12/12) The Chinese Laws of Creativity

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The Chinese Laws of Creativity

Fractals, Evolution and the I Ching

By: R.C.L.

A Fractal Introduction to Chinese Philosophy

From recent advances in biology we know that the basis of evolution is self organization. There is no outside force orchestrating evolution. There is no master plan. We do it ourselves. Conversely, evolution does not happen by random chance, by stupid mutations. God is not playing dice with the Universe, but we do make a good deal of it up as we go along. We do it. It does not happen to us. Self organization develops without predetermination. There is free will.

Still, there are constraints. The self organization is structured and shaped by basic laws. As shown in the prior chapters it is shaped by the four dimensions and other numerical building blocks of nature. From this perspective self organization can be understood as the capacity to create information based on the Mandelbrot vector 0 -> : z -> z² + c considered as a continuous creative process. As we have seen the key to this process is spontaneous improvisation in the moment. This means returning to Zero, to pure awareness, and acting from there.

This whole field of spontaneous creativity and returning to zero was thoroughly explored for millennia by Chinese thinkers. In Chinese, pure awareness is called Wu Chi. It is the infinite, formless place just before all meaning and form. The place from which all creativity springs. When you are connected with Wu Chi you are in the Tao. When you are in the Tao creativity naturally happens. WU CHI, emptiness, is symbolized by the empty circle, and TAI CHI, plenitude, is symbolized by the ancient Chinese yin/yang fractal:

WU CHI is pure attention, zero emptiness, corresponding to deep sleep. TAI CHI is one, containing the fractal dichotomy of Yang and Yin. Yang is time, Yin is space. Yang is characterized by the circle. Yin by the right angle. Symbolically Yang is a straight line, Yin is a broken line.

Yang ________

Yin   ____   ____

In CHI, Yang is the direction upwards, Yin downwards. Yang is the closed circle, Yin is the open angle. Yang is clockwise, Yin counter-clockwise. Yang is hard, resistant and tense, Yin is soft, yielding and relaxed.

Creativity is used here in the largest sense of the word. It refers to a free and spontaneous state where life itself is created and self organized in new and intelligent ways. It does not just refer to the creation of objects of art. The Chinese understood the whole of life as the proper field of creativity, not just ceramics, music, books and paintings, but also drinking tea and archery. Everything we do can be an art. Everything can be infused with creativity and beauty.

One of the applications of this kind of creativity which we have come to know in the west is martial arts. Martial arts originated in China and then spread to all of the other Eastern countries such as Japan and Korea. Martial arts such as Kung Fu, Tai Kwon Do, Karate, Judo, etc. apply the creative flow to the field of self defense. The creative process has been applied by the Chinese in many other fields as well, including medicine, religion, psychology and even politics.

The psychological and political applications of the creative process can be seen in the ancient Chinese book, the I Ching, or as it is sometimes called, The Book of Changes. According to many scholars this is the oldest book on Earth. The I Ching is made of 64 hexagrams, which are combinations of six yin or yang lines. The sixty four possible yin-yang combinations O the hexagrams O represent the basic situations of creative time. In my opinion, the best translation of the I Ching is by Richard Wilhelm, the friend of Carl Jung and Joseph Hauer mentioned before. Confucius is purported to have said that by following the counsels of the book, and studying it continuously, a person could attain creative awareness in every situation. Understanding the Book of Changes is the key to comprehension of the Chinese laws of creativity.

The Eight Trigrams

By: R.C.L.

The basic component of the I Ching is a three lined symbol called the Trigram. Each of the three lines in a trigram can either be straight or broken. A straight line symbolizes Yang: A broken line stands for Yin.

Yang ____

Yin ____    ____

Yin Meaning much more than just female/male, Yin-Yang are the Chinese terms for the basic polarities of the Universe. Yang is time, light, strong. Yin is space, dark, weak. Yang is the direction upwards, Yin downwards. Yang is the closed circle, Yin is the open angle. Yang is clockwise, Yin counter-clockwise. Yang is hard, resistant and tense, Yin is soft, yielding and relaxed. By the use of the two kinds of lines each trigram also has yin and yang. Eight Yin-Yang combinations are possible with three components. The trigrams thereby depict the eight types of consciousness (actually 7 consciousness + 1 Awareness). The eight trigrams are basic symbols of Eastern philosophy. They are found everywhere throughout the Orient. They are even depicted on the flag of South Korea. Each of the eight trigrams has an inner structure, image, motivation and essence as shown in the following chart:

The eight trigrams can be considered spatially, all together as a whole, or temporally, one after the other. The spatial image of the trigrams requires reference to The Wheel because The Wheel follows the structure of space. The eight trigrams follow the eight directions shown on The Wheel.

SUN. Sensing. The sensing is defined by the weak yin line, outside, at the bottom. The motivation is to be soft and penetrating. The image is grass and wind; the wind does not harm the rooted grass.

