Some 15 years ago, I wrote on this blog about the non-people of Hexagram 12.

'Blocking it, non-people.
Noble one's constancy bears no fruit.
Great goes, small comes.'

Hexagram 12, the Oracle

Back then, I emphasised how the idea of 'non-people' (fei ren, 匪人) could mean labelling people and sticking them in boxes, which eliminates any possibility of human understanding. Legge's translation, speaking of a 'want of understanding between men,' is striking.

That's a useful meaning to bear in mind when you have Hexagram 12 - but it's also important to remember that there can be 'inhumanity' here: a dearth of empathy or solidarity.

A less literal and more idiomatic translation would be 'bandits' or 'outlaws'. However, I'm sticking with 'non-people', as I think that draws attention to something we might otherwise miss about outlaws: that these are people who are outside society, 'beyond the pale'. They're not part of the social fabric as we know it, don't observe its norms, and are simply not available for that normal, social relationship of mutual help and support. Restoring communication might or might not be as simple as peeling away the dehumanising labels.

So... what happens in the one other place Yi mentions fei ren - Hexagram 8, line 3?

'Seeking union with non-people.'

Hexagram 8, line 3

The context is very different: Hexagram 8 is about the desire to belong, and how people come together, as easily as water flows together over the earth, on the basis of natural affinity and mutual enjoyment. And it's also associated with Yu the Great, after he has conquered the floods through his labours, founding a new world based on what belongs. (More on Hexagram 8 here.)

8.3 changes to Hexagram 39, Limping - another of Yu's hexagrams, where he limps and struggles through the floodwaters, in urgent need of allies and ready to make a 180 degree turn (from north-and-east to south-and-west) to find them.

This helps to explain what's happening at line 3, 'Seeking union's Limping': the combination of hexagrams both tells us that seeking allies here is tremendously hard work, and might also hint that we're in such straits that we'll try to get blood from a stone, and seek union anywhere, with anyone, even the outlaws.

Here are a couple of different translations and commentaries that cast fresh light:

Stephen Field -

'He sides with the non-human.'

8.3 in Field's Duke of Zhou Changes

He suggests that Hexagram 8 has to do with the Zhou seeking alliances, and that here they are trying to ally with non-Chinese tribes, maybe even with the Guifang, the 'Demon Country' of 63.3/64.4.

And an unlikely ally (!) for Field: R.J. Lynn:

'Here one joins in Closeness but not with his own people.'

8.3 in Lynn's I Ching

Wang Bi's commentary explains how line 2 and line 4 are both allied with the yang line at 5 (corresponding with it or supporting it), so that 3 is left without potential allies nearby.

At this line, we're seeking union with those who are just not our kind of people. The really odd thing, though, is that the line doesn't say whether this is a bad idea. Maybe this alliance with foreigners is just what we need? Probably not - there's nothing to suggest that - but there's also no 'misfortune', nor even a 'danger' or 'shame' or 'regret', any of which would make sense.

The general view of the line has always been that all that goes without saying. This begins with the Xiaoxiang - the commentary on the lines that was canonised as part of the Yijing itself:

'“Here one joins in Closeness but not with one's own people": will this not indeed cause harm?'

Lynn, I Ching

And commentators of all stripes follow in these footsteps:

'One rotten apple can spoil a whole basket, so throw it out. If that is not possible, then leave yourself. You have just one life, don’t waste it.'

LiSe

'The people you are involved with now will do you no good. Danger. This is not where you belong. Leave now before you are sacrificed along with the others.'

Karcher, Total I Ching

And something subtly different from Wilhelm:

'We are often among people who do not belong to our own sphere. In that case we must beware of being drawn into false intimacy through force of habit. Needless to say, this would have evil consequences. Maintaining sociability without intimacy is the only right attitude toward such people, because otherwise we should not be free to enter into relationship with people of our own kind later on.'

Wilhelm/Baynes, I Ching

This has to be the common sense view; it can't be wise to try to find union with non-people. It's almost an oxymoron: you're trying to belong with those who don't belong; seeking solidarity with those who are - exactly, by definition - outside any such bonds. As Wilhelm hints, you could only find union with them by going out of your own sphere, your own way of knowing, finding meaning and connecting.

