3 Ways To Prepare Your Back For Jiu Jitsu

By Tom Barlow 6 Comments

Back injuries suck. But I didn’t really understand how much they sucked until I had one. Putting my socks on became a challenge and a sneeze would drop me in spasms of pain faster than a Mirko CroCop head kick.

Injuring my back was also the first time I’d ever had to take time off training. And it kept me out for around 6 months. During that time, I spent all the monies and saw all the specialist trying to figure out to fix it.

But it wasn’t until the initial pain had subsided that I discovered what had caused it.

Years of martial arts training had created imbalances my body and tightness in my hips. Which is bizarre as I could almost do the splits at the time. Once I realised this, it allowed me to start the road to recovery.

A big part of that was understanding how to relieve the tensions of Jiu Jitsu and increase my hip and hamstring flexibility. This video covers two ways I prepare my back for training and the best way I’ve found to relieve the tension created by Jiu Jitsu.

Follow Rob at Elite Flexibility for more information about flexibility training. Either visit http://www.eliteflexibility.com/ or follow him on Instagram @eliteflexibility

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Growth Mindest: The Power Of Yet

By Tom Barlow Leave a Comment

mindset
/ˈmʌɪn(d)sɛt/
noun
1. the established set of attitudes held by someone.

One of the most important elements in success is your mindset.

As a martial arts student, it can be very easy to feel a lack of progression. Students can often feel frustrated by a bad training session or if they struggle with a certain technique. And it’s common to hear students say “I’m not good at…” or “I can’t do …”

When a student says this, they’re operating from a Fixed Mindset. Their belief is that regardless of the amount of training they put in, it’s impossible for them to succeed.

However, by adding one simple word to the end of those sentences / beliefs they can switch to a Growth Mindset and achieve remarkable success.

A Better Mindset

The concept of Fixed and Growth mindsets comes from Carol Dweck. Dweck is a Professor of Psychology at Stanford University and has devoted her career to understanding success. Here’s Dweck’s definition of Fixed and Growth <indsets from a 2012 interview:

In a Fixed Mindset students believe their basic abilities, their intelligence, their talents, are just fixed traits. They have a certain amount and that’s that, and then their goal becomes to look smart all the time and never look dumb.

In a Growth Mindset students understand that their talents and abilities can be developed through effort, good teaching and persistence. They don’t necessarily think everyone’s the same or anyone can be Einstein, but they believe everyone can get smarter if they work at it.”

Here is a short video (3 min 50 sec) clearly explains the concept.

Students with a Fixed Mindset believe that success is all that matters and look to competition, exams, and training as proof of this. Unfortunately, if things don’t go there way they feel like a failure.

Because their self-worth is built upon winning or losing, these individuals will look for opportunities that justify their self-worth rather than challenges which will force them to grow.

This Fixed Mindset can cripple their progress. They’ll avoid the tougher training partners, skip training if they feel less than 100%, and can resort to cheating in order to win.

A student with a Growth Mindset sees failure as a necessary part of development and relishes opportunities to improve. In other words, they see effort to improve is their success.

Here is a more complete comparison of the Fixed and Growth Mindsets:

The Power Of Yet

According to Dweck’s research, the simple addition of “yet” can switch a belief from a Fixed mindset to a Growth mindset. For example: “I can’t do a back kick” becomes “I can’t do a back kick yet!” Or “I’m not good at press ups” becomes “I’m not good at press ups yet!”

The addition of ‘yet’ implies that in the near future with practice they will succeed. Dweck’s studies have shown that teaching children the addition of “yet” or “not yet,” results in greater confidence, and creates greater persistence as they see success in the future.

What’s fascinating is that it’s possible change a students’ mindsets.

In one study, Dweck taught students that every time they push out of their comfort zone to learn something new and difficult, the neurons in their brain can form new, stronger connections. The students who were taught this lesson actually got smarter over time.

Praise Wisely

For a parent or instructor it’s easy to praise a students successes or talent, and that’s important, but praising these alone is teaching a Fixed Mindset.