LI. Thinking. Thinking links up sense data with words, following the wishes or motivations and impulses. Thinking has a beginning and end, visualized in the image of burning wood. You should not think beyond the solution of the problem. The motivation is to attain clarity, unattached to the thought. Thinking, like dialogue, is not an end in itself.

TUI. Feeling. Feelings experience the inner signals, as opposed to the outer signals of senses. The image is the clear lake which you can look through. The motivation is serenity, to be joyous together, and not to be together in pity or sympathy, which means emphatic suffering with the another.

KUN. Earth. The image is the vastness of our planet. The motivation is the receptive, to receive the germ and let it grow.

The first four trigrams are Yin, they result in emptiness of the functions. In Sun, after receiving an impression, the senses are free for a new one. In Li, thinking, once you have understood a problem, the solution is in memory, you cannot understand it twice. In Tui, feeling, a satisfied need disappears. Once you have eaten, you have no more hunger. In Kun, willing, once a choice, resolution, or decision is made, it is done and you are transported to a higher level of responsibility. The next four trigrams, the three realms, plus Awareness, are Yang. They have a certain significance. You have a body, a soul, and a spirit, you cannot ignore them. In Awareness, as Keyserling says, "you face the voice of revelation".

KEN. Body. The body has a certain gestalt. You are unable to change it, and have to accept it as it is. The image is the mountain, the motivation is keeping still. Only in the tranquility of silence, of deep sleep or illness, can your body talk to you about his/her motivations.

KAN. Soul. The soul is between heaven and earth, spirit and body. It is always in danger of stagnation, based on the six primary relations of the family: Mother, Father, Sister, Brother, Daughter, Son. The Soul, like the river, has to flow from the source in the mountain to the sea, then be transformed, die, into clouds, and finally be reincarnated again as rain in the mountains. The motivation is danger and the abyss.

CHEN. The Spirit, attained only in the waking state, is always sacred spirit; it is defined by the images of thunder and lightning, and the motivation is the inciting. First you experience awe and anxiety, then laughter, because you understand the game and the rules.

CHIEN. Awareness. here means living in tune with the spirit of the time, the East. The image is the night heaven. The motivation is creativity. The purpose of the I Ching is to merge with cosmic creativity.

METHODS/EXPERIMENTS: The Trigrams are accessible to consciousness and physical exercises like the Pa Kua of Tai Chi Chuan. There is a specific Tai Chi exercise tied to each of the Trigrams. For instance, the trigram Kun, the Receptive, is characterized by the "pull back" movement. As an experiment try and place yourself into this frame of mind, the function of receptive willing. If you have a PrimaSounds CD, then you may want to play it softly while you try this. Think about the Receptive and feel the force of your will power. Then stand in a relaxed position, weight even, with knees slightly bent. Hold your hands out in front of you at chin level so that the left palm faces up towards your right palm, and your right palm faces down almost touching. Now begin the "pull back" movement by slowly moving both hands diagonally, the left hand moves to the right, and the right hands moves diagonally up; the body turns naturally to the right. Then after reaching a slight stretch right and a high point, begin a slow downward movement towards your lower left side with the waist moving slightly left. There are also foot movements to go with this, but that gets too complicated for a first experiment or word descriptions, so just let your feet go with your hand/arm movements. Do this a few times, until you can do it effortlessly without self consciousness. Move your hands slowly and coordinated one with the other. Stay with a loose, relaxed body and let yourself be graceful. Pay attention to the energy and movements, feeling particularly the movement back down and left, the pulling back. Try taking a Tai Chi course, or pick up a book on Tai Chi, like for instance, Da Liu's book Tai Chi Chuan and I Ching: A Choreography of Body and Mind. Other martial arts courses can be helpful if the instructor does it for purposes of development of Chi rather than as a machismo thing, as is often the case. One good book on the subject is Martial Arts: The Spiritual Dimension by Peter Payne.

The Sixty Four Hexagrams

By: R.C.L.

Study of the trigrams can help you to understand Awareness and your states of consciousness. But the trigrams alone can not help you with existential decisions and choices. This requires the doubling of the trigrams into inner and outer worlds wherein six lines are used to create the Hexagram. The I Ching book is made up of the 64 possible Hexagrams and commentary on each Hexagram. The 64 Hexagrams are shown vertically on the left. The chart below shows how the trigrams combine to form the hexagrams. The upper trigrams ar listed on top, and the lower trigrams on the left.

The first three lines of the Hexagram, from the bottom up, constitute the lower trigram and symbolizes the inner world. The fourth, fifth and sixth lines constitute the upper trigram and symbolizes the outer world. The lower trigram of the Hexagram represents the attitude towards motivation, the upper towards intention. There are sixty four possible combinations of six yin or yang lines. For example, one possible combination is a hexagram known as PEACE where the top three lines are all yin, and the bottom three all yang, Heaven below the Earth:

                    ___   ___  6
                    ___   ___  5  Outer Trigram
                    ___   ___  4
                    ________ 3

Inner Trigram _ 2 _ 1

The I Ching is more than a book to be understood. It is a tool invented by the Chinese to help a person reach their creative state by proper alignment of their inner and outer attitude. A person can read the I Ching like a book, but its highest purpose is to be consulted or used like an introspective tool. You consult the I Ching by using a random selection process to choose one of the sixty four hexagrams to answer a question.

