Luck Cycles and Yearly Luck: The Flow of Time

Luck Cycles: the big flow in 10-year units

A Luck Cycle (대운) is an energy that changes every 10 years. It is decided by moving one step at a time forward (순행) or backward (역행) from the month pillar (월주), the pillar of the birth month, in the order of the 60 gapja. If your birth chart is a car, a Luck Cycle can be likened to the road that car enters anew every 10 years.

Forward and backward

Men born in a yang year (the year stem is 甲 gap, 丙 byeong, 戊 mu, 庚 gyeong or 壬 im) and women born in a yin year (the year stem is 乙 eul, 丁 jeong, 己 gi, 辛 sin or 癸 gye) go forward, and the opposite go backward. This is why Halmeoni asks for gender. If gender is not chosen, the direction of the Luck Cycles cannot be set, so no Luck Cycle reading is given.

The age at which Luck Cycles begin

Count the days from the birth day to the next solar term (going forward) or the solar term just before (going backward), and divide by 3: this gives the age at which the first Luck Cycle starts. Three days count as one year. So the age at which the Luck Cycle changes differs from person to person, and even people born in the same year can have different Luck Cycle timing.

Halmeoni measures this distance in minutes and converts three days into one year, one day into four months, and two hours into ten days. The date on which the Luck Cycle starts is set by adding the years, months and days obtained this way to the birth date, and the age is written in international age (만 나이).

Example: counting the Luck Cycles yourself

Someone born in Seoul on 25 August 2001 at 00:50 has the year stem 辛 (yin), so a man goes backward and a woman goes forward. For a man, you count backward to the solar term just before, Ipchu (입추, the Start of Autumn, 7 August at 19:52). The gap is 24,777 minutes, about 17 days and 5 hours, which converts at three days to a year into 5 years, 8 months and 24 days. So the first Luck Cycle starts on 19 May 2007, at age 5, and runs backward one step at a time from the month pillar 丙申: 乙未, 甲午, 癸巳.

For a woman, you count forward to the next solar term, Baengno (백로, White Dew, 7 September at 22:46). That is 20,036 minutes, about 13 days and 22 hours, which gives 4 years, 7 months and 19 days; the first Luck Cycle, 丁酉, starts on 13 April 2006 and continues with 戊戌, 己亥 and 庚子. So even for people born on the same day at the same moment, both the characters and the timing of the Luck Cycles differ by gender.

As of October 2026, a man would be passing through the 甲午 Luck Cycle (2017–2027), and the 癸巳 Luck Cycle starts on 19 May 2027. The stem 甲 of the 甲午 Luck Cycle collides with the Day Master 庚 (stem clash, 천간충), and the branch 午 collides with the hour branch 子 (clash, 충). On the other hand, 甲 (wood) and 午 (fire) are among this chart's favourable elements (fire, water, wood), and they also supply Wealth (재성), which does not appear in the natal chart (원국). Both facts go into Halmeoni's reading material, and the reading, too, does not settle on either side but speaks of the two together.

When the Luck Cycle number differs from another manseryeok (perpetual calendar)

The age at which the first Luck Cycle starts is called the Luck Cycle number (대운수). For the man in the example it is 5 years, 8 months and 24 days, so Halmeoni writes age 5 (from 19 May 2007). Other manseryeok (만세력) may round this up to 6, or write it in Korean counting age (세는나이), so the number can differ by a year or two. If the start date is the same, it is the same calculation written differently.

If the birth time is not known, Halmeoni counts the Luck Cycles taking noon of that day as the time of birth. If the man in the example is counted from noon instead of 00:50, the first Luck Cycle moves about two months later, to 15 July 2007. The characters of the Luck Cycles stay the same, but the timing of the change can shift by this much.

Yearly Luck: the energy that comes in each year

Each year the characters of that year come in, and this is called Yearly Luck (세운). For example, 2026 is the year of 丙午 (byeong-o) and 2027 the year of 丁未 (jeong-mi). If a Luck Cycle is the big season, Yearly Luck is closer to the weather within that season. The energy that comes in each month (monthly luck, 월운) can be looked at in the same way.

For the example chart, 2026 is a year in which the favourable fire comes in while binding with the year pillar and colliding with the hour pillar, and 2027 is a year that brings fire along with Resource (인성), which does not appear in the natal chart. Halmeoni calculates two years in this way, this year and next, and uses them in the reading.

How is it read?

You look at whether the characters of the Luck Cycle and Yearly Luck combine with or clash with the characters of the birth chart, and whether the favourable element comes in. A time when the favourable element comes in is read as a time when things tend to go well, and a time with many clashes as a time of much change and movement.

How Halmeoni uses the Luck Cycles in a reading

If a gender has been chosen, eight Luck Cycles are calculated from the first one. For the Luck Cycle you are passing through now and the ones immediately before and after it, the Ten Gods, Twelve Life Stage, Twelve Spirits, combinations and clashes with the natal chart, favourable element and the Ten Gods they supply are all written out in detail; for distant Luck Cycles, only what they bring is noted briefly. The "Luck Cycles and the flow of life" part of the reading uses this material to speak most fully about the current and next Luck Cycles, and treats past and distant Luck Cycles briefly. The Luck Cycle and the year's characters are each compared with the birth chart, and the relation between the Luck Cycle and the year is not calculated separately.

Common misunderstandings

• Men go forward and women go backward: the direction is set by looking at gender together with the yin-yang of the birth year. A man born in a yin year goes backward, and a woman goes forward.
• The year a Luck Cycle changes is always hard: there is a tradition that sees such times as prone to a cluster of changes because the energy is shifting, but Halmeoni does not forecast difficulty merely because a Luck Cycle changes.
• In a good Luck Cycle everything goes well: a time when the favourable element comes in is read only as a good time to put your strength to use. Even within the same Luck Cycle, the energy that comes in differs from year to year.
• Luck Cycles change every 10 years at New Year: the day a Luck Cycle changes differs from person to person and is set by the distance between the moment of birth and the solar term.

Frequently asked questions

• What if I do not choose a gender? The direction of the Luck Cycles cannot be set, so no Luck Cycle reading is given, and only each year's luck (Yearly Luck) is looked at.
• Can the first Luck Cycle start near age 0 or age 10? Yes. If you were born just before or after a solar term and the distance counted is short, it starts at age 0–1; if it is almost a month, at age 9–10. A woman born in Seoul on 10 October 1988 at 23:30 was born in a 戊 (yang) year, so she goes backward, and since she was born a little over two days after the solar term just before, Hallo (한로, Cold Dew, 8 October), her first Luck Cycle starts at age 0, around 10 months after birth.
• Up to what age are Luck Cycles looked at? Eight are calculated from the first one, that is, a little over 80 years. For the man in the example, that is from age 5 to around 85.
• Are days or months looked at too? The saju (Four Pillars astrology) reading covers the Luck Cycles and the Yearly Luck of this year and next. Day-by-day luck is looked at separately in the "Daily Fortune".