How should I manage my tasks? 47.3.6 to 44

[Phaboo]

Hi everyone,

I asked this question regarding a situation where I feel particularly overwhelmed, and the Hexagram 47 Kun 困 "Confined" is spot on about that. I think it also refers to the lockdown situation, where I'm obviously stuck at home. Chinese people also use this character to say "sleepy", e.g. 我很困 "I'm tired/sleepy", which I am. I live in Italy, which as you might know is the first western country to adopt the lockdown. So, I've been "confined" at home for quite a long time now.

I'm a 25 years old student, I have a bachelor degree in linguistic and cultural mediation, and I'm also getting another bachelor degree in musical composition next year. In the meantime, I've decided to apply to the part-time master degree in cultural mediation. Before applying I've also asked the I Ching what to do about my desire to keep studying languages along with the conservatory, and I got The Well, with 3rd line changing. I interpreted it as I would regret it if I didn't "get the water" out of the well, which is clean, but not being used. But I should point out that my desire also comes out of the fact that I'm 25 already and the composition path is quite long and uncertain. That 3rd line might also be telling me that I'm too afraid, and that one of the main reasons why I want to get the master degree in languages is because I doubt that I will get a living out of music or have success as a composer. Anyway, I interpreted it as the former, and here I am, managing to study both.

The problem is, this year hasn't been particularly lucky. I'm meeting lots of troubles along the way. First of all, my composition teacher, with whom I happily studied 5 years, had a stroke last august, and he's still recovering. I don't know if he would ever come back. I had troubles fitting with his substitute, but we're slowly getting along. I even felt like pausing until next year because of that, but then I asked I ching and I got 37.5 to 22: people in the home and beauty; so I stayed. It's quite interesting that the nuclear hexagram of 47 is 37.

Also, the Chinese Linguistics teacher died from an accident last September and his substitute has been nominated only two weeks ago. Other bureaucratic troubles happened this year which slowed down the lessons, and therefore my schedule is extremely busy. Furthermore, I have a band since I was 15, and now we are making short videos and recording stuff at home to post on social media. That requires quite a lot of time too.

And of course there's this lockdown situation. I should have lots of free time, by staying at home. But on the other hand, it gets really depressing, and I get distracted easily.

I don't know what the I Ching is trying to tell me with the 3rd and 6th line. I get that something has to change, in order to solve this situation. Maybe I should develop healthier and more productive habits during the quarantine. Or I should give up some of the things I'm pursuing and/or prioritize more on the musical composition, which is my main major, after all. And that takes lots of time and energy even by itself. I'm afraid the 3rd line is suggesting that I'm spending to much time working with my band, or maybe that I should focus on music, and give up languages. I suppose the 6th line is telling me that the situation will get better when the quarantine is over.

I have no clue on what the second hexagram 44 would mean.

Thanks everyone for your precious time.

 

[Trojina]

Hi

I'm a 25 years old student, I have a bachelor degree in linguistic and cultural mediation, and I'm also getting another bachelor degree in musical composition next year. In the meantime, I've decided to apply to the part-time master degree in cultural mediation. Before applying I've also asked the I Ching what to do about my desire to keep studying languages along with the conservatory, and I got The Well, with 3rd line changing. I interpreted it as I would regret it if I didn't "get the water" out of the well, which is clean, but not being used. But I should point out that my desire also comes out of the fact that I'm 25 already and the composition path is quite long and uncertain. That 3rd line might also be telling me that I'm too afraid, and that one of the main reasons why I want to get the master degree in languages is because I doubt that I will get a living out of music or have success as a composer. Anyway, I interpreted it as the former, and here I am, managing to study both.

Here I'm looking at the reading in the title 47.3.6>44 how to manage tasks...
It's quite a complex situation that takes mental energy for respondents (at least me) which is maybe why you got no replies yet even though you've done well in presenting your reading and offering your own views on the cast.

As it's complex and you know the situation best I'll just offer impressions starting with the cast as a sentence which might be 'Exhaustion's Temptation'. As I read the situation that is what I get a sense of - beware of being dragged down paths that offer nothing because they for a while seem tempting or irresistable to you.

44 can be those things that divert you from your way, occasionally this can be an inspiration, it may have been an inspiration here, that would be the desire to do whatever course has presented itself as in interruption to you, I'm not sure which option that is.

I mean you're tired and feel trapped in some sense, bogged down (47) and some option has come up as rather inviting - which option I have trouble grasping


Just reading again

I'm a 25 years old student, I have a bachelor degree in linguistic and cultural mediation, and I'm also getting another bachelor degree in musical composition next year. In the meantime, I've decided to apply to the part-time master degree in cultural mediation. Before applying I've also asked the I Ching what to do about my desire to keep studying languages along with the conservatory, and I got The Well, with 3rd line changing. I interpreted it as I would regret it if I didn't "get the water" out of the well, which is clean, but not being used. But I should point out that my desire also comes out of the fact that I'm 25 already and the composition path is quite long and uncertain. That 3rd line might also be telling me that I'm too afraid, and that one of the main reasons why I want to get the master degree in languages is because I doubt that I will get a living out of music or have success as a composer. Anyway, I interpreted it as the former, and here I am, managing to study both.

