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Your Experiences with Unchanging Castings - Hexagram 54

Trojina

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I was trying to start the uc threads in the manner of the mood of the hexagram in question


Oh dear...
Oh dear me

I'm not sure anyone will actually have the time to read this.

In fact I am pretty sure it will end up at the very bottom of the thread pile...un noticed

I have checked my journal so far for 54uc casts and now have a list by my side of all the questions I got 54 uc for.

There is a fairly strong common theme,,,it turns out to be a list of demoralising experiences. What it seems to boil down to, subjectively speaking, is the awareness that my feelings/motives/ wishes ...whatever don't matter or count in the situation. One cannot move forward with one's own agenda because one's own agenda is secondary in the situation...What it has felt like is that the situation dominates any wishes I might have in regard to it. This is just a part of life of course....er it just isn't very edifying in relationships of any kind. If the question is about work/your boss it seems easier to digest. But in family relationships, friendships..and 'love' ....well 54uc is not so welcome.

In it's unchanging form it feels to me to be quite a stark and emphatic statement of something I have to accept about the relationship. Or if one has freedom of choice one may decide it isn't enough to feel secondary..


The other aspect of 54uc that has stayed in my mind was to do with a purchase. I had seen something I wanted but didn't need. For some reason I got into that state of mind where I felt I just had to have this thing. I asked Yi about getting it and got 54uc....and I recognised that feeling of compulsion, of being pushed by desire, was very 54ish. In my notes I have the words
'hasty,
whimsical,
following desire,
shallow'

and er I think that was my frame of mind around acquiring something that I didn't need. I got the thing anyway and it wasn't suitable and indeed I had just been subject to a particular 'I want it now...' frame of mind. Why do I associate that frame of mind with 54 ? Because 54 has come up for that slightly obsessive, consumerist mind set probably many of us get into some times. I'm also linking this with what advertising does...what it hooks into in us. I'm not sure how I can clearly justify linking 54 with that part of us that responds to the advertising ....I guess when faced with advertising sometimes we become small, we recede, we become secondary or slave to that wish. At least that is one way I have experienced 54uc to date.

Sometimes the Image helps understand a hexagram in it's unchanging form.

From Hilary's book



'Above the lake, there is thunder: the Marrying Maiden.
A noble one through ever- flowing endings
Knows what wears out.'

The lake is stirred and awoken by thunder, the vibrations travelling deep through the water. The noble one is inwardly as fluid as the lake, always open and responsive. So the shock of the new quickens her heart to a new awareness, and she senses the currents of change. She sees how things that are complete are also flowing, like water, and this is how they endure - as the generations of a family endure. And as the spreading vibrations from the thunder reveal what is flawed, she also gains a direct and sure knowledge of what is too brittle to last.


If Maria reads this it would be good to have her picture of the sands....it sticks in my mind as she has used it to portray 54 before. I think there are figures stranded on sands/ sand castles by the sea.

I have also always liked Wilhelm's Image for 54 which I link with Maria's picture..(.will try to find link to picture)

'Thunder over the lake:
The image of the MARRYING MAIDEN.
Thus the superior man
Understands the transitory
In the light of the eternity of the end'

I do like the sound of that. Understanding the transitory in the light of the eternity of the end. I'm not completely sure what it means but I like it anyway and for me those words go with Maria's picture of the sand castles. That thing I spoke of that I wanted to buy, was, a sand castle.



Wing writes this of 54uc . Wing calls 54 'Subordinate'
The powerful upper trigram, CHEN, arousing movement, usurps the energy and influence of TUI, openness, below. When SUBORDINATE is received without change, it suggests that the path you have chosen, regardless of where you imagine it may lead, is actually a circle. You will end up where you began and will not transcend your current role. If you see this as unfortunate, then trace back to the beginning. This is where the situation was created and the only place where it can be changed.


I find that take on it quite interesting. I know I have had 54uc for relationships in which I am forever subordinate in some way...always waiting on someone else's wishes and not being valued for my individuality. I think that a common experience in 54 is that one's individuality is not visible to the other or is simply not relevant in the situation. In some scenarios it is only to be expected...packing boxes in a factory for example who you are is not relevant....you are there to pack boxes. I'm sure there are better examples.. If 54 uc shows up for queries around close friendships and so on I think it can be quite a wake up call....as in 'look this is what you are to this person, this is your role'.

