Help with interpreting relationship issue

[cate]

Please could anyone help me with this. I last posted on here in June, and everyone was really helpful, and I acted on their advice about my relationship and left my partner. However, things changed, or at least I thought they had, and we got back together and are now living together again. At that time my partner had an on-line relationship with another woman. He said it just a friendship, but it turned out not to be, even though they never met. It's now all happening again and I'm being told the same stuff again, i.e - its just a friendship, although, again, I have my doubts.

I don't want to stand in the way of their relationship, if its what's meant to be. At the same time I want to do whatever's necessary to keep our four year relationship together.

This morning, I asked the I Ching;

Please show me an image of their relationship and where it's going.

Hexagram 37 lines 1, 4, and 5 > Hexagram 56.

I then asked;

Please show me an image of our relationship and where its going.

Hexagram 1 line 2 > Hexagram 13.

Could anyone please help me interpret these as I need to know whether to move on, or to try and make this work. I suppose I'm trying to ask, which is the right thing, for all of us?

Thanks

 

[ginnie]

Please show me an image of their relationship and where it's going.

Hexagram 37 lines 1, 4, and 5 > Hexagram 56.

I then asked;

Please show me an image of our relationship and where its going.

Hexagram 1 line 2 > Hexagram 13.

1.2 > 13 is interesting, because Hexagram One means great, unrestrained energy: the Creative Forces in action. Through the connections your partner is now making over the Internet, it is quite possible that early next year he will begin to be seen and recognized in his field.

Is he trying to start an organization or a group over the Web? Sounds like he's got a lot of work to do setting the ground rules, determining the roles of the different people, and so forth. Looks like this effort will be successful.

If he's spending all this time on the Internet, maybe that's because he's involved in a start-up, Cate. In other words, it's a temporary situation. That is the meaning of the relating hex 56 to your first question. Life will not always be this way.

Do you think you could just go along with it for now?

Sorry, I don't know the content of the previous thread . . .

 

[ginnie]

Fellowship

I don't see anything in any of these lines about your getting hurt in this relationship, Cate. I cannot seem to find your posts from June, so I don't know why the relationship broke up.

Is your partner unemployed (at a full-time job) and so he has more time to spend on the Internet, or perhaps he is able to earn some money on the Internet?

There are lots of reasons why people form relationships with people on the Internet, but, you know, with an Internet relationship, you may not even know what the other person really looks like. Internet relationships are not intimate relationships, no matter what they might look like to an outside observer.

 

[cate]

Ginnie, Thank you so much for your reply. It's incredibly accurate. Yes he is someone who spends most of his time, - if not all of his time on the net, yes, he is unemployed, although he would say he's employed through the research and contacts he makes on the net, - he's an astrologer, and supposed to be writing a book on Aspects, which I'm kind of helping him do by going out to work to fund him, so he doesn't have to, and can concentrate on the book, except, he doesn't do it, and spends most of his time talking to other women, which makes me p****** off!

I know there's this other woman, and I just want clarity or closure if necessary on this thing, - I've been driven half crazy by it for about a year now, - but also, the I Ching keeps giving me H32 on this, and seems to keep saying stay with it, - even though it's totally doing my head in. IC also seems to say find a project, a joint enterprise that can unite you, - H8, a lot of the time. I'm basically desperately confused. I want to make this work, but at the same time, if he's supposed to be with someone else and elsewhere, I want to understand and accept that.

As I said, - just the few lines you wrote to me are amazingly accurate, and I thank you for spending time looking at this.

What do you think I should do? I'm so confused and terribly unhappy because I don't know what the right path in any of this is.
Thank you so much for your reply.

 

[cate]

Thanks again Ginnie,
I've just re-read your comments and wondered if you could perhaps explain why you think this is a temporary situation? Also, what I should have made clearer, is that the relationship he has with the other woman on the internet is not a professional one, its definitely a very intimate exchange of messages etc.
When I asked for an image of their relationship and received 37 > 56, the lines seemed to suggest that they were made for each other, although 56 does indicate change.
I too was puzzled by receiving 1 > 13 when I asked for the image of my relationship with him.
I'd be really grateful if you or anyone else could comment on this.
Thanks

 

[ginnie]

Thanks again Ginnie,
I've just re-read your comments and wondered if you could perhaps explain why you think this is a temporary situation?

Well, hexagram 56 sometimes refers to freelancers, the unemployed between jobs, or others not employed full-time. They are 'traveling through' the situation of the inquiry and not expected to 'reside there' for long. When people are 'traveling,' their situation can be thought of as being temporary. But, I have to correct what I said, because maybe, since he's a writer, he'll be a permanent freelancer, a permanent traveler, a permanent seeker.

