Hexagram 23
Strategic Retreat
bō
Reading it as a decision
Mountain rests on earth in Bō, but the image the tradition draws from it is erosion — high ground being worn down from below until what's left can no longer hold its shape. This hexagram describes a loss that's already underway rather than a risk on the horizon: something is being stripped away, and the judgment is blunt about it, warning against pushing forward while the process is still active. It fits a decision made while conditions are visibly deteriorating rather than merely uncertain.
This is a position that doesn't resolve by staying still — something here genuinely has to give, and holding the current course without changing anything tends to make the erosion worse, not slower. The classical line texts lean cautionary, consistent with a period better spent conserving what's left than defending ground that's already going. The practical move is retrenchment: accept the loss already in motion, protect what can still be protected, and wait — this pattern is classically read as one that exhausts itself and turns, but not on command.
The classical text
Judgment (卦辭)
剝，不利有攸往。
Things are being stripped away and worn down — not a time to advance or set out anywhere.
The six lines (爻辭)
初六：剝床以足，蔑貞凶。
The bed is stripped away starting at its legs — ignoring the warning brings misfortune.
六二：剝床以辨，蔑貞凶。
The stripping reaches the bed's frame — disregarding the danger brings misfortune.
六三：剝之，無咎。
Caught in the stripping away, yet here there is no fault.
六四：剝床以膚，凶。
The stripping reaches the very mat where one lies — misfortune.
六五：貫魚，以宮人寵，無不利。
Fish strung in a row, like palace attendants led in order to receive favor — nothing unfavorable.
上九：碩果不食，君子得輿，小人剝廬。
One last great fruit survives uneaten — the honorable man is given a carriage, while the petty man tears down his own house.
This is a general reference, not a live reading — it doesn't know your situation. iYarrow casts a fresh hexagram for the actual question you're weighing.
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