Dabbling in bagua zhang

[Prince...]

Thanks, I'm actually thinking of moving to Asheville, NC soon-ish, so that would not be far at all. Is there a website or contact info for this group?

 

Sean

Just shoot Brian a PM on emptyflower and tell him you're in the online Bagua group and would like to check out some of his classes in Murfreesboro (or he might be teaching in Franklin). His s/n is Aksijaha.

[sean]

Just shoot Brian a PM on emptyflower and tell him you're in the online Bagua group and would like to check out some of his classes in Murfreesboro (or he might be teaching in Franklin). His s/n is Aksijaha.

fantastic. thanks!

 

Sean

[sean]

for what it's worth, just got an email from folks over at energy arts. looks like they're opening up the "bagua mastery program" again to sell the last few copies, or until monday, whichever happens first. then it will close down for a year.

 

http://www.energyarts.com/offer/bagua-mastery-program-launch

$50 off coupon: taobums88

 

sean

[sifusufi]

Nice tip, thanks. Any tips for a sore ass and a weird gait for the 24 hours that follow a long ride?

 

Sean

 

My wife said "Keep riding everyday? and shovel poop for a full body workout."

(she's a barrel racing champ)

 

How goes the Bagua course?

[sean]

My wife said "Keep riding everyday? and shovel poop for a full body workout."

(she's a barrel racing champ)

 

How goes the Bagua course?

hah, tell your wife thanks for these tips.

 

bagua is going well. really i feel like a whole new world is opening for me. i'll try to communicate what that is like.

 

my core practice for many years has more or less been variations on sitting in stillness. through this i've grown familiar with certain depths of awareness, relaxation, clarity, equanimity, even bliss. the gifts of this practice do spill into my life, and yet over time a distinction between my sense of the reality i access in my sitting practice vs. "the real world" and my day to day life has grown.

 

really it was always there, and my experience now is that this distinction is, in a way, much more than just a thought. it's embedded in my structure. the very way i approach sitting meditation vs. the way i switch into walking around unconsciously when i'm "not meditating right now".

 

with bagua i've had tastes of that same oneness i experience in sitting, and yet i am simply walking. may sound trivial, but it was a real satori kind of experience for me. "wow, this too! this too." similar vibe to some of my awakenings with adyashanti, but more grounded in my body. this body. this world.

 

to be clear, from a form perspective i am surely at most a hair above downright terrible at bagua. but it feels like bagua was/is an important key to cracking open an important door just a tiny tiny sliver ... allowing something on the other side of the door that is much larger than bagua and much more than i expected to push back.

 

sean

[Ya Mu]

Just shoot Brian a PM on emptyflower and tell him you're in the online Bagua group and would like to check out some of his classes in Murfreesboro (or he might be teaching in Franklin). His s/n is Aksijaha.

Hi,

Just saw this today so I know it is an "after" type reply.

Just wanted to say I have met Brian and he is a heckuva nice guy. And obviously has been with the Bagua for quite some time.

[Red Pheonix]

I signed up for Bruce Frantzis' "Bagua Mastery Program" and received my first module last week.

 

Any other members into Bagua here?

 

Best,

Sean

 

Hey Sean! Bagua is much more sophisticated than other forms, especially in an energy respect. There are 2 Baguas, pre heaven and post heaven. The energy concept is that you are converting your bodies energy from the post heaven state to the pre heaven state. Many schools will teach you the martial side of Bagua, but have no understanding of it's internal implications; these are not to be missed though!

 

If you're just dabbling for fun then go for it, you're not going to hurt anything. If you want a more proper approach to understanding these arts I would highly suggest starting with Tai Chi. Bagua is a lot to master, Tai Chi will give you a foundation that will make that much easier. Since you are ADHD I would suggest working with arts that will help you bring balance to that. If you cannot empty your mind then none of these forms are going to give you their intended benefit; Yang Cheng Fu wrote some good stuff about this. I don't mean to discourage you, but rather encourage you! You cannot have Tai Chi if you cannot enter Wuji (passive mind state), you most certainly can't benefit from Bagua if you have no Tai Chi. If you start out with base styles like Tai Chi then the Bagua will make a lot more sense to you; learning posture basics is very important with respect to your forms coming out correctly

 

In the end you should be having fun with what ever you do, Bagua is hands down my favorite!

