Article Index
You will find a great variety of articles and guides on our site, from short topical guides and how-to-do-it instructions to articles that look at I Ching, divination and culture in depth. We also offer e-books and consultation programs.
The Decades model the ideal shape of the Symbolic Life. Each tells of a birth, death and re-birth process that enables us to Accumulate De, the actualizing power that lets an individual connect his or her own identity to the Ancestral foundation of life. Each recreates the shape and dynamic of the sacred or ritual cosmos at a different Stage of Life. The movement through a Decade or sequence of ten hexagrams can be simultaneously imagined as a personal experience; as a progressive reorganization of the intelligence and the nervous system; as a step in the evolution of culture; and as an experience of the creatio continua, the continuous creation of life and spirit.
The following sections give you the mythic background to the Decades and material from the Matrix of Change to begin to study and understand them.
I Landscapes of the Decades
Setting the Stage
The culture that gave rise to the ritual education portrayed in the Decades developed on China’s great northeastern plain between the sea and the craggy mountain wall bounding the central plateau, spreading into the beautiful river valleys of the Wei and the Fen and over the passes into the Yangzi Valley. This is a land of extreme contrasts, a world of wide plains bounded and divided by mountains, cut by great rivers, with arching skies overhead where the weather comes sudden and violent. It is torrid in summer and glacial in winter, when the rivers and earth are frozen solid. The spring thaw is rapid, turning the rivers into torrents full of floating ice. The low lying areas become marshes during the spring and summer, full of a profusion of plants, nesting geese and cranes and swarming fish, surrounded by clumps of tall grass and scrub, thickets full of great wild beasts hunted by setting fire to the brush.
The fertile border areas of the great marshes were developed into mulberry groves and deep green pastures for horses. The best land was drained and cultivated to produce millet, sorghum and rice, wheat and hemp, beans and gourds. The fields were cultivated on the well-field model, eight fields surrounding a central well. Nearby were houses of pounded earth, the hamlets where the people lived in winter. The twenty-five families of a hamlet made up a group centered on an Earth Altar with a cult of the Divine Couple, the Protectors. The manors of the nobles, surrounded by a high pounded-earth wall and ditch, were interspersed among the hamlets. The farms, fields, village clusters and manors were in turn clustered around the fortified cities, great palaces and royal tombs. All these areas of culture were surrounded and divided by dense brush, wild rivers and rugged mountains inhabited by wild animals, nomads, outlaws and barbarians, tribal groups apart from the civilizing movement of the plains peoples.
The landscape is dotted with sites of close encounter with the spirit world: ancestral temples, tombs, initiatory towers, grave mounds, earth altars, hidden mountain shrines and River-Mountain festival sites. We see a great variety of people go about their lives here, peasants, nomads, merchants, wandering sages, nobles and kings, shamans, officials and magicians, husbands and wives, slaves and prisoners, children, craftsmen, soldiers and officers, courtesans, and wide range of spirits and heroes eating and drinking, carrying out a variety of ritual actions and feasts, loving and hating, working and hoping and scheming, making war and finding peace, despairing and becoming enlightened, facing death and disaster or sudden joy.
The Center and the Edges
In old Chinese thought, an organized social and geographic unit - a land, region, province or kingdom – is defined by a Center and the rippling waves of influence and ritual energy radiating from it. In archaic China this was the King and his Court, the Center of power, high culture and the magic of writing and high ritual that connected Heaven and Earth, assuring the flow of blessings into and through the world of the All-under-Heaven. This Center organized and deployed the territories “a thousand li around” into circles of rich surplus producing fields ringed by villages, manors and fortified cities. The lands, fields and local altars they contained were focused on the Royal Altar that provided offerings to Shang Di, the Supreme Above. The whole ritual landscape was surrounded by high Mountains to the North and West, rushing Rivers to the South and great marshes draining down to the sea on the West. These Mountains, Rivers and Marches were the oldest homes of the Hundred Gods (Shen) of the edges and the archaic cults at holy sites that fed them.
The social center of this power was the She or Earth Altar, an interface of human and natural interests that served as the community focal point. It “doubled” the old Mountain and River sites and was in turn re-doubled into the Altar in the Royal Temple. It integrated the cults of local gods and spirits into the grand cult of the Primary Powers of Earth Mother and Heaven Father as Ancestral spirits. This unification wove together two cycles of ritual and sacrifice, the River-Mountain rites and festivals associated with Spring and Autumn, East and West, and the elaborate cycle of rites for Ancestors associated with North and South, Winter and Summer.
The Royal Center became a great Sacred Mountain. It was flanked by approaches on the East and West that invited incoming Spirit Guests and opened Gates to the North and South through which the awesome power of the Royal Ancestors flowed. From this Royal Center the King and his Diviners looked out to the powers on the far-off edges, prayed to them and saw the omens coming in from the Four Directions or Hidden Lands, omens that could indicated the shifting patterns of the Way.
