Hi everyone,
I am wondering if anyone on this forum actually keeps track of the questions they have asked the IC and follow through in time with checking to see how the answer from the IC pans out in reality. I would love to read other people's discovery of how the IC's answer matched a particular situation, or did not match up. Has this topic already been covered in the past? Does anyone know of any archives dedicated specifically to this topic?
P.

P... Great question. I have kept track of them since day 1 and made notes as things come to light for each question. Sometimes I go back and make notes several times at different periods. It's a great way to learn. Have you been doing this, P.?

I, too, have wanted to read archives of cases. If anyone out there knows of any, please share! In the meanwhile, perhaps we could create our own archive for the benefit of all interested...

Schastlivchik

So glad someone else is interested, too! I started just such an archive as a 'hobby site' years ago at http://www.ichingresources.co.uk . It's an archive of experiences arranged by hexagram. If you have any stories to add, please email them to me!

(And yes, I keep track. On the computer, now, so it's searchable and I can actually read it.)

Yes, Pagan, I also keep track of my readings. I think a lot of people do. I keep them in a spreadsheet format so I can sort as well as search on key variables. I guess I could do all kinds of analysis if I wanted to, but to be perfectly honest I haven?t learned much by looking at my own old readings. Except a little humility.

There is another reason I keep track of old readings, a reason I never dreamed of when I started doing this.

I am a skeptical person. Half the time I think I?m crazy to use the Yi at all. Superstitious nonsense. Abrogation of responsibility. A cop-out. Then, when I?ve worked myself up into a full-blown rationalist frenzy, I go back and look at my old readings.

What I see is that the Yi has tried, time and again, to point me in the right direction. Old readings are like history ? it takes a while before you really understand what everything that happened was all about. When I finally realize what the Yi was trying to say to me, it has an effect on me. It isn?t just that it makes me a ?believer.? I?m not a lover of ?faith-based initiatives? (9/11 was a ?faith-based initiative,? wasn?t it?). But it makes me feel that something was trying to give me some help.

This is a good feeling. It doesn?t matter that half the time I?m too stupid to see what the Yi is showing me in the present moment. The fact is, something is trying to help me. I have tangible evidence of it in my old readings. This is pretty close to having personal proof there is a kind of love behind things in the universe.

So that?s why I keep my old readings.

I think it would be interesting to be able to go back in time to everytime I received a certain line of a certain hexagram and compare the questions and situations surrounding the questions. I would like to see, for example, every time I was given 23 line 4 as an answer. I would love to hear about it if anyone has done something like that.

I have one instance that is extraordinary. There was someone who I was dating but I never felt he was completely sincere with me, although I had no concrete reason for my discomfort. One day I was sorting through all my old IC questions and I noticed that I repeatedly got hexagram 40 line 6 whenever I asked about him. I never had a strong sense of what 40 line 6 means, so I would pretty much overlook it. To this day, I still don't know how 40 line 6 applied to me or him or the situation but I ended the relationship with him after he overstepped boundaries with me once too often.
P.

I keep a log of particularly important readings so I can refer back if I need to. I usually know when I'm asking a question whether it belongs there.

I keep most all my "day-to-day" readings (usually without writing the question) in a growing pile of scrap paper scribbled over with hexagrams. The rare times when I want to fish through to verify an old reading, I usually manage to find it if it's from within the last month or so.

Lindsay -

"This is pretty close to having personal proof there is a kind of love behind things in the universe. "

That's how I feel, too.

- Jeff

Just a guess, Pagan, about 40.6. You are the duke; your friend is the hawk. Your friend may be pretty and graceful, but he is still a predator. He is too subtle to come close and reveal himself. You will have to deal with him as though shooting at a distant target, but your eyesight is exellent. Even as he waits in the distance for his opportunity to strike, you recognize him for what he is, and you shoot him down. That is the right thing to do - nothing about this will cause you regret later.

I hand-write my daily question and related hexes, and a note or two about the interpretation, into a bound notebook. It's just about the only place I use handwriting these days. ("Have you got a pen and paper handy?" "No, but my PC's on and, whaddaya know, now Notepad is open. Go.") I review the notes occasionally, just to see how events on the ground are unfolding vs. what the Yi seemed to be saying. Depending on how compulsive I am on any given day, I'll also put readings into a huge Word doc I'm amassing, but I use the notebook every time, if nothing else for convenience in jotting down each line as I cast it.

I'm in the "it's all in the interpretation, or more to the point, the interpreter" camp; and for my purposes, it's useful to see my patterns of comprehension and misinterpretation.

Happy Thanksgiving Day to all!

Hi Lindsay,
I think you are correct about 40 line 6, that is how I experienced the situation. He did seem to be a predator to me but I still don't know any concrete thing about why that was. But I have learned to trust instincts now without trying to make any concrete logical conclusions from them.

Now I am in a situation with a person where I often get 17 line 4. I feel this person is not being sincere with me, and that seems to be what the IC is saying. It just blows my mind about how consistently I have gotten that answer when I ask about him over the past 6 months.

I asked the IC "does 17 line 4 mean that this person is being insincere with me?" and I got hex 61 line 4 which I interpret to mean "stop looking aside at other people's flaws--rather look at your own path and follow it sincerely". So I feel that I got sort of whipped by the Sage for getting distracted with another person's character deficiency, letting that distract me from my own path.

This is one reason why I particularly get a lot out of Carol Anthony's commentary because she puts it back in your own lap every time.
P.

Dear Pagan,

About your readings of 17.4 and 61.4, I think you are very close to the mark. Maybe it will be a little uncomfortable for you, but this situation is different from the one with the hawk. 17.4 seems to me to be a warning not to press this relationship too hard. It is still pliable, baby-boned. As long as you are honest with yourself, you?ll be OK. But it will be a mistake to treat this rabbit like a quarry for your suspicion. More important to focus on your own deepest sincere feelings. Do you really want him?

61.4 seems to force the issue. The moon is almost full ? the situation cannot become much clearer or developed. This is the brink of full-moon time for this relationship. The moon is your planet, not his, so I guess things are about as clear to you now as they will ever be. What do you see? A paired team of horses? Or one abandoning its mate? Either way, no blame. Multiple realities are possible. It is the clarity of your vision that matters, the scene as you see it in the full, stark moonlight of your intuition. You see it all now in black-and-white, you only need to act on what you see.

Only my view,

Lindsay

Hi Lindsay,
What a shock I had today. After thinking about 61 line 4 I decided to do a tarot reading about this relationship and the reading had a lot of suspicious things like the Devil card, the 2 of cups reversed, the seven of swords and the High Priestess. So I sent him an email and in the subject line I wrote WHAT HAVE YOU DONE? Then in the body of the email I said, "the oracle says you are being dishonest with me, is it true?"

He called me today just furious, accusing me of putting a spy camera in his house. He said he tore his house apart looking for it and wanted to know where I had installed it.

Then he admitted to me that he had been tempted by a woman who worked at a local hardware store where he often went because he is fixing up his house to sell it. He said she came over drunk after work and begged him to have sex with her. He told me that he said "no" to her several times but she wouldn't give up and finally he gave in.

He doesn't believe in oracles and is sure that I was somehow spying on him. I have to say that it is a shock to me. When I sent him that email I was almost joking with him about his being dishonest. I really never suspected him of having any other female in the picture.

Its funny because, I should be just furious with him but I am so busy being fascinated by the oracles that I haven't really had time yet to get an attitude about his infidelity.

He and I have not made any real commitment to each other, so it really isn't infidelity to a promise or vow, but it is still infidelity to the spirit of the relationship so I am on the fence about it.
P.