Some suggestions you could try:

1) Look out the first answer, and trust that. Read it, memorise it, meditate on it, spend about a week with it at the back of your mind... See if your question isn't answered. You may well find you can ignore the rest of this post.

2) Ask the I Ching what effect it is having on you to keep asking about the same thing.

3) Ask the I Ching to comment on the idea of asking one more question. 'What could it do for me if I asked one, decisive question about this?'

4) If you like the sound of the answer to that one, think of a very different question to ask, and 'start anew' with that. But make this your last question on the subject until circumstances have really changed.

5) Alternatively - put the book back on the shelf, leave it there, and trust to your own intuition and conscience.

I would trust all the answers, although I'd likely give each a different weight. If the situation is ongoing, it's not likely to be simple and in some kind of steady state. It probably shifts around quite a bit, and the Yi's shifting answers can guide you through the twists and turns. And of course you can say, "Let's start anew." Or something like, "What is the situation today?" Or, "I am confused. Please give me an image to orient me."

You didn't ask for one, but here's a suggestion: Keep a notebook of your consultations with the Yi. Record and date your questions and the main hexagram you cast, along with any resulting and relating hexes that you feel add meaning or somehow to contradict the Yi's main response. Then jot down a few notes about your understanding of the symbols you've gotten, and perhaps a comment on the day's events. ("Terrible fight with mother, will never speak to her again.") Review your records once in awhile, and you will begin to develop a sense of how the Yi speaks to you. Over time, this will give you an understanding of how you interact with the Yi, and that understanding will help you resolve any apparent contradictions more quickly. And of course you can always come here to ask for help in clarifying. (Thank you, Hilary.)

My own way of resolving contradictory advice from the Yi is to put everything that seems to belong together into a main statement, and to read any contradictions as a counterpoint or caution. Something like, "Yes, this is a wonderful and promising relationship and you are right to pursue it, but bear in mind that there will be times when you will want to annihilate each other." Of course, in such a situation, if you were to get a great many of the "annihilation" messages over time, you might want to be extra cautious.

IMHO, I find the issue of repeating the same question to the Yi somewhat akin to a child asking their parents "are we there yet?" on a long road trip. Work with what you have for an answer. Keep chewing it until no more juice comes out of it for a given question. You'll be surprised how much you'll find in there, months or even years after the question was answered.

If your personality does not allow for that, a better approach to repeating the same question is to open a dialogue with the Yi. Talk to it as you would with a friend you trust, respect and value his opinions. Children also use a very wise and magic word: "why?"

L

I will sometimes ask the Yi -- well, not the same question exactly, but very closely related questions. My experience is that the answers actually are quite coherent. This was one of the early things that really persuaded me that more than randomness was going on here: you ask related questions, you get related answers.

I have found that it is important, though, to think about where I was and what was happening at the moment I asked. For example, sometimes the meaning of the answer might be, "Shut up! You're bugging me. I've told you before, so now, listen!" (I had an experience recently with 61.6 that meant something like that -- not because of repeated questions, but because of an impertinent question.) Obviously, if that's taken as a literal answer to the question you asked, it will seem incoherent.

One of the times I asked the most repeated questions was about a job situation. I came up for reappointment at my job a year and a half ago, and was denied. They eventually changed their minds, but the interesting thing is that a year before the reappointment decision, the Yi was telling me that things weren't going to go well for me at work. I found it so unlikely (things seemed then to be going quite well) that I asked it about it over and over, and it came up with a thousand different ways to give me the same message. I still didn't really believe it, but it did mean that when I finally got the decision, I was less totally shocked than I would have been otherwise. And I had a great deal more respect for the Yi (this was relatively early on in my relationship with it).

Another little story about repeated questioning. Immediately after I received the decision about my reappointment, I asked the Yi about fighting the decision. It replied with 29.3 to 48 -- dreadful! The next day, I asked the question, "What about appealing the decision?" Almost the same question, but with a different tone. This time, it answered with 63.3,5 to 24, which sounds vastly more positive. 63.3, for example, says "Emperor Gao Zong attacks the Gui Fang. Three years: conquered. Petty fellows should not be used." It might seem contradictory, but I don't think it was. The message was that if I approached the situation with an attitude of fighting, I was sunk. If I approached it in a more neutral way, things were going to come out OK. I did, and it did.

My general sense of the Yi is that it is incredibly forgiving if you treat it with respect. I do think it tends to get mad if you ask something like, "I didn't like your last answer. Wanna give me a better one?" But even questions like, "Can that really be true? I'm having a hard time believing that. Can you tell me some more?"
have, in my experience, been helpfully answered -- if I then put in the effort to really understand it.

Good luck with your current situation.

Julie

I love the idea of asking what effect asking the same question's having on me. I think I've wanted to ask that for ages but not quite thought of how.

I just asked the Yi that (because I have asked alot about a relationship over the last six months)

and got; 20,6 to 8.

Hooray. i think it's very true that I've been helped alot to look at my motivations and contemplate factors affecting the fluid situation- even though I've sometimes worried I might be pestering the Yi.

I am one of those who consistenly asks a lot of questions and have even been told here that I should back off a bit. I think it depends on your state of mind and why you are asking repeated questions. If you are asking over a period of time, I agree that things can change, so the answer might change, depends on how you phrase the question and the time frame you are looking at. I don't think there is anything wrong with asking clarifying questions as long as that is really what they are and not an attempt to get a different answer because you weren't happy with the one you got.

I too like the idea of asking about the effect of repeated questions, never thought of that. I did ask a why question recently, why should I not forget about X, 7.2 to 2, which I think is a very clear answer, but have decided not to interpret it fully until I am more clearheaded. I worked a lot last week incl 13 straight hours on Sat, so still recovering.

Another thing about contradictory answers, how many interpretations are you using? I have had what seemed to be contradictory results in one interpretation, but then looked up a few others (I use 5-8 depending on the complexity of the question and answer) and found other perspectives that clarified it.

If you are still having trouble, why not go ahead and post the answers here and get some other perspectives. Sometimes, 2 heads, or 6 or 8, are better than one