“...we have more faith in what we imitate than in what we originate. We cannot derive a sense of absolute certitude from anything which has its roots in us. The most poignant sense of insecurity comes from standing alone and we are not alone when we imitate. It is thus with most of us; we are what other people say we are. We know ourselves chiefly by hearsay.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Be like water making its way through cracks. Do not be assertive, but adjust to the object, and you shall find a way around or through it. If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves.
Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless, like water. If you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle and it becomes the bottle. You put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Now, water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.”
―
Bruce Lee
“The ideal is unnatural naturalness, or natural unnaturalness. I mean it is a combination of both.
I mean here is natural instinct and here is control. You are to combine the two in harmony.
Not if you have one to the extreme, you'll be very unscientific.
If you have another to the extreme, you become, all of a sudden, a mechanical man
No longer a human being.
It is a successful combination of both.
That way it is a process of continuing growth.
Be water, my friend.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Practice makes perfect. After a long time of practicing, our work will become natural, skillfull, swift, and steady.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Effort within the mind further limits the mind, because effort implies struggle towards a goal and when you have a goal, a purpose, an end in view, you have placed a limit on the mind.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Moving, be like water. Still, be like a mirror. Respond like an echo.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Be like water making its way through crack.
Do not be assertive but adjust to the object and you shall find a way round it or through it.
If nothing within you stays rigid outward thigs will disclose themselves.
Moving be like water.
Still be like a mirror.
Respond like an echo.”
―
Bruce Lee
“There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Defeat is not defeat unless accepted as a reality-in your own mind
―
Bruce Lee
“Set patterns, incapable of adaptability, of pliability, only offer a better cage. Truth is outside of all patterns.”
―
Bruce Lee
“The spirit of the individual is determined by his dominating thought habits.”
―
Bruce Lee
“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.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Ricorda, amico mio, che non è tanto importante quello che ti succede, ma come reagisci agli eventi.”
―
Bruce Lee
“Now I see that I will never find the light
Unless, like the candle, I am my own fuel,
Consuming myself.”
―
Bruce Lee
