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Speaker 1: Ah row, Michael, how are you doing today? All right,

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my friend, I know this tour is right up your alley.

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I wanted to say I sent you a text. I

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don't know if you got it. I do, I could

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give you more, Okay, kay, you can go more than twenty. Yeah,

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you like excellent, excellent, Thank you so much. I want

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to go thirty. You can go thirty, and then we'll

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give Jeff a ten minute break. He's gonna have to

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go do some martial arts. If he's gonna do thirty

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with me, he's gonna have to go do something. Break

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a couple of boards or something.

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Speaker 2: All right, warm them up, Warm up those boards. Get

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those boys ready to be broken.

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Speaker 1: Jeff, let's break. Let's break this down in the way

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that I am a third degree black belt. And you

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learn somewhere along the line, maybe a boat you on

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that that you know it's not really about the kicking,

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the blocking, the tournaments, the victories, the trophies and things,

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and you start realizing this really is about community. And

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that's the one thing that your book peels away at

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is that it showcases what Bruce Lee did to the community,

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and that is so important to me as a black

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belt barrow.

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Speaker 3: You're just warming my heart. Man, I'm getting chills listening

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to you. That's amazing.

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Speaker 2: What did you practice or what do you.

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Speaker 1: Practice out in combat karate? But I kept getting my

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butt kicked, broken ribs, broken arms, you know how it is.

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And then and then so I went to taekwondo because

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I wanted to kick to the head, and my sense

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kept saying no, no, no, no, no. One day you're

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going to be sixty four. The higher you're gonna kick

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is the shin.

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Speaker 3: Yes, yes, Sarah, that's true. That's true. Yeah, yeah, I'm yeah,

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we're nearing that now. I'm sure I am.

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Speaker 1: And but the thing about it is, though, is that

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a lot of people and this is gonna prove this

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book true. And we're gonna we're gonna you're gonna create

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a mystery or a mystique vibe here because we're all

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gonna wish what if he were still alive today? What

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kind of a great man would he be? And how

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would he be leading his community?

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Speaker 3: Yes, yes, yes, yes, I think about that all the time.

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I think about all, you know, the gap that he

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left and and how we've.

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Speaker 2: Tried to fill it. So this is gonna be a

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really great interview. I'm looking forward to this well.

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Speaker 1: One of the things that and you know, maybe listeners

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will kind of just roll their eyes over this, and

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but I hope you understand. One of the biggest change

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that Bruce Lee brought was the fact that a lot

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of these martial arts schools in this country had karate

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on the outside because you knew what the building was,

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but if it truly had the martial arts name on it,

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everybody thought it was a restaurant. And I just feel

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like that Bruce Lee changed that that texture by saying, no,

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you need to learn all forms and it does not

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come with a restaurant attached.

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Speaker 2: That's right.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, he broke down a lot of stereotypes for a

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lot of people. I mean there's a lot of stories

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about Bruce being in Hollywood and talking about go fu

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to people and people going what kind of Chinese food.

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Speaker 2: Dishes that you know, and he'd show them and they'd

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be stunned and you know, and wanting to sign up

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to work with them.

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Speaker 1: So what did you learn on a project like this,

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because I mean I get all mine from because in

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martial arts in taekwondo, we had to do a thesis

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every time that we had to do a black belt test,

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so we had to dig into the history of mind,

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which was a two thousand year old martial art. What

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did you learn in digging into this?

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Speaker 2: I didn't. There's some do we have eight hours to

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spend here together.

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Speaker 1: You know that you can do it.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 3: The thing is is is you think you know Bruce

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and then you really really don't. That's the thing is

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every turn I started learning something new about him.

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Speaker 4: So I thought, you know, I'm part of the generation

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that grew up where there was no Bruce before, you know,

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for folks in the generation before me, But for me,

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there was always Bruce.

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Speaker 3: You know, I grew up with Bruce. I'm like the

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generation of my kids that always grew up with hip hop.

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So so I thought I knew Bruce, and I started

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learning a lot more about his early years, especially as

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a teenager even before that, as as a kid growing

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up in war torn Hong Kong, you know, surviving, struggling

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to survive, and then becoming somebody who is wrapped up

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in this teen fight culture. And I was just fascinated

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by all of that. But you know the other part

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of it too is you don't hear about what it

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was like for him when he first got to the US,

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and it was a struggle for him. It was really hard,

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you know, he was having to live in racially segregated

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neighborhoods and he you know, and he's working as a busboy,

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as a waiter in a Chinese restaurant and they're serving

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the rich, you know, white clientele from up the hill,

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and so he's really learning about what it means to

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be a minority in the US. And I think that

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that's something that's maybe underplayed in his story, but that's

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where he becomes American, and I think that's why he

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becomes the hero of the underdog.

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Speaker 1: Well, you know what the void that your book Watermerror

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Echo brings to us is the fact that there's not

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a movie out there really about Bruce that tells the

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real story. And I think that's the reason why with

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your book, I'm taking it so slow and I'm highlighting

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the hell out of it. So you don't ask for

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this book back unless you can handle some artwork in it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot. It's a big book.

