Bruce Lee Podcast

"It's not about what happens; it's about your reaction to what happens that matters."

This is a big Bruce Lee concept and a big concept for moving through life. Sometimes we use what happens in a situation as justification for our extreme reaction. How you react to anything says more about you and where you are in that moment than any of the events that led to your response.

It could be that you had been having a bad day all day and then this one incident sparked a huge reaction from you. Or it could be that this event poked some small part of you where this fear, anger, or insecurity exists and that provoked a huge reaction from you that is not truly related to the situation. The truth is that it is never about the incident it is about the response.

"I have learned that being challenged means one thing and that is what is your reaction to it? How does it affect you? If you are secure with yourself, you treat it lightly – just like today the rain is going on strong, but tomorrow, baby, the sun is going to come out again."

The more rooted you are within yourself, the more you're able to let things go. It is about noticing how you are reacting to a situation. You always have a choice with how you react to something, even though it can be difficult with an onslaught of emotions hitting you. A good practice is to not react right away. Take a beat to react to something.

There is a lot of information to be found in your initial reaction to a situation. Take a step back and look at how you're reacting. Why are you reacting so irrationally?

"To live is a constant process of relating, so come on out of that shell of isolation and conclusion and relate directly to what is being said. Bear in mind, seek neither approval or influence. Do not make up your mind as to "this is this" or "that is that." I will be more satisfied if you begin to learn to investigate everything yourself from now on."

This is a posture of openness and taking things in as they occur.

Don't take things personally, and don't make assumptions.

"Eliminate all opportunities for rivalry."

Bruce was not about competition and was not about putting someone down to "win." If you're always looking to be the "winner" and for someone to be the "loser", then you will always be living in conflict.

"It is the ego that stands rigidly against things coming from the outside and it is this ego rigidity that makes it impossible for us to accept everything that confronts us."

There is also the "ego boundary" which is everything that is outside of you. We keep this wall up to justify our existence, and protect us, but usually at the expense of yourself and others. This wall will prevent you from meaningful relationships and interactions with other humans.

"A man is born to achieve great things if he has the strength to conquer himself."

If you can be knocked over easily, then you need to work on self-love and self-worth. You need to look and see why you are being triggered. What is the pain that is being touched to set you off? You cannot push your fears and pain aside, they will continue to grow and fester. You have to look at them and learn about them. Face those fears and pain with the posture of "What do you have to teach me? What can I learn from you?" Then, it is not so scary to face your fears and your pain.

"The growth aim is to lose more and more of your "mind" and come more to your sense. To be more and more in touch with yourself and the world, instead of only in touch with fantasies and prejudices."

The mind is a justifying machine; it will justify anything you want it to. The mind wants to be in control. The mind can be a negative thought generator, and the misinterpretation is that the mind is always right. Our minds can create these fantasies that aren't based in the real world. If you stay in fantasy then you will not have fulfilling relationships in work, friendship, family or romance. Fantasy keeps us in isolation.

"I acquire no understanding of myself except as I take account of my surroundings. I do not think unless I think of things – and there I find myself."

When we are in relationship with people and our surroundings then we can constantly ping ourselves off of these relationships and get feedback about ourselves. You have to truly engage with your actual relationships, not just the fantasy of what you think that relationship is.

The close relationships in your life, such as your best friend, family, or partner, are meant to push your buttons, they are meant to show you the things you need to work on.

"People have to grow by skillful frustrations, otherwise they have no incentive to develop their own means and ways of coping with the world."

"Zen reveals that there is nowhere for man to go out of this world; no tavern in which he can overcome anxiety; no jail in which he can expiate his guilt. So, instead of telling us what the problem is, Zen insists that the whole trouble is just our failure to realize that there is no problem. And, of course, this means that there is no solution either."

There is no escape; you have to be engaged in the process to grow. That's not to say that there are not problems or solutions to problems, but there is not one solution for every problem. You're in constant process of relating and flowing.

"Be a calm beholder of what is happening around you."

#TakeAction:

Pick one of these and try it out: eliminate judgements; eliminate rivalry and competition; eliminate needing approval from others; eliminate wanting to influence others; think of yourself as an equal part of a whole. What happens if you eliminate being in competition? A simple exercise: when you're about to have a strong reaction, take a beat before reacting.

"Do what seems wise to be done, forget it and walk on."

#AAHA

Grace Lee & Grace Lee Boggs

Grace Lee is an American director and producer. She grew up in Columbia, Missouri. Lee originally wanted to be a journalist, but after interviewing sex workers in South Korea she realized she could tell better stories through film and studied at UCLA. In 2005, she filmed "The Grace Lee Project," a documentary about Asian-American women who share her name, Grace Lee. This film is about Lee's attempt to define a common set of stereotypes associated with the name that she shares with the film's subjects and how they break the mold. During this project she met Grace Lee Boggs, a Chinese-American philosopher and activist about whom she later made a documentary.

Grace Lee Boggs is a Chinese-American philosopher, author, feminist, and activist. Lee was born in 1915 in Providence, Rhode Island, and died at the age of 100 in 2015. On scholarship, Boggs studied at Barnard College and went on to receive her Ph.D. in philosophy from Bryn Mawr College. She began working as an activist for human rights. In 1953, she married African-American autoworker and political activist James Boggs, and they moved to Detroit where they continued to focus on Civil Rights and Black Power Movement activism.

Grace Lee and Grace Lee Boggs, thank you for sharing your talents and your voices with the world, we think you're awesome!

#BruceLeeMoment

This week our #BruceLeeMoment is from listener Harry:

"The one piece of advice of Bruce's I have always find most useful, and although it may not seem like one of his more profound statements, it is one I have always followed:

"Make at least one definite move *daily* toward your goal."

The other year at the age of 28, the same age as Bruce when he did, I wrote myself a definite chief aim. I won't reveal all of what I wrote, but the first part of it is this:

To reach the point of becoming a full-time artist. And in return, to fully dedicate myself to keeping it that way.

