I Ching, Yijing or Zhou Yi
"Oracle of the moon": © 2000 LiSe
Yi Jing, Oracle of the Moon
The image of hexagram 33
Dùn, withdraw
What does it mean, 'inner' and 'outer'?
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Mountain inside: you are who or what you are, it is your inner strength and how you endure everything and stay genuine. But the world does not always grant you the room. So be severe, Heaven outside gives you the knowledge of values and ancient laws and the perseverance to stick to them.
At left the ideogram shows a foot and a road: going. In the center meat, and at right a pig. The combination of pig and meat is a suckling pig, one raised to be eaten. An image of a pig running away from being turned into meat. Or someone chasing a pig for its meat.
Another old version of the character shows a suckling pig being taken by a hand to be offered in sacrifice.
Meanings: to escape, to run off, to hide, to go into obscurity, to conceal oneself; to cheat, deceive, impose upon.
The 'Great Image' says: The world has mountains: withdraw. The noble one distances himself from small people, without dislike and yet stern.
Hex.33 is the contrast of 19, which is about nearing others, physically or mentally.
In hex.33 one protects oneself physically or mentally: one's life, mind or privacy. It can mean one saves oneself from being contaminated by evil, or withdrawing in retirement or from irritating people. It can also mean to hide one's true intentions, to deceive others.
The outside trigram Heaven means that to the outside this is about truth, or the severe laws which control life,
or these same laws which your mind yearns for in order to make life worthwhile. They are the reason hermits withdraw to solitude to find the magnificence of Heaven's laws, or you have to hide yourself when you encounter evil people because survival also depends on listening to Heaven's laws.
Sometimes you are the pig, running for your life. Other times you are the one who has to chase after the things that sustain your life. Don’t ever let them escape, they are too valuable. One single idea or love that escapes can mean that you miss all the subsequent generations of ideas and loves it would have triggered into life.
The more you live others lives, the more piggies of your own you will lose. And eventually you will be eaten yourself. Withdraw from all things that are not compatible with your hopes for life. Making a real life is not only making it – the largest part is escaping from losing it.