Accelerate

Had a hell of a nice day today.

I've been trying to get motivated to take on extra work in my Jiu-Jitsu training. It's hard to do. The goals are just so very, very far off. Accelerating just didn't seem to make a significant difference.

I thought a Purple Belt would be almost 8 years away, a Brown 16, and a Black Belt 24 years in the future. At that rate, I couldn't see me ever getting a Brown or Black Belt, and even Purple was darn far away.

Tonight the instructor explained to me how the ranks actually work. Each fifth level is review, and need not take much time at all. Let's say they only take two months.

This changes the timeline to; Purple in 6 and a half years; Brown in 13; Black in 20.

If I accelerate my training, I think I can shave this, too; Purple in 4 and a half years; Brown in 9 and a half; Black Belt in 13. Suddenly, a Purple Belt is virtually staring me in the eye. Brown and Black are still well over the horizon, but the changes are huge.

I am pumped, and want to start extra training immediately.

　

Ambitious?

A tiny milestone tonight. It's the last class of my first Blue Belt chapter at Jiu-Jitsu. I have completed roughly one seventh of the material I need to work through before I move up to the next level.

It's a long road.

This chapter took all of September, October, and November. The next will occupy December, January and February. I'll be retired before I complete the third.

Next year at this time I'll be working on chapter six, with only number seven left to do.

Somewhere towards the end I want to spend a month training at the Gracie Academy in LA. If I haven't finished my level and earned the first stripe for my Blue Belt, I'll be training in LA on the same material I will have been working on for a year and a half. If I manage to get my stripe before we go, my California month will be spent working on my upcoming level.

I would much rather work ahead, rather than working back.

To do that, I will need to finish my stripe material and exam before Christmas of 2013. That will be hard. That's about exactly a year from, well, now.

If everything runs smoothly until then I will still have a chapter and a half to go. Can I complete a chapter and a half ahead of schedule? That is a pretty daunting task.

Can I teach myself one extra technique and all of its variations each month? Maybe. I could do a private lesson on the technique, and then drill it afterwards on my own.

I wonder if any of the other Blue Belts would like to join me on this quest. That could work really well.

This all assumes no interruption in training. Getting sick, or hurt, or any changes in the class schedule would certainly throw a monkey wrench into everything.

Once I retire, I can find extra training time, but I'm not there yet.

Maybe I should run this all by the Instructor. It can't be done without his help and support.

If I go for it, I'd like to do one a month until I retire and then two per month thereafter until it's done. This would get me done a little early. This would be good in case of unforeseens.

I must be nuts.

　

Time

Three weeks and two days until Christmas vacation, not that I'm counting.

For me it's always been the longest haul of the year. It doesn't matter exactly when the holiday starts, I manage to just barely crawl over the line and collapse.

Somehow this year it doesn't feel like that. Maybe it's still too early to tell.

After school starts up again in January, there are traditionally no days off until Spring Break. Keep in mind that I don't consider teacher proD days to be days off. We still go to work. Sometimes the days are quite delightful, and other times I'd rather be at the dentist.

Spring Break is a week in my district, but many have two. This year the Easter 4 day weekend falls one week later. May holds Victoria Day, and June is the end of the year.

There is a new holiday in BC, introduced by a government desperate to buy votes. February 11th will be "Family Day".

This is what the rest of my final teaching year looks like, assuming I make it all the way until June. I could leave any time.

Clearly, I'll make it to Christmas. I'll even return all rejuvenated and perky in the new year. This never lasts long, but should get me to the end of January. This would be a good spot to bow out, as it is the halfway mark in the year, the end of second term, and the end of the first semester.

It will, however, still be all dark and cold and dreary. I'd be quitting my job in order to spend time trapped indoors, or be outdoors and shivering. I really doubt I'll want to go then.

The next logical exit time would be Spring Break, which is the third week in March. This is tempting, but if I come back afterwards I'll get paid for the week off. Must take everything into consideration.