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Speaker 3: I don't write short books too much, But there was

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also a lot to tell about, you know, and I

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think when you look at Bruce's life, it really tells

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the story of what it means to be an underdog,

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an immigrant, or a poor person, or somebody who's just

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struggling to make it, you know, through life. Because his

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entire life he struggled. We only know him as a superhero,

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but he didn't even get to see his big success

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when Ended the Dragon, you know, debut in nineteen seventy three.

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Speaker 2: He had passed on.

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Speaker 3: And so so really, you know, his whole life is

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like pushing that rock up this really long high hill

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and we.

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Speaker 2: Get to see the benefits of that all these years later.

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Speaker 1: You know, I'll tell you how how And this is

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going to make a lot of people. Carench is that

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there was a documentary back in the latter part of

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the nineteen seventies into the eighties about Bruce Lee that

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talked about that they're watching his gravesite because he always

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said that he would escape from the dead and so

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and so my entire life, I've sat there and I thought,

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did he crack it? Yet? Did he do it? Did

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he do it? I mean, they planted that so deep

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inside my soul because I want him to come out

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of there to be that guy.

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Speaker 2: You wanted, you know, you see him.

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Speaker 3: I can't imagine what it must have been like to

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see Bruce at the premiere right and to know that

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this guy had passed away just a month beforehand. But

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he's so alive right on the screen. He's just so

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full of it, so full of energy, so full of power,

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and you want to be him. And I think that

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that's fueled partly, you know, the the subsequent every generation

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like trying to find their own Bruce Lee, trying to

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find their own way to be like him.

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Speaker 1: You talk about, you know, the impact that he's had

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in our lives. I've been with Kareem Abdul Jabbar. Let

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me tell you what. Kareem is still touched by his

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time with Bruce Lee two thousand percent.

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Speaker 3: He still talks about it all the time. I was

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really you know, inspired, actually to find out how deep

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their friendship ran. That they you know that they traded

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books with each other, that Bruce was over here when

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they took him out the Chinese restaurants. Everybody wanted Kareem's autograph.

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He was the superhero in LA at that time, and

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he was trying to protect Kareem. You know, from getting

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mobbed by all these autograph seekers, because that's how Bruce

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had grown up. You had grown up as a star,

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as a child star, and Kareem had always been a

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basketball star, so he knew. I think Kareem really intimately

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that way. It's such a moving part of it. And

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I have a whole chapter on Kareem in there, because

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you know, you have to, you just have to. Their

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relationship was so deep.

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Speaker 1: Well, and look at what Kareem Abdul Jabbar has done

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with the community, which takes us right back to the

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beginning of this conversation.

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Speaker 5: It's about community absolutely two thousand percent. You know, Kareem

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has just put out this shoe, the Javar Low. All

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the sneaker heads will know this, but he's got a

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yellow and black shoes. There's a little Bruce Lee thing

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at the bottom of it.

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Speaker 3: But the thing that moves me is, you know when

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he came out to bring it out a couple of

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weeks ago, he went to Chinatown to do it, and

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he spent a lot of time with the kids there

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and he's obviously continued to do so much for the community.

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It makes you think, right like, had he been able

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to survive, Like, what would the two like be doing

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right now, right in terms of trying to help the kids,

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trying to uplift them, trying to give them inspiration. Kareem's

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still caring on the work.

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Speaker 1: I got to tell you where I think that Bruce

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Lee would be now. And I think it's all based

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on what his choices were when it comes to the

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martial arts, because everybody has always said, oh, he was

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never a master in one certain martial art. You don't

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have to be That's the thing about it. You don't

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have to be a master at a certain art. And

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I think that what he would say is, I need

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you to go learn what you can, what you're willing

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to learn, and put it all together in your own

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journey so that you can have your own personal strength.

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And people are left guessing.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, he formed this thing called jiqu Kundo,

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which he thought of as sort of a way to

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be able to bring together all these different types of styles.

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Speaker 2: He was a maverick. He was a maverick in that

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way because he was.

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Speaker 3: Not of the mind that you taught these things and

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you kind of kept them in your school and you

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didn't teach anybody else, and in fact, if you're the seafood,

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if you're the if you're the sense, you're maybe not

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even teaching the students everything that you know because you're

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only reserving certain kinds of stuff for for just a

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couple of students. If even that, right, Bruce was like,

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let it all out in the open. We're going to

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test all of this, We're going to try it all out.

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And he found like minded people that were coming, whether

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they come from Hawaii or whether they were already mavericks

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in Chinatown, because Hawaii had been mixing.

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Speaker 2: Up martial arts for two generations before Bruce.

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Speaker 3: But they're you know, they're getting together and they're forming

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their own kind of thing. But ultimately, Bruce was like,

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it's up to you, Like you learn all this type

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of stuff and you figure out how it works on

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your body. And that's what g Cando is ultimately right,

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That's what he comes to as he grows through this

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and you realize it's not a style. I'm not teaching

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something that's going to be fixed. It's got to be

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something that's growing that that you are continually adding to

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that you're evolving, like you said, right, like we're nearing

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our middle ages. If not there already, we're not gonna

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be able to kick the way that we kick. I

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just met a man who was Bruce Lee's, one of

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Bruce Lee's best friends and students. He's ninety five. He's

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still kicking a heavy bag every day. He's still doing it.

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And I think that that's the kind of practice that

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Brucell would have wanted for him to have, and for

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all of us to be.

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Speaker 2: Able to have.

