hi all,

i am new to the i ching (relatively), and i am looking for some assistance as well as some feedback.

i have been in a very protracted divorce which is taking place overseas where we got married and in a place where neither of us hold citizenship. my ex-spouse is an extremely apt businessman, and i am out of my league. at this point, i have been fighting for alimony for 4 years, and there is a substantial amount of which has been ordered to me, but again my ex has been fighting tooth and nail and appealed and appealed, and now it is in the supreme court in this country. therefore, there is backpay for alimony being held. I am quite anxious as you can imagine. so i asked yi to help me out. here are the questions that i asked (pls, if i did not ask great questions, please feel free to cast question on my behalf as i am still learning):


will the court order that i be given the full amount including back payment?
38 2.6 > 51

will my lawyer be properly prepared?
62 2.6 > 50

is there anything i can do now to improve the outcome?
13 no changing lines

is my ex willing to settle now?
42 1.5 > 23

i may have more questions...it's just been such a long fight. i have minimal resources in comparison, and he is the one who filed for divorce. i keep no blame in my heart, but i do want to stand up for myself and have conditioned my mind that whatever God wants me to have is what i will have, but i should do my part.

thanks, modest learner

Hello Modestlearner,

Sounds like a long tough battle you are going through. Your opponent is strong stubborn and fierce. And your lawyer is quite ambitious too. Is he fighting a huge chunk of "not very reasonable" (in your ex's perspective) amount of money for you?

Your last hexagram suggest that he is willing to settle it now, with resultant hexagram 23, a complete separation or divorce.

And like I always say, I am no Yi- guru. I may be wrong. Hopefully, other Clarity members will drop a few lines for this desperate lady.

You have both good and bad guas with respect to this legal action. Let me suggest something to you: Courts are very bad places to settle personal battles, and generally speaking courts don't want you to continue. And courts do not like to be agents of revenge. They want a settlement. All your guas indicate that you must compromise and so should your ex-. You must realize that if, for example, there are ten items of dispute, you must be willing to give up eight for the sake of getting the two you really want. It is time for you to take stock of your life, and decide what is it that you really want out of this battle. At the same time, think about what your ex- really wants. Once you come to a decision as to what you really want, then you are prepared to negotiate a settlement, i.e., be ready to drop what is unimportant for what is important. If you are not prepared to do that, you will find that your life will be miserable as your ex- clearly has legal resources that you don't and your ex- can use the courts as a plaything to make you miserable. It's time to think about what it is that you really want.

reason for not settling 59.4>6

Sorry for the delay. I came down with a stomach flu!

Thanks for both of your responses. Both make a lot of sense are both very accurate. I did approach him for a settlement, but he was non-responsive. This has been a long worn out battle, and I have only been following the law in all of this. I just cast this:

Q. Please give me insight into why my ex didnt take me up on the offer to settle?

59.4>6

Does that means he is not sure what I want or what he wants...or that he is unwilling to see beyond his own interests?

Thank you again,
modestlearner

And to the end of being efficient, I asked the Yi, is this the right time to settle?

I got 36.5>63
which seems to scream, "Not yet!"

So I am thinking that Yi is saying despite the difficulty, not to make a move yet. So is that strange given it seems that settlement is the right course of action given Yi's other answers?

In the meantime, "what should i do YI:"

49 2.5>34