This would effectively leave the months of April, May and June.

The hours of daylight will be long, and the weather will be nice. I'll be doing a lot of window gazing, assuming I don't retire.

I only have so many Springs left. Do I want to spend another one in a classroom? We'll see.

The longer I stay, the more I'll earn and the better my pension will be. However, by this logic, I should stay 8 more years until age 65. At some point I will pull the plug, and I will do it this year.

I'd call it either the end of the year, or maybe sometime in the last few months.

I've known people who hold their career as their central focus and identity. They often shrivel away after retiring.

I've also known many who retire into a new era of contentment and self-improvement. They seem to fluff up, and their pre-retirement wrinkles largely relax away.

I can't wait to get started.

　

　

Nice Drive

Today I was really impressed at Jiu-Jitsu. All the usual hard work was happening but there were a couple of surprises.

I was really impressed with Amelia and Juan. She is rapidly approaching her Blue Belt exam, and Juan is super keen to progress. Both are pushing hard towards their goals.

Juan has asked me to help him progress through his White Belt stuff. We did this on Friday, but he's doing even more. He got the Chief Instructor to give him a real private lesson. It is nice to be an adult and be able to spend a few bucks doing this. Last year I did over a dozen private classes with Stirling. They were huge in my progress.

Anyhow, last week Juan completed two regular combatives classes out of the 69 needed to qualify for testing. He then did an extra one with me, and still another one with the Chief Instructor. If he can keep this up he'll be advancing twice as fast as anybody else.

Amelia impressed in another way. She grabbed Madeline to help her. The rest of the White Belts were working away on a single technique. Amelia and her Blue Belt worked their way through the material Amelia needs to brush up on for her coming exam. They didn't waste a single second.

Nice drive.

Repeat

Most people are content to let progress in martial arts just happen. They take the training as it comes, and do the test when the instructor says it's time. It is a perfectly fine way to progress, kinda like the seasons.

Others look ahead, and try to achieve their next level as soon as they can. They understand that missed classes can cause significant delay, and do what they can to maintain near-perfect attendance.

The only way they can improve upon this is to take private lessons.

Our instructor is the best one to approach for this. However, he already has a full-time job, a family, and teaches up to five hours per day. He can only do so much.

When I was a White Belt, I got Stirling to teach me privately. He's the only one certified to give full private lessons besides the main instructor. Unfortunately, he's moving to Australia soon. I'm gonna miss him.

This leaves all the other Blue Belts. We cannot give full, private lessons. This means we cannot teach any class that a student hasn't experienced at least once, but we can do subsequent repetitions. Each class must be repeated three times in order for a White belt to qualify to test. We can run them through their second or third repetitions.

I've done this a couple of times. I don't mind at all, but it does cut into my own training at the Friday open-mat sessions.

I've figured out a solution. I've stopped going to Saturday open-mat as I find that so few people show up I can't get motivated to work hard.

If anybody asks me to help them repeat lessons, I'll suggest Saturday. I'd train them for half the time, which is enough for them to get credit, and then make them help me with my Blue Belt stuff. I can always use a victim....I mean partner.

Don't know why I didn't think of this sooner.

　

　

LA?

This is my last year of teaching. It isn't for my wife, but she is planning to match me for a while by taking a year off.

Sometime in that year off together, I'm hoping to spend a month in Los Angeles. Helen seems to be on board with the idea.

The question arises; how much Jiu-Jitsu training can I do in a month?

I could attend over forty classes, and as many private lessons as I care to pay for. How much progress can I make with all that opportunity?

Let's say we wait until the weather at home gets nasty, and go after Christmas for the month of January. I will have only one chapter of my Jiu-Jitsu level left to complete before my exam. At home this would take me until April. Can I expect to accelerate this? You would think so.

