Confused by my results? [21.3.5, 51.4.6, 24]

[fun_horse]

Hey everyone! I'm very new to consulting the I ching, but any help is greatly appreciated!

"What will happen if I take an online skills course as a first step in my adult life?" > 21.3.5 changing to 13
"What will happen if I try to teach English abroad" > 51.4.6 changing to 27
"Is it wise to take a great leap at this moment in my life?" 24 Unchanging

A little context for my reading: I just graduated community college. Not a huge milestone, but it has been a surprisingly difficult journey. It's taken me five years to do what a lot of people do in two. My plan was to finish it up and transfer out to a full university but that didn't pan out for financial reasons. I'm at a point where I'm eager to move out of my parents house and generally feeling unsatisfied with my life as it currently is. Working in retail has started to weigh on me in the past month or so. I've always been able to tune out how much I dislike my job because it's been a matter of necessity but lately I haven't been able to ignore how stressed out my job makes me. I have reached a point where my managers are talking to me like I'm going to be a retail lifer and they're mentioning setting me up for management, but the thought makes me nauseous. I also have a sense of a deadline looming above me, as after six months my student loans switch into repayment and that would lock me in my current situation financially for a good period of time.

That said, I've settled upon some options that I feel are good first steps in getting me out of my current situation. One is an online professional skills course that I feel aligns with my overall desired career path, the other being getting a certificate that would let me teach English abroad.

The main dilemma is that the english abroad offers a more concrete timeline because it's handled by training and employment agencies, so that you pretty much know that as long as you get your paperwork done by the deadlines you'll be teaching english in Spain or wherever by September, but long term has nothing to do with where I want my career to go and also I have no idea what I would do after my teaching contract expires, and so I feel is only an exercise in kicking my current problems down the road a year or two. Another con is that it's much more expensive and because of how strict the visa deadlines are I could be locked out for a year if I fail to come up with the money in time.

On the other hand, the skills course aligns pretty exactly with the general direction I know I want to take my career, but doesn't have the clear set timeline of teaching abroad and I could potentially get mired in a fruitless job search.

I first asked the oracle "What will happen if I take the online skills course as a first step?" and got 21.3.5 changing to 13. The way I interpret this is that my current situation is difficult and needs some "chewing over". There's also something about having some baggage I need to work through, that maybe my dated concept of how I would be living by now is holding me back from building my best life in the present? For a long time I've had a lot of emotional value in the idea of having a traditional college experience. I thought I had come to peace with not attaining that, but maybe I haven't? The conflict between line 3 and line 5 says to me that things could either go well (find gold), or go poorly (find poison). But that if it does go poorly it's not a huge setback?

Next I asked "What will happen if I try to teach english abroad?" and got 51.4.6 changing to 27.
I see this as saying I'm in a situation where I've experienced some tremors, have been sort of mired in the mud, but that this is also a situation that has given me some clarity and direction (which I would agree with), but I'm unclear what changing to Nourishment should mean?

In the end I decided to ask one final question, because I began to see that maybe my true question was if it was even a good idea to stick myself out like this? Maybe I should accept that things are a little off balance right now and I should just ride it out in the uninspiring yet comfortable way I live now. So I asked the oracle "Is it wise to take a great leap at this moment in my life?" and got 24 unchanging, but I don't know how I should take this.

Thanks in advance to anyone willing to offer some insight on this! I'm pretty new to the yi ching and forums, so let me know if I've made any rookie mistakes lol

EDIT: modified for clarity

 

[Freedda]

Fun Horse, welcome.

I don't mean your first response here to be about the 'rule's but it's always hard to read and respond to one very long block of text. You might want to look at this thread about formatting in case you need to change some of your settings - https://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/fri...ving-trouble-formatting-or-editing-your-posts

Also, word of advice - don't bury the 'lead' or, it is always best to make your actual reading (45.2 to 33, etc) easy to find. So, consider starting with it, or putting it in your title or ....

All the best, D.

 

[fun_horse]

Thanks freedda! I originally wrote with paragraphs but that exact bug condensed it all. C'est la vie. It should be fixed now!

