Jiu Jitsu Quotes

Please keep in mind that no matter how strong, fast or coordinated you are, there is always someone stronger, faster and more coordinated.

Anyone can be tough for a season. It takes a special kind of human to rise to life's challenges for a lifetime.

Wearing a black belt does not make you a super hero, and wearing a white belt does not mean you have little to offer as a person. It is what we do in the belts we wear, and not the belts themselves that matter.

The greatest effects we have on the world are the ones we can never see.

My time in the woods is time spent with a tutor on how to live.

If you want to be a lion, you must train with lions.

Jiu Jitsu is a baptism by combat, and serves a purpose in the inner life of the individual that has always existed, but our modern culture fails to acknowledge.

The highest aim was never to master Jiu Jitsu; it was to master myself.

There is no losing in jiu jitsu. You either win or you learn.

This is what Jiu Jitsu gives us, and is what so often remains ineffable. Jiu Jitsu frees us and allows us to be what we have always been, but simply never had the medium to express. Jiu Jitsu is the vehicle. Not the Road.

In the modern world we are surrounded by so much abundance that we cannot see it.

If we do not master ourselves, we will be a slave to ourselves.

The point of meditating is not to learn to sit quietly in a room. The point is to live that way in the world.

We must not learn to try harder. The key is to learn how not to try in the first place.

When you react, you don't give your mind the time to get filled with emotions. You are devoid of anger, fear, and frustration; you are simply moving.

Things can be added, but that doesn't mean that anything is missing.

When you realize you are no longer made of glass, you lose the desire to demonstrate that fragility in others.

Anyone who has ever achieved anything has been a steward of his potential.

There is no higher calling than service to your fellow man, and to do so through your own personal mastery of a craft is a gift enjoyed by few. Cultivate this gift, and give it away.

Make no mistake, you earn a white belt. The belt is a physical representation of a commitment to the beginner's mind. It is a vulnerability and a willingness to learn that shines through.

True mastery, it turns out, is not found in accumulating each and every tool under the sun. True mastery is learning that there are really only a handful of tools, and it is the proper application with correct timing and setting that makes them so useful.

On the other side of self-doubt comes a confidence from faith in the process. Even though our destination may be a long way off, each day we rise with a subtle smile as if we have already achieved it, because, when we are truly committed to a task, we already have.

Properly directed thoughts result in properly directed actions. The only way to appropriately guide our thoughts is to know their foundation, our values.

I can think of no more worthwhile aim than pursuing mastery in this craft while transcending one's own limitations.

An intelligent consistency is the foundation of genius.

The major events in our lives receive the entire spotlight, but ultimately your life will be defined by the same handful of choices you make each day.

Mastery does not exist.

Jiu Jitsu gave me the opportunity to be a real human being. It opened my heart and my mind. I am kinder, more gentle and more loving due to my efforts in this art.

I have never been as alive or awake as I have been through Jiu Jitsu.

For the sincere student, it mustn't be enough to simply understand Jiu Jitsu. We must seek to understand ourselves.

In Jiu Jitsu, we often fall into the trap of simply trying a technique "harder," rather than recognizing that it is a poorly chosen tool for the task at hand.

Jiu Jitsu uses us to express itself, and the best thing we can do to is to become a vehicle capable of expressing Jiu Jitsu with all of its perfection minus our imperfections.

Jiu Jitsu is a vehicle for self-discovery and growth. It reminds me of my ego, of my insecurities, and of my shortcomings.

Jiu Jitsu is the vehicle. Not the road.

If you can wrestle but not play Jiu Jitsu, or you can play Jiu Jitsu but not wrestle, you are not a complete grappler and lack the sufficient skills to safely subdue an opponent.

After I received my blue belt, I soon recognized that the belts were simply an external representation of an inner experience, and that they mattered little compared to the person I was becoming.

Jiu Jitsu removes the societal walls that we have been forced to unknowingly hold up with our adopted beliefs. It removes the limits of common thought, and allows for expression of our highest ideals.

We seek to understand Jiu Jitsu as a vehicle to understand ourselves. We have different explicit goals, from getting in shape, learning self-defense or competition, but tacitly we all seek mastery of ourselves.

