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This is Undaunted Life, a man's podcast.
0:51
I'm your host Kyle Thompson, let's get into it.
0:54
A friend loves it all times, and a brother is born for adversity.
0:59
That is Proverbs 17-17.
1:00
Guys, thanks so much for listening to this podcast episode.
1:02
We are so thankful for you, but guys, I just also want to say right before we get into
1:06
today's content because I'm very, very excited about today's content.
1:09
But I want to remind you that we are a 100% donor-supported ministry.
1:13
So guys, we have people that are coming on on a monthly basis or even a one-time basis
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don't really make any money off of, we've given away hundreds and hundreds of hours worth
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We've given away just tons of content in terms of devotionals for free.
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We've got a lot of stuff coming out in the next 12 to 18 months that'll all be for free.
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And the only reason we're able to do that is because guys are supporting us.
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We thank you guys so much for considering that and also to the guys that have been giving
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all this time, you are our rock, you are why we're able to do this.
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But let's go ahead and get into today's content.
1:54
January 27th of 2022, that will literally be a day that I will not soon forget, okay?
2:03
Because that was the day that I was promoted to Purple Belt in jujitsu, okay?
2:07
It was an absolutely incredible night and we'll get more into the festivities of the evening.
2:11
But it was an incredible experience in some ways shocked that it even happened.
2:16
But before we get into the festivities of the night and everything they're in, I wanted
2:19
to reflect a little bit on how I've discussed Brazilian jujitsu on this podcast.
2:23
Because jujitsu, for any of you guys that have been listening to this for any point of time
2:27
or any length of time, you've seen jujitsu as kind of a center point for this show.
2:32
And really from the beginning, you know, I've done entire episodes on the sport and I mention
2:37
it often, as many of you know, and I'm almost constantly encouraging my audience, right?
2:41
All of you in my audience and really anyone that I'm around, all the people that are in
2:45
my circle to get into jujitsu, I'm constantly telling guys like, hey, I want to get in shape
2:50
and it's like, nah, come come to jujitsu, come try it on Sunday nights with my crew guys
2:54
and you know, work out a little bit and you learn some things and I'm just constantly,
2:57
you know, like evangelizing how great jujitsu is and what a big impact, big positive impact
3:02
it can have on your life.
3:04
And really I've done two entire episodes of this podcast just really dedicated exclusively
3:09
to my experience with jujitsu and then I've done some interviews as well.
3:12
So episode five of this podcast is six months of jujitsu, episode 62 of this podcast was
3:17
bluebell.
3:18
That's the episode I did the week after I got bluebell.
3:20
And I'll put both of those in the show notes so you guys can listen to to them for yourself
3:23
but just kind of give you a little bit of a primer.
3:25
Episode five that was called six months of jujitsu that was released on January the 18th
3:28
of 2018.
3:29
Man, it's just crazy to think about how long ago I started training and I'm going to be
3:33
trained in that long compared to some of my partners.
3:35
But you can listen to that one for yourself but I'll give you a little bit of a rundown.
3:38
I went through my athletic history, kind of told you what sports I played and you know
3:41
how none of that really related to jujitsu except for a couple of years doing wrestling,
3:45
how I had a lifetime interest in mixed martial arts and fighting me joining fight club.
3:50
That's my group of guys that I talked about my foxhole group that meets on Sunday nights
3:53
at the forge at seven o'clock at the forge in Edmond, Oklahoma.
3:56
And I went there the first time I know the exact date.
3:58
I first started training jujitsu and that was July the 10th of 2016.
4:02
And the reason why I know that date is because July the 9th of 2016 was UFC 200.
4:08
And that's where I met all these guys.
4:09
We did like this man day thing and guys were like, Hey, we trained jujitsu on Sunday nights.
4:13
If you want to come roll out the very next day, I was like, Yeah, let's do it.
4:16
So July 10th, 2016, that was my very, very first class I ever took.
4:19
And then, you know, from there, I was kind of flirting with the idea of doing Brazilian
4:22
jujitsu for real.
4:23
Then I eventually found the forage.
4:25
I talked about that in that episode.
4:26
And then I talked about the immediate lessons that I learned.
4:29
I learned about how, you know, humility is a big deal because, you know, I'll be talking
4:33
a little bit more about that here in a second, but humility is a really big deal.
4:37
There's a lot of power in jujitsu.
4:38
You can really learn how to control people physically in that there's some power in that.
4:42
And also that jujitsu can be for everyone.
4:44
That's not a particular body style that does well.
4:46
There's not a particular type of athlete that tends to do well.
4:48
You know, I talked about my first tournament.
4:50
I talked about Andre Galval giving me my Brazilian jujitsu nickname Viking.
4:54
I talked about the spiritual mental and physical connection with jujitsu.
4:57
So that was episode five.
4:58
So again, right from the beginning, I was talking about jujitsu and then fast forward
5:01
to February 14th of 2019.
5:03
That was episode 62 called bluebell.
5:06
So I talked about getting my blue belt.
5:07
I talked about, you know, everything kind of leading up to that moment.
5:10
I went through the lessons that I had learned since episode five of the podcast.
5:13
I also went into three things that I need to needed to do in order to make my Brazilian
5:17
jujitsu game even better at the time.
5:20
And the three things I put out there were to feel even heavier on top, you know, increase
5:24
my top pressure also to keep getting the takedown, right?
