Martial Artist Quotes

“To spend time is to pass it in a specified manner. To waste time is to expend it thoughtlessly or carelessly. We all have time to either spend or waste and it is our decision what to do with it. But once passed, it is gone forever.”

“The highest technique is to have no technique. My technique is a result of your technique; my movement is a result of your movement.”

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

“Put 'going the extra mile' to work as part of one's daily habit”

“Without frustration you will not discover that you might be able to do something on your own. We grow through conflict.”

“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.”

“Running water never grows stale.”

“Your state of mind is everything.”

“Everybody has to think for himself. A right way for a big man may not be a right way for a small man. A right way for someone who is slow may not be a right way for someone who is quick. Each person must understand his weaknesses and his strengths.”

“A good teacher can never be fixed in a routine... each moment requires a sensitive mind that is constantly changing and constantly adapting. A teacher must never impose this student to fit his favourite pattern; a good teacher functions as a pointer, exposing his student's vulnerability and causing him to explore both internally and finally integrating himself with his being. Martial art should not be passed out indiscriminately.”

“To change with change is the changeless state”

“You must accept the fact that there is no help but self-help. I cannot tell you how to gain freedom since freedom exists within you.”

“Not being tense but ready. Not thinking but not dreaming. Not being set but flexible. Liberation from the uneasy sense of confinement. It is being wholly and quietly alive, aware and alert, ready for whatever may come.”

“Willing is not enough, one must apply.”

“To take responsibility for one's own actions, good and bad, is something else.”

“I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.”

“Genius: The capacity to see and to express what is simple, simply!”

“It is not what happens that is success or failure, but what it does to the heart of man.”

“Emptiness the starting point. — In order to taste my cup of water you must first empty your cup. My friend, drop all your preconceived and fixed ideas and be neutral. Do you know why this cup is useful? Because it is empty.”

“The founder of any branch must be more ingenious than the common man. However, if his achievement is not carried on by disciples of the same ingenuity, then things will only become formalized and get stuck in a cul-de-sac; whereby breakthrough and progress will be almost impossible.”

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

“Action is a high road to self-confidence and esteem. Where it is open, all energies flow toward it. It comes readily to most people, and its rewards are tangible.”

“Always be yourself, express yourself, have faith in yourself, do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it.”

“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.”

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