Rén-Rén-Rén-Yang
The yin breath makes it hard.
Water sets, the ground splits open, and the yang lies weak in the deep.
1
He puts the bar across while it is still dark.
Nothing has happened yet.
He saw a thing that had not taken a shape.
2
Frozen into the ditch where the ice is.
A mad horse striking at a tree.
Whatever is born here is born for nothing.
3
Hard all through the middle of him.
The thing that should not happen is stopped there.
Nothing is going to tip him over.
4
He throws the egg at the stone.
The egg is spoiled and nothing hatches.
That is what hardship is, for a small man.
5
He stops it up and leaves no seam.
The trouble is large and he is not working hard.
Nothing found a way in to begin with.
6
The great cart comes on slowly, slowly.
The mountain above it, the river below it.
Both ends of the road are chocked.
7
He is pulling the stone up, and it comes hard.
Every bit of his strength goes into the rope.
He got out, and the hour was what he rode.
8
He butts the rock, he goes at the tree.
The horn snaps off.
This is not the way anything gets managed.
9
The one-horned beast that knows the guilty.
It ends by going straight at it.
What it gores, it gores for the straightness.
THE IMAGE
A resolute expedition caravan pushing steadily through a high snowy mountain pass flanked by towering icy cliffs, carrying lanterns and relying on ancient stone cairn markers.
THE COMMENTARY
Obstacles are substantial and cannot be wished away. The situation may require patience, prevention, endurance, or recognition that ordinary force will not make the road easier.
Hardship tests whether you can distinguish firmness from futile struggle. Some difficulties are overcome through strength at the center, some by blocking trouble before it enters, and some by refusing to attack what is plainly harder than you are.
Do not waste yourself proving that the obstacle exists. Study its shape, preserve your integrity, and use effort where effort can actually alter the outcome.
This figure is one of 81 in Taixuanjing for Today, a book by Joe Perez that renders Yang Xiong’s Canon of Supreme Mystery in original verse, with expanded commentary, essays, and full instructions for casting the oracle yourself.