Tao of Jeet Kune Do

A must for any martial artist!

My sifu always said that Bruce Lee was to martial arts what Albert Einstein was to physics. Bruce was truly a revolutionary and this book outlines his philosophy, techniques, and his brilliant analysis of martial arts. This is not a how-to book, because in Jeet Kune Do, there are no katas, forms, etc. You use what works and don't use what doesn't. Bruce's words are brilliant as they come off the page and open your mind to concepts you never thought of before. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!!

3 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

A sum of words from A great martial arts master/philosopher

The Tao of Jeet Kune Do is A great great piece of history (his-story)get it! Bruce lee's story.Well you have to experience it for your self because this book is not just A form of fighting, do you remember the great film ENTER THE DRAGON? like Bruce said in his own words I study the art of fighting with out fighting and what that means in my own words is you can fight just as hard or harder with your mental mind rather than your physical body.Bruce Lee was trying to deliver us as human beings A clear message that the life that we live as individuals,rather you be black,chinnese,white or even hispanic,we are like catapillers in A cacoon just waiting to blossom into butterflies to be free from the life we use to live regardless if you were rich or poor, famous or infamous.But to have A real meaning of your spirituality is the real gift of life.

3 out of 4 people found this review helpful.

A profound, inspirational and all around terrific book!

I've been reading and practicing Jeet Kune Do for a little over five years and this book is one of the reasons why. This was the first book I read involving JKD and it inspired me to read all I could about the subject. It is a well put together book containing drawings to illustrate various points, philosophies and concepts surrounding JKD and its application. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in either Jeet Kune Do or Bruce Lee.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

All styles and arts have value to them

Volumes could be written on the information contained in this book. Bruce Lee was surely a martial artist whose concepts were far ahead of his time. He irritated the traditionalists of his day, and yet, his ideas are well accepted in the 21st century, as most martial arts schools now cross train in other styles and arts not related to their original personal training. Mr. Lee expressed the idea that a true martial artist will train, read, sleep, think, and devote his/her entire life to the study of martial arts. Many readers can study this book and yet miss the minute details that Bruce relied upon as everyday fact. For example he said ¿a person reacts to a quick motion toward his eyes instinctively blinking. Such instinctive blinking must be controlled in practice or else the opponent, if aware that the fighter closes his eyes when threatened, may provoke this reaction and utilize the moment of blindness for a hit or kick.¿ Two sentences out hundreds presented in this book, and yet, a complete course can be built around it, (frontal, side, surprise, angry attacks, etc). Many new students want to show their speed of technique in a short time frame but, Bruce stated ¿high levels of perceptual speed are the product of learning, not of inheritance.¿ Mr. Lee presents to the reader a fact that occurs when stress or anger interferes with your self-defense. ¿Over all tension and unnecessary muscular contractions act as brakes reducing speed and dissipating energy.¿ What angered Bruce Lee¿s distracters the most was his philosophy that the true martial artists are not confined by rules, tradition, or fighting methods. He believed that the best art was no art, that one must just flow and let the attack and defense be one and the same. A story was told to me that one day Bruce Lee and Edmund Parker, the Father of American Kenpo, were having a discussion on this very matter. Mr. Parker told Bruce that he agreed in many parts of his concepts but, a student needs to be grounded in a good solid martial arts system and master the basics before that student can explore ideas on his own. He also reminded Bruce that he had a solid base in Wing Chun style and trained under the Great Yip Man before expressing his own methods. Read this book carefully and let Mr. Lee¿s ideas enhance your personal style of martial art, not replace it. All styles and arts have value to them, and no matter how long we train and study, we can always learn something from them that will add substance to our personal development.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

The diary of an evolving master

As a former student of Lee's art of Jeet Kune Do and co-author of 'Attack Proof: The Ultimate Guide to Personal Protection', I have a tremendous appreciation for the earthquake The Tao of Jeet Kune Do created in the martial arts community. In contrast to many present day martial artists, Lee didn't regard his own skills as a monolithic, immutable religion that never needed to change. He had the true humility to keep evolving his art, improving it without fear of discarding what had become useless--whether classical or not. The 'Tao' is a fascinating look at a bold and curious mind at work. What rigid classicists fail to realize when they refuse to evolve ever (because their style is 'carved in stone'), is that even in their own art, somebody at somepoint had to CREATE it, either from some new combination of older styles or out of nothing.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Excellent Jeet Kune Do Resource

Hello everyone my name is MX. I think that this is a concise book on Jeet Kune Do--for one thing, it was written by its creater, Bruce (Jun Fan) Lee. I feel that this book has a wide array of technical background on implimenting your techniques in an efficiant and explosive manner. It also has quite a few detailed and straight forward statements on the state of martial arts and philosophical background that would make Socretes think. This book covers technical backgrounds on nerve manipulations to execute your techniques without thinking about it--also without warning to any potential assailants. The philosophical background teaches--sorry--GUIDES you to personal freedom of expression and how NOT to jump the bandwagon as do many classical martial artists commonly do--freedom of expression is hard to do, but when achieved, you become true to yourself and your quality of life becomes clear. I hope this 'In-A-Nutshell' has helped anyone out there reading my review of this marvelous text. With all due respect to any classical martial artists out there, I do not wish to offend any of you, but I feel it is neccessary to point out that freedom of expression will help out all of you in all aspects in life. Thank-you.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Excellent update to the original

I have the original "Tao..." This expanded edition keeps the flavor of the original while adding new explanatory information and English translations of the Chinese characters. Very Nice!

