50. Ting / The Caldron

[frank_r]

Ravenstar and Frank,

Reading your posts makes me think about the significance of the human body. We talk about spirit, soul, and connection with the divine and you enter in that discussion the mundane body, liver, kidneys, heart etc. If I have understood you well, seems that the physical body plays a vital role in that connection. Acts like a medium, receive and transmits information, translates messages. It aligns you more closely with the universe. Paying attention to the reactions of the physical body we can learn more about us.

Those thoughts are quite primitive and not clear in my head so if you see any flaw , please correct me . Is the physical body a well-designed system that send us signals, and assists us , like road-signs, to correct our course towards 50 transformation?

As a reiki and TCM practitioners, I guess that people come to you to heal their body but maybe through this process can come closer to their selves and gain awareness. From your experience, have you see this happens ?

Maria

Hi Maria,

The big difference between the Western and Eastern Medical Tradition is that in The west they say body and Mind are one. In the Eastern tradition Body = Mind. There is no difference. It's a different level of looking at the things but nevertheless it's the same.
People sometimes come with physical problems other with mental or spiritual problems. The only difference is the level of awarness but the levels itself are all interconnected.

Like the Chinese say that the Liver is the awarness of Spring, Wood in our body. And the colour Green is the representation of the spring. Wood is also the emotion connected with asertivity. And wood is number three, so these examples are all representations of the same. The only difference is that it are different levels.

And all these levels are searching for unity. And all these are comming together in this melting pot of 50 where they transform and try to make the Gold of immortality, our inner Child or the next generation.

And Yes I think that the body is giving us all kind of signs to put us on the right track of this transformation road. Because when you can find unity in and with yourself you can also do this with other people.

Frank

 

[ravenstar]

Ravenstar and Frank,

Those thoughts are quite primitive and not clear in my head so if you see any flaw , please correct me . Is the physical body a well-designed system that send us signals, and assists us , like road-signs, to correct our course towards 50 transformation?

As a reiki and TCM practitioners, I guess that people come to you to heal their body but maybe through this process can come closer to their selves and gain awareness. From your experience, have you see this happens ?

Maria

Hi Maria,

For both your questions the answer is a definite yes. The body is a magnificient healing machine. It has the world's larged pharmaceutical supply to keep us healthy. As healing pracitioners all we do is help the body to heal itself. Healers are the catalyst to put all this in motion. Pain is the body's intuition at work alerting and communicating with us to slow down and develop a more meaningful connection with ourselves. Dis-ease is but a lack of energy and balance within the body. When a person isn't feeling well, their energy is focused in the area of attack, energy (chi) that normally would be abundant in our organs and cells becomes diminished. When we don't slow and pay attention to our emotional life, we can't hear our intuition which speaks to us through the symbols in our dreams and waking life.

Reiki oscillates and fills the body with light and seems to work alot like the soap (+- ions) we use in our washing machines to clean our clothes. Our bodies are made up of mostly water and reiki or hands on healing helps the waterways and bi-ways in our physcial and etheric body to flow again. It is alot like Frank spoke of transforming base metals into Gold. The philosopher's stone most sought after by alchemists is not a stone at all but a spiritual one, created out of fire.

I'm sure Frank has many stories to tell of people who have come to him seeking balance. I'd love to hear them!

Reiki allows the practioners mind to connect with the patient's mind. We hear your thoughts, some of us feel your pain. Reiki II allows us to connect to the emotional aspects of the physcial and etheric body. Sometimes we see this in the way of symbols and sometimes in actual events. If for example, I visualize a staircase, my intuition tells me to check the energy of the throat, esophagus or spine. A room or rooms of a house could represent an organ in the body.

I had one woman come to me with severe back pain and as the treatment unfolded it allowed her to begin remembering emotional issues in her life. As reiki travelled to the core of her pain, it revealed shame, grief and guilt at the loss and drowning of her only child in the backyard pool. After this session she said she felt pain-free (for a time) and realized she was in deep need of counselling. This she did and a year later began a support group in her area for mothers, fathers, siblings who had lost a child, brother or sister. Reiki helped her to understand and heal her own pain which led her to helping others with the same issues. She is a remarkable woman and true humanitarian.

ravenstar

(isn't that intersting, Frank and I posted your answer almost at the same time!)

