When you were a student you got concessions. When you completed your apprenticeship you got the acknowledgement of being a Tradesman. There was a public acknowledgement that you had given up certain things to attain new knowledge or skills which would benefit the society. But modern society doesn't really recognise the significance of working towards getting your Blackbelt in any martial art. It takes so much time, energy and focus over a long period of time 10-15 years. But we are not in it for the recognition so who cares right? Wrong. As practitioners of the art whether you be a frothy newbie or a salty veteran we need to better appreciate the demand of this thing we are giving our life to and how important it actually is.
When you were a student you got concessions. When you completed your apprenticeship you got the acknowledgement of being a Tradesman. There was a public acknowledgement that you had given up certain things to attain new knowledge or skills which would benefit the society. But modern society doesn't really recognise the significance of working towards getting your Blackbelt in any martial art. It takes so much time, energy and focus over a long period of time 10-15 years. But we are not in it for the recognition so who cares right? Wrong. As practitioners of the art whether you be a frothy newbie or a salty veteran we need to better appreciate the demand of this thing we are giving our life to and how important it actually is.
Speaker 1:
so the thing that I have been thinking about more and more with with life and BJJ is that we don't. We don't think we get into it and it's fun and that's that's really awesome, but we don't, really. We don't approach it in the way we approach other things in life, for example, like whether it's like saving up for a car or, uh, you know, working towards a degree at school or whatever, because maybe it's not spelled out to us by our coaches as a structure like you must get to point a before. We know you've got to get a blue belt before you get a purple belt. We know that, but we don't change our behavior. We might change our behavior to do more jiu-jitsu, but we don't say even though there's plenty of people out there who they get their blue belt, everything's blue, blue, rash guard blue, fucking blue, car blue, everything right.
Speaker 1:
But when people go to university they say I'm a student. It's like an identification of this person. That's where you're at, it's a mode and you could be a student as an older person, you can be in your 50s and go back to uni or whatever, but it's like oh, that person's studying, cool. But we don't say that about martial arts, even though that's kind of what we're doing. We're sacrificing time and energy to be good at a thing. In the same way with a profession, when somebody becomes a doctor or someone becomes a lawyer not that your profession has to be your identity, but it's kind of part of it, it's part of what you do. Some people say, oh, what do you do? I say, oh, yeah, I'm a lawyer, I'm a type of of, I'm an architect, whatever. This is not applied to bjj. Like what's interesting at, uh, gracie baja, they call you prof. Uh, they call you professor. If you're a black belt, you automatically are now professor, right, and so it was. Uh, I thought some guys called me Brock. I'm like, yeah, I'm fucking, I'm jacked like Brock.
Speaker 1:
I was training at GB Penrith Shout out to Jason, who runs GB Penrith, and all you crew. And a guy kept calling me prof and I was like that feels weird for him to call me that. And but no, it's just like a sign of respect that you are a black belt. Therefore it's also professor. It's professional in a way. But how many black belts do we know? They're not professional. They give a fuck. They're reckless as fuck, right, they don't feel any kind of responsibility in who they are. To be a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt, but it was really put on me when I got my black belt in Taekwondo as a 14-year-old. You're a black belt now you must.
Speaker 2:
You're a grown-ass man. Now you need to uphold this thing.
Speaker 1:
You know there was much more of an identity piece that you're a black belt. You must set an example. You must be a good person because if people hear you're a Taekwondo black belt and you're a scumbag, that brings like shame right. You know, like shame to the art. Yeah, and there was more. There was probably more of that, whether you like that or you don't like that or whatever, because you want to live your life how you want to live your life. But yeah, it's it. But they do give up a lot to do jiu-jitsu and care about jiu-jitsu, yet they don't actually change much else in their day-to-day lives to consider how much they're investing in jiu-jitsu.
Speaker 2:
Right.
Speaker 1:
And so this is the idea that's been kind of, I guess, bouncing around in my head that people understand that it's a long road and they understand it's really fucking hard, but at no point do they actually really. Part of the reason why I think people fail is they don't make accommodations to say I'm now suddenly doing something five days a week which I wasn't doing before. You know, if you had suddenly said, right, I'm gonna do my job, but I'm also gonna go back to uni and do that five nights a week, you're like, whoa, that's a lot's a lot man.
Speaker 2:
It's a lot.
Speaker 1:
But at uni you're just fucking sitting there Like, yeah, it takes your attention, but it's not going to break your fucking shoulder, it's not going to break your leg. I think what people are not appreciating about jujitsu and what it takes to get to black belt is such a lifetime of investment. That's what it fucking is. It's fucking huge. In the same way, when you look at interest rates and you look at your fucking mortgage and you're like, let's do the interest on this. Holy shit, I'm not borrowing 100 grand, I'm borrowing $2.5 million. That's what I'm going to have to fucking pay.
Speaker 1:
And what people don't appreciate is there's all this. There's this interest rate on your jujitsu, which is age. The longer you do this, the harder it fucking is. The standard goes higher. The game gets harder. You get more injured. You get older, you get more responsibilities. You're still trying to keep it up. Interest rates are through the fucking roof. You're a bound belt. You're about to go bankrupt. That's the thing.
Speaker 1:
I'm not saying that we need to take the fun out of jujitsu. I think we just have to realize what a fucking investment it is time, energy, physically, mentally and give it that respect to go. This is fucking big. This is a home loan, this is 10 years, this is 15 years. Right To get to this thing.
