Why do you get out of bed?

I was all set to come home after training tonight and write about the crazy man that followed me out of a Mexican restaurant and how I SWORE I was going to have to test my jiu jitsu skills just that instant, but something bigger popped up.

Class was good tonight. More sweeps and I got to work them on a guy that was 240+, so I HAD to get them right. We went over the...and someone please correct me on this if I'm spelling it wrong...Balalonga and scissor sweeps. I'm just not getting my hook right against the side of the torso on the scissor. I think it's because I've been seeing the move demonstrated, and stopping my knee where I see the instructor stopping his, but my shin is longer, so I'm a good 3" off where I need to be, and that makes all the difference. It really is a game of inches, isn't it?

Anyway, I was talking with one of the other ladies in class tonight and she was telling me that one of the guys had her feeling really, REALLY bad about her skills and had been making negative remarks about her being female. We talked for a while about how hard it is being female...not so much about the physical issues, but the toll it can take on you mentally. Just sitting in a room with that many men can make you feel like an outsider. You wonder if the guys dislike rolling with you because of your gender, or because you're too weak or too small or too slow. You wonder if, even if you've told them five times not to go too easy on you, if they still feel annoyed at not being able to go full gorilla with you. You push all that wonder and doubt down every class and go and train anyway.

We got to talking about some of the guys there and how great the higher belts were and how a couple of lower belts were getting a little...cocky...and it made me think about intent. That's been coming up a lot in my life lately...message at church, office stuff, family-ness. Everywhere. I had a huge fire at work today (well..."have", because it's still nowhere near out) but it was one of those issues where you really start to wonder if everybody's playing on the same team. No matter what I do or where I go, it all seems to come back to that.  

Why do you show up to work. Why do you show up at the gym. Why are you at church. What brings you to those community and HOA meetings. Is it to fill a desire you have? Is it to make yourself a better person? Is it to help others with their lives? I don't think any of those are mutually exclusive at all, but I look at the first question, and too often, that's the only one of any concern and the second two aren't even after thoughts. I don't expect people to be Mother Teresa, but the blatant disregard for the ripples they cause or even directly predatory behavior for the sake of soothing one's self...well...getting a break from that is part of the reason I show up to train my little 3x a week...and hearing that that's causing problems in a gym...it makes me sad. To be honest though, I also find it motivating to do my part in maintaining the great atmosphere at my school. 

My private was so timely. Getting to talk with one of the instructors just about...training and age and the school's background, it really gave me insight into what's really going on around me and where I am in the big picture. The higher belts do such an amazing job of maintaining a physically AND emotionally safe training environment that I'm still being caught off guard. I'm also even more thankful now for the white belts that I started with who, despite my being slow and tired and and an anti-athlete and frustrated, still didn't show one twinkle of annoyance at working with me. Amazing. 

My 4th shower...my 1st private

Yeah...just finished my 4th shower today. Morning private and evening class. I'm sure my bathroom is tired of seeing me.

I've been thinking about private lessons since day 1. I initially considered starting with privates instead of group classes, but I had so many general physical barriers to overcome, it would have been a waste of my money. Well, it's been about a year, and I had a day off so I decided to give it a shot.

It was friggin' AWESOME!! 

My lesson was with the same brown belt who did my very first intro lesson. Seeing people every day you kinda forget about the stuff they've done, and honestly, when I first started, I didn't get that taking third in Mundials and his list of NAGA champion titles was pretty impressive. More importantly though, he's a great teacher. I've seen him adjust very quickly to different learning styles and perspectives on jiu jitsu.  At the advice of Slidey and a few others, I went in with a game plan and took notes...which my instructor was surprisingly excited about.I got an energetic "Cole Miller does the same thing!" He told at least three people in class tonight. The lesson started with stretching and he told me about a seminar he'd gone to yesterday. I finally admitted to someone NOT reading this blog how scared I was when I first started and he seemed genuinely surprised...which surprised me, since I thought it was mad obvious. He then started telling me about the first gym and how man-tastic the training was. Glad I came around when I did, because I honestly don't think I would have made it. I think a lot of cultural shifts have gone on at the school in the last few years. Funny how things change.

