Martial Arts Inspirational Quotes

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Never respond to an angry person with a fiery comeback, even if he deserves it...Don't allow his anger to become your anger.
Bohdi Sanders (Warrior Wisdom: Ageless Wisdom for the Modern Warrior)
The primary thing when you take a sword in your hands is your intention to cut the enemy, whatever the means. Whenever you parry, hit, spring, strike or touch the enemy's cutting sword, you must cut the enemy in the same movement. It is essential to attain this. If you think only of hitting, springing, striking or touching the enemy, you will not be able actually to cut him.
Miyamoto Musashi (The Book of Five Rings)
You Have the Power to Fulfill Your Dreams!
Tae Yun Kim (Seven Steps to Inner Power)
Religion can never reform mankind because religion is slavery. It is far better to be free, to leave the forts and barricades of fear, to stand erect and face the future with a smile. It is far better to give yourself sometimes to negligence, to drift with wave and tide, with the blind force of the world, to think and dream, to forget the chains and limitations of the breathing life, to forget purpose and object, to lounge in the picture gallery of the brain, to feel once more the clasps and kisses of the past, to bring life's morning back, to see again the forms and faces of the dead, to paint fair pictures for the coming years, to forget all Gods, their promises and threats, to feel within your veins life's joyous stream and hear the martial music, the rhythmic beating of your fearless heart. And then to rouse yourself to do all useful things, to reach with thought and deed the ideal in your brain, to give your fancies wing, that they, like chemist bees, may find art's nectar in the weeds of common things, to look with trained and steady eyes for facts, to find the subtle threads that join the distant with the now, to increase knowledge, to take burdens from the weak, to develop the brain, to defend the right, to make a palace for the soul. This is real religion. This is real worship
Robert G. Ingersoll (The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. IV)
A Kung Fu Master is a Practitioner of Martial Arts Who Keeps Practicing.
Kailin Gow
The most difficult part ot traditional taekwondo is not learning the first kick or punch. It is not struggling to remember the motions of a poomsae or becoming aquainted with Korean culture. Rather, it is taking the first step across the threshold of the dojang door. This is where roads diverge, where choices are made that will resonate throughout a lifetime.
Doug Cook (Taekwondo: A Path to Excellence)
Laughter has got to be the single healthiest activity one can perform. Just think how healthy you would be if you could sincerely laugh at that which now oppresses you.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Well-being, or wholeness, implies integrity and harmony between all existing elements, providing freedom for the whole.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
A champion always prepares to win.
D.C. Gonzalez (The Art of Mental Training: A Guide to Performance Excellence (Collector's Edition))
a quote from the venerable martial artist Bruce Lee, which he hoped would serve as inspiration: “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.” I
Joshua Foer (Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything)
Enjoy your dreams and empower others to live theirs.
Joseph Ash (Martial Arts UNLOCKED: A Parent's Guide for Choosing a Martial Arts School)
Recovery through sleep isn’t going to happen if the majority of the components of your being aren’t getting enough stimulation or resistance to work against. Your brain may be tired after work, but if your body and emotions haven’t been challenged through the day, they’re going to keep irritating you even if you’re asleep. They don’t need rest; they need work for real recovery to take place.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
The body is not a product. It is an experience.