 

[Trojina]

I first asked the oracle "What will happen if I take the online skills course as a first step?" and got 21.3.5 changing to 13. The way I interpret this is that my current situation is difficult and needs some "chewing over". There's also something about having some baggage I need to work through, that maybe my dated concept of how I would be living by now is holding me back from building my best life in the present? For a long time I've had a lot of emotional value in the idea of having a traditional college experience. I thought I had come to peace with not attaining that, but maybe I haven't? The conflict between line 3 and line 5 says to me that things could either go well (find gold), or go poorly (find poison). But that if it does go poorly it's not a huge setback?

It's so good you are interpreting for yourself and really thinking about your answer, I hope you get more replies.

As a first step it looks fairly strenuous and I do wonder if Yi is also talking to you more broadly about your overall current dilemma. I say that because often when we present several choices to Yi with a question for each choice it answers as in conversation, going straight to the central issue rather than the option so I feel this is what you are doing now, you are trying to bite through to what is good. The change patterns are 39 and 38 (patterns we get when we make all change lines yang or yin)

Next I asked "What will happen if I try to teach english abroad?" and got 51.4.6 changing to 27.
I see this as saying I'm in a situation where I've experienced some tremors, have been sort of mired in the mud, but that this is also a situation that has given me some clarity and direction (which I would agree with), but I'm unclear what changing to Nourishment should mean?

I think with 27 you must realistically assess your needs and somehow I think you may miss your real needs if you think teaching English abroad will be especially useful to you.

BTW I am taking 27 as the context in which you asked not 'the future'. Also these are only my impressions, I don't think anyone should turn down anything they would really like to do on the basis of a Yi cast, one must be able to live life freely with all it's mistakes so I'm not saying this would be a mistake exactly, after all mistakes are simply experiments. However there seems a lot of turmoil around this option, as if it disturbs you, troubles you and also it seems to make you feel more stuck (line 4). What about line 6, not sure what to make of that here except I wonder if the shock of realising your current situation fully presses you into making choices that won't actually nourish you. People think of the shock in 51 as one specific incident they are reacting to but it isn't always like that. One can be in shock as an inner event, realising things about your own life and so on.

In general from the cast and the way you speak about it I don't feel this option is the best fit for your actual needs. I even think it might be a good idea to really get in touch with what your basic needs, real needs are at this time. I think starting from your needs is a better place to choose from than lots of options that just exist on a mental level as possibilities that don't really connect with who you are now.

In the end I decided to ask one final question, because I began to see that maybe my true question was if it was even a good idea to stick myself out like this? Maybe I should accept that things are a little off balance right now and I should just ride it out in the uninspiring yet comfortable way I live now. So I asked the oracle "Is it wise to take a great leap at this moment in my life?" and got 24 unchanging, but I don't know how I should take this.

Oh it's a very clear answer I think. 24 is a quiet time, a time of the returning light. Light returns gradually after the longest night, it isn't suddenly midsummer after the winter solstice. 24 is the time of the winter solstice where people don't trade or travel but stay home to return into themselves and renew themselves. Likewise it is clear you need not force your life into the brightness of achievement, that would be disruptive for you. You say it is uninspiring but comfortable but 24 shows this is a time of rest, a gentle time which is actually a turning point that you can't see because it is starting inside you. You need to be comfortable right now to nurture the return of the light in your life. Every day after the solstice it gets lighter bit by bit.

So no you don't need to make any huge changes right now, the most important change is happening organically in your life, it's happening by itself. Important changes can happen even when it looks like nothing is happening. I will post a link to the 24uc thread where you can see others experience of this line click here

 

[oldwillow]

Hi fun_horse,
I don't have a lot to say, but I do note something in your thoughts about each of the readings. It isn't a "rookie mistake" it's just a little assumption you make in your point of view. You look at each reading as if it's mostly speaking about your current life, rather than giving you a picture of what the possibility itself might look like. This is actually in a way really good. You are very thoughtful and reflective, self aware, and open to considering many things. That is a much better place to be coming from than the sometimes desperate grasping, ("gotta get outta this place...") of the person who puts too much emphasis on the future picture. But here is my quick take on what the readings might be showing you looked at from the other way around. Apologies if it's too cryptic and poetic - that's just how these things come out for me. I rely on LiSe for my line quotes below.

21.3.5 changing to 13 - online skills
Sez IC: Biting through - pay attention - you are doing this. Nice work on the baggage. But what I'm really saying here is you're done. Through is through - you've bitten. Stay in your old rut, your "cured meat" and yikes, here comes the poison. You see that. Now to line 5, biting dried out meat - there, your view of retail again: "You have made the root difficulties visible and conscious; this creates the possibility to do something about it. There is a natural resistance against doing this, because it means change, which is usually hazardous. But it also means your life will improve." Go for it, try this.

