day 24: bagua qi-gong & circle walking - 7th palm change

concepts

• gathering chi
• projecting chi
• jing, chi, shen
• footwork (ko, bai, ko)

qi-gong:

• bagua qi-gong (level 1 and level 2: lion and snake)

forms

• 7th palm change

i arrived really early today. i was tired, groggy, and grumpy, and coffee just wasn't really working. so i got to the park about an hour in advance to stretch, warm-up, and stare at the clouds, only to find a girl scout troop in full assembly where we usually practice (with. no. girl. scout. cookies. boooooooooo!!!).

after the girl scouts left, i managed to go through an initial circuit through bagua qi-gong level 1. during this time, Tommy (one of the new baji students) arrived for his warm-up. we chatted a bit about Sifu's lei tai tournament announcement from last week, with Tommy telling me that a few of the baji students had committed to the tournament, although he was a little hesitant because of the travel costs involved.

by this time Art arrived. he suggested we get started, but that we begin with bagua warm-ups. i've never done these before. Laura said the class hadn't done this in awhile. the bagua warm-up routine is a series of mild joint rotations done in sets, and from what i can tell is probably meant to help loosen the joints (both lower and upper body). these didn't take too long, and we finished just as the jian shu students arrived with Sifu.

at this point, Art told me that true to his promise from last week, he had brought a good number of DVDs this time. i took a set of 6--2 for tai-chi push hands, featuring Sifu; another 2 for tang lang (praying mantis), with Master Su; and 2 for qi-gong, again with Master Su. the price for all 6 turned out to be $195. while we're currently not studying anything covered in the DVDs, i figured that they would still be constructive, and i could hold them as a reference assuming i stay in LA after graduation.

a new student appeared today: an Australian fellow named Jay, who apparently has studied Shaolin White Crane (sic?) and is starting his own acupuncture practice in Westwood. he said he's been away from kung fu for a few years, but is starting it again. he stated that he preferred to get personal instruction with Sifu on Sundays, since his Saturdays are usually occupied with work.

bagua qi-gong

as we were finishing our discussion of the DVD contents, Sifu returned from starting the baji students with their drills and announced that we were going to do bagua qi-gong.

i was a little excited. i'd been curious about qi-gong for awhile, and it was one of the reasons i'd decided to try kung fu. i'd wondered when it was covered in the curriculum, since i hadn't heard of it mentioned in class during the time i've been studying. Phunsak and Art had told me on several different occassions that i'd started after the initial qi-gong, and that there's a number of different points in the training where it's brought up. i'd picked up bagua qi-gong level 1 from the few times John, Mike, and Art had done it before class sessions, and i'd gotten the qi-gong handouts from Mike and Ronald, but i still felt that i'd missed out.

Sifu started us with bagua qi-gong level 1. from what i've seen in the Wutan bagua handouts, there's 3 levels of qi-gong for bagua. the 1st level is intended for gathering chi, the 2nd level is for emitting chi, and the 3rd level...

while qi-gong is a subject of traditional asian (particularly chinese) medicine, it has been incorporated into martial arts. with kung fu, i've found that various styles each have their own forms of qi-gong. based on what i've seen in class, there is baji qi-gong, bagua qi-gong, as well as tai chi qi-gong, and i'm guessing also for the other styles taught by Sifu.

bagua qi-gong seems to follow the 8 sets of bagua trigrams, which are typically oriented in an octagon. each side of the octagon has its own trigram, compass direction, animal, element (fire, wood, metal, earth, heaven), yin/yang designation, and dedicated body part. the term bagua refers to this 8-sided octagon of trigrams, which is a derivation of Taoist philosophies expressed in the I Ching. bagua zhang is the actual name of the martial art connected with bagua, although bagua zhang is frequently shortened to just bagua in discussion (as well as in this blog). the incorporation of "bagua" in "bagua zhang" explains the prevalence of the number 8 (as well as its multiples) in the style, particularly with forms like "8 mother palm" or "64 palms." along this line of reasoning, each level of bagua qi-gong is a set of 9 exercises, with each exercise matching each side of the 8-sided octagon and performed facing the direction assigned to each side, along with an additional exercise facing the center. Sifu described this as "8 directions, 9 palaces."

level 1 qi-gong

level 1 qi-gong, meant for "gathering chi," was relatively straightforward. the exercises are largely stationary, with feet remaining in place and legs only doing slight bending in time with breathing. each exercise starts from a standing posture, hands together at the abdomen. for each exercise, there are different hand motions. for level 1, each of the exercises is "gathering chi" into a unique body part: head, kidneys, spine, limbs, heart, abdomen, lungs.

the purpose of level 1 is to accumulate chi. Sifu, in describing the exercises, talked about "drawing" chi, or energy, from the earth and air through our hands. he also discussed being able to "hold" or "push" chi with our hands, almost as if it were something physical.

