The Channel of Judgment

Gate 58 (Vitality) sits in the Root Center with the hexagram name The Joyous. Its keynote is "Stimulation is the key to joy." It senses when something is weak or unhealthy and brings joyful and compassionate audacity to challenge patterns. The teachings calls it logic's most precious and highly coveted energy resource. It provides the fuel logic needs to test the viability of patterns, formulas, rhythms, and directions moving humanity into the future.

Gate 18 (Correction) sits in the Splenic Center with the hexagram name Work on What Has Been Spoilt. Its keynote is "The vigilance and determination to uphold and defend basic and fundamental human rights." its gift of critical awareness as directing you to the source of a weakness or imperfection and focusing your thinking on ways to correct, modify, or replace it. Gate 18 also represents the fear of authority and the challenge to that authority.

The Channel of Judgment is like a sentry who judges if what it perceives is stopping life from being joyous for the Collective. It tests patterns continually, compares what is inherently correct with what has worked or not worked, and keeps society on track through correction.

No challenge is too great for logic to take on, and no pattern lies beyond the Root-fueled need to perfect it. People with 58-18 will challenge mother, father, teachers, governments, anyone and everything. The dissatisfaction you feel is a signal that something has lost vitality. It activates the drive to correct and focuses your critical awareness.

When this correcting process is made personal, either turned inward or directed at others in relationship, the result is perceived as constant fault-finding or a pervasive dissatisfaction with yourself and life in general. the not-self pattern: an endless and incessant stream of data about what is wrong that no one wants to hear.

The channel is designed for Collective applications, not personal criticism. the toothpaste tube example: Logic says squeeze from the bottom. The Individual says they will squeeze wherever they please. The Collective solution is to invent a pump dispenser gadget and share it with society. Impersonal, practical solutions applicable to the Collective restore peace and save relationships.

What brings you real joy is being asked to share, as in: "Is there something wrong here?" Those who ask you are the people who are prepared for and open to your answer. The teachings advises devising solutions applicable to the Collective, challenging only what others are open and ready to address, picking your battles with care, and avoiding wasting precious energy.

Even for the true perfectionist, perfection can never exist because patterns are subject to continual change. Your job is to keep improving, not reach an end. The art of mastery is perpetual refinement. When you sense something is weak or unhealthy, feel dissatisfaction, wait to be asked, share your critical awareness and solution, and they are prepared for your answer, you experience real joy in the correction.