And so I wanted to share today's definite move with you - and one that actually achieves this goal - of sending my letter of resignation, right now."

Read our full show notes at Brucelee.com/podcast

Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected].

This episode we talked with our final Podcast Challenge winner, Dina, who called us all the way from Germany!

Dina is a recent fan of Bruce Lee. She grew up in East Germany, the German Democratic Republic, and she never heard anything about Bruce Lee. She thinks Bruce Lee wasn't mentioned in the GDR because he had "made it" in the Western world and people from Western countries were not talked about in the GDR. Dina just discovered Bruce Lee last year when she and her boyfriend watched "Way of the Dragon," last December. Her boyfriend grew up in Western Germany has been a huge fan of Bruce Lee since he was young. Finally, he convinced Dina to watch a Bruce Lee movie. She thought the movie was really fantastic and it touched her. The humor in the film surprised and delighted her since she sat down expecting a serious action film. Bruce Lee was like Superman, but without any special effects. It was so impressive and she could see that everything was real, the muscles, the fast moves, something you can only achieve today with computers. She thought, "He must have a special super power." After the movie, they watched the footage on the DVD and Dina found out what Bruce Lee's super power is, his philosophy. That's when Dina decided she had to research Bruce Lee further.

After the movie, Dina's boyfriend gave her a book, "The Life and Tragic Death of Bruce Lee," which is a biography Bruce's wife Linda wrote in the 70's. Dina would read some of the stories aloud when she and her boyfriend would sit down to breakfast or lunch. She then searched online for more about Bruce Lee and that is how she discovered the podcast

Dina decided to participate in the Podcast Challenge because she's always been interested in working on herself. She finds it is important to not stand still and to get better for oneself. Bruce Lee's perspective on being the everlasting student especially impressed Dina and that way of life was something she wanted to pursue herself. She wanted to know what would happen to her if she applied this philosophy.

After completing the Podcast Challenge, Dina's takeaway is that it was hard, but also fun. Before the Challenge, when an episode particularly resonated with her, Dina would try and do the Action Item for that episode. With the Podcast Challenge, she says all that came together and helped her to take her inner development more seriously and to put it in focus.

At the beginning of the Challenge, Dina says she was not the best student. She wasn't journaling or saying her affirmations out loud, she thought she could just recall her affirmations to mind and that would be enough. Dina found that this doesn't work and by the 3rd or 4th day she decided that she had to take the time in the mornings to do it properly.

Dina's affirmations:

(1) Will power: I will bring the power of my will into action at least once daily e.g. getting one unloved task done (at work or at home)

(2) Be water: I won't be in the opposite and rigid but I will be neutral to any at first sight strange or nonsense things that happen or are going to happen and will try to adapt myself, look at them from a positive side and so change them by adapting to my favor or put my mark on them

(3) I will recognize /be conscious of my negative feelings and hold back an outward reaction as soon as I recognize them. I'll take a pause in these situations, calm down, analyze why I am negative about it (analyze my fears) and give a response later or maybe no response. In best cases I try to see something good in it or try to reframe it to something positive.

Once she started to read her affirmations out loud, Dina found she was thinking deeper about them and that the words gave her energy. They became a daily reminder, especially for her second and third affirmations which she thinks she has to work extra hard on.

Dina's third affirmation was helpful in her workplace. She works for a large corporation and sometimes she gets notified about things or has to do tasks that don't make sense. She found that being more open in those situations created a better dialogue between her and her coworkers and that people became more helpful when she didn't have a negative attitude about the situation. It energized Dina and the people around her.

For the second part of the Challenge, Dina said, "I would feel better in my body if I would sleep at least 7hrs per night." She only accomplished that goal for half of the Challenge, but the rest of the time she slept her usual 5-6 hours a night.

Even though going to sleep earlier was getting Dina more sleep, it wasn't making her happier. She has a full-time job and by going to sleep earlier she was cutting into her time to do her hobbies and whatever her household needs. While her body was feeling better in the mornings, her mind wasn't happy giving up doing the activities in the evening that bring her joy. The balance between feeling fulfilled in life and caring for her body is a problem that Dina can continue to experiment with.

Dina discovered the third action item of "Letting others be," to be the most difficult for her.

She framed it as, "Letting others be / live in harmony by not saying or thinking anything negative about anyone else or myself or trying to reframe negative thoughts into positive ones or just being happy with them when they are."

Even though Dina is not one to comment negatively about others, she found that others like to talk to her about other people. She didn't realize that people liked to gossip with her, and found it hard to refrain from commenting when a colleague would come to her and ask, What do you think of person X or Y?" or "He/she is so this-and-that, don't you think so?" She found that it was very difficult to refrain from commenting, but tried to remain positive about everyone. Dina worked on different responses to these situations, either just having a non-committal response or if she had to say something bad about someone she would also say something good about them. She noticed that the negative talk would stick with her longer than the positive talk, but that there is also a time when criticism has to be given to improve someone's performance.

Sometimes you have to let your emotions our and it is okay to vent, but with a trusted friend or partner instead of with everyone. If you vent with everyone then you can become the person that everyone brings their gossip talk to, and that's never a good thing.

#AAHA

Dina nominated Korean American actor Steven Yeun and she knows him from the TV show he's on, The Walking Dead. Steven Yeun plays the character Glenn in the show, and Dina thinks that he does a wonderful job. Yuen was born in Seoul, South Korea and grew up in Michigan. He received a bachelor's degree in psychology with a concentration in neuroscience and became involved in the improv scene in Chicago before moving to Los Angeles in 2009. In 2010, Yeun was cast as Glenn on AMC's The Walking Dead. Yeun is also an investor of The Bun Shop, a Korean-Mediterranean fusion restaurant in Koreatown, Los Angeles. Steven Yeun, we think you're awesome!

