11-16-24 🤍💙💜 Last day as a blue belt! 😭🥹 Thanks to the Meraki fam and all the gyms who let me train and travel! Grateful for such a welcoming community anywhere I go 🙏🏻
It’s been a long journey since I walked into a jiu jitsu gym for the first time in 2018. The first two years I hardly even took a single photo training because I didn’t want to ruin it by oversharing or posting online. It was something I was doing for myself and I was afraid of quitting and have it be another 🪦 hobby.. (now I can’t stop sharing hahaha)
I started out of fear. Fear of my own safety after having an encounter that I later reflected having no idea what I’d have done if things escalated. Having always heard Maynard from Tool talk about the benefits and his love of jiu jitsu I decided the next day to find a gym and give it a shot.
Those first 6 months were brutal. Not just the training but being so physically weak, everyday I wasn’t sure how I’d even survive another. But as with my online career, I just decided to not quit and figure it out as I go.
My love of video games I think is the true through line — gaming used to take up a massive amount of my free time until I found jiu jitsu. It has the same appeal as gaming for me but with way more real life benefits.. the strategy and learning curve with small wins here and there is like those little xbox pop up achievements 🏆
Anyways, long story short.. try jiu jitsu 🤗 even though I now feel like I know less than I did a day ago lol.