Can You Reconnect With a Lost Friend? Zhun Hexagram Top Six: Turnaround Comes Near the Hardest Moment

Can a friend who’s gone out of touch still be reached?

A while back, a reader came to me saying his college roommate had suddenly cut off all contact.

No replies on WeChat, his phone was off, his Moments feed had gone quiet. He’d asked every mutual friend, and no one knew where he’d gone.

He said, “Wen Laoshi, can you help me see if he’s safe? Will I ever be able to find him?”

I didn’t answer right away. First I asked him, “How long have you been looking for him?”

He said it had been almost a month.

I said, “The most important thing for you to do right now isn’t to keep searching aimlessly. First, take a look at **the Top Line of the Tun Hexagram (屯卦上六)**.”

What Is the Top Line of the Tun Hexagram?

The last line of the Tun (Difficulty at the Beginning) Hexagram has an eight-character line text: **乘马班如，泣血涟如 (Chéng mǎ bān rú, qì xuè lián rú)**.

Sounds pretty grim, right?

“乘马班如” means riding a horse in circles, wanting to move forward but unable to, wanting to search but having no direction.

“泣血涟如” is even more devastating — weeping so hard that the eyes bleed, tears streaming nonstop. It describes a state of utter despair and extreme anxiety.

Why is the Top Line (Six at the Top) so dire?

Because the Tun Hexagram has six lines total, and from the First Line (Nine at the Beginning) up to the Top Line (Six at the Top), the difficulty gradually deepens. The First Line is the start of hardship, the Second, Third, and Fourth Lines are the middle of hardship, the Fifth Line is being stuck in hardship, and by the Top Line, hardship has reached its extreme.

What’s more, the Top Line has a key trait: it is a Yin Line, sits in the highest position, and has no support or resonance below.

What does that mean? It means being isolated and helpless. No one below to back you up, no path forward above — stuck between a rock and a hard place, with no one to turn to for help.

When you’re searching for someone and reach this state, it’s the most agonizing time.

But don’t rush to despair.

There’s a particularly crucial line in the *Xiang Commentary (象传)*: **泣血涟如，何可长也 (Qì xuè lián rú, hé kě zhǎng yě)**.

“Weeping so hard the eyes bleed, tears streaming nonstop — how could this state last long?”

What’s the subtext? — Things reverse when they reach their extreme. When hardship hits its peak, change is bound to come.

After the Tun Hexagram comes the Meng (Youthful Folly) Hexagram. What is Meng? Meng is enlightenment, a new beginning, the fog lifting, the path becoming visible.

That’s why the four characters “何可长也” (how could this last) are a reassurance for everyone searching for someone.

This state of being out of touch won’t go on forever. When hardship reaches its peak, it has nowhere to go but down.

The Scariest Part of Searching for Someone Isn’t Not Finding Them — It’s Breaking Down First

That reader of mine had been searching for a month and had lost more than ten pounds.

He couldn’t focus at work, couldn’t eat, and spent every day glued to his phone refreshing messages, hoping the other person would reply.

He said, “Now every time I hear a WeChat notification, my heart races. When I see it’s not him, I feel so let down. I can’t sleep at night. My mind runs wild — did something happen to him? Is he just ignoring me on purpose?”

I can totally relate to that feeling.

When you’re looking for someone, it’s easy to get caught in an emotional spiral — the more you can’t find them, the more anxious you get; the more anxious you get, the more you search haphazardly; the more haphazard your search, the less likely you are to find them, which makes you even more anxious.

It’s a vicious cycle.

This is exactly what the Top Line of the Tun Hexagram calls “泣血涟如”. It’s not that not finding someone is the bad thing — it’s that you wear yourself out first.

I told him, “Calm down first. Searching this way won’t make you more likely to find him, but it’s very likely you’ll break down first.”

Searching for a person is just like searching for a lost object.

The more frantically you look for it, the more you can’t find it. Once you stop looking, it turns up on its own.

This isn’t mysticism. When you’re panicking, you’re blind — you only see what you want to see, only look in the places you think are right, and you miss the truly important clues.

Once you calm down and your mind clears up, all the details you overlooked before will start popping up one by one.

So the first meaning of the Top Line of the Tun Hexagram is — don’t panic. Panicking does no good; it only makes things worse.

Why Do Three Lines of the Tun Hexagram Have “乘马班如”, But Only the Top Line Has “泣血涟如”?

Have you noticed that “乘马班如” appears three times in the Tun Hexagram?

The Second Line (Six in the Second Place) says: “屯如邅如，乘马班如 (Tún rú zhān rú, chéng mǎ bān rú)” — hard, but there’s still hope; if you wait ten years, you’ll get what you’re waiting for.