Jiu Jitsu forges friendships in a way I’ve never known. Being involved in an art as intimate as this, where bodily connection is a must, the common cultural boundaries of personal space are broken. You will never see more hugs, high fives, and physical expressions of love than on the mats. Ultimately, this proves to be one of the most fulfilling aspects of our pursuit of mastery. Along the way, we learn to love others as we love ourselves.

For young kids, Jiu Jitsu should be nothing more than a fun form of recreation that introduces them to the movements through games and structured play. As they get older, you can introduce more Jiu Jitsu, but it should be playful.

These Taoists' ideas have greatly influenced all our theories of action, even to those of fencing and wrestling. Jiu-jitsu, the Japanese art of self-defence, owes its name to a passage in the Tao-teking. In jiu-jitsu one seeks to draw out and exhaust the enemy's strength by non-resistance, vacuum, while conserving one's own strength for victory in the final struggle. In art the importance of the same principle is illustrated by the value of suggestion. In leaving something unsaid the beholder is given a chance to complete the idea and thus a great masterpiece irresistibly rivets your attention until you seem to become actually a part of it. A vacuum is there for you to enter and fill up the full measure of your aesthetic emotion.

Jiu Jitsu gives each of us something that no other sport can. We have the opportunity to become truly great regardless of what circumstance fate has handed us. We have complete freedom and responsibility to achieve whatever level of mastery we wish.

Relativity is a beautiful, irrifutable truth. We must acknowledge that wearing a black belt in jiu jitsu does not make you a black belt in life. In the home, there are black belts who are white belt fathers, and there are white belts who are black belt fathers. This holds true for all areas of life. A black belt does not mean you are successful in life. It does mean that you have mastered this art to an enormous degree, and that the skills you have acquired can be transmuted to a plethora of other activities. It does not mean, however, that you have done this.

Today's world is flooded with participation trophies. In an attempt to promote equality we have robbed our youth of the most growth-inducing aspect of competition, failing. If you want to be resurrected, you have to first be crucified. Everybody wants to be reborn, but no one is willing to die. Losing, in the context of whatever arena it may be, is a microcosmic death. When we learn from our failures and grow because of them, we are reborn.

I am fortunate to be content with having very little, and so I never wanted the new car, fancy clothes, the big TV and the video games. All I ever wanted to do was read, walk through the woods and do Jiu Jitsu. When this is the foundation upon which your life is built, you need very little in the way of material security.

Imagine a true master of the art, someone with complete skill in every aspect of Jiu Jitsu. This master would not force anything. He would simply allow the roll to take whatever form it does, and in every position would act in the most efficient way based off what the circumstance dictates, and not what he himself prefers.

If Jiu Jitsu does not make you a better father, son, mother, daughter, wife or husband, you are missing the point. If Jiu Jitsu does not leave you viewing strangers in a kinder light, you are missing the point. If you are not better equipped to deal with the vicissitudes of life due to your training, then you are not really training.

The best yardstick for our progress is not other people, but ourselves. Am I better than I was yesterday? This is the only question worth asking. As long as you go to bed at night a better practitioner than the one who woke up that morning, you have succeeded. Your worth should have nothing to do with how your progress stacks up relative to another.

If you are forcing it, you are doing it wrong

Where my tendons have been torn, my psyche has been mended. This was a worthy trade.

Any advanced student will tell you the best way to recover guard is simply not to get your guard passed in the first place.

Life is so unlikely, so rare and beautiful an opportunity it is to live, we must be on constant guard to ensure that our actions are worthy of the life it takes to perform them.

We must know where we want to go in order to get there. Our modern lives are growing increasingly chaotic, and it is only a clear, definitive purpose that will keep us on track.

When we honestly take stock of our ability, we are then granted the opportunity to improve our circumstance. Accessing where you stand is the only way to stand somewhere else.

Do not seek victory, for victory in itself will not serve you. Seek to understand what made the victory possible.

We are free to live the life we have imagined, not the life imagined for us.

It is in community where we find our very selves.

Being part of the whole, as I grow so does that which contains me.

Plateaus are a manifestation of the law of diminishing returns, and when we reach one it simply means that it is time to adjust our methods.

To achieve anything we must grind, but to enjoy anything we must flow.

We are never truly ourselves as we are mid-roll.

Somehow my gold medals didn't make me a better person.

You are never as good as you think you are, and you are never as bad as you believe yourself to be.

You have become more and therefore expect more, but never become too purpose-driven to step back and realize just how far you have progressed.

