What defines Greatness

Posted by Dayton Chan on August 14, 2010 · 4 Comments 

What defines Greatness

First, what is “Greatness?” By one of Webster’s definition, greatness is:

“markedly superior in character or quality; especially : noble <great of soul>”

Let us agree what pursuing “greatness” is not.

Greatness is not settling for mediocrity.

Greatness is not the same as pursuing perfection.

Greatness is not simply trying to be a famous historical figure head.

Greatness is not conquering a hundred nations.

Greatness is not being the richest person on the planet.

Greatness is not being the most powerful person on earth.

Instead, think of pursuing greatness as doing something that will inspire others to want to live as you did. It does not mean that they do what you do or pursue the same dreams you did. Instead, they should be inspired by the way you went about pursuing your achievements and overcoming your obstacles. Sometimes, pursuing greatness comes with a price. Sometimes it is making sacrifices and working harder than anyone else. Other times, it is enduring hardships and disappointments. Sometimes, it requires selflessness and making the ultimate sacrifices that may cost lives. To me, pursuing greatness is simply how you live your life that inspires others. Read my blog on How To Inspire Others.

I practice Martial Arts and one of my real life heroes ever since I was a young child was Lee Siu-Lung (a.k.a. Bruce Lee). I used to watch his action films, read his books and whatever articles I could find about him. I would imitate his moves and wondered when I could be as good as he was. After almost forty years after his death, Lee is still an icon that is remembered and admired in the action film industry, martial arts community, Asians, philosophy writings, strength training community and others. His passion for excellence, contributions to the world and how he lived is an inspiration for many. It is very unfortunate that his life ended at such a young age of 32, but what he accomplished during those short years is absolutely astonishing. Not many will achieve the same level of greatness as Lee had, but we should still try to pursue greatness at any level, whether great or small.

I want to share some of my favorite Bruce Lee quotes:

Bruce Lee on Learning:

When there is freedom from mechanical conditioning, there is simplicity. The classical man is just a bundle of routine, ideas and tradition. If you follow the classical pattern, you are understanding the routine, the tradition, the shadow — you are not understanding yourself.

Even today, I dare not say that I have reached a state of achievement. I’m still learning, for learning is boundless.

The man who is really serious, with the urge to find out what truth is, has no style at all. He lives only in what is.

I have come to discover through earnest personal experience and dedicated learning that ultimately the greatest help is self-help; that there is no other help but self-help—doing one’s best, dedicating one’s self wholeheartedly to a given task, which happens to have no end but is an ongoing process. I have done a lot during these years of my process. A swell in my process, I have changed from self-image actualization to self-actualization, from blindly following propaganda, organized truths, etc. to searching internally for the cause of my ignorance.

Concentration is the ROOT of all the higher abilities in man.

Seek to understand the root. — It is futile to argue as to which single leaf, which design of branch, or which attractive flower you like; when you understand the root, you understand all its blossoming.

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.

To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person.

Bruce Lee on Teaching:

An instructor should exemplify the things he seeks to teach. It will be of great advantage if you yourself can do all you ask of your students and more.

As an instructor, you must be able to distinguish between poor performance caused by lack of ability or aptitude on the part of the student and poor performance caused by lack of effort. You should treat the first with patience and the latter with firmness. You must never apply sarcasm and ridicule.

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.

Bruce Lee on Love:

If one loves, one need not have an ideology of love.

The happiness that is derived from excitement is like a brilliant fire — soon it will go out. Before we married, we never had the chance to go out to nightclubs. We only spent our nights watching TV and chatting. Many young couples live a very exciting life when they are in love. So, when they marry, and their lives are reduced to calmness and dullness, they will feel impatient and will drink the bitter cup of a sad marriage.

Bruce Lee on adaptability:

Don’t get set into one form, adapt it and build your own, and let it grow, be like water. Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless — like water. Now you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup; You put water into a bottle it becomes the bottle; You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.

Jeet Kune Do favors formlessness so that it can assume all forms and since Jeet Kune Do has no style, it can fit in with all styles. As a result, Jeet Kune Do utilizes all ways and is bound by none and, likewise, uses any techniques which serve its end.

Bruce Lee on living, seeking excellence and determination:

There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level.

You must have complete determination. The worst opponent you can come across is one whose aim has become an obsession. For instance, if a man has decided that he is going to bite off your nose no matter what happens to him in the process, the chances are he will succeed in doing it. He may be severely beaten up, too, but that will not stop him from carrying out his objective. That is the real fighter.

