Actors From San Francisco

"Don't fear failure. — Not failure, but low aim, is the crime. In great attempts it is glorious even to fail."

"Research your own experience; absorb what is useful, reject what is useless and add what is essentially your own."

"When asked what the difference between a karate punch and a kung-fu punch was during his first U.S. screen test in 1965, Bruce Lee replied, “Well, a karate punch is like being hit by an iron bar—whack! A kung-fu punch is like being hit by an iron ball swung on an iron chain with an iron ball attached to the end—it goes WHANG!—and it hurts inside.” Then he stood up and showed exactly what that might look like in a flurry of hands and feet moving so fast they blurred."

"Bruce Lee was grateful to those who helped his career. When The Green Hornet was cancelled, he wrote to producer William Dozier to say, "I like to take this opportunity to thank you personally for all that you've done to start my career in show business. Without you, I would never have thought about being in Hollywood. I've gained tremendous experience from the Green Hornet and believe I've improved steadily since the first show----that of minimizing and hacking away the unessential.""

"The perfect way is only difficult for those who pick and choose. Do not like, do not dislike; all will then be clear. Make a hairbreadth difference and heaven and earth are set apart; if you want the truth to stand clear before you, never be for or against. The struggle between "for" and "against" is the mind's worst disease."

"When I was having dinner with Chuck Norris I did ask him: "If you and Bruce would be in a real fight to death, who would win?", and he said without thinking: "Bruce of course. Nobody can beat him.""

"Bruce Lee lived martial arts every day! He could do things in the martial arts that others could not. He was very friendly and outgoing and usually the center of attention. We met after the national championships in 1964 during a dinner. Because I had just won the championship, he immediately challenged me. He said, "I want to challenge you to an arm wrestling match." I thought this guy barely weighs 120 pounds soaking wet. This will be simple, and I immediately accepted his challenge. Then he said, "But we’re going to arm wrestle — Chinese style." I agreed since I really thought I could take him any way that he wanted to wrestle. At the time, I weighed about 225 pounds to his 120 pounds. So we got to it, and I will confess that trying to twist his arm was like trying to twist a piece of steel! He looked at me and smiled while I was giving it all I had. Then he just dumped me over like it was nothing at all. He was quite a martial artist– the best I’ve ever seen. Yet with skill that masterful, he was always very warm and friendly — the kind of guy everyone wanted to meet."

"I wouldn't have put a dime on anyone to beat Bruce Lee in a real confrontation. Bruce Lee was the best street fighter I ever saw, even to this very day, and not just pound for pound — but against anyone in a real fight."

"His martial art skills made Lee arguably the greatest martial artist of his time — or any other."

"The story was particularly serious . . . I know Bruce Lee from secondary school in Nigeria. I come from Ghana, and there has always been a race, a loving rivalry between two countries. So I was picked on. Every child who is bullied, has an imaginary hero. I had several, and Bruce Lee was the greatest. Every little boy has a little bit of Bruce Lee in him."

"There's no doubt in my mind that if Bruce Lee had gone into pro boxing, he could easily have ranked in the top three in the lightweight division or junior-welterweight division."

"The slender, swift Bruce Lee was the Fred Astaire of martial arts, and many of the fights that could be merely brutal come across as lightning-fast choreography."

"I wanted to do in boxing what Bruce Lee was able to do in the martial arts. Lee was an artist and, like him, I try to get beyond the fundamentals of my sport. I want my fights to be seen as plays."

"In a dictionary, you say "greatest", you say "Bruce Lee", that's the way it is. He is second to no one."

"When Bruce Lee kicked, you don't shut your eyes. Because when you shut your eyes, you cannot see Bruce Lee kick it's so fast! Human beings cannot move like cartoon [sound effects], that's the fastest you can be. Even Muhammad Ali or Mike Tyson, their punches are fast, but you still can see [them]."

"If Bruce Lee wasn't the greatest martial artist of all time, then certainly he is the number one candidate."

"I considered him by far the greatest. And for those who don't considering him the greatest, at least he is the top candidate for being actually the greatest."

"Every kid, I believe, in America noticed that guy behind The Green Hornet— the one who could kick, the one who could punch, the one who could move so amazingly—all eyes centered on him. … The makers of The Green Hornet had to actively restrain Bruce Lee from being himself because they realized every time they saw the rushes that everything else was wiped off-screen."

"I truly liked and admired Bruce. I worked with him some and he helped me in my foot movement and back fist. Bruce probable weighed 135 pounds at most, but he could hit like a mule. I know, because he knocked me under Sharon Tate’s barstool at Columbia Pictures in 1968. Bruce never confronted any big men to my knowledge. There are stories out there, but none I personally know of. I will say this; I would have picked Bruce in any street situation. He had the knowledge and the attitude to carry him through anything."

"I remember many times my father (Ed Parker) talking about, pound for pound, Lee was the best martial artist, he'd ever seen."