So maybe Yi doesn't explicitly say, '...and this is a Bad Idea' because that's already patently obvious.

But then again... I've had a few experiences with this line lately where there was no choice: it was essential to create some kind of rapport with the 'non-people'.

• Needing to work with someone whose priorities are so wildly different as to be unintelligible.
• Having to communicate with a medical system where you get the impression you're talking to a rulebook, not a human being with empathy.
• Trying to build relationships with people - exceptionally lovely, compassionate people - whose strong foreign accents make mutual comprehension a real struggle.

In each of these cases, it wasn't a situation anyone could leave: 'seeking union' was essential. And each time, when someone made a great effort to step into the world of the 'non-people', it worked and communication succeeded.

This experience, and the gentler translation from Lynn, gives me a new perspective on the line. This is never going to be a promising place to seek union, but if you have to try for that 'sociability without intimacy' Wilhelm mentions, don't give up. Instead, cease hostilities; bear in mind you may need to 'turn around', 39-style, and completely change your natural approach. And allow the possibility - however remote - that they might become allies.

Ni, 泥 , simply means ‘mud’ – soil, putty, to daub with plaster. It’s the clay that was baked into bricks and tiles.

I normally look for how a word is used in the Book of Songs, or the Book of Rites, but ni doesn’t appear anywhere in either of them. I suppose it’s not a very poetic or elevated substance (at least, it wasn’t, before Flanders and Swann). But oracles have to be more down to earth, and mud appears three times in the Yi:

'Waiting in the mud
Invites the arrival of robbers.'

5.3 to 60

'The well is muddy, no drinking.
Old well, no birds.'

48.1 to 5

'Shock, and then mud.' 51.4 to 24

51.4 to 24

One noteworthy thing these three lines have in common: none contains an omen, or even any explicit advice. It actually seems less and less clear what – if anything – you should do about the mud. Get out of the bog, surely. Renovate the well... unless you need to dig a new one? And the mud after a shock doesn’t even suggest a response – it just is what it is. And as far as I can see, the three lines don’t ‘bake’ together into a tidy structure or coherent message: they just stay muddily indeterminate.

Here they are line by line…

5.3

'Waiting in the mud invites the arrival of robbers.'

As a small child, I once wandered into the middle of a muddy paddock and got stuck. I only managed to escape in the end by leaving my boots behind me. (Dad must have had to retrieve them later.) So I have an idea of the consistency of this line – deep and positively glue-y, offering no traction. Sitting here is asking for trouble: the commentary on the line (xiaoxiang) says we’re ‘inviting the robbers ourselves.’

In ancient China, war was ritualised, and it was against the chivalric code to attack your opponent while his chariot was stuck in the mud. (See this story.) So you might be able to wait in the mud quite safely – until robbers arrive, who by definition don’t observe the rules. If you stay vulnerable, someone or something will be along sooner or later to take advantage.

Waiting with Measure

This line points to Hexagram 60, Measuring or Limiting, a hexagram of contracts and shared agreements. That can point both to the fact that you need limits – even just a time limit to how long you’ll wait in the mud before you leave your chariot and/or wellies behind and start walking – and to the risks of waiting in confidence that agreed measures will keep you safe. Mud has no firm ‘limits’ – no solid edges, nothing where your spinning wheels can find traction – and nor have robbers. ‘Bitter measures do not allow constancy,’ and sitting in this vulnerable position isn’t sustainable.

In readings

Sitting staring at the computer when I’m tired invites time-thieves; a sedentary lifestyle and a toxic diet invite health problems; waiting for him to decide whether to leave his wife is like putting out a ‘Please take advantage!’ welcome mat; prolonged hospitalization for the elderly invites opportunistic infections.

In all these 5.3 readings, the mud is clearly an unhealthy place to be stuck, even if it’s more often inertia than obstinacy keeping us here. We’re in dire need of ‘measure’ – routine, time limits or personal boundaries – and firm ground to stand on, but from down here, up to our axles in the mire and sinking deeper the longer we wait, it can be hard to get that kind of overview.