Each Hexagram selected can also change into another by means of changing lines, whereby a yin line can change into a yang, or a yang to a yin. The random selection of the hexagram is traditionally accomplished either by a complicated process of using 50 yarrow sticks, or by throwing three coins. Heads is three, heaven-yang. Tails is two, earth-yin. With this chance system of coin tossing the following possibilities of change emerge:

3 tails - 2 + 2 + 2 = 6 _ X --> __Yin line that changes to Yang

2 tails, 1 head - 2 + 2 + 3 = 7 __ Yang line that does not change

2 heads, 1 tail - 3 + 3 + 2 = 8 _ _ Yin line that does not change

3 heads - 3 + 3 + 3 = 9 _O --> _ _ Yang line that changes to Yin

The consultation process begins by your formulation of a real-life question, a significant question involving a problem you are facing or a decision you must make. The hexagram or hexagrams then selected allows the Self in the Right brain to communicate with and send messages to the Ego in the left brain.

Work at the School of Wisdom since the 1920s has shown that the best form for any question asked of the I Ching, particularly for the inexperienced, is "What should my attitude be towards ... such and such an action". You fill in the particular action you have in mind, the course of conduct which you are considering to solve a particular problem, the decision you want to make. With the question focused like that, the response is typically much more meaningful and easy to understand. An unfocused question which has no particular action in mind, like "What should I do", will usually not have good results. You have to formulate the proposed choice yourself. Then the hexagrams will give you an idea as to whether you should go forward with the action, and if so, how, with what inner attitude.

After you formulate the question and pick a hexagram(s) through chance, you then refer to the hexagram in the I Ching which you have selected. Most of the text of the I Ching is comprised of explanations and commentary concerning each of the sixty four hexagrams. They are written in very general terms and images. The Book of Changes appears to have been slowly compiled over thousands of years by hundreds of different sages and scholars. However, the legendary Chinese rulers King Wen and the Duke of Chou, along with the ever-popular Confucius, are usually given credit for most of the writings. The explanations and commentary of the hexagrams can be mystifying unless the structure is understood. Until recently few people have understood the structure and so the I Ching has been widely misunderstood outside of China.

The six lines of the Hexagram relate to the seven states of consciousness (four functions and three realms) by deletion of the middle function - willing. In the I Ching you yourself provide the will by forming the question and then by making a decision based upon the hexagram. The first line is sensing, the second line is thinking, the third is feeling, the fourth is body, the fifth is soul and the sixth is spirit.

Using Confucian terminology the first line at the bottom of the hexagram, the sensing line, is called the "cause outside of you". The sixth line at the top of the hexagram, the spirit line, is the "result". Like the first line, the sixth does not depend on your consciousness, it represents a cause outside of you. The second line from the bottom, the thinking line, is known as the "official". The fifth soul line is the place of the "prince". The third feeling line shows your motivation which will lead to the fourth body line of karma. There is no willing line on the hexagram - this comes from you, and from the random process itself, the Strange Attractor.

Result 6 __ __ Spirit

Prince 5 __ __Soul

Karma  4 __  __Body

Motivation 3 __ __ Feeling

Official 2 __ __ Thinking

Outside Cause 1 __ __ Sensing

The consultation process is really very ingenious, and as most people who use it with understanding soon find, extremely powerful and effective. In Chinese terms the Wu Chi n here evoked by random chance is used to tune you into the Tao. The hexagram randomly selected provides guidance as to what a person's attitude should be to the particular life situation they find themselves in.

Again, the basic structure of the trigram begins with the polarity stated by Jung as introversive and extroversive. The lower Trigram stands for a person's attitude to their inner world, the upper trigram stands for their attitude to the outer world. The basic law of this system of Chinese thinking is that by changing your attitude to life, both inner and outer, you can effectuate a change in your fate. It is a pragmatic philosophy of taking responsibility for your life and creating your own reality.

Each hexagram is also understood as containing 4 trigrams: the lines 123, 234, 345, 456.

The Yin trigrams in this context are said to point downward:

The yang trigrams point upward:

Thus for example, hexagram 53 Development:

contains four internal trigrams:

With Development the four internal trigrams create a "mental equilibrium" of two yang trigrams going upward and two yin trigrams going downward. Most hexagrams have a equilibrium of 2 to 2, but sometimes there is a relationship of 1 to 3, such as with 44, Coming To Meet:

There are eight hexagrams made up of doubled trigrams, called the Pa Koa, which have only one direction.

Four are all yang, moving only upwards:

These four yang hexagrams represent the movement from Self to Ego.