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Speaker 1: Please do not move. There's more with Jeff Chang coming

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up next. The name of the book Water Mirror Echo.

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We're back with Jeff Chang. The one thing people always

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ask me if I could, would I go back and

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interview Bruce Lee? And people are shocked by my answer

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because I tell them no. What I would do is

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I would like to stand on the sideline of a

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mat and listen to him mumble. That to me would

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be the greatest experience.

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Speaker 2: M Yeah.

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Speaker 3: You know, it's interesting there are not too many extent

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public interviews of Bruce anymore.

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Speaker 2: He wrote prolifically.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and he took lots and lots and lots of notes,

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and some of his notes are taken for his writings.

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And that's a whole other story. But but yeah, you know,

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I agree with you. I think just being able to observe.

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I think something like you and I know, like being

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in the martial arts, like you might come in loaded

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with all kinds of questions.

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Speaker 2: That's not what you're going to get. You're not going

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to get answers, not right away.

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Speaker 3: You're going to have to be in the practice for

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decades right to be able to get some of these

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questions out. You may die of having still some of

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those questions, and that's maybe how the practice should be.

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But yeah, like as a teacher, you know, people puzzled

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because he wasn't a linear teacher. He wasn't like you're

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going to learn this lesson and then you're going to

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learn that lesson. It was like you're going to come

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in and you're going to try this, and.

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Speaker 2: You know, follow along with me.

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Speaker 3: And I think that those folks you know, who learned

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in that kind of way still teaching that kind of

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a way as well.

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Speaker 1: You talk about him being a writer, but now inside

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my heart, I'm thinking everything that I've ever read it

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was always like Bruce will not keep a journal because

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he doesn't want his enemy to know his life and

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his style. And basically his choice of weapons if he

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needs to use them, and so and so to have

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this book, I'm going, Am I violating a rule here?

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Can I please just start writing about my journey too,

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since it seems like his is here?

279
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Speaker 3: No, I think you got to you know, I think

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that that's again like what everything was about that he

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was teaching. You know that you've got to find yourself.

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You've got to be able to express yourself. Yes, is

283
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I think you know the words that he would have

284
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used and find your highest expression, and then to be

285
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able to share that with people. I was lucky, you know,

286
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Shannon Lee, his daughter opened up the files, his papers

287
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and his writings and that kind of thing to me.

288
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So I got to see a lot of his private papers.

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And you know it's true he did like he did

290
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this thing when he got sick. He hurt his back

291
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and he was on his back he couldn't move for

292
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about three or four more and so during that time

293
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he compiled these binders of what he thought was everything

294
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that he knew up to that particular point. And these

295
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binders are amazing, and he gave them to maybe like

296
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a dozen friends, if even that, And he because these

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are the folks that he thought would be able to

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hold you know, this stuff should anything happen to him.

299
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And you know, some parts of that have been made

300
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public now, not all of it, but it was a

301
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type of thing where he wanted people to follow their curiosity.

302
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And so during his lifetime, you know, he had done

303
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one instructional booklet and then after that he said, I'm

304
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not going to finish these other books that have been

305
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contracted for or put them out because he didn't necessarily

306
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want people to get stuck and fixated on a particular

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set of lessons, because then it becomes gospel and you

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can't grow out of that, and he wanted people to

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continue to grow.

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Speaker 1: You can't learn it from a book. It's about experience.

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When when you fall on your back and you have

312
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no air in your lungs and yet there's still two

313
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minutes left of that round. You got to get your

314
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ass back up and you've got to do something.

315
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Speaker 2: You gotta do it.

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Speaker 3: You got you have to find it within yourself, and

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and you can't really teach that actually, right, you got

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to You've got to encourage people and you got to

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push them.

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Speaker 2: Uh. And so I think you know, in that way,

321
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Bruce as a teacher.

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Speaker 3: I think you're entirely right erro like being able to

323
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watch him, be able to see what he would do

324
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in certain kinds of situations, and then and then kind

325
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of ponder, like, how would that apply to to me

326
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in a certain situation that I might catch myself in.

327
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Speaker 1: I want to break down the book title. I know

328
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I'm absolutely wrong, but this is what I feel from

329
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my side. Water is flow, the mirror is the present,

330
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and infinity and echo is study your past.

331
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Speaker 2: Hmm. You know, there's a lot of different meanings.

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Speaker 3: Bruce's you know, most famous saying, of course, is moving

333
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bele like water. And it turns out right that's where

334
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we get all this beewater, my friend, be like water.

335
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But it comes from this Daoist text, and there's three lines.

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It's moving, be like water, still, be like a mirror,

337
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respond like an echo. And you know, for his entire life,

338
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I think he discovered these lines probably when he was

339
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about seventeen or eighteen years old, and for his entire

340
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life he was trying to figure out how to apply

341
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this to his life. And you know, so we all

342
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hear the words be water, and you know, athletes have

343
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taken it up. Corporate leaders have taken it up. Entire

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social movements have taken it up, and they've kind of said, okay,

345
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be Water's like being adaptable, right, being changeable, being not fixed,

346
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being elusive, right, being able to go around if you

347
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need to go around, being able to go straight if

348
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you need to go straight. The interesting thing about his

349
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life is that he never really got to explore the

350
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ideas around.

351
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Speaker 2: Being a mirror or being like an echo.

