The 75 best quotes of Bruce Lee
Lee Jun-Fan, better known as Bruce Lee, he was a famous American actor and martial artist, born in the city of San Francisco during the year 1940.
Although he was born in the United States, Lee was raised in Kowloon China, where he began training at the age of 13 in the arts of Taichi and Wing Chun fighting style. At a very young age, this famous actor began to participate in films first as a child and then as a teenager. But it would be on his return to the United States, when Lee would achieve the notoriety that he truly deserved.
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The best quotes and reflections of Bruce Lee
We have all seen at least one of his movies at least once, as these are quite possibly the most famous martial arts movies in history. But what do you know about the personality of a great actor?
In the text that you will find below, you will find a selection of the 75 best phrases of Bruce Lee, some phrases that will allow you to discover the particular philosophy of life of this martial arts legend.
1. Don't pray for a simple life, pray for the strength to resist a difficult life.
If we are strong enough, we can get out of any situation that life throws our way.
2. Defeat is not defeat unless it is accepted as a reality in your own mind.
We will not be completely defeated until we decide it ourselves, since total defeat requires our surrender to be consummated.
3. Don't fear failure. The crime is not failure, but aiming low. In great attempts it is glorious even to fail.
In order to go far in life, we will undoubtedly have to have great ambitions. If we do not have the necessary ambition we will never achieve those higher goals.
4. Adapt what is useful, reject what is useless, and add what is specifically yours.
In this way, Lee managed to create a completely new style of combat and totally adapted to himself.
5. Be aware of yourself, instead of being a repetitive robot.
Being honest with ourselves will allow us to find our best version.
6. What you habitually think largely determines what you will become.
Our thoughts run our lives, so we might as well come to think that we really are what we think.
7. Possession of anything begins in the mind.
If we are not completely determined to succeed, we will never achieve our goals.
8. A good teacher protects his students from his own influence.
A teacher must know how to inspire his students, but also let them make their own mistakes.
9. True life consists in living for others.
We can all put our particular grain of sand to try to improve our society. The world can be a better place if we all do our part.
10. Don't have any path as a path, and don't have any limitation as a limitation.
Life can be wonderful, and we can achieve everything we set out to do if we don't set limits.
11. Simplicity is the key to brilliance.
It's funny how the brightest things can also be the simplest, simplicity can make our lives much easier and more bearable.
12. I don't fear the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.
This phrase reveals to us what is undoubtedly a great truth, because as we all know, practice leads to perfection.
13. Choose the positive. You have the choice, you are the master of your attitude, choose the positive, the constructive. Optimism is the faith that guides success.
Being positive will help us to be much more efficient in everything we do, negativity is a type of thinking that will only cloud our mind, making us lose all momentum in our Actions.
14. I am not in this world to live up to your expectations and you are not in this world to live up to mine.
We should not look at the lives of others, each one to do with his personal life what he wants.
15. Always be yourself, express yourself, have faith in yourself, don't go out and find a successful personality and duplicate it.
Our originality and way of being will be in charge of leading us to success in the future.
16. Those who do not know that they are walking in the dark will never seek the light.
If we don't know what we really want, we can never start looking for it. First reflect on your goals and then get moving towards them.
17. The success of my biggest movies is because I was being Bruce Lee. Not a character.
His originality catapulted him to success, being true to himself he gave us a very valuable lesson to all his viewers.
18. Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them.
Mistakes do not have to define our life if we can learn from them.
19. The key to immortality is living a life worth remembering.
Lee wanted to leave a great legacy so that the world would always remember him, without a doubt, he managed to achieve the immortality to which he was destined.
20. Accept things as they are. Hit when you have to hit. Kick when you have to kick.
Acting at the right time will be necessary to be able to win. If we don't act when we should, we'll lose the opportunity to stand out.
21. Don't stay in one way, adapt it, build your own, and let it grow, be like water.
If you don't like something, you can always try to adapt it to your particular way of being or acting. We should not be afraid when we have nothing to lose.
22. You have to find the right balance in movement and not in stillness.
In order to live our life fully, we must work to make our wishes come true.
23. Concentration is the root of all man's capabilities.
Being able to do certain things will require our maximum concentration. When people concentrate, our physical and mental efficiency skyrocket.
24. To know yourself is to study yourself in action with another person.
Experiences help us to know ourselves, with each new experience we grow as individuals and advance on our way to the person we really should be.
25. Research your own experiences, to come to understand what works for you.
The experiences will be responsible for opening new doors and discovering new paths towards the future we dream of.
26. Thoughts are things.
Thoughts are more valuable than we usually think, because every great action will always start with a thought.
27. The less effort, the faster and more powerful you will be.
In this quote, Bruce Lee tells us about the search for efficiency, what requires less effort will always be much easier for us to do.