#BruceLeeMoment

Dina shares her #BruceLeeMoment:

"It's all a process. I realized that everything that Bruce Lee says, his legacy, that I am able to use this in my own process, to develop myself. This is actually not a Bruce Lee Moment, but it is a Bruce Lee ongoing moment. What I learned is to start, just to start, jump into cold water, and not to have everything ready and perfect. The "Oh I can't start before I have prepared on this or that." That is something I learned from Bruce Lee. To start, to fail a little bit, learn from that, and do it again. Maybe make some adjustments on it as I experienced doing the challenge. Better done than perfect. If something is done then it is perfect but never done. To me this is sort of fun. Although it is work, it means fun and a lot of things that I can research into myself. It piqued my curiosity."

If you're interested in doing the challenge, check it out at BruceLee.com/podcastchallenge.

Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected].

"Many people are still bound by tradition; when the elder generation says 'no' to something, then these other people will strongly disapprove of it as well. If the elders say that something is wrong, then they will believe that it is wrong. They seldom use their mind to find out the truth and seldom express sincerely their real feeling. The simple truth is that these opinions on such things as racism and traditions, which are nothing more than a 'formula' laid down by these elder people's experience. As we progress and time changes, it is necessary to reform this formula."

Bruce is talking specifically about racism, but this quote can be applied in a broader sense to old traditions and stagnations we face in life. Bruce encountered racism and stale traditions in both the martial arts world and in Hollywood, and decided that he had to create his own formula for moving through those worlds.

When is it time to reform the formula? How do we know when a formula is not working? You can tell when something is not working for you if you are banging against a barrier and not progressing forward or if the tradition you are upholding is hurting other people. Another indication of a formula not working is if you find you are dimming your light, your essence, for the sake of others. These are all indicators that you need to change the formula because what currently exists is not working.

"When one is not expressing himself, he is not free. Thus he begins to struggle and the struggle breeds methodical routine. Pretty soon on is doing his methodical routine as response rather than responding to what is."

This is when you return to doing what has always been done, instead of asking: is this the right thing to do in this moment? Have you grown past that routine? It can be hard to notice that you need to grow, especially when you are frustrated in the struggle.

"Organic seeing is diminished or forgotten when we begin to choose sides."

Witness what is flowing. Organic seeing comes from within you and is not influenced by other people's thoughts and ideas. Organic seeing is more difficult when you are mired in negative self-talk.

"In a struggle you need, not neutrality, not indifference, but Transcendence."

Transcendence is the reforming of the formula. Step back, get a different view of the landscape, and figure out where you need to go from there.

"Because one does not want to be disturbed or made uncertain, he establishes a pattern of conduct, of thought, of relationship. Then he becomes enslaved to the pattern and takes the pattern to be the real thing."

Not all patterns we follow are bad. Routines can be created as the solution for a particular problem, but that does not mean the pattern will be a solution for all situations or continue to work forever.

When do you notice hints that the pattern is not working for you? It is important to be in constant awareness of those signs so you know when you need to modify or tweak what you're doing.

"When your actions and your thinking become mechanical, you cease to expand or grow. You do not rely on yourself for expression. Do not nurture dependence, rather nurture independent inquiry."

Get curious about what is not working. Inquire as to why it isn't working.

Some things are going to be easy, small things in your life and others are going to be much bigger like racism and going up against the old school traditions. Those big things do not change quickly and require a lot of souls bonding together to fight against them.

"When real feeling occurs, like anger, fear, etc, can one express himself with a classical pattern? Or is he merely listening to his own screams and yells while mechanically performing his routine?"

This quote offers a great visual of how to know when you have to reform the formula. (Think of Edvard Munch's "The Scream.")

"However, do not deny the classical approach as a reaction, for you will have created another pattern in which you will be trapped."

This idea of reforming the formula is not that either "all old ideas are bad" or "all new ideas are good." It is about an evolution, it's about building on what works and tweaking what does not for your self. This is an ongoing process that is never finished.

Trusting your self and living in harmony means that you do not have to be constantly at war with everyone who disagrees with you, you can let them be and follow your own path.

"Fortune is the reward of the man who can think of something that hasn't been thought is before."

Reforming the formula, thinking of something that you have not before, can bring you good fortune and goodwill in your life, and help you transcend your struggles.

"A choice method is the cultivation of resistance. A well-disciplined mind is not a free mind. Any technique, however worthy and desirable, becomes a disease then the mind is obsessed with it."

#TakeAction

Notice where you are stagnant or dimming your light. Ask yourself: what would it look like to go beyond the thing I am struggling with?

Is there a place in your life where you say, "That's how I've always done it." Examine that and ask if that is truly the best way or if you are stuck in a pattern.

#AAHA

Jennifer Yuh Nelson is an American director and storyboard artist. Born in South Korea, Jennifer grew up in Lakewood, CA. Jennifer Yuh is best known for her directorial debut Kung Fu Panda 2. Jennifer is the first woman to solely direct an animated feature from a major Hollywood studio. She won an Annie Award for Best Storyboarding in an Animated Feature Production for directing the opening for Kung Fu Panda and was the second woman nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature for her work on Kung Fu Panda 2. After Kung Fu Panda 2 was one of the most financially successful films directed by a woman, Jennifer returned to direct Kung Fu Panda 3. In 2016, Jennifer was added as one of the board of Governors by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Jennifer, thank you for sharing your talent with the world and being a pioneer in Hollywood and the animation industry, we love your work and think you're awesome!

#BruceLeeMoment

This week our #BruceLeeMoment comes from listener Tyler J.:

"I just finished the 27th episode about energy. My Bruce Lee moment, before I realized it was a Bruce Lee moment, was keeping in touch with friends with good energy, or energy that is positive, the friends with those good vibes. I haven't lost touch with my old friends, but I definitely haven't reached out to them because I feel their energy has never been positive toward my life. Even in my workplace, which I am in the process of finding a new job, I've had plenty interviews and although I am desperate for a job, I do not want to be at a job where the energy is negative. I am hoping to find a job with good energy that I can also be a part of as well."

Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected].

Read our full show notes at Brucelee.com/podcast

"To hell with circumstances, I create opportunities."

Patience was something that Bruce Lee tried to cultivate. His wife Linda said that he would get very frustrated by other people not being able to match his timeline or if they would say they would do something and then not do it. Bruce was in dynamic motion all of the time. He had follow through so when others did not he would get frustrated.

