Find strength in stillness; let patience nourish your path.
From
52
Keeping Still
To
27
Nourishment
One has returned most of the items one borrowed, but some are missing. taoscopy.com
Keeping Still52
Stay still and composed. Focus inward, find tranquility amidst chaos. Embrace calmness to understand your inner self.
↓ Line 1
The beginning of stillness. It is important to remain calm and not act impulsively.
↓ Line 3
Excessive stillness can lead to stagnation and emotional distress. Balance is needed.
↓ Nourishment27
Focus on sustenance and nourishment, both physical and spiritual. Evaluate the sources from which you draw energy and wisdom. Guard against meaningless indulgence and seek genuine fulfillment.
Other titles: Mountain, Keeping Still, The Symbol of Checking and Stopping, Desisting, Stilling, Stillness, Stoppage, Bound, Reposing, Resting, Meditation, Non-action, Stopping, Arresting Movement, "Refers to meditation and yoga." -- D.F. Hook
Judgment
Legge: When his repose is like the back, and he loses all consciousness of self; when he walks in his courtyard and does not see the people, there will be no error.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Keeping Still. Keeping his back still so that he no longer feels his body. He goes into his courtyard and does not see his people. No blame.
Blofeld: Keeping the back so still as to seem virtually bodiless, or walking in the courtyard without noticing the people there involves no error!
Liu: Stillness. Keeping the back still -- one feels that the body no longer exists. Even when one walks in the courtyard, one sees no people. No blame.
Ritsema/Karcher: Bound: one's back. Not catching one's individuality. Moving one's chambers. Not visualizing one's people. Without fault. [This hexagram describes your situation in terms of confronting a boundary or obstacle. It emphasizes that stopping and acknowledging the limit, the action of Bound, is the adequate way to handle it. To be in accord with the time, you are told to stop!]
Shaughnessy: Stilling his back , but not stilling his body: Walking into his courtyard, but not seeing his person; there is no trouble.
Cleary (1):Stopping at the back, one does not have a body; walking in the garden, one does not see a person. No fault.
Cleary (2):Stilling the back, one does not find the body, etc.
Wu:Stoppage indicates that, resting on his back, he does not find his body and walking in his courtyard, he does not see any person. Faultless.
The Image
Legge: The image of one mountain atop another formsKeeping Still. The superior man, in accordance with this, does not allow his thoughts to go beyond the duties of his immediate circumstances.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Mountains standing close together: the image of Keeping Still.. Thus the superior man does not permit his thoughts to go beyond his situation.
Blofeld: This hexagram symbolizes two mountains conjoined. The Superior Man takes thought in order to avoid having to move from his position.
Liu: Mountain next to mountain symbolizes stillness. The superior man's thoughts do not go beyond his position.
Ritsema/Karcher: Joined mountains. Bound. A chun tzu uses pondering not to issue-forth-from one's situation.
Cleary (1):Joining mountains. Thus do superior people think without leaving their place.
Cleary (2):The mountains are still. Thus the thoughts of developed people are not out of place.
Wu: One mountain overlapping another makes Stoppage. Thus the jun zi does not contemplate things beyond his position. [Confucius said: “If you do not hold an office, do not give counsels on its administration.” What he meant is: not to volunteer counsels freely. On the other hand, if you are requested, then give the best you can.]
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge:Keeping Stillmeans stopping: One rests when it is time to rest, and acts when it is time to act. When action and rest occur at the proper times, one's behavior is enlightened. Keeping his back still, he rests in his proper place. The upper and lower lines of the hexagram all mirror each other, but are without any interaction: Hence it is said that he has no consciousness of [ego]. He does not see the persons in his courtyard, and there will be no error.
Legge: Two trigrams symbolizing Mountain make up the hexagram ofKeeping Still. Mountains rise up grandly from the surface of the earth, their huge masses resting on it in quiet and solemn majesty. They are barriers to the onward progress of the traveler. The attributes of this hexagram are both resting and arresting. It denotes the characteristic of resting in what is right in principle, right on the widest possible scale -- in the absolute conception of the mind and in every possible position in which a man can be placed. As in hexagram number thirty-one, Initiative, the symbolism is taken from the different parts of the human body.
