Gate · centre: Heart
Gate 40 · Aloneness
Work for others, then a closed door. Effort for the community goes together here with the right to rest alone.
What it is like
You keep your promises and work reliably. Afterwards you need time just for yourself to get your strength back. Others sometimes mistake this rest for coldness, and when nobody appreciates the work, the wish to keep going fades.
When someone close has it
Someone with this gate gives a lot and, after work, often needs a moment alone. Say out loud that their contribution counts, and don't take their retreat personally.
A question for today
After today's work, am I giving myself the rest I need?
The six lines of gate 40
Line 1 · Loosened Knot
This line begins its rest at the moment the tension of work is just letting go, and it needs that moment to gather itself. From the inside you feel that the matter has to be closed first, and only then can you truly breathe out in solitude. When the break comes before the resolution, it is easy to keep carrying the work in your head and rest only in appearance, without real relief.
Line 2 · Three Foxes
This line effortlessly tells what really needs work from what only pretends to, like a hunt you come back from with three foxes. Because of this you finish things faster and have well-earned time to yourself, and others often try to call you out of it, because they see how efficiently you work. It can happen that you then find it hard to defend the solitude that is owed after the job is done.
Line 3 · The Riding Porter
This line learns about rest through situations in which it takes it at the wrong time or shows it too openly. From the inside these are trials: sometimes you settle in comfortably before the work is finished, sometimes you rest in a way that draws other people's grievances. When a break does not fit the situation, a charge of laziness comes easily, yet each such trial teaches you better when solitude is truly owed to you.
Line 4 · Shedding Dead Weight
This line rests only once it has cut away what weighs on it, even when that thing is close. In life it looks like giving up one comfortable but heavy relationship or commitment, after which people arrive with whom you can really be yourself. It can happen that friends read this need to separate as rejection, and then it is worth telling them plainly that it is about rest, not about them.
Line 5 · Weight Lifted
This line makes others see you as someone who knows how to get free of what overwhelms. People count on you to show them how to close the work and rest without guilt, and it is often your example that gives them the courage to take a similar step. When they expect you to lift the weight off them as well, it is easy to go back to work instead of to the solitude you really need.
Line 6 · Shooting the Hawk
This line looks at work and rest from above and sees what still stands between them, like a hawk perched on a wall. Over the years you learn to remove the last obstacle with one well-aimed move and then truly rest, and this is exactly what others pick up from you. It can happen that this distance makes you wait too long for the perfect moment, while the tiredness grows in the meantime.