5:27
Because I would get a lot of takedowns, but just kind of keep doing that.
5:30
And then the other one I said, kind of keep the dog hungry.
5:33
And so that's just always having, you know, that dog and you like, Hey, I'm going to scramble
5:36
a little bit, you know, faster than you.
5:38
And I'm going to go a little bit harder to you than that kind of a thing.
5:41
But then I also talked about the three things that I need to fix with my Brazilian jujitsu
5:44
game, which is funny because looking back at the back of the list, I'm like, man, I still
5:46
suck at a lot of these things.
5:48
But the first one is just being comfortable on my back.
5:51
And so that's something that I'm certainly a lot more comfortable on my back.
5:54
But that leads in the second thing, which I said, which is being dangerous from my back,
5:57
which I'm not very dangerous from my back.
5:59
That's still something I need to work on, but my guard isn't getting passed as easily.
6:02
I'm doing at least some sweeps.
6:04
I'm getting some triangles, that type of a thing.
6:06
And the third thing I looked at was not getting stuck in bottom side control and, you know,
6:10
spoiler alert, I still get stuck in bottom side control sometimes.
6:12
But those are the things I want to kind of talk through on that episode.
6:16
And then also I just kind of pitched all of you on why you should train your jujitsu.
6:19
So again, guys, I've talked about this a whole lot and it's been years and years in
6:24
the making to kind of get to this moment.
6:26
And that was the night where I got my purple belt.
6:28
But before we get to that exact evening, I need to back up about three weeks.
6:33
Because I knew that promotions were coming up.
6:36
I didn't think there was a very good chance that I would be promoted.
6:39
But the way that we do promotions at the forge in Edmond is we kind of do a big deal.
6:43
We do a big evening where a lot of people show up and people that are being promoted
6:46
are kind of put in a separate group.
6:48
And then that person's basically put through the gauntlet.
6:50
They have to roll constantly for about an hour and a half with, you know, little breaks
6:53
here and there.
6:54
But the thing is is you need, you're going to be one of two people, or I guess one of
6:58
three people, you're going to be a spectator or you're going to be getting promoted or you're
7:02
going to be one of the people that's helping the person get promoted, get promoted, right?
7:06
You're going to be helping put them through the gauntlet.
7:08
So either way, you've got to be in really, really good shape.
7:10
Now I'm in good shape in general, but rolling for those of you guys that do Jiu Jitsu, you
7:14
know, rolling is a little bit different kind of shape.
7:16
And so I was like, okay, I'm going to increase my level of classes, you know, that I'm doing
7:20
or increasing amount of classes I'm doing for the five or six weeks leading to that.
7:23
Because more than likely I'm going to be, you know, just a teammate that night, I want
7:26
to make sure that I give good roles and good looks to the guys that are getting promoted.
7:29
I want to be a good teammate.
7:31
And then three weeks, literally to the day prior to that evening, I suffered a pretty
7:36
bad injury.
7:37
I popped a rib out.
7:38
And so, and I never really got an exact diagnosis, even though I saw a couple of doctors could
7:44
have been a fracture, you know, it was definitely some muscle tearing and some cartilage tearing
7:48
up in that area.
7:49
But for any of you that have experienced a rib injury, which before this moment, I had
7:52
not, it's awful.
7:53
It is absolutely awful.
7:55
You can't breathe.
7:56
There's not really a position you can lay or sit in that's comfortable.
8:00
I sneezed about two days after I popped this rib and it was, I thought I was dead.
8:04
I was like, okay, that's it.
8:05
I mean, life's just over.
8:07
That's as bad as it can possibly get.
8:09
But all I was thinking about was dang it.
8:12
Like everyone says it takes forever, you know, four to six weeks for a rib, really to heal
8:16
and for you to get back to normal to where you can really move.
8:19
But I was like, you know, I'm going to really dedicate myself.
8:21
I'm going to really, really dedicate myself to keeping as much inflammation out of the
8:25
body in any way that I could, you know, I was, I was willing to do some experimental
8:28
stuff to try and heal, which I didn't end up doing because I didn't want to like lose
8:31
10 years off the end of my life so that I could, you know, roll for a couple of hours
8:34
one night whenever I was in my thirties.
8:37
But I did everything I could, you know, was, you know, putting healing balm on and I was
8:42
icing it all the time and I just straight up rested for about a week and then one of my
8:46
physical therapists buddy said, okay, here's some different things you can do that won't
8:49
really tweak the rib.
8:50
And so I was able to still work out and for me, the only thing I could do cardiovascular-wise
8:55
was to ride on an air-dime bike, but without using the arm.
8:59
So I would basically sit on an air-dime bike with a, you know, a couple of pairs of pants
9:02
on, a couple of hoodies on, just with my hands in my pockets and I would just, you
9:05
know, move that bike for 20, 25, 30 minutes, something like that and just try to do some
9:09
sprints and really do anything, excuse me.
9:12
And I also did some classes.
9:15
I went to some of our Jiu Jitsu classes because, excuse me, the coughing podcast too in a row.
9:20
But there was an element of I wanted to make sure I stayed mentally sharp that I, you know,
9:24
I wasn't just taking three weeks off and not even thinking about Jiu Jitsu.
9:28
And so I did go to some classes.
9:30
I would basically sit on the air-dime bike in class and I would just kind of watch whenever
9:33
people were drilling, but then I would just still get a little bit of work in.