This quote starts with a frustrated, fed up tone, but ends with a proactive, positive tone. It is about not being a victim of circumstances and creating your own solution.

Bruce offered a unique talent to Hollywood, he was a superb martial artist, actor, and writer, but he was dealing with a racist 1960s Hollywood. He was not getting the opportunities his talent deserved because of the color of his skin. Bruce could have kept slowly chipping away at the establishment to get to where he wanted to be, but instead he decided to figure out how to fast track his way to the lead roles he wanted. This led Bruce to move to Hong Kong where he could be a leading role. He became a huge movie star in Hong Kong, breaking every box office, and this finally got the attention of Hollywood.

Bruce Lee's philosophy is truly action oriented. It comes back to the idea that these things are meant to be lived, not just thought about, not just intellectualized and pondered, but really applied. Since Bruce was a martial artist, it makes sense that he would want to pursue his ideas through movement and action.

Bruce lived fully in the world as a martial artist, father, husband, actor, teacher, artist, writer, and philosopher. He never limited himself to pursuing just one thing at a time. Sometimes we think that we cannot have a relationship since we are focusing on our career or that we cannot be a parent and pursue a career. Go for the whole life experience.

"A man can achieve great things if he can conquer himself."

When you reach a plateau, the only way to go beyond that is to put in the effort and conquer whatever is keeping you on that ledge.

"In this world there are a lot of people who talk intellectually about how they would do this or that. They talk about it but nothing is ever actualized or accomplished."

Talking about an idea or a project can simulate the feeling that you're taking action towards your goal, but in reality if you only talk and never take action then you won't move forward.

"The result of man is action and not thought."

Creating opportunities is a creative act, and by using your imagination it can be limitless. If you can conceive it then there is a pathway toward it.

"The spiritual power of man's will remove all obstacles."

You have to have confidence in yourself, and cannot listen to those who have power over you telling you that you cannot do something.

"I've always been buffeted by circumstances because I thought of myself as a human being affected by outside conditioning. Now I realize that I am the power that commands the feeling of my mind and from which circumstances grow."

Bruce talked a lot about being a self-willed man and that is how he viewed himself.

"A self-willed man obeys a different law – the one law I too hold sacred – the human law in himself, his own individual will."

Asking someone what they want often causes them to stall without a response.

"Know what you want, don't worry about the reward but set the motion the machinery to achieve it. My contribution will be the measure of my reward and success."

Sometimes we confuse ourselves and think that what we want is the reward. Know what you want in the big picture and that there are many pathways to get there. How you get there is the fun of it and when we encounter obstacles we have to be willing to adjust our path to continue forward.

"It is not your task solely to lead, for this might make you lose The Way, but to let yourself be led. If you know how to meet you fate with attitude of acceptance, you are sure to find the right guidance. The superior man lets himself be guided; he does not go ahead blindly, but learns form the situation what is demanded of him and then follows that."

It is a give and take of "What do I need to learn?" and then stepping up to action.

You do have to be a warrior in the pursuit of your purpose because there will be times where you struggle or meet with resistance and you have to figure out how to get beyond that.

"The enemy of development is pain phobia. The unwillingness to suffer interrupts your continuum of awareness and stagnates your action."

"When you drop a pebble to a pool of water, the pebble starts a series of ripples that expand until they compass the whole pool. This is exactly what will happen when I give my ideas a definite plan of action."

Take Action:

"Anytime you use the words NOW and HOW and have awareness about this, you grow – it is the path to reintegration, taking back what is rightfully yours."

What do you want or need right now? And how can you get? Within that be creative, be honest with yourself, and act. Be brave and create that opportunity.

#AAHA

This week our #AAHA is Mindy Kaling as nominated by our listener Grace who said that she "gave me hope and people to look up to, since they closely resembled what I look like and the culture I come from."

Vera Mindy Chokalingam (born June 24, 1979), known professionally as Mindy Kaling, is an American actress, comedian and writer. Kaling's parents are from India.

She is the creator and star of the television sitcom The Mindy Project, which premiered on Fox and later moved to Hulu; Kaling also serves as a writer and executive producer on the series. Kaling is also known for her work on the popular NBC sitcom The Office, where she portrayed the character Kelly Kapoor. In addition to acting on the show, she was a writer, executive producer, and occasional director for the show throughout most of its run. For her work on The Office, Kaling received various accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series, in 2010. In 2012, Kaling was included in the Time 100 list of influential people. In 2014, she was named one of Glamour magazine's Women of the Year.

In addition to her work on film and television, Kaling has written two New York Times best-selling memoirs, titled Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) and Why Not Me?, respectively.

Mindy thank you for sharing your talents and we think you're awesome!

#BruceLeeMoment

This week our #BruceLeeMoment comes from listener Aaron: "My middle name is Bruce. I'm told I was given it because it's a strong name. My dad told me about your dad and introduced me to his films. I think your fathers films do a great job of teaching and conveying the importance of inner strength. Even though your father died before I was born I wonder what he would be doing if he was still around. Even just Game of Death getting completed would have been pretty epic if you ask me. I guess I don't know how to pinpoint the exact "Bruce Lee Moment" I've had. There's been lots of them. They just happen. Maybe it's this moment right now. I just know I'm grateful. Thank you forever."

Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected].

This episode we sit down with another Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge Winner, Mahmoud Hamed! He shares with us his experience with the challenge and how approaching life from a place of love has deepened his daily interactions.

Mahmoud first discovered the podcast out of a desire to learn more about Bruce Lee and reengage with the interest he had in Bruce Lee when he was growing up. Mahmoud knew of Bruce Lee the martial artist and actor, and over the years he acquired that interest in Bruce again, but wanted to know "What more can I learn about Bruce Lee, what more did he have to tell us?" After doing a quick search Mahmoud was excited to find the podcast and excited to see that Bruce's legacy was being upheld and showcased in a meaningful way. When the Podcast Challenge was announced, Mahmoud was impressed with the format, the affirmations, and the introspection the challenge promoted.

