Jiu Jitsu is a strategic combat technique whose origins lie in the ancient Eastern practice of Japanese jutjutsu. However, modern day Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is a relatively new martial art. BJJ’s primary use is for defense and fighting. Those who decide to take jiujitsu seriously also develop an awareness of how body, mind, and spirit work together.
Most martial arts come from China and Japan, such as Karate, Judo, and Jiu-Jitsu. Jiu jitsu is probably one of the most intuitive. When Japanese jujutsu was brought to Latin America in the early 20th century it quickly evolved into the sport we now know (and love) called Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. It combines martial arts, self-defense, and combat sports all in one. It’s a sport that requires discipline and dedication, especially if you want to become a professional. But why is Jiu Jitsu is good for you?
In jiu jitsu, the aim is not to harm the opponent, but to immobilize them. It is not a sport centered on punches and fighting. BJJ is also a philosophy of life, of improving physical and mental fitness, and learning to defend oneself from an attack. Even a thin and small person learns how to dominate a much larger and even more energetic person. But that’s just a start: here are 10 more excellent reasons you should throw on a gi and hit up your local BJJ gym.
1. It’s an Excellent Way to Get in Shape. It Works the Whole Body.
This sport is demanding and its practitioners require consistency and discipline. It can even be a very extreme sport at first, primarily if you are not used to the rhythm of the exercises. Does this mean that BJJ is bad for your body? Not at all! People of all ages can practice Jiu Jitsu: one of its main advantages is that it benefits anybody who practices it, regardless of their age.
In adult jiu-jitsu lessons, there is plenty of cardiovascular conditioning along with stretching and strength training. Here are some of the physical highlights you will get if you start training BJJ regularly:
- Weight loss: the burning of fat without loss of muscle causes weight loss.
- Increased strength: training (especially rolling) can be incredibly physically demanding. You will work a ton of muscles, without even thinking about it, when you start rolling with a partner.
- Flexibility: jiujitsu requires flexibility, especially so you can get out of the choke holds your partner puts you in. Believe me, your body will gradually become more and more flexible.
- Cardiovascular capacity: try three, 5 minute BJJ sparring (rolling) matches one after the other and tell me jiu jitsu isn’t good for cardio. I dare you.
- Lung capacity: by controlling breathing during aerobic exercise, lung capacity increases.
- Improved overall physical condition: for all the benefits that are mentioned here, BJJ is also a sport that will remarkably improve your physique.
Pretty much all adult lessons at jiu-jitsu schools will include these health benefits. You can choose a basic program or an advanced one. The lessons are usually warm-up, a technical explanation, specific work on various techniques, and basic combat (generally after you’ve learned a few things).
2. It’s Great For Kids Too!
Kids jiu jitsu is generally taught in an atmosphere of fun and fellowship. Through jiujitsu, children learn personal values, respect, resilience, and confidence. Here’s just a few more benefits of BJJ for the younger generation:
- It encourages motor skills. Children become more aware of their body and its movements.
- BJJ stimulates the mind. Children have to decide which technique to use in the different movements of the fight, so it stimulates their reflexes and improves their decision making skills.
- It improves confidence and self-assurance: just as in adults, this discipline helps kids face difficult situations with security and self-confidence.
Brazilian jiu jitsu is a highly recommended sport for people of all ages to practice.
3. It Builds Personal Resilience.
One of the central philosophies of BJJ is that a smaller, weaker individual can successfully defend himself from a larger, stronger opponent by effectively using leverage. This teaches each practitioner that with perseverance and discipline, they can overcome very difficult obstacles. Jiu-jitsu is a very complete and exciting sport. It requires discipline to be able to follow training schedules and mental strength to overcome the fears that confront you every time you roll with someone better than you. You also need to develop perseverance and determination if you want to graduate from white belt to blue belt, from blue belt to purple belt, and so on. All of these qualities are needed in our real lives as we learn to develop respect for others, fellowship, humility, and responsibility. BJJ is more than a sport; it is a lifestyle.
4. BJJ is a Meditative Art Form.
Jiu JItsu teaches an awareness of the present moment. This is one of the soundest reasons why jiu jitsu is good for you. By practicing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, we get to know the nature of our emotions in the present moment. We can experience joy, excitement, sadness, fear, frustration, anger, hate, not drawn from the past or projecting in the future, but at that very moment. It is a way to find what we have inside and to avoid entanglements in the emotions that can control us. When you train, you emulate battle situations where there are one or more enemies to survive. As you get better at BJJ, you learn to sense and act, instead of reacting out of fear or habit.
The martial arts have an explicit physical component that can help deal with certain harmful emotions that people carry. Awareness and connection with the body is a direct path to the “here and now”. From this point of view, it’s easy to see BJJ as an active meditation. It can have a profound effect on our state of mind and how we manage our emotions.