Instead, you should praise the learning process, the focus, the perseverance, and the effort that went into achieving that success.

In a recent TED talk, Dweck, sites the astonishing results of students that were praised for effort vs those that were praised for success.

“In one year, fourth grade students in the South Bronx, way behind, became the number one fourth grade class in the state of New York on the state math test.
In a year to a year and a half, Native American students in a school on a reservation went from the bottom of their district to the top, and that district included affluent sections of Seattle.”

Dweck states this happened because that the meaning of effort and difficulty were transformed.

“Before, effort and difficulty made them feel dumb, made them feel like giving up, but now, effort and difficulty, that’s when their neurons are making new connections, stronger connections. That’s when they’re getting smarter.”

(Click Here to watch the TED full talk.)

The Take Aways

Instructors, parents, and students should emphasise improvement and growth rather than success or failure in training or competition when evaluating training progress.

A Fixed mindset will limit your growth
A Growth mindset believes success comes through effort and continual development
Adding ‘yet’ to a statement can shift you from a Fixed mindset to Growth mindset
Praise the learning process, perseverance, and effort instead of the success itself.

Losing Like A Champion: The Art of Turning Defeat Into Victory

By Tom Barlow 2 Comments

Recently, I was fortunate enough to spend five weeks living, training, and competing in California.

During those weeks I learned about success and failure. I went from wining a World Championship without having a single point scored against me to losing my first fight in the next competition. A competition I should have won.

What happened? That’s an excellent question and something I’ve asked myself a lot since returning to the UK.

But that’s not the point of this article, although I will be writing about it soon.

This article is about how I learned to lose like a champion and went from consistently losing major competitions to becoming a two-time world champion. I have learned far more about about myself and my skills from losing than I ever have from wining.

Don’t get me wrong– winning is great. I love having my hand raised at the end of a match and the feeling of standing in the middle on the podium. My victories in competition are some of my proudest achievements. But in terms of development, winning doesn’t teach the same lessons as losing. Winning simply means I did everything right; losing means something different.

Of course, if I made mistakes along the way to victory I learn from them, but I find losing a much more educational experience.

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” – Thomas A. Edison

Many people view losing as failure. And I can see why, of course. It’s hard not to view losing and the associated feelings as failing. I choose to take Thomas Edison’s view on failure. Each and every failure simply gets me one step closer to your goal. Edison famously took over 10’000 attempts before he succeed in creating the light bulb. Imagine how different the world would be if he’d stopped at 9’999.

So how do you lose like a champion and achieve outstanding results through failure?

I’m sure there are a number of ways to reach your goal and overcome failures. Personally, I follow a four rules that have allowed me to come back stronger after every loss; they have always helped me to move one step closer to my goals after suffering the disappointment of defeat. Here they are.

Rule #1: Be Gracious In Defeat.

“Strive to be humble in victory and gracious in defeat.” – Boots Williams

Losing is a unfortunate reality of competition and life. We would all like to go through our entire competition career undefeated. However, very few competitors ever achieve this.

So when the unfortunate day arrives and you lose your first competition, you are faced with two options.

One is to shout, scream, curse the referee, and throw a fit. All of these things will only make you look foolish and damage your reputation.

Instead, choose to be gracious in defeat.

Congratulate your opponent, and walk out with your head held high. Simply by stepping in to the arena of combat, you have achieved something most people will never even dream of accomplishing.

Of course it’s emotionally hard, but that is a good thing. It means you care about your performance and the outcome of all your hard work.

Rule #2: Analyze Your Performance

“My past has not defined me, destroyed me, deterred me, or defeated me; it has only strengthened me.” – Steve Maraboli

Defeat can happen for any number of different reasons and most of them had little to do with my technical performance. I have lost competitions because I over-trained, under-trained, ate poorly, didn’t rest properly, lost my focus, and for many other reasons.

It’s important to analyze your whole competition process not just your matches. The problem could be in your training, your lifestyle, your diet, or a host of other areas. By reviewing your competition preparation as a whole, it will allow you to learn from your mistakes and avoid them in the future.