My toes! We did a lot of focus on techniques that involved "live feet", keeping weight low and maintaining pressure. I heard someone once say that the things you learn in private lessons...some hit immediately, others over time. Pressure is going to be one of those "over time" points for me. I just have a tendency to back off and keep distance with my upper body.

I talk to my cousin (piano pedagogy person) about the instructional methods and environment a LOT, so I tend to have to turn a lot of what I learn into music-speak. Well, I sparred with the teenage blue belt that was also in my first lesson and he gave me some tips on improvisation...hyper extending elbows in positions that don't get taught as formal submissions. It's such a small concept, but makes such a huge difference.

My breathing is so...bad

And my brother rocks!! I had to come back and edit this since I opened a couple of boxes from Amazon right after I posted. Well, they had Grappler's Toolbox and FlowFit Ground Engagement. Giving gifts to adult siblings can be hard, but even half a world away in Japan, he got it dead on:)

There are two warm-up exercises that can "taint" the rest of my class performance. Those are sprinting and bear walks. Today was sprinting. Moving Megan fast is hard and after a couple of laps I was just off the rest of the night. I got caught on the bottom...a lot...but I took the opportunity to study what it feels like to be there instead of immediately fighting out of being mounted/turtled. Had some success really feeling the balance of the top player.

A year in and my breathing is still bad. A blue belt pointed out that it's shallow and quick. From day 1, I've tried to be conscious of it since I knew I had some hurdles to cross (asthma, sinus issues and allergies.) Four years into dancing and I was still having issues with not breathing when things sped up. Guess it's back to FlowFit. Speaking of body stuff, I looked at myself today and I look quite a bit smaller...and musclee-er.

Tonight was...different. I think a memo must have gone out to tell all the ladies to stay home and all the big guys to come. I was the only female...felt a bit weird since it had been a while. Couple that with the appearance of a viewing crew comprised solely of several, random young women who were a bit overdressed for being at a gym and the mood was just a little different.

My last roll tonight was with another green belt I really enjoy training with. Somehow, we always end up starting off in a clinch. Last time, I was able to take his back and I got the feeling he wanted to rectify that. Both times he got me on my back, which was fine by me, since I generally just jump guys into full or spider guard. I'm starting to see how I get caught in Americanas so much. I haven't yet learned when to let go of grips once they turn disadvantageous and that leaves my arms open for the taking. 

One of my favorite blues told me tonight that I'm getting a lot better. This is the same guy that told me about the breathing. I love well rounded feedback. Yay again.

Relearned a life lesson tonight...

Decent men know sorry ones when they see them. They just do.

GREAT results from reading the flow section of The Guard II. I tried just flowing through submissions and linked up to four. Mostly flowing between triangles and armbars. Still haven't worked the omoplata in, but I'll do that next class. I wasn't killing myself to apply them, but I did run into a strength issue. I had a good night of rolling with a bunch of the bigger, higher belts (I'm still exhausted) so my armbars kept getting stuffed by the guy grabbing his other arm. I've had some success forcing the defending arm off (only with my legs), but after a couple of 7 min rounds, I didn't have much "brute force" left in me, so any time a guy tried to just force his arm free, the tap was pretty much lost. No matter though, I was glad to actually link some submissions.

I've also found a new stalling "safety point" that I tend to fall into. I used to freeze once I got someone in my guard, questioning whether I should try to submit or sweep. Now, it's at submission setups. I had a triangle locked and, as I quite frequently do, started wondering if I'd gotten my hips close (I'd rolled him into the lock while he was escaping my side control),  wondering whether I REALLY needed his arm to finish the choke...all kinds of things. I tried to just force it from my original position, but chokes on higher belts have to be clean, or they're not tapping. Adjusting still makes me wary, and once I get a triangle locked, I get terrified of losing it...makes no sense, I know, but I get scared to take the chance of losing my one bird in the hand for the two in the bush. 

