Martial Artist Quotes

The more complicated and restricted the method, the less opportunity for expression of one's original sense of freedom.

When there is freedom from mechanical conditioning, there is simplicity.

To hell with circumstances; I create opportunities.

The Now is indivisible. Completeness, the now, is an absence of the conscious mind to strive to divide that which is indivisible. For once the completeness of things is taken apart it is no longer complete.

We are told that talent creates opportunity, yet it is desire that creates talent.

Willing is not enough, one must apply.

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.

To reach me, you must move to me. Your attack offers me an opportunity to intercept you.

Don't be forecasting evil unless it is what you can guard against. Anxiety is good for nothing if we can't turn it into a defense.

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

Recognizing that the power of will is the supreme court over all other departments of my mind, I will exercise daily when I need the urge to act for any purpose; and I will form habits designed to bring the power of my will into action at least once daily.

When we hold to the core, the opposite sides are the same if they are seen from the center of the moving circle. I do not experience; I am experience. I am not the subject of experience; I am that experience. I am awareness. Nothing else can be I or can exist.

There is "what is" only when there is no comparing and to live with "what is" is to be peaceful.

What we are after is the root and not the branches. The root is the real knowledge; the branches are surface knowledge. Real knowledge breeds 'body feel' and personal expression; surface knowledge breeds mechanical conditioning and imposing limitation and squelches creativity.

Be like water making its way through cracks. Do not be assertive, but adjust to the object, and you shall find a way round or through it. If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves.

Out of chaos, find simplicity, From discord, find harmony.

Either push your limits or die.

Its like a finger pointing away to the moon. Dont concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory.

The stillness in stillness is not the real stillness; only when there is stillness in movement does the universal rhythm manifest.

I've come to understand that life is best lived, not conceptualized.

I don't believe in different ways of fighting now. I mean, unless human beings have 3 arms and 3 legs, then we will have a different way of fighting. But basically we all have two arms and two legs so that is why I believe there should be only one way of fighting and that is no way.

When you point to the moon, what do you see in front of your finger; Your task is to feel, not to think, when you can understand that the lesson will be learned.

Conditioning obstructs our view of reality. We do not see IT in its suchness because of our indoctrination, crooked and twisted.

Art requires imagination. It requires Creativity. Creativity requires experience and experience comes from your life. And your life is expressed in your art.

There are too many stars and too few actors.

In life, what more can you ask for than to be real?

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

To me, ultimately, martial arts means honestly expressing yourself. Now, it is very difficult to do. It has always been very easy for me to put on a show and be cocky, and be flooded with a cocky feeling and feel pretty cool and all that. I can make all kinds of phoney things. Blinded by it. Or I can show some really fancy movement. But to experience oneself honestly, not lying to oneself, and to express myself honestly, now that is very hard to do.

Either you understand or you don't, and that is that.

With every adversity comes a blessing because a shock acts as a reminder to oneself that we must not get stale in routine.

It is easy for me to put on a show and be cocky..but to express oneself honestly not lying to oneself, now that my friend is very hard to do

As you think, so shall you become.

To express yourself in freedom, you must die to everything of yesterday. From the 'old', you derive security; from the 'new', you gain the flow.

It is better to live as a broken piece of jade, than to live as a useless clay.

You will never get any more out of this life than you expect.

To be certain, every day there can be a revelation or a new discovery.

When you fight, if it is a real fight, use every tool that you have, use your whole body. Use your fists, your legs, your fingers, your head if you have to, and hit them in every vulnerable spot, the balls, the eyes etc. to win.

The aim of art is to project an inner vision into the world, to state in aesthetic creation the deepest psychic and personal experiences of a human being. It is to enable those experiences to be intelligible and generally recognized within the total framework of an ideal world.

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

No matter what, you must let your innerlight guide you out of the darkness.

The martial arts are ultimately self-knowledge. A punch or a kick is not to knock the hell out of the guy in front, but to knock the hell out of your ego, your fear, or your hang-ups.

All martial art is simply an honest expression of one's body — with a lot of deception in between.

My style? You can call it the art of fighting without fighting.

The less effort, the faster and more powerful you will be.

All types of knowledge ultimately lead to self-knowledge. So, therefore, these people are asking me to teach them, not so much how to defend themselves or how to do somebody in. Rather, they want to learn to express themselves through some movement, be it anger, be it determination or whatever. So, in other words, they're paying me to show them, in combative form, the art of expressing the human body.

Practice makes perfect. After a long time of practicing, our work will become natural, skillfull, swift, and steady.

Life is wide, limitless. There is no border, no frontier.

Emotion can be the enemy, if you give into your emotion, you lose yourself. You must be at one with your emotion, because the body always follows the mind.

I believe in teaching just a few students, as teaching requires a constant alert observation on each individual in order to establish a direct relationship. A good teacher cannot be fixed in a routine, and many are just that. During teaching, each moment requires a sensitive mind that is constantly changing and constantly adapting.

The height of cultivation always runs to simplicity.

The mind is like a fertile garden in which anything that is planted, flowers or weeds, will grow.

I treasure the memory of the past misfortunes. It has added more to my bank of fortitude.

Flow in the living moment - We are always in a process of becoming and nothing is fixed.

Take things as they are. Punch when you have to punch. Kick when you have to kick.

As long as we separate this oneness into two we won't achieve realization.

Let yourself go with dis-ease, be with it, and keep it company. This is the way to be rid of it.

A man must constantly exceed his level

Learn the principle, abide by the principle, and dissolve the principle. In short, enter a mold without being caged in it. Obey the principle without being bound by it. Learn, master, and achieve.

Your state of mind is everything.

If you want to be immortal live a life worth remembering