9:37
But here we are.
9:38
It's the week of promotion week.
9:40
You know, of course, I don't know until I show up if I'm actually going to be promoted
9:43
or if I'm actually just going to be helping out and I didn't feel great.
9:47
The rib didn't feel good.
9:48
I wasn't, you know, getting into certain.
9:50
I wasn't getting into positions where it felt normal, right?
9:52
But the day before one of my main training partners and main coaches, a guy named Aldo
9:56
Gonzalez, who I'll talk more about here in a second, you know, we went up to the forays
9:59
a day before and I was like, I just want to see what I can do.
10:01
Like what takedowns do I have available to me?
10:03
What positions on bottom dive available?
10:05
Can I do some sweeps?
10:06
Well, blah, blah, blah.
10:07
And let's just say it was, it was not a fun experience because basically everything that
10:11
I wanted to do hurt.
10:13
So I take downs are a big part of my game.
10:16
None of those were really available to me because the bridging motion.
10:19
So if you lay down on your back and you like bridge your hips off the mat or something
10:22
like that, you know, that motion was where I got hurt to begin with.
10:26
And so a lot of my takedowns, I'm kind of bridging to dump the guy to a certain side.
10:30
So that was going to get after the rib and all that.
10:32
And so basically every position we tried to get into, except for bottom knee shield, which
10:37
is, you know, a version of bottom half guard was not really available to me and Aldo gave
10:42
me some good advice.
10:43
He goes, man, you know, depending upon what happens tomorrow, you just need to play defense.
10:48
Like no explosive movements, like no takedowns, like none of that stuff that you're used
10:51
to just, you know, play some defense.
10:53
I try to pull some guys into half guard, see what you can do from there.
10:56
I work a little bit from lockdown.
10:57
So here we go.
10:59
So then I roll in there on Thursday night and basically from the very beginning, you know,
11:03
whether or not you're going to be promoted because they call your name out and they put
11:05
you in a separate side of the gym.
11:08
And then they kind of get everything, you know, facilitated.
11:11
And then they kind of bring you in there.
11:13
And so from the very beginning, you know, they're naming all the names and I'm like, Oh, yeah.
11:16
That guy's getting promoted.
11:17
That's awesome.
11:18
That's awesome.
11:19
That's awesome.
11:20
And then they said my name and it's like.
11:21
Okay.
11:22
All right.
11:23
I'm here now.
11:24
Like let's might as well do this.
11:26
There's no way to tape the ribs up.
11:27
I didn't take any pills.
11:28
It's just like we're going to have to deal with it.
11:30
And so without getting into everything, you know, for the next hour and a half or so,
11:34
about a dozen of us that were being promoted at varying levels, we were put out there and
11:39
the best of the best from our gym and even people just affiliated with our gym showed
11:42
up.
11:43
I got to give a big shout out to my coaches because they were very on top of, you know,
11:48
telling the my training partners that night, the guys competing against me about the injury,
11:51
making sure that they were aware of it.
11:53
And even whenever they would roll with me, they rolled very, very, very hard.
11:56
They went for a lot of subs, but they were aware of the injury.
11:59
And then we get to the end of that, the guy that's kind of facilitating everything starts
12:03
clapping.
12:04
Everybody starts clapping.
12:05
We know what's going to happen.
12:06
So we all kind of line up, you know, based on our color, a belt and all that.
12:09
And then we just go down the line and they start promoting, you know, whites to blue and
12:13
blue to purple and purple to brown.
12:14
And we did have one guy go from brown to black, more on my teammate, Chris, even here in a
12:18
bit as well.
12:20
And then they got to me kind of bring brought me out there.
12:22
You know, it's great.
12:23
Everybody's clapping.
12:24
It's a big family type deal.
12:25
You know, you take your belt off and put it around your neck and, you know, our main
12:28
black belt, Rob Harper, who's a third degree black belt, you know, put my purple belt
12:31
on me.
12:32
And it's just like, oh my gosh, like this just crazy, amazing moment.
12:35
One of my main coaches and training partners named Tyler Mera, he had some very, very nice
12:39
things to say about, you know, my tenacity and my ability to kind of work through injuries
12:43
and all that, which was really, really nice to hear and kind of went back and, you know,
12:48
my wife was there.
12:49
She kind of snuck in.
12:50
You know, I thought she was going to be home with the baby, but you know, she snuck in
12:52
there, you know, found a babysitter at the last minute because, you know, someone to
12:55
let her know, you know, that was on the inside that I was actually being promoted.
12:58
So I got to, you know, experience that with her, take pictures, we had pizza and, you know,
13:02
Gatorade and beer and all that stuff afterwards.
13:04
And it was just a great environment.
13:06
But I will say one thing that was, it was interesting is, you know, after everybody kind
13:09
of settled down and, you know, we had, you know, kind of recovered a little bit and had
13:13
some cake and we're all leaving.
13:15
So I get in my truck and I close the door and kind of where I park is a little bit, you
13:19
know, far away from the door and, you know, not in the same parking lot or whatever.
13:23
And I just sat there for a moment and I just kind of took a deep breath and thought about
13:28
how thankful I was for that moment, how thankful I was for my teammates, how thankful I was
13:33
for my family and how thankful I was just for Jiu Jitsu in general.
13:37
And you know, how thankful to God I am that, you know, I found this place and I found these
13:40
people because I really feel like I hit the jackpot with the forge in Edmond, Oklahoma.