There are 11 techniques in that chapter. At home, each takes three classes to complete. No way to predict how many of the Los Angeles classes will be addressing those 11 techniques. To be safe, I'd best be ready to take enough private lessons to cover each of these at least once.

My math skill says 3 private classes a week would guarantee coverage. Easy peezie.

So back home all Hollywood and Disneyfied after January is over, and ready to test. That would be February instead of April. A month in Los Angeles will move my exam up by two months. Cool.

So what do I get besides a couple of months earlier promotion? I will have trained under and with world class martial artists. This is an entirely different kettle of fish. It will deepen my understanding in a fundamental way.

And it will be fun.

　

Dropping Saturday

I've stopped going to the open-mat session on Saturday. I make every other class in the week; all seven of them.

Why do I miss Saturdays? It's only an hour long, and requires an hour of driving to get there and back. The main reason is that nobody else goes either.

Not exactly true. Cosme shows up. He has the key and usually works on his Hapkido. He's often the only person there besides me. Now, I guess, he's sometimes the only one there.

My feeling is that if I'm going to be there alone, or almost, it isn't worthwhile.

If somebody wanted to work out with me and asked, I'd meet them there. Nobody has.

Another reason that I'm not going is that I don't need another hour to work on my own technique. I'm pretty happy with where I am right now.

We've been working on the Mount chapter since the start of September. There have been 27 classes dedicated to learning the techniques followed by 9 classes of review. We have an extra 3 review classes left before we move on to the next chapter.

I've also done 16 open-mat sessions where I've worked at review on my own. I'll continue doing open mat on Fridays to continue this.

I think I'm good.

If I hear that Saturdays have gotten popular, I'll be there in a shot.

　

　

　

14 Months

It's weird how things go.

I started out in Karate about a million years ago. Becoming a teacher of any kind was the farthest thing from my mind.

I started in September. A little over a year later, in November, I was asked to take over half of the teaching at the club. Asked is not exactly the right word. When your Sensei asks you to do something, you really can't say no.

But that's all ancient history.

In September of 2011 I started training in Jiu-Jitsu. I had no interest in becoming an instructor. I already teach Karate, and am a high-school teacher. I was enjoying simply being a student.

It is now November, a little over a year later. I've been asked by one of the White Belts to give him some private lessons. As I'm always around, our instructor has suggested to several people that I might help them that way.

I attend all the Blue Belt classes, and none of the others do. As a result, I help them learn the techniques that they've missed.

14 months after starting Shotokan I was teaching it. I find myself teaching Gracie Jiu-Jitsu in a tiny way 14 months after starting.

Maybe I should start another martial art next September, just to see if 14 months later I end up teaching it.

Maybe I should look for other patterns and hope they hold up. It might work if I twist things a bit.

I got my Karate Blue Belt 18 months after starting. 18 months after starting Jiu-Jitsu I'll be wearing a Blue Belt, even though I earned it 9 months in, and will still be wearing it years from now.

I got my Karate Purple Belt 21 months in. If I could get a Jiu-Jitsu Purple after 21 months I would be stunned, as would everybody else.

Got to Brown after about 2.5 years. A Jiu-Jitsu Brown Belt in a similar time would be unbelievable.

Black? That took a hair over 4 years. Surely I can get a Jiu-Jitsu Black on a similar timeline.

Stop laughing.

Maybe I just leave things at the 14 month teaching coincidence.

Time

One of the guys at Jiu-Jitsu is really keen. He wants to get to his Blue Belt test as soon as possible. This is pretty much what I was doing at this time last year.

He is now currently 6 months away from his goal.

To speed this up he asked me if I'd give him private lessons every Friday. I am allowed to do this for White Belts.

This would move his goal closer by about two months.

I don't really want to commit to this, but said I'd be willing to do it every second Friday. I want to keep the other open sessions for working on my own stuff. This would make his test be about 5 months away.

A private lesson takes about half an hour, so it's not an onerous commitment on my part. He offered to pay me, which I declined.

