These are not separate clocks. They are one wheel turning inside another. The year sets the theme of the season of your life-year. The solar term (~15 days) is the body's true mid-rhythm. The real "week" runs on the sun, not seven days. The day carries today's character. The hour is the moment you act. Read outward for theme, inward for timing.
The Twelve Hours · 十二時辰
Each branch holds two hours and its own quality. The lit one is now. The others tell you when the day leans toward beginning, peak, retreat, or rest.
萬年曆Wàn nián lì: the Ten-Thousand-Year Calendar. A perpetual almanac mapping every day to its energetic signature.今日 / 命Jīn rì "this day" · Mìng "life / the chart one is born into."天干Heavenly Stems: ten signatures (甲乙丙丁戊己庚辛壬癸), the five elements in their yang and yin forms. The visible character of a pillar.地支Earthly Branches: twelve (子丑寅卯辰巳午未申酉戌亥), the year-animals and the carriers of season and hour.五行Five Elements: Wood 木, Fire 火, Earth 土, Metal 金, Water 水. The phases all energy moves through.四柱Four Pillars: Year, Month, Day, Hour. Four nested wheels of time. Together, a life.日主Day Master: the day's stem, read as the self: the element you are.十神Ten Gods: how every other force in the chart relates to the self: support, expression, wealth, authority, resource.
Solar terms compute astronomically to within ~10 minutes. For a birth on a solar-term knife-edge, confirm against an authoritative 萬年曆. True solar time here is longitude-corrected (the equation of time, ±16 min, is not applied) and historical daylight-saving should be verified for the birth year. A chart is a mirror for practice, not a verdict. The reading describes tendencies the practice refines, never fixes.