352
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Speaker 3: And so in the book, you know, we kind of

353
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explore when I say we, me and my editor, we

354
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kind of explored how to think about his life in

355
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this way, right, And being like Water was like him

356
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trying to take on Hollywood. So him trying to find

357
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a way to become who he really wanted to become,

358
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which was somebody who could teach Asian fighting arts and

359
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Asian philosophy to the broadest number of people, and using

360
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the media platform, whether it be TV or movies, as

361
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a way to be able to do that. You know,

362
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so he encounters a lot of resistance, and so he's

363
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he has to be like Water and moving in all

364
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these different types of directions to fulfill that. But he

365
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dies before he's able to really.

366
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Speaker 2: Be able to be still with himself. His last year

367
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is really intense.

368
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Speaker 3: He's not in a good place, and he passes away suddenly,

369
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So you know, we're left to kind of ponder that

370
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he like mirror a lot of people's millions and millions

371
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of people's from millions and millions of people all around

372
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the world, and generations of people like he's been able

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to mirror their ambitions and their hopes and their dreams.

374
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And his words still echo today, right they're echoing right

375
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now with us. So that's sort of the way that

376
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we broke it down. But the way you broke it down.

377
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Speaker 2: Is really nice. I really really like that, and I

378
00:17:23,359 --> 00:17:26,359
like that it's open to all kinds of interpretations and meanings.

379
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Speaker 1: You speak of the way that he could walk toward

380
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or he could walk around. That's why I would love

381
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to have just taken a walk with him, because one

382
00:17:32,240 --> 00:17:34,119
of the things that a lot of people don't realize

383
00:17:34,160 --> 00:17:36,359
is that martial arts don't go looking for trouble. We

384
00:17:36,400 --> 00:17:39,000
walk around. We do everything we can to stay away

385
00:17:39,039 --> 00:17:41,880
from it. So to have a conversation with him while walking,

386
00:17:42,039 --> 00:17:44,079
it'd be interesting to find out what our path would

387
00:17:44,119 --> 00:17:46,240
be and what his eyes were seeing versus what he

388
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was sharing through his lips.

389
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Speaker 2: Absolutely two thousand percent. I totally agree. And you know,

390
00:17:51,279 --> 00:17:53,839
the other part of it is what does it mean

391
00:17:53,880 --> 00:17:54,599
to be a warrior?

392
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Speaker 3: Right?

393
00:17:55,079 --> 00:17:58,559
Speaker 2: What does it mean to have these skills and to

394
00:17:58,680 --> 00:17:59,960
not use them? Right?

395
00:18:01,079 --> 00:18:04,480
Speaker 3: I think that that's something that really is befitting the

396
00:18:04,480 --> 00:18:06,839
moment that we're in right now, where we've all kind

397
00:18:06,880 --> 00:18:09,880
of been weaponized against each other, and is that the

398
00:18:09,960 --> 00:18:12,640
right way that we need to be proceeding, you know?

399
00:18:12,839 --> 00:18:15,640
And so so it's interesting I think, you know, we're

400
00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:19,400
all called upon to fight in the moment, but what's

401
00:18:19,440 --> 00:18:22,240
the right thing to do? I think that that's part

402
00:18:22,279 --> 00:18:26,319
of like what we could learn from looking at Bruce's

403
00:18:26,319 --> 00:18:28,920
life and looking at how he walked and what he

404
00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:29,480
was seeing.

405
00:18:30,200 --> 00:18:32,640
Speaker 1: Did he see himself as a symbol of the entire people?

406
00:18:32,680 --> 00:18:35,319
Because today we would call Bruce Lee an influencer.

407
00:18:36,519 --> 00:18:40,319
Speaker 3: I mean he's yeah, he's absolutely that. He continues to

408
00:18:40,319 --> 00:18:42,920
influence millions of people. I don't know, you know, I

409
00:18:43,319 --> 00:18:46,920
think that what I got to see from my particular

410
00:18:47,000 --> 00:18:51,000
vantage point was insight into who he was when he

411
00:18:51,079 --> 00:18:53,359
wasn't around people or when he was only with his

412
00:18:53,400 --> 00:18:58,440
loved ones, And that was profound to me. You know,

413
00:18:58,599 --> 00:19:03,359
I'm not sure if he I want to be careful

414
00:19:03,359 --> 00:19:05,079
about how this I was going to say, where the crown.

415
00:19:05,359 --> 00:19:09,559
I'm not sure if if he held his responsibility like

416
00:19:09,599 --> 00:19:13,559
heavily all the time, you know, or if he held

417
00:19:13,599 --> 00:19:16,759
it lightly. I tend to think that in the last

418
00:19:16,880 --> 00:19:19,440
year of his life he was holding it really, really preciously.

419
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Speaker 2: You know.

420
00:19:19,839 --> 00:19:22,039
Speaker 3: He was like, I have to be able to break

421
00:19:22,039 --> 00:19:24,799
through in Hollywood because I need people to be able

422
00:19:24,799 --> 00:19:27,720
to have a way to see us in a way

423
00:19:27,799 --> 00:19:32,279
that is not stereotypical, in a way that's not denigrating

424
00:19:32,599 --> 00:19:33,359
or dismissive.

425
00:19:33,480 --> 00:19:34,000
Speaker 2: I need to be.