Daniele Bolelli (On the Warrior's Path: Philosophy, Fighting, and Martial Arts Mythology)
If one follows what is in one’s heart (let’s leave out mind for the moment), one ends up with what one truly values and loves in life—and one acts accordingly. One’s own private indulgent cyclic habitual reactive subjective transitory feelings are, hopefully, not at the head of that list.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Physical well-being necessitates listening to what you already know, and then taking it seriously enough to act accordingly. When you wake up and feel the impulse to arch your back, stretch and exhale with a loud sigh, for God’s sake, do it.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
In my experience, most people are actually seeking recovery from the monotony and anxiety of qualitative repetition. This applies to body, emotions and mind. And that monotony and anxiety involves inertia just as much as over-use, meaning inertia in some areas and over-use in others.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
No one will improve his health significantly without accurately perceiving priorities, knowing clearly what is at stake if those are not attended to and what is to be gained if acted on correctly. That’s the basic homework before any change can come about. Then that knowledge has to be transformed into a sustainable motivation.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
The typical image of a depressed, lazy and tired person is someone hunched over and inert. Often, the assumption is that if one had more enthusiasm and inspiration, he would then stand up straight and move. In many cases, this equation is backward. But, as with everything related to one’s physicality, balance is the key. An overly erect and rigid posture may convey confidence and power to some, but it also causes a subtle accumulation of tension and rigidity on various levels, including psychological and emotional.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Δυνατή γροθιά κατά την γνώμη μου δεν είναι αυτή που θα πετάξει τον αντίπαλο τρία μέτρα, δυνατή γροθιά είναι εκείνη που θα πετάξει πίσω και εσένα τον ίδιο.
Γιώργος Μ.
Strong punch in my opinion is not that the opponent would fly three meters, strong punch is that would fly back and yourself.
Γιώργος Μ.
Even a low class warrior can surpass an elite, with enough hard work
Goku
Take the discipline from Martial Arts, mix it with the air awareness of a gymnast, and the attitude of a breaker. Thats Tricking!
Armin Houman
If you are forcing it, you are doing it wrong
T.D. Abe
Getting down to the gym a couple days a week and having low-fat milk in your morning latte isn’t going to make much of a dent in a system or lifestyle that is essentially, well, unwell.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Yearning often does not provide a sense of attainment or “peace,” as it is fuel for one’s personal purpose, to in some specific way give or create; to do that is not necessarily easy or peaceful.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
~In motivating people, YOU've got to engage their minds and their hearts. I motivate people, I hope, by example - and perhaps by excitement, by having productive ideas to make others feel involved~
Rupert Murdoch
People generally believe that stress is responsible for depletion, but apathy and uninspired systematic repetition are equally responsible. Or rather, systematic repetition produces as much or more stress and anxiety as anything else.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Some martial arts are very popular, real crowd pleasers, because they look good, have smooth techniques. but beware.They are like a wine that has been watered. A diluted wine is not a real wine, nto a good wine, hardly the genuine article. Some martial arts don’t look so good, but you know that they have a kick, a tang, a genuine taste. They are like olives. The taste may be strong and bittersweet. The flavour lasts. You cultivate a taste for them. NO one ever developed a taste for diluted wine
Bruce Lee (Tao of Jeet Kune Do)
The Cutting Edges of all Eternities combined were not as sharp as those of the Blade-Saint Valkyrie’s, who loved much and who pierced deep, far beyond infinity’s meager grasp for those whom she loved. On Valkyrie Kari, Cold Steel Eternity, Vol. II (Valley of the Damned)
Douglas M. Laurent
It’s highly refined stuff—holding to one’s purpose and focus, but also intuiting the value of being a piece in a larger design and evolution. The balance between these two rhythms is where and when true harmony is achieved and magic happens. Often, just the release of the obsession for personal preferences and to personally gain opens the door.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Forgiveness is like the martial arts of consciousness.  In aikido and other martial arts, we sidestep our attacker's force rather than resisting it.  The energy of the attack then boomerangs back in the direction of the attacker. forgiveness works in the same way.  When we attack back, and defense is a form of attack, we initiate a war which no one can win.
Marianne Williamson (A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles")
Ironically, many of the institutions that run the economy, such as medicine, education, law and even psychology are largely dependent upon failing health. If you add up the amounts of money exchanged in the control, anticipation and reaction to failing health (insurance, pharmaceutical research and products, reactive or compensatory medicine, related legal issues, consultation and therapy for those who are unwilling to improve their physical health and claim or believe the problem is elsewhere, etc.), you end up with an enormous chunk. To keep that moving, we need people to be sick. Then we have the extreme social emphasis placed on the pursuit and maintenance of a lifestyle based on making money at any cost, often at the sacrifice of health, sanity and well-being.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
What is it that the soul of the tragic artist communicates to others? Is it not precisely his fearless attitude towards that which is terrible and questionable? This attitude is in itself a highly desirable one; he who has once, experienced it honours it above everything else. He communicates it. He must communicate, provided he is an artist and a genius in the art of communication. A courageous and free spirit, in the presence of a mighty foe, in the presence of a sublime misfortune, and face to face with a problem that inspires horror — this is the triumphant attitude which the tragic artist selects and which he glorifies. The martial elements in our soul celebrate their Saturnalia in tragedy; he who is used to suffering, he who looks out for suffering, the heroic man, extols his existence by means of tragedy, — to him alone does the tragic artist offer this cup of sweetest cruelty.