 

[maremaria]

Thank you both for your answer. They have been very helpful.
Allow me to quote the following.

And Yes I think that the body is giving us all kind of signs to put us on the right track of this transformation road. Because when you can find unity in and with yourself you can also do this with other people.
Frank

I had one woman come to me with severe back pain and as the treatment unfolded it allowed her to begin remembering emotional issues in her life. As reiki travelled to the core of her pain, it revealed shame, grief and guilt at the loss and drowning of her only child in the backyard pool. After this session she said she felt pain-free (for a time) and realized she was in deep need of counselling. This she did and a year later began a support group in her area for mothers, fathers, siblings who had lost a child, brother or sister. Reiki helped her to understand and heal her own pain which led her to helping others with the same issues. She is a remarkable woman and true humanitarian.

ravenstar
)

What Frank says is illustrated by Ravenstar's example. Very 50,imo.

 

[rosada]

The image

Fire over wood:
The image of THE CALDRON.
Thus the superior man consolidates his fate
By making his position correct.

The fate of fire depends on wood; as long as there is wood below, the fire burns above. It is the same in human life; there is in man likewise a fate that lends power to his life, And if he succeeds in assigning the right place to life and to fate, thus bringing the two into harmony, he puts his fate on a firm footing. These words contain hints about the fostering of life as handed on by oral tradition in the secret teaching of Chinese yoga.
-Wilhelm

 

[frank_r]

Ravenstar and Frank,

As a reiki and TCM practitioners, I guess that people come to you to heal their body but maybe through this process can come closer to their selves and gain awareness. From your experience, have you see this happens ?

Maria

I'm sure Frank has many stories to tell of people who have come to him seeking balance. I'd love to hear them!

)

Hello Maria and Ravenstar,

When I work as a acupuncturist I always ask what is the most important thing the patient want to have changed. Some tell me the pain or the complaint, other want to have more balance, others want to have less stress etc.
But in most of the time this is a deeper peace with themselves and others.
And when they find this peace they usually get better. With the treatment itself I also feel this tension in myself, and when I can leave this feeling a part of the patient I can help my patients.
But sometimes this energy is too strong. Than I also are going through a kind of transformation. Than I have to learn to leave this with the patient.
In certain times I see people with different kind of problems, but they all give me the same sort of feeling. And they all get better in the same period when I also can make this jump.

In a way I'm always treating myself.

I love working with the so called Extra Ordinary Meridians. This are the meridians that are deeper than the normal ones. There are 8 in number and they have to do with the most esssential parts of us. They all are assigned to one of the 8 trigrams and the extra ordinary part is that they are connected with the miracle/origine of life. These meridians make each person unique. When I treat with this meridians I use the Yi, and treating with them I treat on the level of gaining awarness. But in these cases it is also important that the patient is on the level of this awarness otherwise they usually will deny the change.
I use these meridians with long lasting chronical conditions. Also to get them of medication which they have recieved for longer times.

And Janice I liked your story about this patient very much.
Some time ago I treated a young men that had mental problems after losing his mother on a very young age. His father married soon after this loss. He could't give his mother a proper place in his life. He was put on anti depression medicine. But he got very sick of it because it took a lot of depht out of his life.
Now I'm treating him with acupuncture and he is seeing a psychiatrist, he is already medicine free.
Now he can talk with his mother because he found this part in himself. This together with breathing exercises, the talks and the acupuncture treatment gave peace in his heart. And sometimes he is still anxious but now he can handle it better. Now he is not afraid to feel his pain but it is bothering him less.
He is part of his own history again and he is feeling hope for the the future.

Frank.

 

[meng]

Hiya Frank,

You draw attention to what is potentially harmful to the cauldron. Interesting is that your approach is you cleanse first yourself, as you consider the patient's condition. Interesting also are your comments on antidepressants. Having had a 5 year run and dependency on antidepressants, I realize that just having a friend to talk to and receive advise from would have been much better therapy. The blanket effect of antidepressants is comforting, for awhile, but once the little breathing holes to the soul have become clogged, it only further exacerbates the root problem. A real 18 dilemma.

Now, so that I don't get flamed, I'm not saying antidepressants have no place, but only with awakened supervision and therapy.

