Learn
How these systems actually work
Short guides to the calculations behind each tool, and to what the tradition reads from them. Written to be accurate, not mysterious.
Read the classics
The texts themselves, in the original and in translation.
How to read the I Ching
How to read the I Ching: a beginner's guide to a hexagram
What a hexagram is, what the Judgment, Image and line texts do, how to read a cast with or without changing lines, and which translations to trust — step by step.
Read →Changing lines in the I Ching: which text to read, and why
Old yin, old yang and the hexagram they change into; Zhu Xi's rules for one to six moving lines; a worked example — so you always know which sentence is speaking.
Read →The eight trigrams: the alphabet of the I Ching
What each of the eight trigrams pictures, its element, family role and direction, the Early and Later Heaven orders, and how two trigrams make a hexagram's meaning.
Read →Nuclear, inverse and opposite hexagrams: the hidden structure of a reading
The nuclear (互卦), inverse (綜卦) and opposite (錯卦) hexagrams hidden in every figure: what each one is, how to find it by hand, and how readers use them.
Read →Where the I Ching comes from, and which translation to trust
The Zhou divination text, the Ten Wings, the commentarial schools and the Mawangdui find — and an honest comparison of Legge, Wilhelm/Baynes and modern translations.
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How each tool works
What is BaZi? The Four Pillars, explained
BaZi (八字, Four Pillars) writes a birth moment as eight characters of the Chinese calendar: how the pillars are found and what tradition reads in them.
Read →The ten Day Masters: 甲 to 癸 as traditional images
Your Day Master (日主) is the stem of your day pillar. Ten short portraits, 甲 to 癸, drawn from traditional imagery: metaphors to think with, not verdicts.
Read →The Ten Gods (十神) explained: how each one is derived
How each of the Ten Gods (十神) is derived from the Day Master, by element and by yin-yang, and the themes readers attach to it in a BaZi chart.
Read →Luck Pillars (大運): how they are calculated
Luck Pillars (大運) divide life into ten-year periods. How the direction, the start age (3 days = 1 year) and the sequence are found, plus flow years (流年).
Read →Why your zodiac animal begins at the Start of Spring (立春)
In the Four Pillars tradition your zodiac animal changes at the Start of Spring (立春), not at Lunar New Year. Edge cases, the 60-year cycle and 2027.
Read →The I Ching three-coin method: 6, 7, 8 and 9 explained
How three coins build an I Ching hexagram: coin values, the numbers 6 to 9, moving lines, the changed hexagram and the order to read it all in.
Read →Zi Wei Dou Shu basics: the twelve palaces and the major stars
Zi Wei Dou Shu (紫微斗數) maps your lunar birth date and hour onto twelve palaces. The Life Palace, the fourteen major stars and the Four Transformations.
Read →Plum Blossom numerology (梅花易數): numbers, time and Body and Use
Plum Blossom numerology (梅花易數), attributed to Shao Yong, turns numbers, the moment or a question into a hexagram, read through Body and Use (體用).
Read →Why true solar time matters for your BaZi chart
Clock time and sun time can differ by over an hour. How longitude (4 min per degree), the equation of time and daylight saving move hour and day pillars.
Read →How the Life Candlestick Chart is scored
The published rubric behind the Life Candlestick Chart: every weight, straight from the code.
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Chinese wisdom
Yin and yang, without the mysticism
Yin and yang as the classics use them: two complementary aspects of any whole — their origin, the four rules that govern them, and how they shape the I Ching and BaZi.
Read →The five elements (Wu Xing): a cycle, not a chemistry set
Wood, fire, earth, metal and water are five phases of change, not materials: the generating and controlling cycles, their correspondences, and how BaZi uses them.
Read →The 24 solar terms: the sun's calendar behind Chinese tradition
What the 24 solar terms are, how they cut the sun's year into 15° steps, the full list with dates, and why BaZi, the zodiac and farming lore run on them, not the moon.
Read →Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches: the sixty-year cycle, explained
The ten stems and twelve branches, the sixty-term cycle that names years, months, days and hours, how to work out any year by hand, and why 2026 is the 丙午 Fire Horse.
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