According to the K'ang-hsi editors, the second sentence in the Image should be translated: "The superior man, in consequence with this, thinks anxiously how he shall not go beyond the duties of his position."
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Judgment:"Wipe out imagination: check desire: extinguish appetite: keep the ruling faculty in its own power.” -- Marcus Aurelius
The Superior Man eliminates all distraction and concentrates on the matter at hand.
A large portion of the Work consists of nothing more than the will to keep still. Anyone who has ever tried it can attest that Keeping Still, or doing “nothing,” is probably the most difficult thing that a human can be asked to do. We are an ever-flowing fountain of restless desire -- the senses are mindlessly programmed to encounter their objects, and when we prevent them from doing this, a great commotion occurs in the psyche. We are so accustomed to feeling our desires, drives, instincts and appetites as integral to our awareness, that we are seldom conscious of the fact that they are actually autonomous forces -- as separate from the ego, or choice-making complex, as we are from other people, creatures or objects in the physical world. Try controlling an ingrained habit, such as smoking, and observe how difficult it is to impose your will upon it. Who controls whom?
The power of sight does not come from the eye, the power to hear does not come from the ear, nor the power to feel from the nerves; but it is the spirit of man that sees through the eye, and hears with the ear, and feels by means of the nerves. Wisdom and reason and thought are not contained in the brain, but they belong to the invisible and universal spirit which feels through the heart and thinks by means of the brain. All these powers are contained in the invisible universe, and become manifest through material organs, and the material organs are their representatives, and modify their mode of manifestation according to their material construction, because a perfect manifestation of power can only take place in a perfectly constructed organ, and if the organ is faulty, the manifestation will be imperfect, but not the original power defective. Paracelsus -- De Viribus Membrorum
The ego has only one legitimate function -- to make choices: it is the switchboard in the psyche which directs where the energy of the instinctual powers shall go. If these autonomous forces are stronger than the will of the ego, they soon learn to get their way as often as possible. The main difference between an inferior and a superior man is that the latter has learned to control and direct his energies for a higher purpose. One of the best ways to acquire this ability is to learn the lessons inherent within Keeping Still.
Psychoanalysis has demonstrated that the power of these images and complexes lies chiefly in the fact that we are unconscious of them, that we do not recognize them as such. When they are unmasked, understood, and resolved into their elements, they often cease to obsess us; in any case we are then much better able to defend ourselves against them. Roberto Assagioli -- Psychosynthesis
The lines of the upper and lower trigrams are mirror images of each other, yet not one of them has a proper correlate: they don't connect with each other. This suggests the separation of the senses from their objects. For example, eyeballs are sensory-receptors designed for the perception of light and form -- close your eyes, and they are prevented from contacting the phenomena they were created to perceive. That the psychic entities attached to this desire to perceive phenomena might resist restriction is a foregone conclusion, but the ego has control over the eyelids -- or should have. “Not seeing the people in one's own courtyard” means that one ignores one's autonomous impulses.
Regulation of the psyche’s autonomous manifestations in accordance with the will of the Self is for the purpose of gaining a controlling influence over one’s karma. As stated herein many times, you, as ego, are nothing more than a tool created by the Self for the direction of its own destiny.
Both karma theory and quantum mechanics refuse to accept that observers can exist independent of the systems they observe. Spiritual science goes so far as to take the observer’s own internal universe and its states as its experimental field. For it is within that field that karma is produced and stored …The “matter” from which we and our obstructions are created includes both the dense physical material from which our bodies are built and the thoughts, attitudes and emotions that make up our minds. Tantric practice is karmic engineering within this field of name and form, orchestration of substance and action into result. First you direct new causes against previous effects to nullify adverse influences on your awareness, then you unleash yet further actions to negate the influence of the nullifying actions. Robert Svoboda –Aghora III, The Law of Karma
How any ego could tackle such responsibilities with any hope of progress is impossible to imagine without the direction of the Self. Keeping Still certainly has its own karmic consequences, but when the “not choosing” implied in this hexagram is done in accordance with the Self’s will and intent, the results slowly lead to ever higher levels of awareness – eventually into realms beyond the physical. That is what the Work is all about: any other choice is to lock ourselves into a continuous round of birth and death in physical manifestation.