Something Maria said earlier (or was it in the 49 thread?) about the important role the physical body plays on the overall condition of a person. It may sound too obvious, but so much emphasis has been placed on "spiritual" and mental matters, it's always as if the spiritual is "over there", and you have to go it. But, as has been said before, the body is the temple. The brain without a body is a crazy thing. The body without a brain, well, guess there's quite a bit of that, as well.

 

[rosada]

Frank - I thought your observation that the man's problems were "He couldn't give his mother a proper place in his life" fit in so well with Wilhelm's comment on the image of 50, that a man must assign the right place to life and to fate and bring the two into harmony.

 

[maremaria]

. It may sound too obvious, but so much emphasis has been placed on "spiritual" and mental matters, it's always as if the spiritual is "over there", and you have to go it. But, as has been said before, the body is the temple. The brain without a body is a crazy thing. The body without a brain, well, guess there's quite a bit of that, as well.

Yes. Agree.

Frank, must be very rewarding you job. Thanks for sharing with us your experiences.

Maria

 

[rosada]

Fire over wood is the image not of the TING itself but of its use. Fire burns continuously when wood is under it. Life also must be kept alight, in order to remain so conditioned that the sources of life are perpetually renewed. Obviously the same is true of the life of a community or of a state. Here too relationships and positions must be so regulated that the resulting order has duration. In this way the decree of fate whereby rulership falls to a particular house becomes established.
-Wilhelm

 

[meng]

50 ethics

A society may or may not be built upon ethics. Either it will have none, and be conquered by those that have, or else it has, and will be conquered by those that have none. Ethics is beyond political trends and styles of government. That's why it is an individual endeavor.

 

[frank_r]

A society may or may not be built upon ethics. Either it will have none, and be conquered by those that have, or else it has, and will be conquered by those that have none. Ethics is beyond political trends and styles of government. That's why it is an individual endeavor.

Or to know where the weak spot in ethics is at that moment.
Like the revolution that took place in India with Gandhi, the non violance action only worked because it worked on the ethics from the English that moment.
There where also a lot of actions that have coloured the streets red with blood. It all depends on the ethics(or non ethics) of the society if something can change.

Frank

 

[meng]

Very much in agreement, Frank. In fact, that, I believe is what enables a society to endure. It isn't a position of heels dug into the past, but of what is required now.

 

[maremaria]

A word has stuck in my mind : framework.
I looked up at the dictionary
Framework : A set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality.

 

[rosada]

The lines

50.1
Six at the beginning means:
A TING with legs upturned.
Furthers removal of stagnating stuff.
One takes a concubine for the sake of her son.
No blame.

If a TING is turned upside down before being used, no harm is done - on the contrary, this clears it of refuse. A concubine's position is lowly, but because she has a son she comes to be honored.
These two metaphors express the idea that in a highly developed civilization, such as that indicated by this hexagram, every person of good will can in some way or other succeed. No matter how lowly he may be, provided he is ready to purify himself, he is accepted. He attains a station in which he can prove himself fruitful in accomplishment, and as a result he gains recognition.

"A TING with legs upturned." this is still not wrong. "Furthers removal of stagnating stuff," in order to be able to follow the man of worth.

The line at the bottom means the legs of the TING. Since the line is weak and stands at the beginning, the implication arises that before cooking one must turn the TING upside down to throw our the old food remnants, The line has a connection by position with the central and strong line next to it; hence the idea of a concubine (weak and subordinated).
-Wilhelm

 

[ravenstar]

50.1
One takes a concubine for the sake of her son.
No blame.

Funny, when I read this, my thoughts went to the movie Rainman and his special date with a woman Raymond called 'Very Sparkly'.

Then I thought of children with autism. I used to drive school bus with mentally challenged children, several of them were autistic. These children are socially aloof, indifferent and preoccupied with repeitive routines. They resist change and can be quite undisciplined. Also they have severe problems with both verbal and visual-spatial skills. Their left-right balance in the brain seems to be altered in them in some way. Despite their handicaps, like Rainman they can be remarkable mathematicians, draw or paint or play music brilliantly - all right hemisphere skills.

Then I thought of a boy (adolescent) who may only respond to real affection. It pierces through the tough layers created from being hurt by others or circumstances, which in turn holds back love. A concubine would help the young man let go of any constraints, restraints and repressions. She'd help to unlock the door of his inner prison so his soul could emerge and shine.


