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◈ Primary hexagram: 60—Scarcity.

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Name from “Language of the Lines”

Scarcity.

Lines

Image created from the lines

Activity is centred in the outer world (lines 3 and 4) and we are recognizing that our inner world is quiet (lines 6 and 1). So the activity of this tao is on the outside and is not supported by new energy from the depth of our being. Intuitive feeling is quiet also and we are not noticing this so there may be some tendency to overdo the outer activity.

Image created from the trigrams

The emerging energy in the image of Tui is more of a hope than a flow, yet in the outer world there is a torrent of activity (Chên) which is contemplated, held at a distance, by our identity (Kên), so there is little flow taken up by our inner being (K’an). So from a very small emerging energy flow we have a great outer surge or release of energy; the surge exhausts itself and we contemplate this because it leaves our inner being with very little energy. The common name of the hexagram is “limitation” and it is about providing this limitation so that a small resource is not squandered.

The Chinese Oracle

> Limitation (or restraint).

> Success.

> Do not persevere in excessive restraint.

Comments

The intention is to spread resources, not to go into some sort of a fast, it is to learn control, not abstinence. Control requires just the right balance of inflow and outflow.

Manifestations

The pattern

When there is little at the beginning

its activities rise to a peak, its limit,

and fall to a dangerous low.

For humans

He limits the flow.

Seeing scarcity he spreads resources

to avoid famine.

In nature

In poor soil the seed germinates,

rises up but does not mature.

In forms we make

When the little

is gathered up by the few

the rest are empty.

This is dangerous.

Moving lines

Line 1 goes yin — life force shows more change

In this tao outer activity is not fed sufficiently to keep up its flow. Here in this line inner activity increases, but it is still necessary to conserve this and not to let it flow outwards without restraint. We have to provide our own restraint in this tao where our outer reality will take all that we can give and more, draining our source.

> Not to go out of the door

> and courtyard is without error.

❧

Line 2 goes yin — intuitive feeling more active

Restraint is a form of relationship with something and all relationship needs intuitive feeling, a direct knowledge of the other. If we are restrained in our relationships they do not flow, and feeling _is_ a flow, not something we hold. So here in the line of feeling, although we are in a tao of restraint, to stop a flow outwards would suffocate relationship and then there is nothing to restrain; where feeling is more active as in this line, it should flow out.

> Not to go out of the door

> and courtyard brings misfortune.

Whether it is beneficial to “go out” depends upon the subject to which the symbolism is attached; in line 1 it is no error not to go out because the subject is our inner energy that needs to be conserved, here the subject is feeling and to control the flow of feeling does not conserve it for it is a flow itself, it only makes us confused which is a misfortune.

❧

Line 3 goes yang — outer world changes less

Activity decreases in this tao because it is exhausted, and perhaps it is exhausted because it was unrestrained.

> He acts without limitation

> then regrets it.

> No error.

Here is a lesson learned and this is certainly no error. Without the experience of mistakes life is all theory, so mistakes that are regretted (and so understood) are experience well used.

❧

Line 4 goes yang — accepting the outer state less

Our outer world is active in this tao and here we are becoming less concerned with this activity, so we are not pushing it along by being active in it. This is in keeping with the idea of limitation and produces a more harmonious flow.

> Natural limitation. Success.

❧

Line 5 goes yin — more awareness of intuition

Our intuitive feeling is inactive; to become more involved in inactive feeling (feeling of peace) is harmonious in a tao of restraint, no effort of restraint is required is required when we are naturally peaceful.

> Voluntary restraint.

> Good fortune.

❧

Line 6 goes yang — our inner being accepts less

It is the inactivity of the life energy that makes limitation necessary; by ignoring this we will overreach ourselves and be limited by the trickle of support the tao can give.

> Limitation by pain.

> Continuance brings misfortune,

> but regret will disappear.

If we continually limit ourselves by the painful results of excess, a balance will be set up which keeps us on the edge of pain and this is a misfortune, but if we learn from going into pain through excess our regret ceases.

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