Choice from the flow.

Line image

Our intuitive feelings are active and are accepted (lines 2 and 5) and the outer world also (lines 3 and 4). The inner is not active in providing new energy so we are acting out energy already in our outer identity. This hexagram is commonly called “nourishment”; our inner being is nourished by the experience of identity in relationship. The outer is food for the inner and the inner is food for the outer in continuous cycles of experience.

Trigram image

The emerging energy is very active (Chên) and flows freely in the outer world and our outer being, identity, (both K’un). This is only seen distantly by our inner being (Kên).

Here is a flow of energy that is freely out into action and the experience is viewed widely by the stillness of our inner being. This expresses outer experience nourishing the inner.

The Chinese Oracle

Nourishment.
Persistence in being correct
brings good fortune.
Watch how people nourish others and themselves.

Comments

Nourishing requires the supply of what is lacking; to nourish others we often provide what we have in surplus regardless of what the other needs. It is necessary to persist in seeing widely and witnessing ourselves (being correct) to see what is needed.

Manifestations

The pattern

All action has results in form.
All growth towards the archetypes.

For humans

From what has passed through
we are made.
From what we choose
we are nourished according to our need.

In nature

Storm and torrents flow.
In every crevice watered something grows.
Every crack eroded shows
what has passed,
each hollow filled, another shape.

In forms we make

To provide what others need
to fill their form,
follow the pattern of their choice.
For our own we follow ours.

Changing Lines

Line 1 goes yin

life force shows more change

Where new energy is becoming available we may look for nourishment in some new experience from the life force rather than that available in our present circumstances.

The Chinese Image

You let your magic tortoise go and look at me with drooping mouth.
Misfortune.

Tortoise shells were used for divination, and divination is the link between the outer and inner knowing; without the link we lose the thread of what experience is about—nourishing the inner self from outer experience. What is needed is in our experience now.

❦

Line 2 goes yang

intuitive feeling less active

Intuitive feeling is necessary for us to know our circumstances and if we cannot feel our circumstances we seek nourishment elsewhere.

The Chinese Image

Seeking nourishment from below
is not proper.
Seeking nourishment from above
brings evil.

Both below and above identity in the hexagram we come to the inner, and this hexagram is about nourishing the inner through outer experience; so to seek the emerging life force is to look to nourishment coming to identity in the future, which is not correct or proper, not existing. To look to the inner being for nourishment is to look to what is already formed so it is narrowing or evil.

❦

Line 3 goes yang

outer world changes less

In this tao outer activity is the source of experience and is essential to nourishment, without our taking part in outer experience the tao is useless to us.

The Chinese Image

He refuses nourishment.
Misfortune.
For ten years there is no progress.

When we avoid outer experience at the time it is offered in our circumstances it is lost and the nourishment of it cannot be had until such circumstances come to us again; this is symbolically the complete cycle of ten years.

❦

Line 4 goes yang

accepting the outer state less

Outer activity in the world is an essential part of this tao from which we gain nourishment; we do not, however, benefit from owning that activity and so nourishing our separate ego-being. Here in this line we diminish our owning of outer activity and so can participate more because with less desire we have a wider view.

The Chinese Image

Nourishment on the mountain top.
Good fortune.
He glares like a tiger looking down.
No error.

A hunter which has perfected the art of being alert; the tiger. Looking down he has a wide view. On the mountain we also have a wide view which comes from a vantage point of disinvolvement.

❦

Line 5 goes yang

less awareness of intuition

We normally accept ourselves to be as we feel ourselves to be (which is the interpretation line 5 puts upon line 2). Here we are less aware.

The Chinese Image

Leaving the usual ways.
Perseverance, keeping still,
brings good fortune.
Do not cross the great water.

Without a feeling of ourselves in our circumstances action becomes hazardous so it is inadvisable to instigate changes.

❦

Line 6 goes yin

our inner being accepts more

The inner being accepts nourishment and is the source of outer nourishment while doing so. The position has a fine balance and so has a danger of imbalance; either way it is the producer of a flow of nourishment.

The Chinese Image

The source of nourishment.
Peril but good results.
Crossing the great water brings good fortune.

Crossing the great water is changing our way of being, and experiencing without choice makes this change, but if we choose we are fed from past experience, not from the source of nourishment, the present.

Secondary HexagramHexagram 44

Adapting to circumstances.

Line image

Here the life force is manifesting actively (line 1) and we are not feeling it, not involved in it, not recognizing what it is (lines 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 are all yang). This unawareness is likely to lead us into misreading our situation.