Four hexagrams are all yin, moving only downwards:

These four yin hexagrams represent the contrary movement from Ego to Self. Both movements are necessary for a balanced life.

Unlike western scientific laws which are based on causality, where everything has physical cause and effect, the I Ching is based on a non-linear law which Carl Jung called "synchronicity". The Law of Synchronicity is an a-causal connecting principle. Much has been written about this by Jung and his followers. Synchronicity recognizes the relationship between physical reality and the unconscious, and provides an explanation for how seemingly chance events in physical reality can reveal a hidden order in the psyche.

The principles of the I Ching and the law of synchonicity are in accord with the natural Laws of Chaos and Self Organization. Life is based on Self Organization, the fractal reality of the fourth dimension. At the human stage of evolution we try to base our Self Organization on the infinity beyond the left-right symmetry of the animal kingdom. So it is appropriate to make our choices out of chance, out of chaos, so long as the chance is constrained by mathematical structure in consonance with the Universe. This is exactly what the I Ching does. It uses chance, constrained by the basic numeric structure of life, to bridge Wu Chi and Tao the infinite and the finite This is how the book is able to provide such remarkably-accurate answers to questions put to it.

The system works and creates synchronicity because the mathematics are correct. Mere tossing of coins, for instance, heads I do this and tails I don't, cannot create synchronous effects because the mathematics are wrong. The I Ching "constrains chance" as Mandelbrot says, by ordering the random process with a mathematical structure which correctly mirrors the Universe. It works because of the mathematical structure of the hexagrams themselves. This structure is the "base two" number system to the sixth power, the six yin or yang lines in the hexagram. One of the first Europeans to see the hexagram structure when it was first brought out of China in the early 1700s was Gottfried Leibniz. He is the German philosopher and mathematician who first developed base two mathematics in the West. Today the base two number system has become the cornerstone of all modern technical culture. All computers operate on a machine level using a base two binary code of off or on, 0 or 1, or as the Chinese would say, Yin and Yang.

The Five Agents of Change in Chinese Philosophy

By: R.C.L.

A Compendium of Ancient and Modern Wisdom Revealing the Meaning and Significance of the Myth of Science.

To understand the full significance of the hexagrams we also need to understand the interrelated Chinese concepts of Time, Change and Energy. Basic to Chinese culture and mythology is the discovery/principle of the 5 Hsing. The five "Hsing" is usually translated incorrectly as the five "elements". Actually it means the five "stages of change" and are better thought of as "agents" rather than fixed "elements". The Hsing constitute the five basic types of human energies on the mesocosm. They are symbolized and correspond fractally to the macrocosm by the five visible planets in the fixed field of stars.

The five Hsing, the visible planets, along with the Sun and the Moon, order the flow of creative time. The Sun is Yang, the Moon is Yin. The Sun creates the two-fold rhythm on Earth: day and night. The Moon divides the solar year into twelve months, each of which has a special meaning originating from the structure of consciousness described in the first chapter. In Chinese and Islamic mythology, among others, inspired messages are sent to Man from the chaos of the night n the twelvefold star constellations n during the time of the new Moon when it is invisible for three nights.

When these messages are integrated into the Mesocosm, the spiritual inspiration guides Man to achieve a balanced flow of the five Hsing, the five types of energies in the human soul. The Hsing can flow in two different directions, the life cycle and death cycle. In the life cycle it flows from Wood, willing, to Fire, sensing. The Wood nourishes or gives life to the Fire. Action once completed gives rise to new sensations, takes you to a new place. So too the Fire, sensing, nourishes the Earth, body. Sensing is the doorway to the body. In the Earth grows Metal, thinking. From out of the physical true thinking can arise. Metal can be made fluid, like Water, feeling, and take any form as a tool of civilization. A thought completed should lead to a feeling and not just another new thought. The Metal condenses Water, and the Water nourishes the Wood. Feelings once spent should lead back again into action. When a person's energy is flowing, it constantly changes in the direction of the life cycle. No one type of energy or Hsing dominates and there is balance in change.

The danger is stagnation where the energy flow becomes blocked in one of the Hsing. That type of energy then begins to dominate and the person's energy becomes imbalanced. For instance, in the trap of thinking where one thought loops endlessly into the next, and the other energies atrophy. When one Hsing dominates over time the other energies weaken. The person then goes out of sync with the natural rhythms of creative time. Unless corrected, such stagnation leads to illness and death. This danger is overcome by going into the inner pentagram, the death cycle, which can liberate from stagnation. Water puts out Fire, Metal saws the Wood, the Earth absorbs the Water, Fire melts the Metal, and Wood assimilates the Earth. Put another way, feelings can overcome a sensual fixation, thinking can get you out of a willing loop, the body can get you out of feelings, sensing can let you out of a thinking prison and willing overcomes body dominance.