48.1

'The well is muddy, no drinking.
Old well, no birds.'

To me, this line sounds utterly melancholy. ‘Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes, it’s awful,’ said Beckett. ‘Old well, no birds,’ said Yi. (The ‘coming and going’ was in 48’s Oracle!) The commentary on the line has the same atmosphere:

‘One does not drink the mud of the well: it is too far down. No animals come to an old well: time forsakes it.’

Wilhelm/Baynes Book III

Bradford Hatcher, who – unusually among Yijing commentators – also had experience digging wells, said that this indicated drought, and the best time to repair and dig out the well. Or maybe the water table has shifted and we need to dig a new well elsewhere. But in any case, there’s no point just waiting for things to change: you will have to do something about it.

The Well Waiting

Of course, this line points – precisely – to Waiting. In a way, its relationship to its zhi gua is a bit like that of 5.3. There, you could say waiting in the bog is a sign of over-reliance on Measure (unspoken agreements), but also that it really needs Measure (setting boundaries and limits) to get free.

Here, the Well itself is Waiting, as if in suspended animation. Responding with more Waiting, in the sense of passivity, is not going to help – but the more active sense of Hexagram 5, the positive expectation that inspires you to get digging, is required. The whole complex of possibilities of the zhi gua is engaged.

The paired line for this one, 47.6, offers another interesting insight into its mood, and the traps it lays:

'Confined by trailing creepers,
By unease and discomfort,
Says, "Acting - regret".
With regret, setting forth, good fortune.'

47.6

If I try anything, says 47.6, it’ll go wrong. (Anything I gain, adds 6.6, will soon be lost.) If I dig out this well, it’ll only silt up again. Or as the child explains to her mother, there’s no point washing because I’ll only get dirty again! To which the mother replies, ‘Well, then, there’s no point giving you any dinner, because you’ll only get hungry again!’

In other words, this line is the bottom, the lowest ebb. This stagnant mud might be the end of years of communal effort. And… it’s also line 1, the beginning.

In readings

In readings with this line, there’s always melancholia and stasis – fundamentally, nothing doing, nothing creative happening. I’ve seen this refer to mental stasis, like writer’s block, and the condition of an elderly person feeling that life is passing them by, and also – very often – to a relationship that’s dead in the water and going nowhere, but still with that boggy, sticky quality.

The issue of what to do about it – whether to start digging out the mud from this well, or leave it behind and excavate a new one from scratch – is often paramount, so it’s frustrating that the line doesn’t offer any advice. True, the oracle of 48 insists that the Well isn’t moved; then again, experience suggests that you often do need to look for what you need elsewhere. Go and work somewhere new, get the browser to fetch new files from the server instead of the old copies in the cache, or – yes – leave a relationship behind and move on. There’s still a well to build.

51.4

'Shock, and then mud.'

This is the shortest and most enigmatic of these ‘mud’ lines. 震遂泥 : 'Shock, and-then mud.'

The implication is probably that the shock generates the mud. That’s quite possible if you think of 51 as a thunderstorm, but I’m starting to think of it as volcanic mud – bubbling with noxious, sulphurous gases. Not only can earthquakes trigger mudslides, but there are mud volcanoes which may erupt after an earthquake.

So while the line has no omen or advice, I think this is mud we’d like to avoid or escape – if we can. The xiaoxiang seems to agree:

‘“Quake comes, so this one gets mired," which means that he shall never shine forth.’

R.J. Lynn, I Ching

Shock Returning

51.4 changes to Hexagram 24, Returning, which is an optimistic hexagram by definition: return means recovery, renewal or revitalisation. Is there any sign of that in the line, or in our experiences of the line?

If there is, I find it’s very well-buried, under a whole lot of mud. Mostly, it feels more like ‘the Shock Returns’: after the earthquake, the mudslides.

However… 51 isn’t just about shock; it’s also about holding to the sacred ladle, finding continuity and managing to process the experience of dramatic change (in 49/50). I think this line also holds the potential to be ‘Shock’s Turning Point’. Shock is part of the cycle: the wheel turns, recovery begins. There’s mud… to make bricks with, maybe? 

