JustBHappy

Personally I'm all for dancing and developing my Bagua to the point where it is beautiful. Having skills that are beautiful to watch does not in any way, exclude having those same skills transfer over into martial, spiritual and healing. Ge GouLiang (the author of that quote) and his lineage of Gao Bagua is extremely effective, in fact I've never met any Gao stylist with experience that wasn't quite formidable. I've crossed hands with people from many many styles and I know from experience that it's the dancers that always end up leaving me on the ground saying "what happened?" The stiff, hard, external players that have no rhythm and flow to their movements are much much easier to deal with and read. The same goes with chi development. Relaxation and smooth steady movements are what promote chi development. If someone says my Bagua looks like a beautiful dance, I will say "thank you! Would you like to dance?"

99% of what is said about emptiness is misleading and misses the point. From my experience and understanding, emptiness cannot be talked about, or began to be understood without also talking about dependent origination. It's not nihilism, nor is it a teaching on inherant existience. In fact, as the great masters have said things are neither "existent", nor are they "non existent" and like I said, one will never come to an intellectual understanding of this without also examining the teachings on dependent origination. They go hand in hand and are inseparable. Intellectual understanding, I stress, not realization, there is a huge difference. The internet in my opinion is not the place to get too far into it, or at least not on a public forum. In fact depending on ones samaya and precepts, even mentioning emptiness to people who are not ready is a violation. The few that have any realization or intellectual understanding are highly likely to also be the ones who are extremely careful about who and when they lead someone towards emptiness.

While searching online about Ge Guo Liang I came across this great quote: “Your form should be beautiful. It should look unhurried, graceful, easy and effortless. It should not be painful to watch, putting observers into distress. If you put people in distress, you are not doing Bagua.” -Master Ge Guoliang

I agree, up to a point. You are 100% spot on, but there is also the other side of the coin to consider. Anyone who has been in the loop for a while knows that the internal arts, spiritual arts, and martial arts do have some outright scam artists or mis-informed "teachers" teaching dangerous or harmful practices, having inappropriate conduct with students or children and other issues. It is our responsibility as brothers and sisters on the path to do our part to help others avoid damaging their bodies or minds and wasting precious time, energy, and money. Some people of course, will not listen and must learn the hard way. But, for our own peace of mind, and personal conduct and karma we our bound to speak out. We can never know how many people steered clear of a charlatan or harmful path but we can be sure that if we remain silent we will help nobody. I have no idea what your talking about in regards to Master Lomax but whatever it is, I hope all involved learn from it and move on. We are lucky to have him and others share with us on this site.

Like I say, the last seminar I saw advertised here on the bums was quite reasonable. It was like $1000 USD and included accommodation and meals for 9-10 days. Your likely to spend much more than that on the travel expenses to get to China and back, so the seminar cost would be cheaper than the travel for most Americans and Canadians. I would gestimate the total cost at around $3 -4,000 USD depending on your filght. I was looking to train in JinHua on my own, not as part of a formal seminar. I'm not a big fan of seminars and would rather spend more time/energy/money sticking around for a while and really diving into a system. I was planning on taking care of all the travel, and lodging myself. My mandarin sucks, but I have no problem getting around, bargaining, and finding what I need. It's no big deal for me to hop over to Shangers from Taipei and get on the train to JinHua. I just can't afford many many thousands of dollars in training expenses once I arrive. I guess if I wish to train with Wang Liping I need to stick to the short seminars or have a lot more money.

I saw one Wang Liping seminar posted here on the bums a while back and it was extremely reasonable. So I was surprised to receive such a response back when I looked into training in JinHua earlier this year. I guess he's starting to realize that he can name his price and cater to the rich. I hope the rich turn out to be dedicated students.

