Sloppy Zhang

I know this is an old post, but I'm surprised it didn't get any replies I find this subject really interesting, especially about the whole "relaxation effect" and stuff.

I think it depends a lot on the type of standing practice you are learning. If you are learning a Shaolin type of horse stance (like the one you linked) which involves long hours of holding (usually pretty forcefully, as you are shaking a lot at the beginning) a particular stance, for strength or for energy, then, yeah, I'd say you can mess yourself up. But you can mess yourself up forcefully doing ANYTHING for hours on end. With my experience with B.K. Frantzis' standing method taught in his books, the body naturally corrects itself if you do it right. We usually develop pretty bad posture during our lives/day to day habits, but a lot of that is because of the tension we carry around in our muscles- we force ourselves to adopt certain postures. And we even sleep carrying a lot of that tension! But when you start releasing that tension, you ease up on the system. Suddenly, the system, your body, wants to return back to it's natural state. I, at least, thought that I was straight and relaxed, then suddenly I have an urge to move. I do, and I find out that I naturally shift into a posture that is much better than the one I had before, and much more relaxed. For a while while after meditation, my posture is near perfect, but as the day goes on I usually revert back to my poor posture from bad habits little by little. People who have known me for a long time noticed how my posture dramatically changes, a lot of times I don't even notice anymore, how it is straighter, more vertical, but isn't tense or rigid. So I think if you practice a truly relaxing form of standing, one in which you let go of a need to be in control, the body will do what it needs to do to fix itself. The whole reason our bodies evolved the way it did was to conserve energy- comparing how we walk on two legs to how a monkey walks on two legs, it shows that the monkey wastes lots of energy, but human movement is very efficient and graceful. It's just how we are, but our mental thoughts have the power to override the system controls sometimes, and mess the whole thing up. But if you can get in tune with your body, you can figure out what it wants to do to become more efficient, and you can do it. Once you get a better posture, good things start happening, and once you get a good sense of what posture your body needs to be in to be healthy and have a relaxed energy flow and good circulation (sometimes quickly sometimes not, depends) then you can begin to take on other stances and know when you are doing something right or wrong (sometimes the entire stance will feel wrong!!!) just by listening to your body.

Hmm, crazy. The only times that I've dissolved anything that could be considered "aura" (just an inch or so off my body) is sometimes after dissolving a physical spot, I sometimes feel stuff just above the surface of my skin floating around in the air, sort of like a blockage. I'll dissolve that too on my way down, just figured it was another part of the dissolving. Are there any practices or methods to keep entities and stuff away? I know in one of his books Bruce mentions how he went through formal Daoist training, in prying, blessing, charging, cleansing rooms, and things of that nature (if I recall correctly). Western magick traditions are really big on stuff like the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram. I was wondering if there were any sort of practices like that to sort of "close off" your space before you started to work? I know that sometimes the idea of "closing yourself off from the world" doesn't sound like a mature thing to do, but sometimes it might be handy to know.

