BJJ Kid

While doing school at GCE to become mentally strong, I wanted to learn how to become physically fit. Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is a martial art where it acts as a sport and a self defense mechanism. This something that I have always wanted to do, with other kinds of martial arts. The main challenge is that it is very hard to upgrade in this martial art, taking a lot of mentally and physically will. This also helped me meet new, people and because of the place I go, POW MMA and Fitness, I got to also explore other martial arts.

NVA/AA "Gracie Regional Tournament" 2015

So to start from the beginning, I was actually inspired first by boxing, mainly through watching movies where it showed the man get defeated and then rise up from will. So in about 2 years ago, I watched a movie called Never Back Down, this had the same premise of Karate Kid, but instead of Karate, he did mix martial arts (MMA). This movie was a slap to face and from that point I wanted to join a place and learn how to fight, but also learn how to become a more cerebral person.

It took a while, but I found POW MMA and Fitness, where for my first class I took Muay Thai, which is the art of eight limbs, meaning fists, legs, elbows, and knees. I did that for a week or, and then I remembered that the main reason I joined this place was to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and I quickly started that, while also doing Muay Thai. Then, I realized I joined this place at the right time, because they started doing martial art of the month, where every Wednesday of the month they would do a martial art that they didn’t normally have. That quickly grabbed my attention, and the very first one was Kung Fu, a very old and well known Chinese martial art. Then it was Taekwondo, which is a well known Korean martial art, mainly focuses on kicks; since everyone loved this it went on for 2 months. Now it is currently Jeet Kun Do, which is Bruce Lee’s martial art that is a mixture of martial arts he liked.

The one martial art though that has had my focus, is Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, which is my all time favorite, because this martial uses leverage, unlike many martial arts. This one takes, a lot of mental strength as well, because it it like playing chess, you are always trying to out smart people. I am training with guy named Dino Costeas, who once trained with the very famous Rickson Gracie. A man named Helio Gracie created this, because he was taking Traditional Jiu Jitsu, and he was a much smaller person than his brothers, so he tweaked that martial art to make it best for him. Now the Gracie family is huge in the fighting world, and the are the ones who created the UFC, mainly to show how powerful Brazilian Jiu Jitsu was to the world.

From doing this for 5 months, I have become very fit, and I think a little more logically in certain situations. Something that martial arts taught me that I always will remember, is that people do martial arts so they never have to use them. I think I can stand for myself more, being someone that people could always pick on, making me very inconfident about myself. I am still a white belt, but one life goal I have set for myself, to become a black belt, which will be hard but I am up for the challenge. I will definitely, keep doing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and trying other martial arts to mainly become a well rounded fighter.