The Wisdom In "Kung Fu Panda" (2008)
Laughing All The Way To Peace, Harmony, and Focus
Image by L.E. Wilson from RedBubble based on Wikipedia licensing
The 2008 animated movie Kung Fu Panda opens with a funny turn of phrase delivered to even greater comedic effect by the great Jack Black,
Legend tells of a legendary warrior whose kung fu skills were the stuff of LEGEND!
In one instant the mood is set. This is going to be fun. In less than one minute, we’ve also already been exposed to beautiful animation and dazzling music. This is going to be good.
But when the movie ends, we also realize that we have just completed a journey where we were taken by the hand and shown the way to peace. Kung Fu Panda deftly reveals some deep truths about life and how to find harmony within it.
Kung Fu Panda (2008) is a humorous animated fantasy directed by Mark Osborne and John Stevenson about an unlikely hero, Po, a warrior panda voiced by Jack Black, who trains to become the legendary Dragon Warrior.
Life Lesson: Physical appearance does not determine ability.
🍿Movie Scene Link (movie quote)
The very first conversation in it, at around the 4 minute mark, deals with the unhappiness of confining expectations. It’s a trap. Po, the titular giant panda, hides his true passion, kung fu, in order to appease the dreams of his father, who wants him to take over the family business, just as he did from his father and his father did before him.
You are almost ready to be entrusted with the secret ingredient of my Secret Ingredient Soup. And then you will fulfill your destiny and take over the restaurant!
But obviously this is not the right path for Po, who must develop the courage to be honest with himself and his father so that he can focus on his destiny.
Life Lesson: To feel fulfilled and happy with your life,
pursue your dream, not someone else’s dream.
The second conversation, around the 7 minute mark, is one of the most profound and deals with the unhappiness of trying to control that which you cannot. Master Oogway, a Galapagos tortoise, tells Master Shifu, a red panda who is still struggling to find inner peace, that:
One often meets his destiny on the road he takes to avoid it
Life Lesson: You bring about what you focus on, whether good or bad.
What can we control? Perhaps nothing. Master Oogway gives this counsel,
Your mind is like this water, my friend. When it is agitated, it becomes difficult to see.
But if you allow it to settle, the answer becomes clear.
Life Lesson: Emotions cloud your judgment.
Wait until they pass to make decisions.
The next insight encompasses the whole story arc of Kung Fu Panda; it is a theme that is repeated a couple of times by different characters, and is one of the most empowering messages:
Life Lesson: Physical appearance does not determine ability.
Or, as Mantis, the smallest of the Furious Five puts it, “Who am I to judge a warrior based on his size? I mean, look at me.”
But it’s not just physical appearance. It’s identity. Po gives a touching speech when talking to Master Shifu about what it feels like to confuse the two:
I stayed because every time you threw a brick at my head or said I smelled, it hurt, but it could never hurt more than it did every day of my life just being me. I stayed because I thought, if anyone could change me, could make me, not me, it was you.
In his journey, Po learns that he can use food as a source of comfort, “I eat when I’m upset, ok?” but also as a source of limitless motivation, which allows him to reach new and unexpected heights, even as a fat panda.
Life Lesson: Find what naturally motivates you.
The third conversation, at about the 30 minute mark, touches on the unhappiness of worrying. Master Oogway tells Po,
You are too concerned with what was and what will be. There’s a saying, ‘Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the present.’
Life Lesson: “Do not use your energy to worry. Use your energy to believe, to create, to learn, to think, and to grow.” —Professor Richard Feynman
Later Master Oogway reiterates this message to Master Shifu by saying, “There is just news. There is no good or bad, ” which is a thesis that is further explored in the moviewise post, “There Is No Bad News; There Are Only Blessings In Disguise.”
But before we can reach the next level of enlightenment, we must truly embody and accept the one precept that Po already knows, “a real warrior never quits.”
Life Lesson: Don’t quit.
The fourth conversation, near the 43 minute mark, returns to an earlier lesson, one that bears repeating because it is a difficult truth to receive. We naturally feel compelled to rage against it because to accept it seems to diminish our importance, our significance. But this doesn’t have to be an eternal struggle, if we heed Master Oogway once again when he says,
Let go of the illusion of control.
“But how? How?” we plead alongside Master Shifu.
“You just need to believe,” is Oogway’s answer. You must believe. There’s nothing else.
