We do not properly take part in the outer activity of this tao; we long to share but we cannot (sometimes dare not) give ourselves up to it. When the activity decreases we are able to take some part in it, an entrance into a world we wish to share.

A servant does not participate, a concubine does; a servant has separate quarters, a concubine co-inhabits. Here we become a participator, we enter the world of others and our energies have some outlet.

In this moving line we are involved, we are interested or even dedicated to becoming involved; but this tao is a result of a long time of denial of outer flow and of acceptance of inner inactivity, so becoming interested in feelings of flow does not cause a torrent of activity, it prepares for movement.

In this tao we have been accepting that feeling is inactive; here we no longer accept this and so create a mind-feeling, a feeling stimulated by mind rather than the life force.

Our feeling is, in this symbol, the serving maid of our identifying, supplying the experience that is then identified, and this moving line 5 is about what identity does with feeling, how it dresses it up. The emperor is the ruler and our ruler in identity is the identifying process; this dresses up the experience in a way that is less beautiful than its original natural self. But the moon is nearly full, the growth of the feeling influence is waxing and about to reach its full radiance, so this opening to feeling will allow natural feeling to show itself again and this is good fortune.

Here we cease to accept the life force as it emerges into manifestation and act as though we could create activity; but the life force is not active so our actions become gestures only.

In both these images the action of the person is empty, nothing in the basket and no blood in the sheep. Whether we feel (the woman) or try to make identifying nourishment for identity (the man) there is nothing there and no direction we take, no action we make, will produce the result we desire at present. It is something to learn that we are not the creators.

Repose in this tao means awaiting a new cycle of activity with calm confidence, but here in this moving line the life force produces inactivity that we do not like (line 6 is accepting activity).

Because we do not like the inactivity of this moment we become busy about it. The misfortune is that we miss the experience of peace in the present and are ill-prepared for the next movement of the life force.

Our intuitive feeling goes into repose, and this is quite in keeping with this tao but we may get stuck in this if we fix our minds on resting.

Rock is the underlying truth of our surface world which we feel here as our feelings go into repose, but we do not feel this for the whole cycle, the whole day, surface activity will again manifest. We need to stay with our present circumstances as they change.

In this tao it is our involvement in outer activity shown by line 4 that is in repose, not the activity itself. Here outer activity is lessened so we are involved in making it less which is still an involvement and not repose; to let it go will enable us to find a new cycle.

Looking upwards is to look away from the matter in hand, looking for something that is not in our circumstances brings remorse because it is not available and we miss what is available (we come to it too late).

As the tao of repose is marked by this line being the only yang line, here we are involving ourselves in a new phase which is the natural development out of the phase of repose.

If, now that repose is ending, we carry our calm confidence on into activity, we can expect the support of others.

As we become less aware of what our intuitive feelings are doing we are more likely to be unaware when there is change, when something new arises, so we are more likely to carry on with old feelings when they have lost their vitality.

This applies to the feelings, but physical illness often accompanies our identifying with stale feelings over a long period.

When we lose interest in a transition while it is happening to us we lose touch with the flow and become confused.

The transition is in us, it happens despite the confusion of identity because identity is not its cause but is what is being affected. As the transition completes itself we see more clearly again.

Here is new activity developing from the inside; we need to await its development so that we act outside in phase with it.

The general rule when going through transition is to keep going, but here we are just in “after completion” and there are still parts which have not completed the change, or the tail is still in the water in the image of crossing the great water. It is no error to slow down so that these parts can catch up with the change.

In a new situation, after transition, there may be feelings of insecurity which cause us to feel over-exposed and withdraw our feelings.

She feels vulnerable as we do at this time, but as the cycle completes itself (the seven days) the protection of confidence returns. This vulnerability is actually an advantage if we accept it as natural to our situation and not an error to be corrected, it gives us additional sensitivity which we need in new surroundings.

If we have outer activity increasing directly after completion it shows that we have not yet changed our external mode of being; transition does not occur through making changes out there in the world, it is by change in the way we ourselves are.

Three is the number of transition or change, so it is this that creates the success. A devil or evil one in a situation of change is the narrow view which will not change and allow enlargement, and this is also the inferior man—the opposite of the great man so often referred to.

Our outer state (line 3) is inactive in this tao and we need to preserve that inactivity if we are to change out of our mind-desire mode of being—the mode of trying to make something “better”.

Amongst our wide aspirations are narrow desires; all day is throughout conscious activity, and being always aware of them will itself change them.

Intuitive feeling is the basis of our knowing our circumstance and this line 5 is about the conscious interpretation of that feeling; when we become more involved here we consider how to use the life force.

The ox is the strength of outer activity and this is sacrificed at the beginning (the east where the sun rises).
The spring offering is the sacrifice of beginnings (a giving up before we start and so an offering, not a killing); this is made at the end of a cycle (the west).
So it is more beneficial to give up starting new things, which arises when the old are ended, than to kill off the outside activity after it has developed.

If our inner being does not accept the end of a cycle the transition cannot complete.

The head is the controller and here it is right in the liquifying process of change. For identity to emerge changed from transition it needs to flow in the momentum of being changed, not to get involved in controlling it.