[Gerard]

Excellent article written by Michael Guen, Bagua brother of He Jinghan:

 

http://www.guensystem.com/vertical_article1.html

 

It captures the essence of this amazing esoteric and ancient art.

[ben]

I studied with Xe Shoude in Sydney, he teaches a style of Ba Gua not connected to Dong Haichuan. This is the current lineage holder, very powerful.My link

 

This is also worth a look, Ma Gui got the real juice from Dong Haichuan. My link

[Gerard]

Main Bagua points extracted from that excellent article I linked above:

 

"1. Comprehension of the inner and outer mechanism of internal arts, which included a mysterious highest attainment called hou qi ba gua "latter steps of ba gua otherwise known as, sheng ren zhi lu, "way of the saint."

 

 

2. It is too open and intimate, making you feel vulnerable with your feelings.

 

 

3. It offers an equal balance of warriorship, scholarship and medicine.

 

 

4. Everything about it causes one to have to let go of old preconceptions of what martial arts is, especially the value of strength.

 

 

5. The goal is not to find something —that will only kill it— but to seek the principles that already exist within you.

 

 

6. Engaging in self-inquiry under the guidance of a good teacher it will help you understand many things about Chinese culture and spirit, about human nature and the natural course of life. It is the development of a strong intelligence that makes the body strong and capable, of a caliber above the norm. This is what makes one superior as a fighter; not the endless conditioning of body parts and killer techniques. Superiority as a human therefore has nothing to do with fighting or training. Those who need to prove their self-worth by fighting are in many respects like adolescents.

 

 

7. Expanded awareness is reflected in Bagua's style of fighting as well. A master will teach you to follow the opponent and use softness to overcome hardness just as Taiji; but the approach taken to develop skills is slightly different. In bagua training there is more incremental breakdown of the joints from head to toe, and more focus on mastering the footwork.

 

 

8. The method for developing strength is very profound, as one learns movement and strength in relation to oneself rather than first learning strength by applying it to an outside body. Integration of the mind with one's own body, character and conduct with one's teacher, tradition and other relationships in one's life, are all vital to gaining unwavering mind-based strength. Most essentially, the movements and postures need to be in accordance with physiology. The inner organs and outer body regions have close functional correspondence with each other. The invisible barrier separating movement of the limbs with the internal organs must be transgressed.

 

 

9. A true master will state that bagua can never learned to the end. I am not talking about external forms, but the grasp of the three essential standards —principles of physiology, medicine and technique— to be able to move in perfect adherence to these principles, living the mystery of change within the eight trigrams, five elements, and yin yang, in every moment of one's relationships.

 

 

10. A qualified teacher and method are required to teach you how to get in touch with your internal organs. Once you find the connection between movement of the limbs and the language of the internal organs, everything you do is in harmony with your higher wisdom.

 

 

11. Enables one to gain more self-awareness, and ultimately to be able to change and deal with the stresses of life very effectively.

 

 

12. The challenge for all practitioners from lineage holder to student, in this respect, is to transcend the form of one's practice. I do not know what Yin Fu learned from Dong Haichuan. There is no proof whether it was Dong Haichuan or Yin Fu who brought in the lohan aspect to bagua. Bagua is only a li, principle. We don't really know what the original system was. What we do know for certain, however, is that the system passed on is so extraordinary and all encompassing of the essence of philosophy, medicine, mysticism, martial arts from ancient Chinese civilization, that it seems impossible one person could have created it. It's simply too vast in scope —for instance, the 64 posture pao chui "cannon fist" form, and the reason it is done on the post-heaven diagram, each trigram representing one of the eight internal organs and body regions, with change between them based on the five element diagram overlaid on top of the eight trigram template— this was likely the product of generations of collective research".