The Shape of the Turtle
The sacred shape of this world was the form of Linggui, the Numinous Turtle that provided one of its main oracles. The Fu-sang or Sun Tree from which the Ten Suns rise lies to the east; in the far west the Ruo or Moon Tree on which they set. Each tree has a pool at its base in which the Mothers bathe the suns and the moons. Beneath the earth are the underground Ghost River and the Yellow Springs that connect the two trees and make them one, the World Tree or Bushy Mulberry. Above is Sky, Heaven and the Great Bear or Dipper, the court of Shang Di, the Lord Above who gives the fates and his court of Royal Ancestors. The flat, square Earth is spread between the round sky and the underworld waters, extending to the Four Sides or Directions (si fang), home of mysterious bird-headed wind spirits who are objects of high sacrifice. The Four Hidden Lands and the square Earth revolve around an axis that connects Heaven, Earth and the rushing Ghost River beneath. This ceremonial axis is a World Tree or axis mundi, a “zone of absolute reality where there is perfect access to the spirit world.” It can be established or invoked at any site where the high ritual or divination is performed, particularly through the use of the bronze sacrificial vessels or at the monumental Royal Tombs, gates to the Ancestors and the High Lord. This center of the world is where the dead rest in peace and receive the great offerings, the place from which their blessings flow.
See: World of Change
II Themes of the Decades
Each Stage or Decade in the Symbolic Life that played itself out in this great ritual landscape seems to have a basic developmental task or theme associated with it.
The First Decade (1-10, childhood) is an intensely self-contained time when the child seeks to imagine a world in which to discover an identity.
The Second Decade (11-20, the Teens) presents a series of struggles with group and individual identity, sexuality and an emerging personal destiny or mission.
The Third Decade (21-30, the 20’s) contains the first great Male and Female Initiations where our adult Name and identity are roused and fixed. It begins the search for an image of the deeper Self.
The Fourth Decade (31-40, the 30’s) consists of the heroic struggles to found a dwelling, family and career that extend beyond the personal.
The Fifth Decade (41-50, the 40’s) represents an emergence into higher levels of culture and empowerment in society, conferring a new ritual status and power on the now fully individualized being.
The Sixth Decade (51-60, the 50’s) confronts us with the proper exercise of power and our responsibilities to the human community, releasing and fulfilling the potential for present good and re-orienting us towards the great passage across the river of life and death.
The Crossings (61-64) are a coda and a linking of cycles. They represent a birth into the life of the spirit, the passage across the River of Life and Death and a link to the new generations to come.
The Pairs in the Decades
Each Decade collects and specifically empowers five Pairs of hexagrams or Figures to create a ritual narrative or passage. Understanding the mythic Story of a Decade depends on first seeing the Pair Positions within each Decade not just as static themes or empty places but as symbolic agents or “markers that do work” that are part of the complex interpretive tradition created by the overall Matrix of Change. Each is a characteristic resonance, stance and set of interconnections, like sounding boxes or wind harps, masks or metaphors. As the stuff of change or yi flows through each of these Pair Positions it is given a characteristic voice.
Further, each Pair occupying one of these Positions generates a set of other Relational Pairs across its Crossline Matrix that link it to other Pairs and other Decades. Of particular interest here are the 1:6 Crossline line interchange and the 6:1 Crossline line interchange. They show which other site a Pair “directly exchanges ritual energy with” (1:6 Crossline exchange) and which it calls on to provide its “inner drive” (6:1 Crossline exchange).
1:2 Position: The Gates of Change
The Originating 1:2 Position acts as an Axis and a Gate that rotates to open a new configuration of the world of the Four Directions and change the energy level of the psyche. It is like a set of doors swinging open and closed through which we emerge from a liminal zone and are oriented to a new stage of life.This position inspires and orients. It is monumental, positional and projective, charged with high, centralizing energy, a place where we stand and look at numinous things revealed by Hidden Powers. This is where what is Nameless emerges into the world of manifestation. It is governed by the Protectors, the Divine Couple, and the Archaic Twins Wang Xian and Wang Heng, powerful shamans and Sons of the Sun and the Moon who mediate the relation between humans and the spirit.
1:2 The Dragon and the Dark Animal Goddess is the Two-Leafed Gate of Change through which all things enter the All-under Heaven. It is an Engine and Primal Theme of Change that projects Zones of Radical Transformation throughout the Matrix, recharging experience with meaning and energy. It acts as the Gate to the first Decade of life when the child seeks to imagine a world in which to discover a self. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see the imaginal forms that can make a living world out of the Primal Chaos.
11:12 The New King and the Old King: High Rituals on the Sacred Mountain is a site of intense ritual and mediating activity that connects the individual to cultural change. It shows the great symbols of what is going and coming (wang lai) on the river of time and establishes a fertile connection between Heaven and Earth. It exchanges ritual energy directly with the Royal Center at 45:46 the Assembling Resources for the Great Project and Climbing the Sacred Mountain and calls on the energy of the Royal Center at 25:26 Disentangling from the Ghosts that haunt old tombs in order to Accumulate a Great new spirit to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Gate to the Decade when we struggle with the relation between group and individual identity, sexuality and an emerging personal destiny or mission. Look at the world of this Pair and you will learn to discriminate between the images of a good culture and the images of an oppressive culture.
21:22 Initiation Sites: Eating Ancient Virtue and Bringing Home the Bride is a site of Male and Female Initiation that contains a Zone of Radical Transformation where the Bright Omens (30) that guide people’s lives arise from the Tiger’s Mouth (27) to eliminate the corruption of the past. It exchanges ritual energy directly with The Royal Center at 35:36 Recognition and the Difficult Journey and calls on the energy of 51:52 The Rouser and the Sacrificer who begin and end all cycles to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Gate to the Decade of life when our adult Name and identity are roused and fixed and we begin the search for an image of the deeper Self. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see what must be embraced and what must be discarded in order to become a sexually and culturally responsible adult.