If somebody were really, really keen they might be able to talk several of the Blue Belts into helping them out.

There is enough open-mat time at the academy to crank out 3 private lessons. If my friend could arrange this, he could be all done in 2.5 months.

I wish such an option were possible for the Blue Belts.

My next test is 17 months off. If I could take bonus classes at the same ratio it would knock off almost a year.

Not possible, of course.

I resent every delay in my own progress. There are 60 items on my next test. Each of them takes a full week to learn and drill. I thought that would mean a bit over a year to complete. Wrong. It is longer than that.

Between each of the 7 chapters, there are three or four weeks of review. I admit review is necessary, but hate that it takes so many weeks. I review on my own like crazy, but most don't. We are currently in week three of a four-week review. We start new material again on December 4th, and will crank out three more techniques before Christmas.

That will put me at 12 competed out of the goal total of 60.

We had a Blue Belt meeting last night. Everybody that could come, did. Looking around I was jealous. They are all much less than half my age. If they dawdle along, they can still eventually progress. Every one of them can someday be a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Black Belt.

I cannot dawdle. If I progress as fast as is theoretically possible, I would reach Black Belt by the age of 80. Somewhere between now and then my rate of progress will slow significantly. A single old-guy injury could end my training altogether. A Brown Belt would put me ONLY into my 70s. Realistically, I cannot expect to reach this level either.

Purple? My early 60s. That’s realistic.

In any case, I have limited time to get as far as possible. Each Belt or added stripe is a victory.

I really understand my White Belt's drive to move on quickly through private lessons.

　

Responsibility

I'm declaring it official. Our Blue Belt class has gotten tiny. At Tuesday's class there were 3 of us, Wednesday just one, and Thursday there were 2.

That is an average of 2 per night.

In any learning endeavour it is important to take responsibility for your own progress.

I attend every class. My peers are averaging about 50%. I attend most open-mat sessions. They rarely come to that at all.

They trust the instructor to present the material to them in the best way possible. I do, too, but understand that I have to do extra to solidify his teaching. If you are studying algebra, you can't just work in class time but also need to do some homework.

Since September we've worked on the first chapter of the curriculum. There have been 9 items, all with about 3 or 4 variations. That adds up to over 27 separate techniques. Each of these has probably half a dozen separate points to remember. Let's call it 150 things to learn.

I know I can't learn all this in the time allotted. I can't afford to miss classes, and need to do extra study.

I want each chapter solidly in my data bank before we move on to the next. I want to be ready to test in a year and a half when I get done with chapter seven.

Would you decide to learn a musical instrument, and then only attend half of your lessons, and not practise at home? I doubt it.

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

Rare

Another weird Jiu-Jitsu night. For the second time in a row I was the demonstration dummy. That's the guy that the instructor uses to demonstrate the technique. I was the only Blue Belt guy there tonight.

When the White Belts went home there was almost nobody left for the advanced class. It was just the instructor and me.

It was really a private lesson. I can't complain about that.

The question is, "where were the other Blue Belts?"

One is out of town right now, and another is off with a nasty work-related injury. Of the others I have no clue.

Last night there were three Blue Belt students there, and tonight just me. That's pretty low turnout both nights. I wonder if it will go that way again tomorrow. I sure hope not. We need a healthy group.

A healthy advanced group means a source of assistant teachers. It also means smoother progress for the members within the advanced group itself.

People also become friends over time. Sometimes they just vanish. It happens a lot in martial arts, but it isn't ever good.

Demo-boy

Yesterday was interesting. I had a dentist appointment, and so was running a little late. It could have been a car day, but I decided that if I were a few minutes late for the White Belt class it wasn't the end of the world. After the dentist, I rode home on the bike.

Grabbed a bite. No panic if I should be a few minutes late for the White Belt class. Packed my gym bag. No need to rush.

Drove half an hour to the gym. No panic.