13:44
And you know, it was just, it was a moment, you know, a quick moment, you know, five,
13:47
10 seconds of just extreme thankfulness before I drove on and got some ice cream to, to celebrate
13:53
the night, even a little bit further.
13:55
Now one thing that I did similar in the blue belt episode, so those of you that listened
13:58
to it, even here recently, you'll, you'll kind of know where this goes because I thought
14:01
about this is, you know what changed immediately after that purple belt was put around my waist?
14:09
Nothing, nothing changed, right?
14:15
I mean, I'm the same skill level as the Jiu Jitsu fighter I was when I walked into the gym
14:22
that day.
14:24
As I was walking out, I had a new experience, but I didn't learn a new move.
14:28
I didn't learn a new position, right?
14:29
I didn't really get any better because I was playing defense for an hour and a half.
14:33
I basically couldn't do anything other than get tapped and try not to die, right?
14:37
But I left the gym with a new color of dyed fabric belt, which symbolizes something.
14:45
It symbolizes essentially what my coaches think about me because I think we have a dozen black
14:49
belts affiliated with our school and those are the people that get together to decide
14:52
who's being promoted.
14:54
So that that's an awesome feeling to know that these people think enough of my game to think
14:59
that I'm at that level, whether I disagree with them or not, because, you know, within
15:04
six months of that evening, I was thinking to myself, man, I'm closer to my first day
15:07
of Jiu Jitsu than I am to my purple belt.
15:09
Like I just felt like I was stagnating that I wasn't really getting any better, but then,
15:13
you know, kind of made some changes and kind of worked towards that direction and, you know,
15:17
the coaches thought enough of the game of my game to give me my purple belt, but again,
15:21
nothing changed.
15:22
I'm the same person.
15:24
I had the same personal struggles.
15:25
I have the same issues whenever I, you know, go home or go to work or do any of those things,
15:29
you know, same issues with the podcast and growing on daunted life.
15:32
All that stuff is the same.
15:34
It's the only the color of the belt that changes and you know what's required of me training.
15:40
You know, it's cool.
15:42
It's one thing to get a belt and then never show up again.
15:44
Some guys do that a blue belt.
15:45
They get the blue belt blues and they're like, ah, you know, I'm good.
15:47
I'm a blue belt.
15:48
I can pretty much beat up everybody, right?
15:49
But what's required to me is to get right back in the gym.
15:53
I'm still rehabbing the ribs so it's going to be a while before I can go live in the way
15:56
that I, that I'm used to, but it just kind of is what it is.
16:00
But then we got to fight club.
16:02
So again, every Sunday night, you know, my, my group of guys, my foxhole, we get together.
16:05
We're reading the same book.
16:06
We do a workout and then we train Jiu Jitsu.
16:08
So Russ, the ringleader, you know, if you guys remember from episode 104 of the your
16:12
foxhole series, Rush Whitman, he was my first Jiu Jitsu coach and he, you know, we were
16:17
kind of doing our talking right before I lead the workout and then he kind of broke up the
16:21
talk and he said, man, big congratulations.
16:24
He's to go out to Kyle and, you know, I won't say everything that he said, but he just said
16:28
how great of accomplishment he was.
16:30
And when he started doing Jiu Jitsu, when he was a white belt, like he was getting smoked
16:34
by people that have been training for like 30 or 45 days, right?
16:37
And he's like, Oh my gosh, this is crazy.
16:38
And he's, you know, kind of this big hulking guy.
16:41
And then whenever he would compete as a white belt against a blue belt, he's like, Oh my
16:44
gosh, these blue belts are like almost impossible.
16:46
It's like, I feel like a blue belt could get in a street fight.
16:49
And even if they lost, I bet the person they fought would probably not want to fight that
16:52
person again.
16:53
But then he's like, when I was a white belt, I would go against these purple belts and
16:58
they were like a different thing because he was like, I was a white belt.
17:02
I was a human, but a purple belt was just a different thing altogether.
17:06
And he basically said, you know, a purple belt is like a certified, you know what kicker,
17:10
right?
17:11
Like that's basically what a purple belt is.
17:14
And he's a purple belt.
17:15
Now he's been a purple belt for a while.
17:16
But he was just basically being very, very complimentary of me and of, you know, how far
17:21
I've come just even as a person since I started training jujitsu, a lot of life lessons that
17:25
I've learned, but then also just gave me a very encouraging message in terms of, Hey,
17:29
this is who you are right now, but, you know, keep going.
17:32
Let's keep training.
17:33
And it was just an inspiring message to hear.
17:35
But right now I kind of want to get in to the turning points in my jujitsu life.
17:39
And in this episode, we're going to talk about some turning points, some of the lessons
17:41
I've learned.
17:42
You know, I got some very interesting things I want to share with some of my coaches.
17:45
So even if you're not a jujitsu person, there's going to be some interesting takeaways that
17:48
you can have for the remainder of this episode.
17:50
But the turning points in my jujitsu life so far, I'll go at each level.
17:53
So at white belt, and I've talked about this before, but I really love the story and I
17:57
love sharing it.
17:58
When I was a white belt, I had a very tough love lesson that was delivered to me by, you
18:04
know, basically my main training partner for my entire jujitsu life, which is Tyler Mera,
18:08
who's an IBJ JF, a brown belt world champion, like he's, he's legitimately one of the most
18:13
dangerous human beings that I know.