I was raised Catholic. Some of the worst experiences of my life were in Catholic School, I was picked on, I received no practical help from any teachers or any members of the Church. It was a very closed off group, anyone different was outcast pretty harshly, and I was different. So for me, it didn't help at all, turned me away from Catholicism and Christianity in general. Did some other stuff, got into other spiritual methods, Zen, Daoism, things like that. Then looking back on Christianity, and Catholicism, there's a lot of stuff in there I agree with and could get behind. The thing with religions is that it provides a good community to grow up in, assuming you can fit into it in the first place (which I personally did not but there are others who do). I know a lot of Christians and Catholics at the college I am at now, they all have groups of students that they can hang out with. They throw parties and take trips on the weekends that don't involve alcohol, everyone believes in abstinence until marriage, there's no "funny business" going on. They don't watch movies that have bad messages, they don't do drugs, and in general are honest people and very safe to be around. I am genuinely happy knowing that there are college students that behave that way in the modern world, and it's fun to hang out with them and sometimes I think I could start going to Church and hanging out with these people full time and get back into being a "Christian". But it's just not for me. Good community, if you find that you fit into that crowd. Since your nephew would grow up in it, he would generally have a good access to friends and people to look out for him at any time really. The only thing to look out for is extremism in beliefs- which is a problem for anyone, regardless of what their beliefs are. The people in the community where I grew up in were extremely conservative and they were extremely closed off from other groups and passed severe judgment that stuck with you for as long as they knew you. That's no good. But a lot of the Christians and Catholics that I know of now are extremely tolerant, will hang out with you even if you don't believe what they believe, and are willing to listen out to any alternative beliefs- they just practice what they practice and are very cool about it and have a very good community backing what they do- positive peer pressure, if you will. So see if you can meet some of your brother-in-law's other Catholic friends, or, you know, talk about religion and spirituality about him directly. Ask him how exactly he tends to raise him, will he teach his son about other faiths? What lessons will he teach him, believe in yourself and your own connection to God (through Jesus) or just play a puppet to whatever Church doctrine happens to be at the time? No offense, but assuming that your brother-in-law believes and acts a certain way because he's Catholic is just as bad as assuming stuff about Muslims or New Agers or any other group- everyone is different, even if they do identify with a group.

I don't want to speak for cloudhand, but I do believe "LBROTP" refers to the "Lesser Banishing Ritual Of The Pentagram", it's a ritual taught in a lot of western magick traditions (most notably ones influenced by the Golden Dawn) which involves drawing a circle and drawing pentagrams while charging them with the various names of God, then evoking the four Archangels from the different directions to guard you. The point is basically to create a space for you to work in that is devoid of outside influences. It can also be combined with the Middle Pillar Ritual to bring pure energy down from the universe and through you to purify the inside of your body, so you are basically creating an energetic "clean zone", meaning you can work pretty much anywhere. It's good for clearing out a space to work, settling your mind, and preparing your body. The more experience you have and the more energy you put into it the more effective it will be, if doing rituals like this is your kind of thing.

Well he could have been enlightened. But he also worked in movies, I'm sure worked on choreography, so he had a sense of how a fight would look to a camera from any angle- even his own fights. This probably helped in the moment because it helps you detach from all the feelings and emotions and bodily responses that are going on in the moment and probably making your judgment poor. And because of his movie career he could probably predict some trends, namely movies like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. But he was also pretty spiritual/philosophical when it came to his fighting philosophy, so maybe he realized something (sort of like Miyamoto Musashi)

They all seem pretty legit in terms of what they are teaching- each one of them seems to be pretty straightforward in what they learned from who and what they taught. Then again, sometimes people take one seminar with someone and turn around and say, "yeah I studied with so-and-so". Luckily with tai chi, as far as forms go, they are pretty standard. So yeah, like Rainbow Vein said, you're gonna have to go to each of them and feel them out. The big question would be: what do you hope to learn from them? Do you want to do tai chi for exercise? Do you want to incorporate energy and qigong in the future? Do you want to be able to use this stuff in a fight? Again, since the forms are pretty standard (the main ones, anyway) if you just want the health benefits and gentle, relaxed exercise, and no style preference, might as well go with the cheapest one. But if you want something else, you are going to have to just visit each one. While all of these may teach you the same form as someone from another school from the same style (Yang style, Wu style, etc) they might not all be the same in terms of combat effectiveness, but again that's something you're going to have to find out by going there and talking or pushing with some of the people that teach/learn there.

She likes how she looks. She has a job that she is proud of. Other people like how she looks. She has a significant other who likes her for how she looks. ...... Most people would bend over backwards (and in fact, do a lot more than that) to get just ONE of those things. Looks like she has it all. As long as she genuinely feels that way about all of the above, why not just let her be happy? Unless she is deceiving herself. Then again, we can deceive ourselves no matter what the situation is, so that doesn't really hurt her case.

Thanks for posting this.