 

 

Beside the scope covered by this article, I feel that Bagua is the ultimate tool to reach spiritual enlightenment, It is the formeless shape that Daoist mountain mystics devised to attain a state of Wuji and merge with the Dao. Hence Bagua acts like channeled information from the ultimate reality.

 

This amazing art belongs to humanity and as such it should be nourished and preserved for the future generations.

 

Blessings.

 

Edited February 17, 2011 by Gerard

[candide]

I've signed up for Bruce Frantzis' Bagua Mastery Program too and been practicing it since december. I'd say on most days I like it, but sometimes I can almost hear my mind screaming as I try to pull it out of its hiding place in the head and connect it to the body, that gets very exhausting.

 

I don't know where bagua will take me, but it's kinda comforting that everyone, from bumbling idiots like me to enlightened masters walks the same circle and there's no lap counting and no finish line, you just keep walking.

[sean]

If you're just dabbling for fun then go for it, you're not going to hurt anything. If you want a more proper approach to understanding these arts I would highly suggest starting with Tai Chi. Bagua is a lot to master, Tai Chi will give you a foundation that will make that much easier. Since you are ADHD I would suggest working with arts that will help you bring balance to that. If you cannot empty your mind then none of these forms are going to give you their intended benefit; Yang Cheng Fu wrote some good stuff about this. I don't mean to discourage you, but rather encourage you! You cannot have Tai Chi if you cannot enter Wuji (passive mind state), you most certainly can't benefit from Bagua if you have no Tai Chi. If you start out with base styles like Tai Chi then the Bagua will make a lot more sense to you; learning posture basics is very important with respect to your forms coming out correctly

 

fwiw i do see "add" traits in myself but without the "h", i.e., i don't exhibit any hyperactivity. also imo "add" is a bit of a misnomer as it's not a deficit of attention, it's experienced more like a preference for intense laser-beam like focus on a single thing, accompanied by a sense of difficulty transitioning quickly from thing to thing. this attention style works great for going deep with a single thing, e.g., i can sit for hours in stillness meditation, but is problematic when i need a wider, more diffuse attention.

 

anyway, hopefully i don't really have to learn tai chi first as i have yet to experience much of a pull to that art. would you care to elaborate on how you see tai chi as a base art for learning bagua? my understanding is that bagua precedes tai chi by quite a bit.

 

Excellent article written by Michael Guen, Bagua brother of He Jinghan:

 

http://www.guensystem.com/vertical_article1.html

 

It captures the essence of this amazing esoteric and ancient art.

 

Gerard, thanks for the article and for highlighting those points.

 

if you don't mind me asking, is He Jing-han your teacher? from the little i've seen he seems amazing.

 

I've signed up for Bruce Frantzis' Bagua Mastery Program too and been practicing it since december. I'd say on most days I like it, but sometimes I can almost hear my mind screaming as I try to pull it out of its hiding place in the head and connect it to the body, that gets very exhausting.

 

I don't know where bagua will take me, but it's kinda comforting that everyone, from bumbling idiots like me to enlightened masters walks the same circle and there's no lap counting and no finish line, you just keep walking.

hear hear!

 

...

 

if bagua keeps hold of my tail over the next year or two, i'm considering spending a few months in taipei to study chinese and practice with Luo Dexiu.

 

 

sean

[Ya Mu]

fwiw i do see "add" traits in myself but without the "h", i.e., i don't exhibit any hyperactivity. also imo "add" is a bit of a misnomer as it's not a deficit of attention, it's experienced more like a preference for intense laser-beam like focus on a single thing, accompanied by a sense of difficulty transitioning quickly from thing to thing. this attention style works great for going deep with a single thing, e.g., i can sit for hours in stillness meditation, but is problematic when i need a wider, more diffuse attention.

 

anyway, hopefully i don't really have to learn tai chi first as i have yet to experience much of a pull to that art. would you care to elaborate on how you see tai chi as a base art for learning bagua? my understanding is that bagua precedes tai chi by quite a bit.

