Brandon C. White - November 2020

Brandon C. White - November 2020

VOL. 6 · NOVEMBER 2020

SUCCESS SECRETS

BRANDONCWHITE.COM · 320 CENTRAL AVENUE, HALF MOON BAY, CA 94019 · 415-429-1229

Entrepreneurship Lessons From Bruce Lee WHAT MARTIAL ARTS AND BUILDING A BUSINESS HAVE IN COMMON

Thanksgiving is just around the corner, so it would be easy to fill this newsletter with articles about being thankful. Of course, I think we should always be grateful on a daily basis, but in my opinion, everyone has discussed that topic to death. I’m tired of Thanksgiving content and I bet you are too, so this month I’m going to talk about something else: Bruce Lee. Bruce Lee was born on Nov. 27, 1940. He became a famous actor, director, martial artist, teacher, and — most importantly in my opinion — philosopher. When I was a kid in the 1970s, I grew up watching Lee obliterate enemies in action movies like “Enter the Dragon,” “Fist of Fury,” and “The Big Boss.” I was impressed by the way he beat up the bad guys and looked so cool doing it. He had a great style, and it stuck with me. As I got older, some of the characters I admired fell away (Bugs Bunny and the Road Runner didn’t have much depth), but my admiration for Brue Lee only grew. Lee had substance. He was a truly interesting person with a fascinating approach to life and excellence. When I talk about Lee’s approach, I’m specifically referencing Jeet Kune Do (JKD), the martial art and philosophy that Lee developed. In Cantonese, Jeet Kune Do means “way of the intercepting fist,” and people talk about it as Lee’s “style,” but really, his style was to have no style at all. The Bruce Lee foundation describes JKD’s main tenet as, “Using no way as way; having no limitation as limitation.” Lee’s philosophy when developing JKD was simple: Absorb what is useful, discard what is not, and add what is uniquely your own. To create JKD, he studied all the existing martial arts

and cherry-picked what he could use from them. Then he tossed out the things he felt didn’t work and added his own unique moves. Eventually, that thought process grew to become just as important as the martial art itself. I’ve studied Lee and JKD for years now, and I’ve adopted his philosophy as part of my business strategy. I think this is the thought process behind most, if not all, successful businesses. Take entrepreneur Steve Jobs, for example. He didn’t invent the iPod, the mobile phone, or even the first computer. He chose the best parts of those existing things, got rid of the bad stuff, and added his own twist. That’s what made Apple so good. That said, you don’t have to be Steve Jobs to take a leaf out of Bruce Lee’s book. I’ve done it myself with multiple companies, including one called File Finder, which I co-founded. File Finder is a new type of search program that helps you find lost files faster. I came up with the idea when my wife, Ivette, was struggling to round up years of >Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4

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