18:15
But at white belt, you know, I was probably about a year year in because I got my white
18:18
belt at basically at the year and a half mark, and I had a bad practice.
18:21
So I go back to the locker room and I'm changing and I'm brooding and I'm doing all this and
18:26
kind of cursing myself and all that.
18:28
And Tyler, who's a very reserved guy, doesn't really say a lot, but when he does say things,
18:32
you kind of perk up, he kind of knew what I was doing and I was brooding and I was having
18:35
a little ego fart and all those different things.
18:37
And he just kind of looks at me and he goes, Kyle, what would you do to the Kyle that
18:42
you were six months ago?
18:44
And it's like, oh, I'd, I'd kill that Kyle, like there's, there's no way the guy from
18:49
me from six months ago could beat the me from today.
18:52
And he just looked at me and said, okay, then shut up.
18:56
He's like, we're all getting better, right?
18:59
Like you're training with all of us, you're getting better, but also we're getting better.
19:03
So you're going to have tough classes, get over it.
19:06
And I didn't get offended.
19:07
I was like, dang, like you're completely, completely right.
19:12
And that that really changed a lot of my mindset at the white belt mode, which is like, Hey,
19:16
man, we're all getting better at the same time.
19:18
And it just is what it is.
19:19
So that was a big turning point for me at white belt.
19:22
Now at blue belt, I had several turning points for me.
19:26
And I guess the first one that would be interesting to you as an audience is deciding that jujitsu
19:33
was going to be a part of my life forever.
19:37
Now you might think to yourself, but wait a minute, Kyle, you were doing all this, you
19:40
know, preaching and evangelizing about jujitsu, a white belt, you know, I thought you wanted
19:43
to do jujitsu for forever.
19:45
And the reality is at white belt, like from the moment I took my first class of the forge,
19:50
I thought from that day on that that was going to be my reality that I was going to do jujitsu
19:55
for my entire life.
19:56
I was going to be try to be the guy rolling in his sixties, right?
20:00
And then came the injuries.
20:03
I got bit by the injury bug, something fierce in my blue belt days, right?
20:07
I was having chronic neck issues, right?
20:10
From trying to muscle out of stuff and, you know, letting submissions go on a little bit
20:14
too long, trying to prove how tough I am, right?
20:16
I broke my nose.
20:18
So I broke my nose right before I got promoted to blue belt, right?
20:21
Like the day that I got released to my doctor to be able to do jujitsu is whenever I got
20:25
promoted to blue belt.
20:26
So there's a trend here, you know, right before promotions, I get a pretty big injury.
20:30
I destroyed my thumb tore every single ligament in my left thumb, required surgery.
20:34
I had another surgery and it was just, it was a tough, tough time period there for a while
20:39
in jujitsu.
20:41
I had like a four year mark of my training in jujitsu.
20:45
I figured it up and I kind of like did the math.
20:48
I probably lost an entire year of training to injuries.
20:52
So about 25% of my first four years was spent on the shelf, right?
20:56
I mean, there was just no, no way to get on the mat with some of the injuries I had
21:00
if I had a cast on or something like that.
21:02
And the thing about it is, is I hurt my, my neck again about six months ago.
21:07
And after that neck injury, I honestly thought that I might have to give up jujitsu.
21:13
I was like, okay, this neck injury is affecting other parts of my body.
21:16
It's affecting, you know, my ability to parent like if I can't like turn around or pick my
21:20
kid up, like that's not really going to work.
21:22
You know, we want to have more kids and that type of a thing.
21:24
And it wasn't like I was ever moving in that direction of actually quitting and not doing
21:28
that anymore and letting jujitsu be a part of my past, but that was at least a thought.
21:33
That was at least something that was kind of in my psyche that this is something that
21:36
might actually happen.
21:38
But I made a decision that I was going to focus on saying healthy.
21:44
I was going to focus on getting healthy.
21:45
I was going to focus on just taking care of my body and if so, changing my, my style
21:51
of doing things and because this is going to be something that I want to do for my entire
21:55
life.
21:56
Like I don't have any illusions that I'm going to be some sort of world champion someday or
22:01
make a career out of jujitsu.
22:02
That's just not really what I'm going for.
22:04
But I made a decision.
22:05
And that was a big turning point for me that jujitsu was just going to be something that
22:08
I do.
22:09
And so I got to make sure I take care of myself as I age into the sport.
22:13
But another turning point at blue belt was a coach that challenged me.
22:18
I've already talked about Aldo Gonzalez, but he gave a challenge to me.
22:21
And to be honest, I tried to think through it.
22:23
I couldn't remember exactly why he said this, okay?
22:27
But I was preparing for a tournament and there was some context that I can't even remember
22:31
right now.
22:32
But Aldo looks at me and just says, Hey, man, start thinking like a purple belt.
22:36
And it wasn't like he was dropping a hint like, Oh, six months from now, you're probably
22:39
going to get it.
22:40
But I'm sure I had said or done something or maybe even rolled in a way that was very blue
22:45
beltish or like basically like a seven stripe white beltish, right?
22:49
Like that type of a thing.
22:50
He said, start thinking like a purple belt.
22:53
And so that made me introspective.
22:54
And I started looking around at our gym at the purple belts, because here's one thing
22:58
about our gym that I think is very, very important to mention.
23:00
We don't have like lifetime achievement belts.
