He often compared doing forms without an opponent to attempting to learn to swim on dry land.
Lee believed that real combat was alive and dynamic.
Circumstances in a fight change from millisecond to millisecond, and thus pre-arranged patterns and techniques are not adequate in dealing with such a changing situation.
As an anecdote to this thinking, Lee once wrote an epitaph which read: 'In memory of a once fluid man, crammed and distorted by the classical mess.
' The "classical mess" in this instance was what Lee thought of classical martial arts.
Bruce Lee's comments and methods were seen as controversial by many in his time, and still are today.
Many teachers from traditional schools disagreed with his opinions on these issues.
The notion of cross-training in Jeet Kune Do is similar to the practice of mixed martial arts (MMA).
Many consider Jeet Kune Do to be the precursor of MMA because of its syncretic nature.
This is particularly the case with respect to the JKD "Combat Ranges".
A JKD student is expected to learn various combat systems within each combat range, and thus to be effective in all of them.
