Casting the Changes

The cast is not the answer. It is the instruction. This book teaches you to take a yarrow-stalk, coin or plum-blossom cast and turn it into work: a fu talisman written in the hour, a sigil carried on the body, a timing chosen with confidence, and an internal-alchemy practice that matches the hexagram instead of fighting it.

You begin with the three casting methods, taught side by side so you can see what each one is good at. Yarrow stalks for the slow, deliberate question. Three coins for the question that needs an answer now. Plum-blossom numbers for the passing moment - a bird, a clock, a sentence overheard. Each method is given complete, with the counting, the recording, and the mistakes that make a cast unreadable.

Then the reading itself. The six line-positions and what each one governs. The changing lines and how to follow them when there is one, two, three or more. The trigram pairs inside the hexagram, and the sequence of the sixty-four in the order the old teachers used. Every hexagram is read the same way: first the image, then the judgement, then the lines, then the instruction - what to do, what to stop doing, and when to wait.

Inside:

· The six line-positions, and how each one changes the reading.

· Changing lines: one, two, three, four, five or all six - and the rule for which line speaks.

· The eight trigrams and the hexagram families they form.

· How to write the cast into a fu talisman: stroke order, sealing, timing and carrying.

· How to turn a hexagram into a sigil for the body, the home or the altar.

· Internal alchemy keyed to the hexagram: where to gather, where to circulate, where to rest.

· Choosing days and hours from the cast, and knowing when the cast says wait.

· Worked casts, start to finish, so you can check your own reading line by line.

The hexagrams:

☰☰ ☰☱ ☰☲ ☰☳ ☰☴ ☰☵ ☰☶ ☰☷

☱☰ ☱☱ ☱☲ ☱☳ ☱☴ ☱☵ ☱☶ ☱☷

☲☰ ☲☱ ☲☲ ☲☳ ☲☴ ☲☵ ☲☶ ☲☷

☳☰ ☳☱ ☳☲ ☳☳ ☳☴ ☳☵ ☳☶ ☳☷

☴☰ ☴☱ ☴☲ ☴☳ ☴☴ ☴☵ ☴☶ ☴☷

☵☰ ☵☱ ☵☲ ☵☳ ☵☴ ☵☵ ☵☶ ☵☷

☶☰ ☶☱ ☶☲ ☶☳ ☶☴ ☶☵ ☶☶ ☶☷

☷☰ ☷☱ ☷☲ ☷☳ ☷☴ ☷☵ ☷☶ ☷☷

Changing lines:

⚋ ⚊

⚋⚋ ⚊⚊

⚋⚋⚋ ⚊⚊⚊

By the last chapter you will not be asking the Changes what will happen. You will be reading what to do - and doing it, with a fu in your hand, a sigil on your body, and the season's work already begun.