Friedrich Nietzsche (The Birth of Tragedy)
If you’re ignoring a high percentage of the elements of your entire being, and the range of qualities they can naturally engage, there will be no real recovery or progress until you do. The typical relentless worker is just as lazy as the typical indulgent idler; they’re both just going through the habitual motions. To break the repetitive pattern, and discover more energy and effectiveness, one simply must stretch out in all directions, rotating focus and application of the qualities that make up one’s natural versatility.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
For instance, when it came to developing his art of jeet kune do, he delved not just into standard martial arts for inspiration and information; he looked at Western boxing, fencing, biomechanics, and philosophy. He admired the simplicity of boxing, incorporating its ideas into his footwork and his upper-body tools (jab, cross, hook, bob, weave, etc.). And from fencing, he began by looking at the footwork, range, and timing of the stop hit and the riposte, both techniques that meet attacks and defenses with preemptive moves. From biomechanics, he studied movement as a whole,
Shannon Lee (Be Water, My Friend: The Teachings of Bruce Lee)
If you, one, loves something or someone, that means that one is willing to, and does, sacrifice for it. That is, one chooses to do and give what is better to the being or thing one loves than to sacrifice the loved one for the personal emotion that is unrelated to or even hinders the giving. In other words, the way to transform an emotion is with a deeper one. This involves discernment and, yes, discipline, which are both frowned upon and seen as emotionless and less important. Which is immaturity, plain and simple, and is the fundamental aspect of human growth from child to adolescence to adult.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
The days became for Christina endless preparation. Ceaseless winds tore through her massing battle ranks, the grey cold sun above marking the timeless date. With skies of blue and cloud overhead, driving, uncompromising time stood still, lingering, as if giving Christina precious eons to perfect her shaving straight razor cuts of mind and sword. She worked alone now, forging the essence of herself in the policies and ways of hammer and anvil, pounding away with the classic, living Japanese blade. Her deft hands spun dervishly, wroughting out the iron of her will, fashioning a blade-mind remade unto her. --Brickley, The Lady and the Samurai
Douglas M. Laurent
The essential dynamic underlying almost every elite and esoteric physical art is work with the breath, so there’s information available. I would only add that it’s unfortunate that so much work is done with it, and not much play. Laughter has got to be the single healthiest activity one can perform. Just think how healthy you would be if you could sincerely laugh at that which now oppresses you. I’ve mentioned before that one good measure of someone’s depth of spirituality is how long it takes before they become offended. Imagine laughing hysterically at the criticisms, complaints and impositions you receive. At the least, you’d be breathing well.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
If I were to make a list of focus for well-being, I would begin with lifestyle (the totality of one’s circumstance and how that is engaged, including job and relationships, and proximity to nature), attending to the physical functions correctly (posture, breathing, exercise, food, rest, etc.), consistent expression of your natural range of qualities, working and playing well and hard, and designing things so that you are doing what compels you. Obviously, you can’t give this list out as a prescription for physical problems and diseases, but then again, it is probably the correct prescription. If one were to follow it, any specific problem, even extreme, would almost certainly resolve itself.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
You really are sort of a basic person, aren’t you, except for that blue stratospheric veneer of crust you wrap yourself around. I was going to ask you, with your usual never-ending broadside complaints of lack and wearisome bushwa ‘nonsensical’ humdrum excuses, just exactly what kind of person are you? You must have had it easy growing up. Now, as per your habit, tonight when you hit the hay, percle on this: There are 7even basic types of people—: 1. People who make things happen. 2. People who talk about making things happen. 3. People who start to make things happen but never finish. 4. People who watch things happen. 5. People who wonder what just happened. 6. People who don’t have the faintest idea that anything happened. 7. People who need a stout “clue-by-four” of hickory smacked up alongside their head to make them happen. — As for an eighth— —Which one are you? Puzȥle it out. . . . -- Thomas Kannon, Instructor to Brickley. The Lady and the Samurai
Douglas M. Laurent
Never become so attached to following the path that you cease to question whether you should still be on it.
