Hexagram 31 · Influence
咸 · Xián
The Judgment
Influence. Success. Perseverance furthers. To take a maiden to wife brings good fortune. A lake rests on the mountain and the two respond to one another. Attraction arises where there is genuine openness on both sides. Feeling that moves freely between people is the natural beginning of every lasting union.
The Image
A lake on the mountain: the image of influence. Thus the superior person encourages people to approach him by his readiness to receive them, keeping himself empty enough that others can fill the space.
Interpretation
This is the hexagram of mutual attraction, and it applies to courtship, persuasion, negotiation, and any situation where one person moves another. The mechanism it describes is receptivity rather than pressure. The mountain is still and the lake settles into it; influence works because there is space for the other person to enter. So make yourself genuinely open. Listen without an agenda, keep your own preferences light enough that something new can register, and let attraction develop rather than pushing it. The lines trace feeling as it rises through the body, from a stirring in the toes to talk in the mouth, and they consistently warn that acting on every impulse the moment it arrives is a mistake, and that talk alone, unbacked by real feeling, influences nobody for long. Let sincerity be the thing that moves people. Wooed properly, what begins as attraction here becomes something lasting.
Love
The central love hexagram: mutual attraction, courtship, and real chemistry. Be open and let the other person come toward you too. Move at a natural pace and let feeling, rather than persuasion, do the work. Receptivity, not persuasion, is what makes you genuinely attractive in this moment.
Career
Negotiations, partnerships, and persuasion go well if you listen more than you argue. Make people feel genuinely received. Rapport built now converts into agreements later, provided your interest in them is real. Rapport built now converts into agreements later, provided your interest in people is real.
Advice
Stay open and receptive, and let genuine feeling rather than pressure do the persuading.
Line by line
The influence shows itself in the big toe. The very first stirring of attraction, felt but not yet capable of moving anything. Nothing is decided. Notice it and do not act on it yet.
The influence shows itself in the calves. Misfortune. Tarrying brings good fortune. The impulse to move is strong and premature. Wait. Following every early urge here leads somewhere you did not intend.
The influence shows itself in the thighs. Holds to that which follows it. To continue is humiliating. Following whoever attracts you, without judgment of your own, costs you your self-possession.
Perseverance brings good fortune. Remorse disappears. If a man is agitated in mind and his thoughts go hither and thither, only those friends on whom he fixes his conscious thoughts will follow. Steady the heart.
The influence shows itself in the back of the neck. No remorse. Firmness of will beyond the reach of ordinary emotion. Nobody is moved by it, and nothing is lost either.
The influence shows itself in the jaws, cheeks, and tongue. Influence that is only talk. Words without substance behind them may impress briefly, but they change nothing and convince no one.