Tag: Gen → Kan

15 – modesty

Scope of Questions
  • A user is very exhausted by the situation he is in at the moment: a lot of (creative) chaos, construction sites, everything is very demanding. He knows that he should let go of all kinds of things, but he doesn’t know where to start. He asks the I Ching for advice and receives hexagram 15 – Modesty as an answer.
  • After a phone call with her husband a user got stomach cramps and vomiting. And suddenly she had the answer in her head: “You have to get a divorce.” Since then she feels deep inner peace, contentment – and no resentment at all. When she later consults the I Ching, the answer is hexagram 15 – Modesty.
  • “Where does the poison in my life come from?” asks a user. “Does it come from the outside or the inside? What is the source of my blockages – and what is it that always gets me tripped up in the end?”
  • One user describes his situation as follows: “We don’t feel very comfortable here in the village and in our house and wonder whether we should change. However, our daughter enjoys the location here very much.”
Some Reflections

Hexagram 15 – Modesty shows a person who rests in himself, is self-referential and concentrated. His environment meets him with openness, with an observing attitude. Out of this calm and meditative attitude the person acts, full of inner peace, and simultaneously clear and determined. This triggers a change  in the environment, which may take on a surprising dynamic.
What exactly is the basic meditative attitude and the resulting action? In any case, it is not an action that is the result of cleverness of the mind. Rather, it has to do with presence, with being present in the here and now. The action itself can be small and unimpressive. But it is precisely the drop that will make the barrel overflow and thus trigger change.
The pivotal point is therefore one’s own (mental) presence, which fades out all distracting thoughts or feelings (anger, fear, grief), concentrates solely on this moment and acts according to spontaneous inspiration.

The current interpretation can be found here: https://www.no2do.com/hexagramme_en/887888.htm

16 – enthusiasm

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Scope of Questions

Regarding hexagram 16 – Enthusiasm I received a couple of questions concerning quite different issues:

  • “How should I interpret my physical symptoms?”
  • “What point am I at right now?”
  • “Without success, I can not keep living. But success always includes some failure. How can I deal with this?”
  • “What do I have to give up to be happy?”
Some Reflections

I find it surprising that – in my understanding – a certain disorientation speaks from all these questions. Personally, I have always been amazed by the name of this hexagram: enthusiasm. How in the world can something like enthusiasm arise from the combination of Kun, the earth (lower trigram) and Zhen, the thunder (upper trigram)?

It is exactly this question – how does enthusiasm arise from Kun and Zhen? – which I asked myself when the answer literally crossed my path. It crossed my path in the form of an incident that made me suddenly understand how something like… enthusiasm!… eventually could arise from what the winding paths of the changing lines suggest.

The story goes something like this: Quite a long time ago a damage was done to me, which I noticed only many years later. As a result, I broke off contact with the person in question. And then recently I run into someone I hadn’t seen in a very, very long time and who knows the story and everyone involved. That day we talked about this and that, but then the conversation turned to this ancient story and… somehow I had the feeling that my counterpart wanted to sound me out in the form of: “Well, and how do you feel, as a victim?”

At that very moment I realized: I don’t want that any more. I no longer want see myself as a victim. Because that’s what I had done, for some time, because the damage had indeed been great, the whole thing vile. But I had worked it out for myself since then, intensively even, and at some point… yes, you can put it that way: At some point I made my peace with it. The chapter was closed for me.

And then this person comes and… wants to see me (again) as a victim. No thanks, no need.

At that moment, the changing lines of the hexagram made suddenly sense to me. I am in a place where I am at peace and comfortable (Kun, the earth). The victim story lies long behind, is worked through. And then someone speaks to me about the old incident and I realize: Hey, that’s not it anymore. The chapter “I, the victim” is done with. It’s no longer a description that applies to me. I am now much more than “the victim”… Voila: Gen, the mountain, releasing what has become obsolete.