After the initial trauma, as the shock fades, our energy starts to come back – only this resurgent energy is muddy, sticky: we get bogged down. The point is that shock’s turning point is difficult. Pulling free of the trauma, recovering inner balance, changing direction, starting to rebuild – all easier said than done. Which might be why Yi says nothing so glib, but only, ‘Shock, and then mud.’

In readings

This line does tend to refer to a time after the first shock, at what might be the turning point if we could only get unstuck. This is when the recovering patient feels more anxious and frustrated than they ever did during the acute phase, or when someone who was the hero of the hour during the emergency can only sit and go over and over their experiences.

(As I write this article, I’m using ‘Cast history search’ in my journal to review all my experiences with each line. The entries for 51.4 readings tend to be the longest, because I’ve written out in great detail all the things I am Not Saying to someone I’m annoyed with! And I seem to have been quite incapable of thinking about the reading, or anything else much at all, until I’d rehearsed all that at some length.)

Wang Bi’s commentary on this line grabs my attention:

‘Fourth Yang is located in the midst of the yin and, finding itself as it does here at a time fraught with fear, it becomes the ruler of all the yin lines. As such one here should bravely assert himself in order to bring security to all. But if such a one were to suffer Quake himself [i.e. succumb to fear], he would fall into difficulties. If one were to tread this path of unrighteousness and fail to ward off fear and instead make others provide for his own security, his virtue would “never shine forth”.’

R.J. Lynn, I Ching

So he’s saying the issue here, the emotion we might get mired in, is fear, and the particular way we get stuck is by looking to outside sources for security instead of finding courage. (A yang line between yin lines is reminiscent of the trigram kan, after all.) I don’t believe this is always the case with this line, but I can think of a few readings where this was spot on: a tennis player paralysed by fright and unable to access her talent; someone incapacitated by chronic anxiety.

More generally, I think the mud here is made of all the emotional reactions to shock – to a reality that’s not at all what you anticipated, the ground failing to be underfoot where it should have been. When we say, ‘I survived, but I’m still in shock,’ this is the line we mean. The mud might contain fear, anger, guilt, resentments… the kind of muck that can keep us bogged down for years.

And finally

If you don't understand the title of this post, you need firstly to think of all the rhymes you can for 'hippopotamus', and then watch this.

You know how the lines of some hexagrams unfold and tell a story? Hexagram 53 traces the journey of the wild geese; 1 follows the dragon's journey across the skies; 48 describes well-repair.

Well... I'm wondering whether something similar might not be happening in Hexagram 51. The name of the hexagram, Shock, means both a thunderclap and an earthquake, and there are a couple of good reasons for thinking of it as an earthquake. Firstly because it 'spreads fear for 100 li', about 30 miles - which could just be a round number used with poetic licence, but could also mean this is an earthquake, not a thunderstorm - and secondly because it's hard for us nowadays to imagine a thunderstorm as something that would really shake us. And I think Hexagram 51's lines are telling the story of how we undergo and respond to Shock.

Think of earthquakes for a moment, and travel through the lines of Hexagram 51:

'Shake comes, fear and terror.
Then afterwards, laughing words, shrieking and yelling.
Good fortune'

'Shock comes, danger.
A hundred thousand coins lost
Climb the nine hills,
Don't give chase.
On the seventh day, gain.'

'Shock revives, revives.
Shock moves without blunder.'

'Shock, and then a bog.'

'Shake goes and comes.
Danger.
Intention is not lost - there are things to do.'

'Shock twists and turns,
Watching in fear and terror,
Setting out to bring order: pitfall.
The shock does not reach your self,
It reaches your neighbour -
No mistake.
There are words of marital alliance.'

Hexagram 51, lines 1-6

Starting at line 1...

'Shake comes, fear and terror.
Then afterwards, laughing words, shrieking and yelling.
Good fortune'

51.1

We're frightened first. That's what gets us moving, yelling to our neighbours, rousing the village, doing something about it. (This line changes to 16, which is very good at making a noise and galvanising people.)

