I recently lost a cherished article of clothing so asked Yi - will I find my red sweater? and received Hex 60.5.6 >41 Limitation followed by Decrease - only to find it (quite by fluke) a week later. Hmmm... I would've thought the reading concluded that I would never find it.

hexagon said:

I recently lost a cherished article of clothing so asked Yi - will I find my red sweater? and received Hex 60.5.6 >41 Limitation followed by Decrease - only to find it (quite by fluke) a week later. Hmmm... I would've thought the reading concluded that I would never find it.

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I might take it as the loss (41) was for a limited period only (60.5.6) but then its only seems obvious with hindsight I guess. Taken as a sentence 60>41 might 'loss has limits'

Also you assume in your question the future is absolutely predetermined which i don't think it is, certainly not the details anyway. So if you ask Yi 'will x or y happen' why would you think it always knows if it hasn't happened yet.

I don't get that asking a question presumes predetermination. Are there limits to Yi I should know about?

hexagon said:

I don't get that asking a question presumes predetermination. Are there limits to Yi I should know about?

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All I meant was if someone asks "will i get this job" or "will x return to me" then they make the assumption the answer is predetermined - that is the future is already laid out and waiting to happen. They have to make this assumption to think they can be answered as if the Yi already knows. Who knows maybe sometimes it is but between the time of asking the question and the outcome alot of different things can happen - people have free will after all. Will you find your red sweater ? Well alot depends on what you do to find it, whether someone else picks it up etc etc, its not as if its fated that you will or won't find it. I always find it more useful to me to ask my best course of action about something rather than what will happen - afterall what will happen very often depends on our wills.

In your answer i saw the answer as your loss has limits - so maybe here you were fated to find the sweater after a certain period because circumstances around the sweater were stable enough to favour you finding it eventually

It is not so much that the I Ching lies, as it is we are limited in our capacity to interpret. And to add to this disability, many of us have a tendency to lie to ourselves. This is why I constantly say that the I Ching must be used for personal growth. For short of full maturity, which normally takes many, many lifetimes, we are unbalanced to the point we cannot accurately determine in every case the course that has been delineated for ourselves. All too often when we question the I Ching, we question due to a state of "ANXIETY," which automatically limits the quality of the answer in such a way as to make it debatable. The answer, even if clear, does not limit our anxiety. Often the I Ching will reflect this anxiety, and answer us in such a way that shows the anxiety, rather than a straightforward answer.

In line 5, the W/B commentary says, "...demanding little from those associated with him." As always, the I Ching talks first and foremost about itself, and our relationship to it. Our relationship is such that we should "demand little" from it. And it too, from us, except in the sense that we keep the right proprietary relationship to it, and it to us. To do so brings good fortune. And in keeping with your question, the search for the sweater results in good fortune.

However, in the I Ching, it must never be assumed that just because the text says good fortune, that you will automatically have it. The good fortune is the result of following the advice in the text. If you do not follow the advice, the good fortune will not result. In your case, you looked for the sweater, and hence had good fortune. We too, when we search the I Ching for personal development, properly respecting it as a person, and not just a tool, we have good fortune. But we must approach it with respect, with admiration, and in good faith, best without anxiety.

Gene

trojan said:

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- so maybe here you were fated to find the sweater after a certain period because circumstances around the sweater were stable enough to favour you finding it eventually

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that sounds really silly doesn't it

Yup, like taken from a chapter of "The Secret Life of Sweaters"...

I am r e a l l y cautious of taking Yi's answers as omens. Taking them as council is a sweater of a different color. *baddaboom*

Hex 60.5,6 says that you will find it.

Line 60.5 says "sweet limitation brings good fortune, going brings esteem" in other words success.

Line 60.6 says do not put up with being without your sweater, search for it then your sadness will disappear.

Hex 41 is about decrease but if lines 60.5 and 60.6 say that you will get the sweater back then what is to be decreased? Perhaps you have too many things already and need to scale back or that you need to curb your emotions over the loss of one sweater

willowfox said:

Hex 60.5,6 says that you will find it.

