There is a strong tendency to be goaded into unwise actions by one’s compulsions. Fortunately, circumstances can prevent such action. Urges remain unsatisfied, but one can learn from contemplating the near catastrophe in order to prevent a repetition of the crisis.
Opposition remains, but graceful interaction and compromise can produce small gradual effects that mitigate the conflict and lead to resolution.
Read the text from Richard Wilhelm's translation of the I Ching
“
The inferior man rises only because the superior man does not regard him as dangerous and so lends him power. If he were resisted from the first, he could never gain influence.
The time of COMING TO MEET is important in still another way. Although as a general rule the weak should not come to meet the strong, there are times when this has great significance. When heaven and earth come to meet each other, all creatures prosper; when a prince and his official come to meet each other, the world is put in order. It is necessary for elements predestined to be joined and mutually dependent to come to meet one another halfway. But the coming together must be free of dishonest ulterior motives, otherwise harm will result.
There is a temptation to fall in with the evil element offering itself-a very dangerous situation. Fortunately circumstances prevent this; one would like to do it, but cannot. This leads to painful indecision in behaviour. But if we gain clear insight into the danger of the situation, we shall at least avoid more serious mistakes.
When people live in opposition and estrangement they cannot carry out a great undertaking in common; their points of view diverge too widely. In such circumstances one should above all not proceed brusquely, for that would only increase the existing opposition; instead, one should limit oneself to producing gradual effects in small matters. Here success can still be expected, because the situation is such that the opposition does not preclude all agreement.
In general, opposition appears as an obstruction, but when it represents polarity within a comprehensive whole, it has also its useful and important functions. The oppositions of heaven and earth, spirit and nature, man and woman, when reconciled, bring about the creation and reproduction of life. In the world of visible things, the principle of opposites makes possible the differentiation by categories through which order is brought into the world.
Meditation
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Today: I Ching
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