The Karate Kid’s Mr. Miyagi is one of the most iconic senseis in the history of martial arts cinema, not only for his prowess as a karate master, but for the invaluable life lessons he imparts to his students. Many of Mr. Miyagi’s best quotes are more than just things for Daniel LaRusso to take on board for his character growth in theKarate Kidmovies. They’re principles by which we can all live, treat one another, and relate to the world around us.
Miyagi draws on ancient Chinese philosophy to counsel LaRusso, and later Louisa Pierce, about how to approach life as well as how to practise karate. Primarily,his beliefs are grounded in Confucian and Taoist teachings, as well as the form of karate practised on the island of Okinawa before World War Two. They’re underpinned by a set of seemingly eternal truths about nature, personal well-being, and individual morality that are just as useful to our lives today, and toDaniel LaRusso’s own karate dojo students inCobra Kai, as they would have been to Miyagi himself growing up in Okinawa.
10"Karate Is For Defense Only."
Cobra Kai Season 2, Episode 1
Although this quote is only directly attributed to Mr. Miyagi by Daniel LaRusso when he’s showing students around hisMiyagi-Do karate school inCobra Kai, it’s a key tenet of Miyagi’s own teachings from the very beginning of theKarate Kidfranchise. When Mr. Miyagi takes Daniel on a fishing trip in the firstKarate Kidmovie, it’s made clear to the teenager that learning karate is completely different from learning how to fight.
As a martial art,karate can be about defending yourself when strictly necessary, not taking the fight to someone in an act of unprovoked aggression. This perspective entails living as peacefully as possible with a fundamental sense of respect for others. It’s reflected in the way Miyagi teaches Daniel LaRusso karate moves, which focuses on defending against and countering attacks rather than the merciless violenceKarate Kidvillain John Kreeseteaches his students to enact.
9"Man Who Work For Passion Always Richer Than Man Who Work For Money."
Cobra Kai Season 3, Episode 3
Another Mr. Miyagi quote introduced by Daniel LaRusso inCobra Kai, this time in a discussion with his wife at their car dealership, this mantra expresses a sentiment we can all get behind, in theory. It’s not quite as powerful as Miyagi’s other famous advice about following your passion, but it stillreflects the impact he had on LaRusso’s future, as he always encouraged him to indulge his passion for cars.
We see Mr. Miyagi himself taking the time to enjoy multiple passions, from the Japanese art of bonsai to fishing.
Meanwhile, in theKarate Kidmovies, we see Mr. Miyagi himself taking the time to enjoy multiple passions, from the Japanese art of bonsai to fishing. While Miyagi often emphasized the need for self-discipline,he certainly wasn’t a stoic, and placed great importance on living a happy and fulfilling life, as this quote demonstrates.
8"Win, Lose, No Matter."
The Karate Kid
This sentiment may often run counter to the plot ofKarate Kidmovies andCobra Kaiepisodes, but it underscores the real purpose of karate for Mr. Miyagi. Martial arts may have become competitive sports in their own right, but for the people of Okinawa, karate was simply a traditional form of self-defense passed down through the generations.
Miyagi says these words to Daniel LaRusso moments after his apparent defeat inThe Karate Kid, and explains thatDaniel has proven his own courage and strength to himself, so he has no need to fight on. Of course, what happens next in the movie directly contradicts Mr. Miyagi’s words, but they remain a wise way of handling both triumph and adversary in life with a sense of perspective.
InCobra Kaiseason 6, Mr. Miyagi’s ghost returns to Daniel in a dream, reminding him of this quote. This happens just as Daniel feels that his dojo team competing at the Sekai Taikai tournament is a lost cause.
7"Man Who Catch Fly With Chopsticks Accomplish Anything."
Mr. Miyagi might be a master of karate and a model for living in harmony with the world around him, but one thing he can’t seem to do inThe Karate Kidis catch a fly with chopsticks. When Daniel LaRusso first arrives to train with him, he shares this quote with him, as if to tell him it’s a virtually impossible act. YetDaniel catches the fly with chopsticks almost as soon as he tries it, implying that he has a great future in store as a karate student.
Theending scene ofCobra Kaiis a touching callback to this moment, as the middle-aged Daniel LaRusso reattempts the trick during lunch with Johnny Lawrence at a Japanese restaurant. When Lawrence returns from the bathroom, he promptly steals LaRusso’s thunder by squashing the fly between his hands, telling him, “No mercy.”
6"A Person With No Forgiveness In Heart Living Even Worse Punishment Than Death."
The Karate Kid II
This quote comes moments after Mr. Miyagi subdues Cobra Kai sensei John Kreese in humiliating fashion after stopping him from beating up his student, Lawrence, in the parking lot after a tournament.LaRusso asks Miyagi why he didn’t kill Kreese, and these words were the sensei’s response.
They’re the perfect illustration ofMr. Miyagi’s merciful attitude to others– even those who see him as their worst enemies. It’s a sentiment which contrasts starkly with the “No mercy” mantra that Kreese himself drills into his students. Daniel LaRusso later echoes Miyagi’s words to his own students inCobra Kai, when he tells them, “If you have hate in your heart, then you have already lost.”
