How to record an I Ching consultation
An I Ching consultation can include a question, a method for obtaining a figure, a chosen text, and a personal interpretation. Record those components before blending them into a narrative. Someone reviewing the session should be able to tell what came from the book and what you added while thinking about your situation.
Write the question before consulting
Choose a situation with clear boundaries. A fictional reader, Jun, is preparing to discuss workload with a colleague. His question is: “What should I consider before Thursday's conversation about dividing the project tasks?” This does not ask the text to reveal the colleague's private thoughts.
Jun writes two sentences of known context: several tasks lack an assigned owner, and the meeting is already scheduled. He also lists what he does not know, including the colleague's available hours. Keeping those ordinary unknowns visible will prevent an evocative passage from seeming to supply them.
If your question changes during the session, preserve the earlier wording and mark the revision. Recasting a question after reading the result can make the original consultation seem more specific than it was.
Record the procedure completely
Name the method you actually use and the guide supplying its rules. If using coins or stalks, record the outcomes and their order according to that method. If using an application, save its method description and any settings it exposes. Do not claim that every digital implementation follows the same procedure.
Copy the resulting figure as displayed and write its name and number from your chosen edition. A romanized name alone can be ambiguous: the Chinese Text Project page for 困 identifies one particular hexagram and shows its Chinese text alongside James Legge's translation. Preserve the Chinese character or the hexagram number when it helps distinguish entries.
For this article's example, Jun selects that page directly for a text-study exercise. He does not perform a cast. The note should therefore say “selected passage for study,” leaving the casting section blank. A fictional consultation should still state honestly which procedure it demonstrates.
Identify the textual layer
On the linked page, the received hexagram text and named commentary sections appear together. Copy the heading of the section you are reading. A sentence from Xiang Zhuan is a different textual location from a line statement. An application may display them in one stream, so inspect its source labels before citing it.
Read a small unit first. Jun starts with the opening hexagram text and writes a plain paraphrase of the difficulty it describes. He does not borrow a striking sentence from a later line and present it as the opening passage.
If you use changing lines, state the rule that led you to the passages selected. Different reading instructions require separate attribution. When you cannot establish the rule used by an application, record the selected passages without inventing the missing procedure.
Make the interpretive bridge visible
Jun connects the chosen text's concern with constrained circumstances to his own uncertainty about workload. He writes, “This prompts me to examine what is already fixed before proposing a new division.” That is his application of the text. The passage does not establish his colleague's motives or available time.
His proposed action is to bring a list of unassigned tasks and ask the colleague which they can take. He checks the list against the actual project plan. A correction to that plan should take precedence over an appealing symbolic explanation built on an outdated version.
Include an alternative reading if one seems plausible. Jun could interpret the passage as a reason to delay the conversation, but the meeting date and practical need to assign work give him reasons to proceed carefully. Explaining that choice shows how context affected his application.
Review without rewriting the result
After the meeting, add a dated follow-up. In this fictional example, the colleague identifies two tasks already assigned elsewhere. Jun's list changes. Record the discovery as ordinary new information, without suggesting the text secretly specified those tasks.
Keep the original question and interpretation intact. A later review may conclude that preparing a task list helped while the symbolic reading added little. It may also remain uncertain about the reading's contribution. Both responses fit a record that distinguishes the source passage, your interpretive choices, and what happened afterward.