This is a different reading of 48.3 >29. I feel overwhelmed with information I can't tease apart, perhaps someone else can, it all sounds incredibly tiring and complicated to me.

Anyway focusing on the 47.3.6>44 what I see is as if there's a very tired person, already having a large plate of food to digest being tempted by yet another plate of food which they think might ease the sense of burden and entrapment. This is what 47.3 is about, looking for help and support in the wrong places. I can't be specific about which thing is the new distracting option all I can say is you can't afford to get dragged down blind alleys (44) because of a sense of exhaustion/weariness/imprisonment(47), that's not how to get out of imprisonment. It's all too much, the relating hexagram of this line by itself is 28, too much, seeking a way out except whatever shiny new thing you may be contemplating (44) isn't the way out.

47.6 tells you actually all these things you feel are holding you imprisoned aren't really, you can easily brush them away. I think you might be getting imprisoned in a maze of possibilities and so think another possibility is the way forward but it isn't. Carrying on and going deeper into what you are already doing is a better option (48.3)... it is interesting you got both 47.3 and 48.3, line 3 in both of the pair.


Change patterns here (the patterns the change lines alone make) are yang 52 and yin 58 so holding still in some sense is where you're coming from and feeling free to move outwards to express and talk and share can release that.

The question was simply 'how should I manage my tasks ?' and the simple answer is by having some suspicion of new and tempting paths (44) (47.3), resisting them in order to get deeper into the well of where your real interests lie (48.3). You can shake off uncertainties about opportunities that aren't really right for you and so move forward out of a sense of being rather stuck.

Too many possibilities can make a person freeze in indecision and feel burdened and very often there's a 44 distraction they might do well to pull away from. I don't what the 44 is here but it's generally something that's just come up as an idea, almost like an intrusion into existing plans. This can be creative, it can also be an unwanted diversion. My own sense of the 47.3.6>44 is that there's some things you look to as kinds of rescue plans which actually aren't. You need to go deeper (48) not wider and wider into the wilderness of 47.3.


That's my take without really understanding your circumstances so you'll need to take it as it fits.

 

[my_key]

Here I'm looking at the reading in the title 47.3.6>44 how to manage tasks...

The response is saying you are being overwhelmed by so much of what you are doing at the moment. Life is draining you and you are trying so hard to not let it. Maybe stepping away from the turmoil a little bit will help you.

How to manage the tasks?
47.3 - You are stuck and unable to keep all your plates spinning. See things for what they really are and steel yourself to let a few plates drop.
47.6 - You are making things way too complicated: juggling with too many balls. Things are tying you in knots and you are tying things in knots. Simplify things, recognise it's ok to handle things less than perfectly or to make a few mistakes.

Then put your efforts into the things that really matter for you and to you.

...or it may mean nothing like this.

Good Luck

 

[rosada]

44. The Image of wind blowing under heaven - it is a feeling of traveling about without stopping and the lines warn against getting sucked in, pulled off one's path.
Perhaps you are being advised to be clear about your goals so as not to get distracted.

 

[Phaboo]

Thanks to everyone. I'm reflecting on what decision I should make, although it's been quite clear that it's almost impossible to handle all of these things I'm doing all at the same time, as much as I wanted to.

I love studying chinese - that's the main reason why I applied for the master degree in the first place - but it needs daily active efforts just as much as music does. I began studying both 5 years ago, but at that time it was different. The more you dive into a subject, the more you have to go deep into it in order to improve with it. Then there's something else: even if I manage to graduate in both at the same time, what then? At some point I will have to choose anyway. There is the possibility of merging the two, like teaching music in china, studying chinese folk music, working as a translator in the music area, but that sounds like merging the two for the sake of it in some ways... And even if that would be my ultimate goal, doing both at the same time isn't necessarily the most practical solution, only because it's technically doable. At the end of the day, graduating doesn't mean you mastered the subject or craft per se.

Then there's the fact that I play and write non-academic music, with my band. But that's directly influencing me as a musician, even though the efforts I make with rock music is not directly recognized in my academic path. It makes me breathe.

So, I have to decide whether to renounce studying languages, since music is my main goal, or simply let it go and see where studying both brings me to, while concentrating more on music and treating languages as a side thing, as it should be.

One last thing: this year has lots of objective difficulties, which are not my faults. My composition teacher had a stroke and the substitute was nominated only a few months ago, the chinese linguistics teacher died in an accident and he was substituted only a month ago (!), I also changed two other teachers, hence why I'm crammed with lessons. It doesn't entirely depend on me...