The more complicated and restricted the method, the less opportunity for expression of one’s original sense of freedom.
Fear comes from uncertainty; we can eliminate the fear within us when we know ourselves better.
It is not a shame to be knocked down by other people. The important thing is to ask when you’re being knocked down, ‘Why am I being knocked down?’ If a person can reflect in this way, then there is hope for this person.
The mind is like a fertile garden in which anything that is planted, flowers or weeds, will grow.
Your state of mind is everything.
Truth cannot be structured or confined.
Let the spirit out – Discard all thoughts of reward, all hopes of praise and fears of blame, all awareness of one’s bodily self. And, finally closing the avenues of sense perception, let the spirit out, as it will.
Love is like a friendship caught on fire.
Jeet Kune Do favors formlessness so that it can assume all forms and since Jeet Kune Do has no style, it can fit in with all styles. As a result, Jeet Kune Do utilizes all ways and is bound by none and, likewise, uses any techniques which serve its end.
Art lives where absolute freedom is because when it is not, there can be no creativity.
When you say that something is impossible, you have made it impossible.
It is true that the mental aspect of kung-fu is the desired end; however, to achieve this end, technical skill must come first.
Life is wide, limitless. There is no border, no frontier.
You and your opponent are one. There is a coexisting relationship between you. You coexist with your opponent and become his complement, absorbing his attack and using his force to overcome him.
When you fight, if it is a real fight, use every tool that you have, use your whole body. Use your fists, your legs, your fingers, your head if you have to, and hit them in every vulnerable spot, the balls, the eyes etc. to win.
Out of chaos, find simplicity, From discord, find harmony.
Martial arts, like any art, is an unrestricted athletic expression of an individual soul.
Unfortunately, now in boxing people are only allowed to punch. In Judo, people are only allowed to throw. I do not despise these kinds of martial arts. What I mean is, we now find rigid forms which create differences among clans, and the world of martial art is shattered as a result.
I’m not a master. I’m a student-master, meaning that I have the knowledge of a master and the expertise of a master, but I’m still learning. So I’m a student-master. I don’t believe in the word ‘master.’ I consider the master as such when they close the casket.
There are lots of guys around the world that are lazy. They have big fat guts. They talk about chi power and things they can do, but don’t believe it.