The Return

Reading it step by step

The last page left one fruit on the tree. When stripping is complete, all six lines are yin: that is Kun, the Receptive. One step further, and a single yang line comes back at the very bottom: that is Fù (Return). It belongs to the eleventh month, the month of the winter solstice: the coldest, darkest time of the year, when the days begin to lengthen.

First: “in Return, do we not see the heart of heaven and earth?” The commentary doesn't speak of heaven and earth's heart while yin is pushing yang out layer by layer. It speaks of it at the lowest point, when a spark of life appears. Heaven and earth never stay frozen in a dead stillness; life always starts again from below. Strictly speaking, heaven and earth may have no heart at all; this is a meaning people read into the way the world turns. But it is exactly the word a person in the pit needs to hear: the darkest day is also the day things turn.

Second: “the gates closed at the solstice.” The Great Image says thunder lies inside the earth, and so the ancient kings shut the passes on the solstice: no merchants, no travellers, no royal tours. Why? The new yang has only just appeared, and it is weak. It needs nursing first. People just out of a hard time are often in a hurry to prove themselves: back to overwork the moment they recover, or demanding that a mended relationship be exactly as it was. Be quiet for a few days. Let that small strength take root. The Judgment's “on the seventh day it returns” marks a cycle; you needn't read it as exactly seven days.

Today, returning might mean deleting an angry message before you send it, telling your child “I was wrong just now,” or stopping a new bad habit on day three. The sooner you turn back, the shorter the road home.

In the darkest night, heaven and earth have already begun to turn.