72 Priceless Miyamoto Musashi Quotes To Awaken The Soul

Miyamoto Musashi was one of the most infamous swordsmans, writers, philosophers and rōnin in Japan. As the son of a farmer, he soon found himself more capable in the art of noble swordsmanship.

With 66 duels, he learned much about strategy and being adaptive on the battlefront. It’s his philosophy that today drives many from the western worlds for a daily dose of influence.

We hope these quotes by Miyamoto Musashi can inspire you to look beyond your own perception.

1. The ultimate aim of martial arts is not having to use them.

Miyamoto Musashi

2. If you do not control the enemy, the enemy will control you.

Miyamoto Musashi

3. Know your enemy, know his sword.

Miyamoto Musashi

4. Think lightly of yourself and deeply of the world.

Miyamoto Musashi

5. Under the sword lifted high, There is hell making you tremble. But go ahead, And you have the land of bliss.

Miyamoto Musashi

6. To become the enemy, see yourself as the enemy of the enemy.

Miyamoto Musashi

7. You must understand that there is more than one path to the top of the mountain.

Miyamoto Musashi

8. When you decide to attack, keep calm and dash in quickly, forestalling the enemy…attack with a feeling of constantly crushing the enemy, from first to last.

Miyamoto Musashi

9. You can only fight the way you practice.

Miyamoto Musashi

10. When you attack the enemy, your spirit must go to the extent of pulling the stakes out of a wall and using them as spears and halberds.

Miyamoto Musashi

11. If you wish to control others you must first control yourself.

Miyamoto Musashi

12. It is difficult to realize the true Way just through sword-fencing. Know the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things.

Miyamoto Musashi

13. Perceive that which cannot be seen with the eye.

Miyamoto Musashi

14. Nobody is strong and nobody is weak if he conceives of the body, from the head to the sole of the foot, as a unity in which a living mind circulates everywhere equally.

Miyamoto Musashi

15. Today is victory over yourself of yesterday; tomorrow is your victory over lesser men.

Miyamoto Musashi

16. No man is invincible, and therefore no man can fully understand that which would make him invincible.

Miyamoto Musashi

17. It is difficult to understand the universe if you only study one planet.

Miyamoto Musashi

18. I dreamt of worldly success once.

Miyamoto Musashi

19. Do not regret what you have done.

Miyamoto Musashi

20. Polish your wisdom: learn public justice, distinguish between good and evil, study the ways of different arts one by one.

Miyamoto Musashi

21. In battle, if you you make your opponent flinch, you have already won.

Miyamoto Musashi

22. When in a fight to the death, one wants to employ all one’s weapons to the utmost. I must say that to die with one’s sword still sheathed is most regrettable.

Miyamoto Musashi

23. Get beyond love and grief: exist for the good of Man.

Miyamoto Musashi

24. Though you give up your life, do not give up your honor.

Miyamoto Musashi

25. It is said the warrior’s is the twofold Way of pen and sword, and he should have a taste for both Ways. Even if a man has no natural ability he can be a warrior by sticking assiduously to both divisions of the Way.

Miyamoto Musashi

26. Step by step walk the thousand-mile road.

Miyamoto Musashi

27. All man are the same except for their belief in their own selves, regardless of what others may think of them.

Miyamoto Musashi

28. Both in fighting and in everyday life you should be determined though calm. Meet the situation without tenseness yet not recklessly, your spirit settled yet unbiased. Even when your spirit is calm do not let your body relax, and when your body is relaxed do not let your spirit slacken. Do not let your spirit be influenced by your body, or your body be influenced by your spirit.

Miyamoto Musashi

29. If you know the way broadly you will see it in everything.

Miyamoto Musashi

30. Never stray from the Way.

Miyamoto Musashi

31. The true science of martial arts means practicing them in such a way that they will be useful at any time, and to teach them in such a way that they will be useful in all things.

Miyamoto Musashi

32. Develop intuitive judgement and understanding for everything.

Miyamoto Musashi

33. You may abandon your own body but you must preserve your honour.

Miyamoto Musashi

34. Why would you want to appear as one thing and be another? If you are a warrior then you are a warrior and if you are not a warrior then you are not a warrior. The Way of the warrior is the Way of the warrior. To be a warrior, look like a warrior and stand like a warrior. Do not be false to yourself.

Miyamoto Musashi

35. Do not sleep under a roof. Carry no money or food. Go alone to places frightening to the common brand of men. Become a criminal of purpose. Be put in jail, and extricate yourself by your own wisdom.

Miyamoto Musashi

36. Whatever the Way, the master of strategy does not appear fast.

Miyamoto Musashi

37. Respect Buddha and the gods without counting on their help.

Miyamoto Musashi

38. Do nothing which is of no use.

Miyamoto Musashi

39. What I call the void is where nothing exists. It is about things outside man’s knowledge. Of course the void does not exist. By knowing what exist, you can know that which does not exist. That is the void.

