The Book of Changes · Da Zhuang

Hexagram 34: The Power of the Great

Thunder (the storm arriving) over Heaven (the sky)

Great strength arriving, and every line warns about the same thing: force is available and using it is usually the error. Power that has to be demonstrated is not yet power.

The image

Thunder in the sky above. The reading is that a person does not walk in ways that are not proper, which is the only restraint strong enough to hold this much energy.

Thunder, above

Shock, beginning, and movement that starts below.

Heaven, below

Force, and the initiative that does not wait to be asked.

The six lines

Read from the bottom up.

1. Line 1Power down in the toes. Going on from here is a mistake, and a certain one.
2. Line 2The strength is real and it is not being spent. Constancy.
3. Line 3The small person leads with force and the person of character does not. A goat butts a hedge and sticks.
4. Line 4The hedge opens and the horns come free. The regret lifts.
5. Line 5Losing the goat easily. Nothing to regret in letting the force go.
6. Line 6Stuck in the hedge, unable to go forward or back. Seeing the difficulty is what gets you out.

The same figure in Human Design

Human Design took its sixty four gates from this book, in this numbering, so hexagram 34 is Gate 34, Power.