The Directions

The directions turn the compass into a moral geography: in the Book of Changes, southwest and northeast, west and east, are not places but qualities of action. The southwest, region of the Receptive, is the direction of retreat, work, and fellowship; the northeast, the mountain region, of hard advance and solitude. The Judgment of 39 Chien - Obstruction states the polarity plainly:

OBSTRUCTION. The southwest furthers.
The northeast does not further.

"The southwest is the region of retreat, the northeast that of advance," the commentary explains; faced with insuperable obstacles, one retreats toward friends. 40 Hsieh - Deliverance repeats the counsel, "DELIVERANCE. The southwest furthers," glossed as the return to ordinary conditions once tension breaks. The fuller form stands in the Judgment of 02 K'un - The Receptive: "It is favorable to find friends in the west and south, To forego friends in the east and north," for west and south are where the Receptive works for the Creative "as nature does in summer and autumn," while east and north demand the solitude of planning and accounting.

The west is also historical ground: King Wên's homeland while the tyrant still reigned in the east. Hence the pregnant image of 09 Hsiao Ch'u - The Taming Power of the Small, "Dense clouds, no rain from our western region," blessing gathered but not yet released, echoed in 62 Hsiao Kuo - Preponderance of the Small as "Dense clouds, No rain from our western territory." The Western Mountain of 17 Sui - Following, where "The king introduces him To the Western Mountain," receives the loyal into the ancestral temple of the Chou.

The south, finally, means light and activity. 46 Shêng - Pushing Upward promises "Departure toward the south Brings good fortune," since activity, as Wilhelm notes, is the meaning of the south. Orienting conduct by cosmic direction rather than abstract rule is the habit of thought that later produced feng shui and the Taoist ritual compass; in the Changes it is already fully formed.