I Ching trigram
Earth
Earth (☷, Kūn) is one of the eight trigrams of the I Ching — the natural forces the 64 hexagrams are built from. Its essence: receptivity · carrying · nourishing. Earth appears in 16 positions within the 64 hexagrams: as the upper trigram in eight and as the lower trigram in eight, and carries itself twice in hexagram 2 (Bearing Strength).
Atlas context
Earth
A visual symbol used as context for reading change.
Earth as the upper trigram
The eight hexagrams with Earth on top.
- 2. Bearing StrengthWhat carries does not need to steer to be decisive.
- 7. The ArmyWhen force scatters, the moment calls for an order that people can carry.
- 11. PeaceWhen the high and the low find each other again, the world starts to breathe.
- 15. ModestyWhat truly has height has no need to display it.
- 19. ApproachWhat approaches brings opening with it, and with it the duty not to grow careless in good fortune.
- 24. ReturnAfter the far edge of distance, something small and true turns back.
- 36. DarkeningWhen the light keeps burning visibly in the wrong time, it must learn to take cover without going out.
- 46. AscendingAscent here is not made in leaps, but through steady, upward faithfulness.
Earth as the lower trigram
The eight hexagrams with Earth at the bottom.
- 2. Bearing StrengthWhat carries does not need to steer to be decisive.
- 8. UnionWhat truly wants to join must first know what it is faithful to.
- 12. StandstillWhat still stands is not necessarily still connected.
- 16. EnthusiasmWhen energy gathers around a rhythm, movement becomes contagious.
- 20. ContemplationBefore a thing can be seen rightly, it must first be looked at quietly enough.
- 23. CrumblingWhat has lost its base falls apart not through enmity, but through the loss of what held it up.
- 35. RisingWhat truly advances does not only rise, but comes into the light to be seen.
- 45. GatheringA gathering gains weight when what comes together also stands around something real.
The eight trigrams
Each hexagram is a stacking of two trigrams. See all eight natural forces or all 64 hexagrams.
Start small
Read what is moving in your own situation.
A trigram takes on meaning within the hexagram it appears in, and a hexagram in relation to your own question. Ask one and read what appears.