5. The BJJ Community is Great. Welcoming and Humble, Yet Willing To Push You.
A vital aspect of a person’s mental health is their sense of community and belonging. By practicing BJJ, you begin to open up relationships with others who are excited about your learning. You will communicate and compete constantly with your training partners. When you join a jiu jitsu gym, you quickly find a community of hard working people who want to help you bring out the best in yourself, physically and mentally.
The BJJ community stands out from other communities of martial arts practitioners. Most jiujitsu practitioners focus on humility, patience, and teamwork in addition to competitiveness and fighting. It is a community based on the principles of camaraderie and integrity. These principles act as a guide for the development of all of its members.
6. It Builds Confidence
The confidence built through BJJ has a lot to do with the ability to defend oneself. As you begin to learn more about the art, you can face challenges you didn’t think you were capable of. When you overcome these challenges, you start to gain confidence. Submitting an opponent, finally using a technique that you had difficulty carrying out, or simply moving up a level are all factors that build self-esteem. People learn to trust themselves. This leads to strong character building and a more positive outlook on life.
7. It’s Addictive (In a Good Way).
Some people are intimidated about joining a BJJ gym. They worry that they don’t have enough skills to join. However, skill level is not important at all when you first start out. What is important is consistency: the results come little by little! When you show up to train regularly, you will be amazed at how much your BJJ knowledge and abilities will grow.
The amount of time you train depends on whether you intend to compete or not. Professional competitors usually train at least twice a day. Those who do not wish to compete and only want to learn jiu-jitsu train about three days a week. As you start to notice the improvement in your skills, you will want to increase your practice time. There is so much to learn about yourself and about the sport that most people who stick with jiujitsu after the first few months, wind up sticking with it for a lifetime.
8. It Reduces Stress
Although many people think Jiu Jitsu trains people to be violent, this idea is entirely false. BJJ promotes peaceful ideas and advises the use of force only when necessary. In fact, many professionals recommend jiu jitsu training to people with anger problems. It is also recommended for those with high-stress levels, or with aggressive behavior. With consistent BJJ training, people learn to better control their emotions and they find their stress levels greatly reduced.
9. It Teaches Patience.
The practice of BJJ teaches you that consistency and patience are critical to personal growth. In Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, as in other martial arts, there is a belt grading system. In the case of BJJ, the grading system is slightly different: it offers intermediate degrees between belts. Have you ever wondered why some BJJ belts have a stripe? Well, this is where the degree system comes in.
The degree system consists of the instructor’s recognition of a student’s hard work. An instructor will consider the time a student has dedicated and the assimilation of the techniques that he or she is using during the time between the belts. This recognition as a general rule (not for black belts) will always be at the discretion of the instructors. However, as a reference and orientation guide, the IBJJF has its own official grading system.
10. It’s Fun!
Are you still wondering why Jiu-Jitsu is good for you? This answer is even more straightforward: it’s fun. Obviously a lot of other hobbies are good for you too. You can make friends in a CrossFit team, lose weight on a bike, or gain confidence practicing Muay Thai. However, Jiu-Jitsu has all those things and more. Some people describe their BJJ training as an experience that makes time go away. Others describe it as entering a state of mind where all of life’s problems disappear temporarily. One BJJ practitioner would respond that after “rolling” nothing provides the same experience as Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
So what makes Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu different? If we take a cue from nature, we can observe how animals play. We’ve all seen some video of a bear wrestling or large cats making passes on their backs. From an early age, most mammals engage in this type of play by pretending to fight. Despite having claws or fangs, the purpose of these games is not to seriously injure each other. Instead animals practice techniques as if they were fighting.
Although it’s often a lot of fun, play is undoubtedly an evolutionary behavior. There are theories as to why mammals play, all of which agree that it’s a preparation for real life. Studies have also shown that playing provides more than just survival training. Studies show that rats, one of the most playful of all mammal species, are one of the most stress-reduced species.
With this, it’s easy to see why Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is truly unique. It connects us to innate mammalian behavior.
Other martial arts such as wrestling or Judo also use very similar moves to those used during play. However, these arts are more strict in their rules, limiting the variety of moves that we might try to explore in other ways. Today, only Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu allows a dynamic and creative style like the play of wild mammals.
Conclusion
One of the (many) advantages of BJJ is that the spiritual and mental strength it builds gives us a high level of confidence and self-esteem. Jiujitsu is a martial art that is growing by leaps and bounds and may one day be an Olympic sport.
Here are just a few of Its great virtues:
- Open to anyone who wants to start their practice.
- It can be a relatively cheap sport to learn.
- Builds self-confidence and resilience. People learn to overcome adversity.
And, perhaps best of all, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is FUN. While you are having fun, you also get into excellent shape, learn to be present, and reduce the stresses of your daily life. All of these benefits make it more than a sport: it’s a way of life. Now that you know why Jiu-jitsu is good for you, what are you waiting for?