I train because it makes every area of my life better, and it makes me better at every area of my life.

We see that the vast majority of our suffering is needless, and simply arises from the misidentification with our thinking mind.

Jiu-Jitsu is just an excuse Brazilians came up with to hug people for a few hours a day.

The medal from an old grappling tournament will not serve me today, but the courage I developed in its acquisition will. By investing in yourself, by using all endeavors as a vehicle to shape who we are, we exist in the present moment with a lifetime of growth behind us. I have loved many vehicles throughout the years, Jiu Jitsu more than any other, but the vehicle has, and always will, be a distant second to the driver.

Jiu Jitsu is meant to serve us, not the other way around. It is meant to make you more of whatever it is you already are. It is meant to separate the wheat from the chaff. It is meant to bring to conscious attention all that once went unseen. It is meant to make you more loving. It is meant to make you more wise, but less certain. It is meant to make us humble, yet supremely confident. It is meant to remind us of our frailty while simultaneously making us feel invincible.

Nothing feels dirtier than living a life that is not your own. No amount of money is worth my soul. I would rather be homeless and go out in a blaze of glory than subject myself to a slow and steady death of apathy and government by my environment.

Thoreau and Huxley calmly state what I have spent years trying to articulate, and never found the words for doing so. To read the words of these great men is to read the highest expression of my very self which is inexpressible due to the shortcomings of my particular nature.

There is an opportunity cost for everything we do. This is why we must have the awareness to ensure that what we are pursuing is really what we value, because the pursuit leaves countless lost opportunities in its wake. We choose one experience at the sacrifice of all other experiences.

Many of us begin this art with little to no understanding of what we are getting ourselves into. Then, maybe a year or a black belt later, we realize this odyssey we have embarked upon and rest happily in knowing we have chosen a noble struggle. I think we owe most of our successes to our initial ignorance. When we begin, we cannot see the obstacles ahead, and so we march on optimistically. In hindsight, when we look back and connect the dots, we see just how green we were at the start, and it was only our ignorance that upheld us from the crushing despair of the task at hand.

When we know our values, we can easily measure whether or not our actions are in accordance with them. Values are the measuring sticks with which we determine the worthiness of our actions. To be better associated with one's own values is to remove a lot of the needless activities of daily life.

A truly humble man has no concept of his humility, for he cannot fathom that he would be so special to have the need to be humble. He is too busy getting lost in appreciation of a craft or his fellow man to think of himself. “True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.” -C.S. Lewis

To base your self worth relative to others is to play a losing game. If you are at the bottom, you will be filled with self-loathing. If you are at the top, you will be filled with self-aggrandizement and ego. This will most certainly be one of your greatest obstacles to achieving whatever degree of mastery you are capable.

I believe the real reason we pursue anything in life is not for the thing itself, but for who we become on the way to its accomplishment. We strive to accomplish things in the attempt to mold ourselves. The greatest benefits Jiu Jitsu will have in your life will have nothing to do with Jiu Jitsu. It is this simple understanding that allows me to persist in my study. Even on the rare days when I may not have a burning desire to practice Jiu Jitsu, I am reminded that my practicing Jiu Jitsu is more accurately my practicing to become a better human being. The lessons I learn on the mat will serve me in every area of life-- personal development, relationships, business, and the like.

Quotes tell a story. A stringing together of a few words can leave you with an idea that changes the course of your life, and can direct you toward reaching your highest potential as a human. The story they tell is derived from the experience which inspired them, and it is our sharing that experience that allows for the quote to resonate so deeply within our being.

If you are fortunate enough to have a particular activity with which you find greatest joy and technical success, it is your responsibility as a growing human being to continue that study. Whatever your endeavor, if you can expand upon the knowledge in your strongest subject, that new found understanding of all things will trickle down to every other area of your life.

