General Lumpishness

I like Christmas as much as the next guy, but it sure looked to be a horror show for my training.

What with all the visiting, and being visited, and travel, and travel back, and academy closure, and Vancouver academy closure, it was pretty severe.

Part of the good news was that of the 100 classes needed to qualify for promotion, I had 81 in the can before the festivities started.

It looked as if there could be as many as 20 days without even a single second of mat time. In a similar non-holiday period of training, there would normally be 15 advanced classes. I prepared myself for there to be none at all.

The first break came when both my home academy and the one in North Vancouver announced that a normal schedule classes would start after only 19 days instead of 20. That meant that with a bit of ferry and bus travel, I would get to 2 classes instead of the much less satisfactory number of zero.

Then Marc later decided to have North Vancouver classes resuming almost a week earlier than that. This was nice, but didn’t immediately make a difference, as we might still be in the thick of family festivities.

A couple of days ago, this changed a tad as some of our scheduling shifted. It could very easily and happily shift back, but it might just get me 2 more classes.

Instead of zero classes, I might get to as many as 4. Instead of my total sticking at 81 until well into January, it could just creep up to 85. For somebody who likes to get the attendance goal done as quickly as practical, that tiny difference is nice.

A very good aspect of all this relaxation is how much my body is managing to shake off my collection of little injuries. My back was wonked back before the shutdown, and working out was slowing its recovery. It feels as right as rain now, or possibly snow. I also have an arm injury that is absolutely loving the time off. It improves with every day that passes.

I have also enjoyed a fair amount of sitting about with family, including watching a nephew kill strangers from around the world on his xBox.

The only negative is a general feeling of lumpishness. A run up and around the university was considered, but then put off until just perhaps possibly tomorrow; or not.

Hurts

I would say there are five levels of physical condition when training in Jiu-Jitsu. I don't mean ability, or fitness or anything like that. There are five levels of injury or illness.

The best category to be in is when nothing is wrong at all. In this state, a student can train fully and can happily roll without any concerns. This is the state that we all like to be in. It's actually rarer than you'd think.

When things are a bit rougher, you fall into the category where you need to take more than normal care. Something has been injured, and is in danger of re-injury and could therefore become worse. This is annoying. Training when youu are like this is usually not a problem, but rolling should be modified. I can't tell you how many times I've rolled with some little thing hurt that I've brushed aside. Almost always, it gets yanked on, or crushed, or something happens to make the injury worse.

Arm or shoulder hurt, but you think you can still roll? Go ahead, but tuck that arm into your belt and DO NOT USE IT FOR ANYTHING. If your partner starts to grab at it, tap immediately.

I've found that the very best thing to to is to only roll with your absolutely most trusted partners, and only after letting them know the situation. Most will be happy to help. I could roll for hours with Tawha, or Tobias, or Elizabeth, or Rob, or a few others, and never feel in the slightest danger, and it would be just as fun as any rolling out there.

The next level is when you've managed to get yourself a real injury. The question should be, “can I at least do the lesson?” If so, go right ahead, hopefully with a trusted partner that you've spoken to ahead of time. Any use of the injury should be minimized and modified, and there should be NO ROLLING AT ALL. You need to heal, and you'd better let your body get on with it.

Level four is when you can't train at all. The injury is just too much, or perhaps you are out due to a cold or some other such contagious thing. Mustn't make the others sick.

If this is how you are, you should ask yourself the question; “would it be better to stay home and watch TV, or to do Jiu-Jitsu, and watch the lesson.”

I am not claiming that viewing from the sidelines is anything like being part of the group and actually training, but it is a lot more educational than not being present at all. This presupposes that sitting on the sideline would not be a physical problem in itself. You should not be present if you might be about to barf, or if your back can't handle sitting for very long. Would watching be worth the effort and time invested? Your instructor certainly won't be expecting you to be there, and might even think you're weird for showing up.

The crappiest level is when you are too damaged to even handle sitting and watching, or just too full of bacteria and germs. Stay home, or in the hospital, and do so without guilt. If you shouldn't be in class, then don't be. Be content in that you are doing the appropriate thing, even if it sucks.

At various times, I've been at every one of these levels. I've stayed home, and watched from the spectator seats, and trained without any rolling, sometimes had to roll with care, and even sometimes been fine-and-dandy. It seems that my usual state is somewhere between no-rolling, and rolling-with-care, with occasional forays into fine-and-dandy.

The other thing that it takes a long time to really accept is that it is better to err on the side of caution. If you don't then best you can expect is that you will be making your healing take longer than it should. Think about how bad the worst oucome could be. Just what condition could your kimura-injured arm end up in, or your knee that doesn't want to bend, or your cranked neck? A bad outcome might not merely mean an extended period of healing, but rather to permanent damage.

Don't take unnecessary risks. It is far better to miss a few rolls, or a few classes, rather than to risk your health and perhaps have a shortened Jiu-Jitsu career, which would mean thousands of classes and rolls that you will then never experience.

