In honor of my Teacher, Liu Ming,
::: ::: :::
Commentary and compilations by Jamie Shulander
All notes from class notes/works by Liu Ming
INDICATORS Listed: Yearly, Monthly, Lunar then Daily
::: ::: :::
LUNAR YEAR: YEAR of the OX
Deplete: Insensitive, ruthless if crossed, humorless, sullen, slavishly conventional, fearful of change, aloof and dull.
Image: The Ox talked about in Chinese Astrology is well known to all Chinese farmers. When China turned away from the wily horse to the sedate ox as the plow animal, rice productivity greatly increased. As a plow animal the Ox plows straight furrows and needs no coaxing. Ox are linked with the profits of consistent hard work and the Confucian virtue of perseverance in what is right. Naturally strong they are at their best when they are constantly challenged. Their sense of justice (and the law) makes them good leaders. Though often materially successful, they lack attachment to material things.
Metal Ox are accommodating, strong and reliable. They never shy away from difficulty or back down in confrontation. They promise more than they can deliver. Hurtful trauma in childhood (orphaned, immigration) and repressed anger ultimately polish their cold-heartedness into a calm and generous character. They are good parents and friends to a small in-crowd. They are rarely sick, and live long lives. Though their fortunes wax and wane they have comfortable old age.
LM Notes: Metal Ox
LUNAR MONTH: YANG WOOD DRAGON (1844, 1904, 1964, 2024) ‘Laughing Dragon’
Wood Dragons are artistic, righteous and ingenious. They survive difficult childhoods to become caring parents. They are persuasive, humorous and easily make friends. Jealousy haunts them. They are productive artists. Their fortune steadily improves throughout their life. In old age they will cultivate elegance and own a considerable amount of property. They are prone to lung and liver disharmonies due to suppressed anger. They are susceptible to possession when passing through damp forested areas.
LM Notes: Water Dragon
QI NODE: 6 Grain Rains
Yin and Yang Courtship
"Spring ends with the inter-seasonal qi node Grain Rains. This qi node is the transition from spring to summer. It charges the growth process with increased warmth (Yang) and Rain (Yin). The growing and transforming process is now seen everywhere in Nature. The power of growth hits the ground and spreads. Flowers bloom in orchards. Buds, the true outcome of spring, appear everywhere with the promise of abundance. The mantle of power is given to the princely forms of Yang. It is auspicious if thunder (sound of spring) is heard in this qi node to welcome the power of summer - just as it is auspicious that the quiet of autumn ends in the utter silence of winter.
"It is a time of final preparations, even ceremonious preparations. It is a good time to thank the wise mentors who have helped to shape your life. It is a good time to graduate from school or move on to higher education. New and better job (promotions), new and better address (moving house) and the chance to reinvent yourself is present themselves. It is a time to enjoy music, play music and dance. If your cultivation of spring was insufficient or negligent you will be held back with Damp (criticism, lethargy, allergies and indigestion)."
LM The Way of Three Treasures
"It is a favorable time for dramatic reform and revolution - night becoming day. If you are ready to accept serious change and ready to let go of the past, everything is favorable. If you fear change, Ge donates the painful torment of unsuccessful resistance.”
LM Changing: Zhouyi 49 GeSolar Indicator: Design
“Routine work brings about unexpected results. At the highest level of success is an opportunity to be extraordinarily generous."
LM Changing: Zhouyi 26 Da Chu"To consult a physician and consult oracles (divination of all kinds) will bring clarity. It is a good day for industry (labor/gardening = long term wealth), building (restores clarity) and burying the dead (enhance intuition). It is inauspicious to take anything for granted. It is inauspicious for revolution, confrontation, breaking taboos, neglecting responsibilities or travel (someone at home dies/gets sick)."
LM Notes: The Net
“It is an excellent day to recover wisdom by stepping back, planning, recalling alliances and reassessing our position.”
LM Notes: Design
Hexagram 5 Xu: Waiting
Lunar Mansion: The Beak / Monkey
Solar Indicator: Divide
"Xu suggests that waiting is a part of the natural unfolding (fate) of all situations. Xu is about making the most of waiting - using the power of patience and procrastination to avoid struggle and develop wisdom in action. Accepting fate is not about abandoning intelligence. A wise and able person has the sensitivity to find the freedom within fate. The wisdom of Xu is the clarity to hold back and go forward at the right times.”
LM Changing: Zhouyi 5 Xu"It bodes well to follow superiors, practice austerity and/or pool resources with others. It is a good day to sincerely comply with divination and maintain taboos meticulously.
"It is inauspicious to push forward, be industrious or initiate new ventures. Revolution or demanding idealistic justice on this day will be catastrophic."
LM Notes: The Beak
"Holding back on this day is related to deeper self-reflection, education of all sorts and consulting with experts and elders - rather than forward action. It is not about immature reluctance or cowardice but about shedding inessentials."
LM Notes: Divide
Hexagram 9 Xiao Xu: Minor Force
Lunar Mansion: The Trio / Gibbon
Solar Indicator: Full
"It is best to subordinate to or ally yourself with the strong or wait to accumulate more strength and resources. Do not be rambunctious, distracted or diverted. Small projects done well will eventually add up to success. Obstacles and delays can be expected in any forward action.”
LM Changing: Zhouyi 9 Xiao Xu"It bodes well to dispose of inessentials (haircuts), edit, fast, study (Classics), take exams, enter retreat and practice meditation. It is good to be industrious close to home (house clean). Initiating business (particularly group enterprise) will be fruitful if planning has been thorough.
"It is inauspicious to push forward aggressively. Do not get married, finalize divorce, bury the dead (it will create family dissent), spend savings or speculate financially as these all lead to losing resources and cooperation."
LM Notes: The Trio
“This is an optimum day for education, preparation, polishing, gathering resources and firming up plans. Confidence grows as the right time and necessary resources are now part of the vision. The qi is forming patterns and remaining in the channels. Practice and disciplined cultivation bring confidence. The prince (yang) is gaining support. Discipline in small matters succeeds. True confidence requires no aggression. Though nothing needs to be done, the natural maturation of strength occurs.”
LM Notes: Full
Hexagram Consult the Oracle
Lunar Mansion: The Well / Tapir
Solar Indicator: Level
“It is auspicious to build, remodel, do fengshui adjustments, take exams, and maintain routine industry. The earth can be dug (gardening = wealth) and it is a good day to donate, buy or sell (investment) real estate. Community or charity projects will flourish. It is favorable for apologies. It is favorable for medical treatments (particularly for initiating a series of treatments for a chronic condition).
“It is not auspicious to postpone needed repairs, apologies or difficult tasks. It is not good for funerals or burials of those who died by suicide, violence or sudden illness because others will soon follow.”
LM Notes: The Well
“This is a day when stable readiness and the qi of confidence blooms into activity. Youthful anxiety and ambition are replaced by personal strength and confidence. From this position all things look and are possible. Educated choices are easily acted upon. Others join you to enlarge the success of activity. The prince (yang) is mature, if inexperienced, but ready to act independently of his mother (yin). Pleasure is the outcome of disciplined practice. Yang qi’s previously renegade quality is matured, integrated and dominant.”
LM Notes: Level
"Gu indicates that life is a continuous flow, not just an individual personal experience. Success is not simply a matter of personal control. Unseen environmental forces do affect us."
LM Changing: ZhouyiLunar Mansion: The Ghost / Sheep
Solar Indicator: Settle
“The wise use great strength with great caution, because the know it is costly (great injury). In general, the authors of the Zhouyi give great strength no value, unless it is paired with wisdom.
However, it is also observed that even the weak, when in a desperate situation, naturally possess great strength - the will to survive. The force or instinct to survive has great strength and can have a successful result. This kind of great strength should not be confused with belligerence or mere violence."
LM Changing: Zhouyi 34 Da Zhuang“It is especially auspicious for funeral/burial (resolution of fate). It is also good to make gifts/donations to temples and offerings to the divinities, spiritual guardians and make memorials for the dead (ancestors/lineage). It is advantageous for entering retreat, meditation, fasting, spiritual initiation, ordination and ‘crossing over’ into transitory states.
“It is not auspicious for worldly industry of any kind. It is a bad day to go to war (many casualties) or get married (husband will die early). One should avoid the wilderness (possession/illness will result).”
LM Notes: The Ghost
“Preparedness makes action timely and successful. Tradition, convention, training, education - all forms of readiness, inspire action. Forces join together and new alliances produce unexpected results. Action taken with such thorough preparation is bound to succeed. The qi of the day is stable, progressive and functional. Clarity and calm (yin) are not unseated by action (yang). Focus and repetition succeed. Procrastination and equivocation is contraindicated.”
LM Notes: Settle
Lunar Mansion: The Willow / Roebuck
Solar Indicator: Maintain
"Through good management, prosperity is established and, through generosity, prosperity is translated into great benefit."
LM Changing: Zhouyi 14 Dayou“It is especially auspicious for seclusion and the composing of memorials. It is favorable to make offerings and practice divination. It is fruitful on this day to fast, enter retreat, practice meditation and receive spiritual initiation and/or ordination (lineage). It is ideal for funerals / burials and the complete resolution of the unsettled dead (exorcism).
“It is not auspicious for marriage. Do not indulge in lawsuits (as it will ruin 3 generations).”
LM Notes: The Willow
“Spontaneous action and inspiration (yang) become the new tradition (yin). Qi assertion (yang) is repeated again and again to hold and harden gains (yin). Establishing a new state is the focus. The qi of practice and the drilling of troops is awesome. Allies appear from all quarters. True majesty succeeds without pressing forward. Today success breeds more success and everyone may be included in the new victories. Generosity is a prophylactic to decline - giving is a sign of strength and cements alliances. It is the sun at noon.”
LM Notes: Maintain
Solar Indicator: Destroy
“Guai tells us when impulsiveness, abruptness and breaking with standard protocol are okay. Success, in the case of Guai, is a timely, but abrupt, escape. Sometimes it is best to immediately quit a situation and/or abandon a relationship because of its excessive restrictions. Guai carries the ambiguous message that misconduct is sometimes appropriate.”
LM Changing: Zhouyi 43 Guai“Think powerful, but gentle succeeds...It is auspicious for building and routine work (you will meet / hobnob with the powerful). Good auspice is directly related to continuity, convention and not innovation.
“It is not auspicious for funerals/burials or marriages (rape, divorce). It is a dangerous day for travel and/or medical treatments.”
LM Notes: The Birdstar
“The successful prince as warrior must now lose his youthful ambitions and develop into a proper king….Today calculated loss (cancellation) succeeds”
LM Notes: Destroy
Jamie Shulander
