Nine Years Facing A Wall

[9th]

Nurturance of the great means taking care of the great. As for the qualities of the hexagram, above is mountain (still), and below is heaven (strong); having strength yet being able to be still, it is therefore called nurturance of the great.

 

This hexagram represents incubation nurturing the spiritual embryo; it follows on the previous hexagram return. Return means restoration of the primordial energy. When the primordial energy comes back within, slight and vague to begin with, then becoming clearly evident, it restores

the original self; the foundation of life is stabilized, the spiritual embryo is formed, and one enters from striving into nonstriving. Then one should carefully seal it and store it securely, forestalling danger, incubating and bathing, aiming for the great transformation, the unfathomable state of spiritual sublimation, making it indestructible and incorruptible.

 

On this path, it is beneficial to still strength, not to use strength. Therefore the text says "it is beneficial to be chaste." Chastity here means quietude. Stilling strength is nurturing strength. The work of nurturing strength is the work of keeping centered, embracing unity; to keep centered and embrace unity, it is good to be still, not active—if one is still, this preserves strength; if one is active, this damages strength. Stilling is not leaving the world, quietude is not empty inaction: Therein there is a way of adjustment, addition and substraction; therefore one should not "eat at home."

 

Only thus is one capable of great nurturance, producing good fortune. Not eating at home means externally adjusting the furnace while internally operating the true fire, still within and also still without, continuing subtly, not forgetting, not forcing. Then when one encounters great danger and difficulty one is unmoved, unshaken — only then is it real nurturing, only then is it greatness of nurturance.

 

Therefore it is also "beneficial to cross great rivers." The crossing of great rivers is that whereby inner nurturance and outer effectiveness is accomplished. This is the work referred to as "nine years facing a wall."

 

"Facing a wall" is the state of being like a wall of immense height, detached from all kinds of biases and extremes, stopping in unknowing, breaking through space. When you break through space, the spiritual potential is freed, both body and mind are sublimated, merging with the Tao in reality. With greatness of nurturance comes greatness of development, and one becomes a companion of heaven.

 

Top yang: Carrying the crossroads of heaven; development.

 

At the end of nurturance of the great, the achievement complete, the practice fulfilled, with a peal of thunder the real person emerges, startling the ignorant, amazing the mundane. Beginning with striving, which no one sees, when one arrives at nonstriving, for the first time one is known to others—who does not extol carrying the crossroads of heaven? When practitioners of the Tao reach liberation and attain reality, there is a body outside the body, beyond heaven and earth. One does not only complete oneself but others as well. From greatness of nurturance comes greatness of manifestation. What can compare to that development? This is nourishing strength culminating in spiritual transformation.

 

So the path of incubating the spiritual embryo requires clear knowledge of nurturance of the great, strength held in check. Once one is strong and also still, in the beginning there is striving but in the end there is nonstriving. One is strong and healthy and rests in ultimate good without evil, integrated with the absolute. A single energy circulates, indefinable as being or nonbeing; self and others will return to emptiness, and the path of twin cultivation of essence and life is consummated.

 

 

 

Tranquility means going through in harmony. As for the qualities of the hexagram, above is earth, (submissive), and below is heaven, (strong): Yang is strong inside, yin is submissive outside. Strength and submission unified, yin and yang correspond; it therefore is called tranquility.

 

This hexagram represents the mixing of yin and yang; it follows on the previous hexagram nurturance by the small. In nurturance by the small, one yin nurtures five yangs; yin energy is in charge, and yang energy is not active. Being small in nurturance and unable to be great in nurturance, the activity cannot succeed; the way to successful activity requires that great and small be unharmed, that yin and yang balance each other, yin obeying yang, yang governing yin.

 

Only when yin and yang are harmoniously combined is it possible to accomplish things. Therefore the way of tranquility is that the small goes and the great comes; it is auspicious and developmental. The small is yin and the great is yang: "The small goes" means yin submits, "the great comes" means yang is strong. With yang strong on the inside and yin submissive on the outside, the primordial gradually returns and acquired conditioning gradually melts away; thereby it is possible to reach the realm of pure yang with no yin. It is a matter of course then to be fortunate in action, and for activity to develop.

 

However, in the path of bringing about tranquility, there is a firing process, there is a course of work. If advancing and withdrawing are done with the proper timing, and one is strong yet acts docilely, using docility to nurture strength, one can bring about tranquility and preserve it, understanding essence through understanding life, attaining nonstriving through striving, completing the great Way. Of this one can be sure.

 

 

[9th]

 

[SeekerOfHealing]

Nine year of facing the wall = pre-heaven 

[9th]

5 hours ago, SeekerOfHealing said:

Nine year of facing the wall = pre-heaven 

 

Ok so what does tranquility = 

[9th]