Mahmoud's five affirmations:

1. Love
2. Presence
3. Knowledge
4. Purpose
5. Wellbeing

Mahmoud's Wellbeing Affirmation:

Complete wellbeing in mind, body and soul makes one whole. These faculties must be well-nourished for one to feel well and good. While I may encounter obstacles that result in the contrary, I shall remain cognizant of this truth and make it the default pattern of my way of life.

The fact that Bruce Lee took time to write out his affirmations and read them every day, impressed upon Mahmoud that the practice of affirmations is important. With his own affirmations, Mahmoud took inspiration from Bruce, but had to dig deep, and access aspects of his life, history, and future that he didn't normally spend much time thinking about. Mahmoud shares, "A lot of times we have these assumptions of what we want and where we want to go, what we want to achieve, but then we wonder if there's anything beyond that, if there's anything more to it, if there's more substance behind it." Having to write out the affirmations really put Mahmoud on the spot, instead of only having vague notions he wanted something specific, achievable, and direct.

Mahmoud's Love Affirmation:

Love is the loftiest of all emotions. It is also the most mysterious, as it is most elusive to define yet most apparent when experienced. Love is capable of innumerable manifestations that are inclusive of all existence. I shall therefore attempt to afford others the love they deserve, and love for them that which I love for myself.

For Mahmoud, this affirmation was about wanting to love everyone as a human being even though their actions might vary and they might do very unloving things. This goes for everyone from family and friends, to coworkers and strangers. He found that love is a great catalyst for breaking down barriers and for social connection. During the Podcast Challenge, Mahmoud found that his relationships took on a higher meaning and felt more genuine.

For the second part of the challenge Mahmoud said, "I would feel better in my body if…I move more and eat more mindfully."

Mahmoud wanted to become more mindful of how often he moved his body and remember to move it more often. Even just being aware of the position of his body, and how it feels, taking time to stretch and change his posture. He found that over the two weeks, just taking the time to stretch, move his limbs, and when sitting to have good posture, Mahmoud started to feel better in his body.

The third part of the challenge is the Harmony challenge of "Letting others be." Mahmoud found this part to be particularly challenging. Letting others be turned out to be not as easy as he thought it would be and it took him some time to get a hold of it and hold himself accountable. Mahmoud found that he often makes snap judgments about people, like most of us do, before they even do anything.

Doing all of these exercises gave Mahmoud a heightened awareness overall. He found that in general he's giving everything more attention, time, and more consideration, learning more about things. You cannot change other people, but you can change yourself and how you interact with others.

Thank you so much for participating in the Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge, Mahmoud! Keep up the good work!

If you're interested in doing the challenge, check it out at BruceLee.com/podcastchallenge.

#AAHA

This week we have a listener nomination from Marlon who nominates his friend Westley Chow:

"I would like to nominate my friend and buddy Westley Chow. An awesome trainer in NYC, he motivates me to be not only a better trainer, but a more stronger and awesome version of myself. He is pound for pound the strongest person I know. Not only because he's a little power house, but because he sets goals and materializes them. He is truly the type of person that has ALWAYS been himself from the moment I met him. He was always wise enough to learn from others the good and bad, either from being a trainer or just in life and applied it to himself. So that's why I want to nominate my friend one of the most inspiring person I know for, AAHA."

Westley works for FIT Formula and you can view his profile here: http://fitformulanyc.com/about/meet-the-team/

#BruceLeeMoment

This week our #BruceLeeMoment comes from listener William D.:

"I was told to sleep until my operation tomorrow at 9am. I was frightened and scared. I was surrounded by suffering all evening and now I'm in a dull and depressing room. I googled what was to happen and it made me worry even more. I was to have a real operation with general anesthesia. All of the things I saw on TV that seemed so unreal and distant was to happen to me.

My thinking started to become clouded and I became frustrated. I thought to myself, this is unfair! I run 15km per week, I go to the gym regularly, I meditate, I do yoga, I eat healthily and I'm only 26 - this is not supposed to happen to me.

I became disappointed because I work very hard on my goals and I'm determined to achieve them, how much time out would I lose because of this operation? What is the point of achievement if I'm going to end up here again when I'm old like the man in the corner of the room? A very negative pattern of though began to loop in my mind.

It was at that time that I thought of Bruce Lee and how he had damaged his sacral nerve. I read many of his biographies and I remembered my reaction when I first learnt of this. I thought to myself he must have been really pissed off. But then he made the most of it. I was reminded of how he chose to react; how he made the most of his time injured by reading, striving to recover quickly with positive visualizations and doing what he could whilst being in a bad situation.

Thinking of his incident gave me hope and inspired me to think positively. His injury was much worst than mine but he got back up and achieved what he set out to do. I can do the same and I did."

If you feel inspired to try out the Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge you can check it out here: brucelee.com/podcastchallenge.

Read our full show notes at brucelee.com/podcast

Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected].

For this episode we talked with another Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge winner, Mary C. If you've been following the Bruce Lee Challenge, then you know that we couldn't just pick one winner due to all the wonderful submissions we received. Mary was kind enough to join us and share her experience participating in the challenge.

The Podcast Challenge came to Mary at a very crucial time in her life. She is in a career transition and since 2009 she had been doing her business as a public speaking coach and trainer part time, but at the beginning of this year she decided to do it full time. One aspect that she focuses on with her clients is the "inner critic" and she used the challenge as an excuse to document her own inner critic.

The part of the challenge that Mary found the most difficult was the "Letting others be" because you couldn't say anything negative about other or yourself. Mary wanted to delve into why human beings default to negative thoughts:

"As human beings we have a tendency to want to survive. Wanting to survive means not going outside our comfort zone, and when we do go outside our comfort zone because we also want to grow as equal and opposite forces that are happening there. We take those first steps and immediately the survival mode kicks in and says, 'No, no, no, it's a perceived threat don't do that.' Therefore the negative voices come up to discourage us from growing."

