39. Obstruction

jiǎn · Water ☵ over Thunder ☳

Running into a wall that forces you to stop and look within.

The Noble One's Path

Water atop a mountain. An outer obstacle is an invitation to inner work on yourself, not to a fight with circumstances.

The Lesson

If you can't move forward, look within. Be patient before you start forcing things.

A question to sit with

Is this obstacle a call to fight, or a signal that I should change my strategy?

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.

64. Not yet completed

未濟

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

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