Bagua as Meditation:

[Anonymous]

I hear your frustration.

But don’t be too hard on yourself about “flawed descriptions.”

Zen cherishes silence.
It realizes that fundamentally words cannot describe reality.
So when a pupil merely imitates “the smile” or “one finger pointing” or a “slap” as a way out of the dilemma as a resolution to a koan
the master cuts through any procrastination by shouting “Speak now!”

There is no secret recipe.

Not even the I-Ching provides all the answers.
How does Qian change to Kun?
It starts with the single bottom yang line changing to a yin line.
This is a dragon lying low.
It’s not time yet for action.
It’s time for preparation.

You could start walking the bagua circle in the energy posture of “Holding up the Heavens.”
The reverse the circle and switch to “Holding the Lower Tantien.”

In Tai Chi you could start the same change beginning with “Ward Off.”
Then change to “Press/water/Kan”

To me this is the process of realizing the
“Fullness of emptiness.”

Heaven descends to earth.
One change of the bottom yang line to yin
starts the decrease of Yang towards Yin.
When the decrease reaches its extreme
(all yang lines change to yin lines = Kun/Earth).

One of my teachers frequently reminds me that:
what is missing in sparring, is missing in my push hands;
what is missing in push hands is missing in my tai chi form; what is missing in my form is missing in my standing.
So true.
Further, what’s missing in my standing is missing in my sitting practice.

But this is the meditative moment of truth:
“Speak now!”

Or as my teacher says:
“Boom-chug-a-boom!!!”

[Anonymous]

OMG, it is way worse than I thought. I just went through one of the volume 3 DVDs and watched a senior student of Bruce’s with over 25 years of experience that doesn’t even know how to balance the arms at the grossest physical level. On the same DVD, Bruce says that if a student can’t do it, “they’re not that far past being a beginner. They are still in the beginner-ish category.” Bruce’s words not mine.

It is no wonder people think I’m crazy when I start talking about how I do peng, gi, liu, and an strictly from the mind directing the gates in various patterns. Do people know that the six combinations isn’t the clumsy 4 points that Bruce teaches or some vague notion of the shoulder and hip. These get significantly more refined. You start matching every detail of the gates in the wrist with the gates in the ankle, every detail of the gates in the elbow with the gates in the knee, and so on and so on.

If this sounds like BS, you won’t believe what you are doing in Bagua.

[Author]

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