51.4.6 changing to 27 - English abroad
Sez IC: Timeline, structure, put yourself at the mercy of the Big Forces. Oooh, tempting. Yeah, you've been knocking the mud off your soul, again nice work - seriously congratulations. I, venerable Oracle, reflect back to you that your querying is a good thing. But now let's look up and out - there's your mud and there's the world's mud. The very thing that makes the structure of the English abroad option appealing also makes it way way bigger than your one wild and precious life. Deadlines and visas and assignments, oh my. Line 6! Line 6! The shock goes everywhere, to set things right, pitfall, the shock does not reach you. "Many shocks are not really yours. Don't try to mend them, even though they can be upsetting. They are valuable lessons. Connect with others and talk about it. Understanding and learning from it are better than fixing it." What you are looking at with this option is going onto the world stage. You'll be a pawn in the great questions and struggles of the age. If you do this, it could be very exciting. It could teach you much - especially from those you find yourself thrown in with as you go. By its nature, as well as by how you are contemplating this, English abroad is usually a short vigorous compelling break in one's life. There are those for whom it does become a career, maybe you, maybe not. More likely it would be shock shock aligning with the thunder. [I wonder if this might be an answer to your lingering yearning for a traditional college experience. It's way different, but could that be?]

24- unchanging - wise to take a great leap?
Sez IC: Oh, dear one, you have taken the leap. Only you do not know it yet, but let me assure you, you have. See, change works one way - we cannot go back, we can only go forward. The wheel is turning. You are wise. Great leaps? It's only that you don't yet all the way understand. Great leaps are really tiny steps. The new line slides in at the bottom again and off you go. It does not matter at all if you stay in retail or you take your course that maybe or maybe not will open a door or if you go through that other big door with the gale blowing through. It matters only that you asked these three questions and you worked and played hard to understand and to be both responsible and alive. Don't take this as an invitation to complacency or permission now not to choose and to go back to pretending it is all (only) confusing and painful and awful. It's more, way more. Again, I give you my blessing to perceive and experience this. You are at the great balance point, a fine still place, a great height and a deep depth of a still place. Oh wait, I lied. You are one teensy tiny tick beyond that point; this is a potent pregnant stillness. Your unknown but unstoppable self waits to take form and be born. Blessings, querant.

Hope that's helpful, or at least entertaining.

 

[fun_horse]

Thank you for the insightful responses!

I think you may miss your real needs if you think teaching English abroad will be especially useful to you

shock aligning with the thunder...lingering yearning for a traditional college experience

I really like this lens. Thinking of nourishment in terms of needs/ yearning really opened this one up for me mentally. I would have to agree that I don't think it is a great fit. As I've been researching this option it has felt a lot like I'm feverishly pursuing something just past my reach. I'll read an article about teaching abroad and it will provide a solution to a kink I've had in the plan but then reveal four new kinks. All the while a lingering sensation that each solution brings with it a compromise that waters the experience down for me in some crucial way. Like why go through all this work when I'm only interested in what accompanies it. Or, in terms of the food analogy the Yi presents, cook a complex meal when all I really want is one of the side dishes.

I have noticed that the changing lines in my 51 hexagram looked at individually change to both 21 and 24. Trojina, I think you are right to say that the Yi is saying this altogether.

See, change works one way - we cannot go back, we can only go forward. The wheel is turning.

You need to be comfortable right now to nurture the return of the light in your life. Every day after the solstice it gets lighter bit by bit.

In the end, I decided to enroll in the online skills course. To me the overall message of these readings is that I'm at a precipice, about to begin on something new, but that I should be patient and fortify myself. Don't sink into and accept my rut, but also don't force anything. A voyage-- exciting and scary but also exciting exactly because it is scary--is coming, but for now I should focus on preparing myself for the journey ahead. I see the skills course as one way of doing that, maybe so long as I don't put pressure on myself into thinking that it is the specific exact door that kickstarts it all. Another way of preparing myself is to identify what my needs actually are, besides change. Because change is always a given.

Thank you both for your kind and enlightening words!

 

[oldwillow]

Excellent! I'm glad it was helpful, and it sounds like you have a great approach to this time in your life!