Stupid Seventy

I am about to hit a glass ceiling at Jiu-Jitsu.

The belt system is quite demanding enough, and glacially slow. Getting a Blue Belt, which is the first awarded rank, takes typically one year. Each of the 3 other coloured belts (Purple, Brown, Black) is earned after progressing through 5 levels (zero through 4 stripes).

Perfect attendance would make the entire road from Blue to Black take ten years.

The road is never that smooth. I am hopefully approaching a Purple Belt, and that one alone will have taken me 3 years and 8 months. At that rate, my entire road to Black would take 11 years instead of 10.

Long enough, but nothing compared to what I am actually anticipating.

Students can only be promoted as high as one level below their instructor. I am currently close enough to Shawn that this presents a problem.

He is living in Mexico for more than the next year. Can't see the Gracies promoting him within that time. They only award instructor rank in person. After his Mexico time, he plans to return here late next winter. If he then travels to train with the Gracies at the very next instructor session, it will not occur until the following summer.

If he cannot go, or if they do not promote him, it will add another 6 months.

Instead of my next promotion after a Purple Belt coming 8 months later, it will likely take from a year-and-a-half to two years.

They also seem to award instructor rank at a pace 50% slower than students can earn. That would mean that I will also be progressing in rank at the same slow rate.

I will have trained for 3 years and 8 months to get Purple, which will be followed by about 5.5 years getting to Brown, and then 5 years to Black Belt. That's a total time of over 14 years.

The theoretical, fastest path would have me reaching Black Belt by age 66.

A prediction based on my actual speed of progress so far would see me getting there by 67.

My fastest actual, glass-ceiling arrival at Black Belt cannot occur until I am over 70.

Why does this matter?

If I were 30 years younger, it wouldn't. A Black Belt at 36, or 37, or 40 isn't all that different.

I've had lots of injuries. One of my knee wounds looked to be potentially Jiu-Jitsu ending, but it wasn't. The older I get, the more banged up I'll be, and the mending will be slower.

People in my age group get hurt doing chores, or lifting groceries. My wife had to give up the violin as it was too hard on her neck.

Jiu-Jitsu is a whole different magnitude of risk. Big, strong people try to choke me, or to rip off my legs, or arms, and to crush me will all of their weight. All the while, I wrench my neck out of their grasp, or whip my arms away, or explode from beneath and contest for the top position. It's remarkable I survive at all.

So to get a Black Belt all I have to do is to keep doing this for year after year, without injury.

It would be much nicer if I only had to do it until age 66, instead of 70.