Private lessons
I was going to say, nice little private lesson here.
I mentioned this to a friend of mine and we had a chance to play at it. About the footwork, getting to the outside was a big choice between us. I noticed if his left foot was leading or he was taking a left step forward and he threw hard left punch, after intercepting from the outside of the punch with my left (deflecting it left/ up/ or down): Half step forward plant my left foot inside his, then use my left knee on his and press forward with it bending his in (hooking his neck with the right hand/ drilling with two cloud palms/ bouncing him away with thunder). Or. Swinging the right foot in behind his left foot (while changing the cloud to fire to his face and using the right to smack the back of his head/ sinking your weight on his trapped leg with your own knees together, pinning his down/ bounceing him away). Or. Pull his arm down and left after you’ve stepped accross with your right (to your left) to do and inside palm change to dump him on the ground like a hip toss (ending with two waters?). Or. Stomp his knee/ shin/ instep with either leg.
We worked the senerios you wrote down and they flowed really well at full speed.
Bong sau is like a thunder or water with the hand turned out, wrist held straight and fingers together. Bong saus can fold in and let pressure slide by, is this true for thunder and water palm, or do they try to use expanding to overcome a force?
Unrelated question:
Is it possible to fajing without any feet on the ground (as in, in the air, lying down, sitting)?
There may be times when you must let the force past using those types of blocks, like if the force is overpowering and is just too much for you take on in that manner. Bagua is very flexible in its application of the palms, never demanding that one palm be used in only so many ways. After all, its main theme running throughout that art is change. Besides that, you do what you must to be the last one standing. If you must let the force through in order to maintain control, then by all means do so, as long as it doesn’t involve taking the hit. Also, if the force is too much, you have the option of moving around him and his attack yourself instead of trying to redirect it. In a twisted sort of way (and what other ways are there in Bagua?) this is still a redirection, if you consider that you are the center this time and he is on the outside. That way, you move the centerline, and he must turn to take it back, and in that way you are still moving him off the centerline, just as if you had simply redirected his arm.
Also, we never force an application in the Internal arts, so if what you try at first doesn’t work, you use the folding principle, or simply move on to something else, and go on to your next attack. Sometimes that is the choice thing to do anyway.
Also, if you want to lead him in by letting the force come on through so that you can do something really nasty to him (like one of the more advanced techniques), then you might let the force through by your own choice.
You also might want to make it appear sometimes like you are letting the force through when you are not letting it through at all.
For examples: Moving yourself around him is easy through simple footwork. You can V step to your left with your left foot while blocking a right punch, then mud step farther forward (which would put you in one of his rear corners) with your right foot as you strike him in the face, then do an outside turning change and either throw him with the right palm or leave him standing so when you spin around your left strikes him.
Maybe you have struck at him or tried to block a punch, for instance, and he either blocks you or you simply cannot redirect his strike. You simply fold and pop him with something else. Maybe he has thrown a right low punch to your ribs. You block with your left Water palm (looking more like Bong Sau in this instance) and try to strike him in the eyes with Earth. But he blocks it with his left, so you fold your right arm at the elbow a bit and collapse your waist, and slap him in the temple with a right back palm as you bring your left palm up underneath his right arm, and redirect it over to the left (to keep his attention off what your right palm is about to do). You could use whatever change or swivel step feels right to you. If it were a real fight, you would not even think about what your feet do, they would just do it. That’s the way it should be.
Letting the force come on in is not quite an accurate phrase. What I mean is leading it in. You’re the one in control, so it’s leading it in. One example of this might be blocking a right punch with your left palm as you step in with the left foot. The right palm then grabs and pulls down and to the right. From here you have several options: You can jerk the wrist and pressure the elbow to break it or throw him to your right by the arm. Or you can maintain your grip on his wrist and slip the left forearm into his armpit and throw him the other way, whch would mean you pull him down and to the right, and then come back the other way up and to the left, so that his feet keep travelling to your right and he lands on his back. Or you could maintain your grip on his wrist, place your left palm at his elbow, twist the wrist, and thrust it back into his center to throw him that way.
(As you can see from the last one, there are many many things you can do from that one.)
Or you could do something like block a right punch downwards using your left Water palm (across and downwards to your left if it is a high punch), then palm his in the face with your right Fire palm. From here, you snake your right palm around the right side of his neck to the back, and jerk his head down and knee him in the face or throat as you left palm continues its same arc (now travelling up and to your left) to bring his arm up. From here you can go into an arm lock and really start being mean. Or you could add an elbow in between the palm to the face and the pull down.
You sound like you are really grasping the Bagua way. If I understood your descriptions right, then they are pretty good. You sound like your footwork is coming along nicely. Just remember to be careful with those knee presses, as you can really hurt your partners knee. The knee only has two little tendons attaching it to the thigh, and knee presses from the outside or inside can easily break them.
For your other question, yes, you can fa-jing without having your feet on the ground. Once you have mastered it you are supposedly able to do it from any position. I myself believe that certain movements are going to be more effective than other in these disadvantageous positions, though, as I have found some movements to be a bit difficult or tricky to execute from sitting, lying down, etc. If you are doing fa-jing correctly, your whole body will shake, and sometimes your feet will actually leave the ground, so it doesn’t really matter whether your feet are on the ground or not, because you remain rooted anyway. Rooting is not just having your feet planted, it’s an internal energy thing as well.
Keep up the good work, Ion Swamp! 
“I put forth my power and he was broken.
I withdrew my power and he was ground into fine dust.”
-Aleister Crowley, The Vision and the Voice
Nice post, Sam. You really describe well how the principle of change runs through a series of bagua techniques. I almost felt like I was the guy attacking you ;- ).
Cheers.
Points well taken. I appreciate what you’ve said. (i’m looking forward to working with the ideas you laid out.)
I’m not really working on fajing right now, but I plan on getting into it this spring and summer. Been mostly qigong, sil lum tao, and circle walking during these cold months.
Thanks for the compliment, too.