"Thus woman stands in the cosmogony in relation to "matter" or the great deep, as the "Virgin of the Sea," who crushes the "Dragon" under her foot. The "Flood" is also very often shown, in symbolical phraseology, as the "great Dragon." ISIS UNVEILED

The next is from this website http://goddessontheloose.com/?page_id=93

"The original whore was a priestess, the conduit to the divine, the one through whose body one entered the sacred arena and was restored. Warriors, soldiers, soiled by combat within the world of men, came to the Holy Prostitute, the Quedishtu, literally meaning "the undefiled one," in order to be cleansed and reunited with the divine."

ravenstar

 

[jilt]

I think I have to make some additions to the remarks I made about that sensual alchimy, the circulation of the light. I am no expert in that field, although I did try of course, but not consistentently. But things in my dreamworld changed, "spiritual children" got born and grew up, some died because of lack of discipline. It must be something from the ethereal body.
When the 5th line changes you get hex 44, coming to meet, seduction. Always a lot of discussion around the interpretation and the role of feminine sexuality. But in this line the couldron has golden rings to carry it, so you don't burn yourself at the content, that hot seductive sexuality. So, in itself something potentially harmfull and dangerous is transformed over here. Because of experience and lessons you know how to "handle" things like that, just like with real cooking. There you make unedible things edible because of cooking in the right way, makig the fire hotter or less hot on the right moments, applying herbs at the right moment (herbs are like medicine: to much is harmfull, but applied on the right place in the right time they "make" the meal). So, in the cauldron all kinds of "energies" are mixed by some kind of real or metaphorical cooking. Good and bad energies do not exist, only things applied on the right moment in the right quantities.

But... I digged up "the secret of the golden flower" in the Wilhelm translation.
So in life the energy comes in through the kidneys and then either goes upward and becomes shen (something like mind, spirit) or goes down and becomes kuei (ghost, bad spirit, devil). The direction of the energies could be called positive or negative. In the secret of the golden flower you learn to handle those energies. That process is very much comparable with the cauldron.

 

[rodaki]

Rosada pointed out in a recent thread about hex.14 the happy coincidence of getting 14 exactly when here the discussion is on 50.1 (to 14) . .
Well, her remark sparked insights on the meanings of 14, might as well for 50.1!

here's the link:
http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/friends/showthread.php?t=7140

rodaki

 

[charly]

50.1
Six at the beginning means:
A TING with legs upturned.
Furthers removal of stagnating stuff.
One takes a concubine for the sake of her son.
No blame.
...

Rosada:

chinese characters, pinyin, usual meanings, W/B version:

鼎 ding3 : sacrificial vessel / cauldron / tripod / TING [untranslated]
顛 dian1: inverted / jolt / top / UPTURNED
趾 zhi3: leg / toe / [WITH] LEGS

利 li4: profitable / benefit / FURTHERS
出 chu1: to go out / to produce / to exit / to issue / REMOVAL [OF]
否 pi3: to negate / to deny // evil / STAGNATING STUFF

得 de2: obtain / get / gain [ONE] TAKES
妾 qie4: concubine / [A] CONCUBINE
以 yi3: to use / according to / by / FOR [THE SAKE OF]
其 qi2: his / her / its / theirs / that / such / HER
子 zi3: son / child / seed / egg / small thing / SON

无 wu2: without / not / no / avoid / NO
咎 jiu4: blame / to blame / mistake BLAME


妾 qie4 usually translated as CONCUBINE, maybe no pejorative, means WOMAN:

a concubine / ( in old China ) a polite term used by a woman to refer to herself when speaking to her husband
From Sears, Chineseetymology, at: http://www.chineseetymology.org/Cha...aspx?characterInput=妾&submitButton1=Etymology

The character has two components: 辛xin (bitter, hard, toilsome, laborious) and 女 nü (daughter, girl, lady).