'Shock comes, danger.
A hundred thousand coins lost
Climb the nine hills,
Don't give chase.
On the seventh day, gain.'

51.2

The danger of collapsing buildings, next, and physical losses. We need to get out of the village and climb to higher ground, and not dawdle to look for our lost property. (Changing to 54, because we are really not in the driving seat.)

'Shock revives, revives.
Shock moves without blunder.'

51.3

Adrenaline flows, we come alive, and are suddenly more clear-eyed (the inner trigram is changing to li) and sure-footed. We fight off lions, or remember CPR - we can draw on whatever reserves we have. (The hexagram change is to 55, with the king at the centre, taking it on.) This will carry us through the immediate emergency.

And then we move on to the outer trigram, the second 'Shock'. These lines seem different to me: more to do with the aftermath and the longer term.

'Shock, and then a bog.'

51.4

The conjunction in this fourth line, the 'and then', means 'what follows,' 'thereupon' and 'complying with'. I think it might be laying emphasis on a close, causal link between shock and the mud that follows. And it's not just rainstorms that create mud: earthquakes trigger mudslides, and they can also be followed - a few hours or a few days later - by the eruption of mud volcanoes, seething with noxious gases. The first shock is over; now the wheel keeps turning, and the shock comes back to haunt us.

I've just been reviewing a lot of readings with this line, and found they very often describe a post-traumatic experience, with someone stuck in an emotional morass. Like the other 'mud' lines, there's nothing so solid here as advice or a prediction; it just is what it is.

'Shake goes and comes.
Danger.
Intention is not lost - there are things to do.'

51.5

Aftershocks? Perhaps. Or perhaps just the predictable unpredictability of things. We don't know what'll come next, but we know something will - there's no such thing as an uninterrupted 'normal'. (This one changes to 17, Following, a reminder of the ceaseless flow of change.) Hold onto your intention; don't drop that ladle.

'Shock twists and turns,
Watching in fear and terror,
Setting out to bring order: pitfall.
The shock does not reach your self,
It reaches your neighbour -
No mistake.
There are words of marital alliance.'

51.6

It's not completely clear what the shock does here: twists, twines, squeezes, demands? The character, 索, contains the 'silk thread' component and Richard Sears says it originally meant 'rope'. Perhaps it entangles and constricts, perhaps it binds.

I think this line is watching, from its higher, sixth-place perspective, the way shocks recur over time, fearing what's to come, and wondering how to come to grips with the problem.

This line changes to 21, Biting Through - tackling a problem, and also creating an effective union. You can't fix future earthquakes with military expeditions ('setting out to bring order'), but how about forming an alliance for mutual help with someone at least 101 li away?

I learned this morning that Bradford Hatcher has died. The Yijing world has lost a treasure, and many of us have lost a good friend.

Brad was ridiculously generous with his knowledge. His epic, two-volume Yijing is available from his site, for free. (He's made arrangements to ensure it'll stay that way.) It's a superb work - including a character-by-character translation to let non-Chinese scholars get a glimpse of the original, a poetic translation, an 'introduction' with more meat in it than most books, and unique, original commentary. That commentary comes with an acute awareness of Yi's internal relationships (he coined the term fan yao) and, especially, of its native humour. It's an extraordinary gift to us all.

When visiting hermetica.info for the Yijing book, pause and look around to appreciate the breadth of its author's intelligence, which was intimidating, and his experience, which meant he was one of the few Yijing scholars who could write his commentaries about wells, cows and goats on the basis of personal knowledge of wells, cows and goats.

On a personal level, I know Brad was also generous with his time. A regular at Clarity's I Ching Community for many years, he also helped me a great deal with my book in 2010, both with practical feedback on translation, commentary and nuance (as I emailed him each hexagram in turn), and with steady encouragement.

We met once, thanks to LiSe, a few years ago in the Netherlands, where I discovered that he also gave very good hugs.