 

 

 

Gerard, thanks for the article and for highlighting those points.

 

if you don't mind me asking, is He Jing-han your teacher? from the little i've seen he seems amazing.

 

 

hear hear!

 

...

 

if bagua keeps hold of my tail over the next year or two, i'm considering spending a few months in taipei to study chinese and practice with Luo Dexiu.

 

 

sean

I would say go for what you like. I don't practice Tai Jee Or Bagua but I will tell you that there is no need practicing something you don't like. Quite a long time ago I studied with Master Chang, who in his 90's still referred to himself as Chen Pan Ling's senior student. He lived in NO and I drove from the far side (about an hr) of Jackson to see him. I wanted to learn his Hsing I and didn't care about the tai jee but he made me do it concurrently. Long story short; the Hsing I somewhat stuck and I STILL don't like Tai Jee as a personal practice. Study what you like, I say.

[Sloppy Zhang]

I would say go for what you like. I don't practice Tai Jee Or Bagua but I will tell you that there is no need practicing something you don't like.

 

This.

 

And if you believe the history that B.K. Frantzis is telling, Daoist monks were walking the circle as part of practice for a long time (potentially thousands of years) before tai chi even existed. So the whole "the progression of practice goes from tai chi to bagua" is just one way of looking at it.

 

In fact, if look at the progression of his books "Relaxing Into Your Being" and "The Great Stillness", he teaches the straight line and circle walking as the intro to walking meditation. Bagua would then stem from the walking meditation.

 

Of course, tai chi could also fit the bill.

 

But I certainly don't think you have to choose/do one before the other. Like Ya Mu said, do what you like. And like RV mentioned, go by your intuition. If practicing bagua feels like that's the direction your practices need to go/are going, go with it, and don't necessarily feel the need to pick up something else because that's the "proper order".

Edited February 16, 2011 by Sloppy Zhang

[zerostao]

I would say go for what you like. I don't practice Tai Jee Or Bagua but I will tell you that there is no need practicing something you don't like. Quite a long time ago I studied with Master Chang, who in his 90's still referred to himself as Chen Pan Ling's senior student. He lived in NO and I drove from the far side (about an hr) of Jackson to see him. I wanted to learn his Hsing I and didn't care about the tai jee but he made me do it concurrently. Long story short; the Hsing I somewhat stuck and I STILL don't like Tai Jee as a personal practice. Study what you like, I say.

i agree. imo there are so many styles/systems becoz there are so many diferent types of people. my original thoughts in the beginning were to do xingyi and the 5 animal frolics. i still think this would have been a good choice. living in a remote area i ended up going the bgz route becoz i actually have folks to practice that with.

i have done the cheng manching in the past but i dont see any pre-requisites for any of these internal arts. well certain qigongs imo help.

 

i have heard from many people tho, that it is useful to do the taiji first.

imo taiji, bgz, xingyi each produce a diferent type of qi. i am just a beginner, but that is the idea i get from my practice.

[mYTHmAKER]

Chen taijiquan is a nice fit with Bagua

[Gerard]

Gerard, thanks for the article and for highlighting those points.

 

YW Sean.

 

 

if you don't mind me asking, is He Jing-han your teacher? from the little i've seen he seems amazing.

 

I trained with him in Taipei yes, in the past but for a very short time, I had health issues back then which stopped me from continuing. He is indeed very good and knowledgeable about his style and the art in general...but there are many Bagua styles...and can vary significantly...and as we know Bagua is not bound by form even though it expresses itself through various forms. I found the walking circle style, which brings in the various palm changes, more suited to my personality as opposed to the more fixed Gong Baotian style.

 

...

if bagua keeps hold of my tail over the next year or two, i'm considering spending a few months in taipei to study chinese and practice with Luo Dexiu.

 

You will stick to Bagua if it was meant to be that way Luo Dexiu style is another beast all together. But he also tosses in Xingyi in his classes. He's got a lot of internal power, is more like a machine as opposed to He Jinghan's grace and depth of movement. I would say Luo Dexiu looks more like a real Shaolin monk.