It's as productive as you make it. When learning on your own, you get exactly what you put in. If you only put in a little work, you only get a little results. If you think of it 24/7 for years, then you will get that much returned to you. But it has to be quality. Not quite sure exactly what you mean, but you utilize corrections in the situations in which you need to use them. For martial applications, that means you use them in a fight. For spiritual/lifestyle applications, you use them in your day to day life. In a fight, you will know you fail when you get punched in the face, or choked out, or submitted. In a spiritual/lifestyle/health sense, you will know by how much there has been a change, positive or negative, in your life. Some of these things require time to see their efforts, some of them do not. When training with a teacher, you know you are doing it wrong because your teacher says, "you will lose in a fight if you do it that way." And you're like, "yeah yeah yeah, whatever". Then you keep doing your forms practice, or your cooperative two man routine. Or maybe you keep doing your light contact sparring. Maybe your teacher is strict and will hit you on the back of the head. Yeah, well, big deal. But when you are on the ring or on the mat with someone who wants to PUT YOU DOWN, they aren't trying to help you, they aren't trying to make you better, they are trying to knock you the fuck out, well, you are going to learn pretty damn quick. It's a survival thing. Your body starts learning what works and what doesn't, then hard wires it into the system. Yeah, it's hard to practice an internal art in a high stress situation because your body has a natural tendency to, well, tense up. But that's part of the training, and that's why again I say training on your own is harder: you have to be able to step outside of yourself in a highly tense situation, look at yourself as a third party would, and say, "you're doing it wrong, change, I know it goes against what every cell in your body is screaming right now, but you gotta relax/change your structure/whatever you need to do at the time". And the ability to do that extends far, far beyond martial applications. Six months with a teacher making corrections to a form and you going, "okay, I hear you, and I trust that this will work in real life eventually" is absolute peanuts compared to six minutes in a ring or on the mat telling YOURSELF, "if I keep doing it wrong I am going to get knocked out or choked out." Yeah, friends are great, but sometimes you gotta go it alone.

I found my concentration went up dramatically after a couple of weeks doing Franz Bardon's practices. Classes and labs that seemed to drag on forever and ever and ever seemed to fly by in minutes and I always seemed to be on task. The practices that helped me were mostly single pointed meditation- focus intently and exclusively on one sense (one visual image, one auditory image, an image that you feel, an image you smell, and an image that you taste, as well as keeping your mind only on one particular thought or object in front of you). The only downside is that sometimes intense concentration can produce tension, so after a while, if left unchecked, you might encounter some problems with that. So balance out concentration with relaxation practices. Think of it like working out and exercising- sometimes you want muscles to tense, sometimes you want them to relax. Both are required for healthiness. Anyway, good luck!

Thanks, but there are definitely much more experienced people on this board with the dissolving method who could probably help you a lot better. Wait around for some of their replies

