I went to my first Brazilian jiu-jitsu class this past weekend. A Jocko Willink video finally convinced me to go.
I was both nervous and excited. I tagged along with a work friend who had been training jiu-jitsu for a couple of years (thanks Camilo!). I’ve seen how rough it can get so doing it with somebody I knew made it way more comfortable to go and try out.
It went a lot better than I thought – for reasons I will explain later on.
What is Brazilian jiu-jitsu?
For anybody who doesn’t know what it is, Brazilian jiu-jitsu is a form of martial arts that involves a lot of close contact wrestling. It focuses on timing and pressure. When I say timing, I mean knowing when to strike. When I say pressure, I mean using your own body weight and certain body positions to apply pressure to specific areas of the body.
The main principle and goal of jiu-jitsu is survival. So it’s more than just beating or submitting your opponent. It’s also knowing how to defend yourself.
I was pretty nervous going in
I was a lot more nervous than I was excited about trying out Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
I first heard about ‘jiu-jitsu’ back in 2018. My first roommate started taking a class. Now I say ‘jiu-jitsu’ generally because I didn’t know what type my roommate was doing. I didn’t think much of it because I was never into contact sports. I remember he came back one day with a bruised chest. When I saw how much pain he was in, I was like – “I ain’t ever gonna do jiu jitsu. That just looks painful.” I also bruise like a peach.
So what made me want to try it out? Well…I was listening to Jocko Willink on his take on what it means to develop “man-skills“. One of the things he recommended was to go and do jiu-jitsu because of the physical and mental benefits. One of the benefits he mentioned was that it teaches people how to be calm and collected.
After I heard that, I was like – I definitely need to learn how to be calm, collected, patient…any of those synonyms…especially when I’m under pressure. So I decided to give it a go.
It wasn’t as bad as I thought
It definitely was uncomfortable at first. Having my friend, who is at least 10 to 15 lbs heavier than I am, put a good amount of weight on one of my legs or try to contort me in ways I’ve never been before was definitely awkward and a bit painful. He was taking it easy on me as well, so I’m pretty sure things would’ve hurt more had he gone “all out”.
After about 15-20 minutes of being roughed around, the pain wasn’t as bad anymore. I sort of knew what to expect. It definitely was still uncomfortable, but I got used to being in the awkward positions. I forgot what moves I was taught, but I realized how insanely powerful I can be if I am in the right position to submit somebody, even if that person was like my friend, who was heavier and more muscular than I was.
After we went through the moves of the class, I sat out for the grappling – the teacher recommended that I just watch what people were doing.
I’m definitely going to do more jiu-jitsu
I can definitely see myself doing more jiu-jitsu in the future. Even though I only took one class, I can see the physical and mental benefits that Jocko was talking about.
From a physicality standpoint, there’s the agility, explosiveness, and persistence that you can develop in jiu-jitsu.
From a mentality standpoint, it’s developing really sharp awareness, a calm attitude, and presence under pressure. When I was watching the other students grapple, I didn’t see anybody go into panic mode when they were in a tight situation. I just saw people kind of work their situation out and break themselves out of the jam.
I also like the fact that there’s a lot of strategy involved in jiu-jitsu. I love strategy-based hobbies 🙂
I can also see jiu-jitsu being super helpful in dealing with pain. I was reminded of the fact that doing anything for the first time may hurt, but once you get used to the pain, it gets less scary to explore and try new things.
For anybody who has an interest in doing Brazilian jiu-jitsu, I’d definitely recommend trying it out!