I think 54uc can be really useful for one to assess one's position in a situation because it really isn't always obvious that one has little power in a situation. I've not given much thought to the trigrams but come to think of it receiving 54 has often felt something of a shock. I hadn't realised for example in some situations I had as little say or influence as I did. It has at times helped me to orientate myself to my true status in a situation. It's also interesting that actual status may not come into it.

I'm sure I heard a story of someone very important in a company getting 54. To all appearances she would not have seemed the subordinate. Anyway, yes it is very useful to know when you are the Marrying Maiden !


I look forward to hearing other's own experiences......if anyone ever finds the thread.

BTW though I quoted Hilary on the pair 53/54 in the 53uc thread it still is not very clear to me how and why 53/54 operate as a pair.
 

anemos

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I hope it works
have lost my password and the password and... the password
hexagram54.jpg
 

Trojina

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Great ! Thank you. I only just noticed that the figure standing on the island looks pregnant.
 

Tohpol

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Or arms folded in front of her in suitably contemplative fashion ....
 

Trojina

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Answering my own question..


BTW though I quoted Hilary on the pair 53/54 in the 53uc thread it still is not very clear to me how and why 53/54 operate as a pair

Hauling out my huge 'Original I Ching' by Ritsema and Sabbadini, I was intrigued by what I read about the pair 53/54 there.

Infiltrating: womanhood converting awaits manhood moving indeed.
Converting maidenhood: the completion belonging to womanhood indeed.

They call 53 'Infiltrating' and 54 'Converting maidenhood'.


So it seems that 53 is marriage from the man's POV and 54 from the maiden's POV...in ancient China that is. (Old news to many but not me.)

Their intro to 54 says

The situation described by this hexagram is characterised by realizing one's nature by accepting one's allotted destiny, as in the traditional image of a maiden finding her social maturity by entering the house of her husband.
 

anemos

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I think that pair, 53/54, is a good example of what we call complementary hexagrams. The ways I feel it, is that the one is intertwined to the other in a very coherent way. The look so similar in some respects, yet, so diversely different in others. Its hard, imo, to think of 53, without following the advises of 54 and vice versa. Everything you "create" in 53 needs to maintain it (54). Time , expectations and maturity is a common theme, whether its about the external circumstances or the inner yearnings.

I spend several days in the hospital to assist my mother who had an accident and noways help her at home. Perhaps posting this image the day before the accident was the reason it was and still is in my mind. Its my pacifier and reminds me that consent its the only vehicle will help me float. Consent , its more powerful, imo, than accept, compromise etc. When circumstances are difficult and you feel you have no control , self-control is the only thing you have.

I was given 54 many times ( un, lines or relating) while I was trying to understand what was going in my mind and body while facing- and ignoring- the signs of exhaustion. What I had no understand then was the power of consenting.
 
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sooo

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If there is a single translation then why do translators translate the same things so differently, and so many claim to have translated the true text? That's why to me they're all interpretations. Each infuses their own persona, their own values. I'm not suggesting there's something wrong with that since it's the best we can do with what there is to work with. I like listening/reading what Harmen has to say about these things; always exploring, finding artifacts, uncovering more information, and admitting to our limitations. Perhaps the original (not original Ritsema and Sabbadini, which is still an interpretation), was never intended to be a finite work or understanding. Perhaps doors were intended to be left open rather than sealed shut and made complete and final.

I interpret the 53/54 pairing as both being part of the whole, with the difference being that 53 has no hierarchy: no chief, head, general, husband, first, second or third wife, but all are one, all water buckets are on the same water wheel, all the geese fly as one flock, and that is how steady progress happens - whereas 54 shows a clear hierarchy with the young maiden in the lowest position, but making the best of it, and by doing so sets the example to keep her sight on greater and farther things than herself. It shows leadership from the bottom, thus making all equal regardless of rank or seniority. At least that is the goal, a difficult and ego-less personal challenge.
 

jzy369

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Friends:

I joined this forum to learn,test, and refine my understanding of I Ching text. In the past 2000+ years, many respected and famous scholars throughout Chinese history interpreted I Ching with large variations. Some even claimed the original text has errors becaue they could not make sense of the original text! So I believe we have to derive our own interpreation that works for us. Through constant application and refinement to real life situations, I believe we can refine our interpretations iteratively. My personal experience is that forming one's own understanding of I Ching is an arduous journey that requires works and rational thinking. The reward is insight to the rhythms of spiritual and material life.