23:04
So there's some people that like, Oh, you know, they've hung around gym long enough
23:07
and some random gym and they've been a white belt.
23:08
So I guess we'll give them their blue belt.
23:09
Nah.
23:10
And they've been a blue belt for a while.
23:11
They're not really getting any better.
23:12
They don't really train that much in there.
23:13
They're getting fat.
23:14
And they're purple belt.
23:15
We don't have any of that at the forge.
23:17
And part of the way that I know that is because when our guys go over to other gyms, open
23:22
mats, that it's not pretty, like our blue belts are smashing purple belts and brown belts
23:28
from other schools.
23:29
Right?
23:30
It's just, you know, that that's a good thing that you we have such a tough room and nobody
23:33
just gets promoted just because, right?
23:35
But when he said, start thinking like a purple belt, I started looking at our other purple
23:38
belts and understanding what they were doing because everyone's different.
23:41
They have their own game.
23:42
They have their own things that they like to focus on.
23:44
But I started thinking like, okay, as a purple belt, I would like to be X, Y, and Z.
23:50
Here are the things I would like to be able to do.
23:51
Here's what I would want people to think after they're done rolling with me because I would
23:55
think, you know, after I got done rolling with a lot of our purple belts, like, man,
23:57
this is terrible.
23:58
Like, what am I going to do?
23:59
And like, I can't figure this out.
24:01
But that's what you start thinking like, you're thinking like, Hey, I want to be a puzzle
24:04
that somebody else has a lot of trouble solving, I guess.
24:06
So that was another turning point for me, you know, getting that challenge from Aldo.
24:10
But then the last challenge I'll talk about in terms of blue belt is the last competition
24:14
that I did.
24:15
So the last competition that I did at blue belt, I did very well, I won my weight division
24:19
and I won absolute.
24:21
Okay.
24:22
But it was how I won those matches.
24:24
And this was after Aldo's challenge and all those different things.
24:27
And I kind of made some changes to how I was focusing and doing certain things.
24:31
But in the most humble way that I can say it possible, I buzzsawed through my opponents.
24:37
My opponent that I won when I won my weight division, I took him down almost immediately.
24:41
I took him down really, really hard.
24:43
And within 45 seconds, I tapped him, right?
24:46
Just buzzed right through him.
24:47
And then in the absolute, I went up against a guy that was bigger than me, but I've gone
24:50
up against guys that are bigger than me.
24:52
I've gone up against guys.
24:53
I way, you know, I think I weighed into that tournament at 187.
24:55
I've gone up against guys that were as big as 275.
24:58
But the thing that's always interesting, even with these big guys is they're usually not
25:00
stronger than me.
25:01
They're just bigger, right?
25:03
But this guy was bigger than me and stronger than me.
25:06
And I could feel that almost immediately when I, you know, we kind of locked up.
25:09
But I beat this guy like 19 to zero or something, 20 to zero.
25:14
And just buzzed right through him.
25:15
I made a lot of mistakes like you don't want to see the match.
25:18
The match is ugly.
25:19
My coaches are saying the right things and I'm doing the wrong things, but it just kind
25:22
of worked out.
25:23
Like I kept getting in good positions, advantageous.
25:25
He wouldn't tap in certain positions, but I just kind of ran up the score on him.
25:28
And that was a turning point for me because it's like, okay, I'm getting smoked all the
25:33
time at the forge.
25:35
You know, I'm getting killed by my teammates and, you know, I have frustrating practices
25:38
and I hope I'm getting better.
25:39
But then when you go to a tournament and you go against people that are supposedly at your
25:42
level and they're just not, like it just made me thankful for my gym and made me thankful
25:48
for my teammates all over again.
25:49
But that was a turning point for me as well to where it's like, I already knew my gym
25:52
was great.
25:53
But that just kind of helps solidify it.
25:55
And again, it wasn't like some international tournament or something like that.
25:57
I'm not trying to say that I'm, you know, the next big thing or I'm going to be, you
26:00
know, making money doing this, but it's just, it was good to kind of see that even at a
26:04
local tournament with guys from disparate schools or from different schools, that was
26:07
a really, really cool thing.
26:09
But then there's got to be another turning point coming, you would think, right?
26:12
You know, what's the turning point going to be a purple belt?
26:15
I don't really know, but I am very, very excited to find that out.
26:18
But now I want to go ahead and get into the biggest lessons that I've learned so far in
26:22
terms of jujitsu.
26:23
And I'll kind of do that in terms of, you know, in different transitioning points.
26:27
But here are the biggest lessons because I tried to distill them down all to one thing.
26:31
From not training to white belt.
26:33
So going from just being a dude that tries to be in shape and all that to being a white
26:37
belt, the biggest lesson that I learned is that your ego will kill you.
26:41
Your ego will absolutely kill you.
26:44
Okay.
26:45
Because the thing about it is, is if you go into jujitsu as a white belt, acting like
26:48
you're God's gift to the sport or to athletics in general, it's going to be a horrible, horrible
26:54
thing for you.
26:55
The number of people that come in that are great athletes, you know, Adonis bodies, super
27:00
strong, super explosive, and they just get smashed by dudes that have a little bit of
27:05
a beer belly or guys that are considerably smaller than them, not nearly as strong as
27:10
them.
27:11
A lot of those guys don't come back because their ego can't handle it.
