Further note on Yin and Yang, and a comment about the symbol of the Crane

From Evernote:

For steve marshall

More on Yin and Yang

Yin and Yang are not equal and opposite, they are independent but complementary.  If they were equal and opposite, their uniting would cancel each other out.  This is far from the case. Yin and Yang are separate 'influences' and it is through their uniting that '...the products of Heaven and Earth are given their substance'. (Book of Changes, Appended Remarks, pt 2. Ch 6, quoted in A Source book of Chinese Philosophy,  Wing-Tsit Chan, Princeton University Press, 1963). In the Book of Changes, Ch'ien, considered the essence of yang , begins things, while K'un, the essence of yin, completes them. 

Often we find yin and yang incorrectly described in popularised accounts by a list of opposites:  black/white, hot/cold, male/female, etc. Certainly these characteristics are attributed to one or the other principle but these pairings are not opposites in any fixed polar sense; they exist only as relative to each other. It is meaningless to talk of men and women or even hot and cold as opposites, and neither one depends upon the other. When yin and yang are ascribed to 'female' and 'male' respectively it is to illustrate the independence that each has from the other. A female does not need a male to be female and similarly a male does not need a female to be male.

We find this well expressed in Traditional Chinese Medicine that considers the situation in an out of equilibrium organ where yin and yang components can differ without regard to other, at least in the beginning.  In an organ where yang is in excess but yin is relatively normal, the state is called heat-full; when yin is in excess and yang is relatively normal, the state is cold-full.  In an organ where there is a deficiency in one while the other remains near to normal we have either heat-empty (lack of yin) or cold-empty (lack of yang).   Because the state of something is made up of a continuous action of both yin and yang, when one gets out of balance, then inevitably the other one will too, because of their mutual interaction but not because one is the negative or mirror image of the other.

Note on the Crane

In Eastern philosophies, the crane is often considered the symbol of the human essence: an elegant fisher and a diligent parent, hiding its nest deep in reeds and away from prying eyes, keeping itself to itself, coming out into the open in moments of evening tranquility, and flocking with others to make its journeys.