Gate 38 · The Fighter

What it is like

You don't give up when something important is at stake, and that persistence gives life direction. Sometimes stubbornness kicks in where the stakes are small, and then it helps to ask what the fight is really about.

When someone close has it

This person often takes the opposing side and doesn't back down easily. Talking about meaning and purpose, rather than who is right, makes it easier to understand each other.

A question for today

Where am I pushing back today, and what am I trying to protect?

The six lines of gate 38

1. Line 1 · The Returning Horse

   This line learns what is worth fighting for before it even steps into a fight. From the inside it is calm in the face of loss: when something runs off, you do not chase it blindly, because you know that what is truly yours usually comes back. When stubbornness sets off after every loss, it is easy to spend your strength on a chase that never needed starting, and to meet people along the way who are not worth the contest.

2. Line 2 · Alley Meeting

   This line finds a supporter where hardly anyone looks, in a narrow passage, by chance. Your stubbornness does not need official routes, and the right people often come across you without searching, because they recognise what you are fighting for. It can happen that you wait for large, formal backing and overlook the informal kind that is already standing right beside you.

3. Line 3 · Rough Beginning

   This line finds out what its fight means through collisions in which everything first goes wrong. From the inside you feel the cart stop halfway, someone pulling you back, and you push on anyway, because you know the stakes are real. When failures pile up, it is easy to decide the fight is pointless, although a bad beginning can turn into a good ending.

4. Line 4 · Honest Encounter

   This line fights for what matters to it among people who think differently, and in that crowd it looks for one person it can talk to honestly. Your strength grows through such single, trusted bonds, because with someone close it is easier for you to work out what it is really about. When there is no such person, it is easy to see nothing but opponents around you and to fight everyone at once.

5. Line 5 · Accord After Conflict

   This line makes others see you as someone who can end a dispute and bring the divided together. People come convinced that you know what is worth fighting for and what is not, and you often do cut through a misunderstanding more easily than anyone expects. When they expect you to win every matter, it is easy to be drawn into a fight that is not yours and to pay for someone else's stubbornness.

6. Line 6 · The Lowered Bow

   From a distance this line learns to recognise who is really an opponent and who only resembles one. Over the years you more often lay down the drawn bow, because you see that what looked like an enemy turns out to be someone seeking closeness. It can happen that mistrust lingers longer than needed, and then it is easy to fight shadows before the rain washes the picture clear and shows what was true.

The centre of this gate

• Root

Channels through gate 38

• 28–38 · Struggle