426
00:19:33,920 --> 00:19:38,400
Speaker 3: Able to understand how people understand that we've had this

427
00:19:38,519 --> 00:19:41,160
wisdom that we've passed down for thousands of years, and

428
00:19:41,200 --> 00:19:43,839
that we've you know, we've got strength and power and

429
00:19:43,839 --> 00:19:46,279
that we can you know, be that like that, and

430
00:19:46,359 --> 00:19:48,839
I think as people have seen that it's become a

431
00:19:48,920 --> 00:19:52,480
universal thing, right, Like when you share your individual struggle,

432
00:19:52,519 --> 00:19:55,440
it becomes a universal struggle in a lot of ways.

433
00:19:55,480 --> 00:19:58,759
That's the power of art, and that's the power of communication.

434
00:20:00,559 --> 00:20:03,240
So you know, that's that's part of what I wonder about.

435
00:20:03,279 --> 00:20:07,839
You know, if had even able to survive past thirty two,

436
00:20:08,119 --> 00:20:10,359
like what he would have become, how he would have

437
00:20:10,519 --> 00:20:14,559
stepped into the role of what he represents to so

438
00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:15,440
many of us.

439
00:20:15,680 --> 00:20:18,359
Speaker 1: Wow, you bring up Hollywood again, and right away I

440
00:20:18,359 --> 00:20:19,960
had to go back to a question that I kind

441
00:20:19,960 --> 00:20:22,519
of set aside. But and it deals with the mirrors.

442
00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:24,759
Once again, you said that he did not, you know,

443
00:20:24,799 --> 00:20:27,079
have that experience of the mirrors, and yet with Hollywood,

444
00:20:27,200 --> 00:20:29,400
every one of those cameras have mirrors in them. So

445
00:20:29,480 --> 00:20:32,119
therefore I feel like that he stepped into those camera

446
00:20:32,200 --> 00:20:35,279
mirrors in order to give us where we are here today.

447
00:20:37,279 --> 00:20:39,440
Speaker 3: I can see that. I can see that out for sure,

448
00:20:39,680 --> 00:20:41,759
you know, And that's that's fun. Of the really interesting

449
00:20:41,799 --> 00:20:45,000
things to me is like his last big fight scene

450
00:20:45,119 --> 00:20:47,440
is in this hall of mirrors.

451
00:20:47,680 --> 00:20:49,720
Speaker 1: Oh right, oh god, yes.

452
00:20:49,720 --> 00:20:53,160
Speaker 3: And it's frag and these mirrors are fragmented, right, They're

453
00:20:53,200 --> 00:20:57,000
cut in these little slices, and so the image that

454
00:20:57,200 --> 00:21:04,440
you see is delivering kind of elusive, elusive e l

455
00:21:04,759 --> 00:21:10,480
usiv and elusive ill i il siv, which is a

456
00:21:10,480 --> 00:21:13,880
word that Bruce like to use in his letters to friends,

457
00:21:13,920 --> 00:21:18,839
that Hollywood was elusive, that it was illusioned, and so like,

458
00:21:18,920 --> 00:21:21,279
how do you pick out what's real from what's fake.

459
00:21:21,680 --> 00:21:21,880
Speaker 2: Right.

460
00:21:21,960 --> 00:21:26,519
Speaker 3: I think that's like part of that last climactic big

461
00:21:26,559 --> 00:21:31,759
battle is You've got Bruce fighting this character who's a

462
00:21:31,799 --> 00:21:35,400
Fu Manshue character. He's like a stereotype of all the

463
00:21:35,559 --> 00:21:39,359
evil ideas about Chinese people and Asian American people and

464
00:21:39,400 --> 00:21:42,160
Asian people all around the world. And it's almost like

465
00:21:42,200 --> 00:21:45,240
Bruce's job to go and defeat that. Right, and you

466
00:21:45,319 --> 00:21:47,920
walk you see them walking through this hallo mirrors, and

467
00:21:48,200 --> 00:21:50,160
you don't know what's real and what's fake. But he's

468
00:21:50,200 --> 00:21:52,759
the one that emerges at the end, right, and he's

469
00:21:52,799 --> 00:21:57,200
exhausted by this battle. It literally kills him. And so

470
00:21:57,440 --> 00:21:59,480
I think about that a lot. I really really think

471
00:21:59,519 --> 00:21:59,839
about that.

472
00:22:00,839 --> 00:22:02,599
Speaker 1: One of the things that I've learned in my everyday

473
00:22:02,640 --> 00:22:06,000
life is the fact that the way that first of all,

474
00:22:06,440 --> 00:22:08,839
people today now say do not bow, and I'm going

475
00:22:08,920 --> 00:22:10,599
I have to bow because that's the way that I

476
00:22:10,640 --> 00:22:13,119
was trained, and people go, but but you can't do that,

477
00:22:13,119 --> 00:22:15,720
that's offensive. How do you feel about that when you're

478
00:22:15,759 --> 00:22:17,880
trained and you're trained to say yes, sir, yes, sir,

479
00:22:17,960 --> 00:22:20,240
don't call me sir. And and so I mean, because

480
00:22:20,440 --> 00:22:22,359
the way that we're trained as martial artists, because I

481
00:22:22,400 --> 00:22:24,599
look at someone like Bruce Lee as being somebody I'm

482
00:22:24,640 --> 00:22:26,880
playing by the rules, and so should you.

