Li Baohua, originally from Henan, has lived in Beijing since he came to university. He has trained the martial arts since he was a child, and started to learn the MaGui system of baguazhang in 1989 from Yu Zhiming. Before that, Li had trained intensively in Ma Weiqi and Cheng style baguazhang. So we know the feeling of dropping all other systems once one learns some of the MaGui system.
Statement from Li Baohua (written in 2003, in his own words, not my translation)
"Since childhood the love for the traditional Chinese martial art has fascinated me every day and everywhere, I could have willingly given up all I had, but could not stop practicing the art even one day. Even though being well educated both in science and culture, I could not help trusting a dream I had when I was only five or six years old, that I followed a Taoist immortal in a big mountain and saw his jumping from one mountain to another accompanied by red and yellow light.
During the 1970s, I followed a local wushu group and spent several years in wrestling and local martial arts as a child. It has been very funny, laughable, yet interesting that I invented fighting skills through fighting and wrestling between children.
Fortunately enough in 1982 when I qualified to go to the best university in China, I lost the chance and had to attend the local university in Zhengzhou, HeNan province, where I met a wonderful martial art master Mr. Shi ChongYing and became his inside apprentice. Mr.Shi is an inheritor of internal marital art, and specialized in baguazhang and Yang taijiquan. His lineage of baguazhang is from Ma WeiQi, a famous student of Dong HaiChuan and an excellent fighter at his time one hundred years ago.
From that time I practiced diligently the internal martial arts (Yang taijiquan, baguazhang and xingyiquan) under Mr.Shi ChongYing for ten years until 1992. In the early 90s I organized martial art schools in Hubei, Henan, and Guangxi provinces. Around that time I traveled across China and visited many famous martial artists, challenged and was challenged many times. Those who competed with me included internal and external stylist, some of them are very famous and skillful fighters. The experience greatly encouraged me continuing my study and understanding the internal martial art.
In 1986 I was in Beijing pursuing my master degree. One afternoon when I was practicing baguazhang in a small yard, a person around fifty years old with a strong figure came to me and said he was also an inheritor of baguazhang from the lineage of Cheng TingHua. He had watched my practicing for a long time and wanted to share his skills with me, because he thought I was the only man in the young generation devoted in practicing traditional martial art he had ever seen. After a little bit of hand pushing he told me that he would like to teach me his style if I wanted to learn. That was great! His name is Zhang RongLi, my second teacher, a master of both internal and external martial arts, specializing in baguazhang from the line of Cheng TingHua, and xingyiquan. About three years from that time to 1989, I was instructed and trained martial arts styles different from what I learned before. Mr. Zhang not only gave his instruction, but also introduced me to meet his martial art friends, that meant I could have more chances to contact those super martial artists who had not yet been known in reputation but who were really great masters. I learned a lot from them and this helped me have a deep and wide insight in the martial arts.
Among them Mr. Zhang often talked about an old man named Yu ZhiMing, who practiced baguazhang from a special lineage, a seventy years old man who looked like a young man - a calligrapher, a rhizotomist, archeologist, and a prophet. That quietly had attracted me for a long time before I met, because I had believed a good martial art master no matter what kinds of martial art he practiced should be stronger, healthier, wiser and longer lived. In the winter in 1989, I got a chance to go with Mr. Zhang to visit Mr. Yu. The first impression was what I had imagined in my mind, so strongly attracting me, I knew that he was the man I would follow.
After several times contacting, Mr. Yu told me the baguazhang he practiced was imparted directly to him from the lineage of Ma Gui , a special person in the system of baguazhang, being not only a student of Yin Fu but also one been taught by his teacher Dong HaiChuan. It was told that Ma Gui was nominated as the inheritor of Dong HaiChuan but he did not teach any apprentice during his life. How could that happen? Was it just a tale? I began to study and practice under Mr. Yu in late 1989 after permission, but I still kept practicing and learning the baguazhang from Mr. Shi. The first time when I practiced the style Mr. Yu instructed me, he found my strong appetite and special ability in learning martial art and predicted that I would be the inheritor of his baguazhang. I was surprised to hear this, because I had not decided to practice the style on my full effort. For almost two years I was greatly confused with the big difference between the styles taught by different teachers. In 1992 I chose to give up practicing of the baguazhang from Mr. Shi that I had practiced ten years and had become very successful at, and I submitted myself to the instructions of Mr. Yu. Gradually over one year I found out my body had become very strong, the changing both inside and outside had been great, the inside power around hips and waist I tried more than ten years to practice had appeared so naturally. I realized it was just the beginning of the highest point of internal power, also it was the philosophy practiced thousands of years by Chinese people and it was named Dao. Here we called it 'jie dan' (producing elixir field) in the practice of martial art and rebuilding of physical body. Mr. Yu often said "the simplest is the best, the highest martial arts are practiced through the simplest methods". Lao Zi said in his scripture, the Dao that could be clearly defined was not the true Dao. It was proven!
Ever since I have practiced diligently several hours every day, year after year without even one day pause. In 1995, I was greatly encouraged to hear Mr. Yu say‚ "Li Minggui will become invincible after a couple years practicing." It means nothing to me now, but the baguazhang as a martial art and a lifestyle surely means all to me. In recent years Mr. Yu often said he had been satisfied with the fact that the baguazhang had been inherited by me, and he also told me a fact that it was not easy to pass down the true gongfu or real martial art and it could take a whole life for a true master to find a true student. Surely the history of internal martial art gives the same fact as what he talked about baguazhang. The experience of my practicing often reminds me that I am going to be the age of 40 even though I am 36, because several years could be like just several days if one swam in the river of baguazhang.
Almost one hundred years after great master Dong HaiChuan, baguazhang has not been taught publicly in its real state. Ma Gui, the real student of Dong HaiChuan; Liu WanChuan, the real student of Ma Gui; Yu ZhiMing, the real student of Liu WanChuan had no chance to show, to spread, to contest in public the baguazhang. What could I do if I had the chance? With that question facing the temporary and practical world, I regret sometimes that I might not become the special inheritor of the baguazhang. It is a great burden to me because of the truth I know and have. Just like the commitments in the process of my study, the responsibility is to pass down and spread the baguazhang."