Line 60.5 says "sweet limitation brings good fortune, going brings esteem" in other words success.

Line 60.6 says do not put up with being without your sweater, search for it then your sadness will disappear.

Hex 41 is about decrease but if lines 60.5 and 60.6 say that you will get the sweater back then what is to be decreased? Perhaps you have too many things already and need to scale back or that you need to curb your emotions over the loss of one sweater

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I read W/B and get the resulting good fortune with 60.5. Also, "sweet limitation comes from being central in ones' place" could mean finding it at work without even looking for it. But this is followed by 60.6 which states that perseverance brings misfortune. Hmmm.. I found it when I was not looking for it. But the resulting Hex 41 Decrease puzzles me. It could be that I am restricting my use of wear with it even though it is a one of a kind sweater designed by a local fibre artist because I was wearing it the day I was snubbed by someone I am attracted to at work.

This is a lesson not to expect a predetermined yes or no as Gene and Trojan have stated with the Yi as there are many factors involved.

hexagon said:

II But the resulting Hex 41 Decrease puzzles me. It could be that I am restricting my use of wear with it even though it is a one of a kind sweater designed by a local fibre artist because I was wearing it the day I was snubbed by someone I am attracted to at work.

This is a lesson not to expect a predetermined yes or no as Gene and Trojan have stated with the Yi as there are many factors involved.

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Why should decrease puzzle you ? If you lost the sweater then you were decreased (41) for a limited time (hex 60) . The extent of your loss was limited. I actually think its a pretty literal straight forward answer -at least i wouldn't bother to look any deeper, not over a sweater

The decrease in hexagram 41 could me decrease the anxiety. As for hexagram 60 line 6, while it does say Perseverance brings misfortune, it also says, remorse disappears. Remorse disappears when we stop restricting ourselves with an incorrect mental attitude. The Gist of the reading is to let go of anxiety.

Gene

trojan said:

so maybe here you were fated to find the sweater after a certain period because circumstances around the sweater were stable enough to favour you finding it eventually

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It sounds very learned, as if you have a PhD in sweater physics

to me, the 60.6 said "ease up on this" and the 41 was "simplicity, no sweat". NOT no sweater. You found it when you werent even looking for it. If I had gotten that answer in regards to finding something, I would have assumed that it would turn up...just like it did. 41 isnt really about loss, imo, but about making a space

and I also think that if the sweater was REALLY gone for good, the Yi wouldve communicated this to you. 41.0 for instance.

It looks like a 'no sweater' situation through and through.

martin said:

I sounds very learned, as if you have a PhD in sweater physics

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Yes I do and Transpersonal Sweater Psychology, you should see my bookshelf !

dobro said:

It looks like a 'no sweater' situation through and through.

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lol, yeah definitely a "chill out"

Why is it I feel like this thread has been like playing ping pong but that the ball went missing long ago. As for the sweater, I shall now always wear it with special reverence to quantum physics, the explanation of which has always eluded me.

just a PS:
When I ask an 'unimportant' question, the Yi often uses this as an opportunity to give me a lecture and rattles my settled ways of understanding. I learned to appreciate these 'wrong' answers and stopped shying away from 'light' conversation.

The odd, really wrong answer is healthy, as it reminds us to rely on ourselves.
I'm sure, the Yi does this on purpose. I once asked: "Do you ...?" and it answered "Yes, the loosing winner".
Buth then again ... maybe this was a wrong answer.

I feel that Hex 60 line 5 suggests that you should look for your sweater in a balanced and correct way.

Line 6 suggests that you should not overdo this or worry too much about finding it.

Hex 41 could be read as a return to simplicity and normalcy of your daily life after the disruption caused by looking for your sweater and hence you find it in the end.

Irving

The question has long since been answered, and reasons given for people interpreting the hexagrams in various ways, so I don't have a whole lot to add.