 

Anyway you'll have a good time in Taipei, awesome food and oolong teas. The best place to learn Chinese is the National Taiwan University. Here's a link to the Foreign Program (if interested):

 

http://ntulcoffice.liberal.ntu.edu.tw/course-en.htm

 

And a more generic one:

 

http://www.englishintaiwan.com/foreigners/living-in-taiwan/learning-chinese#ntnu

 

 

Good luck in your journey.

 

Edited February 16, 2011 by Gerard

[Gerard]

However do not underestimate He Jinghan's skill. He is no ordinary man.

 

Watch this series of HJH when he was younger:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQp4JympVhc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2Y_od-H6Ng&feature=related

 

 

I wish someone could translate all those Chinese characters. What is the tree doing in there? Aaaah! Trees, magical beings. Maybe the practice itself is like a moving tree, connecting Heaven and Earth, Yin and Yang, the Bagua and Humanity. Who knows... Dao expresses itself in mysterious ways

Edited February 17, 2011 by Gerard

[Gerard]

Last three vids of the series:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAhDMLgl0wo&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWNsY7xx6N0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DuAzp5XPI0&feature=related

 

 

Enjoy!

 

Edited July 31, 2011 by Gerard

[sean]

I would say go for what you like.

 

thank you.

 

and to everyone else for the additional feedback.

 

also, Gerard, thanks for the tips on taipei and these amazing videos!

 

*bows*

 

sean

[Baguakid]

However do not underestimate He Jinghan's skill. He is no ordinary man.

 

Watch this series of HJH when he was younger:

 

Two things I don't care for in these videos. 1. He sticks his azz out like a shaolin player. 2. He turns his Bai step inwards towards the inner part of the circle (twisting on the ankle and knee).

[Gerard]

.

Edited March 3, 2011 by Gerard

[Astral Monk]

Great thread.

 

Bagua practice is great for the spine--straightening, strengthening, and loosening with the spinning yet rooted movements. It's amazing how much of a workout you can get just by the walking alone. My girlfriend thinks its weird when I mud step through the supermarket, lol.

 

I did some practice with Liang Shou-Yu's school and worked on some Emei Swimming Body Bagua taught by Helen Liang. I was especially interested in the bagua weapons forms, particularly the deer hooks. Those are great to practice with. Helps keep your focus on tightening your spin and keeping back straight.

 

There's some good vids on youtube showcasing the use of Bagua Dao--using the super huge dao that is supposedly unique to bagua. Anybody done any advanced weapons practices with bagua?

 

8)

[JessOBrien]

 

 

 

You will stick to Bagua if it was meant to be that way Luo Dexiu style is another beast all together. But he also tosses in Xingyi in his classes. He's got a lot of internal power, is more like a machine as opposed to He Jinghan's grace and depth of movement. I would say Luo Dexiu looks more like a real Shaolin monk.

 

 

 

Gerard bro, everyone has their opinions, so no offense here, but I've practiced with all three of the guys you mention here and to say that Luo De Xiu has any less grace and depth of movement is a pretty absurd statement. You sound like an experienced practitioner, but having been thrashed by Luo Laoshi on many, many occasions I can say with total certainty that his grace, smoothness, artistry and depth is at least equal to anyone I've ever met, seen, or imagined.

 

His ability to move under pressure is instant, effortless and seemingly perfect no matter what you throw at him. He is a genius in creating counters to every strike, throw, lock or grapple you care to attempt. In terms of offense he can create and exploit gaps in your structure and break you faster than you could reach for your cell phone. And as you mention the power and force he creates from virtually any direction and at any angle is truly formidable.

 

All three of the masters you mention are unique and amazing teachers, anyone is lucky to study with any of them. But in my experience grace and depth in the dictionary should have Luo De Xiu as the picture, he is a treasure and impossible to compare to any others I've met.

 

Take care!

 

Jess O

[gendao]