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I Ching · Hexagram 57 The Gentle

Hexagram 57 for decisions: The Gentle

巽 Xùn · A decision

Choose the option that can be pursued patiently and repeatedly toward a definite end. The reading favours the gradual approach over the decisive one, and it insists on knowing where you are going.

Wind below, wind above: the gentle doubled, wind following wind. The Gentle describes influence that works by persistence rather than by force: the wind that shapes the rock over years, the idea that spreads by being repeated calmly. The tradition's judgement is modest and clear: success through what is small, it furthers to have somewhere to go, it furthers to see the great person. Gentleness needs a goal or it dissipates; it needs a leader or it wanders. The image is of commands repeated until they are understood. The reading says the situation calls for patient, unhurried, repeated influence, and it warns that gentleness without direction becomes mere yielding.

Advice
Influence gently and repeatedly, toward a clear goal, under good guidance.
Warning
Gentleness without a direction is indecision; penetration pushed too far becomes intrusion.

The changing lines, read for decisions

If your cast of Hexagram 57 had changing lines, these are what each one adds to a decision question, and where each leads.

  1. Line 1 · changes into 9 Small Taming

    Advancing and retreating. The persistence of a warrior furthers. Stop wavering; add a soldier's resolve to your gentleness.

  2. Line 2 · changes into 53 Development

    Penetration under the bed. Priests and magicians are used in great number. Good fortune. No blame. Look under the bed; bring hidden influences into the open by every honest means.

  3. Line 3 · changes into 59 Dispersion

    Repeated penetration. Humiliation. You have thought about it enough; act.

  4. Line 4 · changes into 44 Coming to Meet

    Remorse vanishes. During the hunt three kinds of game are caught. Combine your gentleness with skill and energy; the result is complete.

  5. Line 5 · changes into 18 Work on What Has Been Spoiled

    Persistence brings good fortune. Remorse vanishes. No beginning, but an end. Before the change, three days; after the change, three days. Good fortune. Deliberate before the change and watch after it; the end will be good.

  6. Line 6 · changes into 48 The Well

    Penetration under the bed. He loses his property and his axe. Persistence brings misfortune. You have gone too far into it; stop before you lose your means of defence.

Hexagram 57 in fullLove & relationshipsCareerMoney

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