But, let’s follow the course of the changing lines even a bit further: What does it mean if I let go of the term “the victim”? And replace it with something else, perhaps with “the one who made it (anyway)”? Then, clearly, the glasses with which I look at the world change (Kan, the water). I no longer see all the little episodes where I’ve been screwed, but I suddenly see… all that I’ve managed and overcome in my life. And instead of fear and worries, I am suddenly filled with… enthusiasm 🙂 in the face of the path that lies ahead of me, the path towards myself (Zhen, the thunder).

The current interpretation can be found here: http://www.no2do.com/hexagramme_en/888788.htm

21 – biting through

Usually, when we take a decision and want to make a change, we assume that we have to act in a completely new way, to add something unprecedented to the already existing.

Sometimes, however, the solution lies in just the opposite: to do nothing – and to let go of something. Maybe of our self-image, a habit, our accustomed view on something, our habitual “but we always…”. Perhaps it is also our impulse to bang with our fist on the table and to push our will through. Continue reading “21 – biting through”

29 – the abysmal

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Scope of Questions

So far the following feedbacks regarding regarding hexagram 29 – the Abysmal:

  • Due to circumstances beyond her control a user lives in an international long distance relationship. Her libertarian partner does fine with it, for herself it is a “better-than-nothing”: Basically the situation does not work for her.
  • Another user reflects on a glassy sea over shoals as follows: “For me, a glassy sea brings the following to mind: keeping everything quiet. From the outside, everything looks calm, however, under the glassy surface there are enormous emotional shoals. These shoals are the ancient behavioral patterns that have been passed on from generation to generation for thousands of years. I myself, as part of this chain, am without any influence on it, my consciousness / body consciousness does not react at all to my wishes for liberation or change. The result is that I am actually incapable of action. I can rebel against the unwanted circumstances, but when my strength is used up, I am left with only resignation. In my case it’s a cycle that has been going on for more than 50 years now.”
  • The user’s landlady terminated his lease for personal use – after less than a year and a lot of money for renovation work. With three children and a dog, however, it is not easy to find an affordable replacement apartment. The lawyer advises calm. The question to the I Ching is, “Will there be a lawsuit and how will it turn out for us?”
  • One user asks: “How can I now find joy, peace and hope – as the last scion of a thorny family drama, impoverished, chronically exhausted, in inner emigration? Must the family always have the last word, may we not decide our own relationships and connections?”
    The I Ching answers with 29 – the abysmal.

The current interpretation can be found here: http://www.no2do.com/hexagramme_en/878878.htm

35 – progress

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Scope of Questions

Regarding hexagram 35 – progress I received the following inquiries:

  • A user asks: “If I won the jackpot this week: How do I deal with the all that money?”
  • Another user asks: “What kind of approach / working method is best suitable for my artistic work?”
  • Another user wants to know what to expected “in terms of love, career and [his] life as a whole” in the upcoming year.
  • One user receives hexagram 35 – progress as a comment to his situation which he describes as follows: “I am heartbroken, financially broken and in deep depression. I am in love with NR, but she left me for no good reason.”

Continue reading “35 – progress”

39 – obstruction

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Scope of Questions

A user suffers from not having any real contact with people. She asks the I Ching: “What will arise for me from keeping a dream diary? I do have the impression that it will work for me – and that perhaps it will even help me to bridge stagnation and isolation.” The idea of possibly publishing her diary and thereby accepting her life as it is has something redeeming, liberating for her. Continue reading “39 – obstruction”

51 – arousing

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Scope of Questions
  • A user has recently been promoted, i.e. internally ascended to a higher position. But he does not get along with the new challenge: he feels not being taken seriously by colleagues and employees. His question to the I Ching: “How should I conduct myself?”
  • A user asks: “How can I resolve my unconscious fears and adjustment tendencies and live a truly independent and unsuited life?”
  • A user has sent work abroad and asks if at all, and if so, what kind of reaction he can expect: “Is now something coming into motion?”
  • A user constantly experiences conflict situations with his partner, with issues being discussed that have not been right for a long time. There are no other conversations than that. He is faced with the question – and he asks it to the I Ching – whether the relationship has ended.

