Transformation · line 3
Clearing Obstacles becomes What Lasts
What this change means
Carrying a heavy load on your back while riding in a carriage invites thieves: that's the image of the third line, which moves alone and carries this reading. Having cleared the obstacles, you may be tempted to act high-handed and to inflate your achievements. Boasting draws quarrels and envy, and those can take away what you've gained. As this line turns, the Water below becomes Wind, and Clearing Obstacles becomes 32 What Lasts, thunder and wind together. The resulting hexagram asks for clear goals and actions that match them, so your achievements grow and endure. That's the remedy for showing off. Lasting results come from steady direction, not from display. Keep your gains quiet, keep your manner modest, and put your energy into the next stretch of real work. What you don't advertise is far harder for others to take from you.
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 40 Clearing Obstacles
If you act high-handed and boast about your achievements, exaggerating them, you'll draw quarrels and envy that threaten to take away what you've gained.
Carries a load on the back and rides in a carriage: this brings raiders. Constancy brings distress.
- The judgment of 40 Clearing Obstacles
The obstacles have been overcome one by one. You're in a time when balance matters: act quickly and decisively as far as you can, without overrating your abilities. If you feel you need a rest, or even to step back before going on, do it.
The southwest is favorable. With nowhere to go, coming back brings good fortune. With somewhere to go, going early brings good fortune.
- The judgment of 32 What Lasts
This moment asks you for action, not stillness. It asks you to have clear goals to head toward and to act in line with them. That way you'll achieve things, and your achievements will keep growing and will last.
Success. No fault. Constancy is favorable. It is favorable to have somewhere to go.
The trigrams
The way back
32 What Lasts → 40 Clearing Obstaclesline 3
Other transformations of Clearing Obstacles
Make your own cast
The answer changes with the question. Toss the coins and see which lines move for you.