Still managed to get there a moment or two before the 5:30 start time and headed to the changeroom.

The mat was packed. Just about every White Belts was present.

So I was changing, and Sterling exploded in saying the class couldn't start until I was on the mat, and then he vanished again. Strange, but I hurried.

Was he kidding? Why would they need me?

Class started and it was instantly clear. The instructor was away and Sterling was teaching the class. He needed somebody to demonstrate on. There was only one other Blue Belt there. Madeline is often used as the demo partner, but she wouldn't be a good choice with Sterling teaching.

He is about twice her size, and it would just look bizarre for Sterling to demonstrate defending himself against such a tiny attacker. He did use her for a demo where she didn't portray an evil attacker, but wanted me for the much better size match.

Sterling taught a fine class, and I didn’t screw up at all.

Funny that it was the first time ever that I didn’t arrive plenty early. Strange that Stirling should be teaching on exactly that night, and that none of the other large Blue Belts were present.

I’ve been used in demos a few times, but this night I was used more than all those other times combined.

　

　

　

Split-Levels

It is very hard to teach martial arts well.

Image a group of students. Typically, each is at a different level, and requires different instruction to prepare them for their next exam.

In Karate there are 9 levels below Black Belt, but even that is an illusion. Two new Green Belts are pretty equal, but if one is not new, but rather about to test for Blue they are not.

It's actually easier to teach a room full of beginners than it is to teach a room full of different levels. One can't even modify the curriculum to make things easier. The exam requirements are incredibly specific, and the tests come about every three months.

Our Jiu-Jitsu instructor has an even nastier problem. The White Belt class functions beautifully. The techniques come like clockwork and everybody is about the same.

In the Blue Belt class he has two groups of students. The first is a bunch of rookies, and the other is working on the next level up. Each evening he has to teach totally different and very complicated material to each bunch within a one-hour class.

What makes it even harder is he is teaching himself the higher level techniques as he goes. It's all new to him.

I have no idea how he does it.

Some nights I'm the only low-level Blue there. When that happens he focuses on the higher stuff. I'm happy enough to join in when I can, and review my own stuff when I can't.

So far it's all working. The goal would be for the current low Blues to be ready to test for their first stripe in a year and a half, and that the higher group of Blues to test for their second stripe.

A complication is that the lower group will be getting occasional additions as White Belts earn Blue Belts.

If it all works, things will get even harder. There will be the lower Blues, a new crop of Blue-with-one-stripe, and a top group of Blue-with-two-stripes starting the three-stripe material.

I wonder how they do it at the Headquarters school. There the advanced class could potentially contain five levels of Blue Belts, with five levels of Purple Belts, alongside five levels of Brown. They, at least, have several instructors to call on.

　

30 Days is Easy

I've stolen an idea at work. There is a TED thing by a guy called Matt Cutts. He has filled his life with 30 day challenges.

They are something done every day for a month. Some examples are; take a photo, walk to work, draw daily, eat a new food each day....and almost anything else.

The idea is that it is enough time to give each thing a fair shake, but short enough that they can be completed.

I've did this with my kids last year and it was a huge success. There is a ton of enthusiasm in this year's group, too.

I do one alongside the kids in support. Don't know what I'll do this year.

I think this is a great idea, and not just for kids. It seems to have done wonders for Matt Cutts.

I've met tons of people who praise me for riding my bike to work. They should try it for a month. Some think it's cool that I run in the summer. They should try running for a month, or even going for long walks.

You have no idea how many people have told me that they've always wanted to try martial arts. They haven't.

It's like anything else. It all seems too big and intimidating. Does trying something for 30 days seem as bad?

Matt Cutts has done many, many challenges. Most ended on day 30, but a number have become part of his life.

I'd like to get into photography, and get back into fine art. I could use daily practise on my advanced Katas. I should dress better.

How about stopping something negative in your life? Could you do that for a month? Drop certain foods, or smoking, or drinking. It's only 30 days. Maybe it could stick, too. Why not try being a vegetarian?