Faith makes it possible to achieve that which man’s mind can conceive and believe.

Faith is a state of mind that can be conditioned through self-discipline. Faith will accomplish.

Make at least one definite move daily toward your goal.

Truth has no path. Truth is living and, therefore, changing. Awareness is without choice, without demand, without anxiety; in that state of mind, there is perception. To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person. Awareness has no frontier; it is giving of your whole being, without exclusion.

Running water never grows stale. So you just have to ‘keep on flowing.

In Jeet Kune Do, it’s not how much you have learned, but how much you have absorbed from what you have learned. It is not how much fixed knowledge you can accumulate, but what you can apply livingly that counts. ‘Being’ is more valued than ‘doing’.

In life, what more can you ask for than to be real? To fulfill one’s potential instead of wasting energy on [attempting to] actualize one’s dissipating image, which is not real and an expenditure of one’s vital energy. We have great work ahead of us, and it needs devotion and much, much energy. To grow, to discover, we need involvement, which is something I experience every day — sometimes good, sometimes frustrating. No matter what, you must let your inner light guide you out of the darkness.

There is no such thing as maturity. There is instead an ever-evolving process of maturing. Because when there is a maturity, there is a conclusion and a cessation. That’s the end. That’s when the coffin is closed. You might be deteriorating physically in the long process of aging, but your personal process of daily discovery is ongoing. You continue to learn more and more about yourself every day.

The intangible represents the real power of the universe. It is the seed of the tangible.

The meaning of life is that it is to be lived, and it is not to be traded and conceptualized and squeezed into a pattern of systems.

Life itself is your teacher, and you are in a state of constant learning.

The primary reality is not what I think, but that I live, for those also live who do not think.

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 spend or waste, and it is our decision what to do with it. But once passed, it is gone forever.

Time means a lot to me because, you see, I, too, am also a learner and am often lost in the joy of forever developing and simplifying. If you love life, don’t waste time, for time is what life is made up of.

Flow in the living moment. — We are always in a process of becoming and NOTHING is fixed. Have no rigid system in you, and you’ll be flexible to change with the ever changing. OPEN yourself and flow, my friend. Flow in the TOTAL OPENESS OF THE LIVING MOMENT. If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves. Moving, be like water. Still, be like a mirror. Respond like an echo.

You cannot force the Now. — But can you neither condemn nor justify and yet be extraordinarily alive as you walk on? You can never invite the wind, but you must leave the window open.

The Moment is freedom. — I couldn’t live by a rigid schedule. I try to live freely from moment to moment, letting things happen and adjusting to them.

What IS is more important than WHAT SHOULD BE. Too many people are looking at “what is” from a position of thinking “what should be.”

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

One should be in harmony with, not in opposition to, the strength and force of the opposition. This means that one should do nothing that is not natural or spontaneous; the important thing is not to strain in any way.

Life is better lived than conceptualized. — This writing can be less demanding should I allow myself to indulge in the usual manipulating game of role creation. Fortunately for me, my self-knowledge has transcended that and I’ve come to understand that life is best to be lived — not to be conceptualized. If you have to think, you still do not understand.

Knowledge will give you power, but character respect.

What you HABITUALLY THINK largely determines what you will ultimately become.

Choose the positive. — You have choice — you are master of your attitude — choose the POSITIVE, the CONSTRUCTIVE. Optimism is a faith that leads to success.

Cease negative mental chattering. — If you think a thing is impossible, you’ll make it impossible. Pessimism blunts the tools you need to succeed.

A goal is not always meant to be reached, it often serves simply as something to aim at.

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

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

As you think, so shall you become.

Ever since I was a child I have had this instinctive urge for expansion and growth. To me, the function and duty of a quality human being is the sincere and honest development of one’s potential.

I’m not in this world to live up to your expectations and you’re not in this world to live up to mine.

If you love life, don’t waste time, for time is what life is made up of.

If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you’ll never get it done.

It’s not the daily increase but daily decrease. Hack away at the unessential.

Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them.

Showing off is the fool’s idea of glory.

To hell with circumstances; I create opportunities.

Bruce Lee on Inspiration:

You just wait. I’m going to be the biggest Chinese Star in the world.

Bruce Lee quotes referenced from:

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bruce_Lee

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/b/bruce_lee_2.html

If this post has inspired you, please leave a comment. How do you define Greatness?

Advertisement

Filed under Inspiration · Tagged with Bruce Lee, Greatness, inspiration