Warrior Mindset: The Tao of the Champion
By Roger Gracie
St. Martin's Press; 304 pages; hardcover, $29.99; EBook, $14.99; available today, Tuesday, September 16th
Roger Gracie is a 10-time Brazilian Jiu Jitsu World Champion (weight and absolute) and a former MMA World Champion. He fulfilled his original dream and is now widely recognized as the all-time greatest practitioner of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. He has opened a series of gyms around the world, as far away as Lithuania and Azerbaijan, called the Roger Gracie Academy of Jiu Jitsu. Many of his former pupils in London have gone on to export their own Roger Gracie Academy's, and adhere to his precise methodology towards teaching and the learning environment, and he is able to ensure a homogenized approach, and to the same standards of excellence for everyone passing through one.
In Gracie's new book Warrior Mindset: The Tao of the Champion, Gracie delivers a deep dive into the mindset and discipline of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu as a means of life lessons applicable to everyone, not just martial artists.
Gracie's family has been immersed in the sport from the outset. He comes from a long line of family champs, starting with his grandfather, Carlos Gracie, who is the founder of BJJ. Roger grew up surrounded by champions, and he started off as a self-contained, chubby little kid.
There were no expectations of greatness for Gracie, and certainly not becoming the all-time champion he later became. He went from being a nondescript kid to the best ever by putting his mind to it as a teenager, and accepted the discipline and work necessary to have his career take off.
Over time, he became unstoppable, and as his thirst for the knowledge needed to succeed in the sport grew, his single-mindedness took over. He had the ability to strip back overly complex moves, paring them down to their simplest and most effective forms.
Champion athletes say that everything in their sport "slowed down" for them, and that was the case for Gracie. He wasn't overthinking anymore, and the sport simply came to him.
In this engaging book, he shares lessons from his amazing career competing at the highest level, and they are thinks that can be applied to all facets of your life and career. These include how to control your emotions; learning to control your breathing; setting personal standards of excellence; mastering your thinking; and developing a "Quiet Inner Grace."
Gracie writes of the essence of his sport in this excerpt: Brazilian jiu-jitsu is the quickest-growing sport in the world. Why does it seem as if everybody is going crazy about it at the moment? Well, one reason is that people are searching for something greater than just themselves - a sense of community, structure, and personal challenge. In an era when trust in public institutions is wavering and daily life feels increasingly unpredictable, BJJ academies offer you a sense of belonging and a clear set of rules. If you're late, you must be invited onto the mat. When the instructor speaks, everyone listens. Every student is expected to maintain hygiene and respect for their training partners. But beyond these formalities, jiu-jitsu fosters an unspoken respect for one another, built through shared effort and mutual growth.
At the beginning of a jiu-jitsu class you all line up according to the colour of your belt, which indicates how long you've been training for and your level of experience. It means that a guy who runs a multi-million pound company who has just got his white belt will be way down the line from a guy who is a caretaker with 10 years of BJJ study and a black belt. That level of humility is what separates jiu-jitsu from other martial arts - here, status outside the gym doesn't matter.
For many, the mats become a sanctuary from the stresses of daily life. Anxiety, frustration and mental clutter all fade away because jiu-jitsu demands absolute focus. The moment you start thinking about work, your to-do list or anything else, you'll find yourself on the receiving end of a choke. As my former student, actor Henry Cavill, puts it: 'If I'm thinking about a script or about building something, or thinking how I'm going to feed my dog, someone will choke me out. It's that simple. I need to be consistently reading and assessing the other person.'
There's a lot to be said about its promotion of good mental health. Brazilian jiu-jitsu is the thinking-person's martial art, and it's working on many levels of the mind while also getting you fit in the process. Intense exercise leaves you feeling great, happy and energised. The greater the effort you make, the more you are able to push through exhaustion, giving you increased resilience; not forgetting the feel-good rush of endorphins...Let's just say that three of the body's feel-good chemicals are produced each time you go to your local academy to roll and spar with others. No wonder people get such a lift from the sport!
Jiu-jitsu is the art of fighting without intentionally injuring your opponent - the goal is to dominate through weight distribution, getting them on the floor where they lose their weight and size advantage, making them submit. The aim is not to hurt them, which also means you can have fun at the same time as you fight. This is why it is called the 'gentle art.'
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