The Bruce Lee philosophy that Mary has found most useful is "self-inquiry." The act of looking back and examining why she was feeling bad or what caused an emotion has been helpful for Mary identifying a common thought she has: "I'm not good enough."

Many people have this same thought, and the negative thoughts gather evidence to support that "I'm not good enough," thought pattern. We have to take action despite this negativity.

Mary started off with ten affirmations, but has since increased to thirty affirmations she reads daily. Here are her original ten:

"Heart all in & Both feet in"

"I am on the right path"

"Life is an enriching adventure"

"Everything is happening exactly the way it's meant to"

"I am a savvy business woman"

"I believe in Abundance"

"I am excited to co-create my freedom with the universe"

"It's not about me. It's about the transformation & empowerment I can bring to others"

"I love my life"

"I am an expert at letting go"

Mary thinks that because Bruce Lee created affirmations for himself, it is easier for people who normally shy away from emotional content to create and use their own affirmations.

Later, Mary created her personal mission in life to add to her affirmations and her personal mission is to develop enlightened leaders. To Mary, a leader is someone who makes others lives better.

For the second challenge of nutrition and fitness, Mary completed the statement "I would feel better in my body if…"

• I got at least 7hrs of sleep per night.
• I did 30 minutes of intense cardio exercise & 30 minutes of weight training at least 3 times a week.
• Train in martial arts at least 3 session per week.
• I eat only the amount that I need
• And drank water instead of juices
• Only drink 1 cup of coffee per week day (and none on the weekend).

By doing the podcast challenge, it made Mary more conscious about what is going on inside her head. She had the epiphany that if she relaxes, is present, and looks inwards she finds that love is always there; she just needs to tap into it within herself to feel it.

Bruce Lee was truly connected with his heart, and really the Bruce Lee lesson is all about love.

#AAHA

(Awesome Asians and Hapas)

Mary nominates Amy Tan, author of the Joy Luck Club and many other best-selling novels. Amy Tan is American Chinese, born in Oakland, CA, one of three kids to Chinese immigrants. Mary wanted to nominate Amy Tan because when she saw the movie version of The Joy Luck Club, it really shifted some things within her. Growing up with Chinese immigrant parents, Mary always felt the feeling of "Do I belong in this culture or this culture?" and never felt like she belonged in either culture growing up. Amy Tan speaking about this experience in her work helped Mary realize that this is a common experience that other Asian kids like her have growing up in a western culture. This helped Mary integrate her two selves and realize that she belonged to both cultures. Amy Tan, officially from the Bruce Lee podcast, you're awesome!

#BruceLeeMoment

Mary shared with us a specific #BruceLeeMoment:

"It was a quote that I saw online, later on I discovered it was from a book by John Little. It was when John Little, the author, expressed a moment that he had with Bruce Lee, which really inspired me, when they were running. They had run three miles and Bruce said 'Oh tomorrow let's do another two.' They started doing the other two miles extra, and John said to Bruce, 'I'm going to die, I feel like I'm going to die. I really can't do this.' And Bruce Lee says back to him, 'Then die.' And John Little got so mad that he just ran the two miles. Later on, after they had finished running, he said to Bruce, 'Why did you say that to me?' Bruce Lee said to him, 'Well, seriously if you're always putting limits on what you can do physically or otherwise, it's going to spread over to the rest of your life. It's going to spread to your work, to your entire being. There are no limits there are only plateaus, but you must not stay there you must go beyond them. A man must constantly exceed his level.'

When I read that I was re-inspired to not let my own limits hold me back."

Thank you so much Mary for joining us and sharing with us your experiences participating in the Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge, your #AAHA nomination, and your #BruceLeeMoment!

If you feel inspired to try out the Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge you can check it out here: brucelee.com/podcastchallenge.

Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected].

We had a chance to talk with another Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge winner, Bryce Young, who came all the way from Montana to record with us. Bryce shared with us his experience doing the challenge, how he found the podcast during a difficult time, and how participating in the podcast challenge changed his life.

Below is an excerpt of our show notes, to read our full notes for this episode go to BruceLee.com/Podcast

Bryce first found the Bruce Lee Podcast during a very tough time in his life. At the time, Bryce was living with his parents in Texas because his dad was dying and Bryce moved there to help with hospital visits and supporting his parents. The applied philosophies from the podcast really helped Bryce through this trying time in his life.

From Bryce's podcast challenge entry he shares:

"My cousin gave me the advice that I should only do so as long as I can still be my glowing positive self, because if I couldn't take care of that, I wouldn't be able to take care of my parents very well. And that's when I found the Bruce Lee podcast, and each episode echoed this philosophy. From home care, to hospitals, to the decision to stop treatments, to hospice, and my dad's eventual death on March 9th, it was a labor of love. I listened to every episode of the podcast as spiritual inspiration throughout that time and now, almost four months after my father's death, I still listen every Thursday when the new episode comes out on iTunes."

Fast forward to the announcement of the Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge, Bryce was excited to participate, but then he got terribly sick with an E. coli infection and nearly died. Bryce found that it turned out to be a great time for him to incorporate these philosophies to his life because it's during those dark, challenging moments where you need them the most.

"All knowledge is self-knowledge." – Bruce Lee

This quote really resonates with Bryce who considers finding your center to be an important part of life. If you don't know what is there inside you, you cannot give of yourself to others. You can't give what you don't have. Knowing yourself helps you feel grounded and anchored, and then no matter what happens you can always get to your center.

It's very impressive that Bryce decided to participate in the challenge as he was so sick with E. coli. He wrote: "Though my body was not doing so hot, the self was doing just fine." While he was sick, Bryce felt that he actually had a lot of blessings in his life through his friends. They would come over with fans, change his sheets, made him food, and would keep him company.

Bryce had six affirmations during the challenge and now had three new ones. The one affirmation that carried through was his "Common Thread" affirmation.

The Common Thread Affirmation

The way one conducts oneself in one aspect of life will transfer to all others. I will therefore infuse the following in all that I do: look for reasons to laugh, reach out to others, move with purpose, do the little things well, do one thing at a time, do first things first, accept help, be ready for change, be charitable and grateful.

