Joyanna Adams

Nobody Remembers: Bruce Lee

Nobody Remembers

“Knowing is not enough. Willing is not enough: we must do.       —Bruce Lee

Like many young girls growing up all over the world, I usually had a crush on some famous guy when there wasn’t a man in my life.  My first big one was Paul McCartney. I always baked a cake for him when it was his birthday, and since it was a day after mine, I got double-dipped in two big chocolate cakes!

Those were the good old days. Now I get ONE carrot cake cupcake, if I’m good.

But, the smartest and longest crush I ever had was on Bruce Lee. At first, I was attracted to Bruce for his movies of course….but unlike the movies of today, when Bruce Lee beat up ten guys at once, you could believe that the man could actually do it. At the time, I saw every Bruce Lee movie, read
every book, and had the usual Bruce Lee posters on my wall. I wanted to be Bruce Lee, or at least get my life up to some kind of better standard.

Another reason I liked the guy was his grace. I had been a professional dancer at one time,  I had just quit my job teaching at Arthur Murray’s (long story) when I noticed this man. How could anyone be so graceful when fighting? Watch any man doing Martial arts and they look clumsy. Crude. Not Bruce…Bruce ‘s body was as graceful as a gazelle in flight. I have yet to see any man look as good when they were fighting. (Being Cha-Cha Campion of Hong Kong might have helped.)  

Bruce not only danced in his body and moves, he danced in his mind. Like any true artist his creativity was endless. I won’t go into the many wonders of Bruce Lee here, but I will tell you, that years later, my grown-up son bought me a framed photograph of Bruce Lee to go in my Japanese decorated front dining room, years after I had forgotten all about the man.

Then I remembered: I used to make my son watch all the Bruce Lee movies with me when he was a kid, and I often wonder if it’s one of the reasons he became a personal trainer.

So, let’s remember Bruce Lee…here’s one of my favorite passages in his own words, and think while you’re reading this if the whole world couldn’t learn something more from Bruce Lee: It was an introduction he gave before he began to teach you his art.

“Make this article relate to yourself because, though it is on JKD,  it is primarily concerned with the blossoming of a martial artist not a “Chinese” martial artist or a “Japanese” martial artist. A martial artist is a human being first. Just as nationalities have nothing to do with one’s humanity, so they have nothing to do with the martial arts. Leave your protective shell of isolation and relate directly to what is being said. Return to your senses by ceasing all the intervening intellectual mumbo jumbo. Remember that life is a constant process of relating. Remember too that I seek neither your approval nor to influence you toward my way of thinking. I will be more than satisfied if, as a result of this article, you begin to investigate everything for yourself and cease to uncritically accept prescribed formulas that dictate “this is this” and  “that is that. “

April 13, 2012 - Posted by Joyanna Adams | Entertainers, Life | Bruce Lee, celebrities, life, Martial Arts, Sports