The current interpretation can be found here: http://www.no2do.com/hexagramme_en/788788.htm

52 – keeping still

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Scope of Questions

I received a variety of questions regarding hexagram 52 – keeping still:

  • A user consults the I Ching with the following concern: “How can I get to work independently in my profession?” She adds: “This year I attended a professional training. Ever since I play with the idea of working independently, self-employed, to develop a new supporting leg. The professional training’s speaker has really impressed me a lot. And anyway, for some time now I feel like trying out some new methods and professional approaches.” The I Ching replies with hexagram 52 – keeping still.
  • Another user asks, “May I heal with Reiki and alternative methods?” The user works as a butcher, his learned profession, but this becomes more and more a burden, especially because this environment does not share his spiritual interests. For more than 15 years now he has been intensively engaged with Reiki and has great respect for this kind of work. Hence his reserved question whether he may help others with Reiki.
  • Another user receives  hexagram 52 – keeping still as a comment to his situation: “I find myself in a hopeless situation. Nothing is possible!”
  • A user asks: “What is the best way to stop smoking?” The advice of the I Ching: hexagram 52 – keeping still.
  • One user is afraid to quit her job (and thus a stable income) with no prospect of a new one. The job market is difficult. However, she has an upcoming interview with a 25 percent chance because she is one of four applicants in the second round. She is very interested in this new job.
  • One user asks: “What is relevant in the current situation in relation to my partner?”

Continue reading “52 – keeping still”

53 – development

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Scope of Questions
  • A user writes: “The development was sketched out, but I refused to see it. My inability to have a healthy relationship let me only see myself, never community. Now there is this gap, I’m all alone.
    Actually there has been a gap since quite some time.”
  • A user: “We have fallen in love with each other, but he remains at a distance. What exactly does he want from me? Will we have a common future?”
  • Another user: “I do not know what to do. My husband has no interest in me anymore.”
  • A user describes his situation as follows: “My partner went to her homeland for a one-month holidays. Alone as I am now, I feel lost. My reason to come back from abroad to my homeland and to paralyze my doctorate studies was to be with her. And now she is far away from me. By other side, I feel that, if I do not define or find what I want to do (my career), I cannot go back. I feel fear. My question to the I Ching: What should I know?”*
  • A user asks: “How can I defeat the inner and outer demons (especially the inner ones) once and for all so that I no longer harm myself and others?”
  • A user spontaneously proposed to his partner on the phone. He then asked the I Ching what it could tell him about it. The answer: Hexagram 53 – the development.

Continue reading “53 – development”

60 – limitation

Scope of Questions
  • The user’s question is: “What is there to say about the city / area where I live?” The user has lived in this place for a long time, but always with a feeling of alienation, uneasiness, like a prisoner. At the same time he feels gratitude – but also burden, boredom.
    The answer of the I Ching is: 60 – limitation. Somehow he likes the interpretation with humus. A similar sentence has accompanied him for a long time, a sentence that speaks about flowers that need exactly this kind soil/dung to grow.
  • The question of the user: “What is important now, in this existentially threatening situation?” The background, as he explains, is that new projects are developing which give him justified hope. He feels that he should nurture hope and at the same time take the chaos (in the form of his living environment) more easily. There is a lot to be cleared up, and this mountain of work together with old fears almost paralyze him. But at the same time he feels hope, a light that gives him courage and says: Everything is good.
  • A user asks how he should behave in the cooperation that is about to begin. He actually feels superior to his partner because of his greater experience and would like to set the pace. On the other hand, it is clear that his counterpart will manage and coordinate the entire project.

The current interpretation can be found here: https://www.no2do.com/hexagramme_en/778878.htm