"What wil be achieved from writing my novel?" 60.3.4.6 -> 1

[compass]

Hi,

Although this is my first posting to Clarity, I've done I Ching readings on and off for years and really enjoy the images the hexagrams bring up--how simple imagery can turn up such deep meanings.

I'm a writer, and for past decade or so have been writing and publishing poetry. Before that, I spent 5 years writing a novel that I was never able to get published. Last year I started thinking about the novel again and how I would re-write it, and this past few weeks I've started doing it and have even asked a friend who's a novelist to look over what I've done so far and he's been very encouraging. Still the task seems very daunting. (One of the reasons I've been writing poetry for the past few years is that poems are 'faster' to write and you can get them published quicker. )

So a couple days ago I asked the I Ching 'What will be achieved from writing this novel?' and I got hexagram 60.3.4.6 changing into hexagram 1.

A couple of different sources I've come across interpret hex 60 as 'limitation' or 'articulation'. I'm wondering if this is about discipline and ensuring that I write on a regular schedule that results in 'the creative', and that lines 3 & 4 are about not sticking to that discipline and realizing I've only myself to blame (3) and then finding my center and taking it on (4). Changing line 6 puzzles me.

I'd love to hear what others think. Thanks in advance and sorry for the long-windedness.

Kind regards,
Compass

 

[pocossin]

What wil be achieved from writing my novel?
60.3.4.6 > 1

You will bury this project, and your creativity will get on to something else.

asked a friend who's a novelist to look over what I've done so far and he's been very encouraging

Your friend is doing you no favor by a cheap sympathy. If your novel were not fundamentally flawed and were easily corrected, someone would have pointed this out to you. Surely you know the odds of writing a novel that is commercially successful -- about one in ten thousand, as I remember, so hold onto your day job. I had a friend, the author of Crazy Dream Horse. If he had asked me, I could have corrected his novel, but he didn't ask, and this novel contains probably the best description there is of hoodoo, but the reader has to pass through a dozen tedious chapters to get to it. The first twenty pages are deadwood and need to be eliminated or rewritten. I bought four copies from the author and circulated them for responses, which were uniformly negative. Readers do not buy novels to be tormented by long tracts of dullness. His great dream in life was to be recognized as a novelist, but it didn't happen. Time to once again visit his grave.

 

[Trojina]

I'm a writer, and for past decade or so have been writing and publishing poetry. Before that, I spent 5 years writing a novel that I was never able to get published. Last year I started thinking about the novel again and how I would re-write it, and this past few weeks I've started doing it and have even asked a friend who's a novelist to look over what I've done so far and he's been very encouraging. Still the task seems very daunting. (One of the reasons I've been writing poetry for the past few years is that poems are 'faster' to write and you can get them published quicker. )

So a couple days ago I asked the I Ching 'What will be achieved from writing this novel?' and I got hexagram 60.3.4.6 changing into hexagram 1.

A couple of different sources I've come across interpret hex 60 as 'limitation' or 'articulation'. I'm wondering if this is about discipline and ensuring that I write on a regular schedule that results in 'the creative', and that lines 3 & 4 are about not sticking to that discipline and realizing I've only myself to blame (3) and then finding my center and taking it on (4). Changing line 6 puzzles me.

I'd love to hear what others think. Thanks in advance and sorry for the long-windedness.

I've looked at this thread a few times and not answered as I'm not sure what to make of it. If we take hex 1 here as your creativity, the source of it, 60 demands it be actualised in a very prescribed (?) or particular way. I think the reading may be asking if you really can channel and hone the huge potential of hexagram 1 via this format ? Hexagram 1 is limitless in it's creative potential. 1 unchanging often finds no way to bring it through to earth reality. Hexagram 1 needs a field to act in. Here it acts through boundaries/measures/limitations. How easily would you say hex 1 sits with hex 60 ?

It reminds me of a ballet dancer. All that huge potential of physical power must be bought through in all those hours of practising the perfect pirouette or whatever steps there are. Huge attention to detail, huge self discipline is required and huge dedication. One cannot just throw oneself about at random (that is how I like to dance )

You asked what might be achieved by writing this novel ? Hmm the answer just seems to ask if you are up to the level of discipline required and whether such self discipline is even good for you or the best form for your to express your literary talents ? I mean I'm wondering if this is too demanding, too cumbersome for your nature ? You think you write poetry because it is published more quickly and so on but I wonder if it is more true to say that in fact poetry is really more your natural art form ? Perhaps it is that through which your creativity can flow through best ? I mean poetry isn't 2nd best IMO. I much prefer poetry to novels as I get bored with novels.....I can never bring myself to care what happens next. I like poems because they are short...and edible and nourishing, in a way that novels are not.


Anyway that's enough about me !

Looking at the change patterns. The yang change pattern is 56 suggesting that you are not much at home with this project, it doesn't quite suit you. The yin pattern, the way through is 60...again. I wonder if you need to really have a think about how your own personal nature is suited to the work of novel writing ?

