from REP: Why This is a Bruce Lee Moment

2025 and THE WORK CONTINUES

As many ponder whether and how they will be able to move forward considering the current and continuing landscape, BRJA wants to offer another way of viewing this moment.

We share this amazing article from our 2025 inaugural issue of the Racial Equity Practices newsletter, explaining why this is a Bruce Lee moment!

Bruce Lee was certainly one of the greatest martial artists of modern times, and possibly one of the greatest who has ever studied, practiced, and taught.  In the U.S., he is most known as a martial artist and actor. But for martial arts aficionados and practitioners, he is known as a founder of Jeet Kune Do – a new school of martial arts philosophy and practice.

AND WHAT, you may be asking, DOES BRUCE LEE HAVE TO DO WITH ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND ANTI-RACISM/ANTI-OPPRESSION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS?

That question – basically, what does one discipline have to do with another – is exactly why Bruce Lee created Jeet Kune Do, and why this is a Bruce Lee Moment.

Jeet Kune Do is a hybrid martial arts philosophy and practice.  It incorporates a variety of martial arts disciplines –- or “mixed martial arts.” Incorporating different martial arts disciplines/styles was not popular in the time of Bruce Lee.  But his philosophy was “The best fighter is someone who can adapt to any style. . .to be formless. . .not following [a particular] system of styles.” 

Since November 5th, we have heard the despair, the fear, and the anger of those whose high hopes for a more inclusive and equitable society were dashed. Since the inauguration, we have seen a series of Executive Orders that have revoked most of the ones implemented by the prior administration – Executive Orders that advanced racial equity and support for historically marginalized communities.

As of January 20th, we have entered a new era that will impact us all — our families, our communities, our workplaces. Groups who have been historically marginalized in society and in our workplaces – African Americans and other Black and non-Black people of color; LGBTQIA+ and Trans communities (especially if they are African American and/or Black); individuals living with disabilities (especially if they are African American and/or Black); Immigrants (both documented and undocumented, and especially if they are Black or brown) -- will disproportionately bear the brunt of negative impacts.

Many corporations and philanthropic communities are either preemptively scaling back or ending the inclusion efforts that they expressed undying commitment to not even a year before.  Others are pondering how they can move forward with inclusion efforts in a way that mitigates risks to their business revenues and/or corporate/organizational brands.

This is the landscape which individuals and employees from historically marginalized groups are negotiating: dealing with heightened daily levels of uncertainty; feeling a lack of (physical) safety; processing the emotional fallout of a racialized vote in which a majority of white voters voted for a candidate with a history of white nationalist rhetoric and policies, while a majority of every other racial group of voters voted for a candidate emphasizing inclusion.

What Bruce Lee’s commitment to a mixed martial arts philosophy offers Organizational Development practice in this time is a focus and flexibility for moving through and forward even as we face the uncertainty of the moments surely to come.

The focus and flexibility of his philosophical martial arts discipline translates to our “now.”

As Bruce Lee said, “Defeat is not defeat unless accepted as a reality in your mind.”

Below are quotes from Bruce Lee’s martial arts philosophy that can help us remember our reality: the reality that we have been striving to create and the reality that will ultimately survive even this present moment:

“Be like water making its way through cracks. Do not be assertive, but adjust to the object, and you shall find a way around or through it. If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves.”

As organizations, it is tempting to think about retreat.  We do not want to raise “red flags” or to put organizational funding at risk. We may ponder changing “DEI” wording in proposals or in personnel manuals; changing insurance policies in ways that exclude LGBTQIA couples or trans employees; retreating from “accommodations” that open the door to recruiting and maintaining workforce talent living with disabilities. Each organization will need to decide whether they will capitulate to this moment, or whether they will “be like water” . . .finding their way around obstacles and retaining their Values.

“The great mistake is to anticipate the outcome of the engagement; you ought not to be thinking of whether it ends in victory or defeat. Let nature take its course, and your tools will strike at the right moment.” In the moments to come, the question is not “victory” or “defeat” but VALUES. Will our organizations hold to the values they profess to believe and by which they profess to practice, or will they pre-emptively acquiesce? Will their inclusion “values” only last as long as conditions are comfortable and risk-free? As Martin Luther King Jr. shared, “…the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” As nature takes its course and this regressive cycle passes, what will your organization be able to say about its adherence to its stated values? What will you be able to say about your adherence to your values? Those are the “outcomes” that matter most, and the promise that we will be able to bring into the new cycle.

“Adapt what is useful, reject what is useless, and add what is specifically your own.” Each of us is differently positioned in this society.  Each of us has a different level of power, a different level of risk that we are willing to assume.  How will you use your Bruce Lee moment in your areas of influence – family. . .community. . .faith-based institutions. . .workplaces?  How will our institutions – including our workplaces – support each of us as we all process through and decide upon collective and/or individual action? A reality is that we will not all come through this together, or even in the same societal positionings where we now find ourselves.  What we all share, however, is that after these moments pass, and “the arc” rights itself toward justice, we will have to look in the mirror every day and face the choices that we have made. There will be no running from those.

“Choose the positive. You have a choice; you are master of your attitude..Optimism is a faith that leads to success.” Discouragement is a choice. As hard as the current and upcoming moments may be, there is work to be done in our organizations. That work should not be left on the shoulders of those who will be most directly and negatively impacted. Employees who were most at risk before January 20th are at an even greater societal and institutional risk now. Instead of pulling back, our institutions must forge forward, despite what seems to be the “reality” of this current moment.

How each of us as individuals, and collectively within our institutions, live this Bruce Lee Moment will define us all -- for generations.

  Bruce Lee said, “The successful warrior is the average [person], with laser-like focus.”

“Average” people will be the ones who ultimately ensure that society once again “bends toward justice.” 

The tools that we have are the ones taken from the philosophy of Jeet Kune Do.  As Bruce Lee said “Do not be tense, just be ready, not thinking but not dreaming, not being set but being flexible.  It is being ‘wholly’ and quietly alive, aware and alert, ready for whatever may come.’ 

This is our Bruce Lee Moment.

And with focus, flexibility  – and hope – we can surely rise to meet it.

all photos from rarehistoricalphotos.com