31:32: The Sacred Place and Fixing the Omens of the Spirit is a site of intense shamanic and ritual activity that contains a Zone of Radical Transformation, a Great Transition (28) when individual experience can be transmuted into Flying words and symbols (62) that can cross the boundary of life and death. A conjunction of the Operators, The Rouser and the Sacrificer, and the Intermediaries, the Lady of Fates and the Joyous Dancer intensifies its power to bring the hidden to expression to renew personal and cultural life. The Pair exchanges ritual energy directly with 33:34 Retreat to the Mountain Shrine to activate Archaic energies that lies just ahead and calls on the energy of 49:50 Revolution and re-casting of the Sacred Vessel to provide its inner drive. It opens the Second Half of Life and acts as the Gate to the Decade in which we struggle to found a dwelling, family and career that extend beyond the personal. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see how to give the gifts of the spirit you are now experiencing an enduring form in your heart.
41:42 The Offering and the Blessing, the two pillars of the act of sacrifice, is a site of intense shamanic and ritual activity. It contains a Zone of Radical Transformation where our life is passed through the two great cleansing sites, the Tiger’s Mouth (27) and the Opened Heart (61). It exchanges ritual energy directly with 19:20 the Rituals of Mourning that release the spirit of a deceased parent and calls n the energy of 3:4 Sprouting and Enveloping the new to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Gate to the Decade when we emerge into higher levels of culture and empowerment in society, conferring a new ritual status and power on the now fully individualized being. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see exactly what must be renounced and offered up and what must be protected to effect the passage to a new ritual status and power.
51:52 The Rouser and the Sacrificer are powerful Wu or Spirit Workers that represent the gates between winter and spring, the New King and the Old King, the celebrant and the sacrifice or victim. They are part of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, exchanging ritual energy directly with the Royal Center at 15:16 the Activation of Liminal Animal Powers that Prepare a Joyous Response to life and drawing on 21:22 Eating Ancient Virtue and Bringing Home the Bride to provide its inner drive. The Pair acts as the Gate to the Decade of life when we must deal with the proper exercise of power and our responsibilities to the human community. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see which old desires and memories must be sacrificed and which can be roused to a new awakening to fulfill your cultural potential.
61:62 Centering and Connecting to the Spirits: The Opened Heart and the Flying Birdis a Primary Site of Radical Transformation, an Engine of Change that connects with Zones of Radical Transformation throughout the Matrix of Change to recharge experience with meaning and energy. The Bright Omens and the Ghost Dancer act as Hidden Agents to intensify its inner power and a conjunction of the Operators, The Rouser and the Sacrificer, and the Intermediaries, the Lady of Fates and the Joyous Dancer intensifies its ability to bring the hidden to expression to renew personal and cultural life. It acts as the Gate to the final stage of the symbolic life, birth into the life of the spirit and the link to the generations to come. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see what is truly significant in your life and how you might pass it on to a new generation.
3:4 Position: Rites of Spring “The force that through the green fuse drives the flower”
The Inspiring 3:4 Position is an Approach to the great Centers of spirit and power, a process through which identity is re-organized and personal energies mobilized. Here the Hidden Spirit Operators “do work” that will enable you to be charged with a higher level of energy. The image of this Position is a container and a sharp instrument that penetrates or punctures it. It is a continual alternation between rousing and limiting, containment and breakthrough, protection and challenge.This position is associated with Spring, the East, green, dawn, wind and wood, the time when the juices rise and life awakes. It is governed by Zhen, the Rouser and Thunder spirit and Sun, the Lady of Fates, the spirit of Wind and growing Wood who penetrates to the core, finds the hidden sickness and couples the being with its fate. It evokes the violence and fertility of Wang Hai, the archaic First Herdsman and War god and the Spring River-Mountain Festival where souls re-enter the world.
3:4 The World Tree: Sprouting and Enveloping the New portrays the interaction between the rousing birth of the World We Live In and the growth of a new being within it that is hidden and nurtured by the “covered sky.” It exchanges ritual energy directly with the Mission of this Decade 7:8 the Armies and the new Group that results and calls on the power of 41:42 the Sacrifice and the Blessing that results to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Approach to the Centers of power in the Decade of life when the child seeks to imagine a world in which to discover a self. Let the process of this Pair contain your immaturity and ignorance and prepare you for your first encounter with the high powers of the Center.
13:14 Festivals at the Outskirts Altar: The People Gather and the Bright Omen Emerges portrays the interaction between the great Spring festivals that bring the people together at the Outskirts Altar to meet the incoming spirits and the individual Greatness that can emerge from it. It contains a Zone of Radical Transformation where the Inspiring Force of the Dragon (1) offers Bright Omens (30) that can guide people’s lives, exchanging ritual energy directly with the 33:34 Retreat to the Mountain Shrine to activate Archaic energies and calling on the power of the 49:50 Revolution and the recasting of the Sacred Vessel to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Approach to Centers of power in the Decade when we struggle with group and individual identity, sexuality and an emerging personal destiny or mission. Let the inspiring and containing process of this Pair provide you with a great vision of a future destiny and build the strength and patience to face the hardships realizing this destiny will involve.
23:24 Stripping the Corpse and the Return of the Spirit portrays the interaction between a process of stripping away the old and a reversal and renewal of personal experience brought about by the entrance of a new sense of spirit. It contains a Zone of Radical Transformation when we pass through the Tiger’s Mouth (27) that eats away the corrupted in order to contact and manifest the Realizing Power of Earth and the Dark Animal Goddess (2). It exchanges ritual energy directly with 2 The Dark Animal Goddess and the realizing power of Earth and calls on the power of 27 the Tiger’s Mouth to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Approach to the Centers of power in the Decade of when our adult Name and identity are roused and fixed and the search for an image of the deeper Self begins. Let the inspiring and containing process of this Pair strip away your old life, ready you for a new influx of energy and give you faith in the overall processes of life.