The Kabbalists teach that everything we do stirs up a corresponding energy in other realms of reality. Actions, words, or thoughts set up reverberations in the universe. The universe unfolds from moment to moment as a function of all the variables leading up to that moment. When we remain cognizant of this mystical system, we are careful about what we do, say, or even think, for we know that everything is interdependent; we know that a seemingly insignificant gesture could have weighty consequences. Rabbi David Cooper – God is a Verb
SUGGESTIONS FOR MEDITATION
Notice that every line of this hexagram except the last deals with an inherent challenge involved in the discipline required to keep still. Compare the lines in Keeping Still with similar lines in hexagram 31, Initiative.
Line 1
Legge: The first line, magnetic, shows its subject keeping her toes at rest. There will be no error, but it will be advantageous for her to be persistently firm and correct.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Keeping his toes still. No blame. Continued perseverance furthers.
Blofeld: Stilling the toes -- no error. Unwavering persistence in a righteous course brings advantage. [This suggests the simplest kind of stillness, namely staying where we are.]
Liu: Keeping the toes still. No error. Continued persistence is advantageous.
Ritsema/Karcher: Bound: one's feet. Without fault. Harvesting: perpetual Trial.
Shaughnessy: Stilling his foot: there is no trouble; beneficial for permanent determination.
Cleary (1): Stopping at the feet, there is no fault. It is beneficial to be always upright.
Wu: He rests his toes. No error. It is advantageous to be persevering.
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge: She does not fail in what is correct according to the idea of the figure. Wilhelm/Baynes: What is right is not yet lost. Blofeld: This passage is implied by the position of this line, which is not out of order. Ritsema/Karcher: Not-yet letting-go correcting indeed. Cleary (2): Stop the feet before losing correctness. Wu: He has not lost the correct way.
Legge: The symbolism of the hexagram rises from one part of the body to the other. The first line at the bottom of the figure fitly suggests the toes. Toes play a great part in walking, but there are here at rest, and so do not lose the correct idea of Keeping Still. The lesson is that from the first men should rest in and be anxious to do what is right in all their affairs. The dynamic line in a magnetic place accounts for the caution with which the phrase concludes.
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Siu: At the outset, the man pauses to study the situation as it actually exists -- without being led astray by wishful thinking or ulterior motives. He must remain persistently firm and correct to avoid irresolute drifting.
Wing: Because the situation is only at its beginning, you are able to see things as they are. Furthermore, your interests and motives have not yet become self-serving. Continuing in this objective attitude is necessary for advancement.
Editor: The I Chingconsistently uses the image of toes as symbolic of initial movement -- the beginning of some kind of action. Here the message is to refrain from action. There is a hint that egotistical compulsiveness or impatience might be involved. You are counseled to squelch this urge and remain quietly in place.
Our vitality constantly drives us to do something and if we stop that, something within us keeps going on. Try once to think of nothing even for half a second! You cannot! You think: "Gosh, I have to go to the butcher, etc." It is the constant autonomous restlessness of the life we lead and our will-power is insufficient to enable a simple inner life to overcome that autonomous liveliness. With the help of the Self, however, it comes forth. M.L. Von Franz -- Alchemical Active Imagination
A. Do not initiate action.
Line 3
Legge: The third line, dynamic, shows its subject keeping his loins at rest, and separating the ribs from the body below. The situation is perilous, and the heart glows with suppressed excitement.
Wilhelm/Baynes: Keeping his hips still. Making his sacrum stiff. Dangerous. The heart suffocates.
Blofeld: Stilling the loins and stiffening the spine – his heart is suffocated by trouble. [Elsewhere in the Book of Change, it is made clear that the loins sometimes symbolize sexual desire. To force oneself to continence when the mind is not ready for it is exceedingly dangerous and may lead to mental and emotional disarrangement. What is required is stilling the WHOLE self, a cessation of desire itself.]
