咸 → 頤
Hexagram 31: Influence → Hexagram 27: Nourishment
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 5 changing lines (lines 1, 3, 4, 5, 6).
Line 1
初六 咸其拇。
Six at the beginning means: The influence shows itself in the big toe.
Line 3
九三 咸其股。執其隨。往吝。
Nine in the third place means: The influence shows itself in the thighs. Holds to that which follows it. To continue is humiliating.
Line 4
九四 貞吉悔亡。憧憧往來。朋從爾思。
Nine in the fourth place means: Perseverance brings good fortune. Remorse disappears. If a man is agitated in mind, And his thoughts go hither and thither, Only those friends On whom he fixes his conscious thoughts Will follow.
Line 5
九五 咸其脢。无悔。
Nine in the fifth place means: The influence shows itself in the back of the neck. No remorse.
Line 6
上六 咸其輔頰舌。
Six at the top means: The influence shows itself in the jaws, cheeks, and tongue.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
華言風語，自相詿誤，終無凶事，安寧如故。
Flowery words, windy talk; they mislead only themselves. In the end, no ill befalls; all is peaceful as before.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
A lake upon a mountain, and the air fills with flowery words and empty rhetoric. People mislead themselves with ornate language, deceiving no one but each other. Yet the verse resolves with unexpected calm: in the end, nothing truly terrible happens, and peace remains as it was before. The 'flowery words and windy speech' (華言風語) describes the kind of gossip and rumor that circulates endlessly but ultimately carries no substance. From Influence to Nourishment, the mountain's receptive openness becomes the mountain above thunder — the jaws of careful sustenance, where one watches what enters and exits the mouth. The lesson is that careless words, though disruptive, need not destroy if one simply waits them out. Nourishment's discipline of speech is the antidote to influence misused as chatter.
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