33:34 Retreat and Advance: The Mountain Shrine and the Archaic Ancestorsportrays the interaction between retreat and advance and strategies at the borders. It is the moment when our inner attention turns from projecting into the future to learning the lessons of the past and releasing their hidden energies. The Lady of Fates and the Joyous Dancer act as Hidden Agents to intensify the inner power of this Pair. Part of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it exchanges ritual energy directly with 13:14 The People Gather and the Bright Omen Emerges and calls on 31:32 the Sacred Place and Fixing the Omens of the Spirit to provide its inner drive. Let the inspiring and containing process of this Pair connect you with the deep animal energies you will need to complete this period of trial.
43:44 Announce the Omen: Enter the Lady of Fatesportrays the interaction between the challenge and courage necessary to announce an oracle at a critical moment and the mysterious and feminine penetration of our psyche by the fate thus announced. A Nuclear or Core Theme of Change, it contains a Zone of Radical Transformation, a Great Transition (28) that connects us to the Inspiring Force of the Dragon (1). It exchanges ritual energy directly with 28 the Great Transition, the emergence of the true individual, and calls on the power of 1 the Inspiring Force of the Dragon to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Approach to the Center of power in Decade where we emerge into higher levels of culture and empowerment in society. Let the inspiring and containing process of this Pair slowly individualize you and move you toward you position and power.
53:54 The Great Marriages: Gradual Advance and Radical Change portrays the interaction between a marriage that proceeds in a recognized manner with one that involves a radical change of state effected by hidden forces as a reflection of the soul’s journey. It is a Nuclear or Core Theme of Change and a site of intense mediating and ritual activity that connects the individual with cultural change, a dialogue between stability and radical change at the highest levels of power. A conjunction of the Operators, The Rouser and the Sacrificer, and the Intermediaries, the Lady of Fates and the Joyous Dancer intensifies this Pair’s power to bring the hidden to expression to renew personal and cultural life. It exchanges ritual energy directly with 37:38 The Shaman of the Shadows: Managing the Ghosts that Haunt the Dwelling and calls on the power of 39:40 The “Goings and Comings” that Bring Deliverance from the sufferings of the past to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Approach to Centers of power in the Decade of when we must deal with the proper exercise of power and our responsibilities to the human community. Let the inspiring and containing process of this Pair gradually mobilize the deep hidden forces within you to effect a radical change in your state of being.
63:64 Burning Water and the Final Crossings portrays the paradoxical interaction of the Burning Water, the transformative substance of the soul. It is Primal Gate of Change and a site of intense ritual and mediating activity that connects the individual to cultural change presided over by the Small Fox, a crafty shape-shifting animal at home in the dream-world, It exchanges ritual energy directly with the 39:40 The “Goings and Comings” that Bring Deliverance from the sufferings of the past and calls on the power of the 37:38 The Shaman of the Shadows: Managing the Ghosts that Haunt the Dwelling to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Approach to the invisible Center of the birth into the life of the spirit and the link to the generations to come. Let the inspiring and containing process of this Pair dissolve the negative emotions that bind you to any re-enactment of past pains and sorrows.
5:6 Position: At the Royal Center
5:6 The Temple and the Council: Waiting for the “Spirit Visitors” and Arguing your Case portrays our first experience of the two institutional pillars of the ritual and the legal worlds, the Temple where spirits are called and the Council Chambers where judgment is given. It exchanges ritual energy directly with the 47:48 the Oppressed Noble who must return to the Common Source and calls on the energy of 9:10 Encountering the Liminal World: Gathering your Ghosts and Treading out to Meet the Tiger to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Royal Center of the first Decade when the child seeks to create a world in which to find a self. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see and understand the first stirrings of the great change to come.
15:16 The Grey Rat and the Elephant: Activating Liminal Animal Powers to Prepare the Joyous Response portrays a young Noble training in the men’s quarters of the Royal Palace of the rising Zhou dynasty and a young woman being prepared for marriage in the women’s quarters of the palace of the older and established Shang rulers. Part of the Sacred Sickness Pathways that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it contains a Zone of Radical Transformation that works between the two, a Tiger Transformation that eliminates the corruption of the past, allowing the Realizing Power of the Dream Animals, agents of Dark Animal Goddess (2), to become Flying Words and symbols (62) that carry across the River of Life and Death. It exchanges ritual energy directly with the Royal Center and Formal Audience Chambers at 35:36 Recognition and the Difficult Journeyand calls on the energy of 51:52 The Rouser and the Sacrificer who begin and end all cycles to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Royal Center of the Decade when we struggle with identity and its relation to society and culture. Look at the world of this Pair and you will feel the stirrings of the Animal Powers of the deep psyche as they work to open the mind of the Great Symbols of Change within you.
25:26 Disentangling from the Old Ghosts that Haunt old Tombs and Accumulating the Great New Spirit portrays the old Royal Tombs and the ghosts and plague demons they contain and a new field of activity being re-discovered in the oracle books that hold the “power and virtue” of the ancient sages. Part of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it exchanges ritual energy directly with 11:12 The New King and the Old King: High Rituals on the Sacred Mountain and calls on the energy of 17:18 Following the Spirit to Renovate Corruption in the Parental and Ancestral Images to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Royal Center of the Decade where our adult Name and identity are roused and fixed and the search for an image of the deeper Self begins. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see clearly what must eliminated and what must be followed in your search for your deeper Self.