483
00:22:27,839 --> 00:22:31,400
Speaker 2: M Yeah, I think you know. I come up. I'm

484
00:22:31,440 --> 00:22:33,160
raised in a culture of respect. Right.

485
00:22:33,240 --> 00:22:36,160
Speaker 3: You respect your elders, You respect those who are wiser

486
00:22:36,200 --> 00:22:41,920
than you. You respect people who who you know show

487
00:22:41,960 --> 00:22:46,319
you love and empathy. Right And and you don't respect

488
00:22:46,319 --> 00:22:49,240
people who are treating you badly. You don't respect people

489
00:22:49,319 --> 00:22:54,559
who are denigrating you. You don't respect people who are

490
00:22:54,400 --> 00:22:58,519
are are trying to figure out ways to slip you

491
00:22:58,519 --> 00:23:00,960
you know, or or or you in any kind of

492
00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:03,680
a way. And uh, and I think that that's part

493
00:23:03,720 --> 00:23:06,759
of you know, what this warrior mentality is about, right Like,

494
00:23:07,759 --> 00:23:12,359
You've you've got to be able to to to respect

495
00:23:12,400 --> 00:23:15,359
and learn from the people that you can learn from,

496
00:23:15,400 --> 00:23:17,480
and you can even learn from your enemies, yes, right

497
00:23:18,279 --> 00:23:21,240
and in fact, right like, I think one of the

498
00:23:21,240 --> 00:23:24,640
things about sparring for the first time is that that

499
00:23:25,119 --> 00:23:27,599
right is that is that the person you're sparring with

500
00:23:27,720 --> 00:23:31,839
is the one who's teaching you actually about yourself, right Like,

501
00:23:32,480 --> 00:23:35,480
they're teaching you about like what your weaknesses are, what

502
00:23:35,599 --> 00:23:38,079
you're where you're like not defending yourself.

503
00:23:38,240 --> 00:23:40,000
Speaker 2: Right, they're also teaching you a little bit.

504
00:23:39,960 --> 00:23:43,759
Speaker 3: About like where you might have an edge or some power,

505
00:23:43,920 --> 00:23:47,519
but they're your biggest teachers anyway. My point is is

506
00:23:48,720 --> 00:23:52,359
that it's not about never bowing. It's about never bowing

507
00:23:52,400 --> 00:23:54,240
to people who do not respect you.

508
00:23:54,359 --> 00:23:57,440
Speaker 2: Yes, I think is what it is. And I think

509
00:23:57,480 --> 00:24:00,359
that that's, you know, part of what the lesson of

510
00:24:00,880 --> 00:24:01,240
this is.

511
00:24:01,279 --> 00:24:03,200
Speaker 3: But also on the other side, to be capacious, to

512
00:24:03,240 --> 00:24:06,880
be able to to realize that not everybody is your enemy, right,

513
00:24:07,039 --> 00:24:10,480
that even those people who are slotted as your enemies,

514
00:24:10,559 --> 00:24:12,599
they might be your opponents, but they're not your They

515
00:24:12,640 --> 00:24:13,680
may not be your enemies.

516
00:24:14,319 --> 00:24:15,359
Speaker 2: I think there's a difference.

517
00:24:16,039 --> 00:24:18,240
Speaker 1: I've always thought that respect begins with the way that

518
00:24:18,279 --> 00:24:20,759
you hand something to another person. I believe in the

519
00:24:20,799 --> 00:24:23,720
two handed transfer and and and so many people that

520
00:24:23,880 --> 00:24:26,599
understand what I'm doing respect that, But others go, what

521
00:24:26,640 --> 00:24:27,519
are you doing.

522
00:24:28,200 --> 00:24:28,279
Speaker 5: M.

523
00:24:30,119 --> 00:24:33,400
Speaker 2: But you're showing respect, right, yeah, showing respect to somebody else. Absolutely,

524
00:24:33,440 --> 00:24:36,240
you're giving that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know.

525
00:24:36,240 --> 00:24:39,480
Speaker 3: And I think again, at this particular point in the culture,

526
00:24:39,519 --> 00:24:43,440
like we are not like respect is not a thing, right,

527
00:24:43,559 --> 00:24:47,200
Respect is seen as weakness, and and I feel like,

528
00:24:47,279 --> 00:24:50,519
that's part of why we've gotten ourselves into a little

529
00:24:50,519 --> 00:24:51,559
bit of the mess that we're in.

530
00:24:51,759 --> 00:24:53,559
Speaker 1: Yah, let me ask you this question. One of the

531
00:24:53,599 --> 00:24:55,079
you know you were talking about you the first person

532
00:24:55,079 --> 00:24:56,839
you ever sparred, and the one that I will never

533
00:24:56,880 --> 00:24:59,160
forget is the first girl I ever sparred. And I

534
00:24:59,480 --> 00:25:01,599
was like, I was so against that because I'm a

535
00:25:01,640 --> 00:25:03,680
male pig, I guess. And the thing is my sense

536
00:25:03,680 --> 00:25:05,839
I looked at me and he says, what you think

537
00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:08,640
you can beat the girl? And he goes, and what

538
00:25:08,680 --> 00:25:10,440
happens if that girl is out on the street and

539
00:25:10,480 --> 00:25:12,559
a man attacks her and she's never had the practice,

540
00:25:12,759 --> 00:25:15,519
get in that ring and shut up, just do your jone.