i discovered that some of the motions were different than what i'd thought, and i had to adjust my movements. Phunsak later explained to me that the class has done different variations of level 1--the exercises were largely the same, but the lead-in and finish from the standing posture to each exercise were slightly different.

level 2 qi-gong

level 2 qi-gong, meant for "projecting chi," was apparently a new subject for the class. Sifu stopped, and took a number of minutes to cover the 1st 2 exercises (for northwest and north) for this class. level 2 is more active than level 1. in level 2, each exercise actually corresponds to each of the stances from mother palms (i.e., lion, snake, bear, unicorn, phoenix, dragon, monkey, big bird). for the northwest direction, the animal (and stance) is lion; for north it is snake. while each exercise starts from the same standing posture and initial hand movement as for level 1, in level 2 the practitioner is supposed to turn and lower themselves into the assigned stance facing in the opposite direction (e.g., if the practitioner starts facing northwest, they begin from the standing posture with hands at the abdomen, then raise their hands above the head as in level1, but from there turn downwards into the lion stance facing southeast, feet still aligned with side of the imaginary octagon). each exercise is done turning left and then again turning right.

Sifu made a number of points about lion and snake:

• northwest, lion--Sifu said to imagine that we are projecting force forward to the southeast from the lion's mouth formed by our upraised hand, head, and lowered hand. we need to imagine the trigram, and that 3 lines of the trigram corresponds to the upraised hand (top line of the trigram), head (middle line of the trigram), and lowered hand (bottom line of the trigram).
• north, snake--here, to incorporate level 1, Sifu said to imagine that we are taking chi from our kidneys with our hands behind us, bringing it together in a ball at the abdomen in front of us, and then turning into snake. we need to have our hands moving out of the ball into snake, with one hand moving forward and the other hand simultaneously moving back--he emphasized both hands and both arms move, neither is never stationary. in addition, our gaze should be at a 45 degree angle down.

initially, my impression of qi-gong was that it was meant for health, and that it was performed in a slow, deliberate, relaxed, meditative manner that helped to calm the mind, ease and deepen breathing, and improve sensory awareness. while possibly true for level 1, i'm starting to think this is not so for level 2. level 2 is more dynamic, with more power. while it could be meditative, i found level 2--or, at least, the first 2 exercises--to be less about inner reflection than about external expression. i suppose this is consistent with the idea of level 1 being "chi gathering" and level 2 being "chi projection."

jing, chi, shen

i should note here that the term "chi" is still proving somewhat elusive for me. while i am increasingly of the belief that "chi" is a term and concept utilized by Asian cultures to describe phenomenon that are described by alternative terms and concepts such as "potential energy," "kinetic energy," or "force" in Western culture, i still find the transposition from Asian to Western perspectives a bit confusing.

for level 2 qigong, i think can see the transposition. i suspect that the "projection" of chi is essentially the generation of power or force involved in shifting into stances, and so is a metaphor of applying and feeling the application of muscle effort. since the exercises for level 2 expect the practitioner to harness muscle effort towards specific points of the compass, they are effectively serving to train students how to direct power in different directions. in essence, i believe level 2 is really teaching students to generate power for bagua combat applications of the basic stances from mother palm.

such a transposition between East and West, however, doesn't apply so readily for level 1 qigong. the purpose of level 1 is to accumulate chi. Sifu, in describing the exercises, talked about "drawing" chi, or energy, from the earth and air through our hands. he also discussed being able to "hold" or "push" chi with our hands, almost as if it were something physical. in addition, he commented that the orientation of the body along each of the compass points was crucial, since it was a result of thousands of years of empirical study by Chinese medicine, which seemed to notice greater positive results with certain exercises being associated with certain compass points. in which case, in level 1, chi is not really being used to describe what Westerners consider muscular effort, force, or even energy.

the only thing i can think of as being an equivalent cultural metaphor for level 1's use of "chi" is "sensory awareness." this would mean level 1 qi-gong is really about teaching students to improve their mind-body connection and physical coordination by consciously thinking about the location and function of their body parts relative to the world around them via a deliberative visualization exercise. this would explain the slower, more relaxed, more meditative nature relative to level 2.

in terms of the "chi gathering" within this kind of metaphorical framework, the only thing i can offer is that level 1 qi-gong, by training the mind-body connection and physical coordination, is leading students to a greater realization of the contributions of each body part to a greater collective whole, and hence to an understanding of how the health of respective individual body parts can be unified to increase the overall health of a total person--in other words, "gather" the "chi," with chi being a metaphor for health and vitality (which itself could be construed as an expression of energy).

i speculate that all of this relates to the notions of jing, chi, and shen that Sifu talked about when i first started class (reference: day 5: a thinking day). then, we talked about chi being "life-energy," jing being chi expressed in physical form, and shen being the utilization of chi or refined jing. now, however, i am starting to believe that these definitions may be somewhat different in a bagua perspective.

i suspect that bagua qi-gong, with its 3 levels to gather chi (level 1), project chi (level 2), and circulate chi (level 3) is connected to jing chi shen. level 1, which focuses on accumulating chi, would correspond to chi; level 2, which targets projection of chi, could be taken as physically manifesting chi, or jing; level 3, which circulates chi, would then be the refinement of skill to manipulate chi, or shen. if this is true, then bagua qi-gong is in some aspects a method of helping practitioners develop skill with chi jing shen. i'll have to ask Sifu about this.

