LOVE THE GRIND

In Jiu-Jitsu, there comes a time, not at the beginning when everything is new and every small victory feels like fireworks, but later, when the novelty has worn thin, when your progress no longer feels radiant or rewarding. The gains grow quieter. The breakthroughs become rare. The rolls that once felt playful now feel heavy, stubborn, grinding.

And in that slow-burning silence, frustration begins to creep into the corners of your mind. You notice yourself comparing. You notice others improving faster. You notice that the things you thought you’d mastered still slip through your fingers. You begin to doubt the hours you’ve already given to the mat.

It’s in that moment, right there in the storm between pride and discouragement, that you are invited to look inward and ask yourself with brutal honesty: Why do I practice Jiu-Jitsu? Why am I here? What am I chasing?

Because if you want to endure this difficult, murky chapter, the chapter where the graph of your progress seems to flatten into a cruel, unending plateau, you must learn to believe in the process, even when the results refuse to show themselves to you. You must trust that growth does not always announce itself loudly. Sometimes it hides in the way you breathe under pressure. Sometimes it whispers through the fact that you no longer panic when you’re stuck. Sometimes it lies quietly in resilience, discipline, and patience, qualities that don’t show on the scoreboard, but shape who you are becoming.

Even when you cannot see it, you are changing. You are improving. You are becoming steadier, calmer, more aware, forged not by victory, but by consistency.

And then comes the deeper work: you must return to the center of yourself. Ask again, with humility, Why am I doing this? What does Jiu-Jitsu mean to me beyond winning, beyond rank, beyond validation?

Soon, if you are willing to be honest, you will see the truth beneath the discomfort: the plateau only hurts because it presses against your ego. It challenges the story you tell yourself about who you are and how fast you should be advancing. It forces you to confront expectations you didn’t even realize you were carrying.

And to continue on this path — truly continue — you must loosen your grip on that ego. You must allow yourself to be a student again, vulnerable, imperfect, stumbling and curious. You must learn to love the journey not because it feeds your pride, but because it chisels your character.

When you release the need to constantly prove yourself, the mat becomes lighter. The journey becomes wider. Progress returns, not as a shout, but as a quiet companion walking beside you.

And you begin to realize that Jiu-Jitsu was never just about getting better at Jiu-Jitsu.

It was always about getting better at being you.