Lǚ, hexagram 10

Treading

Walking your life can be compared to walking in the jungle. You have to know and follow the laws of the jungle, or you will be eaten by the first big hungry animal which happens to cross your path.

It is a struggle to adapt to the big (bad?) world. Not being able to do that can be dangerous. You get trampled over or worse. But adapting can just as well be dangerous – for your soul.

To find the golden mean is not easy. Especially because you have to give up demands and pretense, and you need a will of steel to be who you really are.

The two options seem to exclude each other, but in both cases it is a matter of surviving. Survival of your own character, and surviving in the world. Two sides, two jungles, and everywhere you meet that man-eating tiger. Except when you respect him, then he will turn into your helper and ally. Into your own strength.

The character Lu has as one of its constituent parts a corpse, sitting upright. It was usage that at a funeral someone represented the deceased. But of course this had to be done with style.

Hex.10

LÜ³: The character represents a corpse or a sitting man (1), who is impersonating the deceased person at a funeral. A foot on a road (2): going. A boat (3), also indicating a shoe: Chinese shoes look like boats. And a foot (4). The oldest form of this character was probably simpler, but I could not find one.
LÜ³: shoe, sandal, wear shoes, to tread, follow a track, traverse, accomplish, (right) conduct, virtue, rite, hold an office, domain (of a prince), path. Loan for dignity and for Li², durable happiness.

The trigrams: Lake below Heaven.
Above is Heaven, below is the Marsh: treading. The noble one discriminates between high and low. He gives the ambitions of the people the suitable position.

About hexagrams 9 and 10