Introverted? For a month go up to somebody and ask them how their weekend was. Last year one girl did this. It scared her, but she learned the knack in no time.

One picky eater managed to eat a new food every day. A lot of them she hated, and most of the rest she didn't mind but wouldn't try again. She found about a dozen she actually liked. She no longer resists trying new things.

The big surprise last year was the number of kids that came up and asked if they were allowed to do more than one.

That doesn't usually happen with homework.

　

　

Keep Calm and Carry On

This fine sushi restaurant is packed. I've stopped on my way home to pick up some treats.

 

I've just come from open mat time. I was drilling myself on the Blue Belt mount techniques. I like to go over things many times. Tobias was there, and asked for a hand with some of his material. By my showing him and doing the drills for a half hour or so he gets credit for a class he is missing.

 

We did that, and then rolled for maybe ten minutes. By the end he was bright pink. All White Belts find it had to relax and conserve energy. He noticed, and said, "You don't look tired at all."

 

It's funny to have to work at relaxing, but it's true.

 

 

Necks and Wings

My stupid cold cost me a week of Jiu-Jitsu training, but I was back at it tonight.

Somehow I'm going to have to do some work on my own to make up the gap. I can do that, as long as I don't miss any bigger chunks of training.

Tonight we were working on a thing called an arm triangle. It's a nasty method of choking somebody. It turns out there is something about me that makes me very, very hard to choke this way. It was a real problem. We all worked away to find out what was going wrong. My neck meant that we had to figure out a more perfect way to do it. Once we found it, everybody learned the better method. We all got better because of my tricky neck. That was cool.

When I got home, things managed to get even better. Helen had made me a big heap of barbecued chicken wings. I was expecting to have to cook them myself, and I was really too tired to want to do that. She saved me, and they are so delicious.

Chokes, a tricky neck, and chicken wings.

A good evening indeed.

Cam

The closer I get to retirement, the more creative I am feeling. Likely this is caused by my anticipation of time to do creative things.

Anyhow, I like making slightly unusual videos. Time-lapse stuff is really fun.

I also have a camera that can strap onto bikes, or cars, or the human body and can take a fair amount of abuse. It is called a Gopro.

I've made some bike and car videos, but want to do something more original.

I'm going to strap the camera to either my chest or head, and wear it to Jiu-Jitsu. Just what does it look like to roll around? I wish I knew. Only a small part of the sensory input used is visual. The camera records only the visual.

There might be nothing worth seeing from so close up. It would have to be worn a number of times before anything interesting ends up getting captured.

Of course, the instructor might not like the idea. Things like this are his call.

Playing with a chest cam could be nasty. A lot of the time it will end up between the two competitors, being ground into each with intense pressure. The cam itself is a small, hard, rectangular device. I don't think it could injure anybody, but it will be uncomfortable.

A little editing, and then off it goes to Youtube.

　

Sicko

It's been a lousy martial arts week for me. I usually go to Jiu-Jitsu five times and teach Karate twice.

Monday evening I could feel a cold coming on, but didn't let that interfere with Karate. Sometimes colds are nothing.

Waking up Tuesday I knew it was going to be nasty. Dragged myself through the workday, but knew I shouldn't train. It's the night when the techniques for the week are demonstrated and explained. I went in civies, sat in a chair, and watched. Not as good as doing it, but much better than nothing.

Wednesday and Thursday I was home from work, and stayed away from Jiu-Jitsu, too.

Friday? Back at work, but I shouldn't have been. Stayed home from training.

Tomorrow, I won't be at Jiu-Jitsu. Can't miss Karate as I'm the instructor, but that's easy. It isn't draining like training is.

So, I'll have made it to both Karate classes, but will have not trained at all in Jiu-Jitsu. I watched once.

I wonder if I've made progress. Don't answer. It's rhetorical.