Mind Right Stories: My Love Story With Brazilian Jiujitsu

I'll never do that...

Tony, a good friend of mine, showed me a video of him in the gym class he was going to. It was some kind of foreign martial arts. All I could see was that he was getting beaten up in many different ways. He decided to demonstrate and trapped my head and shoulder between his legs. It might sound funny, but at the time, it was not funny for me!

I had two takeaways that day. That whatever thing he was doing was:

I said to myself: I’ll NEVER do that!

Years went by, and this strange fighting method didn’t cross my mind for even a second.

Until one day...

I went to a gathering my friend hosted. I met Andres there for the first time, and then my old friend, a tall, pale fellow named Max showed up as well. In our conversation, it turned out both they and another friend of mine somehow all went to this thing that was apparently from Brazil. I never quite caught the name that night. I thought to myself: ‘They are all pretty cool people and if they’re into the same thing, I should probably check it out! Plus, I might be having a crush on Andres.’

It was actually a very cool class!

I had no idea what I was doing, but I absolutely loved it. I found myself wanted to “fight” after class. Charlie, who was teaching that night, said the most important thing for me is to go back home in one piece and come back to fight another time.

I knew I loved it right then and there on that mat that regular Monday night. I believe this is what people mean when they say: “Love at first sight”.

But then I realized... ‘Wait, I think that might be the weird martial art thing Tony showed me a long time ago...’

Love Transcends

I’ve always believed that love is easy. I am not denying the work that comes with it; the easy part is choosing to do the hard work! I took Charlie’s advice and came back as a member just two days later, despite the fact that I had no answers to my concerns.

Moreover, I didn’t know how I could re-arrange my time. The gym is kind of far from where I live, and I was scared of possibly injuring myself. Still, even when faced with uncertainty, some decisions are just so easy to make.

I have a slight tendency toward traumatophobia, the fear of being injured. It started when I injured my lower back pretty badly in 2005 and couldn’t bear any weight for a few years and had to live with a 5-year-long chronic pain, day and night. If after countless treatments, one day, you had to get out of a car at the end of a road, walk through the mud to a village “doctor” in the middle of nowhere, pay hundreds for a few bags of mud to put on your lower back and not shower for days because you were so desperate, you could possibly develop traumatophobia as well.

Somehow, with Brazilian Jiujitsu (BJJ), I stood up to my phobia and struck a deal with myself: “Deal with it as they come!” I said to the mirror. I also believe that if you love something, you would choose to follow it no matter how busy you are. Love directs! Love also travels. I have to travel from Sanlitun to Dongdaqiao almost every day. And it’s okay! (If you know me, you’d know I arranged my life to work, play and sleep on my own block, for efficiency and commuting-stress management. So these daily commutes are kind of a big deal.)

Why？

Andres asked me one day: “Why do you love it?”

I probably said something along the line of “I love the fact that BJJ uses momentum, finds the path of least resistance, and takes an energy-saving approach to fighting. This is the same approach that I try to take towards life. It had to do with how cool BJJ moves look, and most importantly, how much respect I hold for the people that I met and train with. They are super cool, blah, blah, blah!”

My mind was trying to interpret the feelings I’d experienced. Does my brain always know what my heart desires? Not always. It tries to work backward and find out why. But in reality, that’s unnecessary.

I love BJJ because when I am on the mat, I am nowhere else.

When I am on the mat, voices of worry in life disappear and even the grand wishes for my future do not exist. I am in the state of “BEING!”

I feel at peace with myself and the world that I live in.

Rolling

So, it’s called Brazilian jiujitsu. It took me a week or two to pronounce it accurately. Imagine that I told people I train Brazilian Jijisu/jujiusu/jiujiuzu over dinners for half a month!

Most of all, I love the social jiujitsu part, where people just fight each other on the mat after class.

“What do you mean, social BJJ?”, a fellow club-member asked me when I mentioned it.

“Oh, you know, the part where you partner up socially after a class. Like on lindy hop nights, there’s usually a dance class. People stay and dance socially afterward. We call it social dance. So, I guess social BJJ”, I answered.

“Oh, you mean rolling, or sparring!” That’s the term used for BJJ.

“Rolling”, I replied, ‘yeah, I am feeling it’.

One World, One BJJ

Yes, it's true. I became a BJJ person!

For my most recent trip, I was in Mianyang (Sichuan) and Chongqing. I was so happy to see that my hometown offers BJJ classes. Since it’s a much smaller place than Beijing, one place was coached by a blue belt. Another place, interestingly, was coached by a – wait for it – orange belt! That's a whole story I'm preparing for a comedy open mic some time. I

had a great time in Chongqing, and was very impressed by how many clubs there are, how good the classes were, and how good people were with BJJ. I very much enjoyed that one class done in Sichuan dialect! I chatted with the owner afterward and he knew so much about BJJ and Beijing-based big shots. He started his BJJ journey in Beijing, and brought it back home in 2015, if I remember correctly. How wonderful it was to see how everything was connected and blooming.

My trips also brought me a great deal of appreciation for my gym, and I feel incredibly lucky to be trained by our amazing coaches, and roll with people who hold up the BJJ spirit and are also so multi-talented.

This is where I just want to sing: One world, one BJJ!

The issue with commitment

A few years ago, I was on a date with a guy that I matched with online. He’s a black belt in some other kind of martial art. I remember he paused after telling me about his black belt to wait for my reaction. However, I didn’t know anything about martial art at all and wasn’t even interested.

All I could say, in all honesty, was: “...hmm, okay.”

Now, after a few years, if you happen to be reading this, I wish I had said: “Oh wow, so what are you doing this weekend?!”

That’s so many years of hard work, dedication, passion and persistence. That is something I am drawn to!

My compass

Life gets busy sometimes, in a way that I sometimes feel that life is living me instead. Too many times, I've been in places where I struggle to find time for things or people that can recharge me. Not even long ago, there was a month that I stopping going to BJJ class, partly because of injuries, and partly because some elements of life became dominating and threw me off balance. I saw that coming though when I bit off more than I could chew. That’s a pattern that I had, and it’s really hard for me not to do that.

Luckily, last year, when I realized I could not make it to BJJ classes for a few weeks, I knew that I need to change things. I have been seeing a therapist, which also helped me to re-center myself. That was a close call for burnout. Now looking back, I am glad I could see the momentum of my motions, and how many times going to BJJ class became a sort of guiding compass for me. 

After all, that's what BJJ is all about: Keeping a strong base and refusing to be thrown off balance!

For now, I’m going to get ready for tonight’s BJJ class.