Bruce Lee Quotes

Hong Kong–American martial artist and actor (1940–1973)

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Lee Jun-fan (27 November 1940 – 20 July 1973), commonly known as Bruce Lee, was a Hong Kong American martial artist and actor who is widely regarded as the most influential martial artist of the 20th century.

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Pen Names: 李元鑒

Native Name: 李小龍

Alternative Names: Lee Jun-fan

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The meaning of life is that it is to be lived, and it is not to be traded and conceptualized and squeezed into a pattern of systems.

If I tell you I'm good, probably you will say I'm boasting. But if I tell you I'm not good, you'll know I'm lying.

To hell with circumstances; I create opportunities.

If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.

One should be in harmony with, not in opposition to, the strength and force of the opposition. This means that one should do nothing that is not natural or spontaneous; the important thing is not to strain in any way.

A good martial artist does not become tense, but ready. Not thinking, yet not dreaming. Ready for whatever may come. When the opponent expands, I contract; and when he contracts, I expand. And when there is an opportunity, "I" do not hit, "it" hits all by itself.

On learning. — Learning is discovery, the discovery of the cause of our ignorance. However, the best way of learning is not the computation of information. Learning is discovering, uncovering what is there in us. When we discover, we are uncovering our own ability, our own eyes, in order to find our potential, to see what is going on, to discover how we can enlarge our lives, to find means at our disposal that will let us cope with a difficult situation. And all this, I maintain, is taking place in the here and now.

Whether or not we can get together, remember well that art “lives” where absolute freedom is. With all the training thrown to nowhere, with a mind (if there is such a verbal substance) perfectly unaware of its own working, with the “self” vanishing nowhere, the art of JKD attains its perfection.

Seriously, if you always put limits on what you can do, physical or anything else; it'll spread over into the rest of your life. It'll spread into your work, into your morality, into your entire being... There are NO limits. There are plateus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level.

Defeat is a state of mind; no one is ever defeated until defeat has been accepted by reality

The More we value things, the less we value ourselves

The possession of anything begins in the mind.

Seek to understand the root. — It is futile to argue as to which single leaf, which design of branch, or which attractive flower you like; when you understand the root, you understand all its blossoming.

If you always put limit on everything you do, physical or anything else. It will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.

Many people dedicate their lives to actualizing a concept of what they should be like, rather than actualizing themselves.
This difference between self-actualization and self-image actualization is very important. Most people live only for their image