In love with Armbars

Ok...just figuratively. I'm still terrible at them. I just got back from a few days in California (funtastic!). The 8hrs travel time gave me a chance to spend some quality time with The Guard. I'm amazed at how much sense it makes now. A few months ago and it (along with Jiu Jitsu University) may as well have been War and Peace in its untranslated version.

There are just...so many ways to hyper-extend somebody's elbow! I remember the first arm bar I learned that wasn't from the guard. It left me with so many questions. Can I really brace a wrist using my neck?  Why do you push directly on the joint from some positions but use more of a twisting motion from others? Is twisting a form of hyper-extension? Do these moves change at all for different genders since women's radius hits the elbow at a different angle?

On a side note, the lady sitting next to me on the plane saw what I was reading and assumed I was studying medicine. I wondered what happens when she goes to the doctor.

Tomorrow's going to be rough. I'm a foodie and anytime I go on vacation...well...unless it's Japan (which has almost no food I'm interested in save some seafood) I come back stuffed to the gills with food experiences. Couple that with the fact that Chinese food is my absolute favorite on the planet (it barely feels foreign to me) and I ended up with a heavy and wonderful list of new food experiences...here's a brief recap of highlights:

Xiao Long Bao: The most perfect food ever invented. Better known as soup dumplings. I'd order it as a last meal. It's hard to get decent ones in Florida and Cali has some really good ones.

Pho: Vietnamese beef soup. Clean and light. Not really into Viet cuisine, but still a favorite of mine.

Doughnuts: Also something we have a lack of down here. Went to a place called Stan's. Had the glazed, sourdough and chocolate covered cake. Yeah...I know. Doughnut hedonism.

Mooncake: Traditional Chinese Autumn festival food. Beautiful, but I'm not big on the taste.

Custard Tart: Had some great ones in Chinatown

Coconut Tart: I actually enjoyed these. Basically a tiny coconut cake

Dumplings: Chicken, shrimp and pork at Tong Dumpling Pot. They had me sold once I saw the wrappers being rolled out by hand up front.

Green onion cakes: Had two versions of these. The dumpling place beat the Xiao Long Bao place hands down.

Taiwanese beef noodle soup: Soup was bland. Noodles were great.

Cupcakes: Love's cupcakes. You need to go. The woman does an amazing job at flavor balance.

Fortune cookies: From one of the oldest fortune cookie factories in the US. More like waffle cones than the twisted styrofoam you get at most Chinese places.

So yeah...I'm totally going to pay tomorrow, but it was worth it.

These emotions keep catching me by surprise...

I've said it before...I build bonds slowly. I believe relationships should be carefully crafted. Most of the people I consider to be friends I've known 5+ years, some 25+. I've had guys surprised when I said I wasn't sure if I wanted a relationship with them since I'd only known them a year. A year is nothing to me when it comes to relationships. All that plus my INTJ status and sometimes swells of emotional connection can catch me off guard.

Thank you jiu jitsu, for that happening to me twice this week. The first was after one of my fellow green belts came back from vacation. He is the sweetest guy I've ever met, ever. I swear one day I'm going to hug him mid-conversation by accident. The full sleeve tattoo he has always catches me off guard, because I feel like he should instead be carrying around an injured puppy or cookies for homeless children. Well, he told me that he ran into a girl by chance that he'd seen before and they were dating. He'd brought her to class and wanted to introduce me to her. He was glowing even more than normal. I was so...happy for him. And I'm not the romantic type. I dread getting wedding invitations in the mail. When I hear somebody's started dating, it's like someone telling me they refilled their gas tank that morning. Just another part of life. Even when in a relationship, Valentine's day could pass without too much fanfare. Well, I don't know how, but a loud, relatively high-pitched "awwww!" came out of my mouth and I really wanted to meet the girl.

Fast forward to last night's class, when I told everyone I'd be out for a while and I was surprised to be met with so many genuine well wishes. I was headed for my car, and ran across my security blanket buddy (whom I was elated to see after his one month hiatus) and jokingly pushed him off the curb. He responded with the most genuine "have a safe trip" that I think I've ever heard. That night, I was terribly sad that I wouldn't see anybody or spar for a whole week. Crazy.