Way beyond my budget. I was hoping to take some time off and go study/practice with him in JinHua this year, but it's clearly way beyond my budget. KathyLi made it quite clear that he asks a high price for his teachings and I would have to be prepared for this. It's strange because some of the most amazing, powerful and skilled teachers I have been lucky enough to study with in Asia charged peanuts for their time and teachings. They see it more as their duty, their responsibility to help train serious hard working students. Heck, my local Tai Chi group that meets in the park three times a week, provides pants and training shirts only charges about $30 US dollars a year! I don't think I could even buy the clothes they keep giving me for that price! I got a pile of the shirts in my closet from the last 5 years and they just keep giving me more. Same exact thing with some high level Bagua masters. They are quite happy to find a student that learns fast and trains hard and get great joy from teaching and sharing their wisdom. Meanwhile others, tend to cater towards westerners and charge insanely high prices for short periods of time and study. In my mind, someone who is truly in touch with the Tao, at peace with his own mind, body, and spirit isn't likely to so greedy and worldly and more interested in passing on the skills to serious students regardless of money. More of a labor of love and joy. I will never forget the kindness of my lama in India for example, it was simply not about money. Every once in a while I am thankful for not being rich. If I had been rich, I would surely have trained with other teachers and missed out on experiencing the love and energy from sincere, selfless teachers.

Some wide open crazy views of what a mudra is on this thread! From San Ti shi to full blown Tai Chi! I've always known mudras as hand seals or hand gestures. Until now I've never heard or seen a complete martial art like Tai Chi, or a stance such as San ti be called a mudra. On a side note, I think one of the things that makes Flying Phoenix such a powerful system of chi kung is it's use of mudras. I often like to just stop and hold the mudras within the meditations. There is something magical about these classic mudras and it's interesting to see them show up in different countries, times, and systems. They are universal, beyond the cultures they are found in.

Off the top of my head, one of the most effective overall tonic mudras is the standard praying mudra. You simply hold your palms and fingers together like you were praying. The has the effect of over-all balancing the body. This is an extremely powerful mudra but very few people give it a second thought and even fewer practice it. There are also some great sequences of holds that you can do as part of your daily practice that will also help, but that's way beyond the scope of a simple reply on a forum. Get the book, it's the bible of Jin Shin Jysutsu as far as I'm concerned.

Mudras are extremely powerful. They all have different effects regardless of breathing or other factors, although adding a harmonious breathing pattern to them absolutely intensifies their effects. Not a day goes by where I don't use mudras. It usually takes about 2-3 minutes then I start to feel the effects. I happen to be a very sensitive person though, and I know that many, if not most people, are quite numb and unaware and therefore will not feel the effects. This doesn't mean that there is no effect or benefit, just that most people may not be aware of any change at the conscious level. For those who do not have teachers with this knowledge I would recommend the work of Mary Burmeister and her book on Jin Shin Jyutsu. The hand and finger work alone is worth the time and money spent on acquiring her book. Although I have been doing the finger holds for many years I am still blown away by the quick transformations they cause. A quick bathroom break during a difficult and stressful day (doing a mudra) makes instant energetic changes that for sensitive people will be quite dramatic. Then you can slowly start to expand your knowledge until your using the whole body. I can't say enough good things about her book and the effects of her Jin Shin Jysutu. The book I have and recommend is called: The touch of healing by Mary Burmeister with Tom Monte. This book has been around the world with me many times and will always be close by until I finally memorize all the contents or scan it into digital format. It has helped me and my friends countless times.

Thanks.

Nice, I like his other vid of the up close coconut break, the arm/hand is not moving very fast but the discharge is still there. What system or type of training does this come from?

Rene -- please re-read my previous post, I was quite clear in making the distinction: "Unless your into religious Taoism then it's not really too useful" anyway.... I highly doubt that any westerners really have much of an understanding of religious Taoism. So lets assume for a second that you guys do, in that case you would have no need to ask a bunch of English speaking westerners on the internet how to make an altar in the first place, you would already know. Sree --- "empirical and experienced at the physical" What you believe to be empirical and experienced at the physical level is, and can only be known by you, through your perceptions.

