The Tao of Jeet Kune Do - A Huge Influence on My Life

books bruce lee martial arts books tao of jeet kune do Dec 28, 2011

In 1975, I bought my first copy of The Tao of Jeet Kune Do, by Bruce Lee. It was a paperback copy. For Christmas in 1976, I was given a hardbound edition. I still have both copies.

This year -- 2011 -- Nancy gave me the Expanded Edition of Tao of Jeet Kune Do for Christmas. As I started reading it again, it really brought back memories of just how influential these writings were when I was 22 years old.

Growing up in the Bible Belt (Kentucky, Georgia, Florida) in the Fifties and Sixties did not provide opportunities for a young guy to think outside the fundamentalist church. Anything that wasn't understood was Satanic, including the Beatles, according to ministers in my church. Actually, it was a Sunday School lecture against the Beatles that first made me realize that the religion might be full of crap. If they would lie about the Beatles just to prove a point, what else would they lie about? It started me on the journey that led me to reject that sort of narrow-minded thinking. That was around 1969.

By the time Bruce Lee arrived, and I began studying Shaolin Do with Grandmaster Sin The, I was 20 years old and fascinated with the Kung Fu TV show and its Taoist morality.

Bruce Lee's book drove it home.

"Moving, be like water. Still, be like a mirror. Respond like an echo."

It was a new way of thinking.

"The eye sees it, But no hands can take hold of it. The moon in the stream."

"Nothingness cannot be defined. The softest thing cannot be snapped."

I began stepping out of the teachings of my youth and embraced a more abstract way of thinking.

Every martial artist since 1972 owes a tremendous debt to Bruce Lee. One of the things that I still practice is his concept of discarding what is not useful. When my students and I come across a self-defense application that seems preposterous, we discard it. If it wouldn't work in real life, we don't worry about it.

But my debt goes much deeper than just technique or martial philosophy. It goes to the very heart, the philosophy of life that I embrace. It's very peaceful, and it has carried me through some very down periods in my life.

I have a lot to thank Bruce Lee for -- I only wish he still lived so I could tell him. Instead, I'm telling you.

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The Tao of Jeet Kune Do - A Huge Influence on My Life

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