By the end of the movie we learn the secret to limitless power, the secret to hearing a butterfly’s wing beat, seeing light in the deepest cave, and feeling the universe in motion around us.
It is nothing. It’s just you.
So say, “Skadoosh!” to all your troubles and fears. Let them go. Let them disappear.
And believe in yourself. To make something special, you just have to believe it’s special.
So, if you lived one thousand lifetimes, would the lessons found in Kung Fu Panda be something you’d master? Or is one lifetime enough?
Or is reading this one essay enough?
There was one other message that was repeated multiple times in this movie and bears consideration:
There are no accidents.
How did you get to be so lucky?
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Excerpt:
> I actually have found comfort in my personal life from thinking about that little passage...
This idea of finding comfort or guidance in movies is exactly how I feel, and it is what motivates me to catalogue the life lessons found in movies on "moviewise."
> Yeah I think mindfulness is not about ignoring your problems. It's more about not letting your mind wander unnecessarily.
Learning to focus is one of the hidden lessons in "Kung Fu Panda." Po's journey allows him to finally reveal to his father his true passion because he learns to focus on his own destiny rather than letting the pressures of the larger society, as represented by his father's expectations, control him.
> just pick something and go for it. Do it well - be excellent.
It's funny that another Jack Black movie, "The School of Rock" (2003), has a similar message: Do what you love because you love it. Even if you are not very good at it, you can find a way to fit it into your life. https://moviewise.wordpress.com/2013/03/05/the-school-of-roc...
Another movie that shows this lesson is the 2013 documentary "Salinger": Be driven by making your work great, not by the reactions of others. https://moviewise.wordpress.com/2015/08/03/salinger/
Which is influenced by Hinduism, "you should do your work as perfectly as you possibly can with no thought of rewards, and only that way can you be a really happy person.”
> The real depth, in anything insightful said, is created by the listener and how they choose to take the words to heart.
This is what life all is about.
> Slavoj Žižek's take on Kung Fu Panda
"The friend noticed there above the entrance to the house, a horseshoe, which I don't know how it is here. In Europe it is a superstitious item preventing evil spirits to enter the house. So the friend asked Niels Bohr, but what you mean aren't you a scientist? Do you believe in this? Niels Bohr says, of course, I'm not crazy, I don't. So the friend asked him, why do you have it there? You know what Neils Bohr answered? He said, of course I don't believe in it, but I have it there because I was told that it works even if you don't believe in it." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niels_Bohr
> The article explains why kung fu panda is a great movie by starting with a quote highlighting the pandas desire to break away from expectations to pursue his passion. By the end of the article, there’s a quote about illusion of control. It’s contradictory
I think the "desire to break away from expectations" and the "illusion of control" are not contradictory because they represent different struggles. The former is a struggle within, the latter is a struggle against the world. Understanding for yourself what you want to accept from the larger society, the expectations, is an inner struggle. Understanding that you have little control over that society, over life itself, is an outward struggle that doesn't have to consume you if you let go of the illusion of control.
The first one is about choosing what to focus on, the second one is about choosing to be at peace with that which you cannot control. These two work in tandem and are not contradictory.
> Oogway then responds with that line, which is basically saying no matter what he does, he's not going to prevent Tai Lung's escape.
This is the difference between fate and destiny. If what we do does not matter, then that is fate, which is very confining, like a prison where you are restricted from having any meaningful impact on your own life. If fate were true, we could all just sit in a room quietly, waiting for fate to intervene and lead us by the nose down a path we never expected.
But that doesn't sound like the life we experience. We do make choices, those choices have consequences, and our lives are different because of the paths we took. This is destiny, and it has to do with what we choose to focus on, good or bad. If you spend your time doing things that are healthy for you and others, you and those around you become healthier. If instead you choose to focus on potential catastrophes, then that is what you and those around you experience.
And this kind of focus will likely enable the catastrophe to materialize because part of you will be working to fulfill this negative expectation to justify all the life that was wasted in worrying about it.
I believe this is a tenet of Karma in Jainism: "There is no retribution, judgment or reward involved but a natural consequences of the choices in life made either knowingly or unknowingly."
"a good and virtuous life indicates a latent desire to experience good and virtuous themes of life. Therefore, such a person attracts karma that ensures that their future births will allow them to experience and manifest their virtues and good feelings unhindered" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reincarnation
And THIS was my all-time favorite from the entire film: You are too concerned with what was and what will be. There’s a saying, ‘Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the present.’