#57 Self-Knowledge

"All knowledge ultimately means Self-knowledge." For all of his adult life, Bruce Lee was on a journey to understand the truest essence of himself. We remember him as the ultra confident movie star with martial arts mastery but even Bruce Lee was a work in progress. Self-knowledge is not a static idea of "who I am" but it's a forward motion pursuit of understanding your root. It is lifelong pursuit of knowing yourself. "Know the cause of your ignorance." "Instead of establishing rigid rules and separative thoughts, we should look within ourselves to see where our particular problems lie and our cause of ignorance.You see, ultimately all type of knowledge simply means self- knowledge. You must look for truth yourself and directly experience every minute detail for yourself." Anytime in your life when you're mired in confusion, uncertainty, or a recurring upset, you're holding onto ignorance about something. It's a great place to start examining and learning about yourself. Often it's difficult to look at these upsetting occasions since we've spent so much time burying or avoiding them Study yourself in relationship. "To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person. Relationship is a process of self–revelation. Relationship is the mirror in which you discover yourself. To be is to be related." The true test of who you are is shown in the real relationships in your life. These days there are so many ways to isolate yourself with technology, but who do you actually interact with daily and weekly, and what is the quality of those relationships? "True mastery transcends any particular art. It stems from mastery of oneself – the ability, developed through self-discipline, to be calm, fully aware, and completely in tune with oneself and the surroundings. Then and only then, can a person know himself." Bruce's true art was mastery of the self, and when you see him in the movies or interviews, he's bringing authenticity, energy, and calm. His unique energy still emanates through his art, film and writings--which is why we are still talking about him today. "Freedom lies in understanding yourself from moment to moment." When you are comfortable in your own skin, centered, grounded, and totally in touch, you're free because you no longer have to manufacture anything. "The sage attends to the inner self and not to the outward appearance." The more that Bruce Lee went inside, the more outwardly visible his essence became. The deeper you know your inner essence, the more you come into harmony with nature and everything around you. Take Action: Look at your relationships, check them out, what is the quality? Can you sustain them? Or do you cycle through them? Make a list of strengths and weaknesses—both are great teachers. #AAHA Miwa Matreyek is an animator, director, designer, and performer living and working in Los Angeles. Miwa is an animator who creates films and then performs along with the animation. She has screens set up where she has one screen in the front where the film is projected onto and she's behind it doing live shadow-play interacting with her animations as a shadow silhouette. She premiered her work "Myth and Infrastructure" at the TED Conference in Oxford. Miwa, we think you're doing amazing work in the world and we think you're awesome! #BruceLeeMoment This week our moment comes from Aleisha: "I look forward to your podcast each week and use it as part of my spiritual journey. I am currently in recovery from addiction issues that have plagued me throughout my life. This peaked 4 1/2 years when I lost my mother to a short battle with cancer. I know I can only live my life 1 day at a time and this recovery will be forever but I just wanted to thank you for being apart of my recovery." Share your #AAHAs, #BruceLeeMoments, and #TakeAction progress with us at [email protected] Find the full version of our show notes at BruceLee.com/podcast