During his lifetime, Bruce Lee formulated a complex personal philosophy that was a synthesis of Eastern and Western ideas that promoted the virtues of knowledge and total mastery of one’s self. A clear example of this can be shown from Bruce himself, whilst talking about his son.

“Brandon is being brought up in the midst of two cultures. There are good points in Chinese culture; there are good points in Occidental culture. He will be taught to take some principles from one, some from the other. Brandon will learn that Oriental culture and Occidental culture are not mutually exclusive, but mutually dependent. Neither would be remarkable were it not for the existence of the other.”

Bruce believed that ultimately all knowledge meant self-knowledge. Although Bruce’s philosophy was deeply rooted in Taoism and the principles of Ying-Yang, he read widely, including Western philosophers such as Aristotle and Alan Watts  as well as the likes of Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu and Krishnamurti. Consequently, Bruce constructed his own philosophy that took positive aspects from both eastern and western philosophies and merged them into his own, one that at the same time embraced and yet was free from tradition...

If one thinks about the last couple of weeks, it is difficult not to consider the fact the possibility that one of the principle claims that Karl Marx made about capitalism has again proved to contain more than an element of truth. Whilst a student, one had to be careful in citing Marx (and especially some of the his followers) for fear of being ridiculed as some sort of out-dated hippy with no idea about the real world of economics.

However, the recent upheaval in international finance and banking and the consequent bailouts by national banks (£100 billion form the Bank of England alone) begs the question whether capitalism will be able to turn the corner again as it did in both the early and latter parts of the twentieth century. Indeed there is a case to be made that without the assistance of a pliant state apparatus the free market may have collapsed long ago. Read more....

Pronunciation: en-'te-l&-kE
Function: noun, plural -chies

A Greek philosophical concept coined by Aristotle.

The word entelechy is one of my favourite words and it means ‘realising one’s potential’. The word potential is bounded around about a lot in a variety of contexts. The point is that potential is something that every human possesses, some people realise theirs and others do not.

I have long contemplated the meaning of that phrase; is it better to master one subject or skill so as to achieve a level of excellence that most cannot? Or is it better to try to gather as many different skills as possible? When I say is it better, I suppose I mean ‘better’ in a number of senses.

Firstly, does being a master at one skill bring you greater life satisfaction than somebody who is reasonably good at a lot of skills?