Change your Position
Ever been stuck in a bad position while you’re rolling? You know, the big strong guy who doesn’t use very much technique and when he gets you in side control he absolutely glues himself to you and holds you on the ground no matter the cost. Let’s say you get caught there early in the roll. You can have two perspectives on the situation.
1. Well this is just great and I guess this guy is just going to hold me here the entire time and I just have to sit and kind of struggle until I get out.
2. This is going to suck. This is going to be hard. It’s going to make me better.
Perspective 1:
Be weak and stay in that position and b#### at the guy during or after for not being a good training partner and for lifting weights and training harder than you when you’re both not at BJJ.
Perspective 2: (my personal choice)
Realize that it’s your fault for getting stuck in a bad situation in the first place. Because if you blame your failure on something or someone else, then you are unable to own it. And if you don’t own it then you don’t have the rights to fix it because it’s not yours! Take responsibility for every bad and good thing that happens to you in your life the same way you should in BJJ. If you own your failure, you’ll also own your success.
It’s time to take some risks and you might be getting into a worse position while trying to get out. But, don’t stop trying no matter what. You have nothing to lose. Take a risk to create an opportunity because every action has a reaction and in chaos come order. After every bad thing, there is always an opportunity. It’s up to you to seize the opportunity. If you do your best and miss it, you can revert back to the perspectives. You can let it beat you and completely give up. Or you can accept that it’s only a challenge to make you stronger and better and you will never quit moving forward, no matter what circumstance.
Go for the escape or for something that you’ve never tried before. You’re already in a super bad spot and are stuck anyway, so what do you have to lose? Nothing. And in the essence of time, in life or BJJ. Your mistakes and mess ups are nothing more than a fart in the wind.
Training in BJJ you’ll take risks and create your own circumstances and opportunities. Never concern yourself with what your opponent or what everyone else is doing. Make your mission to focus on your own movements and how to apply what you know to every situation. Ask questions to the people who have been there before. (A higher belt or someone who is at where you want to be) This will apply to your training and your life.
With every bad situation will follow an opportunity to be seized. And if you miss it, what perspective will you have? One that defeats you. Or one that you will have a good attitude to continue to keep making an opportunity no matter the outcome.
It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. It’s how many times you come back for more and never quit.
I’ll end with a quote by Fedor Emelianenko who was asked what he had to say about his first loss in MMA to Fabricio Werdum in Strikforce (I was there live at the arena and I’ll never forget it)
“Nothing. Because the one who doesn’t fall doesn’t stand up”