Making a fist = a sign of life (Hexagram 26, DETERMINATION)

I love what happens to my mind whenever I see something in a new way. Today I found a poem at one of my fave wisdom sites, Alive On All Channels.

Making a Fist
Naomi Shihab Nye

For the first time, on the road north of Tampico,
I felt the life sliding out of me,
a drum in the desert, harder and harder to hear.
I was seven, I lay in the car
watching palm trees swirl a sickening pattern past the glass.
My stomach was a melon split wide inside my skin.

"How do you know if you are going to die?"
I begged my mother.
We had been traveling for days.
With strange confidence she answered,
"When you can no longer make a fist."

Years later I smile to think of that journey,
the borders we must cross separately,
stamped with our unanswerable woes.
I who did not die, who am still living,
still lying in the backseat behind all my questions,
clenching and opening one small hand.

... Making a fist ... We tend to perceive this action as one of defiance, rage, a punch to the gut. Great power, contained and knotted into that one fisted hand.

But fisted hands become cramped ... sweaty ... sore. They're hard, implacable, and capable of great injury -- both to others and ourselves. A fisted hand needs to open ... like a blooming flower ...

In Hexagram 26, the fisted hand can be likened to the great power of Heaven that is contained within a Mountain. Power is concentrated in that closed fist ... and the Oracle advises us to contain, and prepare to use, our power in moderation. Being able to make a fist does indicate life -- defiant, raging, insistent Life!

("Two fists" illusion from Illusion King -- a feast for the eyes, and for minds that like to puzzle ...)

What will we do with our fisted hands? What do we choose to see when we look down at our hand, closed and tight like a bud still becoming?

Soften the fist ... open and close ... Become used to your power; explore how this one simple action concentrates and releases your energy ... The same green life that soars up through the flower cascades through you ...

(This astounding photo is by Robert Buelteman ... Explore his site for more light-lush images ... Here's another take on his work ... Thank you, Robert ... This image is a perfect find to illustrate the power of that green fuse!)