When I heard this morning that he'd died, I looked at the books closest to me on my desk as I work:

And finally - let me give Yi the last word. I just picked up the beads and asked the oracle to talk to me about Brad. Yi gives Hexagram 50, the Vessel, changing at line 6 to 32, Lasting:

A cauldron with a jade grip
Very promising
Nothing cannot be turned to advantage
50.6x A jade grip across the top:
The firm (and) the flexible (are) in due proportion

The cauldron has a carrying ring fashioned from a fine piece of jade. Sensibility and sensitivity find common ground in a stylish understatement. A pleasant and useful presence will combine the best of both worlds. This cauldron will not be abused or ignored, or carried by random people to random places, or hung up on rusty nails. Respect can be a part of design. It’s the thing that will make people say: They don’t make them like they used to. It’s the classical, timeless elements that will set it above all the fashions and trends, those things which are not made to last. So too with the sage and his teachings: he may lean more than a little towards the things we have handed down, and less towards the latest trends that have the new age so excited. He still wants the new, it’s still about changes, but he wants to use finer ingredients.

50.6, from Bradford Hatcher, The Book of Changes: Yijing, Word by Word, Volume 1.

It's one thing to consult the Yijing; finding the confidence to act on what it says is something else. (What if I've got this wrong?) Yet readings without this, without change, are theoretical at best, and at worst... maybe something more serious than a mere waste of time. We need to recognise the reading's authority - but where does that come from?

On to the final line of my 37 - 46 reading:

'With truth and confidence like authority. In the end, good fortune.'

Hexagram 37, line 6

'Truth and confidence'?

The Chinese word here is 孚, fu - as in the name of Hexagram 61, Inner Truth. Here's an excerpt from its entry in the Language of Change glossary:

"Fu can sometimes (11.3, 44.1) mean simply ‘what is true’ or ‘the true nature of this’. But more often, it means the quality of trust and being true which opens channels and creates an interface – a way or place of connection. Relationships of all kinds happen through fu; it’s the prerequisite for both inner and outer communication. In the Songs, it unites the king with heaven’s mandate, and unites the people with the king."

Language of Change

In this line, I think fu is the quality of trust and truth that creates confidence in family relationships - like the confidence you might have in a wise grandparent.

'Authority'?

This is wei, 威 - also translated nowadays as might, power and force. In the Book of Songs, it seems to be especially about the manifestation of power. A wei appearance or bearing is a dignified one, suited to a solemn ceremony; affiliction-wei is the terrible might of Heaven when it demonstrates its power through famine and disaster. So we can imagine that when truth is 'like wei', it's a manifest power in itself.

We can also get more of a feel for this line by comparison with Hexagram 14, line 5, which is quite similar:

厥孚交如。威如吉。
'Your truth interacts, strikes awe
Good fortune.'

Hexagram 14 line 5

Literally, your truth is like interaction, like authority (威如).

And here's 37.6:

有孚威如。終吉
'With truth and confidence like authority.
In the end, good fortune.'

37.6

Ru, 如, is tricky, but I believe both lines are describing how truth can act as authority. Bradford Hatcher translate ru in 37.5 as 'as good as': 'Being true is as good as impressive.'

And in readings...

So... this is where a reading's authority comes from: from fu, the trust and truth that creates your relationship with the oracle.

That means it isn't something you reason out, or something you talk yourself into, and above all it is not anything anyone else tells you. It's what arises when you hear the reading speaking directly to you: you know it when you feel it.

(Or when interpreting for other people, I know it when I hear it: people gasp, they get goosebumps, burst out laughing or go very quiet - and I have learned to go quiet then, too, because this is the reading happening and I don't want to get in its way.)

The commentary on the line (xiaoxiang) points in the same direction:

'Majestic-like, this is good fortune and means a turning-back to the self.'

37.6, xiaoxiang - Wu Jing Nuan's translation

Truth that works as authority - it has to come from the self.

This is why there is no such thing as being 'too subjective' or too personally involved to understand a reading. It's also why, when you have an immediate intuitive response to a reading, this is not something you need to check with an expert in case you've got it wrong: it's the answer.

'In the end'?

'With truth and confidence like authority. In the end, good fortune.'

Why is there good fortune 'in the end'; why not right away?

