Others want one to be able to give them confidential informations. taoscopy.com
Difficulty3
Embrace challenges and uncertainty; growth is difficult but necessary. Encouragement and persistence lead to success.
↓ Line 2
Challenges accumulate, causing separation. Patience is required, as the right time will eventually come for union.
↓ Line 4
Separation occurs, but efforts to reunite will be successful. Moving forward brings positive outcomes.
↓ Joy58
Embrace joy and communicate openly. Positive interactions and shared enthusiasm strengthen bonds and cultivate happiness.
3 Difficulty
Other titles: Difficulty at the Beginning, The Symbol of Bursting, Sprouting, Hoarding, Distress, Organizational Growth Pains, Difficult Beginnings, Growing Pains, Initial Obstacles, Initial Hardship
Judgment
Legge: Difficulty indicates progress and success through firm correctness. Action should not be undertaken lightly, and it is wise to seek help.
Wilhelm/Baynes:Difficulty at the Beginning works supreme success, furthering through perseverance. Nothing should be undertaken. It furthers one to appoint helpers.
Blofeld: Difficulty followed by sublime success! Persistence in a righteous course brings reward; but do not seek some new goal (or destination); it is highly advantageous to consolidate the present position. [The fundamental idea of this hexagram is that of birth and growth amidst difficulty, as with a sprouting seed becoming a young plant and forcing its way through the earth. Our affairs, being still in their early stages, are vulnerable; we must not wander forth, but attend to them until they ripen; then, with proper care, the seed will bring forth a splendid tree. The upper trigram, a pit, suggests a need for caution; but, if we heed these omens, our success is assured.]
Liu: Difficulty in the Beginning : great success. It is of benefit to continue without planning to go someplace. One should find helpers.
Ritsema/Karcher: Sprouting . Spring Growing Harvesting Trial. No availing-of possessing directed going. Harvesting: installing feudatories. [This hexagram describes your situation in terms of beginning growth. It emphasizes that collecting potential in preparation for arduous labor is the adequate way to handle it...]
Shaughnessy: Hoarding : Prime receipt; beneficial to determine. Do not herewith have someplace to go; beneficial to establish a lord.
Cleary(1): In difficulty, creativity and development are effective if correct. Do not use. There is a place to go. It is beneficial to set up a ruler.
Cleary(2):Creativity is successful. It is beneficial to be correct. Do not make use of going somewhere. It is beneficial to set up lords.
Wu:Distress is primordial, pervasive, prosperous, and persevering. The subject should proceed with caution. It will be advantageous to establish marquisates.
The Image
Legge: The image of clouds and thunder formsDifficulty. The superior man, in accordance with this, adjusts his measures of government as in sorting the threads of the warp and woof.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Clouds and thunder: the image of Difficulty at the Beginning. Thus the superior man brings order out of confusion.
Blofeld: This hexagram symbolizes lightning spewed forth by the clouds -- difficulty prevails! The Superior Man busies himself setting things in order.
Liu: Clouds and thunder symbolize Difficulty at the Beginning. The superior man makes order out of disorder.
Ritsema/Karcher: Clouds, Thunder, Sprouting. A chun tzu uses the canons to coordinate. [Canons: standards, laws; regular, regulate; the Five Classics. The ideogram: warp-threads in a loom.]
Cleary(1): Thunder in the clouds is held back; the superior person orders and arranges.
Cleary(2): Clouds and thunder – Difficulty. Thereby leaders organize.
Wu: Clouds and thunder form hexagram Distress. Thus the jun zi plans and organizes.
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge:Difficultyis experienced as Heaven and Earth begin their intercourse, but correct action succeeds in the face of danger. By the action of thunder and rain, which are the attributes of the lower and upper trigrams, all between Heaven and Earth is filled up. But the conditions of the time are irregular and obscure. Authority should be delegated, but the feeling that rest and peace have been secured should not be indulged in even then.
