Your reading

when i nail the dinner scene...

Your reading resulted in the following hexagrams:

	changing to
63		51

Hexagram 63, Already Across

Key Questions

What is decided?
What now?

Oracle

'Already across, creating small success.
Constancy bears fruit.
Beginnings, good fortune – endings, chaos.'

You have committed yourself and made a transition. Even if the change so far is internal, a resolve formed or decision made, there is a sense in which everything is in place. Now you create success in small ways and in small things: you attend to details, working with what you've already decided or achieved. In following through, you stay loyal to your original reasons for making the crossing.

The Zhou forded the river and overthrew the Shang dynasty. As they established their rule, they had in mind how the Shang once received the Mandate of Heaven to replace a corrupt dynasty. Now the Shang had forfeited the Mandate and were ending in chaos, while the Zhou enjoyed fortunate beginnings. Might the story repeat itself? It's easier to create new, clear-cut patterns for living than to live by them.

It's not that what you have begun here must inevitably fall apart. Only if you feel as if you've 'arrived' already and let yourself come to a halt, then you lose your path and then it all falls apart. Work with what you've accomplished so far, and keep your momentum: keep on beginning.

Image

'Stream dwells above fire: Already Across.
A noble one reflects on distress and prepares to defend against it.'

Sequence

Already Across follows from Hexagram 62, Small Exceeding:
'Going past others naturally means crossing the river, and so Already Across follows.'

Pair

Already Across is paired and contrasted with Hexagram 64, Not Yet Across
'Already Across: calm and settled.'
'Not Yet Across: exhaustion of the male.'

Changing Lines

Hexagram 51, Shock

Key Questions

What must change?
What will continue?

Oracle

'Shock, creating success.
Shock comes, fear and terror.
Laughing words, shrieking and yelling.
Shock spreads fear for a hundred miles.
Someone does not lose the sacred ladle and libation.'

Shock is something that stirs, rouses and shakes you up – like an earthquake, or a violent thunderstorm. In ancient China, Heaven spoke through thunder, and this was an omen that the human world was to be brought back into harmony. Abruptly, your world is not working as you expect; the solid ground shifts under your feet, security slips away and mental constructs shatter; living reality has spoken.

Shock spreads out in waves of contagious fear and hysteria. Suddenly everyone is all too closely in touch with their own emotions – and with everyone else's – and all are reacting to one another. It is a time to hold on to what you most value, and take on responsibility for keeping it safe through the upheaval, like the priest who is charged with safeguarding the temple and altars from the past, for the future. Consider what remains constant and true when everything else is in turmoil. This doesn't necessarily mean resisting the shock itself, so much as keeping a still point in the midst of the tumult of reactions to it. Then you never lose your connection with the creative power that speaks through the storms.

Image

'Rolling thunder: Shock.
A noble one in fear and dread sets things in order and is watchful.'

Sequence

Shock follows from Hexagram 50, the Vessel:
'In the charge of the sacred vessel, none equals the eldest son, and so Shock follows. Shock means new beginnings.'

Pair

Shock forms a pair with Hexagram 52, Stilling:
'Shock begins; Stilling stops.'

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