All Chinese medicine is based on the five Hsing, and corresponds to the twelve acupuncture meridian cycles and organ groups, Yang and Yin. Chinese medicine maintains health and treats illness by emphasizing a person's CHI and striving for a healthy flow of the five forms of CHI. The healing flow of energies can be enhanced by PrimaSounds. Based on the principal of the natural seventh in sound vibrations, PrimaSounds divide the octave into five intervals. Thus PrimaSounds with its pentatonic scale -A - E - I - O - U blends the seven Chakras in the fivefold flow of creative time.

1	Spirit	Mental	A
2	Soul	Fire	U
3	Body	Earth	O
4	Willing	Wood	I
5	Feeling	Water	E
6	Thinking	Metal	A
7	Sensing	Fire	U

METHODS/EXPERIMENTS: Most communities in the United States now have one or more practitioners of Oriental Medicine, typically referred to as Acupuncturists. In acupuncture needles are used to painlessly stimulates the energy flow. However, not all Oriental Medical providers use needles to manipulate and balance the five Hsing energy flows, some use mental effort alone, or slight massage, such as Q.M. therapists. Again, Tai Chi and the martial arts also use physical and mental exercises to help keep the energy in flow and balance. A good book on this subject with exercises and more information about oriental medicine, the five Hsing, twelve meridian channels, Yin and Yang, has been written by Richard Chin, who is both a western medical doctor and a doctor of oriental medicine and a martial artist. His book is called The Energy Within. A Western M.D., Richard Gerber, has written a ground breaking work, Vibrational Medicine, which lays a predicate for an energy bridge between Western and Eastern medicine.

The five Hsing also correspond to the five dimensions, five stages of evolution and five stages of human development:

5-0	Holy Sage	Awarness	TAO, (GOD)
4	The Called One	Walking	Man
3	Superior Man	Reflection	Animal
2	Worthy Man	Dream	Plant
1	Common Man	Sleep	Mineral

The aim of Man at each stage of development is different:

1. Common Man looks for material goods. This is the stage of the vast majority of the contemporary world; commercial, consumer striving for more and more things.

2. Worthy Man looks beyond materialistic consumerism and strives for growth and education. He imitates superior man.

3. Superior Man knows that he can only make sense of life and create meaning if he unites TAO and TE, intention and motivation.

4. But the political situation, greed and power can make the existence of Superior Man impossible. The Called Man, who has the task, "Ming", from heaven, will change the political situation.

5. The highest human stage, the Holy Sage, is in tune with heaven, earth, and the TAO. His mere existence makes him into a living pillar around which a culture might grow. In anthropological terms he is a "culture hero".

Since Life is based on Self Organization, the fractal reality of the fourth dimension, we must make our choices out of chance n out of chaos. If you ask through the chance oracle how all decisions can be in tune with TAO, then God n as the symbol of Chien, Heaven n will unite with the Earth Mother n Kun.

Cyclical Time in Chinese Thinking

By: R.C.L.

A Compendium of Ancient and Modern Wisdom Revealing the Meaning and Significance of the Myth of Science.

The final concept of cyclical time in Chinese thought follows the Moon-Jupiter year, the twelve year cycle. The Chinese observed that people born in the same lunar year share certain collective characteristics that repeat after the Jupiter cycle of twelve years.

The twelve basic archetypes of cyclical Yang time relate to the twelve signs of the western zodiac. They follow both the lunar month and year over twelve years. In precommunist China the Emperor gave audiences according to the theme of the month. Today we can include this Chinese wisdom by having monthly talks, experiencing the difference of personal choices, and the time meaning of the month.

A summary of the Chinese conception of the cycle of twelve is shown below. On the far left column the equivalent western zodiac symbol is shown. Next the realm structure is shown; after that the functions. The fourth column shows the Chinese name given for each of the twelve. The year of the dog is shown on top with the structure of Body-Thinking. In the next column the hexagram traditionally assigned to each of the twelve is shown. On the far right is shown examples of the years which apply to each of the twelve signs. The years of the dog, for example, is in the years 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, etc.

METHODS/EXPERIMENTS: If you participate in a School of Wisdom or other group, try having monthly talks on the theme of that month. Observe the characteristics of the twelve time zones of the year and see if there are any correspondences or "fractalcalities" to the meaning posited in the Chinese system. Determine which animal you are according to the Chinese system and the year of your birth; try the same for your family and friends. Do you notice any type of similarity among people born in the same year? You may want to try reading some of the books written on Chinese Astrology, but at the present time there is little material of quality available in English on this Chinese tradition.

The relation of the I Ching to the 12 comes from the movement of the sun and the moon through the zodiac in the course of the year. The moon goes through 12 cycles in the course of the solar year from which our 12 months are derived. Based on this basic time rhythm a myth of the twelvefold Zodiac has developed in all cultures of the world. This is discussed in Chapter 6 on Time Cycles. The chart shown on the next page shows the relationship of the 6 lines of the I Ching hexagram and the twelvefold Zodiac. It also shows the progression of the Sun and Moon, Yang and Yin, up through the two sides of the 6 lines to form the 12 points. The correspondence of the hexagram to the Chinese zodiac shows another way to use the I Ching to change from consciousness to awareness.