35:36 The Rising and the Setting Sun: Recognition and the Difficult Journey portrays the Formal Audience Chambers of the King and the wilderness at the borders that surrounds it, a contrast between being recognized and being outcast. It exchanges ritual energy directly with 21:22 the Initiation Sites and the Tiger Transformation (27) they contain, through which the Bright Omens (30) that guide people’s lives arise, and calls on the energy of 15:16 the Activation of Liminal Animal Powers that Prepare the Joyous Response to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Royal Center in the Decade when we struggle to found a dwelling, family and career that extend beyond the personal. Look at the world of this Pair and you will understand the connection between the Bright Sun of recognition and the Dark Sun, the difficult mission of the outcast. 45:46 Gather the People and Ascend the Sacred Mountain: The Great Assembly and a Critical Interventionportrays a King or Noble who gathers the people and their resources for a Great Work and an Intermediary or Spirit Worker who ascends the Sacred Mountain to make a timely intervention that gives the effort a place among the Ancestral Images. Part of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it exchanges ritual energy directly with 17:18 Following the Spirit to Renovate Corruption in Parental and Ancestral Images and calls on the energy of 11:12 The New King and the Old King: High Rituals on the Sacred Mountain to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Royal Center of the Decade when we emerge into higher levels of culture and empowerment in society and are given new ritual status and power as an individualized being. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see the diviners ceaselessly at work on top of the Sacred Mountain, pulling up the past and linking you to the great cycles of Change.
55:56 The New King who receives the Mandate and the Wandering Sage who Circulates it through the Shadow Lands is the Royal Center of the ritual year and the ritual cosmos. It portrays King Wu’s military capital at Feng at the time he received the Mandate of Heaven and launched the armies into Shang to “renew the time” and the shadowy Borderlands through which the Mandate was circulated. It contains a Zone of Radical Transformation when the Bright Omens (30) that guide people’s lives become Flying words and symbols (62) that carry the message across the threshold of life and death. It exchanges ritual energy directly with 62 the Flying Bird, the Engine of Change that carries the spirit of a life fully lived across the River of Life and Death to a new generation, and calls on the energy of 30 the Bright Omens, the Engine of Change that reveals the presence of the spirit in all things, to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Royal Center of the Decade when we must deal with the proper exercise of power and our responsibilities to the human community. Look at the world of this Pair and you will see the rippling circles of light and abundant energy that spread from the true Royal Center of the ritual world.
7:8 Position: Rites of AutumnReleasing Words of Love and Death
The Realizing 7:8 Position: Mission is a challenge to enact the mandate from the Royal Center. It is a struggle, an ordeal that must be faced or a challenge that must be confronted. Here the Hidden Spirit Operators “do work” to release stored energy into action that can effect change in the world. It suggests armies, generals in the field, invasion of barbarian territory, fighting at the borders, facing and dealing with angry old ghosts and the corruption of the past.
This Position evokes danger, death, harvest, marriages and the Autumn River-Mountain Festivals. It is governed by Dui, the Joyous Dancer, Queen Mother of the West, Lady of Beasts and Queen of the Dead who gives spirit voice in the human community and Gen, the Mountain spirit and Sacrificer who brings the old cycle to an end and releases its lessons.
7:8 Changing the Face of the World: Launching the Armies and the New Group that emerges shows thefocused and proper use of force that leads to the emergence of a new group and a new way of thinking. It suggests the Autumn Harvest Festivals that celebrated both marriages and the gathering of the armies and contains a Zone of Radical Transformation when the Ghost River (29) emerges from beneath the Earth Altar (2) to change the face of the world. It exchanges ritual energy directly with 19:20 Earthing the Ghost, Releasing the Spirit and Watching for the Omens of the New and calls on the energy of 3:4 the Sprouting and Enveloping of new growth to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Mission of the Decade when the child seeks to create a world in which to discover a self. Move with the realizing process of this Pair and you can profoundly change the way you think and find the people with whom you have spiritual kinship.
17:18 The Fathers and the Mothers: Following the Spirit to Renovate Corruption in Parental and Ancestral Images shows a natural flow of inspiring new energy that leads you out of existing structures in order to confront and renovate the corruption that clusters around inner parental and ancestral images. A site of intense mediating and ritual activity, it is a key part the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects individual suffering to cultural change. A conjunction of the Operators, The Rouser and the Sacrificer, and the Intermediaries, the Lady of Fates and the Joyous Dancer intensifies this Pair’s power to bring the hidden to expression to renew personal and cultural life. It exchanges ritual energy directly with the Royal Center at 45:46 The Great Assembly and a Critical Intervention and calls on the energy 25:26 Disentangling from the Ghosts that haunt old tombs in order to Accumulate a Great new spirit as its inner drive. It acts as the Mission of the Decade when we struggle with group and individual identity, sexuality and an emerging personal destiny or mission. Move with the realizing process of this Pair and you can free yourself from the intergenerational traumas that haunt you and the world you live in.
