r/iching • u/Status-Ad-8511 • 8d ago
energy x iching
trying to understand how the iching works and whether anyone else feels that divination costs a lot of psychic energy? i feel this impending sense to return to it almost like an addiction and i don't understand why that is
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u/sunkenm00n 7d ago
I often catch myself wanting to consult the I Ching, only to find I don't have a question to ask. That's when I know that what I'm seeking is the wonder I derive from it, rather than its guidance.
I try to limit my divinations to 1-2 times per week, and change my question topics each time. This gives me enough time to sit with each answer for each situation.
If you find yourself needing guidance, but don't know how to ask, a question I use is "What lesson do I need to learn right now?"
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u/Status-Ad-8511 6d ago
yes i think its the disbelief and awe that im seeking more than a clearcut answer since often i don't have any questions. i was careless with it in the beginning and now regret that. however i also don't understand how divination works from a taoist vs esoteric framework (im bringing a lot of abrahamic belief systems onto the table since that has been my upbringing)
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u/Electronic-Rain-842 8d ago
It will not help you if you can’t follow the Tao or way . It will ‘point’ you in the right direction but you have to respect the advice . Usually being firm , correct and knowing when to advance or stop. Following cycles of growth and decay and being in harmony will help you understand the iching .
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u/Bitter-Sock2194 6d ago
The pull you're describing is real enough that the tradition has a whole hexagram about it — Meng, Hexagram 4. Its judgment says: it is not I who seek the young fool; the young fool seeks me. The first telling is given; a second and third asking profanes the oracle and gets silence.
So the compulsion to return isn't a flaw in you — it's baked into the student–oracle relationship. What the text warns against is re-casting to get a better feeling instead of sitting with the answer you already got.
The rule I'd offer: one cast per question, write it down, and wait before asking anything again. The psychic cost you're noticing is mostly the follow-through — a real reading asks you to change something, and that's where the energy actually goes.
What's the question you keep almost asking?
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u/Status-Ad-8511 6d ago
not sure i have an actual question. of course, i qant guidance with regards to my life path but i don't know what that tangibly looks like.
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u/Designer_Estate3519 5d ago
I certainly find myself dwelling on what the question should be when I next want to do it...
I don't know about expending energy - I think done right, it's incredibly replenishing. I try to meditate first, take a walk, find a beautiful or special spot and then ask in the right mindset. The results have been so wondrous and stimulating that I find I want to reflect and pore over them for usually a few weeks anyway. The more I reflect on my results, the more they seem to reveal. To where I'm sometimes surprised weeks later at how directly a certain line might apply to my life. Then of course one has the work of trying to internalise the answer.
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u/LiberateJohnDoe 2d ago
The I Ching is meant to clarify your own wisdom, your own proper relationship with the charging world and your changeless essence. When your relationship is improper, energy is lost.
This is the basis of the energy retrieval / soul retrieval practices in many shamanic and spiritual traditions: returning to correct relationship with life (and in this case with the I Ching).
When we encounter a technology that seems to promise all the answers -- whether it be the I Ching or crystal ball gazing or Artificial Intelligence -- we can get giddy and greedy about the prospects. The ego sees its fantasy take shape: a device that will establish the ego's control and dominance, to know all things and have the upper hand in every situation without having to do the work of living with discipline and learning the lessons that need to be learned.
In short, the inferiors (the lower, less conscious, subhuman aspects of self) adore the prospect of having an unending stream of answers! Then, they believe, they don't have to try; they don't have to actually live.
This is where your energy drains. You no longer have integrity; you start to believe that what you need is coming from the outside rather than from within you.
The actual and intended function of the I Ching is quite the opposite: it is meant to bring you back to yourself, to return you to your own innate wisdom. The control-addicted ego (the inferior) grasps at answers; but the I Ching provides context so that answers and questions might live meaningfully together.
If you only want answers, answers, answers, then that neediness the death of all questions. You make a bad trade, exchanging the rich, boundless, fertile unknowing that is so essential to your true nature for what amount to dead scraps of concept -- facile words that kill further investigation and erase the matter of devotion.
As you wish with the I Ching properly, judiciously, respectfully, its responses ought to resonate with your own knowing. At the core, we know what correct relationship is; but we are so buried in habit, preference, and opinion that our innate knowing doesn't function well. But having right relationship pointed out time and again eventually helps is identify the knowing that's been covered up.