Yeah, I agree. Unless your into religious Taoism then it's not really too useful. Also, if your into that, then you will already have an idea of how to build the altar and what to do with it. Otherwise, your altar is always there. In other words: 1. Your Mind 2. Your Body 3.Your perceptions ( the "external world") Make the best Taoist altar in my opinion.

For newcomers it's important to understand that there are two very distinct types of Taoism, religious and what I call spiritual. In the east, most people have no clue or understanding about the spiritual it's almost entirely religious Taoism and from my observations it's not what we westerners would consider very religious. Taiwan is one of, if not the most authentic hubs of chinese culture. The practices, language, arts, and other things that were lost in the cultural revolution thrive in Taiwan. Living in a smaller, more traditional place I see and hear more than I would like to. It's far far far from what westerners think they would see. It's almost entirely ran by the triads, extremely noisy, and big big business. The good part is that their greed has kept all these strange and colorful cultural events alive. Keep the people believing and they will keep buying tons and tons of ghost money and giving donations. I particularly enjoy the temple strippers, or the mobile ones on jeeps with the stripper pole mounted in back. It seems like every few days there is some major god being honored, only a few people even know about who these gods are, then of course every two weeks is the new moon and full moon festivities, once again all ran by extremely rough, binlang chewing, beer drinking thugs. Far far from the spiritual Taoism westerners know and practice. In the west, and what is talked about on This website, is all about what I call spiritual Taoism. The Tao te Ching, the five elements, meditation, chi kung, alchemy etc.... Spiritual Taoism is a personal individual path of improving ourselves and harmonizing with the Tao.

I think many people do fail to see this, but for me it's more than that. I can see it, I can have an intellectual understanding, but that doesn't necessarily protect me from habitually reacting and continuing the cycle. knowing and understanding takes time to become habituated, to become the normal method of operation. We have unconsciously followed our thoughts for so long that it takes time to stop that momentum. Even just becoming aware of our thoughts is a huge step. Then once we start seeing the thoughts, we can start to not get so caught up in their content. We are all going to fall back into habit despite any high and lofty philosophical understanding. Slowly slowly, we make progress. Hopefully we can look back and see that we react much less than we did 5 years ago. If it took us one week to stop replaying and feeding some negative thought patterns, maybe it only takes us a few days now. Then a few hours, then a few minutes. One day we will have become so habituated to allowing thoughts to come and go that nothing will stick unless we want it to and we will only act, not react and thus break the cycle. This will then become the new habit and will be natural and effortless at that point. It's not easy, in the heat of the moment we experience physical sensations going along with highly emotionally charged thoughts and often other people around us feed the illusion. It's one thing to sit quietly in meditation, it's quite another to always remain in that awareness and equanimity in post meditation. Ironically we often feed/water the thoughts we should let go of, and let go of the thoughts we should feed/water.

We choose our future thoughts through are present thought, speech and actions. Not in any exact way, but rather we create the causes and conditions for thoughts to arise. In the present moment, thoughts will always arise from past seeds that have been planted and watered. We don't choose them, they simply sprout up. Nobody knows what their next thought will be. When thoughts arise we can then choose whether to follow them and feed them so they grow, or simply watch them pass away and replaced by another thought (ripening of our Karma).

Proper alignment is of course the most important thing. I would highly recommend following the diagrams I posted before. Knees are not meant to have weight applied to them when the foot is torqued in a different direction than the qua. Keep the qua and the feet pointing the same direction. Straight line walking, or big circles are also a good idea while building strength in the knees and areas that support the knees. Practice only a little. We often have a tendency to overdo. This is when injuries happen. There is no rush, it is not a race. Keep in mind that Tai Chi, Bagua, da cheng, and other internal arts all have great masters with an abundance of internal power that operate from a higher stance. At the lower levels, we need to go down in order to generate power, it is more physical and less internal. Gradually through the years we should be shifting towards using less and less physical strength and relying on low stances for power generation. So there is no reason to rush it, or over-train. Give the muscles, and more importantly the tendons and ligaments time to slowly stretch and strengthen. It takes more time to develop the 'jin' than it does the muscles, but we often forget this point and are impatient in our development.

