豫

16. Enthusiasm

yù · Mountain ☶ over Earth ☷

The joy of action, an energy that wants to spread to others.

The Leader's Path

Thunder waking the earth to life. This is again a hexagram about a leader, not the Noble One — collective enthusiasm as something that has to be deliberately given direction, so it doesn't burn itself out in empty excitement.

The Lesson

Use this energy to build something lasting. Enthusiasm alone, without a plan, quickly dissolves.

A question to sit with

Does my enthusiasm have somewhere to go, or is it scattering without a target?

Related hexagrams

In the I Ching no hexagram stands alone. Each one enters into relationships with others, and those relationships show the situation seen from the other side, in its opposite, and in its hidden tendency.

易

The classical deep dive for this hexagram — the Judgment and the Image after Richard Wilhelm — along with the texts of all six changing lines, is in the book. Get the book

卦

Want to ask your own question? Cast a hexagram in your browser, or download the free app and cast by shaking your phone. Cast now