Transformation · lines 2 and 3
Fleeting Success becomes Darkness
What this change means
Light goes underground in this movement: the second and third lines change, and the lake below becomes Fire buried beneath the earth. The third line leads. Trusting the good times too much brings stagnation and loss, and only an early response lets you recover. The second line gives you the attitude to meet it: every situation is impermanent, so you can pass through each phase trusting your own resources rather than acting from fear.
The resulting hexagram, 36 Darkness, describes a hard season where you may have to live alongside the wrong people. Protect yourself, keep your integrity, and don't show all your light and talents openly; staying unnoticed can keep you safe until better times return. The good period here may turn sooner than you'd like. Prepare quietly, keep your values intact, and remember that hard times pass too. Watch for complacency and for exposing yourself when discretion would serve you better.
What to read, in order
Marked ● is what Zhu Xi's tradition puts at the center for this number of moving lines.
- Line 3 of 19 Fleeting Success
Relying too much on favorable situations will lead you to inertia and loss. If you react early, you can recover.
Drawing near with sweetness. Nothing is favorable. Once grieved by it, no fault.
- Line 2 of 19 Fleeting Success
Recognizing that every situation is impermanent will let you move through each phase not from fear, but trusting that you have what you need to get through it.
Drawing near together. Good fortune; nothing that is not favorable.
- The judgment of 19 Fleeting Success
A period of luck, fortune and well-being is coming. Make the most of it, because it will last only eight months; after that, conditions will change. If you can pay attention, read the signs and take care and precautions before the decline arrives, you won't avoid it, but you will lessen its effects while circumstances change.
Great success. Constancy is favorable. When the eighth month comes, misfortune.
- The judgment of 36 Darkness
It's a dark time: circumstances force you to live alongside the wrong people. If you know how to protect yourself, hold on to your integrity, and go unnoticed, without openly showing your light and your talents, you'll stay safe until better times come. However hard they seem, hard times pass too.
Constancy in hardship is favorable.
The trigrams
The way back
36 Darkness → 19 Fleeting Successlines 2 and 3
Other transformations of Fleeting Success
- 2Passivitylines 1 and 2
- 46Going Uplines 1 and 3
- 40Clearing Obstacleslines 1 and 4
- 51Shocklines 2 and 4
- 34Great Manifestationlines 3 and 4
- 29Waterlines 1 and 5
- 3Initial Obstacleslines 2 and 5
- 5Inactionlines 3 and 5
- 58Inner Peacelines 4 and 5
- 4Immaturitylines 1 and 6
- 27Nourishmentlines 2 and 6
- 26Great Achievementslines 3 and 6
- 38Oppositeslines 4 and 6
- 61Inner Integritylines 5 and 6
Make your own cast
The answer changes with the question. Toss the coins and see which lines move for you.