The reality of the situation is that no matter what you do, there will still be issues. There will always be posters you don't like, spammers, and other forms of furry nasty stinky internet monsters. Just as in life off-line, We cannot control or avoid the things that bring up our attachments and aversions. The one thing it would guarantee though, is a ton of extra work for the admins/moderators. The other factor is the participation rate. The more open a forum is, the higher the rate. The more restrictive and exclusive it is, the less people will come and share freely and openly. I have found for all the valuable things I have learned, that they had to be earned. Not talking about the training, but the work involved in seeking out realized masters and authentic martial lineage holders. I constantly wade through the mud and noise of so called "teachers" in order to find a very small amount of reliable sources. I've spent more than enough time with charlatans, and I fully believe that it's all part of the path, or at-least my path. The very Tao teaches us that hot creates cold, good creates bad and so on. Yet we often reject this same teaching when it constantly shows up in our life experience. We expect to only have one without the other, but it is this original expectation that automatically causes the other to exist in our experience. It is we who create it.

wu wei

I think in no time you will be rockin out all kinds of moves and conditioning with that bad boy on.

It all depends on your level of fitness going in and what your looking to gain from it. You can do almost anything with a vest on, but of course it won't be easy. Like I said before, pay attention to the alignment of your knees before pushing weight onto them or you're asking for trouble. I also recommend toning down the quick waist turns. The vest creates a bit of momentum on its own and you may find yourself rotating farther than your spine is ready to go at the time. I personally don't go any lower than the point where I can keep the rear heel on the floor when pushing the weight forward. This is the reason why some schools/teachers of Bagua have the "walking up/down the ramp exercise" so you can develop the extreme flexibility in the ankle and calves to keep the foot flat and rooted on an inclined surface. (it's also rumored to be a "ching gong" lightness skill practice) This is a nice safeguard against injury, you won't go any lower than what your body is ready to handle.

I agree completely. I bought all six dvd's, but I'm still just doing the first two, with the 50 20 10 from volume 7 thrown in at night for the restful sleep bonus. I am not so sure about the healing effects, I am already healthy and have a fairly strong Tai Chi and Bagua zhuang practice going. What I do know though, is that the FP has made an impact on my overall feeling. It's like it has put me in the "I don't mind" zone where I don't feel a need to react as strongly as before. For me, it has very cooling effect. I can train hard and long doing the FP meditations and not over heat like I do with other practices. I think the energy is still there, but the edges are rounded and softer, if that make any sense.

You guys are great! Helps to keep everyone motivated and energized to hear how you're taking it to the next level. Great stuff.

Yeah a progressive method of slowly adding weight to your vest sounds like a good idea. I played with it to find the max i could handle at the time, but I was much more hard-core in those days. These days I'm more into the internal aspects and less of the conditioning. My first vest was somewhere around 20-25 KG as I remember. I maybe took a few blocks of lead out of it at first, or during weight vest conditioning class but I ended up buying another vest afterwards that weighed even more. I think the recommendation was for roughly 1/4 of your weight minimum. So if you weigh 100KG you use a vest that is 25KG. I never did buy one of those nice comfy commercial vests, they were just too expensive and hard to get at the time. I also remember that at the time, the commercial vests were much much lighter, that of course could have changed by now. I never liked ankle weights. Ankle weights seem like a good way to damage the knees so I've always avoided them like the plague. I train for rooting and power, not so much for snappy kicks. I learned early on how easily a kicker can be destroyed. I absolutely understand why many of my Bagua teachers have stressed the you never kick above the knee except during practice/demos. I got to say it though, if ones stepping technique is incorrect then they're much more likely to inflict some damage on the knees when they add more weight. So depending on ones style or technique it may not be a good idea. We gotta take care of our knees first and foremost in my opinion.