< Writings

Skip this one if you can‘t muster a sympathetic read about competitive violence or the virtue of unapologetic assertiveness.

This post was written back when I was an four-stripe white belt. The dynamics of being overdue for promotion certainly weigh on this topic, though I believe it is generally applicable.

We’ve had a lot of strong, athletic guys coming in to jiujitsu lately. I relish sparring with them, hopefully in their first roll, because I know they’ve come to prove themselves and I just love the challenge of insisting No, that will not be the direction of the smashing. Smashing is reserved for those of us who know jiujitsu.

It’s been making me think a lot about what Dominick Cruz said:

I’m stronger, I’m faster, I’m in better shape, and I want it more.

Here our ticket to victory is “I'm more skillful”, but the point stands. See also what Dr. AnnMaria de Mars said:

You need to have that voice screaming in your head and your heart: ‘You are NOT going to beat me!’

Or what Leah said (in a now-disappeared blog post):

There is a place for ego on the mat... How can we become good competitors if we can’t look at an opponent and know, fundamentally and completely, that we’re capable of beating them?

Or how Chris Weidman calmly asked for more after Lyoto Machida – one of the best strikers in the division! – attacked him with a flurry of blows.

This is to say that I’ve been working my “fuck you” muscle. Fuck you, you aren’t going to pass my guard. Bring your white-belt guillotine, I love it, it’ll never get me. Fuck your guard, you know nothing, I pass it now. Fuck your hail-Mary strength, squeeze all you want. Give me the best you’ve got. I’m still going to choke you because you don't know how to wrestle.

I didn’t embrace this feeling earlier in my training. When it arose, I misclassified it as an overactive ego, or anger, or aggression, so I tamped it down. It can be those things! That sort of manifestation is less productive. But judiciously applied, this Fuck You attitude is merely the intent to dominate. I bear my training partners no ill will. It’s just, well, fuck your half-ass guillotine. I need not let it threaten me, so I won’t. It is a measured rejection of ineffective attacks.

This dominating mindset has been tremendously helpful in making me better at jiujitsu. Contrary to expectations, it doesn’t make me play with more strength or with more risk of injury. I just don’t give up on things as much. This turns out to be useful not just for “winning” sparring rounds (which means nothing) but for learning better technique. When I decide categorically that I’m going to get someone’s back and choke them, it really challenges my back control acquisition and maintenance skills. It might be easy to fall back on well-practiced techniques like the armbar or the transition to top mount, but that wouldn‘t develop new skills. When losing back mount (or whatever it is – that’s just the best example) is defined as failure, then I have to stay in that oh-so-productive border region of my capability.

This insistence on winning is easy to mistake for a negative, reactionary emotion, but they‘re not the same. When a new person comes in, there’s a legitimate tension. Who is top dog, anyhow? What if this guy is so athletic that he runs right through my guard without any training? Where would I be then? This tension, some times and for some people, causes fear or egoistic defensiveness.

Anger is among the most animal responses to such fearful tension. It was mine, at least, when I went to my first judo tournament. I was terrified of competing in this now fully real, full-contact (sans strikes) environment. Point-fighting karate it was clearly not. I worked myself into a lather of fuming at my first opponent, and I got uchimata’d so hard I couldn’t breath right for ten minutes. Anger, as the Hagakure notes, is not often helpful for fighting.

The proper response to the tension of fear is to view your partners and opponents dispassionately, as mere canvases on which one vigorously paints trusted techniques. Your Fuck You muscle helps with that. It‘s the part of you that knows what the opponent is doing isn‘t going to work, because it’s seen it before. It says: Go ahead with your shitty headlock. Grab my pinky and my rashguard. Try an illegal slam. Flail all you want because no matter how much you thrash you will feel me sink this choke.

And then the round ends and I’m all smiles, thanks for coming in, good work there, let me show you a defense against that choke I got you with. They‘re my training partners, after all. I don’t want them injured or emotionally hurt. But for my jiujitsu and theirs to get better, I must flex my Fuck You muscle.

— Dave Liepmann, 03 November 2015