A martial arts milestone: my purple belt in BJJ!
Hi Dojo readers!
I’m interrupting my current Bruce Lee blog series (which you should TOTALLY be reading! 🙂 ) because an unexpected thing happened today that I wanted to share.
We brought in Karel Pravec (aka. “Silver Fox”) to do a seminar for us here at Leadership Martial Arts and, of course, it was fantastic. Readers may remember Silver Fox from previous Dojo posts about my training trips up to Renzo Gracie Academy in New York (if not, go refresh yourself…AND see him totally school me here!)…
The seminar was great and everyone there learned some excellent new submissions and tons of details to help sharpen their game…
Then afterwards it was time for promotions. I knew a few of my friends and training partners would be getting promoted and was happy to see all their hard work pay off. I figured my friend Chase would be our first LMA purple belt…and I was right.
But he wasn’t the only one. 🙂
After nearly 7 years of Brazilian Jiujitsu training I was awarded the rank of purple belt by my instructor and friend, Derek “TC” Richardson!
And to make it even more special, Silver Fox brought our belts down from “the Mother Ship”…
For many readers unfamiliar with BJJ, the belt levels for adults are white, blue, purple, brown and black. Karel said that for most people, purple is the hardest belt to earn. I won’t know if that’s true for me until I look back from the other side of black belt (one day!), but I do know that in 28+ years of martial arts training and dozens of belts earned in various styles, this is the one that means the most to me BY FAR!
But, this is just the beginning. From here on, it only gets harder and the pressure is much greater. Chase and I represent the highest ranking grapplers at LMA at the moment and have the responsibility of representing the school both in competition and when anyone comes to train with us. As my friend, and Gustavo Machado black belt, Ken Hudson once said about earning a new belt, “This just means you have a bigger bulls-eye on your back!”
However, that’s what martial arts training is all about. Constantly pushing to improve, expand and grow until the day you die…
…much like being a disciple, in fact.
Thanks to all my training partners, my instructor, and all the great martial artists I’ve had the pleasure of learning from!
Oh, and here’s the video if anyone’s curious:
Blessings from the Dojo,
JM
Categories: Blog, Martial Arts
Well done brother!
by Wayne Perry on Sep 9, 2012 at 3:06 am
Thanks!
by jm on Sep 9, 2012 at 3:10 am
Congratulations JM!
by dandon on Sep 9, 2012 at 6:04 pm
[…] after an eventful milestone weekend (see my previous post!), it’s back to our look at how the late martial arts master/pop-culture icon, Bruce Lee, has […]
by Disciple Dojo – JMSmith.org » How Bruce Lee shaped my ministry (part 3) on Sep 10, 2012 at 5:23 pm
Congratulations! JM, you are still impressing us.
by June and Dave on Sep 10, 2012 at 7:04 pm