友よ水になれ tomo yo mizu ni nare Be Water My Friend

Bruce Lee's line: empty your mind, be formless, shapeless, like water, which becomes the cup it is poured into and can flow or can crash. In Japanese the friend is addressed first and the command comes last, become water, the order the language likes and the order the line wants; there is no Japanese rendering of it in print, so this one is the house's own. A person who chooses it may mean the fighter's adaptability, the mind that keeps no fixed shape, or one friend's advice to another, and which is yours.

We want you to be as happy with the meaning as you are with Master Takase's art. To learn more, visit Philology of 友よ水になれ.

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