Legge: The written character for Difficultyis pictorial, and shows a plant struggling with difficulty as it rises above the surface of the earth. This initial difficulty is a metaphor for how struggle is the condition of a state which is emerging from disorder after a revolution. The author saw his social and political world in great disorder and difficult to reform, yet he had faith in himself and the destiny of his House. Let there be prudence and caution, with unswerving adherence to the right. Let the government of the different states be entrusted to good and able men -- then all will be well.
According to the arrangement of the eight trigrams, Heaven and Earth are the parents of the other six, who are their children. The first-born son is the lower trigram of Movement, and the second-born son is the upper trigram of Peril. McClatchie renders here: "The figure of Difficulty represents the hard and the soft beginning to have sexual intercourse, and bringing forth with suffering."
The power to move in the lower trigram is likely to produce great effects; to do this in perilous and difficult circumstances (symbolized by the upper trigram) requires firmness and correctness. Good princes throughout the realm will help to remedy the political and social disorder of the times, but the supreme ruler should not trust his subordinates to the point of relaxing his vigilance.
The lower trigram represents thunder, the upper represents rain clouds. The hexagram therefore places us in the atmosphere of a thunderstorm -- a metaphor for the situation of a political state in difficulty. When the thunder has pealed, and the clouds have discharged their burden of rain, the atmosphere is cleared and there is a feeling of relief.
Anthony: This hexagram means that we have not yet found the correct path.
It also means confusion: too many possibilities. Nothing is clear. This lack of clarity is the “hindrance” referred to in the first line of the hexagram. In the second line, the remedies that come forth are inappropriate. In the first stages of dealing with a problem, we are tempted to grasp at solutions, whereas we should wait until the proper actions become clear.
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Judgment: Under the conditions of Difficulty it is best to mark time while seeking assistance.
The superior man uses careful analysis to separate order from confusion.
Wilhelm’s title for this hexagram is Difficulty at the Beginning. I prefer Difficulty, because it is a situation encountered at any phase of the Work, not just the beginning.
Difficulty is experienced because confusion and multiplicity prevail during the initial phase of any creative activity -- thoughts and feelings proliferate and threaten to overwhelm the mind with infinite complexity. The only way to proceed under such circumstances is to carefully sort out the components of the situation and arrange them in categories and in order of importance. To "sort the threads of the warp and woof" is to weave a tangled mess into a tapestry.
The Orderly Sequence of the Hexagrams gives us an image of what takes place under the hexagram of Difficulty:
When there were Heaven and Earth, then afterwards all things were produced. What fills up the space between Heaven and Earth are those individual things. Hence the Dynamic and Magnetic are followed by Difficulty. Difficulty means filling up.
"Filling up," is rendered as "fullness" in some translations. This is the exact meaning of the gnostic term: "Pleroma," or "Fullness" which Jung correlates with the Collective Unconscious or Objective Psyche. These are interior dimensions from which emanate the archetypal energies which we experience as instinctual drives and emotional complexes. This is the "hyperspace" from which the Self, via the oracle, responds to our queries and directs the Work.
Thus we see that the third hexagram, following the creation of the cosmic pair of opposites in the first two figures, represents a dialectical progression. Lao Tse, who wrote the Tao Te Ching some six-hundred years after the I Ching was committed to writing, describes this unfolding process:
Out of Tao, One is born;
Out of One, Two;
Out of Two, Three;
Out of Three, the created universe.
The created universe carries the yin at its back
and the yang in front;
Through the union of their pervading principles
it reaches harmony.
The identical idea is found in many traditions, giving it the status of an archetype within human consciousness. It is not necessary to be familiar with the technical terminology of Kabbalah to recognize that the same idea is being discussed in the following passage:
In Chokmah and Binah we have the archetypal Positive and Negative; the primordial Maleness and Femaleness, established while "countenance beheld not countenance" and manifestation was incipient ... It is between these two polarizing aspects of manifestation -- the Supernal Father and the Supernal Mother -- that the web of life is woven; souls going back and forth between them like a weaver's shuttle. In our individual lives, in our physiological rhythms, and in the history of the rise and fall of nations, we observe the same rhythmic periodicity. D. Fortune --The Mystical Qabalah
This idea has been stated very simply:
All things are a single form which has divided and multiplied in time and space. W.B. Yeats -- A Vision
Is not the sky a father and the earth a mother, and are not all living things with feet or wings or roots their children? -- Black Elk
And also with poetic complexity:
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was a formless void, there was darkness over the deep, and God's spirit hovered over the water ... God said, "Let the waters teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth within the vault of heaven." And so it was ... God blessed them, saying, "Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the waters of the seas; and let the birds multiply upon the earth. Genesis
There are some profound ideas in these images about the structure of human consciousness and the contents of the unconscious psyche. The basic idea is that of Emanation -- the creation of physical reality from a supreme principle in ordered hierarchies of increasing complexity. This concept is essential for a full understanding of the Work.
The involution of man was his descent from the sphere of the spirit, developing bodies of a mental, emotional and then physical nature until he manifested upon this planet. His evolution is to civilize this planet and to develop mastery of the physical, emotional and mental planes and relink himself in unity with God once more, thus completing the cycle. He came from God as an inexperienced Spark of Divine Fire and returns to Him, with all the experience of manifestation, as a Lord of Humanity. Gareth Knight -- The Work of a Modern Occult Fraternity
In many systems of thought, the proliferation of forces is seen in sexual terms -- the cosmic parents produce entities in male and female pairs (gnostic syzygies), which in turn produce offspring. Hence, Confucius says: "Difficulty is experienced as Heaven and Earth begin their intercourse." That this has an explicit sexual connotation is confirmed by McClatchie: "The figure of Difficulty represents the hard and the soft beginning to have sexual intercourse, and bringing forth with suffering." Thus we see that the correct and incorrect correlation ("intercourse") of dynamic (male) and magnetic (female) lines in anyI Ching hexagram symbolizes the favorable (life-enhancing) or unfavorable (life-negating) combinations of thought and feeling within the psyche.
SUGGESTIONS FOR MEDITATION
The sexual intercourse of Heaven and Earth is also described in hexagram number eleven,Harmony. In terms of these sexual metaphors, what does the term "adultery" imply in regard to the Work? See hexagram number forty-four, Temptation, for further insight on this theme.
Line 2
Legge: The second line, magnetic, shows its subject distressed and obliged to return. Even the horses of her chariot also seem to be retreating. But not by a spoiler is she assailed, but by one who seeks her to be his wife. The young lady maintains her firm correctness, and declines a union. After ten years she will be united, and have children.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Difficulties pile up. Horse and wagon part. He is not a robber; he wants to woo when the time comes. The maiden is chaste, she does not pledge herself. Ten years -- then she pledges herself.
Blofeld: He makes no more progress, covers no more distance, than a mounted man trotting to and fro. (His hesitation is due) not to an obstacle but to his wooing a girl who chastely repulses his advances and waits ten years before giving her consent.
Liu: Many difficulties. He goes back and forth on horseback, but he is not a robber. He seeks marriage but the girl does not want an engagement. After ten years she does.
Ritsema/Karcher: Sprouting thus, quitting thus. Riding a horse, arraying thus. In-no-way outlawry, matrimonial allying. Woman and son, Trial: not nursing. Ten years- revolved, thereupon nursing.
Shaughnessy: Hoardingly, earth-moundlike, a team of horses vexatious-like; it is not robbers who confusedly enrich. The [female] child's determination is not to get pregnant; in ten years then she gets pregnant.
Cleary(1): Difficult to advance, hard to make progress. Mounted on a horse, not going forward. It is not a matter of enmity, but marriage. The girl is chaste, not engaged. After ten years she is engaged. [This means not seeking immediate solutions when in difficulty.]
Cleary(2): Stopped, mounted on a horse but standing still. Not enmity, marriage… etc.
Wu: There is hesitation to proceed. The horse carriage falters along. A suitor, not a transgressor, asks for marriage. The young woman chooses to remain chaste and refuses. After 10 years, however, she consents to the betrothal to another man.
