初六：进退，利武人之贞。
Repeated advance and retreat calls for a clear resolve. Choose a workable direction and use steadiness to move beyond hesitation.
I Ching Hexagram 57
Xùn · The Gentle
巽 · Hexagram 57
Xun concerns a gentle, sustained influence that reaches deeply, like repeated Wind. Direction needs clear communication and action that continues over time. Gentleness can be strong, but endless yielding and hesitation remove the ground from which influence works.
Upper trigram: Wind/Xùn
Lower trigram: Wind/Xùn
The situation you may be in
Force may be unsuitable while communication, practice, and everyday conduct can gradually change the situation. Keep a consistent direction rather than accommodating a different person with a different message each day.
How to respond
Choose a clear aim and carry it through with patient, specific action. Hear advice while retaining your own decision. Courtesy does not require agreeing to everything; lasting influence needs dependable boundaries.
Judgment and Image
Judgment
巽：小亨，利有攸往，利见大人。
The Gentle. Success through what is small. It furthers one to have somewhere to go. It furthers one to see the great person.
Image
随风，巽；君子以申命行事。
Winds following one upon the other: The Gentle. The superior person spreads his commands abroad and carries out his undertakings.
Applying it to real life
Love & relationships
Steady, attentive responses deepen trust, and important needs can be expressed gently. Avoid changing your position repeatedly to prevent conflict, leaving the other person guessing what you actually want.
Career & work
Communicate a proposal, cultivate a habit, or improve work gradually. Explain the direction until participants understand it and follow through consistently rather than relying on ambiguous instructions.
Choice & decisions
Choose an approach you can sustain while learning from feedback. If consultation keeps replacing decision, establish your own grounds for judgment and stop accommodating without an endpoint.
Timing & pace
Xun often works through continuity rather than abrupt results. Do not change direction with every response; attend to both preparation and follow-through until a new practice becomes stable.
The six changing lines
The lines unfold from the bottom upward, describing one pattern of change from its first appearance to its extreme. If your reading has a changing line, begin with that position.
九二：巽在床下，用史巫纷若，吉无咎。
Examine hidden concerns and use appropriate guidance to clarify them. Humble inquiry should bring understanding rather than increase mysterious fear.
九三：频巽，吝。
Repeated displays of compliance without a stable position exhaust you and weaken trust. Clarify what you can actually agree to.
六四：悔亡，田获三品。
Moving beyond excessive hesitation permits practical action in a fitting direction. Gentle effort can produce useful results in several areas.
九五：贞吉悔亡，无不利。无初有终，先庚三日，后庚三日，吉。
An imperfect beginning can still reach a good conclusion. Prepare before a change and follow through afterward rather than switching approaches abruptly.
上九：巽在床下，丧其资斧，贞凶。
Yielding has cost resources and agency. Further compliance is unhelpful; restore boundaries that allow you to act.
A common misreading
Xun is neither submission nor manipulation. Its final loss of resources and tools warns that yielding has gone too far when it removes your ability to judge and act.
Related hexagrams
Text and interpretation
Updated 12 September 2026Reviewed by MysticEast Research
This page preserves the Chinese Judgment, Image, and line texts of the received Zhouyi. MysticEast's modern explanations are newly written to emphasize stages of change and practical judgment rather than fixed good-or-bad predictions.
Read the Zhouyi at the Chinese Text ProjectLet the hexagram meet your actual question
A guide gives you the map. A cast made with a clear question can help locate the exact stage of change you are experiencing.