28. Empty your cup that it may be filled; stay with nothing to gain the whole.
In order to move forward, sometimes we must leave behind our taboos and prejudices. Maybe not everything we believed was really positive for us.
29. Life is your teacher, and you are in a state of constant learning.
Throughout life we all evolve and change, little by little improving the person we are. Life will lead us to the person we will become.
30. If one loves, he does not need to have an ideology of love.
Love is one of the most powerful forces that can inspire people, a world with more love would be unequivocally better for all of society as a whole.
31. Reality becomes apparent when we stop comparing.
We should not compare ourselves with others, we are all unique and perfect in our own way.
32. A wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can learn from a wise answer.
What you say speaks a lot about yourself, from the questions that a person can ask, it is possible to intuit a lot about them.
33. Faith is a state of mind that can be conditioned through self-discipline. Faith can be achieved.
Not all people have faith, but those who have it undoubtedly feel much more secure because of it.
34. The spirit of the individual is determined by his dominant habits of thought.
Our most habitual thoughts largely determine the person we are, because as a rule general in what we tend to think about the most will be commonly represented in our actions diaries.
35. Expecting life to treat you well for being a good person is like expecting a tiger not to attack you for being a vegetarian.
Life can be merciless to any of us, regardless of how good or bad a person we are.
36. When the opponent expands, I contract. When he contracts, I expand. And when there is an opportunity, I don't hit; the blow is given by itself.
Lee knew that anticipating his opponent's moves was essential in order to achieve victory. Well, the best combatant is the one who knows how to predict the actions that his rival will carry out.
37. Man, the living being, the creative individual, is always more important than any established style or system.
We should not focus only on one style of fighting or combat, we can take from all of them what best suits us and create our own style.
38. Like a cobra, your punch should be felt rather than seen.
Speed is essential in hand-to-hand combat, with it our opponent will have no option to reply.
39. Showing off is a silly way to get glory.
The public used to marvel at the fighting style of this martial artist, because in his fights he not only won, he also reveled in his victory.
40. Life is never stagnation. It is constant movement, movement without rhythm, because we change constantly. Things live by moving and gain strength as they do so.
Life never stops, time passes silently even if we don't realize it.
41. My old Mandarin movies don't meet the quality standards, but I must say that little by little they are climbing up to that standard that I call “quality”.
As an actor, Lee always tried to improve his work over the years, seeking to become the best possible version of himself.
42. Martial arts have a very, very deep meaning; at least as far as my life is concerned.
Martial arts marked the life of this great actor, and they gave him the opportunity he needed to be able to succeed like no one had ever done before.
43. Now there is a lot of talk about the sport, but when we talk about the real combat, as it really is; you better train every part of your body.
In hand-to-hand combat, physical preparation is vital. Without the necessary physical preparation we could never win any fight.
44. For me, martial arts means expressing yourself.
Martial arts were the means by which Bruce Lee managed to express everything he felt.
45. The word "super star" brings me down, the expression "star man" is an illusion.
Fame was something unwanted by this great actor, but it arose as a result of his success. Over the years he had to learn to deal with her.
46. Knowledge is not enough, we must apply it. It is not enough to want, you have to do it.
The best way to perfect something is by practicing it, knowledge alone will not lead us towards its total mastery.
47. Fixed patterns are unable to adapt. The truth is outside of fixed patterns.
Everything in life can be modified and adapted to us, we should not be afraid of changes.
48. Ever since he was a child, he was in dire need of growth and expansion. For me, the role and duty of every human being is the sincere and honest development of one's potential.
As we can see, Bruce Lee sought personal growth and constant evolution throughout his life.
49. For me, the most extraordinary aspect of martial arts lies in its simplicity. The easy way is also the right way, and there is nothing special about martial arts at all.
The shortest distance between two points is the straight line and this can also be extrapolated to martial arts. The easiest way to do something will always be the right way.
50. If you stay in the classical pattern, you are understanding the routine, the tradition, the shadow, but you are not understanding yourself.
We must absorb as much knowledge as possible, but we must also be able to put all that knowledge into practice. Learn to use your own qualities.
51. I'm not teaching anything, I'm just helping you to know yourself.
As an educator, Lee wanted his students to develop their maximum human potential, thus becoming the best version of themselves.
52. I have always been a martial artist by choice, an actor by profession, but above all, I am an artist for life.
Staying pigeonholed in a profession does not allow you to evolve, and as we see in this quote, he would never close in on a new experience.
53. As love ages, our hearts mature, and our hearts turn to coal, hot.
Over the years, our way of feeling love may vary, but the rubble within us of the great love we once felt will always remain.
54. Simplicity is the last step of art.
The art that may seem simpler, may also be the one that holds the most latent meaning.
