At the top is the trigram Gen (Mountain), below is the trigram Zhen (Thunder). The metaphorical image of this hexagram is the movement of the jaws: the upper jaw is stationary during eating, while the lower jaw moves. To better interpret this hexagram, it is necessary to pay attention to its constituent trigrams. The upper trigram – Gen (Mountain) – represents the quality of steadfastness, immobility. The lower trigram Zhen (Thunder), which is metaphorically expressed in lightning, represents, on the contrary, full mobility. Thus, something immobile is on top and something moving, acting is below.
Nourishment implies the accumulation of strength, however, nourishment in an allegorical sense is education, acquiring new knowledge and experience. Even the wisest person does not stop learning and never thinks that they have learned everything or have nowhere to develop further. This is the key to wisdom. However, any learning is like ‘chewing’ someone else’s knowledge, that is, developing one’s own understanding. There is no point in learning if you simply swallow other people’s ideas or concepts and then present them as your own thoughts without understanding their meaning and applying them to your own experience and life. They say that if you want to live well next year – plant rice, if you want to live well all your life – educate children and give them the best knowledge.
An alternative understanding of this hexagram is a situation when we must carefully weigh what, to whom, and in what situation we speak. If the situation has endowed us with strength, power, and opportunities that exceed our usual possibilities, we should more carefully analyze both what we say (the weight or strength of our word increases) and the information we are ‘fed’, whether it is useful for us and for further advancement forward or whether it is empty and will not bring us the necessary ‘nourishment’.