Dance? Fight?

There are a lot of analogies thrown out in relation to Jiu-Jitsu.

Some are trying to illustrate a point, such as one I recently heard that Jiu-Jitsu is like baking.

If you are making cookies, you can’t force things. You can’t use muscle to make the recipe better. You have to put in the appropriate amount of each ingredient. The baking itself will take time, and you shouldn’t try and rush it. You can’t decide that you want it to happen twice as fast, so you crank it up from 300 degrees up to 600, and expect things to work out.

A fun picture to ponder.

Sometimes an analogy is trying to illustrate things by finding similarities between activities, and extrapolate others. I find this type to be more enlightening.

I have my own take on the sometimes stated comparison between Jiu-Jitsu and dance. Just what similarities are there, really.

I contend that Jiu-Jitsu shares many characteristics with ballroom dance in particular.

Just how can you be a great dance partner? Do you force your partner around? If you do, then you are a truly horrible dancer. Nobody watching will want to dance like you do.

Do you decide to move whenever you want, or should you follow the rhythm that you are being presented with? If they are playing a waltz, and you insist on doing a cha-cha, you will not look good. If you do try and follow the music, and you insist on missing the timing, your dance will be absurd.

Let’s say you like to dance by picking up small partners, and physically moving them around, pushing them and sometimes just lifting them about. Perhaps you can have some ugly form of “success” with that, but what happens when you end up with a partner as large as yourself, or even bigger. Maybe they won’t like being pushed, and you might just pop out a hernia attempting to hoist them into the air.

If your dancing won’t work with every size of partner, there is something seriously wrong with it.

There is another cool secret about the ballroom/Jiu-Jitsu comparison.

The lead in dance is normally a male partner. They get to spend the entire time deciding what moves the couple will perform, and when, and where they will go, and who gets to walk backwards or forwards. That is not what a Jiu-Jitsu person should be doing.

Let’s say you want to get an arm bar to submit your opponent, his hands are not in an ideal location for you to get that move, so you struggle and strain to try and get everything to where you want it. Of course, he is resisting what you are up to, making you work even harder, but you want that arm bar and keep working. You get so focused that you missed about a million other things that presented themselves during all that effort and struggle.

The follower in ball room is usually a woman. She doesn’t get to decide on what happens in the dance at all. She has to sense her partner’s intentions, and conform to them totally. Her partner is supposed to give clear indicators, but even if he doesn’t she has to move as if he has.

We’ve been dancing for a lot longer than I’ve been doing Jiu-Jitsu, and I still have no idea how my wife does it. I pick the moves, and do my best to give her the correct signals, but it doesn’t seem to matter; she is always there...in front of me...flawlessly. She even lets her mind wander while doing this magic trick, and sometimes asks me what type of dance we’re doing, as she is perfectly performing it.

In Jiu-Jitsu, one should strive to be like the following partner in dance. You should be not the one who decides how your partner will be submitted; they are.

If they present a kimura, do that. If it’s an arm bar, fine. Collar choke, triangle, leg lock; if they present it, you will take it. Instead of picking something, and trying to make that happen, you respond, as if following in a waltz. You suspect an arm bar, and move appropriately, they counter, and rather than wasting effort to try and force things you switch to what they are currently presenting. Not only are you more likely to succeed, but will do so with far less effort and energy consumption.

If you want to see all of this executed perfectly, watch the fights of Royce Gracie in UFC 1 through UFC 4.

You will see the smallest competitor burning his way through the events doing exactly what I’ve just described, at least in the first two events. In UFC 1 there were 8 competitors, and in UFC 2 there were 16, and nobody could handle Royce Gracie.

In UFC 3, there was again a field of 8 fighters, but Royce only fought once. His opponent was bigger and stronger and fought like a crazy man. Royce broke all the rules about energy conservation and tried to take his opponent out early by forcing the action. Eventually, he caught him, but not before he totally exhausted himself. He won the match, but was unable to continue in the tournament.

Returning in UFC 4, Royce fought as a perfect Jiu-Jitsu student once more. Again there were 8 competitors. In the final match, Royce faced wrestler Dan Severn. Royce weight about 175 pounds, while Severn was up around 250. Almost immediately Royce was on his back, with Severn wrapped up in his guard. For almost 16 minutes, that’s where it stayed. Severn drove is crushing weight down on the smaller man, apparently in total control. If Royce had tried to get out from under, he would have failed, and would have exhausted himself. He held on, struggling under that power, waiting for Severn to decide how he wanted to lose. Suddenly, it was there, and Royce shot in a triangle, forcing Severn to tap out, or to pass out.

In those 4 events, Royce won every match when he moved like a female ballroom dancer, and had to retire after the single match when he dared to take the lead.

Yet another reason to want to fight like a girl. All you have to be able to do is to dance like one, too.