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge: Her difficulty arises from her place over the dynamic line below her. The union and children after ten years shows things resuming their regular course. Wilhelm/Baynes: She rests upon a rigid line. Pledging herself after ten years means return to the general rule. Blofeld: The difficulties are revealed by this weak line's position just above a firm one. Waiting for ten years to receive the beloved's consent implies awaiting a gradual return to normal conditions. Ritsema/Karcher: Six at second's heaviness. Riding a solid indeed. Ten years-revolved, thereupon nursing. Reversing rules indeed. Cleary(2): Riding on the obdurate. Getting married after ten years means return to normal. Wu: Riding on the strong-minded first nine. A return to normalcy.
Legge: Advance is even more difficult for the second line than for line one. She is magnetic, and pressed by the dynamic line below her. Above, in the fifth line is the ruler with whom union should be properly sought. All these circumstances suggest the idea of a young lady sought in marriage by a strong suitor with whom marriage was unsuitable. She rejects him, and after ten years marries the only suitable match for her. "Things resume their regular course" means that she is now at liberty to seek a union with line five.
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Siu: Progress is further inhibited. Someone suddenly appears who is mistaken for a robber at first but actually turns out friendly. His offer of help is not to be accepted. Not being from the right quarter, it may entail undesirable obligations. Things will resume their regular course at the proper time.
Wing: Confusion and difficulty mount, and decisions become impossible. To allow yourself to accept help will create a hindering obligation. Therefore it is best to wait until the situation returns to normal before you continue your pursuits.
Editor: Horses are a common symbol for energy or libido ("horsepower"). Women and men respectively represent Eros (emotion) and Logos (intellect). These attributes are consistent throughout the I Ching, and are common in almost all symbol systems. In this line the man is seen as an unsuitable match for the woman, psychologically suggesting an improper union of thoughts and feelings, or the temptation to an emotional rationalization of some sort. The situation is confused and up in the air: psychic energy is in a state of regression, and we are tempted to accept the first solution that comes along. Under such circumstances no progress can be made until things are allowed to settle down. The "ten years" refer to any fulfilled cycle of time.
I use Eros and Logos merely as conceptual aids to describe the fact that woman's consciousness is characterized more by the connective quality of Eros than by the discrimination and cognition associated with Logos. In men, Eros, the function of relationship, is usually less developed than Logos. Jung -- Aion
A. Image of an unsettled situation. Resolution of the problem is not possible now, despite your desire for it. Later on, the situation will resolve itself naturally.
B. At the moment, emotions are too unsettled to be reconciled with reason. Reject an unsuitable idea or concept and wait for a better one.
Line 4
Legge: The fourth line, magnetic, shows its subject as a lady, the horses of whose chariot appear in retreat. She seeks, however, the help of him who seeks her to be his wife. Advance will be fortunate; all will turn out advantageously.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Horse and wagon part. Strive for union. To go brings good fortune. Everything acts to further.
Blofeld: Hesitating like a man trotting to and fro, he waits for marriage. Thenceforth, good fortune will prevail and every action prosper. [This passage indicates that success can certainly be obtained, but only after a considerable period of waiting patiently.]
Liu: He goes back and forth on horseback. If he seeks marriage, he will have good fortune. Everything benefits.
Ritsema/Karcher: Riding a horse, arraying thus. Seeking matrimonial allying. Going significant. Without not Harvesting.
Shaughnessy: A team of horses vexatious-like, seeking confused enrichment; to go is auspicious; there is nothing not beneficial.
Cleary(1): Mounted on a horse yet not going forward. Seeking marriage, it is good to go, beneficial all around.
Cleary(2): Mounted on a horse but standing still. Go to seek alliance, and the good results will benefit all.
Wu: The horse carriage falters along. The lady is being asked for marriage. It will be auspicious to accept. Everything will be advantageous.