My four things I care about are truth, meaning, fitness and grace. [...] Sam [Harris] would like to make an argument that the better and more rational our thinking is, the more it can do everything that religion once did. [...] I think about my personal physics hero, Dirac – who was the guy who came up with the equation for the electron, less well-known than the Einstein equations but arguably even more beautiful...in order to predict that, he needed a positively-charged and a negatively-charged particle, and the only two known at the time were the electron and the proton to make up, let's say, a hydrogen atom. Well, the proton is quite a bit heavier than the electron and so he told the story that wasn't really true, where the proton was the anti-particle of the electron, and Heisenberg pointed out that that couldn't be because the masses are too far off and they have to be equal. Well, a short time later, the anti-electron -- the positron, that is -- was found, I guess by Anderson at Caltech in the early 30s and then an anti-proton was created some time later. So it turned out that the story had more meaning than the exact version of the story...so the story was sort of more true than the version of the story that was originally told. And I could tell you a similar story with Einstein, I could tell it to you with Darwin, who, you know, didn't fully understand the implications of his theory, as is evidenced by his screwing up a particular kind of orchid in his later work...not understanding that his theory completely explained that orchid! So there's all sorts of ways in which we get the...the truth wrong the first several times we try it, but the meaning of the story that we tell somehow remains intact. And I think that that's a very difficult lesson for people who just want to say, 'Look, I want to'...you know, Feynman would say, "If an experiment disagrees with you, then you're wrong' and it's a very appealing story to tell to people – but it's also worth noting that Feynman never got a physical law of nature and it may be that he was too wedded to this kind of rude judgment of the unforgiving. Imagine you were innovating in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. The first few times might not actually work. But if you told yourself the story, 'No, no, no – this is actually genius and it's working; no, you just lost three consecutive bouts' -- well, that may give you the ability to eventually perfect the move, perfect the technique, even though you were lying to yourself during the period in which it was being set up. It's a little bit like the difference between scaffolding and a building. And too often, people who are crazy about truth reject scaffolding, which is an intermediate stage in getting to the final truth.

As far as our relation to the physical world, I doubt there will be much more improvement. Our basic survival needs have been met, and much of our current progress is superfluous or downright troublesome. Most advancement is performed out of comfort rather than necessity. What we are lacking, what the world so desperately needs now, is adjustments of the mind. We need to see the world again with fresh eyes, and come to an understanding of who we are as individuals, and what drives us.

The principles of Jiu Jitsu can be applied to every endeavor in life. You have stay calm when you are in bad situations. You need to cover and conceal your intent with other maneuvers. You need to utilize the simplest and most efficient methods. You need to prioritize your focus of effort. You need to train until you trust yourself to move intuitively, without having to think. You need to move at the right time. You have to defend critical areas. You should not attack your enemy’s strongpoints. You must utilize leverage. You cannot let your emotions drive your decisions. You have to establish a good base foundation to build upon. You cannot be overly aggressive, but you can’t just allow things to happen. When you make a move, you have to believe in what you are doing. You have to be mentally strong. You have to keep an open mind. You have to continuously learn new techniques while always reinforcing the fundamentals. You have to adapt your plan if circumstances change.

I do trust you though. I think if someone tried to take me, you’d at least fight them for me a little…” I watched his face for a moment before narrowing my eyes. “Wouldn’t you?” That had his other eye popping open, his cheeks still slightly pink, but everything else about him completely alert. “You know I would.” Why that pleased me so much, I wasn’t going to overanalyze. “If someone tried to take you, I know aikido, some jiu-jitsu, and kickboxing,” I offered him up. “But my dentist says I have really strong teeth, so I’d be better off trying to bite someone’s finger or ear off instead.” Aaron’s eyebrows climbed up his forehead almost comically. “Like a little Chihuahua,” he suggested, the spoon going into his mouth with a sly grin. I winked at him, immediately regretting it. I didn’t want it to come across like I was flirting. “I was thinking more of a piranha. I’ve only had one filling in my entire life,” I told him, wishing each word coming out of my mouth wasn’t coming out of it. If he thought I was being awkward or a flirt, he didn’t make it known. “Or a raptor.” “A lion.” “A tiger.” “Did you know a jaguar has twice the strength in its bite than a tiger does?” Aaron frowned as he took another bite of his oatmeal. “No shit?” “No. Two thousand pounds per square inch. They’re the only big cat that kills their prey by biting its head, through bone and everything. A tiger bites the neck of whatever animal they’re eating to cut their air and blood flow off. Crazy, huh?” He looked impressed. “I had no idea.” I nodded. “Not a lot of people do.” “Is there anything that bites harder than they do?” “Crocodiles. The really big ones. I’m pretty sure they have about 4000 or 5000 psi bites.” For the fifty-second time, I shrugged. “I like watching the Animal Channel and Discovery,” I said, making it sound like an apology. Aaron gave me that soft smile that made me feel like my insides were on fire. Then he winked. “I don’t know much about crocodiles, but I know all about alligators,” he offered. “Did you know there are only two species left in the world?” “There are?” “American alligator and the Asian alligator. More than a fifth of all of them live in Florida.” “We have some gators in Texas. There’s a state park by Houston where you can go and you can usually see a bunch. I went camping there one time.” One corner of his mouth tilted up as he chewed. “Look at you, Rebel Without a Cause.” With anyone else, I’d probably think they were picking on me, but I could see the affection on Aaron’s face. I could feel the kindness that just came off him in waves, so I winked back at him. “I live life on the edge. I should start teaching a class on how to be bad.” “Right? Quitting your job, coming to Florida even though you were worried….” He trailed off with a grin and a look out of the corner of his eye. “I pretty much have my masters and license to practice. I’ll teach people everything I know.

