A year ago, my friend Sean contacted me to tell me about a school club a few of his teammates from Main Line United were helping out with. The Workshop School is a project-based charter school that takes an innovative approach to teacher and learning. Sean and his teammates were pitching in to help by incorporating a jiu-jitsu program into the school’s offerings. When I saw that the students were using "jawn" -- a Philadelphia catch-all colloquialism -- for an ornament project, we had to get involved. In case you don't know, "jawn" is an all-purpose pronoun that's unique to Eastern Pennsylvania, mainly Philadelphia, that can refer to any person, place, or thing, such as "pass me that jawn" or "see you down...

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Question: I am a purple belt with four stripes. The other day I was rolling with a blue belt when two other purple belts, one with no stripes and one with two, collided with us. I asked them to move, but they said two purple belts outrank a purple and a blue, even though I pointed out that I have more stripes than either of them. The instructor agreed with the purple belts, but at the end of the very same class made sure I was higher in the ranking line than they were when we bowed out. What is the correct way to handle these kinds of situations? Does my rank trump two purples with fewer stripes even when...

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When you teach jiu-jitsu, you will routinely encounter uncomfortable situations. You might have to discretely tell someone that they need to trim their toenails. You might have to explain why pressing one’s chin into a training partner’s eye socket is in fact not a good idea. And you might have to field any number of questions about jiu-jitsu and about technique, from the benign to the bizarre.For all the weirdness, one of the most difficult scenarios for me to navigate—both as an instructor and as a student myself—is the contradictory instruction problem. One instructor shows the technique one way, and another instructor shows it another. In isolation, the problem is less pronounced, but isolation is a rarity in jiu-jitsu.I’ve had...

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These 6 submissions are what I believe every white belt needs to develop as the fundamental attacks. Each submission was picked because it develops skills and movements that later techniques are built on, and because despite their simplicity, they are still high percentage finishes at the highest levels of the sport. Armbar from closed guard You need move like you a boxer needs a right hook. This is one of the most fundamental submissions that should be in everyone’s arsenal because it allows you to dictate how your opponent behaves inside your guard. The moment he overextends, you can take his arm off. Triangle from closed guard Just like the armbar, the threat of the triangle lets you dictate how your opponent behaves...

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A few months ago my friend Stephen Goyne was at a camp in Chicago we were teaching at. After one of our training sessions, he started showing us acroyoga poses, emphasizing three he recommended for post-training recovery. We lucked out because in addition to being a BJJ black belt, Stephan is also an experienced acroyoga instructor.I had seen videos of acroyoga floating around the internet, and it always look interesting, but I never had the chance to try it. After some instruction from Stephen, we started doing acroyoga at the end of our training sessions. My hamstrings have never been more flexible, and it has helped Hillary's back and shoulder issues.The main poses we worked on are here are folded...

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A few weeks ago, Princeton BJJ hosted a book discussion group about The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance by Josh Waitzkin. In the book, Waitzkin, a chess master and Marcelo Garcia black belt, describes his love of learning and his realization that he is good at it, a realization he shares with the reader. The book systematizes the experiences many of us probably have when we try to learn something though may not have had the language to describe. Reading the book made me want to be a better learner. Well, it made me want to want to be a better learner. I do not love learning as much as I love having learned. You know...

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In my early days of training, I was a broke college student. I convinced a few friends to start training around the time that I did, and the four of us would carpool for the hour drive from campus to the closest gym, pooling together what would have otherwise been beer money to pay for gas, tolls, and the occasional post-roll pizza. Since it was a drive and money was tight, we used up our two-class-a-week plan in a single Saturday. To train during the week, we removed the only set of mats on campus—ratty gross green ones—from the dance studio under the cover of darkness after an understanding school administrator “accidently” dropped her keys.I didn’t get to take many...

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Stoic philosophy has been gaining popularity over the last few years, with books like The Ego is the Enemy and The Obstacle is the Way conquering the New York Times bestseller list renewing interest in the works of stoic philosophers like Epictetus, Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius (among others). What is stoic philosophy you may ask? Before I tell you, you may be surprised to find out you are already a stoic. Do you endure hardship without feeling or complaint? Do you avoid worrying about things outside your control, and concern yourself only with the things that you can? If the answer is yes—even if you only manage this thinking on the mat—you are well on your way to following stoic...

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When you first sign up for Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu classes, you can feel like you're drinking from a fire hose. Everyday you are bombarded with new techniques, strange movements, unknown terminology, and somehow you're expected to just figure it out while you are out of breath, sweating profusely, and being smashed by all your training partners. To simplify things for you, here are the top 5 things you must learn at white belt: Good Hip Movement You will constantly hear coaching advice to move your hips better, and it turns out it's always true. That's why I created these two videos for solo hip movement drills you can do at home or as warm-ups before training: This video explains the value of...

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Every time I turn around, our two beloved Boss Pandas are in yet another far-flung locale, bringing with them good will, jiu-jitsu knowledge, and the latest training gear. This month I am getting to follow suit, at least a little; I am spending five weeks in Cascais, Portugal, just outside of Lisbon, with a side trip to Germany. I am here taking courses toward a counseling master’s degree as part of an overseas program my (U.S.-based) institution offers. So, I am getting some credits done while having an adventure. I still do not have nearly as many frequent flier miles as Hillary and Nelson, but I have already acquired enough on this trip to take me squarely outside my comfort...

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