Reflections on my Sensei: One of the most valuable attributes a jiu jitsu player can have in order to make sustained progress over long periods of time is a SENSE OF CURIOSITY. Quite often I talk to senior instructors who complain of getting burnt out through constant teaching. Burn out is a real problem for hard working students, competitors and teachers alike. The root cause of the problem is a sense that one is doing the same thing every day without progress. This feeling can be soul destroying and in some cases, even push people out of the sport. The best antidote to this problem is to nurture a sense of curiosity. When you are fascinated by the nature of your field of study and constantly asking how you can know more about it, investigating new ways of looking at and understanding it, and experimenting with new ways to perform within it, burnout will rarely be a problem. My sensei, renzo gracie and I are almost exactly the same age. I did not start jiu jitsu until the very late age of twenty seven (I had done other martial arts, but in jiu jitsu I was a very late starter as very few outside Brazil had really heard of BJJ prior to 1992). When I started jiu jitsu as a white belt, MY SENSEI HAD ALREADY BEEN LEARNING IT FOR TWENTY two YEARS! Yet at no time have I ever seen him tired or jaded of teaching or learning techniques. Today we talked about guard passing and he was very excited to show some new concepts of guard passing he has been working on lately – showing the very same enthusiasm and drive I would see daily when I was a white belt more than two decades ago – it was fascinating stuff. It was a great reminder of how that sense of endless curiosity is the root of enthusiasm and success in both teaching and learning – the moment a man loses that, it is only a matter a time until his study and teaching suffers. I believe the key is to always keep one question in mind at all times – IS THERE A BETTER WAY OF DOING THINGS THAN YOU AND YOUR PEERS ARE CURRENTLY USING? As long as you push this question to the forefront of your consciousness the game will always be exciting and continue to make you grow – just as it does for my sensei.
