What is JKD?

[sweeper]

Question to someone knowledgeable in JKD:

when someone asks you "what is Jeet Kune do" how do you answer? I practice it but it's hard to explain what is and isn't JKD.. Is there realy any deffinition?

To add to this, JKD includes aspects of other arts, so say you like to throw in a bit more kali or silat into your fighting style.. where would JKD stat/stop, or would it?

 

[arnisador]

Interesting question. My instructor often refers to a technique as a Muay Thai round kick, a savate side kick, a Wing Chun trap, a kali destruction...it's easy to wonder where the JKD is! Speaking as a JKD beginner, it seems to me that it's in the strategy that these specific techniques are placed and used in, for the most part, and maybe in a few techniques as well (straight blast, stop-hit, and the emphasis on HKE). I'd be curious to hear other answers as well.

 

[sweeper]

if that is true than it seems like you could apply JKD to any combat situation given a base of techniques, I don't think that is nessisaraly true..

 

[bscastro]

A few thoughts:

1. From another beginner's standpoint, JKD is more than the techniques that comprise the "system." It is about the training I think. My instructor often stressed the importance of "aliveness" in our training. I think in a way, JKD can be "applied" to many, but the same techniques can also be NOT JKD. For example, if you walk through a drill such as hubbud, and you're talking about the kids, or what you're going to watch on television, you are NOT doing JKD at the moment. However, if you are focused on your task, and (depending on skill level) try to challenge yourself and your partner, and try to be in the moment, at that point you are doing JKD. Many JKD instructors take aspects from different martial arts, but I think the key is how these aspects are trained. 2. With this in mind, I think JKD doesn't start and stop with what techniques your are doing, but how it is trained. However, I think there is also a focus on practicality and efficiency in JKD. For example, Paul Vunak wrote in one of his books, "JKD is the jab that lands before it is seen." My instructor uses elements of boxing and Thai boxing, but he adapts it for combat. Therefore, some of the techniques, such as the Thai switch round kick, we use but we shorten the switch as much as possible for the most power. Also, we modify our boxing covers to account for the fact that we don't have a boxing glove on, etc.
3. JKD is about the process as well as the system. When you are training, I think it is that you are doing JKD as opposed to knowing JKD. Bruce Lee spoke a lot about self-expression. To fully express oneself, one must be fully in the moment. It was humorous one day when I was sparring with my instructor. I was trying too hard to get in a certain technique, or to do a certain stop kick which I was waiting for a certain entry. After the round, my instructor told me to "Just be. Let it come out." After that, I was surprised as the same technique I was trying to do came out much more easily as well as several others, and I wasn't able to pull of a stop kick, but other defenses/counterattacks I had trained more heavily were coming out more successfully. I was--to some extent--just "being" and therefore I was more relaxed and let my training come out. My mind was more alert as I was not "looking" for a specific thing.

Anyways, just some thoughts on what I would say...by the time I was done, I'm sure the person asking would be done listening!

 

[YODA]

Good answer bcastro

JKD is about process, method - about how, when & why rather than what.

 

[sweeper]

yeah, I kind of think JKD is a mentality, hitting your opponant before their attack hits you and training for speed and efficience.

 

[IFAJKD]

bscastro:
What a terrific explination of JKD. Really. Too often people describe JKD in terms of what it isn't. Classical, forms, absense katas, yada, yada, yada. It seems that JKD is not found in the sum of its techniques but in the totality of it's application to what is useful to you according to your personal and developed attributes. In other words, It is in the application of the concepts of JKD that allows you to look at other systems and styles and utilize what is effective in them. It isn't lumping one technique from here and another from there, But rather, training in a way that flows from system to system and technique to technique and range to range. If this "flow" is present, what you see is rather unspecified and unidentifiable. Within these concepts exist the "Jun Fan" cirriculum. these are the basics that Bruce taught (some call it original JKD) The danger is in thinking that Jun Fan or JKD ends with these techniques. It does not. It expands constantly to address the threats that exists today.
In this way I personally look at JKD as a journey and the systems that I currently teach and train in as the vehicles I use on this journey.

 

[Cthulhu]

Personally, I look at JKD as evolution. For someone with a 'classical' martial arts background, this is easy to see, but it applies to others who've trained nothing but JKD, or other, less formalized arts.

It's evolving from the techniques, forms, and drills. Subtle changes, omissions, and additions that make your JKD your JKD.

Cthulhu
1am and not thinking coherently.

 

[Kirk]

I heard someone in my school say "JKD isn't a style, it's a
philosophy. The style, is called Jun Fan". My understanding is
that Bruce first taught Jun Fan, which is the style he fought the
experienced master with (Wing Chun, Jun Fan .. same thing?),
which gave him the inspiration to develop JKD. Your thoughts?

