The I Ching translates and is also known as the Book of Changes. The Chinese word “I” has three primary meanings. These are the easy, the changing, and the constant. The easy requires no effort and there is no need of thought. It is simple and without error. It is doing what comes naturally. The changing is that which is always occurring, the only constant. If we look at our lives and at nature, we immediately recognize this constant change. The constant aspect of “I” is embodied in the Tao, the way through life that combines the opposites of yin and yang, the receptive and the creative, into a constant and meaningful whole.

The I Ching says that change is the only constant, that all else is ephemeral. It is like the water of a river, nothing is ever the same. The only constant is the movement of the water flowing on. The early pre-Socratic Greek philosopher, Heraclites, in an example of cultural parallelism, declared in a surviving fragment of his writings that “everything flows.”

As we used to say in the early hippie days, change is the flow. Everything does flow, and being in the flow is easy and the only way to a healthy and fulfilling life. Being in touch with the flow, the Tao, was and still is considered the true path to wisdom. As the I Ching says, the task for the superior person is to flow through each change as it occurs, staying always centered and aware, learning from each change, and growing in wisdom.

The I Ching assigns to man a place in this. He is not powerless. Change is not chaos. Man can influence change. He cannot work against it; he has to work with it, going with the grain, the flow. He has to recognize the beginnings of change. Knowing the beginnings, he can introduce a seed, an influence, into the flow. Further, he can influence the development of this seed.

Man thus has a large role in the course of events, both in the natural and in the social spheres. He is not only master of his own life and fate but is in a position to influence events far beyond himself.