18蠱 Worm – Removing Disorderliness
This hexagram has a Mountain trigram on top of a Wind trigram. The word 蠱 represents poisonous worms in a container and hence represents infighting, strife, confusion, or disorder. There is a story that in the old days, they put poisonous worms or insects in the container and the last one that survives will be the most deadly and is called 蠱. So it can represent in-fighting resulting in strife, confusion, and decline. This hexagram is teaching us how to do transformation or turn-around.
Description:
- 元亨 Great smooth flow.
- 利涉大川: good to cross great rivers.
- 先甲三日: plans 3 days before D-day
- 后甲三日: review 3 days after D-day.
Textual Commentary:
彖曰：蛊，刚上而柔下，巽而止，蛊。蛊，元亨，而天下治也。利涉大川，往有事也。 先甲三日，后甲三日，终则有始，天行也。
Strong and firm on the top and gentle and soft on the bottom. The wind is stopped. It is worm 蛊 Gu. It represents great flow and the world is well-ruled. It is beneficial for crossing the great rivers, going forward to accomplish. First plan 3 days before the event and then review after 3 days. There is an ending and a beginning. The world is ruled well. (note: the great flow and good ruling is the result of taking actions to remove the in-fighting and confusion.)
Pictorial Commentary:
象曰：山下有风，蛊；君子以振民育德。
Wind under the mountain. Wise men encourage people to develop good moral values.
Moral Teaching:
- Face the Bad Situation. The situation described by the name of the Hexagram is actually very bad – infighting, strife, and disorder. But, typical of I Ching teaching, once we are able to face up to the actual situation, even though it is bad, it is the trigger for the change for the better. The bad situation becomes a trigger. For example, in the story of the “Prodigal Son”, what is the best thing that happens to him? The extremely bad situation of living in the pig sty and sharing the pig food. It caused the Son to wake up and go home. AA(Alcohol Annonymous) 12 steps start with admitting one is an alcoholic and then wanting to change.
- Change requires effort, planning, and review. The change is a good and big project. It takes great effort not just on impulse, but careful planning before and one more key step – continued monitoring and review until the new changed situation has stabilized. It is not a one-off effort but a continued effort.
- From the textual descriptions from the stage 6 lines, the problems are actually inherited. It is a bad culture left behind. This hexagram tells us how to fix it.
Stage 1 Begin 6: The Son corrected the father’s leftover disorderly situation. No disaster. Encouraged and continuing to complete despite the danger, is good fortune. 初六：干父之蛊，有子，考无咎，厉终吉
The pictorial commentary says it is turning around the inherited business from one parent. 象 曰：干父之蛊，意承考也
Whether the disorderly situation is due to us or others is not important. Since we are in such a situation, we just need to recognize and change it. In this case, we see the Son inheriting the disorderliness from his father. He takes action to turn around the situation and continues till it is completely changed. He did not give up prematurely. We learn two lessons: make a change for the better and don’t give up too early and easily.
Stage 2 Second Nine: Correcting disorderliness inherited from Mother, one cannot be stubborn (to stick to the old ways). 九二：干母之蛊，不可贞
The pictorial commentary added that one needs to take the middle path for the correction to work. 象曰：干母之蛊，得中道也
Making changes is painful. One cannot try to be nice and keep some of the old ways that caused disorderliness. The are no “Holy Cows” that could not be removed. Einstein has the famous saying that “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Hence, we need to discover the past assumptions, thinking patterns, and practices that are no longer valid in the new world, removing or changing them.
Making changes also requires one to take a balanced approach, considering all the affected parties and working out a win-win transformation. Compromising is not a good solution as there is no winner and all feel they did not get the best, having to forgo something. They will not be too enthusiastic to carry out the change. Getting a win-win requires a lot of communication to understand their issues and feelings and a lot of innovation to come out with a solution that everyone, or at least, the majority feels happy about and willing to give their best to bring about the change.
Another key point is that the problems left by fathers and mothers are different. Father’s problems tend to be too forceful and violent. Those are easy to find. Mother’s problems are more subtle. They are passive and tend to be over-forgiving. We need to fix the rules that are too binding and those that are too loose.
Stage 3 Third Nine: Correcting the inherited problem has some regrets but no big disaster. 九三：干父小有晦，无大咎
Pictorial Commentary: Fixing inherited issues to completion has no blame. 象曰：干父之蛊，终无咎也
As we push forward with the transformation program, we will surely encounter some pains and regrets – we can remember the good old days; times have changed and we need to catch up. The future promises us better and we should boldly continue with the change. Here we have another encouragement to continue with our change program til completion.
If we see stage 1 as fixing problems leftovers from Father, stage 2 as leftovers from Mother, then stage 3 is the leftovers from the rest of the family and namely culture in general.
Stage 4 Fourth Six: Accepting and continuing with the inherited disorderliness will bring regrets. 六四：裕父之蛊，往见吝
Pictorial Commentary: Accepting the inherited disorderliness and continuing to walk in it will not bring any returns. 象曰：裕父之蛊，往未得也
We have carried out the change in stages 1 to 3 but is not yet completed, we are at stage 4 (not 6). The going is tough. Some people are suggesting that the old ways are actually not too bad after all and want us to stop and go back to the old ways. We need to take heed not to go back to the practices that bring us the problem. However, we must learn from the textual commentary of this hexagram about the need for review after implementation. We can make adjustments to the transformation problem when we learn new things but we must not give up and go back.
Stage 5 Fifth Six: Fixing inherited disorderliness receives praise and reputation. 六五：干父之蛊，用誉。
Pictorial Commentary: Fixing inherited disorderliness by promoting the right moral values. 象曰：干父之蛊；承以德也
Our transformation program is yielding results and receiving praise and recognition. We should continue with the right practices.
Stage 6 Top Six: Not to serve King and Ministers (for pay and job titles), but to do the right things. 上九：不事王侯，高尚其事
Pictorial Commentary: No to serve King and Ministers is to follow our own higher more significant ambitions. 象曰：不事王侯，志可则也
Here the secret of the transformation success is revealed. We do all the transformation not to please the bosses or owners but to gain money or titles. We do it because it is the right thing. It is a significant and meaningful thing to do. The moment we go for recognition and rewards, our change program will become biased toward pleasing some significant people. We will lose our objectivity and perspective. We will have a change program that people may not give their full support to since our bias is quite obvious to others ( we may not see it and think we are fair!).
A key moral teaching of I Ching is that doing the right thing is more important than doing the good or beneficial thing. It is righteousness, not benefits that are the evaluation criterion for decision-making. This is the way of Heaven, the Dao or Tao.
Summary:
Admit and face the reality of the bad situation. Begin to change with planning, continued monitoring during implementation, and review until the change is stabilized and internalized. It becomes the new corporate culture.
The stage lines add the following wisdom for any transformation program:
- Inherited a bad situation. Face it, Change it, and Continue to completion.
- Kill the “Holy Cows”. But go for a Win-Win for all. Have a balance between too tight and too loose.
- Some pains are unavoidable, continue the change, the whole culture to the end.
- Review, change if needed, and continue.
- Yielding results, continue.
- Do the right thing, not the good (according to our own views) things.
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