541
00:25:16,920 --> 00:25:20,799
Speaker 3: Yeah, I had the privilege of being able to be

542
00:25:20,839 --> 00:25:23,599
in a clue that was run by by women and

543
00:25:23,599 --> 00:25:26,559
and so uh so I got my butt kicked on

544
00:25:26,640 --> 00:25:32,039
the daily in that and that was that was something

545
00:25:32,039 --> 00:25:35,559
that was was really amazing to be a part of it.

546
00:25:35,920 --> 00:25:39,000
And yeah, and absolutely, you know, like we get over

547
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:41,319
our chauvinism and and we get in there and we

548
00:25:41,359 --> 00:25:45,640
really fight and we find out right, Yeah, that's the

549
00:25:45,640 --> 00:25:46,160
beautiful thing.

550
00:25:46,240 --> 00:25:48,359
Speaker 1: Yeah, we're blessed with the opportunity to talk with a

551
00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:51,119
lot of close family members and friends. What kind of

552
00:25:51,279 --> 00:25:53,680
monsters did you wake up? And I don't mean that

553
00:25:53,720 --> 00:25:55,880
in a bad way, because when you step into someone's

554
00:25:55,880 --> 00:25:58,680
past and their experiences, you wake something up.

555
00:26:00,720 --> 00:26:04,440
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I think there's a lot, right, you know,

556
00:26:04,559 --> 00:26:09,240
there's nobody's a perrect person. Nobody's a perrect person.

557
00:26:10,519 --> 00:26:12,359
Speaker 3: And I think one of the things that I was

558
00:26:12,519 --> 00:26:16,079
really stunned to learn was how vulnerable he was, right,

559
00:26:16,279 --> 00:26:19,880
how insecure he was really at all kinds of different

560
00:26:19,880 --> 00:26:22,240
points in his life. Yeah, And you know, sometimes it

561
00:26:22,319 --> 00:26:25,160
was because he had written these things in Chinese, which

562
00:26:25,160 --> 00:26:28,799
I don't read, but I have an amazing translator, and

563
00:26:28,960 --> 00:26:30,960
she'd be reading this and we'd be talking about it

564
00:26:31,000 --> 00:26:34,200
together and I'd be like, wow, Like he was really

565
00:26:34,240 --> 00:26:36,559
at a downpoint at that particular point. So give you

566
00:26:36,559 --> 00:26:39,319
an example, Right, Bruce is somebody who grows up in

567
00:26:40,440 --> 00:26:44,119
Hong Kong. He's on the one hand, a movie star,

568
00:26:44,319 --> 00:26:47,759
he's like a teen idol. He's really a handsome dude. Right,

569
00:26:47,880 --> 00:26:51,079
He's a chot shot king. You know, he's got a

570
00:26:51,079 --> 00:26:53,599
lot of ladies that are chasing after him. And on

571
00:26:53,640 --> 00:26:55,880
the other hand, he has sort of a taste for blood.

572
00:26:56,160 --> 00:26:59,079
You know, he likes getting punched. You know, he likes

573
00:26:59,119 --> 00:27:04,680
punching and getting punched, right, which we know something about, right,

574
00:27:05,079 --> 00:27:08,599
and so he has in the extreme, so he loves

575
00:27:09,079 --> 00:27:12,880
street fighting. He's in a fight culture in Hong Kong

576
00:27:13,440 --> 00:27:16,319
at the same time that he's a movie star, you know,

577
00:27:16,359 --> 00:27:19,200
and he's trying to protect his face. He's trying not

578
00:27:19,200 --> 00:27:20,960
to get his hit in the face. His friends are

579
00:27:21,000 --> 00:27:24,440
trying to like remind him, hey, man, you know, watch out.

580
00:27:24,559 --> 00:27:25,880
We want to make sure that you get to the

581
00:27:25,920 --> 00:27:28,759
next you know movie set on time without a black

582
00:27:28,799 --> 00:27:32,319
and blue you know eye. But he gets into one

583
00:27:32,359 --> 00:27:34,920
too many fights, and so his parents send him away.

584
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:37,240
They're like, you were born in the US. We're going

585
00:27:37,279 --> 00:27:40,440
to send you back to the US, right, and we're

586
00:27:40,440 --> 00:27:41,799
giving you one hundred bucks. So you're gonna have to

587
00:27:41,799 --> 00:27:42,319
figure it out.

588
00:27:43,440 --> 00:27:46,200
Speaker 2: And what was staying to me, I was I'm reading

589
00:27:46,279 --> 00:27:49,599
his letters at that particular point when he's on the

590
00:27:49,640 --> 00:27:53,839
boat this three week journey across the Pacific, and he

591
00:27:54,039 --> 00:27:58,880
is scared, you know, he's like, wow, like I barely

592
00:27:58,920 --> 00:28:01,400
know English because I haven't been paying attention to my

593
00:28:01,440 --> 00:28:02,200
English classes.

594
00:28:02,880 --> 00:28:05,119
Speaker 3: They teach it, you know, they teach English in Hong Kong.

