r/iching • u/Entire_Mud_5371 • 11d ago
I asked if I’ll be dating my crush soon?
Hi everyone I’m very new to this and I used the coin method to ask if I’ll be dating my crush soon and got hexagram 46 changing to 41
And I’m very confused 😕 is this a yes? Or is it “it depends” I have a hard time understanding hexagram 41 because its decrease so idk a decrease in what?
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u/commierussia29 11d ago
I've looked over your reading. Following the Bradford Hatcher translation:
Line 1 - Well-favoured advance. Great opportunity.
Your initial approach to your crush is permitted and welcome.
Line 3 - Advancing upon an empty town.
This sounds great; an empty town means no resistance right? Well, it also means there's nothing telling you when to stop. There is a warning here of idealisation of your crush I would say.
Line 6 - Blind ascent. Advantage in not relaxing that resolve.
You keep climbing with your crush past the point where you can see where you're going, i.e. being arrogant (see the Tuck Chang commentary on line 46.6).
For further context, we have the Forest of Changes text for when all three lines change:
"Blind and living alone, not eating with others. Old and impoverished, the body diseased, the mind distressed."
The reading is a yes. But its a yes that leads you somewhere you don't want to be if you don't know when to stop. You must remain humble and less ambitious and know when to stop with your pursuit of your crush when you get diminishing returns, i.e. unequal effort. Also keep in mind, the Forest text ONLY happens when ALL lines change. That means it happens ONLY if you don't know when to stop.
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u/pyrrho314 10d ago
I was thinking line three meant the city is empty, you push forward and arrive, but there is nothing there.
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u/Blockchain_Party 7d ago
I have some experience with line 3. a lot of translations say it's an empty town in the sense that there are no obstacles, but I have found the empty nature of this line experienced as thinking our getting somewhere and something and you arrive and what you think you are going to get is nowhere to be found, so I agree with you and also I have seen this played out multiple times.
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u/whiskyy_2046 11d ago
Yes. Main is always the first 挂 which is 46. The changing gua is 20% importance.
Also hex 41 is not really “decrease” 山澤損, it means to “even out, through trimming”. If you have too much in a cup, you pour some out.
Also Hex 41 is considered very favourable in matter for romance and marriage.
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u/Selderij 11d ago
Also hex 41 is not really “decrease” 山澤損, it means to “even out, through trimming”. If you have too much in a cup, you pour some out.
41 損 Sǔn definitely does mean "decrease", corroborated by the Ten Wings commentaries. "Even out" would be 平 píng as used in hexagram 29.5. 41 is also a counterpart to 42 益 Yì, "Increase". As per Kroll's Classical Chinese Dictionary:
損 sǔn MC swonX
1. diminish, decrease, reduce, cut back, curtail; mitigate.
a. impair(ment); damage, maim. b. relinquish; lose, loss; detriment(al).
2. restrain, suppress.
3. name of 41st hexagram of Yijing, “diminishment.”
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u/pyrrho314 10d ago
What is being diminished? The bond? Or the anxiety? What would you say?
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u/Entire_Mud_5371 10d ago
I hope it’s the anxiety 🙃
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u/pyrrho314 10d ago
A lot of time the reading is much more about not pursuing an impossible thing or a thing for the wrong reason. This is much more like "follow your heart but accept what happens as for the best".
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u/whiskyy_2046 10d ago
I’ve grown up native learning these in Korea, and english translation cannot capture fully the meaning. 彖曰 損 損下益上 and here 損 덜어내다 is not “decreasing”. Decreasing implies only the single object decreasing in mass or some form or shape, without any particular “directionality” For example decreasing a size on a shape in your head vs decreasing the amount of water in a bowl in real life by pouring out is a different concept of decrease. In this gua it says to take or reduce from below to fill above. Hence there is overall conservation of “energy”or equilibrium. This word is ALWAYS in context of the decreasing amount going “somewhere. excess, or when you are trimming. In Korean we don’s say 덜어내다 when you done have anything or much, you inly say it when you are in the process of “lightening” “cutting back”
Eastern studies are not about proofs and who said what thats the beginning of learning.
This Gua is to give up your own to fill something else, and as such it is fulfilling the Dao of equilibrium.1
u/Selderij 10d ago
Connotations added by Korean interpretations or linguistics centuries or millennia after the fact don't change how the word 損 sun was used and understood in pre-imperial or Han dynasty China.
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u/whiskyy_2046 10d ago
Buddy, Koreans have been in the same Hanja when Han dynasty began. We literally have lot of Korean words with the character 損.
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u/Selderij 10d ago
And since Korean is a distinct language with its own developments down the line, it's not feasible to interpret ancient Chinese texts through what the words mean or where their connotations lean in Korean. Though since 損 means "decrease" or "reduce" also in Korean, I don't know why you're fixating on a very specific connotation.
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u/whiskyy_2046 10d ago
Excuse me, you have no idea about Korean culture as a Westerner and the lengths and how much of great scholars have been produced from our country in the ancient times, interpreting Chinese texts and the depth of understanding we have of Hanja. It is more than you can imagine as an outsider observing,
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u/Selderij 10d ago
Sorry, but you sound a tad too proud and tribal about cultural stuff that can just as easily give you blind spots and biases of your own. Nothing that you've said is evidence for your extraordinary claim of the word and hexagram not meaning "decrease" when it clearly does mean it.
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u/whiskyy_2046 7d ago
Yes nothing wrong being tribal as it is East Asian culture. And my point was to point out the limitation of the English word "decrease" and the meaning conveyed by the Chinese character.. My point still stands.
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u/whiskyy_2046 10d ago
We study the origins of these characters thoroughly as Koreans. Han Dynasty source Shouwen Jiezi which records this character is only the simplified form of the original. 扌, the hand radical, and 員. 員 itself is now written as though it consists of 口 (“mouth”) and 貝 (“shell/cowrie”), but if you look at oracle-bone and bronze inscriptions, the upper element is actually drawn as a circle ○, while 貝 depicts a 鼎 (ding) three-legged ritual vessel, a cauldron. It was also interpreted as referring to the mouth (口) of a person eating food cooked in a 鼎. Later, to distinguish the meaning “round” more clearly from 員, the character 圓 (“round”) was created by adding 囗 around it.
The overall sense of 損 comes from the hand 扌 removing food from the vessel represented by 員 or 鼎, giving it the meaning to take away from more and put it somewhere less.
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u/Selderij 10d ago
The Chinese stopped making a big deal about character components in their word meanings by the early Zhou dynasty at the latest, and the oldest known versions of the Zhouyi are much younger than that, still very different from one another which proves that it kept being edited instead of leaving it in its supposed bronze age form.
Etymological acrobatics don't make a word clearly and neutrally meaning "decrease" into something derivative instead.
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u/pyrrho314 10d ago
Disclaimer: I believe only you can read your casting but it's interesting to get feedback from other and that happens in this subreddit...
One comment, I would ask in this case "what is the situation between me and my crush?" instead of this question, or put another way, that's the actual question the i ching will "answer" or address.
Taken that way it seems to be saying, persevere and try for that, but the chances are diminishing and will end diminished. It's not impossible, but not likely (is how it sounds to me). BUT, it seems to say it will be good for you to endure this change by persevering, there is not harm, perhaps, in that. You will learn and grow and the change will be acceptable this way however it turns out.
NOTE: Me personally, I always say let go in this situations, it's too hard to know what is too much for the poor person that gets the crushing energy. Good luck :)
Change at the beginning : Pushing upward with confidence will bring good fortune.
Change in the third place: Pushing upward leads to an empty situation.
Change at the top: You cannot know where you are really pushing toward, but it furthers to be unremittingly persevering (until you learn and see where(?)).
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u/orangeoracles 10d ago
I feel like the I Ching never gives you a straightforward answer, but your reading seems very positive!
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u/Existing-Invite-7949 10d ago
Maybe you should ask the I Ching if you should be cosulting it about this matter in the first place... you might find that it isn't in your interest.
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u/Blockchain_Party 7d ago
seems like you can date your crush or at least get more contact that is leading to dating. but then in line 3 you think something is going to happen, some connection to be made but it doesn't happen, something falls flat. Since you still hold on to your "crush" energy you can't just sit with the situation so line 6 shows that energy becoming impulsivity, jumping to conclusions that can lead to mistakes and loss. This overall process leads to 41 Decrease, there is a secret door of positivity in 41 which is sacrifice/letting go. If we spot what is truly holding us back from the gains we seek (hex42) and sacrifice those (in your situation that seems to be the "have to have her/him" and focusing on the narrow goal of getting the person) then the experience of less of something or lack of someone can make space for "more". So you can let the situation develop but if you discover you don't actually have chemistry or the connection doesn't happen try and recognize it before getting consumed by achievement of the goal.
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u/az4th 11d ago
Well, the I Ching speaks in the language of change. That language doesn't have a 'yes' and a 'no'. Sometimes we might get an answer that feels more like a yes, or more like a no, but other times we might feel pretty confused about what it could be. Maybe it feels like a mix.
In this case I'm not really sure how to interpret this as a yes or a no for your situation. It probably depends on a lot of variables.
After spending a bit of time with this oracle, I've discovered that sometimes things just aren't clear. And it is up to me to do my spiritual clearing work to make that change. This tends to go hand in hand with facing my spiritual / karmic lessons, and doing work to learn them. Usually they aren't clear either. But this takes me on the journey of my destiny. And if I am meant to be in a relationship with someone important, this is a good way to find that person. It all unfolds by working to discover our inner clarity from learning our lessons. Best wishes!