The Fourth Line (Six in the Fourth Place) says: “乘马班如，求婚媾往吉 (Chéng mǎ bān rú, qiú hūn gòu wǎng jí)” — hard, but moving downward, you can find support from the First Line; head in the right direction and there’s a way out.

When you get to the Top Line, it’s still “乘马班如”, but followed by “泣血涟如”.

Why, when all are stuck between advance and retreat, is the Top Line so desperate that it weeps blood?

Because the Second Line has time — it’s young, it can afford to wait. The Fourth Line has support — there’s someone below to help it.

What about the Top Line? It has nothing.

Time is almost up, the people below can’t be reached, and there’s no path above. Looking around in all directions, there’s nothing — isolated and helpless.

But this is precisely the start of a turning point.

Why? Because when you have nothing left, you can finally let go of your obsessions.

Before, you thought: I *must* find him, I *must* find him right now, I *must* find him my way. These obsessions trap you, spinning in place.

When you reach the Top Line, you realize — I can’t do any of that anymore.

Then what? Then you let go.

Once you let go, your mind opens up instead.

Before, you only searched in one direction. Now that you’ve let go of hope, you start noticing other clues. Before, you only thought “Why isn’t he replying to me?” Now you start thinking “Where might he have gone?”

The “泣血涟如” of the Tun Hexagram’s Top Line is not the end. It’s when you’ve cried out all your obsessions, so you can travel light and start over.

That’s also why the Tun Hexagram is followed by the Meng Hexagram — when hardship reaches its extreme, that’s the beginning of enlightenment.

The Right Way to Search for Someone: Steady Yourself First, Then Find a Path

After all that, how exactly should you go about searching for someone?

I have three suggestions. They’re not mystical methods — just lessons from people who’ve been through it.

**First: Steady yourself first.**

Searching for someone is a protracted battle, not a blitzkrieg. You can’t burn yourself out right at the start.

Eat when you should eat, sleep when you should sleep, go to work when you should go to work. It’s not that you don’t care — it’s that worrying doesn’t help. If you wear yourself out, there’ll be no one left to look for him.

For that reader of mine, I told him to set a rule for himself — search at two fixed times every day, and go about your business the rest of the time. For example, check for messages once when you wake up in the morning, and once again before bed at night. Don’t refresh in between.

He couldn’t do it at first — he couldn’t help checking. But after getting used to it, he actually felt less tormented.

Steadying yourself is the first step to searching for someone. It’s also the most important step.

**Second: Don’t only look in one direction.**

When someone goes missing, a lot of people’s first reaction is — call them, send WeChat messages, refresh their Moments.

Once they’ve done all that and it doesn’t work, they panic.

But think about it — if someone really doesn’t want you to find them, they definitely won’t be in the places you usually look.

You need to shift your way of thinking.

For example: places he usually hangs out? Cities he mentioned wanting to visit before? His closest friends that you don’t know very well? Does he have any alternate social media accounts?

Even think the other way around — where is he *least* likely to go? Sometimes the least likely place is exactly where he’s gone.

Wen Laoshi often says that searching for someone is the same as searching for an answer — the more you stare at one spot looking for it, the less you’ll find it. When you look away, the answer pops up on its own.

**Third: Leave the other person some space.**

This one is especially important.

Not every case of going out of touch means something bad happened. Sometimes, people just want to hide for a while.

Maybe they ran into trouble and don’t want you to know. Maybe they’re in a bad mood and want to be alone. Or maybe they’re just tired and want to disappear for a while.

If that’s the case, the harder you chase them, the deeper they’ll hide.

What you need to do isn’t dig them out — it’s let them know: I’m here. Whenever you want to come back, you can find me anytime.

Send a message, don’t pressure them to reply, just say: “I know you might be going through something. I won’t bother you. Reach out when you need me — I’m always here.”

That’s enough.

Once they’ve recovered and sorted things out, they’ll come back on their own.

A melon forced off the vine isn’t sweet. A person you track down against their will won’t have their heart in it.

A Few Final Words

About two weeks later, that reader got back to me.

He said his friend had reached out. He’d just run into some trouble at work, was under too much pressure, and had gone off to be alone for a while. Now he’d adjusted and was back.

He said, “I was so frantic before, and it turned out he just wanted some peace and quiet. Thinking back, it’s kind of funny.”

I said, “It’s not funny. For the person doing the searching, that agony is real.”

But you have to remember — most of the time, things aren’t as bad as you think.

The “泣血涟如” of the Tun Hexagram’s Top Line looks scary, but it’s actually a turning point.

When hardship reaches its extreme, it has to turn back.

何可长也 — this state can’t last long.

Whether you’re searching for a person, a lost object, or a relationship, the hardest time is often right before the turning point arrives.

All you have to do is hold on.

Don’t panic, don’t rush, don’t lose your head.

Wait for the fog to lift, and the path will appear on its own.