Trigram image

The only trigram with any activity is that for the emerging life force, Sun, and we do not respond to this circumstance which comes to us in a rather rigid and formed shape. We cannot influence it because it has no changeability and we may not recognize its strength because of its gentleness. We need to remain alert and witness our desires rather than trying to fulfill them.

The Chinese Oracle

Sudden meeting.
The woman is powerful.
Do not marry.

Comments

The meeting is sudden because we are very unaware in this tao, like someone who is very short-sighted and suddenly recognizes something at close range. Feeling (the woman) is powerful and this feeling is emotional feeling that we have stored and now seeks activity, so it is not born out of our present circumstances but is triggered by them. It is useful to allow such feeling but useless to wed ourselves to it.

Manifestations

The pattern

The powerfully mature
has its activity.
Without being influenced
has influence.

For humans

He does not try to change
what is so formed,
but meeting it
he is so drawn
he must himself change.

In nature

The flow of oceans
does not yield to our swimming.
The place of planets
does not shift for our desire.

In forms we make

All forms have archetypes
they tend towards,
yet the archetype has no form.

Changing Lines

Line 1 goes yang

life force shows less change

Here the silence of identity (lines 4, 5, and 6 are yang) ignores the activity of the life force and it ceases to have influence.

The Chinese Image

The wheel is held by a metal brake.
Continuance in the way brings good fortune.
A lean pig leaps about.

The brake is applied; there is nothing we can do about it but follow our circumstances. Any attempt to get out of our circumstances will prove unfortunate so we need simply to experience where we are. A lean pig is an underfed pig and when we are under-stimulated we “leap about” to cause activity.

❦

Line 2 goes yin

intuitive feeling more active

Feeling is our link between the undefined inner and manifest outer; here in this line new activity of feeling is occurring although identity is taking no notice.

The Chinese Image

There are fish in the tank.
It does not benefit the guests.
No error.

Our present identifications (the guests) are not noticing the nourishment available, but this cannot be error, it is just circumstance.

❦

Line 3 goes yin

outer world changes more

In this tao we do not have a true picture of our circumstances and in this line we act out in circumstances of which we are ignorant.

The Chinese Image

No skin on his thighs.
He walks with difficulty.
Keeping alert he makes no error.

❦

Line 4 goes yin

accepting the outer state more

If our increased involvement is with a sense of outer peace all is well, but this is likely to be a search for outer activity and if it is we will search and find none.

The Chinese Image

No fish in the tank.
Misfortune.

The tank which has or has not fish in it is our personal inner being and the fish are our personal identifications in this. Here there are no fish, the process of identifying is inactive in this tao, so if we expect something we are disappointed.

❦

Line 5 goes yin

more awareness of intuition

Our intuition about our circumstances as shown by line 2 is inactive; by accepting this lack of interpretive feeling, we allow life to happen to us.

The Chinese Image

A melon wrapped in leaves is hidden.
Something falls from heaven.

The melons, the gourd family of fruits, have a multitude of seeds in the fruit casing, many possibilities. These possibilities are hidden within the fruit, the fruit is hidden in the leaves, it appears that nothing is there; then suddenly from this nothing (from heaven) there is a happening. This describes how life is when we do not anticipate it.

❦

Line 6 goes yin

our inner being accepts more

By accepting the energy of this tao which flows through emotional channels there is a forcing of their recognition.

The Chinese Image

He approaches with his horns.
Regret but no error.

The way emotion forces its way into recognition is often uncomfortable and causes regret, but it is necessary for it to be expressed so this is not an error.

Nuclear HexagramHexagram 2

Choices amongst activity.

Line image

Here all is activity and acceptance. Everything moves according to its place and there is no question, no complication of hesitation or aim, no attitude is taken up and no stance is maintained. This is a symbolically female mode, not shown in relationship with male as in trigram Li but the elemental female itself of K’un, which flows according to the forces within it in a spontaneous acceptance of movement as its reality.

Structure is not very real to this element, its reality is in the changing flow of the moment as identity experiences where it is but never _knows_ it; to know where you are, you have to stop the movement with an idea, knowing takes an extension of time whereas the purely yin element rides reality in the present, which is time but has no time sequence.

Identity in this mode does not abstract ideas from its experience so it has no structure of idea to confront the experience. We go from one thing to another as it happens, participating in primary manifestation.

Trigram image

Manifestation is all flow and for this to be so, there has to be acceptance of all the circumstances in which we find ourselves. When we accept everything, nothing is held up in the flow and it remains in dynamic balance without stress. Identity does not know itself; it experiences itself but has no concept of what that means—it means only what is experienced

This flowing mode is nearer to our inner source of manifestation than the mode of concepts—we know without knowing why we know—it is an unencumbered way to be and intensely real, being so near to the source of manifestation.

