Hexagram 47: Kun-Oppression (困)

The buttocks are caught on a bare stump; the way on is into a dark valley, and for three years no sight of anyone. Being pinned at the very start of a situation, unable to move in any direction. Changes into Hexagram 58 (Dui).

The lowest line describes being pinned at the very start of a situation, unable to move in any direction, and then going quiet on purpose. The text does not blame you for the pinning, and it does not tell you to fight it either - the only instruction is to accept the withdrawal, because the alternative is thrashing in the open and losing more of yourself than the situation ever took.

Trapped amid food and wine, and the crimson sash has just arrived; it is good to use this for sacrifice, but to march out is bad, and no blame attaches. Doing well materially while stuck. Changes into Hexagram 45 (Cui).

This is the line of the person doing well materially while stuck - a good table, a new title, and no room to move. The advice is unusually specific: turn the offering inward, and do not spend the new standing on a campaign. Going out into the world with a reward in your pocket and no support behind you is exactly the 征凶 the text warns about.

Trapped against stone, sitting on caltrops; the way home is open but the wife is not there. Bad. The worst line in the hexagram: a soft position resting directly on the yang lines beneath it, on broken ground. Changes into Hexagram 28 (Da Guo).

The worst line in the hexagram, and it is bad for a structural reason: the position is soft, it is sitting directly on the yang lines beneath it, and the surface it rests on is broken. 六三 gets home and finds nobody there - being let out does not mean being put back. If this is your line, the warning is that a change of scene will not fix a change of circumstance, and the damage will already be done by the time you notice it.

It comes, slowly; it is held up by the gilded carriage. Regret comes, but there is an end to it. The most useful line in the hexagram: an expensive cage you move slowly inside. Changes into Hexagram 29 (Kan).

The most useful line in the hexagram and the one to work from. The image is a bronze cage-cart: fine, expensive, and still a cage. 九四 is the person slowed by circumstance without being broken by it - 吝 is embarrassment and limitation rather than disaster, and 有终 is a promise rather than a mood. If you are squeezed, the strategy is to be the one who moves slowly and visibly, not the one who breaks out.

Noses and feet cut off; bound by the crimson sash. Then, slowly, there is release, and it is good to use the sacrifice. The top of the hierarchy, hemmed in by the trappings of office itself. Changes into Hexagram 40 (Jie).

The line for someone at the top who has paid for the position in mutilation - inflicted or self-inflicted, and the text does not distinguish. Trapped in the crimson sash means hemmed in by the trappings of office itself: the rank, the ritual, the obligations that arrived with it. The escape described is 乃徐有说, relief that arrives slowly, and it comes from straightening things out and making the offering properly rather than from campaigning.

Entangled in the thorny creeper, standing on unstable rock; it says, 'move and you will regret it' - and regret does come. But to go forward is good. The most entangled point in the hexagram, answering its own fear. Changes into Hexagram 6 (Song).

The last line answers its own fear. The top position is the most entangled point in the hexagram: creeper on one side, loose ground underfoot. 曰动悔有悔 means the danger and the regret are the same thing, so deliberating produces regret and moving produces regret. Since both cost the same, the text says plainly: 征吉, go. There is no version of this hexagram in which staying still turns out to be the cheap option.