Using the I Ching

[Argonia]

Has anyone here consulted the I Ching? What did you ask it about and what did the answers tell you? DId you find it a profitable exercise or was it a waste of time?

 

[Pickman's model]

what prompts these questions?

 

[Argonia]

what prompts these questions?

I used to use it quite a bit and found it interesting but haven't consulted it for a while, was just wondering about other people's experiences

 

[Pickman's model]

Has anyone here consulted the I Ching? What did you ask it about and what did the answers tell you? DId you find it a profitable exercise or was it a waste of time?

oh: you don't need yarrow stalks, arthur waley used match sticks. there's a ton of translations, the wilhelm translation can be found online here I Ching Wilhelm Translation

 

[Pickman's model]

I used to use it quite a bit and found it interesting but haven't consulted it for a while, was just wondering about other people's experiences

i've a copy but i've yet to use it

 

[Argonia]

I used to use spaghetti instead of yarrow stalks!

 

[Pickman's model]

I used to use it quite a bit and found it interesting but haven't consulted it for a while, was just wondering about other people's experiences

auld aleister crowley used it to find out where to have his abbey of thelema (cefalu) and where to go when mussolini told him to sling his hook (tunis)

 

[Pickman's model]

I used to use spaghetti instead of yarrow stalks!

oh! that never occurred to me!

 

[maomao]

Should be known as the Yi Jing now really.

I always used coins. Like most fortune telling systems it's vague enough to be good at telling you what you want to hear.

Learn a little Chinese and read the Dao De Jing instead. Same feel to it but you might actually learn something. I can't believe that fortune telling can ever be good for the mind. If you're detached enough to know it's just a game then it's a pretty shit one.

 

[two sheds]

I used to use spaghetti instead of yarrow stalks!

Difficult to cast them because they slither all over the place.

I used it a fair bit in my yoof. They're general enough answers for you to read something relevant to your situation. And interesting exercise if nothing else because of the Chinese imagery.

 

[two sheds]

Should be known as the Yi Jing now really.

I always used coins. Like most fortune telling systems it's vague enough to be good at telling you what you want to hear.

Learn a little Chinese and read the Dao De Jing instead. Same feel to it but you might actually learn something. I can't believe that fortune telling can ever be good for the mind. If you're detached enough to know it's just a game then it's a pretty shit one.

Yep good advice. I do love the Dao. Also Zhuang Zhou (Chuang Tzu) along similar lines.

 

[TruXta]

Should be known as the Yi Jing now really.

I always used coins. Like most fortune telling systems it's vague enough to be good at telling you what you want to hear.

Learn a little Chinese and read the Dao De Jing instead. Same feel to it but you might actually learn something. I can't believe that fortune telling can ever be good for the mind. If you're detached enough to know it's just a game then it's a pretty shit one.

I've used it, but didn't treat it as either an oracle or a game. For me its use value came from posing a question and then using the answer as a tool for reflection.

In that sense you might well say that you're better off reading the Dao. But I don't have a copy, and I found it easier to get the few lines to ponder.

I used coins BTW.

 

[JimW]

There's an interesting Waley article online somewhere where he rejects the received reading of a lot of the divinatory text and says he thinks it referred actually to observations of natural phenomena such as the movement of birds or ants (common type of divination). Chinese is so ancient and been recopied often enough for mistranscription that he makes a credible case. Usual text really just accumlation of scholarly glosses over two millenia.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

I've used it, but didn't treat it as either an oracle or a game. For me its use value came from posing a question and then using the answer as a tool for reflection.

In that sense you might well say that you're better off reading the Dao. But I don't have a copy, and I found it easier to get the few lines to ponder.

I used coins BTW.

I use coins too. I have some old Chinese coins with the square hole in the middle. I keep meaning to make some yarrow stalks but since I tend towards the Runes by preference, I don’t get round to the yarrow stalks.


I don’t find the Yi Jing general, I find it very specific. I’ve tried several different commentaries but mostly I find that I need to be in a particular state of mind to be able to make sense of this system.

What you say JimW makes a lot of sense. Perhaps this is why I find it hard to really get to grips with the Yi Jing.

