Sep 28 21
Temperance (reversed)
25. Innocence (The Unexpected)
1. The Creative
Petite Reading
You know what to do, but it is of course difficult: pursue dignity. That’s it; if you have a question put it through that filter.
Complete Reading
For the second week in a row, we pulled the Temperance card reversed. We will take this repetition as a sort of urgency to meditate on what has been proffered — namely, that an imbalance is present. To refresh, the following was said last week: Here there is an indication that something is unbalanced — no small imbalance either. Perhaps an outgrown goal is performing you. Maybe a primal vulnerability has been fortified by fantasy for too long. Take an earnest but loving look at what involuntarily predisposes you.
Our first hexagram this week is #25, Innocence (The Unexpected). In our society appearing like you know, that is giving off bold confidence, is considered the height of achievement (though in our private selves we feel differently). This is true when one is challenging older ways of knowing and is also true (obviously) when one is trying preserve older ways of knowing. People like to be carried along by the fantasy that someone else knows what to do and how to do it. But no one knows. No one; confidence is always meretricious. The truth is we are all naive — which since it’s true will have to be ok. This hexagram puts lovely pressure on this point citing Confucius: “Those who depart from innocence, what do they come to? Heaven’s will and blessing do not go with their deeds.” There were two changes this week, of which the specific notes are: be present and at hand, don’t obsess about a future result and take bad luck in stride.
Our second hexagram, the one that suggests how best to meet the challenges (or the changes) is #1, The Creative. Here we have the literal first hexagram of the I Ching, both loadstone and fuel for those that follow. What could this ultimate aphorism be!? “Perseverance in what is right.” Obvious next question: what is “right”? The “right” is all that is not “inferior and degrading” — pursuing dignity in all that you can. “One must make themself strong in every way, by consciously casting out all that is inferior and degrading. Thus one attains that tirelessness which depends upon consciously limiting the fields of their activity.”
You know what to do, but it is of course difficult: pursue dignity. That’s it; if you have a question put it through that filter.
Complete Reading
For the second week in a row, we pulled the Temperance card reversed. We will take this repetition as a sort of urgency to meditate on what has been proffered — namely, that an imbalance is present. To refresh, the following was said last week: Here there is an indication that something is unbalanced — no small imbalance either. Perhaps an outgrown goal is performing you. Maybe a primal vulnerability has been fortified by fantasy for too long. Take an earnest but loving look at what involuntarily predisposes you.
Our first hexagram this week is #25, Innocence (The Unexpected). In our society appearing like you know, that is giving off bold confidence, is considered the height of achievement (though in our private selves we feel differently). This is true when one is challenging older ways of knowing and is also true (obviously) when one is trying preserve older ways of knowing. People like to be carried along by the fantasy that someone else knows what to do and how to do it. But no one knows. No one; confidence is always meretricious. The truth is we are all naive — which since it’s true will have to be ok. This hexagram puts lovely pressure on this point citing Confucius: “Those who depart from innocence, what do they come to? Heaven’s will and blessing do not go with their deeds.” There were two changes this week, of which the specific notes are: be present and at hand, don’t obsess about a future result and take bad luck in stride.
Our second hexagram, the one that suggests how best to meet the challenges (or the changes) is #1, The Creative. Here we have the literal first hexagram of the I Ching, both loadstone and fuel for those that follow. What could this ultimate aphorism be!? “Perseverance in what is right.” Obvious next question: what is “right”? The “right” is all that is not “inferior and degrading” — pursuing dignity in all that you can. “One must make themself strong in every way, by consciously casting out all that is inferior and degrading. Thus one attains that tirelessness which depends upon consciously limiting the fields of their activity.”