Tori Eldridge (The Ninja Daughter (Lily Wong, #1))
The primary thing when you tweet is your intention to gain clout, whatever the means. Whenever you tweet, RT, QT, or reply, you must gain clout in the same movement. It is essential to attain this. If you think only of flexing, dunking, virtue signaling or signal boosting, you will not be able to actually gain clout.
The Book of Five Birds
Disciplined training is a prerequisite for true artistic spontaneity.
Ernest Cadorin
experimenter. For instance, when it came to developing his art of jeet kune do, he delved not just into standard martial arts for inspiration and information; he looked at Western boxing, fencing, biomechanics, and philosophy. He admired the simplicity of boxing, incorporating its ideas into his footwork and his upper-body tools (jab, cross, hook, bob, weave, etc.). And from fencing, he began by looking at the footwork, range, and timing of the stop hit and the riposte, both techniques that meet attacks and defenses with preemptive moves. From biomechanics, he studied movement as a whole,
Shannon Lee (Be Water, My Friend: The Teachings of Bruce Lee)
experimenter. For instance, when it came to developing his art of jeet kune do, he delved not just into standard martial arts for inspiration and information; he looked at Western boxing, fencing, biomechanics, and philosophy. He admired the simplicity of boxing, incorporating its ideas into his footwork and his upper-body tools (jab, cross, hook, bob, weave, etc.). And from fencing, he began by looking at the footwork, range, and timing of the stop hit and the riposte, both techniques that meet attacks and defenses with preemptive moves. From biomechanics, he studied movement as a whole, seeking to understand the physical laws of motion while understanding biological efficiencies and strengths. And within philosophy, he read widely from both Eastern and Western writers, such as Lao Tzu, Alan Watts, and Krishnamurti, while also picking up popular self-help books of the day. He was open to all inspiration and all possibilities—his only limit being the limit of his own imagination and understanding.
Shannon Lee (Be Water, My Friend: The Teachings of Bruce Lee)
The English aristocracy knew better how to work together; the reason perhaps being that, whereas in France the parliament passed into the hands of the lawyers and so became an instrument of the crown, in England it remained an organ of the social authorities and a rallying-point for their opposition. So well did it understand the art of giving to its resistance a plausible show of public advantage that the Magna Carta, to take one instance, though in reality nothing more than a capitulation of the king to vested interests acting in their own defence, contained phrases about law and liberty which are valid for all time. Whereas the French nobles got themselves known to the people as petty tyrants, often more unruly and exacting than a great one would be, the English nobles managed to convey to the yeoman class of free proprietors the feeling that they too were aristocrats on a small scale, with interests to defend in common with the nobles. This island English aristocracy achieved its master-stroke in 1689. With Harrington rather than John Locke for inspiration, it riveted on the Power given the king whom it had brought from overseas limits so cleverly contrived that they were to last a long time. The essential instrument of Power is the army. An article of the Bill of Rights made standing armies illegal, and the Mutiny Act sanctioned courts martial and imposed military discipline for the space of only a year; in this way, the government was compelled to summon Parliament every year to bring the army to life again, as it were, when it was on the verge of legal dissolution. Hence the fact that, even today, there are the “Royal” Navy and the “Royal” Air Force, but not the “Royal” Army. In this way, the tradition of the Army's dependence on Parliament is preserved.
Bertrand De Jouvenel (ON POWER: The Natural History of Its Growth)
Victories that come cheap are cheap. Those only which are worth having come as the result of hard fighting.