These are all things that Bryce is working towards, and while it's a lot, he knows that it is something to aim at. He hopes that by reading this affirmation everyday it will become ingrained in his psyche, and eventually these things will become automatic.

This year has brought a lot of big life changes for Bryce, from his father passing earlier this year, to trying to buy a house, and to starting his own distillery. He's excited to open his business in January.

Thank you Bryce for sharing your story with us, sharing your personal stories on this podcast helps others connect with themselves and the philosophies. Everyone is in their own process, and sharing all of that helps us know that others are also in process.

For those of you inspired by Bryce's experience with the Bruce Lee Podcast Challenge, you can do it too! Just go to brucelee.com/podcastchallenge to find out more.

#AAHA

(Awesome Asians and Hapas)

Yoko Ono is a Japanese multimedia artist, singer, songwriter, peace activist, and feminist also known for her work in performance art and filmmaking. She performs in English and Japanese. Yoko Ono has had a long career as an artist. She is also known for being the second wife and widow of John Lennon. Yoko is awarded for her contemporary artwork and music around the world and in 1989 the Whitney Museum held a retrospective of her work, titled "Yoko Ono: Objects, Films." She is also noted for her philanthropic contributions to world peace and disaster relief. Yoko and John Lennon held a "Bed-In for Peace" where in their pajamas, they invited in the press to talk about and promote world peace. Later they released their first single, "Give Peace a Chance," which was a top-20 hit. Yoko has brought feminism to the forefront of much of her art. In 1964, she did the performance art piece "Cut Piece" where she kneeled on a stage dressed in her best suit with a pair of scissors in front of her and invited the audience to cut pieces of her clothing off. Since then Yoko has continued to pursue performance art and music, as well as being a committed activist for peace and human rights. Thank you Yoko Ono for being awesome!

#BruceLeeMoment

A #BruceLeeMoment from listener Jensen:

"My #BruceLeeMoment is something I practice everyday from one of his most famous quotes which is "Be water, my friend." Currently I am a full time student in a university that is an hour away from home while working part time in an office which eats up my hours in the week. Sometimes I struggle with this crazy schedule and it saddens me because I don't get to spend as much time with friends or family due to being constantly tired. After listening to the "Be water, my friend" episode of the podcast, I started to analyze and looked into the quote more.

Even though I struggle with my schedule, I try to make the best out if it whether it's as simple as putting some time aside to do activities with friends and family. Also I try to look at the bright side in school as I have a very tough major that can be sometimes demoralizing to a lot of students including me at one point. Whenever I just want to give up, I think back to what he said, "Be water, my friend." Bruce Lee gave me the strength to walk on and continue through tough times and I thank you guys for the podcast and sharing your insight from his teachings which inspires many."

Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected].

"Do not pray for an easy life; pray for the strength to endure a difficult one." Sometimes this quote is misunderstood—out of context it seems like Bruce is encouraging you to toughen up because winter is coming. But these words are not about praying for the strength to fight against a hard life. Within the context of Bruce Lee's philosophy of harmony, the "strength" Bruce is referring to is one of calm and flow. An easy life is not something you get because you pray for it or fight for it, the ease comes when you practice self-actualization and achieve peace of mind. If you only look at Bruce Lee as the ripped warrior, it is easy to misinterpret this quote to be about getting tough and developing physical strength to defend against a difficult life. When you understand who Bruce Lee was as a total human being, you know he could not have had the negative mentality that life was a constant struggle to be defended against. Bruce Lee was about keeping the mind on the positive and being in the flow. Endurance is about having the stamina to experience your whole life. It's about inviting all of the experiences, including the challenges and catastrophes, because every experience has a lesson in it. "The good life is a process, it's not a state of being. The good life constituted a direction selected by the total organism when there is freedom to move in any direction." The first step in the good life process is freeing your mind from the limiting thoughts that are preventing you from engaging fully in life. "The cultivation of the spirit is elusive and difficult and the tendency toward it is rarely spontaneous." You have to work at this, the cultivation of your spirit and root does not happen automatically. You cannot quit when it gets tough. "The true stillness is the stillness in movement." If you develop your inner being and you have a strong root from which you function, then your life can be moving around you in a spiral of ups and down, but you at the root can maintain your stillness in the middle of it. "Wisdom does not consist in trying to wrest the good from the evil, but in learning to ride them as a cork adapts itself to the crests and troughs of the waves." Take Action: What happens to you when you get thrown by life's difficulties? Can you be more flexible and adaptable? Notice what kind of escape fantasy you have and when you have it. What are you praying for to take you out of your current life? Where are you trying to force instead of flow? #AAHA James Wong Howe was a Chinese American cinematographer born in 1899 and worked on over 130 films. In the 1930s and 1940s, Howe was one of the most sought after cinematographers in Hollywood. He was nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won twice for The Rose Tattoo (1955) and Hud (1963). Howe was prevented from becoming a U.S. citizen until the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1943. Prior to WWII, he met his wife and they married in Paris in 1937. Due to anti-miscegenation laws, the marriage would not be legally recognized in the U.S. until 1949. James Wong Howe died in 1976 at age 76. Howe, you were a creative and social pioneer, and we think you're awesome! #BruceLeeMoment A moment from Daniel: "My wife and I went out of town to visit our parents over Thanksgiving, and we came back home on Sunday the 27th, I wasn't even aware that it was Bruce Lee's birthday. I previously went out and bought a inflatable Christmas Dragon for the yard, right after Halloween, in Bruce's honor of course. I put it up as soon as we got back home, which just happen to be his birthday, which would come to my attention through your podcast the following day. I just thought the Dragon was perfect and so was the timing, with his work being a more in depth influence on my life, as of the last 2 years." Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected] Find the full version of our show notes at BruceLee.com/podcast