The cycle of twelve also appears in what is known as the "Cosmic Year", the longest time cycle known to Man, the 25,000 year progression of the vernal equinox. This is the time frame for the overall evolution of the human species. It is discussed further in Chapter Six under Historical Time Cycles. The six lines of the hexagram can also be understood in the context of human evolution. This is shown in the following chart.

Each hexagram is structured like the Cosmic Year. The six places correspond to the positions of the full moon, the clear vision, between waxing and waning. The steps are explained in many ways. For our purposes we start with Yang, the Sun, Seated in Dragon (Leo) and leading up to Dog (Aquarius). The Aquarian Age is the age of the Human, where the Earth Self merges with the Higher Self in communion with Tao, the Great Singularity.

In the first step you awake to your DRAGON, you vocation, your question, your participation in the cosmic work of the spirit, or as the Native American's call it, your "medicine". For this you have to leave your family and personal history, changing your dependencies into material for self actualization. The CAT does not care for the past family, only the future one.

In the second step you have to find friends in the TIGER study groups and separate your spiritual way from the quest for survival (SNAKE). You look for those people who make it possible for you to pursue your spiritual way without looking for profit.

With the honest HORSE you transcend your group and make your achievements useful to others. You do so by establishing a style of livelihood, of wealth, which allows others to strive like a BUFFALO to participate in spiritual life.

Now with the RAT you must stand up for your truth by organizing your whole life around your vocation. You blend your material and spiritual life by the GOAT O the lunar capacity to seize the moment, the opportunity. By receptivity to the times you make useful to others what is meaningful to you.

Then you must get into revelation by understanding the comical aspects of all religious traditions, like the eclectic MONKEY in a supermarket of new age publications. The purpose of your search for revelation must be to heal others, to bring them to their wholeness. This requires unconditional service symbolized by the PIG. This understanding of the PIG explains the statement found in hexagram 61 - Inner Truth - "Pigs and fishes. Good fortune."

The highest achievement is no longer self-centered. You are in civilization and in spirit, a part of the New Earth in the sign of the DOG O Aquarius. You are, like the DOG, completely faithful to your path and to sacred history. You transcend your ego by announcing your truth in society like the ROOSTER without regard to the practical consequences.

How does the I Ching fit fractally into the Wheel? As we have seen, there is a striking similarity between the I Ching and the genetic code, the 8 trigrams to the 8 codons. This can be understood as recursive self similarity over scales. There is a basic identity between the genes and the hexagrams because their numeric structure is the same.

Martin Schoanberger, a German scientist, recently discovered that the two Codons which contain the genetic-chemical message "to stop" have the same numeric structure of hexagram 63, After Completion. All lines in this hexagram are said to be in their proper place. 

Moreover, Schoanberger discovered that the Codons which, so to speak, act to say "Go" on a genetic level, correspond to the opposite hexagram 64, Before Completion.

These two genetic combinations and hexagrams seem to be connected together under the influence of the Circuit Attractor / Consciousness, shown in the hypercube as North and South: and . Thus for consciousness you have to start from an understanding of the whole, the Wheel, and then turn to a single problem. In effect the mind has to be made holistic, balanced, put into equilibrium. This is accomplished for instance by PrimaSounds with its tuning to 12 hertz, or by a good night's sleep with its full sequence of REM dreams. The Circuit Attractor with its conscious memories is then integrated into Being, leaving you free to act anew.

The Wheel is fractal, true for the three levels: Micro, Macro and Mesocosmos. The outer trigrams form the space square (discussed in detail at the end of Chapter 8), the inner trigrams form the time spiral. The placement of the outer and inner trigrams and their relationship to the Wheel and all 64 hexagrams is shown in the chart on the following page. The time spiral can be understood as an analogy to the atomic structure discussed in Chapter 7. The innermost circle - Awareness corresponds to the nucleus of the atom. In chemistry the number value of the nucleus, from 1 to 92, determines the quality of the atom, what type of element it is. The next seven circles shown in the chart correspond to the seven electron shells of the atom and the seven circles of the Wheel.

As shown above, the hexagram formation starts in the East and moves counter-clockwise to the South East. It is moving from Creativity in the center of the Earth, up through the seven atomic shells.

In the square chart of all 64 hexagrams the pakua hexagrams form the diagonal. We can regard them as the attractors of the mind. They are reached in Indian terminology by the opening of the Chakras. Thus the Creative must go to the center of the Earth. The aim is spiritualization. Making up ones mind is to decide from the present hexagram (or if there is a changing line, to decide from both the present and the future hexagrams) by oracle, thinking or vision. Changing one's mind is to go from one hexagram to another, following the twelvefold structure. But merging with the center is effectuated through the pentagram, the five hsings, experienced fractally through PrimaSounds.

