Self esteem...crashing!

I can honestly say , this is the single hardest thing I've ever done. I'm not very good at jiu jitsu...and that's hard on me. I want to be good. The fact that instructors and other students have to be patient with me is not easy for me to digest. I think I deal with failure better than I do with pity, real or imagined. I've read other people's stories...people in worse shape, older, less coordinated, injured, slow to learn and I feel almost petty for so consistently forgetting what advantages I do have. What bothers me is not being bad. I'm not bad. I'm simply not good.

 

I finally learned a guard pass tonight that I think I can latch on to. Someone was reading my mind because I've been scouring the Internet for one. Funny, because it involves going from kneeling to standing...a movement that's physically very difficult for me. A few years ago, I couldn't stand from a kneeling position at all (still can't do a full squat). I have genetically HORRIBLE knees, and it's taken quite a bit of work to get myself to the point where I can stand on my own. Adding the weight of another human being just makes it incredibly difficult (not to mention I kept forgetting to keep my hips tucked). The biggest impediment though, is fear. I expect pain, or joints buckling, or spontaneous combustion. None of those things happened, but the expectation takes my focus off what I'm doing and redirects it to places that are hard to come back from. I do worry though, that I'm going to be in some nasty pain tomorrow. I have that same feeling in my knees when I used to dance just a little too long or spin just a few too many times in one night.

 

We're going to be focusing on guard passes for a while, which makes me happy, because I have none that I'm really taking to. Being in some one's guard and getting the mount are the two positions that leave me blank.

 

I've been having a really rough time sleeping. I started MSM supplements for my joints when I started BJJ and one of the potential side effects is sleeping issues. I don't normally remember my dreams, and this stuff has me present for all of them. I'm waking up feeling like I haven't slept more than ten minutes. I've been taking it at night, so hopefully switching them to the morning will make things easier. I've been a tad zombi-fied at work lately and that's not gonna fly with all the growth and changes that are going on on my side of the health care continuum.

 

I made it four whole months without buying another book or DVD...woo! To celebrate, I bought a book and DVD:) Following the recommendations of Slideyfoot, I picked up Roy Dean's Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Blue Belt Requirements, Mastering Jiu Jitsu and The Guard: Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Details and Techniques. Fine...two books and a DVD. I figure they should keep me busy for quite some time.

Creativity

Yesterday, during the transition from the advanced class to beginner, our head instructor made the recommendation that everyone try to be more creative when rolling. It's a bit beyond my comprehension as a white belt, but the concept really stuck in my head. Like anything else though, I'm guessing that it's something that's best practiced after you learn the rules.

I've noticed my shrimping is slower on my left side, so I focused on it, one-legged, and left my right side alone. It made some issues more clear. Not only am I weaker, but I'm less coordinated. Thinking back to sparring yesterday, when I'm pinned on my left side, I feel more stuck and like I have fewer options.

I've been about a week without working on the stability ball and getting back on it today was good. I actually feel more steady on it after the time off. Whatever I pulled on the top of my left foot when I first started has started bothering me again and I'm guessing it's no coincidence that I got rolled back on it last night. I need to spend more time stretching out my feet before class. I'm also noticing some weakness in my left shoulder while doing bridging drills. I think that comes from the bodyweight program just like my loss in knee flexibility. I'm going to leave that (the bodyweight) alone for a couple of weeks and see what happens. Kind of sucks though, since I have so few options for cardio...stupid knees.

I'm starting a new pushup program! It involves starting in plank position, lowering yourself as far as you can, and holding it until you drop, eight times. I'm going to try it 3-4 times a week. Now to think of a way to explain the 8 consecutive thuds to my coworkers...

Staph, staph go away...

I love Hibiclens. It smells like a clean hotel room and helps sedate the germaphobe in me.

Tonight was...pretty rough. I left the mats feeling like an all around failure. I rolled with all higher belts, but my ego doesn't seem to want to take that into consideration.The warmup was long (Wuzzup mentioned it was hard on him, so I didn't feel completely out of shape). The technique we're reviewing is an underhook sweep from guard, and it's giving me grief.

We started it last week and I think I finally started picking up the basic action the last few times I tried it. Tonight we learned how to tie the failed sweep into a triangle or omoplata. BeginnersInstructor asked if I remembered how to finish the triangle and I replied "yep!". Of course I remembered triangle, it was one of the first techniques I learned! Well, apparently I only remembered it in theory, because once I got through the failed sweep, it was all upside-down and backwards. I'm having a really hard time balancing learning new techniques and retaining the finer points of old ones.

On the up side, I rolled with my first purple belt tonight. I didn't notice his belt color until we started rolling, and then a small jolt of fear ran through me. I was ready for a serious fight. But as soon as I started struggling, I noticed that he was very...soft...so I calmed down and tried to pay attention to what he was doing and ask a few questions. I'm starting to really appreciate higher belts that genuinely try to submit me. I want to build a really solid defense, and having someone really trying to catch me helps me find problem areas.

I feel like my one legged bridging is paying off, as I don't get pinned for long periods of time like I used to.

I'm going to spend some time studying escapes from the following holds, because I get caught in them a LOT.

1) Kesa Gatame
2) Reverse Kesa Gatame
3) Seated Mount-I've been attempting the escape from JiuJitsu University (pg 62) but just noticed that I've been staying on my back while trying to escape AND completely ignoring the choke defense.

Going to check out my first tournament...

I was fumbling around Google this afternoon and ran into what appears to be a small tournament in the area. It looks like The Good Fight has been around since 2008 and features both gi and no gi matches. Looks to be interesting.

...now to find someone to drag along with me...

I never thought I'd say this...

...as a person that would choose acupuncture over a back rub any day, this is difficult...

 

 

I desperately need a neck massage.

Learning what you already know

I swear there's nothing better than a post-class shower.

I really needed class tonight. My brain's been all wonky at work since I picked up two new hospitals to clean up and class is a good reset button for me. The space between my twice weekly classes is starting to seem really long. It's tempting for me to add Fridays on right now, but I'm going to give it another month or so. Maybe I'm gun shy or lack confidence, but I can't imagine doing two days back to back.

I feel pretty good about my sparring tonight. I only went two rounds, but I feel like I got some really useful feedback. My second round was with one of the blue belts and he pointed out a lot of what I was doing wrong...sadly I already knew not to do what I was doing, but I've picked up some bad habits over the last few weeks.

1) I was pushing. I think I developed this from rolling with another white belt that likes to crush my throat and face. I started focusing on trying to prevent that above all else by pushing her head off me.

2) I was grabbing the collar when I was mounted. I started doing this because well...I just learned collar chokes and figured I'd start grabbing collars willie-nillie just to see what happened. What happened was armbars.

I got a new drill added to my warm-up! Instead of kimura, I'm now doing shoulder locks/omoplata. I've gotten used to doing them from a failed collar choke, but I think I'll be able to pick up the drill since the concept of moving an opponent's head toward the ground is essentially the same, I'm just not pulling him toward me since I'm not trying to execute a choke.

The masochist/linguist in me is deeply tempted to learn all the moves in English, Portuguese and Japanese. No, there would be no real point in doing this, I just uh...like the idea. Hearing Portuguese spoken every day in class makes it REALLY hard for me not to pick up yet another set of Pimsleur CDs and go to town. I like the sound. It has the bounciness of some Romance languages, but there's a pleasant edge that hits my ears much in the same way Russian does. The fact that I just got confirmation (as I was changing for class) that I finished my business Spanish certificate makes it even harder. But no...I'm going to focus. I need to be solidly conversational in Mandarin before I take on any other languages.

...but then...I could understand even more instruction in class...hmm...