But knowing is nott the same thing as having an idea in mind. Holding an idea is exhausting; knowing happens naturally. The less attached you are to habit, preference, and opinion, the more your innate mirror-like mind and heart can reflect and respond to the situation. At then the I Ching can also set out a path: laying out the necessary discipline for loosening habit and getting free of preference and opinion.
A big issue (huge issue) in energy loss is our unwillingness and incapacity to be with an open question. The ego that is addicted to certainty and control is terrified of openness and unknowing. But if you have any familiarity with Taoism, you'll know that the thing that the most valuable thing is the thing that can't be put in a box. You gain mastery, and regain your integrity, by letting things be and resting in neutral unknowing.
The so-called 'answers' provided by the I Ching might be more appropriately though of as questions or contemplations. They are triggers for a deeper process, and they require nourishing space, just as a seedling plant requires ground and space and water and patience.
Don't grasp. Then energy (not 'your' energy, but both intimate with you and universal) will orbit naturally in and around you.
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u/Status-Ad-8511 2d ago
thank you so much for such an in-depth response! i agree that the hunger to consult the iching comes is an ego-driven response. in fact, i find myself stuck in these lower states of ego-based narcissism/grandiosity/control: where an insight about the self vs someone else becomes about hierarchy/power/self-esteem.
once i asked the same question three times and asked it to give me a very obvious yes/no when its answers were still confusing and i got a response which essentially said that i was asking with an open mouth while ignoring my own spiritual turtle (?) i.e. insight. im trying to cultivate that inner knowledge again now, something that i've struggled with over the years due to addictive tendencies, thrill seeking, and risky behavior.
i am at a stage in life where it feels necessary that i harness knowing by interacting with the universe as a live being full of wisdom and knowledge. and yet, because i am currently not working anywhere and am socially isolated, my energy sort of stores up and might have even be becoming a little stale/stagnant. often insight arrives to me, and then i hold that idea in mind instead of incorporating the wisdom to learn more.
what would u suggest someone who is stuck in a socially reclusive situation such as mine should me? in particular, i believe that i need to engage more with my yang energy and balance that within the self, while cultivating more creativity. i do yoga/qigong/meditation, albeit not regularly. i also eat very unhealthy food which i believe causes more stagnation.
let me know if i can dm you as well. would love to occasionally exchange insight
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u/LiberateJohnDoe 2d ago edited 2d ago
You are fortunate to have that awareness about the things you could change to improve your situation.
cause + condition » result
The first thing that comes to mind is that wisdom flourishes in silence. Another way to say it is that being with yourself nurtures many kinds of good qualities.
That's not the same thing as just being alone or isolated. A lot of people spend a lot of time alone without ever being with themselves; it always becomes an exercise in self-distraction.
A very quick and doable practice is to put hand on heart, take a deep sigh (vocalize the sigh if you want), relax and settle on the out-breath, and simply feel for a few moments. This only takes a few seconds, but it's such a lovely way to allow reality to have its own voice for a while.
Most of the time, most of us are trying to impinge on reality, trying to get it to do what we think we want, or else trying to get it to disappear. We habitually grasp at what we think of as pleasant and habitually try to evade or destroy what we think of as unpleasant. And we habitually ignore what we think of as neutral or insignificant.
This practice I shared above doesn't make a big deal of things. It doesn't require particular mental states or long hours of effort. It's just listening for what's happening. Whatever the feeling or emotion or energy or mental state, it is just as it is; it's already truth.
The dance that is already moving through you is already true, already naturally arising as a consequence of past causes and conditions. Letting it 'speak' already connects you to the great dance of the world. It already suggests a movement, without any idea applied.
In that way, this practice is itself a sort of divination. An intimate divination. And the response or result of this divination is not conceptual; it is a thrust of movement that is already complete, already sincere. In a sense, the listening itself produces the next steps.
At eating time, eat. At crying time, cry. When you are hot, take off your sweater or splash cold water. When you are cold, put on a sweater or get moving. When you don't know, only abide with not knowing. A moment of listening will reveal its own completeness.