*Disclaimer- I've learned exclusively from the books and my own personal experience, no in person teacher-* Dissolving can be done at any layer- physical, qi, and down on through. So where you start and where you focus, in my experience, depends on what you want to focus on. If I just want to focus on physical, I'll start at the top of my head and dissolve through to and including the bottom of my feet. If I want to dissolve my physical and qi bodies, I'll start a little bit above my head and end a little bit below my feet (I basically try to feel as far above or below as I possibly can) and when I dissolve, I release things out as far as I can feel- to the edge of my aura. The dissolving process can be done standing, sitting, moving, lying down, and during sexual activity- the five modes of life, basically. Standing is good to learn at the beginning because that is the easiest to keep all the alignments in check. Sitting is good for people who don't have the stamina to do long periods of standing practice, but it is easier to fall out of alignment and to sit improperly, so you have to be double vigilant. Lying down can also be tricky in the sense that you can get out of alignment, lose continuous full concentration on what you are doing, and even fall asleep! (good to get rest though, most of us need it anyway!) Moving involves walking meditation, including circle walking. And dissolving during sex harnesses the energy that is aroused during sexual activity. Now for area specific healing, I have used the dissolving method in a localized place and it works quite well. But be sure to keep a few things in perspective: 1) I always keep at least part of my focus on the dantien, even if I am focused on one other area. In fact, when doing any dissolving anywhere I always keep focus on the dantien, it's just a good rule of thumb, keeps you centered and balanced. 2) I dissolve the general area as well as the specific area that is in pain, and I am sure to get it all "out", as in, dissolve out to the edge of the aura. 3) Have a general awareness of the balance of your body. While you can focus on one specific area, I have found too much dissolving in one area tends to make me feel a little bit off kilter, like I'm too heavy or too light in one area. So after a while, make sure you do a few rounds of dissolving everything that you can, and don't do too much area specific dissolving. Also, dissolving another area can help with the area in question. For a detailed look, I suppose you can find TCM charts of acupuncture points, various meridians, and channels to see what specific areas are connected to the area you want to fix, but I find that it is best to feel it out yourself. Follow the pain, where else in the body is the pain connected to? Dissolve that as well. As you follow it around, you find that you cover most of your body anyway And remember at the end to ground out all the energy, as in, release everything into the ground from your feet and hands. And don't immediately get up and go do something after dissolving, take a few minutes to relax and ease your body back into some functioning mode. A few other points of non dissolving advice: Take it easy with your body! Your body has tons of natural ability to heal if you just LET it. Don't try to MAKE, instead, LET. Try not to focus too much on the area that is bothering you- the more attention you give it, the more awareness is drawn to it, and the more problems you will seem to have. Let your body balance itself out. If you have a normal exercise routine, cut it down for a few days. Take walks. Get lots of fresh air. Examine your diet, and eat healthfully as you can. Also, I have it made it to inner dissolving, still on the outer dissolving material! Hope that helped!

Well as cat has already pointed out, you seem to have the answer. Also, in your own words, you have already learned not to jump like a gorilla every time something happens, and you've also learned about not giving them the satisfaction- so in a sense they can, and have, helped with developing certain attributes. And I know you said that "parasite" is a human construct, and I'll agree, but in general it may help to think of it like this: things stay around places where they can live, ie where they can find food. Entities, like anything else, stick around places that are conducive to their survival and avoid places that are not. So the fact that they are around means something in your life- the moods you typically are in, the energy you send out, the environment in which you live, etc- attracts them or gives them an energy source. If you want to get rid of them, cut their energy source. Be careful with the thoughts you have and the energy you project. If you are doing any practices, change them up a bit. Or, if you don't want to drive them away, and want to use them, experiment with creating different types of environments, being in different moods, giving/receiving different types of energy, thoughts, etc etc.

Well Wan is the guy who was most of the reason for why I got into meditation- I watched his videos a long time ago, the ones dealing with manifestation, and was really amazed at the concept of using meditation to actually do something. So he really changed the way in which I viewed meditation and spirituality in general. Buuuuuuut as someone else pointed out, there reaches a time when you outgrow those people. For me it happened when Wan, for whatever reason, "left", shut down his site and went to do mysterious other things (train with a Daoist master? Move on to another new internet venture?) I dunno, I moved on and searched for other teachers, other types of meditation. Many people did not. When he came back (after giving people time to grow? When he realized he still had a huge following?) a lot of people were glad to see him- I really was not. He said a lot of good things. He said a lot of the right things. I don't think they were ALL the right things. But they were enough of the right things to make him sound like he knew what he was talking about. He seemed to me like one of those math "proofs", the ones where you prove 1=0 or 1=2, they look legitimate and have many correct steps, but also have one or two hidden steps in there that SEEM right, but are really mathematically false, that someone with a surface level of math knowledge would miss. He also seems to be INCREDIBLY sensitive- leave a comment on any of his videos that even slightly rubs him the wrong way and he will strongly insult you and then block you from his channel. I pointed out an inconsistency he made in a more recent video compared to one from a long time ago, and he completely just went off on me. I'm not personally out to get him, but it seemed very telling of his demeanor. So, in my very humble opinion, just off the mark. He has a website, journik.com and also journic.com and recently did sort of a "promotional campaign" for his horse stance, gi ma sae, by having everyone make a video of them doing it. Really turned out a lot of hits, and if you type in "gi ma sae" to google you wind up with a lot of their videos and a lot of his websites. He also gave a "Dong Han Pai" certification test here so, as you can see, is doing a lot of things. Most of it's not really for me, but he does do a lot to bring meditation to people who otherwise wouldn't do it.

