This is one of my favorite athletic pictures of myself. This picture represents an image of my body that I dreamed about my entire life. In many ways, I was so strong. I podiumed in this race, and I built some solid strength, endurance, and killer perseverance. I LOVED how my body LOOKED. BUT…I know the full story behind my favorite “look.” I was overtrained. By a lot. I didn’t…
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Have You Ever Lost?
Winning is cool and all, but have you ever tried losing? It was some years ago that I lost my first match ever. I had won every fight I had done up until that point in time (in Muay Thai and Jiu Jitsu both), and I was confident that this amateur match would amount to me winning yet another. Then I lost. Two weeks later, when the emotional rollercoaster…
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Show Up Anyway
My freshman year of soccer, I saved a goal with a header, but took the opposing team’s header to the face in the second following. I got knocked out and woke up on the ground with my eye already swelling shut. Within 5 minutes, my eye was shut, swollen, and nasty. Fortunately, we didn’t have phone cameras in 2000. . In the days following, the swelling went away. In the…
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Have An Injury? Good. Get To Work…
So you have an injury? Good. -Jocko (basically, but probably) There’s no way around it-injuries suck. And if you are someone who has a sport they love to do, like Jiu Jitsu, then they can really, really suck. You can wallow in self pity and cry and complain, and you know what, I think those things are completely fine to do and easy to justify doing…for a minute. Then, you’ve…
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Fighting My Body & Mind
Laying, stretching out my neck and letting my arm rest (because it doesn’t want to function anyway) and having a brain war about whether I should cry in frustration vs. reminding myself that it’s part of the healing process. I haven’t cried yet. Doesn’t mean I won’t. And if I do, it’s not the end of the world. But, I am actively trying to win a game in my head…
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Learning To Extend Myself & Others Grace
When I experience negative things in life, I like to think that I now have one more experience with which I can understand someone else. When I started experiencing anxiety in Jiu Jitsu, I figured that once I overcame it, or at the very least learned how to operate with it, I would be an even better coach as I had a new perspective. It doesn’t take a lot of…