I've got about twenty-five books on the Yi, but the only one (of those on my shelf) that gives specific answers to questions like that is the one by Taoist Hua-Ching Ni entitled The Book of Changes and the Unchanging Truth. Every commentary has its pros and cons, and I don't use this translation often since I'm a little put off by some of the author's baggage (although I also am struck by the wisdom of some of his remarks, so go figure...).

Anyway, both of the hexagrams indicate that the object which is lost will be difficult to find. So take that for what it's worth. No need to extrapolate, at least so far as the author is concerned.

Nancy

Is the I Ching literal so that any deviation in precise result is a lie?

None of the traditional translations or commentaries on the hexagrams of the I Ching have a Yes or a No response like the mystic 8-ball of decades ago. There is a reason for that. The I Ching was not written as a set of answers to specific questions. That was the older tortoise shell oracle before 1100 BCE and the King Wen sequence of the I Ching brought the new Yi oracle we all use here.

That oracle would have involved you asking, "Will I YES find my red sweater X " and then "Will I NOT find my red sweater X" with the X's being deep marks into the tortoise shell. Then the tortoise shell (or pair of tortoise shells) would be put in a fire until they cracked.

A successful reading would have one positive cracking and one negative cracking so that only one answer would be affirmed and its negative rejected. Hexagram 41, line 5 refers to this older oracle method when it says "10 pairs of tortoise shells cannot oppose it" about having asked this older oracle ten times and gotten its emphatic agreement.

To rephrase your question-- "events several weeks after I asked the Yi Oracle turned out differently than I interpreted my oracle, does that show the Yi Oracle to have lied to me?"

Yi oracles tend to be instantaneous tangents of the NOW without guarantees that they will stand still any more than the Planet Earth truly stands still with the sun, etc. rising and setting in crystal spheres overhead.

Does the I Ching lie or are you the responsible party when your interpretation fails to meet your future expectations? See the Buddha for the answer.

To make a polite compromise, consider that the Oracle recast your question to say: how do I find my sweater--giving 60 5.6.41 as its answer. Taking this only in the general divination sense, not a specific oracle reading to be interpreted--
In Flux Tome (I Ching) your oracle would be Lining >> Sacrifice which taken literally as you like to do would suggest that the red sweater (with its lining of special importance to you) has become your holy sacrifice being put on some altar of yours.

Unless you still use a lighted fire to sanctify your holy places that would not imply that the red sweater had ceased to exist although you may well be finding yourself realizing just how sacred that red sweater was to you and how much of a sacrifice its being out of your reach truly is. So, in answer to your exact question here--Does the I Ching lie, I would answer NO, but sometimes the truth of its answers hurts that much.

You may wish to review what did you feel and what did you do between interpreting your oracle as promising on the credibility of the Yi that you would never find your red sweater and eventually finding it. The question in my mind is, what was so shocking about finding it again that rather than being pleased at the Cosmic gift of the return, you felt compelled to report the Yi Oracle on an accusation of lying?

Curious, :bows:

Dr. Frank R. Kegan, Psy. D.

I think the bottom line is that the answer Limitation/Decrease does not reflect the result of finding the sweater. We are all trying to defend the Yi position here with criticism of my question, perhaps rightly so; however, I assumed by the answer that I would not find it. Of course I was delighted to find it, even though it was found in a bin I had created to put old articles of clothing left by other coworkers when I was cleaning up an area at work as an incentive for others to pick up their clothes and not leave them hanging around. We could gleem that the answer rightfully reflects how I found the sweater, but truth be told, I did unexpectedly find it, and I was very happy when I did.

hexagon said:

I think the bottom line is that the answer Limitation/Decrease does not reflect the result of finding the sweater. We are all trying to defend the Yi position here with criticism of my question, perhaps rightly so; however, I assumed by the answer that I would not find it. Of course I was delighted to find it, even though it was found in a bin I had created to put old articles of clothing left by other coworkers when I was cleaning up an area at work as an incentive for others to pick up their clothes and not leave them hanging around. We could gleem that the answer rightfully reflects how I found the sweater, but truth be told, I did unexpectedly find it, and I was very happy when I did.