Under a teacher? No. But Chen style taiji really interested me, so I got as many Chen style resources as I could find, books, videos, etc on the form, the application, the standing posture training- then got to work. I'd stand in the standing posture and try to have my friends push me over, and keep examining my form and compare it to the masters (people like Chen Xiaowang, for example) until I started making progress. Not perfect, but much harder to push over. I routinely wrestle my friends who do either wrestling or Brazilian Jujutsu, and put the concepts into practice. I lose a lot at the beginning, but once you get the feel for it, how to listen to an opponent, you start to make a lot of progress. It's a pretty steep learning curve and you encounter a lot of failure at the beginning, but once everything clicks and you see the interconnectedness of everything, you make a lot of progress until the next plateau. And I have a big karate background, and a lot of the people who I trained in karate with were just brawlers- they'd run up to you and start punching the crap out of you, so I always keep fighters like that in mind during my training too. Is it perfect? Not really. But I think it is much closer to how internal martial arts were originally developed. Books like those written by B.K. Frantzis really helped because they show the principles that are always in play. A lot of books on the internal arts say stuff like, "full, relaxed body movement", but what does that mean? B.K. Frantzis goes into detail not only on exactly what that means, but how to do it. The rest is just practice, failure, practice, failure, failure, practice, practice, success, failure, practice, practice, failure, practice, success, practice, success, failure, failure, practice, and more and more of that. Whenever you have a problem, ALWAYS go back to basics.

The best way to learn body mechanics if you don't have a teacher is to put it into practice- Go down to a MMA gym, BJJ school, boxing school, whatever, or find friends that train in various arts, and spar them. MMA gyms and pretty much any other schools have people sparring from near the very beginning, so if you say you want to test out some stuff I am sure they will accommodate you. And in the beginning as you get stuff down you will lose. A lot. You will fail. A lot. And you know the quickest way for your body to figure out what it needs to do to prevent getting hit in the face? That's right, it needs to get hit in the face. Yes, it's easy to just fall off and decide to just learn boxing, especially when faced with a boxer who keeps beating you. But if you go back to your material, keep practicing, stick with the basics, and play around with the techniques a little bit, it WILL happen. Slowly, yes, and with a lot of humiliation along the way. But that's good for the ego, right? Don't want to get too full of yourself, right? Plus, you will never be without a sparring partner because they will always think they can beat you, inflating their egos, when really, you are the one getting the benefit But Ramon was pretty clear that he wasn't interested in martial application so much as health, so I left that bit out. But if you are interested in functional IMA without a teacher, that is how you do it. You have to swallow your pride and be willing to take a beating. But how is that any different from learning from an IMA master? I haven't studied from the DVD's, yin style bagua isn't something I'm interested in studying in at the moment, but I have had a lot of discussions with the two users I linked to previously about baguazhang, they both said the DVD's were excellent, very specific, and on top of the forms gave lots of conditioning exercises and techniques to be practiced on their own (for example, individual strikes, that are incorporated in the forms later on.) Here's a copy of a message I got from artemus18 about the structure of the DVD's and the system:

Don't mean to speak for any mods, but the last post quoted by Taomeow involved a racial slur, and the whole thread from the beginning seemed sort of on the "hot" side- a lot of discussion about various schools of political and economic thought, as well as some pretty harsh personal attacks from and towards members that, frankly, I as a member of the board was pretty shocked to see. But that's just my perspective