Looking at the lines ;

60.3 suggests you need to be more self aware of your own habits and abilities.
60.4 you actually can find a happy medium, a way to work if you acknowledge you need more discipline.
60.6 well but don't go too far with this and make yourself unhappy !

LOL there are contradictions....it's like a lot of balancing is required..in terms of your timetable, your energies and so on.


The shadow hexagram ( I will link to blog on this here http://onlineclarity.co.uk/answers/2014/03/26/shadow-hexagrams-revisited/) is what approach not to take. Here the shadow is hexagram 5 so this is no time to be hanging about to see what happens, allowing time to pass, allowing things to take their course. I wonder if you have some other life pressures that are asking you if you really can get on with this now ?


What do you think ? BTW I don't think the answer says 'don't do this' but you asked what might be achieved ? What did you mean ? I mean if you write a novel you achieve writing a novel and IMO that is an achievement whether it is published or not ! But I'm wondering if you meant really 'will it be published ?'. If that was your underlying question I wouldn't like to predict at all. I think really you have to decide how writing this fits with your life now. I also think you may need a serious re evaluation of how you spend time and what your life priorities are (60.3) I wonder if other areas of your life are needing more attention perhaps ?

 

[compass]

Trojina, what a very insightful reply! Thank you so much. Like many people, I do have a lot of priorities with each day, and often get up early before the rest of my family in order to write and then try to squeeze in another hour after they've gone off to school and work. (In fact, I'd like to continue writing throughout the day rather than having to start on my full-time work of freelance editing.) Of course, I always feel there's not enough hours in the day.

Discipline has been a hard-learned lesson for me and when I wrote the novel originally a decade ago I was very relieved to have finished it, but was definitely ready to move on to pastures new (so yes, Hexagram 5 is definitely shadow here). Returning to poetry, which I hadn't written the whole time I was writing the novel, was a great joy. I had missed it. So, yes, the 'quick turnaround' is probably not the real reason why I write poetry. It is nature. I do believe in the Dao and in discovering and acknowledging one's true nature, and that the worst struggles come when you fight against it. Or in other words, part of the struggle comes through that discovery and acknowledgement.

On the other hand, I do enjoy story-telling though (it's what I wanted to do since I was 7), and to answer the other responder on this thread, I glossed over when I said my novelist friend was 'encouraging'. He actually gave me a very detailed, honest response and critique of what I needed to work on--overall, very encouraging and supportive--and that's when the task ahead felt very daunting and I turned to the I Ching.

Trojina, your last paragraph was spot on!!! Again, thank you. Right after I asked my question and got the results, I immediately asked a second question, which like you said was also what I wanted to know. I asked 'Will my novel get published?' I got Hexagram 57.1.2.4.5 (Gently Penetrating) --> Hexagram 30 (Clarity (or Radiance?)). I wanted to hear what people had to say about the first reading before bringing up the second. I didn't know whether I should post the second one in a separate thread so a different discussion can take place (and I'd love to hear thoughts about that, as I feel it's a more positive response). If so, I will with a link to this one so others can catch up. :-D

 

[mulberry]

Personally, I find this an encouraging casting. Not that you will necessarily produce a commercially successful book out of this attempt, should you make it-- but that the attempt will lead you somewhere for the betterment of your whole self and your creativity.

I also took a look at your second casting, 57.1.2.4.5-> 30, though with hesitation because (after years of bugging it on this subject), I don't think the oracle is capable of answering such specific questions as "Will my novel get published?" before it is actually completed. I have worked in publishing for years and write as well, and I've noticed some distinct shifts in Yi's response to my questions about where things will end up (in terms of book projects) AFTER I've made significant changes in the text of what I'm working on. Does that make sense? There seems to be my own free will at work in the creative/editorial process, and then Yi's response shifts in reaction to that.

What I'm trying to say is 1.) the burden is on you to finish it or make significant progress before any questions of publishing can be successfully posed (in my experience) and 2.) don't get ahead of yourself. The 57 reading, with its changing lines, seems to be a gentle reminder about your own attitude towards the work at hand. The changing lines (especially 2, with the priests and magicians) seem to be asking you, what are the influences at hand that make you seek out this goal (being published)? And do you have the energy required to achieve that goal (line 5, as well as line 1)?

I wish you the best of luck!

 

[AnitaS]

Hi Compass
While 60 is all about setting limits - stretching your schedule or tightening it -., Hexagram 1 is the creation hex, so you could be giving your novel a better chance by rewriting it.

Here's the section on Creative Judgement from The I Ching on Business and Decision Making - Guy Damian Knight

There is good discernment in general but give time to sharpen up. If you're evaluating your own possibilities, do not be so quick to jump to conclusions. You should not set schedules which are patently unachievable , but neither should you be so timid and self limiting that you deny yourself a challenge. During such considerations, avoid being heavily weighed down by pragmatics.

As one novelist to another, happy rewriting! It could be well worth your while to sign up with NAnowrimo to give your motivation the added impetus. I myself completed a novel in the last one.