50 Bruce Lee Quotes to Kick Your Butt into Action

“I am learning to understand rather than immediately judge or to be judged. I cannot blindly follow the crowd and accept their approach. I will not allow myself to indulge in the usual manipulating game of role creation. Fortunately for me, my self-knowledge has transcended that and I have come to understand that life is best to be lived and not to be conceptualized. I am happy because I am growing daily and I am honestly not knowing where the limit lies. To be certain, every day there can be a revelation or a new discovery. I treasure the memory of the past misfortunes. It has added more to my bank of fortitude.”– Bruce Lee

“Self-knowledge involves relationship. To know oneself is to study one self in action with another person. Relationship is a process of self evaluation and self revelation. Relationship is the mirror in which you discover yourself – to be is to be related.”– Bruce Lee

“Life itself is your teacher, and you are in a state of constant learning.” – Bruce Lee

“Life is never stagnation. It is constant movement, un-rhythmic movement, as we as constant change. Things live by moving and gain strength as they go.”– Bruce Lee

“I wish neither to possess nor to be possessed. I no longer covet ‘paradise’. More important, I no longer fear ‘hell’. The medicine for my suffering I had within me from the very beginning but I did not take it. My ailment came from within myself, but I did not observe it, until this moment. Now I see that I will never find the light unless, like the candle, I am my own fuel, consuming myself.”– Bruce Lee

“Art calls for complete mastery of techniques, developed by reflection within the soul.”– Bruce Lee

“The doubters said, ‘Man can not fly,’ The doers said, ‘Maybe, but we’ll try,’ And finally soared In the morning glow While non-believers Watched from below.”– Bruce Lee

“Reality is apparent when one ceases to compare. There is “what is” only when there is no comparison at all, and to live with what is, is to be peaceful.”– Bruce Lee

“Life’s battles don’t always go to the stronger or faster man. But sooner or later the man who wins, is the man who thinks he can.”– Bruce Lee

“The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering.”– Bruce Lee

“Notice that the stiffest tree is most easily cracked, while the bamboo or willow survives by bending with the wind.”– Bruce Lee

“To hell with circumstances; I create opportunities.” – Bruce Lee

“Take things as they are. Punch when you have to punch. Kick when you have to kick.”– Bruce Lee

“It’s not the daily increase but daily decrease. Hack away at the unessential.”– Bruce Lee

“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.”– Bruce Lee

“Use only that which works, and take it from any place you can find it.”– Bruce Lee

“The stillness in stillness is not the real stillness; only when there is stillness in movement does the universal rhythm manifest.”– Bruce Lee

“If you think a thing is impossible, you’ll only make it impossible.” – Bruce Lee

“Everything you do, if not in a relaxed state will be done at a lesser level than you are proficient. Thus the tensed expert marksman will aim at a level less than his/her student.”– Bruce Lee

“Knowing is not enough, we must apply. Willing is not enough, we must do.”– Bruce Lee

“When one has reached maturity in the art, one will have a formless form. It is like ice dissolving in water. When one has no form, one can be all forms; when one has no style, he can fit in with any style.”– Bruce Lee

“The athlete who is building muscles though weight training should be very sure to work adequately on speed and flexibility at the same time. In combat, without the prior attributes, a strong man will be like the bull with its colossal strength futilely pursuing the matador or like a low-geared truck chasing a rabbit.”– Bruce Lee

“Simplicity is the key to brilliance.” – Bruce Lee

“Life is better lived than conceptualized. This writing can be less demanding should I allow myself to indulge in the usual manipulating game of role creation. Fortunately for me, my self-knowledge has transcended that and I’ve come to understand that life is best to be lived — not to be conceptualized. If you have to think, you still do not understand.”– Bruce Lee

“Life is wide, limitless. There is no border, no frontier.”– Bruce Lee

“The spirit of the individual is determined by his dominating thought habits.”– Bruce Lee

“To me, the extraordinary aspect of martial arts lies in its simplicity. The easy way is also the right way, and martial arts is nothing at all special; the closer to the true way of martial arts, the less wastage of expression there is.”– Bruce Lee

“The knowledge and skills you have achieved are meant to be forgotten so you can float comfortably in emptiness, without obstruction.”– Bruce Lee

“In order to taste my cup of water, you must first empty your cup.” – Bruce Lee

“Fear comes from uncertainty; we can eliminate the fear within us when we know ourselves better. As the great Sun Tzu said: “When you know yourself and your opponent, you will win every time. When you know yourself but not your opponent, you will win one and lose one. However, when you do not know yourself or your opponent, you will be imperiled every time.”– Bruce Lee

“Don’t fear failure. Not failure, but low aim, is the crime. In great attempts, it is glorious even to fail.”– Bruce Lee

“Don’t get set into one form, adapt it and build your own, and let it grow, be like water.”– Bruce Lee

“In the middle of chaos lies opportunity.” – Bruce Lee

“Do not be tense, just be ready, not thinking but not dreaming, not being set but being flexible. It is being “wholly” and quietly alive, aware and alert, ready for whatever may come.”– Bruce Lee

“Be self-aware, rather than a repetitious robot.”– Bruce Lee

“Using no way as a way, having no limitation as limitation.”– Bruce Lee

“I am not teaching you anything. I just help you to explore yourself.”– Bruce Lee

“Forget about winning and losing; forget about pride and pain. Let your opponent graze your skin and you smash into his flesh; let him smash into your flesh and you fracture his bones; let him fracture your bones and you take his life! Do not be concerned with escaping safely – lay your life before him!!”– Bruce Lee

“Real living is living for others.” – Bruce Lee

“The great mistake is to anticipate the outcome of the engagement; you ought not to be thinking of whether it ends in victory or defeat. Let nature take its course, and your tools will strike at the right moment.”– Bruce Lee

“Those who are unaware they are walking in darkness will never seek the light.”– Bruce Lee

“Time means a lot to me because you see I am also a learner and am often lost in the joy of forever developing.”– Bruce Lee

“The world is full of people who are determined to be somebody or to give trouble. They want to get ahead, to stand out. Such ambition has no use for a gung fu man, who rejects all forms of self-assertiveness and competition.”– Bruce Lee

“If you love life, don’t waste time, for time is what life is made up of.” – Bruce Lee

“Because one does not want to be disturbed, to be made uncertain, he establishes a pattern of conduct, of thought, a pattern of relationship to man etc. Then he becomes a slave to the pattern and takes the pattern to be the real thing.”– Bruce Lee

“Do not deny the classical approach, simply as a reaction, or you will have created another pattern and trapped yourself there.”– Bruce Lee

“A fight is not won by one punch or kick. Either learn to endure or hire a bodyguard.”.”– Bruce Lee

“The word ‘superstar’ is an illusion.”– Bruce Lee

“But neither can you condemn nor justify and yet be extraordinarily alive as you walk on. You can never invite the wind but you must leave the window open.”– Bruce Lee

“Do not pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a difficult one.” – Bruce Lee