How to get started in BJJ

There comes a point in some individuals' 
lives where they decide that they want to study martial arts and a small percentage of those people who seek a discipline actually follow through with the interest of jiu jitsu. Their main problems are figuring out how to get in shape to start and what to do once they get 'in shape.' The ugly truth to this belief is that there isn't much training outside of jiu jitsu that will prepare you for what you will endure during a normal training session. A lot of the movements done during a live sparring round are completely unnatural to an untrained individual. To train in martial arts, but jiu jitsu specifically, one has to be in tune with their own body movements to successfully accomplish the full effect of the art.

Let's take a look on what a beginner should understand to start their journey into the exciting world of jiu jitsu.

First off, you’ll need a gym or school to learn from… Choosing a school can be a difficult decision when starting out. In this day and age, we are lucky enough to have the power of the internet at our fingertips. It's pretty easy to type in 'BJJ near *insert town/city name here*' and have a bunch of options come up. From there you can browse the websites and read reviews to help narrow down your decision. It's important to think about what the school offers in terms of styles of the martial arts, the times the classes are being taught, the distance from you, the pricing of a membership, and one of the biggest things that is hard to determine through the internet itself; the school's environment/culture.

To fully understand the vibe the school puts out, it's important to go into the school and get a tour. Try to stay for a class or two and watch how everything is run. How friendly is the staff? How do the students treat one another? Is it a clean establishment? What exactly you want to find out may vary, but it's important to ask any questions you have. If you don't like what the school has to offer, try a different one! Remember at this point you are a customer searching for the right home, so don't be afraid to keep searching for the right fit.

After you find a school, the journey begins simply by showing up. It's not necessary to worry too much about the shape you are in or having all the latest gear. Training yourself to be in the right shape for jiu jitsu is largely based on doing jiu jitsu. At the competition level or even to prevent certain injuries, it could be necessary to supplement with weight training. For the beginner who is just getting into the process, jiu jitsu as a whole is the way to go. The constant repetition of movements will strengthen your 'jiu jitsu muscles' and help you get into the shape required to roll.

Okay, so you really want to go try it out, but you cannot get over the going to a class thing... Fortunately, that's a good reason to reach out to the school/instructor that you are interested in learning from and asking about more information for jiu jitsu private lessons. Privates are a great way to have the focus all about you or a small group depending on the type of lesson provided. This can boost confidence to eventually come to a regular class by simply getting used to being on the mats and learning those fundamental principles. Asking a friend to come with you can also help ease the tension of the new experience.

Another difficult thing to realize is that your ego will test you from time to time, especially when first starting out. What I mean by this is that it is very common for a new student to have difficulty with a move or be overwhelmed by the detail necesary to perform a move effectively. This is normal. It's your job as a white belt in the art to learn the art through trial and error. Do not ever be afraid to fail because of the way that it makes you look or that the other new guy managed to learn it faster than you. None of that stuff matters. The focus of your learning should be based on solely yourself; try to become better than you were the previous day/month/year.

The bond of your team will be a family to help you achieve your goals. Improvements come by continuing to show up and have that white belt mindset. It's the view you have to be open to any and all opportunities to learn. No matter the color of somebody's belt, everyone has something you can learn from. Take the time to listen and practice and ask questions. Whenever you get self-doubt, remember why you started to begin with and think of how far you've already come. Each day you persevere through these challenges will make you that much stronger, and doing so creates a stronger connection to you and your team.

Fear of change is a problem in many people's lives, but adaptation is what leads to a great evolution in well-being. This is simply venturing outside your comfort zone to experience new things that can change your perspective for the better. If you can have an open mind and be willing to put in the effort to learn, you'll be well on your way to self-improvement in no time. It's never too late to make the decision to try something new, it just takes a little bit of courage to take the first step.

My Rambling Mind (Part 2)

With the lack of training as of late, I've had plenty of time to flex my mind in some interesting ways. The gears are always on the move and the ideas just seem to flow like a never-ending stream.