I suspect alligators never get arm-barred; dinosaurs where probably safe from the submission as well, at least the T-rex.

If you’re being smothered from someone on top of you, you’ve got to move, if you can’t move, you better pray, and then find a pocket of air (this pocket of air will be hot and humid and almost not worth breathing, but it’s all you got).

The whole ethos of BJJ was based on minimum effort equals maximum result, using leverage to create a favorable position or as described in most business situations this is described as: Efficiency.

Circuits can be found everywhere in your sparring sessions: positions, submissions, guards, sweeps - they are everywhere. Watch your opponents and training partners for patterns and then check yourself out. It's a base human condition.

If you can not measure it, you can not improve it." & "To measure is to know." ~ Lord Kelvin

Total acceptance of this opponent in your space will make you more relaxed where as resistance can only make you more nervous and rigid.

The ability to engage when your whole physiology and psychology is telling you otherwise is a huge part of breaking through levels in everything you do.

Drilling consists of repeating a chosen technique in perfect form for fifty repetitions. That's a workout, believe me.

Do not fear the man who has thrown 10,000 kicks. Fear the man who has thrown one kick 10,000 times.” ~ Bruce Lee - Creator of Jeet Kune Do

It is a shock to many college graduates that their segway into the real world is one of obligation, profound debt, and countless sacrifices of the soul.

I had no desire of being professionally successful. No desire for material wealth. All I wanted out of life was Jiu Jitsu.

I am acutely aware that all I have been able to achieve has been in large part due to circumstances outside my control. This is why I teach, and this is why I write. I want to be one of those opportunities for others. Perhaps this is the true measure of success.

Jiu Jitsu has given me something to pursue. We all need something to work towards. For people, as well as every piece of matter in the universe, there is no such thing as maintenance. If you are not growing you are decaying. The insidious nature of modern times is that it is so easy not to pursue anything. Societal norms pressure us into jobs we do not like, and the daily comforts of televisions and computers offer much in the way of distraction. If that isn't enough, there is always the numbing effects of alcohol coupled with attention-grabbing sporting events which conveniently run year round so one is never short of stimulus.

We are force-fed beliefs through incessant advertisements by a culture that ceaselessly fosters our conformity to values which are of no service to the individual.

Jiu Jitsu is cognitively-complex, so much so that there is a great barrier to entry in terms of intellect. I have never met a great Jiu Jitsu player who was not highly intelligent, and I don't think I ever will.

Jiu Jitsu opened up doors in my mind that public education had bolted shut. In hindsight, I see just how superficial my thoughts had been prior to this art. It is no coincidence that my efforts in reading and writing have run parallel with this craft. I began training Jiu Jitsu at twenty-two, and at the time of this writing I am about to turn thirty. I have learned more in the past eight years than the previous twenty-two, and have no doubts that Jiu Jitsu opened up my mind in a way traditional organized education never could. Jiu Jitsu gave me a life when I didn't know how to live. It is the best thing I have ever done, and is the foundation upon which all I will do.

Jiu Jitsu shielded me from all of this. While many were investing in jobs they did not like, or frequenting bars and spending their weekends in front of the television, I pursued something worthy of my choosing. I say this not to slander another, but to show the sincerity with which I appreciate Jiu Jitsu's influence in my life. It saved me from the rat race. I found a reason to eat healthy, to get to bed early. A reason to stay in Friday nights, resulting in fewer beers and more books. I found a medium with which to carve my soul.