7th palm change

Sifu left us to practice qi-gong level 2 while he went to help the baji students to the next lesson, and left Art in the lead. we spent a number of minutes with qi-gong level 2, and then stopped for a break.

i took some time discussing the connections of bagua qi-gong to bagua applications with Phunsak, who ended up confirming a lot of my suspicions about the relationships between 8 mother palm and bagua qi-gong. essentially, they build upon each other, and Phunsak agreed that bagua qi-gong level 2 is supposed to help improve student understanding of the stances in 8 mother palm, and that the integration of qi-gong techniques into mother palm is why it (mother palm) has the alternative name of "8 internal palms."

Sifu returned, and instructed us to begin circle walking with the 7th palm change. similar to last week, he let us practice for a few minutes to work out any kinks and pose questions, and then asked each of us to perform the 7th palm change in front of the class.

despite my practice over the past weeks, the 7th and 8th palm changes have continued to be somewhat difficult for me. a lot of it is less practice time relative to the previous palm changes, but part of it is also that we haven't had as much in-class review with the 7th and 8th palm changes to refine them. the result, i know, is that i've been doing a number of parts of the 7th palm change wrong, and these errors became evident when it became my turn to try it in the circle. in particular, Sifu pointed out the following:

• hands--starting from white ape presents the fruit, the hand towards the interior of the circle should drop into a redirection of any assailant's strike (using the hand motion from the hand drills) going into green dragon soars in the sky before moving towards the rear into transplant the flower into the other tree. i had never noticed this step.
  
• footwork--my footwork was all wrong in the sequence of techniques from white ape presents the fruit to green dragon soars in the sky to transplant the flower into the other tree to rhinoceros looks up at the moon. i had the foot angles right as ko-bai-ko, but my mistake was that after planting the initial ko, i stepped forward with the other foot into bai. there should be no step forward--once the initial ko is planted, it should stay as the front foot, and the rear foot should stay the rear foot while it moves into bai. from there, i should rotate in the direction of ko until i am facing out of the circle to plant the forward foot as ko once again.
• direction--rhinoceros looks up at the moon should be facing out of the circle. i had been doing it facing along the perimeter of the circle.
• finishing--going from combined spin and kick motion of green dragon bends its body into golden rooster fights for grains of rice, the wrists are together and aimed forward in a push into an opponent's waist. this push is supposed to occur in conjunction with the kicking foot coming down into a forward step. from there, the practitioner is supposed to take another step forward into white ape presents the fruit and allow the hands to move up together into the opponent's jaw. this entire sequence is supposed to be done smoothly and continuously. i, however, keep doing this with a jerky, decidedly awkward motion.

i think a lot of my problems were propagations from the footwork errors. i had assumed the ko-bai-ko sequence is identical to the ko-bai-ko steps in the outside turn for circle walking (reference: day 10: drills and beginning the circle), but it appears that it is actually different, in that in the outside turn the bai foot steps over the ko foot, while in the 7th palm change it does not. i noticed not doing so made the 7th palm change much smoother to perform up to the one-legged spin from rhinoceros looks up at the moon to green dragon bends its body.

for the one-legged spin itself, it is similarly much easier if it starts from rhinoceros looks up at the moon facing out of the circle, since this 1) reduces the spin from 360 degrees to 270 degrees, and 2) allows the ko foot to already be partially turned in the direction of the spin. both act to decrease the instability of the following spin and kick going from green dragon bends its body to golden rooster fights for grains of rice.

all of this was valuable, since it greatly cleared up some issues for me. however, it also means i'm going to have to spend some more practice time getting rid of the bad habits and integrating the good ones.

conclusion

we finished the day with a surprise guest: John Eagles. John showed up with his fiance', his body wrapped in a brace that for all the world looked like a modernized corset. he's been a few weeks out of back surgery that is supposed to keep him out of commission for several more weeks. he had brought his x-rays with him to show us the state of his back, which now features an experimental cushioning device in his lower vertebrae.

we ended up stopping class in various turns to talk with John and catch up on his progress. as class wound down, a large number of us decided to go to lunch with him and his fiance. once Sifu called class to a formal close, we went to the usual place (Dumpling Master) to continue the conversation and share stories with John's fiance' about his exploits at the dining table--as well as allow her to catch some insight into our post-class lunch conversations over kung fu esoterica (no doubt, after this experience, she probably considers us all kung fu nerds). it appears John has been missed at Dumpling Master as well, since the waitresses were happy to see him back. i think we were as well.