Liu: Keeping the loins and the middle of the spine still. Danger. His heart is like an anxious flame.
Shaughnessy: Stilling his midsection: scratching his spine; danger; smoke the heart.
Cleary (1): Stopping at the waist breaks the backbone; danger inflames the heart.
Wu: He rests his waist and tightens it with a waistband. He is deeply worried.
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge: The danger of keeping the loins at rest produces a glowing heat in the heart. Wilhelm/Baynes: There is danger that the heart may suffocate. Blofeld: If the loins are stilled, there is a danger that the heart will suffocate. Ritsema/ Karcher: Exposure smothers the heart indeed. Cleary (2): Danger affects the heart. Wu: He is deeply worried.
Legge: When the calves are kept at rest, advance is stopped, but no other harm ensues. Not so when the loins are kept at rest, and unable to bend, for the connection between the upper and lower parts of the body is then broken. The dissatisfaction increases to an angry heat. Canon McClatchie suggests the idea of "stopping at a limit, and separating what is in continued succession (i.e., the backbone); thus the mind, etc."
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Siu: Danger results from the smoldering resentment against forced inaction on the part of the man. The proper frame of mind for meditation and concentration can arise naturally only out of inner composure and not through artificial rigidity.
Wing: If you attempt to force stillness upon restless desires you will only create deep inner conflict and resentment. This can be dangerous. Attempt internal composure through relaxation and Meditation.
Editor: If the heart is the point of balance between the dry speculations of the brain and the robust libido of the genitals ("loins"), then the will to keep the loins at rest is certain to create a conflict within the psyche which will test our "heart" to serve the higher ideals of the Work. As the top line of the lower trigram, this is a place of transition between a lower and higher condition, and the imagery describes the conflict which ensues whenever one undertakes such a separation. Blofeld's note about sexuality is very apt here: the Self is capable of testing one's will to the very limits of endurance on this issue; indeed, control of sexual libido is one of the cornerstones of the Work and cannot be evaded. The concept of the "cessation of desire itself" is easily understood, yet all but impossible to achieve. If this is the only changing line, the new hexagram becomes number 23, Disintegration(Splitting Apart), the corresponding line of which offers a strong hint about how to handle the situation at hand.
For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. Galatians 5: 17
A. Make a distinction between your will and your desire, and at least be conscious about which one you choose.
B. Enforced inaction is suffocating to a free spirit.
C. Calm down -- get back on center. Disassociate yourself from an inferior force.
Other titles: The Corners of the Mouth, Providing Nourishment, The Symbol of the Cheek and of Nourishment, Jaws, Lower Jaw, Nurturing, Swallowing, Sagacious Counsel, Nourishing, To Feed, "Can mean money, usually as the result of effort." -- D.F. Hook
Judgment
Legge:Nourishmentindicates good fortune through firm correctness. Make sure you know what you are feeding, and determine your proper diet.
Wilhelm/Baynes: The Corners of the Mouth . Perseverance brings good fortune. Pay heed to the providing of nourishment and to what a man seeks to fill his own mouth with.
Blofeld: Nourishing. (Nourishment -- literally Jaws) [The form of this hexagram readily brings to mind the concept of wide open jaws, but the word nourishment must not be taken only in a literal sense; for we are concerned here with all those things which men seek both for their own advantage and for giving succor or assistance to others.] Righteous persistence brings good fortune. Watch people nourishing others and observe with what manner of things they seek to nourish themselves. [For this will teach us a lot about their characters.]
Liu: Nourishment. Continuing leads to good fortune. Observe the providing of nourishment and the food someone seeks for himself.
Ritsema/Karcher: Jaws, Trial: significant. Viewing Jaws. Originating-from seeking mouth substance. [This hexagram describes your situation in terms of nourishing and being nourished. It emphasizes that opening in order to take things in as well as providing to others is the adequate way to handle it...]
