Hexagram 52
Keeping Still
艮
Upper
Mountain · 艮
keeping still
Lower
Mountain · 艮
keeping still
Contemporary judgment
Keeping still. A call to quiet the restless mind, to halt the endless outward motion. True stillness is not absence of life but the condition in which life reveals itself most clearly. Much of what looks like necessary action is actually distraction from what is hard to feel.
Image
Mountain above mountain, unmoving. The superior person does not let their thoughts go beyond their present situation.
Counsel
Stop. Really stop. Take the time to become still enough that the agitation of the mind settles. What you perceive in that stillness is a truer guide than anything you could strategize for in motion. The situation does not need more action from you right now; it needs more clarity.
The six lines
Numbered from the bottom upward; displayed here from first to sixth.
Line 1
A six at the beginning means: Keeping still of his toes. No blame. Favorable is lasting perseverance.
Line 2
A six in the second place means: Keeping still of his calves. He cannot rescue the one he follows. His heart is not glad.
Line 3
A nine in the third place means: Keeping still of his hips. Stiffening of his sacrum. Dangerous. The heart suffocates.
Line 4
A six in the fourth place means: Keeping still of his trunk. No blame.
Line 5
A six in the fifth place means: Keeping still of his jaws. The words have order. Remorse vanishes.
Line 6
A nine at the top means: Magnanimous keeping still. Good fortune!
Contemporary sections are original app interpretations. Line text comes from the CC0 translation in jesshewitt/i-ching.