Miyamoto Musashi

40. The important thing in strategy is to suppress the enemy’s useful actions but allow his useless actions.

Miyamoto Musashi

41. A man cannot understand the art he is studying if he only looks for the end result without taking the time to delve deeply into the reasoning of the study.

Miyamoto Musashi

42. To know ten thousand things, know one well.

Miyamoto Musashi

43. In the strategy of my school, keep your body and mind straight and make your opponent go through contortions and twist about. The essence is to defeat him in the moment when, in his mind, he is pivoting and twisting. You should examine this well.

Miyamoto Musashi

44. Perception is strong and sight weak. In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things.

Miyamoto Musashi

45. In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things.

Miyamoto Musashi

46. You should not have any special fondness for a particular weapon, or anything else, for that matter. Too much is the same as not enough. Without imitating anyone else, you should have as much weaponry as suits you.

Miyamoto Musashi

47. You win battles with the timing in the Void born of the timing of cunning by knowing the enemies’ timing, and thus using a timing which the enemy does not expect.

Miyamoto Musashi

48. When your opponent is hurrying recklessly, you must act contrarily and keep calm. You must not be influenced by the opponent.

Miyamoto Musashi

49. Do not let yourself be guided by the feeling of lust or love.

Miyamoto Musashi

50. The only reason a warrior is alive is to fight, and the only reason a warrior fights is to win.

Miyamoto Musashi

51. If a man chooses a certain Way and seems to have no particular talent for this Way, he can still become a master if he so chooses. By keeping at a particular form of study a man can attain perfection either in this life or the next (if a next life is believed in).

Miyamoto Musashi

52. Become acquainted with every art.

Miyamoto Musashi

53. It is said the warrior’s is the twofold Way of pen and sword, and he should have a taste for both Ways.

Miyamoto Musashi

54. This is a truth: when you sacrifice your life, you must make fullest use of your weaponry. It is false not to do so, and to die with a weapon yet undrawn.

Miyamoto Musashi

55. In strategy it is necessary to treat training as part of normal life with your spirit unchanging.

Miyamoto Musashi

56. The important thing is to polish wisdom and the mind in great detail. If you sharpen wisdom, you will understand what is just and unjust in society and also the good and the evil of this world; then you will come to know all kinds of arts and you will tread different ways. In this manner, no one in this world will succeed in deceiving you. It is after this stage that you will arrive at the wisdom of strategy. The wisdom of strategy is entirely distinct. Even right in the middle of a battle where everything is in rapid movement, it is necessary to attain the most profound principle of strategy, which assures you an immovable mind. You must examine this well.

Miyamoto Musashi

57. The sword has to be more than a simple weapon; it has to be an answer to life’s questions.

Miyamoto Musashi

58. If you are not progressing along the true way, a slight twist in the mind can become a major twist. This must be pondered well.

Miyamoto Musashi

59. There is nothing outside of yourself that can ever enable you to get better, stronger, richer, quicker or smarter. Everything is within. Everything exists. Seek nothing outside of yourself.

Miyamoto Musashi

60. Respect the gods and Buddhas, but do not depend on them.

Miyamoto Musashi

61. A bullet from a gun does not make a distinction between practice and combat. You are training to be one and the same way in your life.

Miyamoto Musashi

62. It may seem difficult at first, but all things are difficult at first.

Miyamoto Musashi

63. Truth is not what you want it to be; it is what it is.And you must bend to its power or live a lie.

Miyamoto Musashi

64. If you master the principles of sword-fencing, when you freely beat one man, you beat any man in the world. The spirit of defeating a man is the same for ten million men.

Miyamoto Musashi

65. Perception is strong and sight weak. In strategy it is…

Miyamoto Musashi

66. There is even rhythm in being empty.

Miyamoto Musashi

67. A thousand days of training to develop, ten thousand days of training to polish. You must examine all this well.

Miyamoto Musashi

68. It is necessary to know ten thousand things by knowing one well. If you are to practice the way of strategy, nothing must escape your eyes.54 Reflect well on this.

Miyamoto Musashi

69. You should not have a favourite weapon. To become over-familiar with one weapon is as much a fault as not knowing it sufficiently well.

Miyamoto Musashi

70. Like a soldier, the carpenter sharpens his own tools. He carries his equipment in his tool box, and works under the direction of his foreman. He makes columns and girders with an axe, shapes floorboards and shelves with a plane, cuts fine openwork and bas reliefs accurately, giving as excellent a finish as his skill will allow. This is the craft of the carpenters. When the carpenter becomes skilled, he works efficiently and according to correct measures. When he has developed practical knowledge of all the skills of the craft, he can become a foreman himself.

Miyamoto Musashi

71. Generally speaking, the way of the warrior is resolute acceptance of death.

Miyamoto Musashi

72. Immature strategy is the cause of grief.

Miyamoto Musashi