A Very Well Done Update On A Classic Text

Well I have to say that the publishers once again did a very fine job on updating another and perhaps the definitive work by the late Bruce Lee. However, unlike their update of Bruce Lee's Fighting Method: The Complete Edition, this edition is not in hardback, but in trade paperback. Not that it is necessarily a bad thing, but it would have been nice to see it in hardback. Now you are probably asking yourself, "Do I really need to spend the money purchasing an updated and expanded edition since I already have the original?" And for that I would have to definitely say YES, and don't wait BUY IT NOW! Now I am not going to go into a review of the contents of this book as that has been done quite thoroughly in the reviews of the original version. Instead I am going to point out the reasons why you should own this updated and expanded edition. And here are the reasons why: 1. The organization and layout of the material, although almost identical to the original, is much better and more clearly defined. 2. The illustrations are much clearer and larger than the original version 3. The added commentaries by Linda Lee Caldwell and Bruce's daughter Shannon, as well as, a number of noted martial artists are quite interesting and add insight to Bruce's work. 4. If you look at an original version and this one, you can see material that has been added throughout. 5. The translations from Chinese to English is much more accurate. I highly recommend this updated and expanded edition along with Bruce Lee's Fighting Method: The Complete Edition and the following two books by Teri Tom, who is a devoted practitioner of Jeet Kune Do and very, very intelligent which can clearly be seen in her two books. The Straight Lead: The Core of Bruce Lee's Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do Jeet Kune Do: The Arsenal of Self-Expression Martial Arts Nutrition: A Precision Guide to Fueling Your Fighting Edge Shawn Kovacich Martial Artist/Krav Maga Instructor Author of the Achieving Kicking Excellence book and DVD series.

Interesting topics by Bruce

The book does contain some philosophies that can either stretch your thought process or re-affirm logic. Though some drawings are a bit distorted, they can be applied to your fighting style. A must have in your martial arts library.

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Valuable Knowledge

This is truly a great book for ANY martial artist, but it would most likely be shunned if A. It was the same knowledge but not written by Bruce Lee, or B: There were other books from him. This is simply valuable because it is his only record in pen and paper. But, be warned, if you buy this book, it is NOT '10 easy ways to learn Jeet Kune Do'. The only way to accomplish that is through hard training.

By a fully devoted fan of Bruce Lee and his genious

Im a very serious and dedicated bruce lee fan and i love the concepts and filosophy Bruce Lee had about style less style and many other beyond brilliant truths. This book is the basis of his various writings, officialy, writen by bruce.If you want to learn how to express yourself through martial art this is the book you need!!! You also, really should read the 4 jeet kune do books entitled bruce lees fighting method so you can see how bruce interpreted jkd(with pictures).

A good intro to Bruce's art

The book itself is informative and is an interesting read. There are many small problems. For example, some of his notes are not as specific for certain tecniques and some of the information is in an odd order. If you are interested in studying Bruce's art, this is a good introduction. There are also many other books to read afterwards, but I have only read two, including this one.

a wonderful book on how to look at fighting

this is a great book to look at diffrent aspects of fight this again is a wonderful book for any marlital artists

Bruce Lee The martial arts man

I just found out about the book when I saw the movie the Bruce Lee Story.It's real good and the book is too if you read it you would understand the real deal of kung fu...

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

A Must-Have!

This is certainly one of the greatest martial arts books ever written. However, this is not a 'learn Jeet Kune Do in 10 easy lessons' book. While it does show the techniques, the real appeal of this book is the explanation of the philosophy of Jeet Kune Do. Whatever your experience in martial arts, YOU NEED THIS BOOK!

Bruce Lee was a master of the martial arts.

I appreciate this book because I am a martial artist. I found Bruce Lee's personal martial arts experience to be amazing. I have seen his movies, and the way he fights is incredible. I understood his opinions in this book and found great use for his wisdom in the area. I am glad that I bought this book because it has been both fascinating and informative during the process of my training.

bruce lee rules

this book is the bomb. Any body who knows about bruce lee also should know that he knows his stuff. This book is unbeatable.

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

An excellent book on killing

This is a fantastic book. One thing is clear: this book teaches you how to kill people, and how to do it quickly, fastly, and effectively. I've read many books and this one is one of the best. Maybe it seems like a normal 'fight' book, but it's techniques can be quickly adapted for killing as well.

0 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

duddish

It looks like it's a great book, his fighting skill is more than that it's his life. Cool Book ***********************************

What you've been looking for.

Bruce Lee was had a vision of an art without the 'classical mess'. The Tao Of Jeet Kune Do is a great collection of Bruce's theories and notes on various facets of fighting ranging from meditation to grappling and western style boxing. To be used not as a manual but more as a guide, Mr. Lee scores 5 stars. A MUST have for any fighting pro.