The Worst Bruce Lee Quote (And Why It’s Wrong for Fighting)

The Worst Bruce Lee Quote (And Why It’s Wrong for Fighting

Bruce Lee has a lot of quotes, and most of them are pretty good. Some of them, however, are not. And one of my all-time least favorite Bruce Lee quotes is, I fear not the man that has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man that has practiced one kick 10,000 times.

This is one of those quotes that otherwise intelligent people that know how to fight still repeat. Of course, it's a Bruce Lee quote, which is why people take it seriously without ever scrutinizing it. First of all, if you practice one kick 10,000 times, I'm not scared of you.

You only have one kick. All I have to do is fight you at any range where that one singular kick isn't as useful, and I'll win. You practiced it 10,000 times.

The Worst Bruce Lee Quote (And Why It’s Wrong for Fighting

You probably didn't have time to practice anything else. Focusing on one move that hard doesn't make you a specialist. It makes you a one-trick pony.

Second of all, you're probably not that good at the kick. Practicing a move is subject to the law of diminishing returns. Personally, once I drill a move three or four times, I don't get much more out of drilling it.

If you drill a move 10,000 times, 9,950 of those times were probably a complete waste of effort. After that, it's not about drilling the move anymore. It's about learning to incorporate it into sparring.

The Worst Bruce Lee Quote (And Why It’s Wrong for Fighting

Third of all, I am terrified of anyone that has learned 10,000 different kicks in any capacity. I can't even list 20, and this guy has done 10,000?! This guy has performed kicks that the human brain can't even conceive of! This guy's throwing kicks through the fabric of space and time! He's about to kick me from a parallel dimension! I can't block those! The serious answer is to fear the man who's practiced 200 kicks about 50 times each. That guy would have a decent, solid grasp of more kicks than anyone's ever seen.

The person who practices one kick 10,000 times has way too much free time on their hands. So, I guess the real moral of the story is that having literally hundreds of popular quotes kind of guarantees that at least a few of them will be stupid.

The Worst Bruce Lee Quote (And Why It’s Wrong for Fighting



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