595
00:28:05,200 --> 00:28:08,480
It's British colonies, right, but he hasn't been paying attention.

596
00:28:08,599 --> 00:28:11,200
Speaker 2: So he's like, I barely know the language, and I

597
00:28:11,240 --> 00:28:14,799
don't know anybody there, and I have no friends.

598
00:28:14,839 --> 00:28:17,440
Speaker 3: All my friends are here. Everything that I know is here,

599
00:28:17,559 --> 00:28:20,880
you know. And so he's writing these notes to himself

600
00:28:20,960 --> 00:28:25,000
that are literally these idioms, these old Chinese sayings, yes,

601
00:28:25,319 --> 00:28:30,039
you know, that are like like, hey, like you mess

602
00:28:30,079 --> 00:28:32,519
around too much and stuff, you'll make a fool of yourself.

603
00:28:33,000 --> 00:28:36,559
And there's another one that's in there that's like forgive others,

604
00:28:36,559 --> 00:28:37,920
but never forgive yourself.

605
00:28:38,200 --> 00:28:42,319
Speaker 2: You know. They're just really really harsh, you know, Chinese sayings,

606
00:28:42,400 --> 00:28:46,640
right like that he's using to kind of motivate himself

607
00:28:46,720 --> 00:28:49,640
and to buck himself off and to be like okay,

608
00:28:50,039 --> 00:28:51,559
like I've really got to figure this out.

609
00:28:51,640 --> 00:28:54,759
Speaker 3: But also, you know, just to it's just a reflection,

610
00:28:54,880 --> 00:28:57,119
I think, on his state of mind at that particular point.

611
00:28:57,240 --> 00:29:01,359
So he he goes through different periods. There's another time

612
00:29:01,359 --> 00:29:04,440
when he's like trying to break into Hollywood and he's

613
00:29:04,480 --> 00:29:07,799
finding that nobody's giving him any kinds of jobs, you know,

614
00:29:07,839 --> 00:29:10,960
and so he's turning to self help books American self

615
00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:14,599
help books. Yes, he's trying to visualize what success could

616
00:29:14,599 --> 00:29:17,160
look like, you know. And so a lot of biographers

617
00:29:17,160 --> 00:29:19,319
they read this and like, oh, he was an ego case.

618
00:29:19,400 --> 00:29:22,359
He was like always on it. He always like had

619
00:29:22,359 --> 00:29:24,000
this idea that he was going to be a star,

620
00:29:24,039 --> 00:29:26,279
and that's why he became a star, which I think

621
00:29:26,359 --> 00:29:29,960
is a very American way to look at things. I

622
00:29:30,000 --> 00:29:31,720
looked at it as like, wow, like.

623
00:29:32,279 --> 00:29:36,720
Speaker 2: He is so unsure about the future that he's over

624
00:29:36,759 --> 00:29:39,279
here training his mind like he trains his body. He's

625
00:29:39,319 --> 00:29:41,720
training his mind every day to say, this is what

626
00:29:41,759 --> 00:29:44,319
I'm focused on, and I'm going to stay focused on this.

627
00:29:45,319 --> 00:29:48,000
So yeah, So it's those kinds of things kind of

628
00:29:48,039 --> 00:29:50,720
just blew me away. You know. It gives you an

629
00:29:50,759 --> 00:29:53,119
idea of the human like underneath the legend.

630
00:29:53,319 --> 00:29:55,480
Speaker 1: See, that's why you can't stop at a black belt.

631
00:29:55,480 --> 00:29:57,240
You got to keep growing, because to me, it's like

632
00:29:57,279 --> 00:29:59,559
the alphabet. Each belt is a letter in the alphabet.

633
00:29:59,599 --> 00:30:01,240
One day you'll be able to write a sentence and

634
00:30:01,279 --> 00:30:03,640
then a paragraph, and then you've got a book like yours.

635
00:30:05,400 --> 00:30:09,240
Speaker 2: Wow, I appreciate that. That's a really, really huge compliment.

636
00:30:09,359 --> 00:30:11,559
Speaker 1: God, thirty minutes is still not enough with you dude,

637
00:30:11,440 --> 00:30:13,359
where can people go to find out more? I mean,

638
00:30:13,599 --> 00:30:15,400
come on, that felt like only three minutes, and you

639
00:30:15,440 --> 00:30:16,319
know it's like what.

640
00:30:16,480 --> 00:30:18,359
Speaker 2: I'd love to talk with I'd love to talk with

641
00:30:18,440 --> 00:30:20,319
you for hours, man. I know that we could. I

642
00:30:20,359 --> 00:30:21,279
really know that we could.

643
00:30:21,960 --> 00:30:25,920
Speaker 3: Watermerror Echo dot net is my website and I have

644
00:30:26,000 --> 00:30:28,279
an Instagram account at Zentronics.

645
00:30:28,799 --> 00:30:30,200
Speaker 1: You got to come back to the show anytime in

646
00:30:30,240 --> 00:30:31,680
the future. You know, the door is always going to

647
00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:32,240
be open for you.

648
00:30:33,359 --> 00:30:35,559
Speaker 2: Man. I'd love to. I'd love to. Let's do it.

649
00:30:35,640 --> 00:30:36,920
Speaker 1: Will you be brilliant today?

650
00:30:36,960 --> 00:30:39,759
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah you too, man. Thank you