27:28 The Tiger’s Mouth and the Great Transition: Emerging as a True Individualshows an ordeal that corrects the sources of inner nourishment to allow the emergence of a true individual free of collective pain and collective judgment. It is the home of the Tiger Spirit, a Primary Site of Radical Transformation, a Nuclear or Core Theme of Change and a key site on the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change. A conjunction of the Operators, The Rouser and the Sacrificer and the Intermediaries, the Lady of Fates and the Joyous Dancer intensifies its ability to bring the hidden to expression to renew personal and cultural life. It acts as the Mission of the Decade when our adult Name and identity are roused and fixed and the search for an image of the deeper Self begins. Move with the realizing process of this Pair and you can emerge as a true individual who will, in time, be of real help to others.
37:38 The Shaman of the Shadows: Managing the Ghosts that Haunt the Dwelling shows the hidden connection between the inside, the safety of the hearth fire and family and the dangers of the outside, the wilderness and the dangerous ghosts that haunt the dwelling. It evokes the attempt of a young Zhou nobleman to found a house on the borders of the established world, surrounded by the ghosts of the past and the excluded. A Nuclear or Core Theme of Change and part of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it exchanges ritual energy directly with 53:54 The Great Marriages, a dialogue between stability and radical change through hidden forces at the highest levels of power and calls on the energy of 63:64 Burning Water and the Final Crossings to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Mission of the Decade when we struggle to found an individual dwelling, family and career that extend beyond the personal. Move with the realizing process of this Pair and you will be able to confront and manage the hidden forces that are threatening everything you most care about.
47:48 The Oppressed Noble returns to the Common Source shows the secret connections that lead a noble out of the spiritual oppression of a corrupt system through a return to real human community and a common source of strength or life-water that all can rely on. Part of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it contains a Zone of Radical Transformation when the Great Individual (28) confronts the Ghost River (29) and the shades of the past. It exchanges ritual energy directly 57:58 The Lady of Fates and The Joyous Dancer, the two great Intermediaries who give the spirit a place in the human world and calls on the power of the Royal Center at 5:6 The Temple and the Council, our first experience of the dangers of the ritual and the legal worlds, to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Mission of the Decade when we emerge into higher levels of spirit and empowerment in society. Move with the realizing process of this Pair and you can reconnect to real human community and the eternal way of water.
57:58 The Lady of Fates and The Joyous Dancer shows the two great Intermediaries who give the spirit a place in the human world, laying out the offerings, binding the fates, finding the hidden sickness and giving the bright spirits a voice in the human community. It exchanges ritual energy directly with the 9:10 Gathering your Ghosts and Treading out to Meet the Tiger, our first encounter with the Liminal World, and calls on the energy of 47:48 the Oppressed Noble returns to the Common Source to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Mission of the Decade when we must deal with the proper exercise of power and our responsibilities to the human community. Move with the realizing process of this Pair and you can help to give the spirits a healing voice in the world around you.
9:10 Position: Childhood’s End
The dissolving 9:10 Position is a Transition or Liminal Zone, a passage between stages that opens the world of the ghosts and spirits. It is a night-sea or underworld journey through the death realms that is the shadow or inversion of the Gates of the 1:2 Position. Here the Hidden Spirit Operators “do work” that dissolves an old identity after it has served its purpose and releases the spark, the unformed yet numinous potential of the new.
This position is associated with Winter, the North and the Mountain, Qian, the labouring Dragon, and Kan, the Ghost River and Ghost Dancer. It evokes black waters, midnight, heavy labor and lonely striving. As a hidden connection between Heaven, Earth and the Underworld Waters, it also evokes Yu the Great, the shaman and culture founder with a foot in both the world of the living and the world of the dead.
9:10 Encountering the Liminal World: Gathering your Ghosts and Treading out to Meet the Tiger portrays a liminal process whereby the ghosts or parts of ourselves that are emerging from the underworld waters are gathered and nurtured to prepare the moment when we Tread out to encounter the creative and destructive spirit of the Tiger in order to receive a new destiny. The beginning of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it contains a Zone of Radical Transformation where the Inspiring Force of the Dragon (1) emerges into the Opened Heart (61) to eliminate the corruption of the past. It exchanges ritual energy directly with 57:58 The Lady of Fates and The Joyous Dancer, the two great Intermediaries who give the spirit a place in the human world and calls on the energy of 5:6 the Temple and the Council, our first experience of the dangers of the ritual and the legal worlds to provide its inner drive. It acts the Transition from the Decade when the child seeks to create a world in which to discover a self to the Decade when we confront the problems of group and individual identity, sexuality and an emerging personal destiny or mission. Move with the liminal process of this Pair and you will emerge from childhood into an image of your greater mission and identity.
19:20 Earthing the Ghost, Releasing the Spirit and Watching for the Omens of the New portrays a sojourn in the Mourning Hut through which a young person dies and is re-born into a parent’s status. It shows the ceremonies at the funeral that quiet the ghost or passion-body and release the spirit into a new Ancestral image and the opening of a ritual space where the omens of the new spirit’s manifestation in the world can be observed. The Rouser and the Sacrificer act as Hidden Agents to intensify the inner power of this Pair. It exchanges ritual energy directly with 7:8 Launching the Armies and the New Group that emerges and calls on the energy of 41:42 The Sacrifice and Blessing to provide its inner drive. It acts as the Transition from the Decade when we confront the problems of group and individual identity, sexuality and an emerging personal destiny or mission to the Decade when our adult Name and identity are roused and fixed and we begin the search for an image of the deeper Self. Move with the liminal process of this Pair and you will be made ready to step into your adult identity and see its manifestations in the world around you.
