Hexagram 26: Great Taming山天大畜 · Dà Xù

• Upper trigram　Gèn, Mountain: stillness, steadiness and stopping at the right time.
• Lower trigram　Qián, Heaven: strength, creation and the drive to move forward.

The Judgment

Perseverance furthers. Not eating at home brings good fortune. It furthers to cross the great water.

利貞，不家食吉，利涉大川。

Our plain English rendering, with the Zhouyi original

Reading

Heaven held within the mountain: a great store built up. Today suits learning and building your abilities, saving your strength for what truly matters.

Something to do today

• Spend thirty minutes learning a skill that will help in the long run.

How a hexagram is cast

The three-coin method: toss three coins together, counting heads as 3 and tails as 2. The total, 6, 7, 8 or 9, gives one line; six tosses, recorded from the bottom up, make a hexagram. A 6 (old yin) or 9 (old yang) is a changing line, which turns this hexagram into another and shows where things are heading.