Rule #3: Get Back On The Horse

“Defeat doesn’t finish a man, quit does. A man is not finished when he’s defeated. He’s finished when he quits”. – Richard Nixon

The only time you are truly defeated is when you quit.

Use a competition loss to motivate you to improve your performance. Providing you are fit and healthy, try to get back in to competition as fast as possible.

The longer you take off between competitions, the more you will begin to question your abilities. This can be devastating for a competitor’s mental attitude.

Rule #4: Take Action

“When defeat comes, accept it as a signal that your plans are not sound, rebuild those plans, and set sail once more toward your coveted goal.” – Napoleon Hill

It is all well and good accepting a competition loss, analyzing your performance, and setting new goals, but if you don’t make changes then the result will be the same.

Take action and implement any necessary changes to your training or life. Evaluate your performance, set new goals, make a plan, and take action.

“No man is really defeated unless he is discouraged.” – Bruce Lee

In my experience, competition loss can be devastating. Without each and every loss I would not be where I am today.

Next time you suffer a loss, don’t let that loss discourage you. Instead, embrace it, learn from it and make the necessary adjustments that will lead you to your goal. Understanding the reasons why you lost and the ways to mitigate those issues in the future is part of the learning process.

And remember the path to achieving success never easy, but don’t failures discourage you. They are simply learning experiences.

The Conscious Competence Model of Learning

By Tom Barlow Leave a Comment

Learning any new skill, whether martial arts related or otherwise, can be a very frustrating experience for many people. It’s a common occurrence to hear beginner students say “I’ll never be able to do this”, “I’m not good enough”, or “It’s too hard!”

Many people view failure or making mistakes with negative emotions. Ironically mistakes are a vital step in the learning process. Far too often people do not see their failures as stepping stones to mastery.

Thomas Edison, the inventor of the light bulb, famously said “I have not failed 10,000 times—I’ve successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.”

Understanding how process of learning can help you stay focused on learning the new skill, and ultimately help you reach mastery.

The Conscious Competence Model of Learning defines four psychological states in the process of beginning to learn a new skill through to mastery.

Stage 1: Unconscious incompetence

“You don’t know that you don’t know how to do something”

In this stage you are unaware or do not know how to do something. This may be because no situations have arisen to demand the skill. You may also deny the usefulness of the new skill.

To progress from this stage of learning you must recognize your own incompetence and accept the value of the new skill.

The length of time an you stay in this stage will depend on the strength of the stimulus and motivation to learn a new skill.

Stage 2: Conscious incompetence

“You know that you don’t know how to do something”

In this stage you are aware you do not know how to do something and begins to recognize it would be valuable to learn this new skills.

The making of mistakes is an integral part of the learning process at this stage. Through continued practice you will refine the new skill and progress to stage 3.

Stage 3: Conscious competence

“You know how to do something but it takes effort”

In this stage you know how to do something and can demonstrate the skill but it requires concentration and effort. You may need to break down the new skill into steps or detailed processes.

There is often heavy conscious involvement involved executing the new skill. As your competence increase the frequency of mistakes will begin to decline.

Stage 4: Unconscious competence

“You know how to so something instinctively”

This is the final stage of learning a new skill. It is reached when you have practiced the skill so much it has become “second nature” and you can perform it with ease.

As a result, you can also perform this skill while executing another task and you will be able to teach it to others, depending upon how and when it was learned.

Conclusion

The goal for all martial artist should be unconscious competence in your techniques. This is achievable for anyone through sustained practice.

In Bruce Lee’s famous book the “Tao of Jeet Kune Do” he refers to the concept of thought in – action. This is the same as Unconscious competence, in which you have mastered a technique so fully that you are performing it as you realise you should be preforming it.

The next time you step on the mat or attempt learn a new skill do not become frustrated by making mistakes, or failing at your first attempt. Instead view it as a vital step on your way to mastery.

3 Ways To Prepare Your Back For Jiu Jitsu