We meet the paradox here that this source of manifestation which we approach in feeling has the male symbol of the creative—the ultimate extreme of idea that arrives at idealessness or non-manifestation. The paradox is resolved when we see the dynamics of yin and yang where the energy flows in and out between the male and female modes; it is one mode really, which manifests in a cyclic form.

The patterns which we humans choose in this flow by our individual natures are the 64 qualified tao or hexagrams. This hexagram of K’un trigrams bears these particularly deep symbolisms because it is one of the extremes of the cyclic movement, but it is nevertheless one of the 64 patterns that we make, and it refers to minor happenings in our lives as well as our very existence itself. We need sometimes to allow ourselves its influence.

The Chinese Oracle

The receptive element brings sublime success. The symbol of a mare.
At first he leads and loses the way, then he follows and is supported.
Friends in the west and south, not in the east and north.
Peaceful continuance is beneficial.

Comments

As in hexagram 1 there is inevitable success in the receptive, but if we start to lead, we lose this tao of being receptive. To be receptive is to allow the self to resonate with the other (the friend). To befriend the height of activity (south, midday, warmth) gives life to the resonance whereas to seek passivity of action (north, night, cold) kills the resonance.

A mare bears the foal, carries man, and is one with nature in a natural and gentle manner—in the receptive, we reject nothing.

Manifestations

The pattern

Simple flow of activity:
unquestioning,
moves unjudged
accepting all things.

For humans

Born from the earth
of its elements.
Return sometimes unprotesting,
resting in the flowing juice of life.

In nature

Onto the earth
warm and chill.
Into the earth
seed, root, love
moving in the magic of water.

In forms we make

The only form he can make
is an empty tube.
The only government
the will of the people.

Changing Lines

Line 1 goes yang

life force shows less change

The life force itself is going into a quiet phase and this will become more evident to us as its manifestation grows outwards. We need to accommodate this, to accept it in this tao of the receptive.

The Chinese Image

Hoarfrost underfoot, ice then comes.

Cold is symbolic of inactivity, so this is to say that inactivity will become more manifest.

❦

Line 2 goes yang

intuitive feeling less active

In this tao, change occurs whether we are feeling it or not—if we feel it, we are aware of our involvement and may even think that we cause the activity, but it is not so except in a very narrow sense; the great tao moves us and accomplishes itself.

The Chinese Image

Straight, wide, great.
Purposeless yet it achieves.

There is no choice of ways so our way is straight, awareness is not limited so it is wide (has a lot of scope) and it is the great tao that is purposeless, yet it achieves (manifests) in everything.

❦

Line 3 goes yang

outer world changes less

In this tao which is all activity there is no chosen coming and going—it encompasses all coming and going. The activity is seen rather as a flow of energy from one part to another—a wider view of many cycles operating. The outer reality expressed by line 3 is our outer world, however, and here in this line the activity is felt as being withdrawn; withdrawn from us and continued elsewhere. We are receptive in this tao, so we are not concerned so much with our part as the activity of the whole.

The Chinese Image

Concealing possibilities is correct.
Outer activities will eventually prosper.

Possibilities, or our own personal aims which we may exercise in the world, are not relevant here in this tao where all are equally received—in other circumstances we can attend to these and bring them to manifestation, but not now when we can experience without choice.

❦

Line 4 goes yang

accepting the outer state less

Cycles of free manifestation flow in phases of activity and tranquility. Our identity does this also and in this tao it does not indicate any manipulation on our part.

The Chinese Image

A tied up sack.
No praise, no blame.

There is no praise or blame because it is the natural state of affairs for cycles to have closed phases.

❦

Line 5 goes yang

less awareness of intuition

Here everything is seen carried in the great tao. We remove our attention from our feelings and they continue to affect the way we are but, as we say, unconsciously.

The Chinese Image

A Yellow undergarment.
Greatest good fortune.

Yellow is active (being near the middle of our visible range of light frequencies) and the undergarment is our unseen clothing or unconscious form; this is what carries us here, so we flow naturally without conscious effort.

❦

Line 6 goes yang

our inner being accepts less

Line 6 is about our inner acceptance of experience, and in this moving line we separate from the great flowing tao and identity believes that it creates and destroys. We have here a birth into identity in some way and we choose and take sides and enter mind reality with our being. We move into the contest between being active or passive and must choose.

The Chinese Image

Dragons fight in the wilderness.
Their blood is black and yellow.

Black is the colour of night and inactivity, while yellow is our most noticeable and so active colour, so this is the nature of the contest.