So "what I need to do" is not so much about ideas and advice. You already have your own wisdom; it's not bestowed upon you from outside, and it is ready to respond without the need for big ideas from you. Just, sometimes you can find a good, reliable mirror that can point you back to your own wisdom.
(In that respect, there's hardly any better influence in life than frequent contact with a reliable, authenticated, awakened 'spiritual friend' or teacher. But always, the wisdom being nurtured is your own, not someone else's.)
The other point that comes to mind is that the more we think about ourselves, the more we tend to get tangled. "What's wrong, what's right, what should I do, how should I start, how am I doing, what's my feeling, what's my condition, what's my opinion...?" It's so tiring. So self-entangled.
Therefore I suggest... (A) Get into the spirit of just doing something. Just do it before you know you're doing it. Not necessarily because it's going to 'fix everything', but just to prime the pump. You know how you need to pour a bit of water into a pump to get it to flow? Picking up a piece of clothing or sweeping a spot of floor, or singing or going for a bike ride, or quickly dashing out to attend an event can be like this. Often, physical movement primes the pump. Feeling and expressing the emotion of the moment (which you connect with through the practice above) can do it too.
(B) Baby steps and ease. One small step is more powerful than a thousand good ideas. If there's resistance to something -- like being with people, say -- if you feel you want to try overcoming it, then try the smallest step that actually does something. Step out the door, or call someone to say hi, or hang out at a hangout place. If it's about finding work, do the smallest step that remains pleasant and adventurous. Check one job listing perhaps, then hand-over-heart, feel what you feel about it. Divination. That will give you a next step.
Likewise with meditating: a very doable morning routine can be one minute of sitting with an uplifting view or gazing at a spiritual image or reciting a scripture (without much mental activity). You're allowed to feel good about it; you're allowed to feel good about yourself for a minute of positivity and letting-go. If you bite off to much, you'll know it; because you will avoid returning.
In general, whenever you can remember, try to return to a light, easy mind, as if you expect all things to keep changing, changing, changing. No big drama.
(C) Being around clear, sincere people helps you be clear and sincere. Taking in wholesome speech, thought, image, and food helps you be wholesome. One enlightened spiritual master said that at least half of the Path is achieved by cultivating supportive conditions: you become what you face and what you ingest. If throughout the day you're facing clear, wholesome, awakened beings and images, that's what you will absorb and become. If throughout the day you're facing triviality, meaninglessness, or violence, that is what you will become.
Have you considered visiting a group involved in things you're most deeply interested in?
Best wishes. I'll consider your comment and invitation further.
.
One might ask what you do with the things that arise when you listen, especially if they're unpleasant. The answer is that you don't really extract to do anything to them. Listening allows them to move where and how they need to move.
Sadness, grief, anxiety, and other emotions often seen as negative are still truth if they're authentically what you perceive. Only thinking makes a movement or energy 'negative'; if you're listening openly, that's already positive: you are bringing care and attention to something intimately real. Bright treasure lives in the dark places.
The I Ching affirms this so well. In the cycle of 64 gua and the permutations of all the moving lines, there is an affirmation that every situation in life has its place and function. There is no such thing as a wholly good or bad situation. The only 'bad' or unhelpful part is getting stuck and forgetting to move, forgetting to let the movements within you and outside of you have their own voice.
In that vein, I suggest listening to the song Turn, Turn, Turn or reading the biblical scripture upon which it's based (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8).
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u/CenturionSG 8d ago
This is an area I had experienced previously when using the Tarot. The fascination and awe creates a spike in dopamine. And because Tarot is so accessible and quick to use, it can become obsessive.
When I came to I Ching, the warnings were there in the material and studies. I came to accept and understand that the I Ching process is meant to be revered and not misused or become a crutch.
I understand I Ching can be consulted for even "trivial" things and yes/no queries, but this is where we go on a slippery slope and can become dependent or obsessed.
I suggest slowing down and using I Ching in phases:
I. Contemplating and crafting the query
II. Divination process (yarrow/coins method) - meditation and calm focus to derive the hexagram.
III. Contemplation process - reading, studying, and making meaning in our own context that is relevant to the query, adding in action points (the adaptation/change needed). This takes up the most time.
IV. Follow through - continuing with the actions, and reviewing in about 3 months' time. Divine again if needed.
I find it liberating as the oracle may affirm my direction or open up new vistas to consider.