MODULE 7

Bagua Applications: The Calligraphy in Bagua

BRUCE FRANTZIS

Copyright 2011 Bruce Frantzis All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. Published by Energy Arts, Inc., P.O. Box 99, Fairfax, CA 94978-0099 The following trademarks are used under license by Energy Arts, Inc., from Bruce Frantzis: Frantzis Energy Arts system, Mastery Without Mystery, Longevity Breathing program, Opening the Energy Gates ofYour Body Qigong, Marriage of Heaven and Earth Qigong, Bend the Bow Spinal Qigong, Spiraling Energy Body Qigong, Gods Playing in the Clouds Qigong, Living Taoism Collection, Chi Rev Workout, HeartChi, Bagua Mastery Program, Bagua Dynamic Stepping System, Bagua Internal Warm-up Method, and Bagua Body Unification Method.

Editing: Heather Hale, Bill Ryan, Richard Taubinger and Caroline Frantzis Interior Design: Heather Hale Cover Design: Thomas Herington Photo and Illustration Editing: Mountain Livingston and Thomas Herington Photographs by: Eric Peters, Bill Walters, Caroline Frantzis, Richard Marks and Catherine Helms Illustrations: Michael McKee and Kurt Schulten Image Alteration: Lisa Petty, GiriVibe, Inc., Patrick Hewlett and Jodie Smith Models: Bruce Frantzis, Bill Ryan, Keith Harrington, Don Ethan Miller and Paul Cavel Printed in the United States of America PLEASE NOTE: The practice of Taoist energy arts and meditative arts may carry risks. The information in this text is not in any way intended as a substitute for medical, mental or emotional counseling with a licensed physician or healthcare provider. The reader should consult a healthcare professional before undertaking any martial arts, movement, meditative arts, health or exercise program to reduce the chance of injury or any other harm that may result from pursuing or trying any technique discussed in this text. Any physical or other distress experienced during or after any exercise should not be ignored and should be brought to the attention of a healthcare professional. The creators and publishers ofthis text disclaim any liabilities for loss in connection with following any of the practices described in this text, and implementation is at the discretion, decision and risk of the reader.

The Calligraphy in Bagua

If you want to achieve excellence in bagua, then having a supreme Single Palm Change (SPC) Palm Posture is essential. Anything less and your bagua practice can only be described as mediocre. As a parallel example, if you desire wonderful, pristine and beautiful handwriting, writing volumes of text by hand alone may not get you there. You could, however, uncover the root of excellent penmanship by practicing Western calligraphy. Calligraphy masters are very clear that it is much easier to learn a good habit from the very beginning than it is to correct a well-established, bad habit later.

Western calligraphy is the calligraphy of the Latin writing system, and to a lesser degree the Greek and Cyrillic writing systems (http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Western_calligraphy#cite_ref-1 ): "the art of giving form to signs in an expressive, harmonious and skillful manner" (Mediavilla 1996: 18).
In the early stages of learning calligraphy, you start by practicing the letter A, which could be likened to the training progression of the SPC Palm Posture. The strokes that comprise the letter A repeat many thousands of times as you proceed to learning the other letters of the alphabet. So before moving on to learning the next letters, you would practice until you obtain some clear level of stability in

2011 Bruce Frantzis-AII Rights Reserved.

Bagua Mastery Program

the most basic straight line strokes of the letter A; until the writing of your letter A shines, even if just a little. Likewise, you should practice the SPC Palm Posture for a month or more before proceeding to other bagua techniques (e.g., the complete footwork turning to follow). Then and only then, would you move forward to the letter B, which includes the same straight line found in the letter A. From the perspective of calligraphy masters, it is not appropriate to move forward until you acquire the motor skills required to adequately create the letter A's most basic linear strokes. Once hard-wired into a pupil's nervous system, adding basic curving strokes (i.e., energy postures or beyond to the SPC or the martial tradition's Double Palm Change) makes the letter B just legible enough to read! So the cycle of learning commences again, whereupon initially encountering the curving letter B requires patience and tenacity. If you are wise, again you would devote time to concentrated practice before moving forward to the letter C (i.e., other energy postures or palm changes). Likewise, future letters will reuse the principle of curving strokes and teach you how they flow together with other letters, such as those with straight lines. The effort you put in and the accuracy of your effort can eventually lead to your penmanship having a strong, stable foundation-the ideal position. In the future, you must continuously recycle different combinations of straight and curving strokes that comprise the 26 letters of the (bagua) alphabet. The point is you can see why, upon first contact with the letter A, you must spend the time and energy to hard wire a decent letter A into your system. If, however, from the beginning you began with a sloppy A (poor handwriting) and just keep going, you might still have barely readable penmanship even after decades and many volumes of handwriting-regardless of how excellent the quality of your intellectual content may be.

2011 Bruce Frantzis-AII Rights Reserved.

Module 7: Bagua Applications-The Calligraphy in Bagua

Failing to notice endless repetitions of inaccurate writing without focused practice to correct those mistakes, makes it exceedingly more difficult to develop good penmanship over time. You can easily become stuck and must live with the lousy micro-penmanship variations that led to your poor letter A from the start. Often, even when practitioners try to go back in time and reform their penmanship, they find it too arduous a task. Essentially, skilled writing must be re-wired into the mind and motor skills/body memory. Saddled with an unstable foundation, most people do not prevail and build (penmanship/bagua) excellence. So becoming a truly exceptional bagua practitioner starts with a lot of exposure to the basics. Both the meditation and martial arts traditions advocate starting slow and revisiting the basics, so everything that follows deepens and is made stronger. In terms of obtaining value from bagua's movement, it is not about knowing a greater quantity of techniques, but rather the quality in executing techniques. The various aspects must be fully integrated into your body-mind system to which all the other techniques are connected and build upon. So in the vein of creating an accurate letter A, I encourage you to take this tiny acorn of the SPC Palm Posture and grow it into the mighty oak of your bagua practice. Eventually, you must return to Walking the Circle while holding the SPC Palm Posture. Many masters would instruct pupils to train this way for long periods of time. Erroneously, many students throughout the ages have thought masters were uselessly testing their patience and perseverance before teaching then the "real stuff" or the "whole art:' In reality, masters know that setting a strong foundation isn't the best way, but the only way to achieve excellence in bagua or any deep art for that matter.

2011 Bruce Frantzis-AII Rights Reserved.