29:30 The Ghost River and the Bright Omens is the Inner Axis of Change, a connection of the fundamental powers that operates within the Great Individual (28) who has emerged from the ordeal of the Tiger’s Mouth (27). It is an Engine of Change and a Primary Site of Radical Transformation, releasing the Bright Omens (30) that guide people’s lives from the underworld Ghost River (29) or dark river of souls. It acts as the Transition from the Decade when our adult Name and identity are roused and fixed and we begin the search for an image of the deeper Self to the Second Half of Life and the Decade where we struggle to found an individual dwelling, family and career that extend beyond the personal. Move with the liminal process of this Pair and you can extend your real identity into the world of manifestation.
39:40 The “Goings and Comings” that Bring Deliverance portrays a dialogue (wang lai) across the River of Life and Death that can deliver us from suffering, an exorcism and an interchange that releases the energy bound in past fixations. A Nuclear or Core Theme of Change, it exchanges ritual energy directly with 63:64 the Burning Water and the Final Passages and calls on the energy of 53:54 The Great Marriages, the dialogue between stability and radical change at the highest levels of power as its inner drive. It acts as the Transition from the Decade when we struggle to found an individual dwelling, family and career to the Decade of higher levels of empowerment in culture that confer a new ritual status on the fully individualized being. Move with the liminal process of this Pair and you will be released from the compulsive suffering that is holding you back.
49:50 Revolution and Casting the New Vessel shows a revolution rising from the depths that melts or skins away the face of the old in order to recast it as a new Sacred Vessel, a paradigm of collective destiny that re-connects us to the world of the Spirit and the Ancestors. It is a key site on the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, evoking the Tiger, the Queen Mother of the West, Lady of the Beasts and Queen of the Dead and Yu the Great, the Limping God and culture hero. It exchanges ritual energy directly with 31:32 The Sacred Place and Fixing the Omens of the Spirit and calls on the energy of 13:14 Festivals at the Outskirts Altar: The People Gather and the Bright Omen Emerges as its inner drive. It acts as the Transition from the Decade of life when we emerge into a new ritual status and power to the Decade when we must deal with the proper exercise of power and our responsibilities to the human community. Move with the liminal process of this Pair and you will be re-connected to the world of the spirits and the ancestors at the highest levels.
59:60 Dispersing the Old Self and Articulating the New Time portrays the sacrifice and dissolution of an old identity that reveals the key moments where we can articulate the river of time into a new life for all, a new ritual year and ritual cosmos. The culmination of the Sacred Sickness Pathway that connects personal disorders with cultural change, it contains a Zone of Radical Transformation where the Ghost River (29) flows through the Opened Heart and is purified (61). It exchanges ritual energy directly with the great Engine of Change 61 The Opened Heart and calls on the energy of the rushing and dissolving waters of the Ghost River (29) as its inner drive. It acts as the Transition from the Decade when we must deal with power and our responsibilities to the human community to the birth into the life of the spirit, the passage across the River of Life and Death and a link to the generations to come. Move with the liminal process of this Pair and you will be received into the heart of life and become an inspiration to the generations to come.
III Decades as Symbols
If we look at the Decades as a Xiang or Symbol they reveal more mysterious dynamic, a continual making, dissolution and re-making characteristic of a Strange Attractor.
Understanding the dynamics of a Decade as a Symbol or Xiang depends on seeing the Pair Positions not just as forms or themes but as “markers or agents that do work”. They continually project and re-gather themselves in time and space as dynamic dance between Inspiration, the power of the Sun and the Dragon whose Inspiring vertical Force loops through boundaries, projects pathways and activates ancestral energies and Realization, the cycling Moon and the Dark Animal Goddess or Horse Mother who roams the wide horizontal Field of Earth, carrying the “symbols of the spirit” to her children to bring them “safety and security”. Each step in the dance is punctuated by a return of and to the dark rushing Ghost River that dissolves old form and gathers the beings back into the fertile womb of chaos that runs beneath all.
This process is reflected in the old Daoist metaphysical image:The Way gives birth to the One; The One gives birth to the Two; The Two gives birth to the Three; The Three gives birth to the Ten Thousand Things.
The Way gives birth to the One
Mythically, this is the Great Mountain at the archaic edge of things. It emerges directly from the Way as the One Alone that contains both Primal Powers. It stands at the borders of existence, both inside and outside the world in potential like a set of great monumental doors that open hidden energy pathways that energize the life to come. In the linear narrative we experience this position as a sudden opening to a new level of experience where we emerge from liminality and are oriented to a new stage of life by the images of new possibilities and challenges.
The One gives birth to the Two
The Mountain of the One becomes the Two by mirroring and projecting itself as a River at the opposite extreme of the Decade. Thus the 1:2 Position enters time as the Beginning by producing a dark double of itself, a Liminal Transition Zone, and projecting it as the End of each cycle.
This 9:10 Position represents an inversion of the energy of the 1:2 Position, a dark mirror that reverses the polarity of the Gates and draws things down into the chaos that lies beneath and around the entire process. This is the dark, rushing Ghost River where everything dissolves into its constituent parts and returns to the chaos from which it emerged. In the linear narrative we experience this as a night-sea journey where Hidden Spirit Operators “do work” that dissolves an old identity and releases the spark, the unformed yet numinous potential of the new.
The Two gives birth to the Three
Just as the distant Rivers and Mountains were doubled into the Earth Altar in the Royal Palace, so the two Positions that form the limits of a Decade unite to project the 5:6 Position as Royal Center.