Speaker 1:
Because we all, oh yeah, we give it respect, but we, we don't. They're like, ah, it's just a given, I'll get my blue belt, I'll get my purple, I'll get my brown, I'll get my black, I'll just get there. And I and I, and I'm saying actually, I think that because people probably like people starting businesses, right, you, you don't know how hard it's going to be. And then you do it and you're like, oh, my god, it's so fucking hard, why are we doing this? And then you get deep enough, you've got the sunk cost bias. You're like, well, I can't go back now. Fucking five years, 10 years. You know like you. You know like anything you invest your time in. I think Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is worth it, but it's a huge investment, it's massive. That's that's, that's my monologue for 10 minutes.
Speaker 2:
I um, I mean, I don't, uh, I don't, I think that you can just cruise through. Yeah, I think that's fine, right, and you might not get as far with it as you could have maybe if you had taken a different approach. But I think if that approach, if that suits you better, you know, then then that's great. Um, but I don't know, like tell me more. If that suits you better, you know, then that's great. But I don't know, like tell me more about the thing you, the part you opened with about how people who study call themselves students. Professor black belt, you know what are you saying there?
Speaker 1:
People with their actions, go really hard into jiu-jitsu, but it's, you know, they start really hard. And theyjitsu, but it's, it's, uh, you know, they start really hard and they fizzle out, whereas if you go, right, I'm going to do a degree, it's going to take me three years, or I might you know, later on I might do a master's, or I might you know. But if you, straight out the gate, was like right, I'm doing a PhD and I'm going, are you sure? Are you sure you want to do that? Now, obviously there's financial repercussions for studying and doing that, so the government might give you a discount. Oh, you're a student, like there's In Australia.
Speaker 2:
In.
Speaker 1:
Australia, yeah sure, or they tax you if you're from overseas. Oh, you want to be a student in Australia? Give us 30 grand a year for the visa, motherfuckers. But I guess what I'm saying there is we make these decisions without much thought other than fuck. I love this thing, I just want to get into it really hard, but we don't consider how much of our life that will impact. That's what I'm saying. And I'm not saying you have to walk around, because obviously if you're a blue belt, you will. I just got my blue belt on the weekend. Yes, just competed in grappling industries, got second. There was only two of us in the division, but I won one out of three. So silver medal One out of three fights.
Speaker 1:
Fights. I'm a fighter. What's the job?
Speaker 2:
It was going to be broadcast but something went wrong with the TV truck that day. Live stream, yeah.
Speaker 1:
Facebook.
Speaker 2:
Live Basically UFC.
Speaker 1:
I'll send you the link, but I think that people do need to consider just how much time and energy they're putting into it to give it the proper respect, right, like I think that's what I'm saying. People will say, oh wow, you're doing a business degree as well as holding down your job. That's amazing. Jiu-jitsu hasn't got that level of respect, even though maybe if you're a jiu-jitsu black belt and someone's got half a clue, they're like whoa, you're black belt, that's fucking, that's hardcore, that's crazy. Right, and you probably take it for granted. If you've already, if you're already there, if you're hearing this, you're a black belt, you know. If you know, you know.
Speaker 1:
But why did I? Why did I say that? Because I only got to black belt, because I didn't have much else going on in my life. I was a personal trainer. I like being fit and I like to fucking bang. So I'm down for the beat down, let's go. You know, like that's. It was an expression of my intensity. But now if I think about being in my 40s, I don't want that because the risk is too high, like recoing my knee, like I didn't even think about recoing my knee. Then I was like let's go. Like try and break my ligaments. They are unbreakable. As far as I know, you didn't even know you had ligaments. Yeah, just fucking go right. And so I think that there is a power in the ignorance to get you started, but let's give it the respect it takes. I would love everyone who gets into jiu-jitsu and falls in love with it to have a relatively hiccup-free path to black belt, because I think it's a great journey and it's a journey worth going on.
Speaker 1:
But inevitably we do get injured and all this stuff, and it has its costs. But it also develops character. Right, losing a tooth, that'll develop character. Getting your nose broken, getting your knee recoated, it makes you a tougher human. Ultimately, because of the pain and everything you've got to go through to get through it. You know you're not and so there's value in losing, there's value in getting your ass beat, there's value in getting injured, but we don't properly allocate or we don't properly estimate what it will cost our lives to get there. Yeah, and that that's because it's just not as much a part of society. Our West, you know, our first world Western society, at least you know, fuck, if we were sumos in Japan, bro, people be Karen shit for us.
Speaker 1:
They'd be feeding us, they'd be doing my hair. That's right I have a special whale bone comb that they'd comb my hair with Get your skin moisturized. Yeah, I'd have my little fucking UK lower, Lower, less girthy sumos putting my shoes on for me and doing up my satin fucking G-strings and your fucking supple, like balloon, like toes, toes yeah.
Speaker 2:
Like a little, like a big baby.
Speaker 1:
A big baby. Yeah, I have rolls on my knuckles. Yeah, I fucking love to be a sumo, but that's what I'm saying. Like the society like sumo, but but that's what I'm saying. Like the society like sumo is still so revered revered in japan. If you're a professional sumo player, holy shit, like being a nba basketball player or being like a nfl quarterback patrick mahomes, or you know, um tom brady in america oh my god, the guy's god.
Speaker 1:
You and you know jiu-jitsu just doesn't get that love, that respect, but people will still commit to it like it was that kind of a thing, like it was. You know, people give so much of their lives to a thing and I think that we need to respect it more personally, to know that we've committed so much to it. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, I feel that, yeah, it's just like being a business owner or raising a kid. You're raising yourself in jiu-jitsu. You're a little kid when you start and then you grow through it. So, anyway, kind of thinking that through as I talk about it, but yeah, yeah, I think we've got to give it the respect it deserves because we give so much to it. Well, put there it is.