I think the best attitude to have is, instead of not believing anything until you see proof otherwise, is to withhold your judgment until you see something that makes you lean one way or another. There are lots of people making lots of claims out there. I don't think that believing all of them until they disprove you (by, say, sexually abusing someone, getting their butt kicked in a bullshido throwdown, stealing money, etc etc) is any way to go, as you can easily be taken advantage of. But not believing anyone until they prove to you otherwise (they are super healthy even into their late years, they can demonstrate some sort of ability, they visit you in dreams, you feel energy transmission, etc etc) is any way to go either, because there is a lot of good stuff written by just plain people- they might not have reached the highest of immortal heights in their lifetime, but the advice they give comes from a life well lived, and to not listen to that advice because they don't pass some immortal test isn't a very good strategy either. Which is why, again, one should try to withhold judgment until enough information is given. This, in my opinion, doesn't conflict with having a skeptical, or inquisitive mind, and it doesn't turn you into some mindless "follow the leader" zombie either. Everyone has to be on one side of the fence or the other these days- you either have to believe a teacher is legit, or believe he is full of crap. Why can't you just not comment because you haven't met the teacher or practiced their stuff? There's nothing wrong with not having an opinion on someone or something.

You are that way because you think you are that way. You make yourself that way. I just went out to a few places. On Friday night you see a bunch of people, guys and girls, people dating. I see really attractive looking women with not very attractive men ALL the time. Some guys just don't have good faces, some have thinning hair, some aren't in that great of shape, but if you look at the women they are laughing and enjoying themselves, and so are the guys. What's the deal? The guys don't let their looks or their personality or their social situation stand in the way of interacting with women. When the women meet these guys, they see guys who don't think anything can stop them. So you know what? Nothing stops them. You aren't going to hit it off with every single person you meet, that's just a fact of life. But you are never going to hit it off with anyone if you just flat out never try.

I can't really comment on the other DVD's, I'm just not familiar enough with their styles. Two youtube users have uploaded some videos of them practicing techniques from the lion bagua dvd: BaguaJunkie artemus18 So that can give you some idea of what the forms look like.

What I mean is that for a couple of days (up to a week) try not to worry about it- you still might feel a bit weird, but try to ignore it, and let your body rest. Then masturbate or have sex like normal- don't try and retain, don't try and build energy, don't try and clear anything out too fast, just go with it and relax into it. Then don't do anything for a few days and let your body rest and heal, then go again and have normal sex/masturbation. What this does, in my experience, is get the body used to just relax and enjoy the feelings, rather than trying to get hung up on holding on to a certain feeling or trying to maintain a certain state. Also, if something is damaged or something is worn out or you have buildup somewhere, this gives you a chance to clean everything out. Well there's plenty of experience around here, so don't hesitate to ask at all Every time is going to be different. Try not to hold on to a certain idea that one type of ejaculation or feeling is the "right" one, or is a "normal" one, and every time you don't have an ejaculation like that you are having a problem. That kind of thinking is just going to keep you obsessed with it, and you'll never be able to move on. Your body remembers what you want to remember, and what you signal it to remember. If you put all kinds of signals and triggers and stress and stuff into a certain feeling- those are all chemicals and nerve impulses that are associated with that feeling, so your body comes to expect those chemicals and nerve impulses to go along with that feeling. So the next time you feel those chemicals, your body remembers the feeling and you feel the feeling. Next time you feel the feeling, your body will remember the chemicals and nerve impulses, and those will be triggered. It's a simple matter of classical conditioning once you've been conditioned to react one way (whether you consciously do it or not) you have to take time to decondition yourself and recondition yourself into new ways- which does take time. Let it be and trust in your body. The body is amazingly resilient, and naturally tends toward a middle of the road approach to homeostasis (basically keeping itself balanced), and the body is constantly regenerating new cells, constantly trying to heal itself. But what happens when you get stuck on these thoughts and feelings is that you don't let your body regenerate. Read this article here on intrusive thoughts Basically what's happening is that everyone gets aroused, it's natural to get aroused, it's natural to masturbate. But what occurred somewhere along the line is that you attached some kind of significance to a certain feeling, or a certain type of arousal- so that when you didn't experience it, it felt "weird" and you kept focusing on it, and when you did experience it, you just reinforced the feeling that that feeling was the type of experience that you wanted. So it all stems from the fact that you have attached meaning to stuff that basically has no inherent meaning- and you are trying to resolve that meaning. But in the long run, that is going to lead you to even more problems. Which is why again, the best thing you can do is to let go of all that, relax, feel what your body feels, but don't get attached or too worried about what the feeling is or what the feeling means. Your body will heal if you let it, you just have to get your mind out of the way.