You are a seeker, too. Therefore the hexagram 56 could also refer to you, because you are seeking most earnestly to find the answer to this long-term knotty problem with your partner.

In which case, you might even regard the hexagram 37 you received as advice to you on how to solve this problem. In other words, Yi has answered your real question.

If you read it that way, I think it says first of all that there have to be ground rules when people live together. I also feel it's just not right if he is flirting and so forth with a woman over the Internet -- not when you are the one going out to work to support him so he's free to write. Maybe a man would feel differently, but it seems inherently unfair and hard on you to be in that position. Maybe you could deal with the problem by writing him a note and giving it to him, rather than complaining, as I'm sure you do not want to do. But it's hard to change something after it's been going on for so long a time.

However, the other lines say that somehow through the two of you cooperating that there will develop a sense of community, or perhaps that you'll be part of a larger group of others (maybe over the Internet? or maybe locally?) who share your values and views. This is definitely suggested by the lines.

The line 4 moving in H37 would therefore refer to you, the wife who brings money into the household and who takes care of all the money matters so well.

Are you sure you're not suffering from jealousy? I'd just thought I'd ask, Cate. You see, I don't know exactly what kind of attention he's showering on this other woman online. Seems to me that these days most people's friendships are over the Internet, and men can be friends with women in other countries very easily. This is sort of a subject I don't wish to get into very much, but sometimes we have to deal with something in ourselves first, before a situation will resolve itself. He sounds rather immature, to be doing this to you. Doesn't he know it hurts you? Maybe you're going to have to wait for him to grow up!!!

We really cannot control other people, and the philosophy of Yi is that the way to eliminate negative aspects in others is to ourselves make progress 'in the good.' People will always be trying doing what they want to do. Men need to feel appreciated. Influencing other people is a long-term proposition. It seems to be that over time, you and your partner will form a brilliantly creative relationship.

 

[cate]

Ginnie, - thank you so much for spending time to respond again, and in depth. I'm going to ponder what you've said, - a lot of it has great meaning and I want to really give it the consideration it deserves and reflect properly on its content.

In the meantime, I just want to thank you again. I'm always amazed by the people on this board, and it goes a long way to restoring my faith in the world.
Again, thank you
kate

 

[cate]

ps. The jealousy thing.
Sadly of course I am!

 

[cate]

I so don't want to be greedy here in asking for yet another bit of help, but the latest development in my saga is that after two pretty ghastly days here of arguments and stuff, he has said that he will write to her and say that he can't continue with their relationship as it's too hurtful to me, and that he will have nothing to do with any other message board as it would hurt her to see him on there, but instead he will concentrate on his work and his book. Of course, in a way, this has upset me even more because I now feel that I am making him suffer by cutting him off from his other friends.

I asked the IC, ' What should I do about this situation?' and received

H 14, lines 3,4 and 6 > H 19

I'm now confused because I'm not sure what it's advising me, - whether to stop my possessiveness, or to concentrate on helping him, or what?!

Can anyone help please,
Many thanks

 

[ginnie]

I asked the IC, ' What should I do about this situation?' and received

H 14, lines 3,4 and 6 > H 19

"This situation" is really his 'traveling' over the Internet and your seeing the need for him to have more self-control in doing that. By taking the actions you did, you have set the stage for the accumulation of great 'wealth,' where wealth can mean great wisdom or a great body of knowledge. I am thinking that now he'll be able to work on his book in a much more self-disciplined way, and you will have been instrumental in helping him do that.

In a sense also your partner and your relationship with him is your great wealth.

14.3: I think he put you in a bad situation, carrying on that way with a woman on the Internet when you were supporting him financially. This line refers to that: that's what led to the dissension.

14.4: I think it may mean you possess great powers of discrimination. Maybe the advice now is to tone down your approach and be more quiet, ending the fighting. When 14.4 changes, it changes to H26: Holding firm. Restraining oneself.

14.6: Usually taken to mean that you are 'walking on Heaven's Highway,' and that means that you are willing to constantly examine and correct yourself. I must say: This is one of the luckiest lines in the whole I Ching. "Those under heaven's protection enjoy good fortune and success in everything. The great good fortune presaged by this line is that of being specially protected by heaven."

You were so right to speak up and influence him to change his ways! Seems like you're doing and saying all the right things, Kate!!!

 

[cate]

Thanks Ginnie, again, for your response. I really appreciate it, - I'll let you know how things work out.