Under such context, I really appreciate Trojina's detailed experience with 54. It helped me confirmed my understanding of 54. I summarize this hex as "Settling For An Inferior Arrangement". Trojina's purchase experience matches 54's line 6 metaphor of woman holding an empty basket. Wow, our consolidated wisdom can be really powerful... Thanks again, Trojina, for sharing your personal journal.
 

anemos

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I interpret the 53/54 pairing as both being part of the whole, with the difference being that 53 has no hierarchy: no chief, head, general, husband, first, second or third wife, but all are one, all water buckets are on the same water wheel, all the geese fly as one flock, and that is how steady progress happens - whereas 54 shows a clear hierarchy with the young maiden in the lowest position, but making the best of it, and by doing so sets the example to keep her sight on greater and farther things than herself. It shows leadership from the bottom, thus making all equal regardless of rank or seniority. At least that is the goal, a difficult and ego-less personal challenge.

I agree with that observation . I also see a kind of gradual maturity in 53 which has an inherent hierarchy ( in lack of better word) which is present in 54 too.

Have been looking at my visual subjective interpretation of those hexes - the images I posted above- and I realize that even in those pictures , those similarities - I perceive- are silent. I'm in trouble, lol
 

Trojina

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Ritsema and Sabbadini I quoted made me reflect that in 53 the waiting upon gradual development is with the husband who must go through the formal procedures and rituals of courtship. Having to wait and having to have the patience to go through such procedures is in itself almost a 54 kind of experience. Young men typically don't want to have to wait to get the girl into their bed. In modern times it is all speeded up quite a lot of course but there often are still rituals. First date, dinner, trips out and so on. All this time the man/husband is likely eager to er you know 'get on with it' . So I see it that 53 and 54 are different aspects of waiting on/being secondary to another. Whether that be another person or bureaucratic system or a job.

In 53 one may be in the role of the suitor in some way. One is obedient to the prescribed rituals of courtship in order to make a lasting union. An imaginary example might be a very clever capable young person starting in a workplace in the lowest position and working their way up through meeting all the requirements with patience. In 54 it seems one does not go to meet the requirements the requirements take you. You aren't taking the initiative in how you progress through the workplace. You are put where ever you are placed.

I can see now how this pair are inextricably bound. I mean they are almost similar experiences from different points of view. One could say in 53 he has to also be 'put where he is placed' but he's choosing still, or has the initiative to progress albeit in the prescribed way laid out for him.

In 53, the male, as in all the folk stories, must go through all kinds of tests and trials to win the lady.
In 54 the lady is won and is carried off on horseback.,,,,or somewhere
 
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Trojina

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Maria it would be fantastic if you have pictures like these for every pair :flirt: I find it helpful when they are placed side by side like you just did.
 
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sooo

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I'll have to give more contemplation to the male/female role of 53. I can certainly visualize your points, I've just not applied them in that way before.

Regarding 54, I've never seen her as stuck in that entry level position. Her greatest potential asset is her long range vision. She may become queen some day. Song of Songs (of King Solomon) depicts a lowly commoner, working the fields in the hot sun, being elevated to the love of his life.
 

Trojina

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Yes I've seen 54.5 play out. Cinderella wins out against the ugly sisters. Not always so ugly in real life but the one who seems to have no chance becomes the real bride or finds the real value.


In updating my journal I have just come across another example of 54uc. I was due to have a new mobile phone. My last phone on a contract was a nightmare. It kept going wrong and had to be returned 3 times for repair or replacement. I wanted out of that contract but it was a 2 year one so I had to keep the stupid phone. So after that contract ended I had to decide what to do. I had really gone off contracts but you do get the best deal sometimes with contracts, especially if you cannot afford a brand new phone as the price of the phone is included in the deal.

I asked Yi 'what about another contract ?' I got 54uc and felt it described that position well ! I took it as a 'no' but on asking about the alternative got 64.4 so actually I started to see 54 answer here a bit differently. I mean in terms of phone services I kind of prefer 54uc to 64.4 ! So I did a lot more research on phones by phoning call centres and talking to young men :flirt: and decided to switch from Nokia (which I had long been faithful to) to a Samsung (android much better). To get this new phone (with internet and everything..) I had to re enter a contract with my provider. I deliberated but it was a good deal ! For only an extra £1 I would have a really great phone.


So I took the contract and so far I am pleased and have no regrets.


Whilst contracts can bind and place you second they can, sometimes, also keep you safe, in a sense. Whilst under this contract if the phone goes wrong I get free repair and so on. If I had gone 'solo' so to speak the whole responsibility of the phone would fall to me which I didn't want. It was actually just easier and more convenient to have a contract. So while often 54 can place you in the under dog role there are also times I think where being the second wife is quite useful/palatable/convenient.