I find it ridiculous how much hype people give to the IMA, that they are some kind of highly spiritual near magical supernatural skills that can only be cultivated in a certain way and if you do them wrong you will be doomed to failure and rejection for the next 10,000 lifetimes. Seriously. Taiji came from a highly experienced martial artist who began to study the human body, and how the body can move naturally and in the most efficient way possible to defeat someone without injuring your own body or doing techniques which will deteriorate your body. The origins of bagua are quite mysterious, but as a daoist internal art, it's safe to say that many techniques in bagua were derived from stillness, listening to the body, observing how the body can move, observing where energy flows most naturally, and moving in such as way as to harness the way the body naturally moves to an effective fighting system. So, what does this mean? It means that if you shut down your rational mind with all the doubts, get rid of all your egotistical preconceived notion about what a badass you are and how you can learn it all on your own, get rid of the preconceived notions of how badass IMA are and how impossible they are to learn, you relax, stick with the basics, listen to your body, and experiment enough, you WILL get it. That said, I highly recommend "Opening the Energy Gates of Your Body" by B.K. Frantzis, as well as "Relaxing Into Your Being" and "The Great Stillness" (The Great Stillness teaches a basic circle walking routine, and Relaxing into your being gives you the foundation for that). All of the books introduce you to Daoist principles which are present in pretty much all the internal martial arts- if you understand those methods, then when you go to learn bagua from a DVD you won't just be learning the technique, and you can incorporate some background knowledge. Learn the basics, and read read read read read. Read everything. There is so much material on the internal martial arts, both for free on the internet and in book form. With a lot of reading and even more amounts of practice, you can get it done. If you are interested in yin style baguazhang, He Jinbao, a lineage holder, has a good website here with excellent articles on how one progresses in the training of yin style bagua here: http://www.yinstylebaguazhang.com/ They have a youtube page here: http://www.youtube.com/user/YSBinternational You can buy a DVD set of different animal forms here: http://traditionalstudies.org/Store/YSB_8_Animals.html He Jinbao recommends you start with the Lion system as the base, as that's easier to learn because it is the most overtly physical. Don't know about any other bagua or IMA products, but those are the ones I'd recommend, and you can do it!

I have....... no idea...... what to say....... If they can transmute lead into gold, why do they need $5???? They can support themselves!!!!! Why do there have to be 6 methods, shouldn't one suffice? I've heard a lot about where the alchemical formulas might actually be.... but ehow was a surprise to me

The thing with practicing on your own and learning from a DVD is that it requires, in my humble opinion, MORE work than if you are studying with a teacher. You have to learn, then be able to correct yourself. So I would say go ahead and do it, but keep some stuff in mind: Don't be too rigid in your practice, meaning, well, always assume you are doing something wrong, and that you are going to have to change something. Re-read or re-watch your material, constantly. The more you read stuff the more you will remember it and the more likely you are to not forget the details. You'd be surprised how you think you know something well, practice isn't working out great, then you reread something and realized you remembered it wrong the first time through- so reading it or watching it over and over is a must. Try to treat everything lightly- the lighter you treat something, the easier it is to change bad habits and let them go. People who take themselves too seriously and are too tightly wound to change mistakes, or admit that they have any, are always slow to change, so if you can have an attitude of "I can change if I want, whatever", the better- heck, bagua is all about change anyway! Relax, stick with the basics, and have fun