 

[Cthulhu]

Jun Fan is JKD but JKD isn't Jun Fan.

Jun Fan is the system Lee developed using his (incomplete) knowledge of Wing Chun and stuff from other systems. Essentially, he used stuff from other martial arts systems (Western and Asian) to supplement or change what he thought were weak areas of Wing Chun. I've also heard Jun Fan described not as a concrete system (i.e., Jun Fan Gung Fu), but simply as the gung fu taught by Lee Jun Fan. Kind of the same thing, really.

So, Jun Fan is JKD in that it can have the JKD 'concepts' or 'philosophies' applied to it, just like any other system. So, TKD could be JKD and karate could be JKD. JKD is not Jun Fan in that, since JKD is not a 'style' or 'system' per se, saying JKD is Jun Fan would limit JKD by trying to define it as any one thing. However, most people do seem to teach Jun Fan gung fu/kickboxing as a base for teaching JKD.

Cthulhu
it's early and I'm babbling.

 

[Magua]

jkd as bruce lee intended it to be in my opinion is not a style..it's more of a term he used to bring across a point..the point that we all must do everything possible to become the best without being restricted to one style or mindset by insisting one is better than another..
all styles have positives and negatives..keeping this in mind will help us all to expand our capabilities and learn more than we imagined we could

 

[bscastro]

Originally posted by Magua

jkd as bruce lee intended it to be in my opinion is not a style..it's more of a term he used to bring across a point..the point that we all must do everything possible to become the best without being restricted to one style or mindset by insisting one is better than another..
all styles have positives and negatives..keeping this in mind will help us all to expand our capabilities and learn more than we imagined we could

Well put. Also, I wanted to add that JKD is about a person expressing themselves--their strengths, weaknesses, body type, etc.--and using these attributes and qualities to become the best they can be. It is not about turning a person into a "JKD" man or for example, a "Kali" or "Karate" man (or woman).

Bryan

 

[Magua]

nicely put friend..there are few who understand the original idea of this art as well as most others..it is most inspiring to see one who does

 

[MartialArtist]

JKD is all arts, and is no art.

Now, in JKD, there are few necessary techniques you do learn like the finger jab and such, regardless of your "own" JKD. But JKD is your own. All JKD practitioners learn certain techniques. But they form the little branches that makes it their own.

 

[7starmantis]

Originally posted by Magua

nicely put friend..there are few who understand the original idea of this art as well as most others..it is most inspiring to see one who does

Here Here :asian: :asian:

It is VERY inspiring to see on ewho does!!!


7sm

 

[Samurai]

I think JKD can be expressed as the art of

1.) Developing the Tools
2.) Refining the Tools
3.) Dissolving the Tools

Whatever that "TOOL" is or were it comes from is not the point.
THanks
Jeremy Bays

 

[sweeper]

maybe, but it's mor than that, there are principles for developing them and sharpening them.

 

[IMAA]

Lets examine this from a finer point:

JEET KUNE DO : "way of the intercepting fist"

TO INTERCEPT one must learn some of the finer points of what Sigung Lee was adding.

Take the 5 ways of attack:
PIA
HIA
ABD
ABC
SDA

With these you get things that intercept Biujee, jeettek's, paksau

are these techniques or tools? I think thier both. Do all systems have them? For the most part yes. Can they be adapted in any martial art? YES!

Can you do a PakSau in Karate against back fist? yes!
So Jun Fan Jeet Kune Do vs. JKD Concepts all your looking at is the name behind it, yet at the same time we're all looking at a total picture. YOU and your opponent. EXPRESS yourself with expression by martial art but yet, rather express yourself by using one of the 5 ways of attack. AT that time you just used JKD no matter what system you just used.....In Karate, TKD, KungFU, Boxing, JuJutsu, Kali, Etc..... the 5 ways of attack are there, in JKD thier just labled and you can pick them out easier. Once you place a tag/label on something you've just created a system whether or not you wanted to. So is JKD a system?
Thanks

CORY

 

[IFAJKD]

Actually, although the 5 ways of attack are universal, they do not exist as a part, labled or not, of every system. And No you cannot pak sao a backfist, not a good one and thei is not what trapping is about. Try to pak a jab, You really have to train trapping to see for yourself where it fits in. try it for instance of a blast and then you will see where trapping fits into the picture. Trapping a punch was never what was intended. a punch is thrown and retracted. no way to trap. Vunak( perhaps the mosy prolific trapper around, will also tell you you cannot trap a punch, not a good one) If you have ever applied such pressure that your opponent does not turn and duck, can't really swing back but only can bring up his hands for guard/protection.......that is where you trap. just wanted to add here.

 

[ace]

The Art & fighting Method of Bruce Lee!
Taken From his Books.


:boxing: