The Great Vessel Blog

Seeing Through Time

One of the great lessons the Yijing teaches is that of how to manage events through time. It encourages a thoughtful stance, patience and an eye for the distant effects of our actions.

Knowing how the current situation came about is every bit as important to our life’s lessons as knowing where we are headed.

Consider this example: I have a problem and want to solve it. The Yijing tells me to go and see the 'Great Sage' and he will tell me what I need to know and thus I will be able to solve the problem and take one more step along my path.

There is a technique which puts this into a greater perspective. Now my reading tells me that this problem grew out of a particular situation. Its the same reading so I still need to go and see the ‘Great Sage’ and that this will give me the missing key to solve the problem and that all of this is so that I can go on and address another task which is…

This greater perspective adds substantial depth and insight into our path, purpose and actions.

I have just posted a new article on this, its called Time Cycles. It explains the use of Seasonal Hexagrams. This is the oldest process model of divinatory time. Its alluded to in the magic formula Yuan Heng Li Zhen.

This model was developed by Stephen Karcher out discussions with Mary Powell who did considerable work in this area.

Essentially all hexagrams may be arranged in groups of 4 around a common Core Theme (nuclear hexagram). By considering the cast hexagram (primary hexagram) in this cyclical context a new time dynamic is revealed.

Instead of a reading merely describing the time and a potential direction of change it now gives a deeper history and the steps required to fulfill a longer term development of which the primary and relating hexagrams might only be a part.

This technique is simple to work out, but like all perspectives its importance in a given reading may vary.

Next week Stephen will post another of his readings series where this approach yelds some very interesting insights.

Kevin

Announcing Changes

We have been rather quiescent online for the last six months. However there has been a great deal of discussion and work going on in the background.

We shall announce quite a number of additions, publications and changes over the next few weeks.

Key changes, which are now in place:

New forums
GreatVessel has a large membership from all around the world. Countries include many from East, South and Northern Europe; United States of A, Mexico and Central America. There are many people in Australasia, Oceania (a few) and Southern Africa. Also a lot of members in Japan; China and Taiwan; South East Asia and India. (Counting Turkey as Europe – Hi guys!)

Thank you to everyone for taking the trouble to visit.

Now, unless we have a small team of international travelling salespeople, using a lot of log-ins, things look very healthy indeed. However few of you seem interested in writing in the forums which is a shame. So much experience and so many different cultures! So we have sat and thought about what types of forum might be of interest. And we have come up with two (Ideas and Feedback Welcome):

1 Stephen Karcher will answer questions about his work online. Any questions about his ideas and work posted to Karcher on Karcher will be answered by him.

2 An open forum Yijing Matters which is just that – Completely open. Ideas, experiences, drifting thoughts, work underway, requests for information references or assistance are just some of the things which you might consider. You may be a busy Sinologist, a City Worker, a beginner or a Sage in a Cave, who believes that the Yi is a personal relationship and each has to find their own way. Fine, but why not let others know you are there? You might be surprised at the depth and breadth of people around… We know this from our post bag. I shall stop here for fear of bursting into song, “I want to buy the world a Coke!”

The only requests are that posts are centred on the Yijing and or Divination and that people respect others differences and opinions.

Readings Panel
Done by Stephen Karcher these have proved to be very popular. They provide worked examples of the use of Stephen’s methodology and thinking. They also offer a discourse on those issues we all confront in both the material world and the way we relate to it psychologically and spiritually. Stephen is now going to add excurses into surrounding ideas which are in themselves very informative. So, for example the Current Reading has a brief piece on psychological ‘complexes’ from a Jungian perspective. This illustrates how the dynamic imagery of the Yijing reflects the dynamic imagery of our inner world.

If you have a interesting reading, of this kind, that you would like Stephen to ask the Yijing and you think would interest others, please post it to the Readings Panel. We will post the resulting exploration and you can ask Stephen questions about it on the forum.

Blog
Stephen is going to start adding some blogs of his ideas and thoughts. As before you might want to write and let us know about your work, developments or projects. If we feel that what you are doing is of interest to our members we will blog it. Those who have been mentioned here in the past have reported increased interest in their work and in a couple of instances have gone on to develop good collaborative links with others.  Its here, use it!

Links Page
Newly updated. It was put together with a great deal of care and thought and its widely read.  We have tried to list all of the quality sites even where the approach is different to our own. So if you have a site or know of one which deserves a mention please let us know. See Yijing Links.

Kevin