I Ching

How to read an I Ching consultation

The I Ching, or Book of Changes, is one of the oldest Chinese classics, both a book of wisdom and an oracle. It does not hand out a fixed fate. It describes the quality of a moment: what forces are moving, which are rising and which are fading, and what attitude fits the time.

Asking the question

The book responds best to a clear question about a real situation or decision. “What should I understand about this conflict?” or “What attitude should I take toward this delay?” will give a far more useful reading than “Will everything be all right?” Ask for orientation rather than prediction, and ask once: the book itself warns that restless, repeated asking receives no instruction.

How the hexagram is built

A consultation produces a hexagram: six lines, built from the bottom upward, each either solid (yang) or broken (yin). The traditional coin method casts three coins six times, with heads counting 3 and tails 2. A total of 7 gives a stable yang line and 8 a stable yin line. A total of 9 gives an old yang line and 6 an old yin line: these are changing lines, forces that have reached their extreme and are about to turn into their opposite.

The six lines also form two trigrams, a lower and an upper, each one of eight images: Heaven, Earth, Thunder, Water, Mountain, Wind, Fire and Lake.

Reading the text

Start with the Judgment, the short statement for the whole hexagram. It names the condition of the moment and often gives advice about conduct or timing. Then read the Image, which draws a lesson from the two trigrams and says how a wise person responds. The Judgment tells you what kind of moment this is; the Image tells you how to inhabit it.

If there are changing lines, read their line statements next. They show where the situation is most alive, and they are often where the advice becomes concrete.

Changing lines also produce a second hexagram: turn each changing line into its opposite and leave the rest as they are. This second figure does not replace the first. It shows the direction in which the situation is moving.

Reading change, not fate

A difficult hexagram is not doom. It may mean the timing is wrong, the approach is wrong, or patience is part of the work. A favourable one is not permission to be careless, since good fortune in the book is always tied to right conduct. Write the reading down and return to it later, when its pattern has had time to unfold.