New Beginnings and Back to Basics

Tonight's BJJ class had some pretty insane drills. Jason first had us go one round without using the right arm, then not using the right leg, and then two rounds with our eyes closed! Strange as it sounds, I think rolling with your eyes closed is less difficult than the other two. Once you grab someone's gi, you can kind of figure out what position you're in and what you can do. It also makes you think a little more while rolling, because it's more complicated to figure out what move to do and how you're going to do it. He has had us doing some very slow and technical drilling lately, and I think making us roll with our eyes closed made us apply it during rolling. I think drilling is very underrated, and one of my pet peeves is when people just stop drilling because they've "done it enough". Unless you have 100% effectiveness in pulling off that technique from any position and setting it up from any position against anyone, you haven't drilled it enough. The top level guys drill the same moves over and over and that's how they get as good as they are. If they're still drilling, you can certainly do it for a few more minutes.

This has been a crazy couple of weeks for me between being out of training and going on job interviews. After many rejection emails and phone calls, I finally have a job. I will be participating in the NYC Civic Corps program, which is a partnership between AmeriCorps and the NYC Department of Service. From August 2011-June 2012, I'll be working on a service project in one of the five boroughs. I'll receive my project assignment next week during orientation, and will start working at my host site the following Monday. Given that it's an AmeriCorps program, my stipend is smaller than the salary for a full time job. I am a little nervous about not being able to pay for training, as a great deal of the stipend will go towards my train pass and Metrocard. I'll see what happens and how my finances work out, but after next week, I'm not sure where or how much I will be training.