27:16
And I had some moments like that where I would get beat by people that, Oh, well, I shouldn't
27:20
be losing to this person.
27:21
Well, I, I'm clearly superior to this person or that person.
27:24
And then I get smoked and sometimes I didn't react very well.
27:27
I let let's not pretend like I just controlled myself the entire time I had some big outbursts
27:31
and some, you know, stupid screaming F words and like, just being an idiot, right?
27:36
But that's the biggest lesson I learned from not training to white belt is if you keep
27:39
that ego, right, the fake ego, like the bravado ego, it's going to kill you eventually.
27:46
You just won't last long, especially at a school that doesn't basically suffer fools
27:50
like that.
27:51
It's not going to be good for you.
27:52
The biggest lesson I learned from white belt to blue belt was Matt time.
27:58
You have to have Matt time.
27:59
Sorry.
28:00
He talked about a lot of injuries kept me off the mat, right?
28:03
And so I didn't, I wasn't able to get that Matt time, but even going from white belt
28:07
to blue belt, I would, I would look at, you know, man, I'm, I'm having so many trouble,
28:10
uh, so many problems in this position.
28:11
I have problems with this type of a person or, you know, I can't finish that take down
28:14
on this guy that I can finish on that guy or something like that.
28:17
But the biggest thing is Matt time.
28:19
Other things is just start to make sense, okay?
28:22
They just start to make sense.
28:23
There's something that even happened here recently.
28:25
This is more of a transition from, from blue to purple, but, uh, X guard was something
28:29
that for whatever reason just didn't make sense in my brain, I would have trouble getting
28:32
to the position.
28:33
I certainly wasn't affected from that position, but just in the last like three months, things
28:37
have just clicked because I just repeatedly was on the mat working X guard, right?
28:41
So that was the biggest lesson I learned from white belt to blue belt is how important
28:44
Matt time is and then from blue belt to purple belt, that the biggest lesson I learned of
28:50
all the lessons is slow down, slow down.
28:54
Now, some of you guys would like me to take that same lesson and apply it to this podcast
29:00
because I talk so fast.
29:01
But guys, I'm just telling you, you could even go down to half speed, even though I encourage
29:03
you to listen at two times speed, but even in Jiu Jitsu, it's like Kyle slow down.
29:07
I can literally hear my coaches in my ear right now, Kyle, slow down, just slow down.
29:11
Oh, you lost position because you got too fast or you got too high, like you got shaken
29:16
off the back again, like slow down, just slow down, trust your technique, like trust your
29:23
body, trust your positioning.
29:24
And the thing is, is I learned that lesson, but I still suck at it sometimes.
29:28
I mean, going back to that, that match I told you about where I beat the guy, you know,
29:31
19 or 20 to nothing, I got put in some bad positions and by say I got put in that bad
29:36
positions, I put myself as a bad positions in that match because I went too fast.
29:40
And afterwards, my grips were blown, which has never happened to me in a tournament or
29:44
in class, like I just went way too fast.
29:46
And when I went back and watched a video later, I could hear my coaches and other teammates
29:50
saying, Hey, Kyle, slow down, slow down to establish position, you get your points.
29:54
Like just relax.
29:55
But that's the biggest lesson from blue belt to purple is just slow down.
29:58
Now obviously I don't have any lessons from purple belt to brown belt.
30:01
I mean, obviously I plan to keep training and keep going that direction.
30:04
So I'm not sure right now, obviously what the biggest lessons that I will learn will
30:07
be, but I can tell you what I'll be focusing on as I'm transitioning and on my journey
30:11
from purple belt to brown belt.
30:13
The first thing is technique.
30:16
I use a lot of explosiveness.
30:17
I use a lot of, you know, things that that shouldn't work, but it's working because, you
30:21
know, I deadlift or it's working because, you know, I have some, you know, agility or
30:25
things like that, but really, really focusing on technique, allowing myself to get put in
30:30
a bad position.
30:31
If my technique was so busted up to not just respond and, you know, try to overcome bad
30:36
technique with good body control or with power or something like that.
30:40
I really, really want to focus on my technique.
30:43
Another thing that I want to focus on, this is going to kind of be the big thing that
30:45
I really want to focus on is high percentage moves, high percentage positions, and high
30:50
percentage submissions, okay?
30:52
We have some guys at our school that train all the time.
30:55
They train every single day of the week, sometimes twice, twice a day.
30:58
So they can get away with practicing moves that are not very high percentage.
31:02
You know, Instagram type moves and all these flying things and all that, because that's
31:07
how they are.
31:08
They've got all that available Matt time to them.
31:10
I do not train enough to warrant practicing incredibly obscure movements or positions.
31:14
I just don't have that luxury.
31:16
Okay.
31:17
So that doesn't mean I'm going to actively not try to learn those things, but I'm just
31:21
going to really focus on positions like getting to the back, you know, a rear naked choke,
31:25
other attacks from the back, you know, passing, pressure passing.
31:28
Some things that are, you know, really good for my style and the way that I do things,
31:33
that's something that I really want to focus on at Purple Ball.
31:35
And again, that all goes back to technique.
31:37
But in general, you know, when thinking about lessons that I've learned so far in my time
31:40
training, not, you know, at any particular time, but just, you know, as a whole, is that
31:45
there are levels to this game.
31:47
Guys, you hear that in every context.