辛 ... Remnant Primitive, in context (1) an upside down person - (laying not standing, dead not alive, woman not man, going not comming, slave not free, bad person not good person)
From Sears chineseetymology at: http://www.chineseetymology.org/Cha...aspx?characterInput=辛&submitButton1=Etymology

Thus, the 妾 qie4, the first person appearing in H.50 is an UPSIDE DOW GIRL, a girl with the legs up, like the CAULDRON of 50.1,

Of course, there are another more conservative interpretations:

Qqie4. A concubine is an inferior wife. Polygamy was once widely practiced in China, resulting in such titles as 1st wife, 2nd wife, 3rd wife, 4th wife ... etc. Anyone who wasn't the first wife was inferior. When 1st wife walked by, a concubine would have to stand up in respect. Hence, 立 (stand, li4) + 女 (woman, nu3) = 妾 (concubine)
From: http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~wwu/chinese/ideograms.shtml

I believe that this one doesn't fit too well with the upturned cauldron. Lying or standing, that's the question!

yours,

Charly

 

[diamanda]

I meant to post this earlier in the thread, when Charly said
"cooking is a kind of alchemy and alchemy has much to do with «fornication»",
well here it is now that i got round to it:

fornication (from www.etymonline.com)
c.1300, from O.Fr. fornication, from L.L. fornicationem (nom. fornicatio), from
fornicari "fornicate," from L. fornix (gen. fornicis) "brothel," originally "arch,
vaulted chamber" (Roman prostitutes commonly solicited from under the arches
of certain buildings), from fornus "oven of arched or domed shape."

furnace
c.1225, from O.Fr. fornais, from L. fornacem (nom. fornax) "an oven, kiln,"
related to fornus, furnus "oven".

 

[rosada]

Personal diary

50. Group Consciousness

50.1
Discard all your preconceived notions of time and space and what is possible.
New information will be coming to you from the unconscious.
Watch for it.
-rosada

 

[rodaki]

WOW!
beautiful . .

:bows:
rodaki

 

[my_key]

50.1
Six at the beginning means:
A TING with legs upturned.
Furthers removal of stagnating stuff.
One takes a concubine for the sake of her son.
No blame.

Hey Rosada - the group consciuosness theme will be good to follow. I like what you have written here.

Something a bit more earthbound -

50.1 - When the wheel has come off the wagon, never mind just unhook the horses climb into the traces and keep moving it up that hill. It's tough work, but someone has to do it, and although you can't see it now, this hard work is all money in the bank and will hold you in good stead.

Mike

 

[lucia]

What I don't get is if the concubine was part of the royal deal she would surely have been 'taken' before she had the son. Surely the son just strengthens her position in the royal posse?

I like the legs up/fornicating idea - maybe it was a royal rape?

just exploring while wrestling with this hex....

Lucia

 

[meng]

Something a bit more earthbound -

50.1 - When the wheel has come off the wagon, never mind just unhook the horses climb into the traces and keep moving it up that hill. It's tough work, but someone has to do it, and although you can't see it now, this hard work is all money in the bank and will hold you in good stead.

Cool summary, Mike. Yes, it is earthbound.

 

[meng]

I digged up "the secret of the golden flower"

Congratulations !

lol

 

[meng]

I like the legs up/fornicating idea - maybe it was a royal rape?

Thanks for that , I'll never see line 1 nor getting the royal screw the same again.

 

[Sparhawk]

For a change, I'm staying away from these free associations...

 

[Trojina]

For a change, I'm staying away from these free associations...

That shows remarkable self control and personal growth (are you well ? feel feverish, joint pains, headache ?)



(Something is very wrong folks)

 

[rosada]

Perhaps Luis is showing us how 50.1 leads to 50.2. : The superior man gets out of the swamp and drinks his tea privately?

 

[rosada]

50.2
Nine in the second place means:
There is food in the TING.
My comrades are envious,
But they cannot harm me.
Good fortune.

In a period of advanced culture, it is of the greatest importance that one should achieve something significant. If a man concentrates on such real undertakings, he may indeed experience envy and disfavor, but that is not dangerous. The more he limits himself to his actual achievements, the less harm can the envious inflict on him.

"There is food in the TING." Be cautious about where you go.
"My comrades are envious." This brings no blame in the end.

This line is firm and central, hence it symbolizes the contents of the TING. It forms a unit with the third and fourth lines, but as it stands in the relationship of correspondence to the ruler of the hexagram, it must go its own ways as prescribed for it by these comrades, the two lines from which it is separated by inner relationships. But being quite free of possible entanglements and shielded by the strong relationship to the ruler, it need fear nothing.
-Wilhelm