 

[TruXta]

I use coins too. I have some old Chinese coins with the square hole in the middle. I keep meaning to make some yarrow stalks but since I tend towards the Runes by preference, I don’t get round to the yarrow stalks.


I don’t find the Yi Jing general, I find it very specific. I’ve tried several different commentaries but mostly I find that I need to be in a particular state of mind to be able to make sense of this system.

What you say JimW makes a lot of sense. Perhaps this is why I find it hard to really get to grips with the Yi Jing.

Interesting. Do you include changing lines?

 

[FridgeMagnet]

I built a virtual I Ching system once, working with a Taoist guy. There were no actual coin or stalk tosses but it did use a true random feed from random.org (based on atmospheric noise) which he rated as suitable. I was thinking of doing a system which did throw virtual coins or stalks but that would have been both a lot harder and you'd need to add some true random element anyway.

I love divination systems, whether they come from a religious/esoteric basis or are purely secular (like Oblique Strategies). In fact they've really taken off nowadays, with bots and web systems allowing people to just make their own up.

 

[TruXta]

I built a virtual I Ching system once, working with a Taoist guy. There were no actual coin or stalk tosses but it did use a true random feed from random.org (based on atmospheric noise) which he rated as suitable. I was thinking of doing a system which did throw virtual coins or stalks but that would have been both a lot harder and you'd need to add some true random element anyway.

I love divination systems, whether they come from a religious/esoteric basis or are purely secular (like Oblique Strategies). In fact they've really taken off nowadays, with bots and web systems allowing people to just make their own up.

Facade.com ftw

 

[wiskey]

An old friend of mine has memorised the I ching and regularly throws pennies to make decisions.

 

[FridgeMagnet]

Facade.com ftw

Mine was in a proper 3D multiuser environment. But you know, there's really not a lot of underlying difference.

 

[TruXta]

Mine was in a proper 3D multiuser environment. But you know, there's really not a lot of underlying difference.

Second Life?

 

[FridgeMagnet]

Second Life?

Yup. No idea whether it's still around, though knowing Second Life it probably is and various people have ripped it off and are selling it for L$1.

 

[TruXta]

 

[twentythreedom]

Does the "Aye, Chang" count? I've used that loads

 

[SheilaNaGig]

Interesting. Do you include changing lines?

Yes.

I think of it ... or I approach it as a conversation. So it’s an unfolding dialogue rather than than single answer that needs to be understood in a lump.

 

[Pickman's model]

Does the "Aye, Chang" count? I've used that loads

i thought you were saying itching in your peculiar accent

 

[Idaho]

I'm very surprised that there are so many urban iching users. Like all divination it is potentially useful as a way of re-examining the question.

I find one can get a bit addicted to it if you are going through a period of uncertainty and anxiety.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

An old friend of mine has memorised the I ching and regularly throws pennies to make decisions.

My first reaction to that was Blimey! because is seems like a gargantuan task.

But I know the Runes well enough not to have to refer to a book, and I’m always looking out for spontaneous occurrences of the Runes as I go about. In order to know the Runes well enough for that to work I have to know the associated gods, their stories, the natural history of animals herbs and trees and a lot of other associated information really well. So I can see how someone could learn the Ji Ying.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

Yes.

I think of it ... or I approach it as a conversation. So it’s an unfolding dialogue rather than than single answer that needs to be understood in a lump.

Like, the other half of the conversation (the Ji Ying) is a wise old cove who is encouraging me to find my own way through, but they know it all, they have a much broader deeper perspective than I could possibly manage. But they don’t want to give me the simple obvious answer, that wouldn’t help me grow or understand. So instead, they guide me towards what they know to be the best path. The changing lines is a bit like they’re saying “warmer, cooler” as I narrow in on the right way through.

If I take a wrong turn I feel like it’s kinda laughing at me, the answers are so preposterously out of whack it feels like it’s taking the piss.

 

[twentythreedom]

i thought you were saying itching in your peculiar accent

Peculiar accent?

 

[Pickman's model]

Peculiar accent?

The one where you mean itching when you say aye chang