Shaughnessy:Jaws: Determination is auspicious. View the jaw; oneself seeking the mouth's fullness.
Cleary (1): In nourishment, it is good to be correct. Observe nourishment, and seek fulfillment for the mouth by yourself.
Cleary (2): Nourishment is good if correct. Observe nourishment, and seek food by yourself.
Wu: Nurturing indicates that with perseverance there will be auspiciousness. People should observe the principle of nurturing and find proper foods for nourishment.
Hua-Ching Ni: In nourishment, one should seek the right nutrition and not be tempted by what others enjoy.
The Image
Legge: The image of thunder under a mountain forms Nourishment. The superior man, in accordance with this, controls his speech and regulates his eating and drinking.
Wilhelm/Baynes: At the foot of the mountain, thunder: the image of The Corners of the Mouth. Thus the superior man is careful in his words and temperate in eating and drinking.
Blofeld: This hexagram symbolizes thunder rumbling at the foot of a mountain. The Superior Man is thoughtful in speech and frugal in his eating and drinking. [The lower trigram, thunder, also represents the power of quickening growth; hence its place in a hexagram concerned with nourishment.]
Liu: Thunder rolling around the foot of the mountain is the symbol of Nourishment. The superior man is cautious in his speech; he restrains and regulates his eating and drinking.
Ritsema/Karcher: Below mountain possessing thunder. Jaws. A chun tzu uses considering words to inform. [A chun tzu uses] articulating to drink and take-in.
Cleary (1): There is thunder beneath the mountain. Superior people are careful about what they say, and moderate in eating and drinking.
Cleary (2): … Leaders are prudent in speech, moderate in consumption.
Wu: There is thunder below the mountain; this is Nurturing. Thus the jun zi speaks with caution and drinks and eats with moderation.
COMMENTARY
Confucius/Legge: When the nourishing is correct, there will be good fortune. We must examine those whom we wish to nourish, and we must also examine our own nourishing of ourselves. Heaven and earth nourish all things. The sages nourish men of talent and virtue in order to reach the masses. Great is the work intended in the time of nourishing.
Legge: The character ofNourishment is the symbol of the upper jaw, but the image of the hexagram suggests a whole mouth with undivided lines at top and bottom, and divided lines between them. The bottom line is in the trigram of Movement, and the top line is in the trigram of Keeping Still -- giving the image of a mobile lower jaw and a fixed upper jaw. The divided lines represent the mouth cavity. The hexagram denotes nourishing of body or mind, of one's self or others, and the proper nourishment in each case must necessarily vary according to circumstances. Thus, judgment must be exercised to determine which nourishment is in harmony with correctness and virtue.
NOTES AND PARAPHRASES
Judgment:Nourishment asks you to examine your motives in the allocation of your energy. Willpower creates a well- balanced apportionment.
The Superior Man controls his expression and monitors his appetites.
The lines in the lower trigram of Movement are all rendered unfavorably to one degree or another, while the lines of the upper trigram of Keeping Still are all generally correct. The implication is that non-action is almost always preferable to movement. This idea is fundamental to the philosophy of the I Ching, and in the hexagram of Nourishmentthe lesson is that non-action feeds and strengthens the psyche.
All actions are the expression of psychic energy through a physical body to create an effect in spacetime. Each effect creates consequences which usually demand further action. It is easy to see that action which is not initiated by the Self can only result in unexpected consequences, and that action which conforms to the will of the Self is motivated by and directed toward a transcendent goal. Although correct non-action generally creates no negative consequences in spacetime, it does have nourishing consequences in the psyche as autonomous forces are gathered, digested, assimilated and renewed in ascending configurations of growth.
As this Path represents the structure of the [ego], the attribution of the Mouth reminds us that the purpose of incarnation is the seeking of the food of experience in Form for the benefit of the [Self] and the Spirit. Gareth Knight -- Qabalistic Symbolism
SUGGESTIONS FOR MEDITATION
Compare the Image of Nourishment in this hexagram with those in hexagram number five, Waiting; number forty-eight, The Well; and number fifty, The Sacrificial Vessel.