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Blog post: Yi, emotions and decisions

hilary

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How often have you heard someone say they need to consult with Yi (and perhaps need help with the interpretation) because they’re ‘too subjective’ or ‘too emotionally involved’ with the topic?
In a way, that can be true. We can be too close to something, too caught up in its ins-and-outs, and need to step back to find space to see the situation from a new angle. That’s something readings help with. Remembering Yi’s response to,*‘What do we give, when we give a reading?’ – 34.1.2.3.4 to 2 – it seems to me that this is what happens at line 4 –
‘Constancy, good fortune.
Regrets vanish.
The hedge broken through, no entanglement.
Vigour in the axle straps of a great cart.’
– when we break through and are no longer trapped inside those thought-hedges that block most of the world from sight.
However, what we’re escaping here is not emotional involvement; in fact, the idea that emotion gets in the way of taking decisions turns out to be exactly wrong.
There have been famous medical cases of people with brain injuries that left their rational intelligence perfectly intact, while they lost the capacity to feel emotion: people who, in effect, are compelled to take decisions without emotional involvement. They*either make atrociously bad decisions or make none at all.
An anecdote from a case history: a man with this type of brain damage is offered a choice of two dates for his next appointment. He pulls out his diary and begins enumerating the pros and cons of each option, lucidly and in detail. Thirty minutes later, he is*still*weighing the pros and cons; finally, the doctor tells him which day to come, and he says, ‘OK, fine’ and leaves.
So for this man stuck in an endless loop of ‘on the one hand… on the other hand…’ the problem was a*lack of subjectivity.*His situation is extreme, and tragic – but I think still has something in common with the kind of indecision we bring to the oracle.
To look at this from the opposite direction for a moment,*think of that commonly-taught way of motivating yourself by tapping into the emotion associated with the end result. You vividly imagine attaining your end result, deliberately become aware of its full emotional impact, then connect that emotional state to the work you need to do today. Emotional involvement gives you the power*to break through the hedge and get started.
And… I think readings, especially readings about decisions, work in a similar – if subtler – way. From what I’ve seen of how people struggle, where we get stuck and how we get unstuck, readings*don’t work like a list of pros and cons. Instead, we ask ‘What about doing this?’ ‘What about doing that instead?’ and Yi says,*‘Here is what that would be like.’ It gives you a*picture of the experience, something you can imagine yourself living, so you know how it feels.
Sometimes, of course, it also tells*you that what you’re contemplating is objectively a good or bad idea (good fortune, pitfall…), but often the reading experience is more completely subjective than you might realise at the time.
This is something that’s easier to see when you watch other people respond to their readings. Someone might be discouraged by*Hexagram 46, Pushing Upward (‘Do not worry, set forth to the south, good fortune!’) because they can’t face the prospect of a long, step-by-step climb. Someone else might welcome Hexagram 44, Coupling (‘Do not marry this woman!’), because they enjoy risk and uncertainty. Hexagram 29, the Repeating Chasms, might be greeted with ‘No, not that again!’ or ‘Yes, that’s how deeply I’m committed to this.’ And in each case, that unique and wholly subjective emotional response is what makes a decision possible.
In other words… Yi isn’t a way to become less emotionally involved; it’s more like the opposite.*It gives us a clear and direct emotional connection to*our reality, so we can rediscover the capacity to choose.
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rosada

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Absolutely - The I Ching is the tool for quieting the mind so we can perceive the emotional response that has been distorted by the mental energy waves. When the mind is confused and doesn't know how to encapsulate the situation in words the hexagrams do that for it. Then with the mind satisfied the emotional response comes through.

Person: Should I buy this house?
Mind: It's big, and it costs money, but it's in a good neighborhood, but what if something happens? The world might come to and end etc. etc. I'll ask the I Ching.
I Ching: "She is the treasure of the house."
Mind: That means if I like the house, I can make it a good buy.
Emotions: Exactly! I love this house and I'll make it a treasure! I'll buy it! [or]
Emotions: Exactly! But the thing is, I don't really like this house, it may look good on paper but I can feel I'm not inspired to make much out of it. I won't buy it.

So the I Ching calms the mind so the true feelings can be experienced.

I think this explains why it is so important to focus and decipher the answer to the first question asked before asking another. ("If he asks twice it is importunity. If he importunes I give no answer!") It is in the finding the meaning in the hexagram that the mind becomes calm. When the mind is calm, the answer is understood. When the mind is not calm no answer will be understood and thus asking a second question will only create more confusion.
m2c, Rosada
 
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angelatlantis14

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"However, what were escaping here is not emotional involvement; in fact, the idea that emotion gets in the way of taking decisions turns out to be exactly wrong."
Finally, someone states that clearly and unequivocally :)
I've always found the idea that only "objective" decisions and judgements are valid slightly bizarre - for one thing I believe there is no such thhing as true objectivity where humans are concerned, and for another if it existed it would probably be worthless, as objective is not how humans work...

Most of the time when we ask the I ching we ask for an emotional response for an emotional question - disregarding this component would to my mind distort any interpretation of the answer.
 
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Candid_X

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I get the point with a fair share of pragmatism. But pragmatism alone strikes me as cold, and it's hard to light a fire with an icicle. It's hard to ignite intuition and imagination with thought alone, even if based on facts, as far as we know facts to be factual. If the Yijing is purely factual, no one would ever need an interpretation, nor could we interpret a book of metaphors with facts alone. I believe it is cognition: the alchemy and interaction between reason and intuition which stirs the question and receiving a satisfying response. That's why the idea of "I Ching study" leaves me cold. Observation of nature is a living thing, constantly changing, never complete as though a fact. I suppose specialists study nature, but it doesn't necessarily make them any more natural. And if the Yijing doesn't change us, what's the use of it? It is reason that has the potential to adjust our emotions, and emotions which can give life to our reasoning.
 

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