Greg Maluma (Quotes of Martial Arts Legends)
The human body, like the human mind, is best at versatility and adaptability. This is our greatest skill and our greatest chance to unlock natural potential. What that means in terms of physical movement is that a fairly equal amount of time and effort should be allocated to the widest possible range of activity. That includes strength, flexibility, precision and endurance, but it certainly doesn’t stop there.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Although each of us has the right to believe we are suffering, I suppose, there is a definite and ultimately essential distinction to be made between actual suffering, its cause and resolution, and invented or imagined suffering.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Besides having been identified recently as the single most important factor in what men find sexy in women, the list of how correct posture influences internal organs and systems, and also mood and general energy, is very long indeed. Your internal environment depends on the efficiency of the flow of elements within it. Obviously, this includes oxygen, blood, hormones and nutrients, but also all interaction between nerves and the brain. The spine, which is your foundation and support, has a natural position that guarantees the efficiency of movement and interaction of the related elements. Your internal organs are all right alongside the spine and depend on its correct position to function well. Any prolonged restriction or deviation from this natural position will result in some, at least partial, dysfunction. Over a long time, the results can be devastating.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
I look at the idea of rest as rotating one’s qualitative focus, not just doing less or changing activity. The role of rest is recovery. If you keep pushing the same quality button (fast or slow, concentrated or dispersed, hard-working or lazy…) for the same component all the time, of course it’s going to become depleted, just like if you keep working a single muscle in the same fashion or don’t use it at all.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
The transitory and random quality of emotions (“Well, that’s just the way I feel about it”) is deeply connected to, and largely the cause of, random engagement of one’s values and priorities. This very randomness and inconsistency is actually the cause of deeper suffering, primarily through the accumulation of addictions and the indulgence in reactions that are disproportionately small in comparison to what is really being sacrificed for them. Curiously—and a major theme in my own work over decades—the casual association of emotions to love is part of the insanity in all this.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
True balance, and harmony, necessitates finding a way to override the addictive, reactive emotions that are the fabric of one’s subjective illusion, and discover emotions that correspond to actuality.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
The trick is in genuinely appreciating the elements of apparent resistance while you are engaging them. Not to oppose or remove them as much as to creatively fold them into one’s linear line of movement, exploiting them and making the necessary adjustments as you go.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
A balanced diet” is not so much about protein/fat/carbohydrate ratios. The real ratios to consider, at least for the typical American or European, are energy consumption/expenditure, pleasure/actual need, food/everything else.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
Many people transitioning to this stage take up practices like meditation, centering, martial arts, yoga, or simply walking in nature to find a quiet place that allows the inner voice of the soul to speak its truth and guidance. Individuals who live from this perspective and connect to a deeper sense of purpose can become quite fearless in pursuit of their calling. With their ego under control, they don’t fear failure as much as not trying.
Frederic Laloux (Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations Inspired by the Next Stage of Human Consciousness)
There is an actual and palpable hierarchy of emotional, mental and physiological intensity that corresponds to the actual capacities and limitations of human beings. In other words, there does exist a real and definable scale of suffering, and of joy.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
The subjective experience of intense pain (“That’s all I can take”) corresponds exactly to one’s subjective experience in relation to truth (“That’s all I can take”).
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
On the high-end spectrum of emotions, which are innately connected to intuition and direct comprehension as well as imagination and creativity, meaning true empathy and knowledge, appreciative realization, transformation and invention, one finds a richer and more voluptuous combination of experience. Unfortunately, to “get there,” one has to be willing to sacrifice what is known for what is not.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
As I’ve mentioned too often before, we are governed, and specifically our physicality is governed, by fairly strict rules, which are easily observable in nature. We have some freedom to manipulate some of these, but really not by very much. Everyone knows, or at least has the information, about the horrors of ignoring health issues and expecting your body to do what you want it to do with the least investment in it. Another “authority” telling you what you should do is not the answer.
Darrell Calkins (Re:)
You cannot control a situation, but you can learn to master it.
Bjørn Aris (The Cutting Edge. The Martial Art of Business)