55. If you want to understand the truth in martial arts, to see any opponent clearly, you must leave behind the notions learned in schools, prejudices, likes and dislikes, among others.
We must not take anything for granted, we must learn from each opponent. Extracting from him the maximum information, we will be able to anticipate his movements.
56. Unfortunately, most martial arts students are conformists. The student rarely depends on himself to express himself.
It is true that students base all their beliefs on their teacher and that is a mistake, we must absorb the information that our teacher transmits to us in order to adapt it to ourselves.
57. Don't think, feel. It's like a finger pointing to the moon, don't focus on the finger or you will miss the glory of heaven.
In order to see a situation clearly, we will need to have the proper perspective. We will not be able to see the most obvious solutions, if we really do not want to see them.
58. Art, after all, is a means of acquiring personal freedom. Your form is not mine and my form is not yours.
We can innovate in everything we do, we just need to infuse our personal stamp into our work or trade.
59. My experience can help, but I insist and maintain that art, true art cannot be delivered.
Our personal experiences give us a very particular way of understanding life, giving us the tools to acquire with them the perspective we currently have.
60. Learning is a constant process of discovery that never ends.
Throughout our lives we should never stop learning, it can always be a good time to learn or discover something new.
61. Whether or not God is leading me, I feel like this great force, this great power, or this dynamic thing, is within me.
Religion can be an engine that drives us in our day to day, but it depends on us that we need to use the motivation that religion can provide us.
62. The disbelievers said: "man cannot fly"; the creators said: “maybe not, but we will try” and finally dissipated in the morning glow, while disbelievers looked on from below.
Many times we do not get to achieve something because of the limits that we unconsciously impose on ourselves, we should not set limits that harm us on our way to success.
63. Martial arts are all those forms of combat around the world; some of them have become more of a sport, but the true martial art is one that focuses on hand-to-hand combat.
As this great celebrity tells us in this quote, there are two types of martial arts: those that are used inside a ring or a ring, and those that are really used for self-defense.
64. On one side, there is human instinct and on the other, self-control; you must learn to combine both in harmony. If you have one at the extreme, you will be an unreasonable man, if you have the other at the extreme, then you will be a mechanical man. You must combine both in harmony.
Knowing ourselves will give us the ability to use our full potential. Learning to control our impulses will act more efficiently at the right time.
65. If you don't want to slip tomorrow, tell the truth today.
The truth must be our banner, because only with it can we live a life whose decisions always represent us.
66. I don't teach Karate because I don't believe in styles anymore. I don't believe in the Chinese way of fighting or the Japanese way. Unless we men had three arms and four legs, there could be different forms of combat.
As Bruce Lee tells us in this quote, we can all have our peculiar way of fighting. A way of fighting that fully adapts to us and that reaches its maximum efficiency, thanks to our particular physical qualities.
67. I don't want to sound like Confucius or anything like that, I want people to recognize me for the man that I am.
The way we express ourselves says a lot about ourselves. Speaking in such a way that everyone present can understand us will help us show ourselves as someone much closer.
68. I share the same thinking as my predecessors; that philosophy is the love of wisdom.
The great personalities of all times have always tried to accumulate the maximum possible wisdom. This martial artist was, at the time, no exception.
69. Under heaven there is only one big family, and I like to see that people accept that we are all different, but that they like to be different.
The diversity of the human being makes it much stronger, all the cultures of the world must contribute in order to create a better society in the future.
70. If forty years ago a Chinese had thought that he was going to play a spy in an American movie, that would have been a vague and poor dream; Now things are different.
In the time of this actor, society had changed and Chinese culture began to have the respect it deserved in Western countries.
71. A choleric temper will soon deceive you.
Anger and rage will only lead us towards defeat, since we will not be able to avoid falling into our adversary's traps when they blind us.
72. Life is better lived than conceptualized.
The experiences in life are very important, we should never say no to a possible new experience.
73. All kinds of knowledge actually involve self-knowledge; people come to me not so much to teach them how to defend themselves against external dangers, but to get to know themselves better and to be able to overcome themselves. Win that internal fight.
Our biggest rival will always be ourselves, if we manage to defeat ourselves we will undoubtedly be much more powerful.
74. I want to be the catalyst of a new era for China, not on a grand political scale or anything like that; but to show the world that many things are different. To be the catalyst for the understanding of Chinese culture.
Bruce Lee opened Chinese culture to the world and thanks to him, we Westerners began to understand the great complexity behind this ancient society.
75. When a man realizes the great spiritual forces within him and begins to use them for science, business, and life, his progress in the future will be unparalleled.
There are many more things in the world than just what we can see, when we can understand this fact, a new world of possibilities will open up before us.