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge: Going forward after such a search for a helper shows intelligence. Wilhelm/Baynes: To go only when bidden -- this is clarity. Blofeld: To pursue what we desire, that is wisdom. Ritsema/Karcher: Seeking and also going. Brightness indeed. Cleary(2): Going in search is intelligent. Wu: Accepting the proposal shows a clear discernment.
Legge: The fourth line is the proper correlate of line one, who is the suitor whose aid she seeks. With his help she is able to cope with the difficulties of her position and go forward.
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Siu: The man lacks sufficient power to discharge his responsibilities. He is like a chariot without a horse. But opportunity for help arises. This should be accepted even in the face of self-abnegation.
Wing: With a little help, perhaps a connection you might exploit, you can attain your goals. Of course, you must admit that you lack sufficient power to act independently. If you hesitate over this, you will get nowhere.
Editor: Horses symbolize energy (horsepower) -- here running away from their female owner, a symbol of the emotional function within the psyche. She seeks her proper male correlate, a symbol of Logos, the mental function. Their destined relationship is one of marriage or union. Psychologically interpreted, the image is of a separation of thought and feeling. The line counsels us to seek a connection, establish harmony, or bring our emotions under the control of reason.
Direct your passion with reason, that your passion may live through its own daily resurrection, and like the phoenix rise above its own ashes. Kahlil Gibran -- The Prophet
A. You have yet to make a mental connection necessary to understand the matter at hand -- calm down and figure it out.
B. Unite your thoughts and feelings. Disunion is temporary.
C. Marshall your forces -- "Get your act together."
58 Joy
Other titles: The Joyous, Joyousness, Pleased Satisfaction, Encouraging, Delight, Open, Usurpation, Self-indulgence, Pleasure, Cheerfulness, Frivolity, Callow Optimism
Judgment
Legge:Joy intimates that under its conditions there will be progress and attainment, but it will be advantageous to be firm and correct.
Wilhelm/Baynes:The Joyous. Success. Perseverance is favorable.
Blofeld: Joy -- success! Persistence in a righteous course brings reward.
Liu: Joyousness. Success. Continuance is favorable.
Ritsema/Karcher:Open, Growing. Harvesting Trial. [This hexagram describes your situation in terms of interaction and exchange. It emphasizes that stimulating things through cheering and persuasive speech, the action of Open, is the adequate way to handle it. To be in accord with the time, you are told to: stimulate!]
Shaughnessy:Usurpation: Receipt; a little beneficial to determine.
Cleary (1): Joy is developmental, beneficial if correct. [This hexagram represents joy in practicing the Tao. Having one’s will in the Tao is finding joy in the Tao; when one delights in the Tao, then one can practice the Tao. This is why Joy is developmental.]
Cleary (2):Delight comes through, beneficial if correct.
Wu:Joy indicates pervasiveness. It is advantageous to be persevering.
The Image
Legge: Two images of the waters of a marsh, one over the other, form Joy. The superior man, in accordance with this, encourages the conversation of friends and the stimulus of their common practice.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Lakes resting one on the other: the image of The Joyous. Thus the superior man joins with his friends for discussion and practice.
Blofeld: This hexagram symbolizes two bodies of water conjoined. The Superior Man joins his friends in discussions and in practicing the various arts and virtues.
Liu: The beautiful lakes symbolize Joyousness. The superior man joins his fellows for teaching and study.
Ritsema/Karcher: Congregating marshes. Open. A chun tzu uses partnering friends to explicate repeating.
Cleary (1): Joined lakes are joyful. Thus do superior people explain and practice with companions. [As water provides moisture for myriad beings, joy develops myriad beings; joyful within and without, reaching the outer from within, communicating with the inner from without, inside and outside are conjoined, without separation between them – therefore it is called joy.]
Cleary (2): ... Thus do developed people study and practice with companions.
Wu: One marsh is adjacent to another; this is Joy. Thus the jun zi discusses and exchanges ideas with friends.