If my memory serves Sooo you once had 54 when you went to live in someone's house for a time and the arrangement, the contract, suited you.
 
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sooo

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That's interesting. I follow your reasoning.

Often I think it's not a matter of right or wrong, nor even better or worse, but what serves our need and desire the best, including some practical things we may prefer not to look at during that time, 62 economics and such.

Having been bound by contracts so often, so deep and so tightly in my past (my mentor referred to corporate contracts as being tied in golden chains), to the point of nearly choking me to death; having become finally free of them, I live life month to month, debt free, modestly. There are no doubt down sides, like being single, renting housing - yet I've learned that to default on a 30 year mortgage lands one in the same street as failing to pay a month's rent; the only difference is that there's no bank hounding me every day, no lawyers to pay. There's some loss of prestige, no late model SUVs, credit cards with crazy interest fees. I guess I prefer living in the 64 zone right now, and for the moment anyhow, the devils have been cast out of line 4.

But like Chris L. always said, all hexagrams apply all the time. We choose the best fit, and the Yi can be an excellent fashion coordinator. Choose and where it well, I think is the lesson, dress for the occasion, and no one size fits all.

But to return to 54, for me the big picture of it has always been, and I think always will be, that this body I live in is only temporary. The real me is the light of eternity.
 

anemos

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Maria it would be fantastic if you have pictures like these for every pair :flirt: I find it helpful when they are placed side by side like you just did.

If Santa wants will finish eventually that collection. :rolleyes: Still lots of them missing. But hey!! we are in 53/54 .. I have time ;)
 

anemos

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There is a sense of freedom in 54 what might be not salient at a first glance but there is. Your experiences about contracts , I feel, shows that. Marriage is a contract too- the theme of both hexes.
 
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sooo

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In my world, marriage is a metaphor for anything or anyone that I commit to. But in all images of marriage, it is a connection between the spirit and the soul that is foremost. In 53, it is intended to be or 'develops' into a more long range commitment. It may not even be considered a committed relationship, it just becomes that over time, demonstrated through loyalty, consistency (which seems to be one of the rarest of human attributes), bound not so much by contract but by love.

Even though my landlord friends refer to me as one of the family, I do not consider that a marriage of the 53 kind; not after just one year at any rate. It is a 54 relationship: conditional and temporary. I pay rent each month, and I can stay for another month. That's the long and short of it. I enjoy my friendship and most of what we share, but it in no way resembles a marriage. Our contract, as I said, is month to month.

This period of my life has only one temporal marriage remaining: that between my body and soul, also until death do us part. Because death marks the end of marriage in many cases, my relationship, or one might say, my contract with physical life is of a 54 nature, not 53. The only true marriage therefore is between my soul and eternity - referred to as many names: Christ, Buddha, light of eternity, God, Universe, Rama, Krishna, or any of the other names given to Spirit, The Creative, The Creator. A monk, nun or priest marries deity while in the physical body; it is an eternal relationship, of loyalty and fidelity. The feather which falls from heaven in 53.6 is the equivalent of the marriage ring, part of the ceremony and dance.

In contrast, 54 is a temporary contract only. That's why for me, since I began using the IC, it represents impermanence, and therefore it is not me. It often manifests as an emotion, not too unlike 44: "the other woman". In ancient Biblical symbolism, 54 is Eve, 44 is Lilith. A relationship with life itself is 53 - a gradual, lifelong development that does not end after death.

This is the archetype I've cast, from which every day minor examples crop up. If my body is sick, it is 54. I never call a sickness mine. I am not sick, my body is sick, and my body is 54. When I receive 54, it reminds me, this is not you; it is your body, your emotions, your conditioning, your temporary home. When I receive 53, I am told to abide, with dignity and fidelity.
 

anemos

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Trying for days to comment on your last post but my mind thinks and thinks and doesn't type. Impermanence and your association between 44 and 54 had occur to me. I almost write that 44 is who is called powerful woman but 54 can be called that way too. Different "powers", perhaps the field exert is different too, but in a broader sense there are similarities between those too.

Once again, something has been discussed in various ways here at the forum, two apparently different charcters/ hex fit together. We are all the hex, sometimes A Hex sometimes B- totAly opposite/ different than A. ...... a plural psyche .
 
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sooo

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Because this is an area designated to our personal experiences with hexagrams, I should clarify that that's what I've presented here: a very personal view of 54 (primarily), plus associations with 53 and a touch of 44. I'm not suggesting that this is how it is, only that this is how I've experienced it and continue to experience it.