The 5:6 Position is the high centralizing place in each Decade where numinous things are revealed. It draws, collects, centralizes and intensifies the power of the limits and sets it moving into the world. In the linear narrative we experience this as a place where we seek audience, are recognized and charged with a numinous mission or mandate (ming) to fulfil.
The Three gives birth to the Ten Thousand Things
The Royal Center then splits its Inspiring and Realizing components to establish flanking positions or wings that surround the central position like the mirrored slopes of a mountain. These are the places where the iterating work, the work of the Three is done, a continual re-doubling that produces change.
The image of the 3:4 Position is a container and a sharp instrument that penetrates or punctures it. It is a continual alternation between rousing and limiting, containment and breakthrough, protection and challenge. In the linear narrative we experience this flank as the journey up the Mountain towards the summit. Here the Hidden Spirit Operators “do work” that will enable us to be charged with a higher level of energy.
The 7:8 Position evokes danger, death, harvest, marriages. It suggests armies, generals in the field, invasion of barbarian territory, fighting at the borders, facing and dealing with angry old ghosts and the corruption of the past. In the linear narrative we experience this flank as the journey down the Mountain carrying the mandate towards enactment. Here the Hidden Spirit Operators “do work” to release stored energy into action that can effect change in the world.
The Decades as a whole set the stage on which the Rituals of developing an individual identity and relating it to the Ancestral foundation of life take place. They are a ritual playing field where beginnings and endings are continually separating and re-converging, the spiralling steps of the process that Jung called individuation.
Though the linear story line runs through each Decade, its hidden inner process is continually doubling back on itself to point at a mysterious center “whose circumference is nowhere and whose center is everywhere”. A Decade is, to quote W.B. Yeats again, like “a Great Egg that turns itself inside out without breaking its shell.”
IV Trigrams in the Decades
To explore the Decades and track the imaginal operations they contain we also need a sense of how the Eight Trigrams, the Bagua or Eight Spirit Helpers act in the Ritual World that the Decades portray.
Qian, Heaven is the Inspiring Force of the Dragon and all that is above, the Father and Intuitive Power, the Sun and the Great Royal Ancestors, the directed flow of time. It is where the hidden spirit inspires awe and makes war. As the inner trigram it brings inner perseverance. As the outer trigram it confers single-mindedness and faith in action through connection with the spirit.
Kun, Earth is the Realizing Energy of the Dark Animal Goddess and all that is below, the Mother, Sensation, the Moon, the tireless Mare, the field of space extending to the Four Sides, the Earth that supports and nourishes all and offers symbols and omens that provide safety and security. It is where the unnamed spirit is offered service at the Earth Altar. As the inner trigram it gives access to deep inner devotion. As the outer trigram it opens a spreading field of realization and a deep faith in the overall processes of life.
Kan, Rushing Water is the Ghost River, the underworld of the unconscious stream of the past. It is the grave and the fear of what is in the grave, ghosts, souls, passions and dark fates, and the courage and labor of the Ego necessary at a critical time, a test or kairos. This is where the hidden spirit rewards those toiling in the Pit. As the inner trigram it brings you containment of fear and impulse when facing dissolution, danger and toil. As the outer trigram it gives you the ability to manage the flow and flux of events.
Li, Fire is Radiance and the heart, congregating warmth and bright spirit, conscious awareness and the stream of the future, clarity, the gift of language, the revelation of the Self, our Name and the blessings it brings as a connection between the generations. It is where the hidden spirit reveals itself in the Bright Omens, the net of words and language. As the inner trigram it offers a warmth and clarity that provides real inner guidance. As the outer trigram it reveals the Bright Omens that let you find real directions in life.
Zhen, Thunder: is the Rouser, Exorcist and Gate of Spring, a fertilizing shock that breaks the shell, opens the buds, rouses the spirit, eliminates deadwood and drives away ghosts. It is where the hidden spirit manifests as quake and thunder. It clears the Feeling Function by focusing fear and anxiety on correcting your stance and your person. As the lower trigram it brings the shock of inner enlightenment. As the outer trigram it acts as a revitalizing force that spreads through the world, a liberating awareness of the whole.
Gen, Mountain is the Sacrificer, the Limit that stills, stabilizes and articulates the thinking function, releasing souls from the past patterns. It marks the end of a cycle, a still point in all turning, a reflecting on the past that articulates the future. It is where the words of the hidden spirit bind us to accomplish fate. As the inner trigram it offers self constraint as an effective inner base. As the outer trigram it reveals the patterns that mark real endings and beginnings.
Sun, Wind, Wood is the Lady of Fates or Karma, the Intermediary who matches and couples the beings, finds the hidden sickness and brings each thing to its fate. She is the foundation of the inner life of the soul, entering, supporting and nourishing it from beneath, supple, flexible and subtle. This is the place where the hidden spirit works through those who lay out the offerings. As the inner trigram it develops inner self-cultivation as a dependable base. As the outer trigram, it is a subtle pervading influence lets you acquire a place where you can influence the world you live in.
Dui, Mists, Lake is the Joyous Dancer, the Intermediary who contacts the hidden spirits of the great Collective Unconscious and gives them a voice in the human world. She is the spirit and expression of the inner life of the soul, the mists that rise from still waters and the stimulating words that persuade, cheer and urge on. This is the place where the hidden spirit speaks and spreads joy. As the inner trigram it promotes inner self reflection. As the outer trigram it gives you the ability to express the hidden spirit in the human community.
See: Shuogua and Tools for Change