I’ve just seen a rather hilarious advert aimed at Qigong teachers, whose heading is “The eight brocades, again?” It goes on to say, “Your regulars know it by heart. Here’s a whole year of what comes next”.
So, the assumption is that your class is bored of doing eight brocades, and if you buy this course, it’s going to plan out a whole year of lessons for you that contain things like “5 animals”, “root” and “stillness”.
I’ve got no problem with people making a living, and as somebody who teaches a class, I can understand the desire to come up with new things to keep people interested, but I think this approach misses the point of these exercises. They’re to be done daily, not things to work on once and then move on from. So, yes, it’s the 8 brocades again for me.
I do them every day, and I don’t think that’s ever going to change.
And yes, the advert had an AI-generated image.
All of the qi-related exercises like Chinese martial arts, qigongs, calligraphy, traditional dance, etc., are focused on moving the body with qi, jin, and subconscious-mind involvement. So, for example, Taijiquan is not about a “form”, unless that form is an adjunct of movement with qi, jin, dantian, etc. The BaDuanJin is no different: it’s not about the ‘magical choreography’, it’s about *how* the body is moved. In that respect, the Baduanjin is like Taijiquan: if someone doesn’t know how to move the body, the choreography is a misleading distraction.
LikeLike