Poor tournament experience leads to renewed love for BJJ

I walked into my wrestling coach's office Friday afternoon to discuss my mental situation going into the tournament this past weekend. (Sometimes I feel more comfortable talking to him than to Ryan because he isn't emotionally invested in me.) I really didn't want to compete, I was feeling bored and tired of BJJ even though I had only trained "hard" maybe twice in the past 5 weeks and gone to maybe a total of 8 practices over that time. How could I possibly be TIRED of BJJ - if I wasn't even doing it??

Anyways, we talked. He basically said that the mental aspect is the most important part of competing and if you don't feel like you have it this time, maybe you should sit this one out. But he's not my BJJ coach so he suggested going down and seeing how I felt in the morning. Morning rolls around and I could still care less about competing. But I did (I didn't feel as if I had a choice). Unfortunately though, I didn't warm up at all (a big no no for those with exercise-induced asthma...oops, I was being lazy and thought I had more time). I was winning most of the match but felt this weird almost out of body experience where I could see myself not doing things that I was supposed to, but I just couldn't bring myself to care enough to try to rectify it. Apparently this is what being burned out is like...then I completely gassed out with nothing left - only about 5 minutes in. Crap. There goes that match.

The next day I returned but was still shy of enough drive to succeed to perform well in my first match. Crap again. FINALLY, before my second match it was as if a big mental switch flicked in my brain. I can't explain it and don't know how or why it happened (but most likely it was due to just getting my butt kicked - except for that one perfect, beautiful single leg). Anyhow, I approached the match against Addie with a little more vigor and even though I still messed up a few things, I felt much happier after the 11 min or so match ended - not in my favor but it was a good fun fight. I definitely plan to be more prepared next time.

You might say that I shouldn't have competed. And maybe that's correct. BUT nothing over the last 5 weeks had been able to jolt me out of my slump and inability to be interested in BJJ. Wrestling was fun of course but it is just technique, not training and it isn't jiu-jitsu. I just hadn't been able to find the drive to do BJJ. Thanks to Jen, Elyse, and Addie for taking no mercy, I can now say that slump has come to a close.

As soon as the knee I twisted during my last match heals. It's go time!