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Just for conversation, 60 also refers to delineation and organization, having a place for everything, such as drawers, closets, or even a bin.

Also, by diminishing the passion to find it where you think it should have been (41), you found it as though by accident. This can also be reflected in 60.6 by trying to force a result, rather than a relaxed way of finding it (60.5).

Rather than Yi telling you if you would or wouldn't find it, it told you how to go about finding it, which is a very common Yi approach to questions.

hexagon said:

I recently lost a cherished article of clothing so asked Yi - will I find my red sweater? and received Hex 60.5.6 >41 Limitation followed by Decrease - only to find it (quite by fluke) a week later. Hmmm... I would've thought the reading concluded that I would never find it.

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Well, yeah. Or you could read it this way: Limit your search for the sweater; decrease the search. (Cuz it's going to turn up anyway.)

See, with some questions and issues there's NO WAY you're going to read it according to the reality it's representing. I conclude two things from this. First, sometimes we're not meant to know, plain and simple. So, in a case like that (your sweater, for example) the Yi gives you an answer which expresses the situation but which you don't have a hope of reading accurately. That's life. Sometimes we're not meant to know. (In your case, it might have been because you didn't need to know, cuz the sweater was going to turn up anyway, and besides, 'why are you bothering the oracle with relatively small stuff like a sweater anyway?')

Second, a useful way perhaps to increase the chances of interpreting successfully might be to do what de Bono calls 'consider all options'. Brainstorm as many possibilities as you can imagine, in other words. So, for your situation, you might have come up with this list:

1 Limit your search, because you've lost the sweater.

2 Limit your search, because it's going to turn up anyway.

3 Limit your enquiry, because this question isn't one you need to be asking.

4 Limit the idea that loss is built into this situation (the sweater's going to turn up).

Then you 'feel' your way toward which of the possibilities seems to be talking to YOU.

Does the Yi lie or just answer with more sophistication than our question?

Your question "would you find you cherished red sweater?" would be a tough one for any sage to answer. Generally, it would be a matter of where and how you looked on the one hand, and on the other where the sweater had gone to after you left it beyond your control.

Your interpretation that the Yi "lied" to you, since the eventual results disagreed with your expectations highlights far more about you than the Yi.

Somehow you had let your red sweater get in someone else's way, so they put it into the bin you use to put things others let get in your way. Sounds like the Yi responded with exactly what the issue was (cf. Wilhelm commentary on lines 5 and 6 of hex 60) though not with the yes/no you wanted. Will you find the sweater? Its only out of your control now since you set up a lost and found tidy bin and then lost your sweater from being untidy and haven't checked your bin lately. Check on your restrictions to understand your loss.
Seems a brilliant sage answer to a strange question, I would have just replied with hexagram 4 without moving lines, and let you find your sweater in your own way. Then you wouldn't have any reason to think the Yi lied to you.

Frank

hexagon said:

I recently lost a cherished article of clothing so asked Yi - will I find my red sweater? and received Hex 60.5.6 >41 Limitation followed by Decrease - only to find it (quite by fluke) a week later. Hmmm... I would've thought the reading concluded that I would never find it.

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Interesting example. I've never consulted the oracle about a lost object, though I have seen mention of it in various books. For the heck of it, I checked in Melyan & Chu, which has a "lost and found" category for each hexagram. I tend to avoid these because they smack of fortune telling. In any case, for 60 Melyan & Chu says "lost indoors. Patient searching will lead to success. Search to the west and north." The authors don't give their reasoning for this interpretation of 60 regarding the finding of lost articles with patient searching.

As others have pointed out, 60 refers to your being limited in some way (here you are limited by the loss of the sweater). 60.5 is fairly positive: "sweet limitation brings good fortune." 60.6 seems to advise that beating yourself up over the matter is not a good idea, so if you keep your cool, regret will vanish (you will find the sweater).

The relating hexagram 41 Decrease describes your situation (you have lost something) and seems to relate to the background of your question. The judgment of 40 is favorable: decrease (loss) with sincerity brings good fortune.

So the oracle did not lie, after all.