the sake of all of us, who try so hard, sometimes too hard to try and get better...but seemingly only get far worse ;)

Could our 'selfishness' in this case be our attachment and identity of ourselves as 'someone who leaves too quickly' of in the contrary 'someone who stays too long'....? Both of which is not necessarily true, which might have been true at one point but no longer is true, but we are still holding on, for it has become a habitual thing?

.1: So stop worrying about your own self(ish ideas about self) and do what is good for all (which is really what You are really about anyway).

.6: seems to develop this further. Rest in this selfless Self. And let any trace of such a false identity of one being this or that dissolves completely before moving.

Hope this helps.

Thank you all.

May all beings everywhere be happy and at ease.
 

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