I make generalizations about 54, but as with all generalizations, there are variables. For example, renting a home is a 54 condition; be it satisfying or too limited, or somewhere in-between, a renter is subject to the home or apartment owner and their will. But being an owner is subject also to government regulations, property taxes, bank mortgages, and so forth. Bob Dylan wrote, "but you're gonna have to serve somebody", and I think that's a great anthem for 54.

The big 54 picture always predominates my view from a whole-life perspective, that this body is also a rented home, and it does not define me. I'm lucky to have this home. I think many demons would love to live in it, and constant home cleaning is all that prevents it from being co-occupied. I enforce rules here, since I'm paying the rent: no spiders, rodents, scorpions or snakes are allowed to live here, nor people who resemble them (had my share of them already). And the light of eternity, whether I retain an individual light or whether I dissipate into the grand light, makes no difference, that is my eternal home, and it is there where my long range focus is fixed. That is foremost. That is my true identity and my true home, my salvation, my deliverer, my ultimate freedom. Everything else is temporal. That is how I interpret 54 on a large scale.
 

Trojina

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Yes...that explains Wilhelm's



'Thunder over the lake:
The image of the MARRYING MAIDEN.
Thus the superior man
Understands the transitory
In the light of the eternity of the end'
 

anemos

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The loss of some power , or find your self in a 54 position can be shocking. In my past experience, I shared, with the many 54, I can say that reacted in a 44 way .

The personal experiences shared is what makes un hex threads really interesting and helpful. There is an aspect of 54 too.
 
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sooo

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The loss of some power , or find your self in a 54 position can be shocking. In my past experience, I shared, with the many 54, I can say that reacted in a 44 way .

The personal experiences shared is what makes un hex threads really interesting and helpful. There is an aspect of 54 too.

That's an interesting comment. I think reacting in a 44 way is quite often our emotional reaction toward being treated in a 54 manner.
 

anemos

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That's an interesting comment. I think reacting in a 44 way is quite often our emotional reaction toward being treated in a 54 manner.

Yup, although we are told " to set things right , pitfall" .. of course I knew that just wanted to explore the null hypothesis:p
:rolleyes:
 

anemos

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Have been thinking a lot lately about a situation and my efforts to keep things alive. Some recent events made me consider again my involvement and anything I'm doing to revive it. Today I asked : " is it over ?" and got 54 un. I used this site's tool and noticed Hilary's comment " she knows what wears out". I took 54 as a qualified "yes, it's over".

More or less, it's everything has been said so farin these thread. For me personally, I can say, it's the first time I can understand and see so clear the message that you can't do much about a situation and the bittr-sweet advice Yi shares.
 

solivini

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Just wanted to share this quick little reading I done in hopes that it will shed some light on 54 unchanging for folks like myself who sometimes have a hard time deciphering it.

I am taking an Asian Philosophy class this summer at University. I was curious to know if the I-ching would be mentioned at all as a part of it. The particular section I was on was Confucianism, and I had a bit of pre-knowledge that Confucius advocated for the I-Ching to be one of the major cannons of study in his philosophy.

I asked, "Will you (Yi) be mentioned in this chapter that I am about to read?"
It answered, "54 Unchanging"

I set off to read the chapter, and sure enough it was mentioned, but just as an aside. Here is the quote from the book, which is "Classical Asian Philosophy" by Joel Kupperman:

"...Confucius and his students read moral messages or hints about the good life into the poems, [The Book of Songs] much as some readers find moral messages in the I-Ching (Book of Changes), on the surface merely a manual of fortunetelling."

So, I found it interesting that Yi answered that it would be mentioned on a secondary level, which is what I figured it was telling me before I began to read the textbook.

I'm glad he added in "on the surface" because we all know it's really far more than that :)
 

canislulu

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Moments ago I asked, "Is it time for a Third Party in the United States?" received Hexagram 54 Unchanging
 

mulberry

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Well. Here I am in the Your Experiences with Unchanging Castings-- Hexagram 54 thread, because I asked... "How should I deal with being so bored at work?"

:rofl:

I love it when I encounter the oracle's sense of humor. Wing's translation as "Subordinate" is so apt here, as is Jzy369's summary of the hexagram as "Settling For An Inferior Arrangement."

Anyway, the reading mostly speaks for itself, I think! After I received it, I went back to my desk and carried on finishing the laundry list of paperwork tasks I'd been delegated.

PS-- My job is often interesting, but the last few weeks have been just really dull, with little in the way of self-direction possible.
 

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