I think it's because this line, though it's the end of the hexagram, is only the beginning of the world beyond the home. 'Wind comes forth originally from fire,' says the Image; the influence of the Home starts here, and spreads onward and outward. Truth is known, then it acts.

37.6 changes to 63, Already Across - where everything is settled and in place, and so the journey starts here. Trusting the reading is just the beginning of change.

(The story so far: I asked what to write about, and Yi's response - 37.1.2.5.6 to 46 - gave me the idea of writing about what makes for a friendly, domestic, quotidien, integrated relationship with the Oracle. I've written about lines 1 and 2; here's line 5.)

What makes for an integrated relationship with Yi? Boundaries, nourishment at the centre - and the king's presence:

'With the king's presence, there is a home.
Do not worry. Good fortune.'

Hexagram 37, line 5

This is a perfect echo of line 1: 'With barriers, there is a home.'

閑有家

xian you jia: 'barriers there-is home'

王假有家

wang jia you jia: 'king presence there-is home.'

To make a home, you need these two things: a barred door, and an authority inside. Looking at a relationship with the Oracle: there has to be someone inside who takes responsibility and makes choices - and that’s you.

This reminds me of two important things about readings...

You're in charge

First, the Yijing doesn't take any decisions. That's what humans do. The oracle will show you pictures of your options, and yes, that may make the right course of action so devastatingly obvious to you that it feels as though the decision is made for you - but it really isn't. You're still the king.

(This becomes clear when you see how different people can receive the same reading and take the opposite decision. Some people see Hexagram 46, Pushing Upward, and know in their bones they don't want to climb any more mountains, not even one step at a time. Some see Hexagram 29, Repeating Chasms, and are ready to dive into its deepest, darkest pits, trusting they'll learn to swim on the way down. And this is why there's no such thing as a 'good hexagram'.)

Decisions inside readings

And secondly, the king has to be inside the home for this to work. That is, you have to bring your decisions inside the reading relationship. Tentative, experimental, 'I wonder what it'll say?' readings - maybe with the decision already taken before casting - aren't the same. A relationship with Yi means being prepared to jettison cherished plans, or take risks when we'd really rather not. Basically, it means being willing to change your mind.

Royal visibility

One other thing - the king is naturally visible; there's no such thing as a king no-one's heard of. And this line changes to Hexagram 22, Beauty. This line's about the clear and visible sign of People in the Home: something that solemnises the relationship, in a way. Remember the Sequence from Hexagram 21, Biting Through:

'Things cannot carelessly unite and be completed, and so Beauty follows. Beauty means adorning.'

Hexagram 22, Xugua

The king in line 5 is demonstrating the solidity of the home, sending the message that you can have confidence, do not worry, he has chosen to hold this space.

I think there are ways to do this for readings, too. 'Carelessly uniting' with an oracle is not complete: you need some degree of formality, some clear sign - if only to yourself - of what this is.

As you may know, I'm no great enthusiast for elaborate ceremony around readings, but I do believe in whatever enhances awareness and focus for you. For me, this means keeping a journal and writing down my intent for each reading. The reading itself can be quick and chatty, but I still want this visible reminder of what I'm doing when I divine.

'Do not worry'

You can also look further into Hexagram 22 to understand why Yi advises us, here, not to worry. The king's presence should banish worry, that much seems clear, but why does it need mentioning? Where might the worry come from?

The fan yao - reverse line, the one changing back from 22 to 37 - often answers this kind of question about a line's emotional context. Here's 22.5:

'Beauty in a hilltop garden.
A roll of silk: small, so small.
Shame.
In the end, good fortune.'

'Beauty in a hilltop garden.
A roll of silk: small, so small.
Shame.
In the end, good fortune.'

Hexagram 22, line 5

Here's a suitor who wants to create a home, but worries about the inadequacy of his own contribution. Or... here's someone who wants the Yi to be part of their life and their decision-making, but I'm not an expert, and what if I'm doing it all wrong? Don't worry, says 37.5: you are present in the reading, and that makes it real. (I think line 6 has more to say about that - coming in the next post.)