Entrepreneurial Jeet Kune Do

The Bruce Lee Code

By Thomas Lee

 

Among the greatest of entrepreneurs certain name have a way of standing out. Steve Jobs, Bill Gate, Elon Musk and several others. One of the best known who had an entrepreneurial spirit was Bruce Lee. Now Bruce was an icon a hero that everyone looked up to. Know for his martial arts prowess and chiseled physique but little do people know that he was an entrepreneur. Bruce had big plans . He wanted to combine the east and the west and show everyone the good parts about Chinese culture. His way to do that involved show casing his Kung Fu skills. His original plan was to open up a string of kung fu schools. When Bruce found that he would reach more people with the cinema that is the route he took.  His role as Cato in the Green Hornet propelled him to fame and his character was the main item of the show. People liked Cato. After that role was finished Bruce did not have any roles. Being flexible and brave he went to Hong kong started his own production company and made several movies. Later he had a stronger bargaining . One could say that if he had plans on opening schools and then later he opened his own production company that he was pretty entrepreneurial.

When compared to someone like Steve Jobs he was an innovator. Bruce took what was there and made it simpler.  Easier to use. If anyone remembers using computer or technologies before Apple it was clunky and difficult. Now Apple products are one of the easiest to use and other tech companies have copied this approach. Bruce Lee also made things simpler. He hated forms and patterns and useless movement that cluttered up the martial arts. He wanted to make it more efficient and useful for  combat. Using Wing Chun as a basis he studied more fighting styles and he took what was useful and discarded the rest. He formulated his own martial art called JeeT Kune Do.

Not only did Bruce study martial arts and exercise routines but he was learning about eastern and western philosophy. He also studied camera angles and script writing.  A good entrepreneur is always curious and learning new things because when you start your own business you must do everything yourself.  If Bruce wanted to realize his vision of introducing kung fu and his philosophy to world he would have to do more than just act. Bruce had to write his own scripts, choreograph fight scenes and learn the basic of production.

Hollywood back in Bruce’s time was very racist. Chinese or Asian actors had limited roles.  Often times when certain characters were Asian in a movie they would often cast a white person to that role. Bruce himself was paid the price of a stuntman for his role as Cato in the Green Hornet. He had fewer spoken lines then his Caucasian counter parts. Bruce knew this racism was wrong but he had and enlightened outlook on it. It was wrong but he understood their reluctance and said that if an American came to Hong Kong he might experience the same thing. This impacted Bruce in a lot of ways. First off he taught Kung Fu to all nationalities something that the Chinese masters frowned upon at first. The second is that he reflected that sense of discrimination in his films. The Chinese Connection showed how Chinese and dogs were not allowed in a park. In Enter the Dragon you have an African American being pushed around by cops. Finally Bruce was like water. He was flexible. He knew America was a closed market so he went to Honk kong.

No nuggets here just the gist. Gonna have to read the book and pull out the nuggets yourself.