5"Why Train? So I Won’t Have To Fight."
Here, Mr. Miyagi exemplifies his keen understanding of Taoist philosophy, which is founded onthe principle of unifying opposites. In fact, the second part of this quote fromThe Karate Kidis actually spoken by Daniel LaRusso, but it’s Mr. Miyagi’s line of questioning that extracts the answer from him.
The question and answer may at first seem completely contradictory, as surely LaRusso is training in karate specifically to fight. Yet the whole basis for Taoism is mutual contradiction, which in turn creates a coherent whole. It’sto avoid getting into a fight that LaRusso is learning the self-defense methodsof karate. It’s precisely when he’s prepared to defend himself by nullifying his potential opponent, with the minimum of violence exchanged between them, that a brutal confrontation can be avoided.
This is a principle reiterated time and again by Daniel LaRusso inCobra Kaias he trains his students in Miyagi-Do karate. It’s also one that’s directly subverted by John Kreese during the All-Valley Tournament at the end ofCobra Kaiseason 4, when he encourages Robby to beat his own Cobra Kai teammate by asking him, “Are you fighting your friend, or your opponent?”
4"Choose Own Way Grow Because Root Strong."
The Karate Kid Part III
The Karate Kid Part IIIdigs a little deeper into Mr. Miyagi’s love of bonsai, as the sensei uses the philosophy behind this botanical art form as an analogy for personal growth and development in people. “Bonsai choose own way grow,” he explains to Daniel LaRusso, “because root strong.” Similarly, Miyagi expects LaRusso to find his own way as a karate master, forging his own path with his sensei’s teachings simply forming the roots of his technique.
A flashback to this quote in the thirdKarate Kidmovie in the 10th episode ofCobra Kaiseason 4 makes LaRusso realize where he’s gone wrong with his own teachings, by obsessively trying to adhere to what Mr. Miyagi himself would have done. It’s the message withinMiyagi’s bonsai analogy that allows LaRusso to accept Johnny Lawrence’s teaching methodsas a valid alternative to his own. This message applies to all of us, more broadly, since we’re all able to pursue life in our own different ways, as long as we have a solid foundation to base ourselves on.
These wise words from Mr. Miyagi make us empathize withJohnny Lawrence inThe Karate Kid, since this wayward and aggressive young man is ultimately the victim of his villainous sensei, John Kreese. As Daniel LaRusso puts it to Lawrence’s son, Robby, inCobra Kai’s season 1 finale, “Your dad had the worst teacher there ever was.” Kreese later quotes Miyagi’s words back at LaRusso to taunt him about his teaching ability.
There are plenty of real-life examples to apply this quote to, beyond the realms of the dojo and the classroom.
In addition, there are plenty of real-life examples to apply this quote to, beyond the realms of the dojo and the classroom. On a basic level,Mr. Miyagi is saying that people are a product of the environment they grow up in. If that environment is bad for them, they can’t be held solely responsible for their bad behavior.
2"Never Put Passion Before Principle."
Daniel LaRusso’s failure to listen to this quote comes back to bite him repeatedly in theKarate Kidfranchise. But it’s LaRusso’s use of the quote in confronting Robby about his betrayal ofMiyagi-Do inCobra Kaiseason 4that is most affecting.
Mr. Miyagi originally says this line to Daniel LaRusso inThe Karate Kid Part II, in the context of his own love for Yukie, the woman he left behind in Okinawa.
As Miyagi adds cryptically, by abandoning your principles, “Even if you win, you lose.” What may be won in the short term by taking shortcuts to success will invariably hurt those taking them in the long run, becausein pursuit of quick gains, they often lose what they had to begin with. It’s our principles that define us and make us who we are, so if we no longer have them, we’re not the same people who started out following our passions in the first place.
1"Whole Life Have A Balance."
Balance is something Mr. Miyagi discusses throughout theKarate Kidfranchise, which is key to his life philosophy. He stresses to Daniel LaRusso that he must learn to balance his body to maximize the power with which he executes karate moves, just as he must maintain physical, mental, and emotional balance to live his best life.
A moving moment in the fifth episode ofCobra Kaiseason 1, in which LaRusso visits Mr. Miyagi’s grave, induces a flashback to a scene inThe Karate Kidwhere Miyagi gifts Daniel a car for his 18th birthday. It’s in this scene that Miyagi makes clear that the importance of balance applies to every facet of life, not simply karate. Indeed, it’s Miyagi’s own role in Daniel’s life that provides him with the balance he’d been lacking, as the sensei doubles up as LaRusso’s father substitute, role model, and mentor through one of the toughest phases of his life.
The Karate Kid is an action/martial arts drama franchise created by Robert Mark Kamen and began with the first self-titled film released in 1984. The series focuses on teenagers who are unable to fit in with their new surroundings as they deal with persistent bullies until a retired martial arts master finds them and trains them to defend themselves.