METHODS/EXPERIMENTS. The correspondence of the six lines of the I Ching hexagram with the twelvefold structure of the Chinese Zodiac can be experienced directly by contemplation of the following personal questions:

1. Dragon: At what time did you have a revelation of your vocation, your "medicine"? Cat: What are the negative aspects of your parents and how do you still have them? How can you change the negative to positive?

2. Tiger: What is your spiritual path? Snake: How do you separate survival and your spiritual work or path?

3. Horse: Are you strong enough to meet people outside of your group? Buffalo: Have you enough wealth, riches, to fulfill your spiritual potential?

4. Rat: What truth do you personally stand up for? Goat: What occasions or opportunities do you seize?

5. Monkey: What is your revelation? Pig: How will your revelation heal others?

6. Dog: How do you get into the "flow", the Tao, the spirit of the times? Rooster: How can this flow vitalize your profession?

Richard Wilhelm

By: R.C.L.

The Marco Polo of the Inner World of China

Richard Wilhelm is the Marco Polo of the inner world of China. He, more than any other, is responsible for opening up to the West the vast spiritual heritage of China, and thus all of Asia. He translated the great philosophical works from Chinese into German, where they have in turn been translated into the other major languages of the world, including English. To this day, among the dozens of translations of the I Ching now available, his 1923 translation stands head and shoulders above the rest.

More than just a linguist and scholar, Wilhelm was a spiritual seeker who penetrated to the very depths of Chinese spirituality without losing his European frame of reference. Living in China for over twenty years he saw first hand the great cultural and spiritual differences between East and West. At the time, the Europeans were conquering colonial powers in China and had little or no respect for Chinese culture. The Chinese in turn considered the Europeans to be barbarians and closed their spiritual traditions to Westerners. Richard Wilhelm was one of the first to realize the value of Chinese thinking, to bridge the great divide between the two cultures.

This division was internalized in his own soul after he moved to China in 1899 and began to penetrate its spiritual secrets. As he integrated Chinese thinking and world views into his own life, the gap between Western and Oriental culture split his very being in two. The new Chinese part of himself did not take over, he did not lose his European identity. He was able to translate the Chinese ideas back into the European gestalt. But the effort required was tremendous and he struggled his whole life to try to merge the two divergent spiritual traditions in his soul.

This struggle manifested itself physically in 1910 when Wilhelm contracted amoebic dysentery from Chinese food and lay seriously ill for months. The next year, at age thirty eight, Wilhelm met Lao Nai-hsuan, a Chinese sage who became his mentor. Lao helped him through the internal conflict and Wilhelm recovered. With Lao's help he bridged the gap and found inner tranquility, at least for a time.

Many years later upon his final return to Germany in 1924, the tranquility lapsed, and the fight between the European and Chinese sides of Wilhelm renewed. After only four years in Europe, at age fifty five, Wilhelm suffered a relapse of his amoebic dysentery. The long-dormant microscopic organism that had invaded his system and triggered his illness in China in 1910, led to his premature death in 1930. Carl Jung saw in his relapse and early death an inability to integrate the two sides of himself. Although not completely successful in this personal struggle to merge the two cultures in his psyche. His writings, especially his translations of the I Ching: the Book of Changes and the Secret of the Golden Flower, succeed where his life did not. They create a strong bridge for people in the West to approach and understand the unique spiritual and cultural insights of the East.

Richard Wilhelm was born far from China, in Germany, in 1873. As a student in a prestigious school, Tubinger Slift, he had broad cultural interests with a special love for the works of the great German poet, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. He was by nature a deeply spiritual person and his studies naturally turned to theology. In 1895 at the age of 22 he was ordained as a protestant minister and served briefly as a parish minister. Young Richard was idealistic and yearned for broader horizons and adventure. At age 26 he joined the Allgemein Protestantischer Missionsverein and agreed to serve as a missionary in China in the German colonial city of Tsingtao.

Shortly after Wilhelm arrived in China in 1899 the Boxer Rebellion erupted. A large faction of radical Chinese began a violent revolution against European colonialism. All Westerners were targeted for attack, especially missionaries. Although the Boxer Rebellion was eventually crushed, the Europeans were sensitized to the need for better communication with their Chinese subjects.

Against this background, Richard Wilhelm began studying the Chinese language as soon as he arrived in China. He quickly discovered that he had a natural gift for the language. Chinese, and the other languages of the East which are derived from it, such as Japanese and Korean, are completely different from the languages of the West. They are based on thousands of characters or ideograms, rather than letters. Translation from Eastern languages into Western languages is extremely difficult. The few who can do it are highly prized, especially in missionary work. Recognizing the exceptional aptitude for translation, the missionary group allowed Richard Wilhelm to spend all of his time studying the language. In 1905, the year his son Helmut was born, he began to translate his first Chinese book into German. His study and translation of Chinese religious life continued until the day he died.

As Wilhelm learned the language he became intrigued with the Chinese religious texts he was studying. Wilhelm quickly developed a passion for Chinese culture, particularly their religious texts. In Tsingtao and in Peking where he studied at the University, he encountered many of the cultural leaders of China at the time. Described by his wife as a warm and gregarious person, Wilhelm was able to befriend many Chinese and learn their way of life.

