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I-Ching Hexagram · 旅 · Lǚ
56. The Wanderer
You pass through unfamiliar territory. Travel light, respect customs, make no enemies.
Keywords
Travel · Guest · Modesty abroad
The field
Fire on the mountain — a campfire moving across foreign country. The Wanderer has left the village and not yet found a new one. Wilhelm reads this hexagram as a lesson in conduct away from home: travel light, keep no quarrels, spend kindly, sleep with one ear open. You may be literally moving — a new city, a new role — or you may be in the inner version, between two selves. Either way, the rules of home do not apply, and your authority is borrowed. The traveler who succeeds is courteous, observant, and unattached to recognition. The one who fails carries the old village inside and tries to plant it on every hill.
Stance
Pack less than you think you need. Ask before assuming. Pay people their proper share quickly — debts on the road poison the next mile. Keep a small notebook of names; the people who help you in transit are a thread back to a future home. Above all, do not perform your old status. New ground reads accuracy, not titles.
Shadow
The shadow is the loud guest — the traveler who turns hosts into audience. Or the homesick traveler who refuses to look at the new country, tallying everything against what was. Both burn through goodwill. The road has a memory; the way you behave in one inn is told at the next. Travel humbly or travel alone.
Changing lines
Forward, the Wanderer becomes the Gentle Wind — your transit settles into a soft, repeated influence on the new country. You stop being a stranger; you start being a current. Keep the lightness of the road and add the patience of repeated breath. That is how you put down roots without putting up walls.
Line pattern
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