"Bruce Lee is my idol. I need to learn some techniques of Bruce Lee, especially the quickness of his hands and legs."

"Actually, the father of mixed martial arts, if you will, was Bruce Lee. If you look at the way Bruce Lee trained, the way he fought, and many of the things he wrote, he said the perfect style was no style. You take a little something from everything. You take the good things from every different discipline, use what works, and you throw the rest away."

"Concepts vs. self-actualization. — Instead of dedicating your life to actualize a concept of what you should be like, ACTUALIZE YOURSELF. The process of maturing does not mean to become a captive of conceptualization. It is to come to the realization of what lies in our innermost selves."

"Nowadays you don't go around on the street kicking people, punching people — because if you do (makes gun shape with hand), well that's it — I don't care how good you are."

"When I look around I always learn something, and that is to be yourself always, express yourself, and have faith in yourself. Do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate him. Now that seems to be the prevalent thing happening in Hong Kong, like they always copy mannerism, but they never start from the root of his being and that is, how can I be me?"

"You know what I want to think of myself? As a human being. Because, I mean I don't want to be like "As Confucius say," but under the sky, under the heavens there is but one family. It just so happens man that people are different."

"When you're talking about fighting, as it is, with no rules, well then, baby you'd better train every part of your body!"

"All types of knowledge, ultimately mean self knowledge."

"When I look around, I always learn something: to be always yourself, and to express yourself, to have faith in yourself. Do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it."

"Boards don't hit back."

"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."

"Don't think, feel....it is like a finger pointing a way to the moon. Don't concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory!"

"Man, the living creature, the creating individual, is always more important than any established style or system."

"Use only that which works, and take it from any place you can find it."

"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."

"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. A man must constantly exceed his level."

"Don't get set into one form, adapt it and build your own, and let it grow, be like water. Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless — like water. Now you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup; You put water into a bottle 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."

"For a moment The surrounding utters no sound. Time ceases. The Paradise of Dreams come true."

"Jeet Kune Do favors formlessness so that it can assume all forms and since Jeet Kune Do has no style, it can fit in with all styles. As a result, Jeet Kune Do utilizes all ways and is bound by none and, likewise, uses any techniques which serve its end."

"When there is freedom from mechanical conditioning, there is simplicity. The classical man is just a bundle of routine, ideas and tradition. If you follow the classical pattern, you are understanding the routine, the tradition, the shadow — you are not understanding yourself."

"Do not deny the classical approach, simply as a reaction, or you will have created another pattern and trapped yourself there."

"Truth has no path. Truth is living and, therefore, changing. Awareness is without choice, without demand, without anxiety; in that state of mind, there is perception. To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person. Awareness has no frontier; it is giving of your whole being, without exclusion."

"To contemplate a thing implies maintaining oneself OUTSIDE it, resolved to keep a distance between it and ourselves."

"Running water never grows stale. So you just have to 'keep on flowing.'"

"If one loves, one need not have an ideology of love."

"The happiness that is derived from excitement is like a brilliant fire — soon it will go out. Before we married, we never had the chance to go out to nightclubs. We only spent our nights watching TV and chatting. Many young couples live a very exciting life when they are in love. So, when they marry, and their lives are reduced to calmness and dullness, they will feel impatient and will drink the bitter cup of a sad marriage."

"Of course you’re there. Death is always there. So why was I afraid? Your leap is swift. Your claws are sharp and merciful. What can you take from me which is not already yours? . . . Everything I have done until now has been fruitless. It has led to nothing. There was no other path except that it led to nothing — and before me now there is only one real fact — Death. The truth I have been seeking — this truth is Death. Yet Death is also a seeker. Forever seeking me. So — we have met at last. And I am prepared. I am at peace. Because I will conquer death with death."

"Neither. I think of myself as a human being."

"The Three Stages of Cultivation — The first is the primitive stage. It is a stage of original ignorance in which a person knows nothing about the art of combat. In a fight, he simply blocks and strikes instinctively without a concern for what is right and wrong. Of course, he may not be so-called scientific, but, nevertheless, being himself, his attacks or defenses are fluid. The second stage — the stage of sophistication, or mechanical stage — begins when a person starts his training. He is taught the different ways of blocking, striking, kicking, standing, breathing, and thinking — unquestionably, he has gained the scientific knowledge of combat, but unfortunately his original self and sense of freedom are lost, and his action no longer flows by itself. His mind tends to freeze at different movements for calculations and analysis, and even worse, he might be called “intellectually bound” and maintain himself outside of the actual reality. The third stage — the stage of artlessness, or spontaneous stage — occurs when, after years of serious and hard practice, the student realizes that after all, gung fu is nothing special. And instead of trying to impose on his mind, he adjusts himself to his opponent like water pressing on an earthen wall. It flows through the slightest crack. There is nothing to try to do but try to be purposeless and formless, like water. All of his classical techniques and standard styles are minimized, if not wiped out, and nothingness prevails. He is no longer confined."

"Using no way as way; Having no limitation as limitation."