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While fairly common among big names actors to take on the full range of roles for a film, Bruce’s desire to uphold the
integrity of the script was, as many on set described — critical. This was a Chinese American director, who owned his
own production company, making a movie that he wanted to make. There were no filters. Much of the film, which is both
a comedy and martial arts drama, portrays universal dilemmas faced by immigrants worldwide. Bruce blended campiness
and irony into his character Tang Lung, the naïve hero doing his best to make it through, while coming to the hard truth of
what it is that he has to do.
Bruce was multiracial American-born, butraised in Hong Kong until moving back to the states at the age of 18. In many
ways, he was as much of an immigrant as his character Tang Lung in the film. Finding his path to gain confidence and to
persevere in the United States is what propelled the martial artist in real life to want to become a household name. Still his
words ring true, “I’m not in this world to live up to your expectations and you’re not in this world to live up to mine.”
READING 5: TEACHINGS ON SUCCESS — JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI
Greatness is anonymity
Greatness is anonymity; to be anonymous is the greatest thing. The great cathedral, the great things of life, great sculpture,
must be anonymous. They do not belong to any particular person, like truth. Truth does not belong to you or to me, it
is totally impersonal and anonymous; if you say you have got truth, and then you are not anonymous, you are far more
important than truth. But an anonymous person may never be great. Probably he will never be great, because he does not
want to be great, great in the sense of the world or even inwardly because he is nobody. He has no followers. He has no
shrine, he does not puff himself up. But most of us unfortunately want to puff ourselves up, we want to be great, we want
to be known, we want to have success. Success leads to fame, but that is an empty thing, is it not? It is like ashes. Every
politician is known and it is his business to be known and therefore he is not great. Greatness is to be unknown, inwardly
and outwardly to be as nothing; and that requires great penetration, great understanding, great affection.
Banaras, India 20th January 1954 13th, Collected Works
Find out for yourself
Questioner:
Why are some people born in poor circumstances, while others are rich and well-to-do?
Krishnamurti:
What do you think? Instead of asking me and waiting for my answer, why do you not find out what you feel
about it? Do you think it is some mysterious process which you call karma? In a former life you lived nobly and therefore
you are now being rewarded with wealth and position! Is that it? Or, having acted very badly in a former life, you are paying
for it in this life! You see, this is really a very complex problem. Poverty is the fault of society—a society in which the greedy
and the cunning exploit and rise to the top. We want the same thing, we also want to climb the ladder and get to the top.
And when all of us want to get to the top, what happens? We tread on somebody; and the man who is trodden on, who
is destroyed, asks, “Why is life so unfair? You have everything and I have no capacity, I have nothing”. As long as we go
on climbing the ladder of success, there will always be the sick and the unfed. It is the desire for success that has to be
understood, and not why there are the rich and the poor, or why some have talent and others have none. What has to be
changed is our own desire to climb, our desire to be great, to be a success. We all aspire to succeed, do we not? There lies
the fault, and not in karma or any other explanation. The actual fact is that we all want to be at the top - perhaps not right at
the top, but at least as high up the ladder as we can climb. As long as there is this drive to be great, to be somebody in the
world, we are going to have the rich and the poor, the exploiter and those who are exploited.
Life Ahead Part One Chapter 4
“DO YOU KNOW BRUCE?”