Staying in shape has been a prime focus with the lack of jiu jitsu. Over the past couple years I pretty much only trained jiu jitsu exclusively for physical activity. Once the school closed down for quarantine I was obviously limited to what I currently had for equipment, which began to spark a lot of different creative ways to stay motivated. 

Motivation to workout alone can be tough and that's where the goal setting came into play. I figure that if I could create challenges to accomplish over a set period of time, I would be more likely to stay on track. The focus was to do basic exercises/movements in high volume over the course of the day, multiple times a week to achieve a greater output. For example, I have a current goal of running at least a mile every day for a little over fifty days. Most days I run a little over a mile and some days it is well over.

The goal is designed to allow more work to be put in, but also has a set point to allow for days to have a manageable distance to avoid burnout. Some days I'll intensify the run with a weighted vest or an alternate route that has more incline and decline. What it all comes down to is to continue to force change to make the body adapt to the situation, similar to the environment on the mat.

I also had completed a MURPH workout recently and spend roughly six months preparing for it. Now the workout itself isn't overly complicated. It is a one mile run, one hundred pull ups, two hundred push ups, three hundred squats, and another mile run all in a twenty pound weighted vest. The vest definitely adds an interesting element of stress on not only the body, but also your willpower. I had no time limit set to actually complete the workout in other than I wanted it to be accomplished in general by the end of June 2020.

Now here's the beauty on setting these goes with an end date in mind, the mind can more easily visualize the goal being achieved. The more you believe in yourself accomplishing your goal, the easier it is follow through and achieve it. By increasing the sets and weight over the six months, not only did I complete the work out two months earlier than expected, I got more than just a single work out. The volume of preparation over those six months was clearly a far greater accomplishment than the goal itself.

Writing these blog posts for me is pretty important on personal growth and if anyone actually gets something out of them, that's just a double-win. When I reflect on the experience of the MURPH work out and the preparations involved, there is a clear correlation to the jiu jitsu world. The work put in along the way was far greater than the original goal. Think of it like this, if you have a goal to get your black belt some day, that thing you hear everyone and their brother say rings true. That statement, "It's not the destination, it's the journey." I gained far more results from the preparations opposed to that one work out that I wanted to accomplish.

It's similar to competing in a tournament. The people who work their butts off in the gym gain far more skill preparing for the event than they would if they just competed. But when you take out the goal of what you are training for out of the picture, the results seem to plateau. Simply put, I find that it's more difficult to improve when you are not working towards a specific goal.

I created several small goals to help me improve in weak areas of jiu jtsu and gave myself specific amounts for each one to accomplish in live rolling. This forced myself to aim for specific submissions, sweeps, escapes, or take downs even though I may have already had a different opportunity. By staying disciplined in this aspect, it was easier to begin to see different set ups and began to understand the move on a deeper level. This was the personal living proof of Jocko Willinks's quote, "Discipline equals freedom."

Lastly, it has been pretty important to stay involved in the learning and planning process. The countless instructional videos I have watched, and several articles and books that I have read are helping expand my mind in terms of jiu jitsu. I fear the idle mind. Naturally, if I'm not working to learn or improve, I have this dreaded feeling that my mind will simply dump any unused pieces of information. It's the use it or lose it mentality. With that being the case, it has been very important to keep the passion to learn alight.

I try to relate everything I learn and do to jiu jitsu. By making that reference, I believe it causes the ideas to imprint deeper into the normal though process. The more natural it becomes to think in terms of the fundamental concepts, the easier it is to function on and off the mat and maintain that composure necessary for high performance. It's a never ending process. The journey isn't just on the mats; just as much work needs to be put in off the mats as well, if not more.

It's easy to show up to class and practice the art, but it's harder to live your life by making choices that influence your goals in a positive way. Not just a positive way, but an exponentially positive way. You can't expect that you'll evolve on your own, you have to make that improvement a way of life.

I refuse to stop working hard, and I will accomplish my goals. It's just a matter of time. You can do it too. It just involves self-discipline and passion. Let's all grow together.