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge:Joy has the meaning of Pleased Satisfaction. We have the dynamic lines in the center and the magnetic lines on the outer edge of the two trigrams, indicating that in pleasure what is most advantageous is the maintenance of firm correctness. Through this there will be found an accordance with the will of heaven, and a correspondence with the feelings of men. When such pleasure goes before the people, and leads them on, they forget their toils; when it animates them in encountering difficulties, they forget the risk of death. How great is the power of this Pleased Satisfaction, stimulating in such a way the people!
Legge: The feeling of pleasure is the subject of this hexagram, which is made up of the doubled trigram of Cheerfulness, or Pleased Satisfaction. The progress and attainment of the figure are due to the one magnetic line surmounting each trigram and supported by the two dynamic lines. The idea is that of mildness which is energized by a double portion of strength.
The pleasure which leads the people to endure toil and risk death is the effect of the instructive example of their ruler. Fu Fan-hsien paraphrases this portion of the text as: "When the sage with this precedes them, he can make them endure toil without any wish to decline it, and go with him into difficulty and danger without their having any fear."
Anthony: This hexagram speaks, on the one hand, of that on which true joy depends, and on the other, of joy as desire, which leads to conflict. The essence of true joy is inner stability. Being firmly devoted to our path, we do not waver. When we think of the soft and comfortable path, on the other hand, self-conflict begins. Therefore, getting this hexagram indicates that we may be wavering or irresolute.
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Judgment: A cheerful attitude serves the will.
The Superior Man shares his thoughts and feelings. [Or, psychologically interpreted: observes, weighs and integrates his thoughts with his feelings.]
The title of this hexagram denotes joyousness and pleasure, and most people regard it as a good omen when they receive it. Yet, an analysis of the lines indicates that only the first two are particularly favorable, and the hexagram itself seldom seems to refer to anything remotely resembling “Joy” in a typical oracle consultation. The lessons to be learned from the figure are the differences between self-indulgence and maintaining emotional stability in one's conduct of the Work, which always demands a firm control over one’s affects. To receive this hexagram without changing lines requires the querent's careful discrimination -- it can mean simply: "Oh happy day!" Or, it can suggest that you examine an inclination toward lack of control in the situation at hand. The oracle is capable of brutal sarcasm when your query warrants it, so don't be too quick to accept the shallow meaning ofJoy – as often as not, Self-indulgence is the more appropriate title.
In light frivolity, the center is lost; in hasty action, self-mastery is lost. Lao Tse
The Image depicts an open interchange among “friends.” Intrapsychically, this suggests the normal give and take between thoughts and feelings for the purpose of reaching integration. The symbol of “two bodies of water conjoined” (Blofeld) might refer to the adjacent dimensions of thought and emotion within the psyche. When feelings are not in harmony with intellectual differentiation (a common phenomenon), give and take (“discussion and practice”), is essential to effect integration: i.e., harmony, or “joy.”"Practice" suggests cycles of time, and the notion that perfection is still to be achieved.
Shaughnessy’s seemingly anomalous title of Usurpation for this hexagram offers some subtle insights into the symbolism here. Emotions, feelings, affects, are often portrayed as daemonic forces which “usurp” ego consciousness and indulge themselves in the “joy” of expressing whatever they happen to represent in the psyche. This is often what is implied when receiving this hexagram.
Each of us is equipped with a psychic disposition that limits our freedom in high degree and makes it practically illusory. Not only is "freedom of the will" an incalculable problem philosophically, it is also a misnomer in the practical sense, for we seldom find anybody who is not influenced and indeed dominated by desires, habits, impulses, prejudices, resentments, and by every conceivable kind of complex. All these natural facts function exactly like an Olympus full of deities who want to be propitiated, served, feared and worshipped, not only by the individual owner of this assorted pantheon, but by everybody in his vicinity. Jung -- Psychology and Religion
Cleary’s Taoist commentary: “As water provides moisture for myriad beings, etc.,” supports this interpretation. Water symbolizes the emotional realm, and the “myriad beings” dwelling therein are emotional entities: creatures like untamed animals, which are never happier than when running free. To them it’s Joy; to the executive function in the psyche, it’s Self-indulgence. Usurpation has taken place.