This association with the Chinese language and culture began to transform him. He began to see the world through the perspective of the Chinese. He was very impressed by the deep spirituality which he found. He came to China intending to convert the heathens to Christianity. But almost without realizing it, the missionary had himself become converted. Many years later Wilhelm would boast to Carl Jung that during his entire twenty-year stay in China he never baptized a single Chinese. He discovered instead that his true mission was to create a translation bridge between Western and Eastern spirituality.

After Lao helped Wilhelm recover from amoebic dysentery in 1911, Wilhelm founded the Confucius Society in Tsing Tao, and Lao Nai-hsuan became its head. Their relationship grew close. Lao lived from 1843 to 1921. Wilhelm described him as an eminent scholar of the old school, one of the last of his kind, and always referred to him as his honored teacher. He was one of the few classic scholars then open to change. He realized that China's isolation from the rest of the world would finally have to end.

Lao was a true Chinese sage, related to the family of Confucius, and trained in Confucian government and traditions. He was also adept at Chinese yoga and psychological methods from the Taoist traditions. His special expertise and passion was the I Ching, and this love quickly spread to Wilhelm. Lao came to trust the extraordinary missionary, and took Wilhelm as his pupil. For the first time the deep spiritual traditions and insights of China were shared with a European.

In 1913 Lao and Wilhelm began the monumental task of translating the I Ching from Chinese to German. The task continued for ten years. At the same time Wilhelm was translating the book into German, Lao was creating a new Chinese edition of the book entitled the Book of Changes According To The Ch'eng School. Lao directly assisted Wilhelm in understanding all aspects of the text. In Wilhelm's words,

Lao first opened my mind to the wonders of the Book of Changes. Under his experienced guidance I wandered entranced through this strange yet familiar world. The translation of the text was made after detailed discussion. Then the German version was retranslated into Chinese and it was only after the meaning of the text had been fully brought out that we considered our version to be truly a translation.

In 1921, just as the last pages of the printer's proofs of the finished translation were coming back, Lao Nai-hsuan died, his life's work complete. Wilhelm continued to edit the work and to add his own comments over the next few years until he concluded the I Ching: Book of Changes, in 1923. The next year he was forced to return to Germany where he assumed a position as a Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Frankfurt. In 1925 he founded the China Institute and served as its director until his death.

From 1924, until his death in 1930, the focus of WilhelmIs work shifted from translation to lecturing and teaching. He tried to promote the great cultural and spiritual insights of China. To do so effectively he had to personally serve as a kind of bridge of the great cultural divide between China and Europe. At first he encountered opposition and hostility to his efforts on many fronts. Europe was nationalistic and chauvinistic. The academic community distrusted him because of his missionary background, and the religious community distrusted him because of his transcendence of Christianity. But a few listened, including Count Keyserling, who was also opposed to the nationalists, academics and orthodox religions. Wilhelm participated in Keyserling's book on marriage, writing the chapter on Chinese marriage and its spiritual significance. Wilhelm also participated in the School of Wisdom in Darmstadt. Due to his influence on Count Keyserling and his son, Arnold Keyserling, Chinese philosophy, particularly the I Ching, has always been a central part of the School of Wisdom.

At the School of Wisdom Richard Wilhelm met Carl Jung, who became his good friend. Jung also realized the great significance of Wilhelm's work, especially the I Ching. Jung helped Wilhelm gain respectability in the German academic community, and wrote lengthy introductions to Wilhelm's two most important translations, I Ching: Book of Changes and The Secret of the Golden Flower. These two books had a profound influence on Carl Jung.

With the help of Keyserling and Jung, Wilhelm's work in Germany eventually met with some success. Wilhelm's books were published, and he met and influenced other important cultural leaders, such as the writer Herman Hesse and the musician Joseph Hauer. But according to Jung, Wilhelm was not able to make a smooth psychological transition back to European life. Wilhelm began to cut himself off from his spiritual roots in China. In Jung's words, Wilhelm Iseemed to feel the pressure of the European spirit.I

When Jung first met Wilhelm he seemed completely Chinese to Jung, in outward manner as well as way of writing and speaking. But a few years later this changed. Now Wilhelm's lectures on China began to sound more like Christian sermons to Jung. The two sides of himself O the Chinese and the German O began to split apart. The Chinese side went into the unconscious. As the Christian views and forms of thought moved into the foreground, his resistance to the Chinese bacteria living in his body weakened. Wilhelm relapsed into the amoebic dysentery he originally contracted in 1910. Carl Jung tried to treat him, but in the end the inner psychological conflict between East and West proved too strong, and Richard Wilhelm died at age 57. His great spiritual legacy, I Ching: Book of Changes and The Secret of the Golden Flower, and other books, will live forever.

http://www.ichingwisdom.com/i-ching/richard-wilhelm/

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