“Research your own experience. Absorb what is useful. Reject what is useless. Add what is essentially your own.” - Bruce Lee.

 

"Wise words, from one of the most influential, insightful, forward-thinking, and skilful martial artists to have ever lived.

"But, don’t be mistaken by thinking it might be a good idea to reject a particular style (or parts of it) before you’ve really had a good look at it – because you do need to look first, to be able to see what is useful to you. And, even then, can you be sure you have looked hard enough? If you’re not careful, by dismissing the teachings of a particular martial arts style before you have truly experienced its fundamental principles (and this takes place over time, by proper application of what is taught, and with a great deal of effort), it’s possible to throw the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. This can happen simply because you may not, at first, fully understand what has been taught to you. There are degrees of realisation, and the student needs to have patience so that through continuous practice, application, effort and experience, he or she reaches those deeper levels of understanding. A good teacher can point you in the right direction, thereby helping you to achieve those realisations for yourself. But they cannot do the work for you. You are also likely to find that there is no end to the levels of enlightenment and unfoldment of knowledge, so in that sense the art, which you have committed yourself to, can last you a lifetime.

"So, it’s easy to see that at any stage of realisation, the most effective and appropriate principles and techniques that you are presently aware of, from your point of view, may differ to what was obvious to you at a previous stage; and they may differ from, or be but a foreshadowing of, that which may become obvious to you in the future. The point of power is the present, so use what you know now, and don’t be trapped in outworn forms (ie your attitudes based on old, incomplete realisations). Yet, trust also that the style you have chosen (if it is working well for you, and if it is effective in real situations) contains layer upon layer of wisdom and understanding, and apply the knowledge appropriate to the stage you are at, knowing it will be enriched as time goes by.

​

"Over the years, I have come to the realisation that it all has relevance, and therefore there is nothing I would leave out.
Yes, in a given situation I would use only what is relevant at that time. But as a whole, circumstances might on occasion call for a different response to your usual, finely-tuned, stripped down approach. In my experience, everything in the Lee family arts prepares you for such eventualities, so I leave nothing from that out of the training. For example, every stance has its purpose and you have to learn each one properly to understand its use and to be effective. Only then can you go beyond those forms and be fluid in the Celestial Dragon stance, which is 'no stance, yet all stances'.

​

​"Like the shifting form of a dragon manifesting in clouds or water, Celestial Dragon stance represents fluidity of posture. Previously conditioned by form (stability gained by the numerous stances learnt, understood and mastered throughout the course of training), the student is now in a position to free himself – to ‘break the mould’ – and is able to continuously adjust his posture in subtle ways to best suit the needs of the moment. Like a dragon in the clouds, he cannot be pinned down to one shape. Just when you think you see him, he changes before your eyes to something you may not even recognise, yet still he is present in the invisible wind, the shadows of bamboo, the swaying of strong-rooted trees, the thunder and lightning, the spiralling of a tornado – with it’s inherent stillness at the centre of the storm, the rain and the rivers, and the warmth and light of the sun.

"Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do enables you to add to and enhance all of that. It teaches you to be aware of the need to make the right choice of response in any given situation, and not to get flowery or blasé, but to use only what is necessary at that instant, to be adaptive, to not be bound or limited by old forms, but to flow with the moment and like water fill the cup whatever its current shape, then, as Bruce Lee said, the water becomes the cup; Jeet Kune Do teaches you to not only adapt, but to become the form that is necessary at any given moment. It teaches you to be the most effective - because your life may indeed depend on it. ​

"That is why I practice the Lee family style, complete as it was taught by Chee Soo, and I support its preservation, because it has great depth and value born from thousands of years of tradition - and it is highly effective. Yet, at the same time, paradoxical as it may seem, I find great value in the approach and techniques of Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do and its philosophy of ‘no style’. To understand and reconcile that paradox, is to understand the nature of the Celestial Dragon."

 

By Hsien Sheng Neil Brown, The Art of Celestial Dragon Temple Boxing.