"Defeat is a state of mind; no one is very defeated until defeat has been accepted as a reality. To me, defeat in anything is merely temporary, and its punishment is but an urge for me to exert greater effort to achieve my goal. Defeat simply tells me that something is wrong in my doing; it is a path leading to success and truth." Bruce defines defeat not as a mistake or failure, but as an attitude of giving up or a depressive attitude, a loss of energy. We all get knocked down and experience moments where things go wrong. It is important to process your feelings about that failure, but you cannot dwell there. Failure is merely temporary and if you accept defeat then you stay knocked down instead of getting back up. You must accept defeat to be truly defeated. The answer to your problem is within the problem itself. What is it you're trying to do? Why weren't you able to do it? Was it something that was within your power to control or was it outside of your control? What can you learn from this? When something goes wrong, if you're willing to dive deep into the problem and be very honest with yourself, there is an answer for how you can work your way out of or around the problem. "Remember, my friend, it is not what happens that counts; it is how you react to them. Your mental attitude determines what you make of it—either a stepping stone or stumbling block." It can be frustrating when you invest time and energy into an endeavor and then something out of your control causes you to fail. You might feel that since you failed it was not worth all the effort and time you put in, but you can control how you react to the failure. "It is not a shame to be knocked down by other people. The important thing is to ask when you are being knocked down, "Why am I being knocked down?" If a person can reflect in this way, then there is hope for this person." The sting of defeat is meant to be a wake up call; not a life sentence. "Be pliable. When man is living, he is soft and pliable; when he is dead, he becomes rigid. Pliability is life; rigidity is death, whether one speaks of his body, his mind or his spirit." "With every adversity comes a blessing because a shock acts as a reminder to oneself that we must not get stale in routine." Take Action: When you get knocked down by life or circumstance, how can you reframe it as a learning opportunity? How can you use this as opportunity to learn more about yourself rather than place blame outside yourself? #AAHA "Jennifer Ho is a professor at UNC Chapel Hill. She is Asian American, a professor of mixed raced studies, 20th and 21st century American literature, and critical race theory. She has written extensively on issue surrounding mixed race identity. She works diligently, both in the classroom and in her research/talks/publications, to help people understand the importance of and influence that Asian Americans have in American culture and history; as well as showing people where racism exists in our society and how to address institutional racism and how to be a racial ally." #BruceLeeMoment Our #BruceLeeMoment comes from Trent N.: "The first time I listened to the podcast, it brought a tear to my eyes. Hearing Shannon speak about Bruce Lee's philosophy is just like hearing Rachel speak. The messages are almost identical. This makes me wonder if Rachel had been a fan of Bruce Lee. I'm going to bet that she was. I wish that I could have met Bruce Lee but in some respects, I already have. I realized that I don't have to be awesome like Bruce or Rachel were, but that people in the world can experience that 'Bruce Lee' feeling from me being the most authentic person I can be. This authentic being is what is remembered, way after the person is gone." Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected] Find the full version of our show notes at BruceLee.com/podcast

Director John Alan Thompson joined us to discuss the film project we worked on together, "One Family." John discovered he wanted to be a filmmaker at 15. A video production class in high school and seeing "Apocalypse Now" propelled John to start experimenting with filmmaking. His teacher told him about a competition that AFI was hosting for students, and his senior year John created a short film that ended up placing. After that first taste, John dove into filmmaking. John still mostly works in short formats, creating music videos, commercials, and short films, including the short film he made with the Bruce Lee Family Company "One Family." This project came to John during a time when he was feeling creatively depleted and filled doubt about some life choices. When he started reading Bruce's philosophy, it was exactly what he needed to hear at that moment in his life. John absorbed from Bruce that fundamental part of living is finding that true essence inside of you and expressing it to the world. For the "One Family" film, Shannon wanted to share this story of the fight between Bruce Lee and Wong Jack Man, a pivoting moment for Bruce that hasn't been told well. The biggest challenge with creating "One Family" is that we didn't have any footage we could use. This challenge of recreating the fight through non-traditional means intrigued John. He pitched the idea of using old photographs and animating them, which proved to be complicated since we didn't have an animation budget. No one moves like Bruce Lee, so the creative puzzle was how to represent the energy, movement, and flow of Bruce's fighting. When Bruce had a school in Oakland, he was challenged by the San Francisco Chinatown community because he was teaching his martial arts in a very brash way and teaching it to anyone who wanted to learn regardless of gender, race, or background. That was not done. The Chinatown community wanted him to stop teaching to non-Chinese so they challenged him to a fight. They picked their champion, Wong Jack Man, and came down to the Oakland school for the fight. Shannon's mother, Linda, witnessed the fight. Bruce won the fight in 3 min, but the take away for him was that his traditional kung fu training didn't prepare him for actual combat outside of a competition environment. This opened Bruce's mind to needing to look at Kung Fu and his approach to combat as well as to training and being in the right kind of shape. Bruce won the right to continue teaching whoever he wanted and continued to do so. He truly believed that we are all one family, all of us humans, no matter our backgrounds, ethnicity, gender, or orientation. This is why the film is titled "One Family." #AAHA Paul Kariya is a Japanese Canadian hockey player that played in the NHL from 1993-2010. He played for four NHL teams, Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, Colorado Avalanche, Nashville Predators, and St.Louis Blues. He still holds a few team records for Ducks and Predators. NHL First Team All-Star three times, Second Team All-Star twice. Kariya's international resume includes Olympic silver in 1994, and gold in 2002 with Team Canada, World Championship gold in 1994, silver in 1996, World Junior Championship gold in 1993. He was elected to the Hall of Fame on 26 June 2017, and is the first Asian player to be inducted to the Hockey Hall of Fame. #BruceLeeMoment From listener Dan V.: "Growing up as a young child was not easy for me. Never knowing my father and only living with my mother until I was four years old, it was a very difficult time for me, as you can imagine. In 1970 I was forced to live in a shelter until I was nine years old. It was in those years that I was taken in by Bruce Lee's philosophies through his movies. He inspired me to take up martial arts; I loved the energy that was linked to his Philosophies." Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected] Find the full version of our show notes at BruceLee.com/podcast