Phrasing any further questions at this point in my life seems pointless.
So very simply:

Please help me?

Result: Hexagram 35.1.6.>51

i.e. ADVANCING PROGRESS > SHOCK

That's about right, I suppose.

So, don't be discouraged (that's funny), just keep doing what is right and you will succeed. Really? Succeed in what? in my actual quest? or is I Ching saying I will simply move one step more towards Enlightenment? Please, I would rather, right now, have the former.... Please? Can you mean this? Please? I am not ready for 'Enlightenment success'. I just want a life. Is that okay?

Given other readings I have had about this situation, I cannot imagine that there really will be/can be 'success' in my terms.....I mean plenty of 'Stripping Aways' (23); 'Chasms' (29); 47 'Confined'; 18 'Corruption'; nasty line 6s; 3.6; 2.6..... and now I am being told I 'will succeed'...? Come on. What does this mean?

Yet I have had some hopeful ones too, but they now seem to be dying out.

Can I resurrect good fortune in relationships? In any situation? How can I do that? Is it feasible? ' law of attraction' anyone? is that wise?

Anyway, this is the wrong thread for conjecturing.

So primary focus on my reading. Ok.

Any offerings?

Dear Wisewoman,

If you don’t mind bearing with a longish answer, I have a few thoughts that might relate to your questions about 35.1.6>51.

51
First, I see 51 as the core of this situation. W/B’s version of 51 was always confusing to me because it was never my experience that I was faced with an actual “shock that terrifies for a hundred miles” the way I imagined it. It was a hexagram that came up for me while taking Hilary’s lessons which referred me to taking a closer look at the actual Chinese characters. I think LiSe’s images of “sickle” and “rain” helped me the most as I was then able to associate 51 with something being “pruned” and “restored” respectively. Adding an image of a “bounty” which gets pruned and not letting fall the “sacrificial spoon and chalice” completed the picture for me.

At the time, I also asked Yi to help me understand more about it (without using the book) one night before going to sleep. The next day I experienced three examples which I thought were fitting answers each having the four elements of “bounty,” “pruning,” not letting fall “the sacrificial spoon and chalice,” and “restoration”:

1) My “bounty” of a night’s sleep was “pruned” short the next morning by a sudden awakening and I did not have kind words about it. However, not letting fall “the sacrificial spoon and chalice,” I apologized and a discussion followed about how the situation might be avoided in the future which “restored” things.

2) Later that morning, my “bounty” of taste buds were “pruned” back after I got distracted and double-heated my tea realizing the situation too late as it went scalding across my tongue and down my throat. After a little self-soothing in order to not let fall “the sacrificial spoon and chalice,” I accepted there was nothing I could do except wait for my tongue to “restore” itself on its own (fortunately one of the fastest healing sites on the body).

3) A project for that day was going through a “bounty” of a hoarder’s stuff that would take a long time to “prune” back. It was difficult for me not to let fall “the sacrificial spoon and chalice” and be discouraged, but small progress was made which was better than nothing, so at least some “restoration” took place.

This long answer about 51 is to say that it sounds like something at the core of you has been abruptly pruned back. But with the two Zhen trigrams, upper and lower, it also indicates great potential in a restoration as powerful and unstoppable as germination and growth in spring, as unbridled as swiftness of movement, and as sudden as awakening to new aliveness.

On a side note, I’ve wondered is the sacrificial chalice related to the Holy Grail? And, surely Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s five stages of grieving denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance play a role regarding loss in this hexagram?

35
In 35, as I’m sure you know, the upper and lower trigrams are Fire over Earth. In addition, the nuclear trigrams are upper Water over lower Mountain. I bring them up because with all that Fire (as in seeing something clearly) and Water and Earth (making mud), 35.1 and 6 together remind me so much of Lao Tzu’s question, “Do you have the patience to wait till the mud settles?”

35.1.6>51
You asked, does 35.1.6>51 answer whether you can succeed in having the life you want, not some intangible enlightenment? I think the answer is yes because it was the fervent question your heart when you asked Yi. As discouraging as things may seem, with 35 and 51 taken together, imo, there is good energy at work. I think it says with outer steady progress of 35’s “sun rising over the earth” and 51’s swiftness of movement and healing within, the wait shouldn’t be too long.

Iams girl :bows:

thank you very much Iams girl! This sounds very good. Thank you particularly for all the careful thought in your answer, and the detail..
That was 2 days ago...I know for most people that is not a long time, but for me it is an eternity at the moment as I am mostly struggling with this in isolation.

I am wondering whether this is still relevant? Can things change dramatically? In this case, probably not. I hope what feels like the good fortune of it remains a true 'trajectory'.. There's that word again.