31:49
I even asked a guy about it in a podcast interview recently that'll come out later, you know,
31:54
about, you know, the gap between somebody that's just really, really good at that sport
31:57
that we were talking about versus someone that's a pro.
32:00
And even on the night that we got promoted, there were probably, I think, three or four
32:04
of us that got promoted from Blue Bell to Purple Bell.
32:07
But the guy that got promoted right before me is a kid named Jake Coleman.
32:10
We call him, you know, Jake the snake Coleman.
32:12
This guy's a blue belt that got promoted to Purple Bell.
32:15
He has basically won every single tournament within several hundred miles of Oklahoma City.
32:21
Like there are so many schools that are excited that he was finally promoted from Blue Bell
32:25
to Purple Bell. He's young. He's probably 21, 22 years old.
32:29
He trains all the time. He's married, but his wife trains as well. It's really awesome
32:32
to see them both on the mats together. He's a student of the game. He's obviously a very
32:36
smart kid. He's an explosive athlete. He's got good natural strength and different things.
32:41
And he also works hard at that as well.
32:44
And to say that somehow Jake the snake Coleman and Kyle Viking Thompson are the same animal
32:50
with a complete disrespect to Jake because Jake Coleman is going to be a world champion
32:58
someday. I can feel it in my bones.
33:01
I'm just trying to survive this jujitsu journey. I'm trying to survive this ridiculous hobby
33:05
that I picked up for myself, right? I want to be able to, you know, walk right and experience
33:09
life into into old age. I don't want to be one of those guys that just can't move later
33:13
in life, right?
33:15
There are levels to this game. Even look at black belt. There are guys that train for
33:19
10 years, 15 years, they finally get their black belt and then they go to tournaments
33:22
and they're competing against people that have been black belts for 10 years. They're
33:26
just flat out levels. There are guys that have black belts because they've trained for a
33:30
long time and they're pretty good and they're pretty tough, but they wouldn't win a single
33:35
tournament match if they went and competed at black belt, even at small tournaments, right?
33:40
There are levels to everything. And that's okay.
33:44
But it's a good lesson to learn because you might think, Oh, everyone's has to kind of
33:47
be on the same level, but pick your favorite sport. Like, you know, for me, it'd be baseball.
33:50
Like there's a big gap between Bryce Harper and, you know, the, the, the guy that I guess
33:57
a ball right fielder for the in the Philadelphia Philly system. They're both professional baseball
34:02
players, but one is going to be one of the best players of his generation. And the other
34:06
guy, he may not make it out of a ball, right? So that's another good lesson that I've learned
34:11
in terms of Jiu Jitsu that they're just levels to this game.
34:14
But now I kind of want to go in a little bit and to kind of give you guys a little bit of
34:17
an idea as to an honest assessment of my game and areas of improvement because it's something
34:21
that I've been focusing on. So this may be interesting to you. It may not, but the first
34:24
thing my game is really predicated on takedowns, pressure, pace and explosiveness, like that.
34:29
That's really my game. So I don't have a long, you know, Oklahoma wrestling pedigree. I only
34:33
wrestled for a couple of years in high school, but people don't focus a lot on takedowns,
34:37
especially tournaments. The wrestling really hasn't been that great. And so I'm able to
34:40
get quite a few takedowns, even on guys that are way, way, way better than me. They're going
34:43
to tap me. It's only a matter of time, but I'm at least going to get those first two
34:46
points. Like that's my thing. I like to be very, if I'm on top in any of those positions,
34:50
I want the guy to feel every bit of my weight. I want to feel way heavier than I am pace.
34:54
I'll put a pace on people that, you know, again, I don't have a whole lot of skill. I don't
34:58
have a lot of technique in a lot of areas, but I'm going to put a pace on you. That's
35:01
going to wear you out. You know, I've, you know, put a pace on people where, you know,
35:04
they basically cardio tap. These are people that are better than me. They just didn't have
35:07
the pace and then explosiveness. That's why I'm very attracted to explosive takedowns,
35:12
explosive movements, because that's kind of, you know, goes with my athletic build. But
35:15
my areas for improvement, I've already talked about technique. My technique can be really,
35:19
really, really bad in a lot of different positions. You know, I still want to focus on being offensive
35:23
from bottom position. You know, I've gotten a little bit more comfortable with not getting
35:26
my guard pass, but I'm starting to learn some different modalities and different techniques,
35:30
but I really, really need to still improve on that. Also honing in on techniques that
35:33
I should be good at, you know, you, everyone looks at their body. Like if you have short,
35:37
you know, big legs, you're probably not going to do a whole lot of body triangle from the
35:40
back is probably not going to be available to you. But for me, I really should be a lot
35:45
better at guillotines, but I suck at guillotines. I don't remember last guillotine I got, but
35:48
I'm barrel chested. I have long arms, you know, strong, strong upper body. I should be getting
35:51
guillotines. I really need to focus on that technique. I really don't know much about leg
35:55
locks. We've got a little bit of a leg lock revolution happening inside of our gym, which
35:59
is great. But that's not something that position I'm comfortable defending. It's not a position
36:03
I'm comfortable going in offense because that's not something you want to mess with. You don't
36:06
want to just grab somebody's ankle and start ripping. Like it's a good way to get kicked
36:09
out of your gym. But also, you know, getting to the back back attacks, sweeps from bottom,
36:13
those are all things that I really want to stay focused on. But the biggest area improvement
36:17
just for me is just staying healthy. You know, I was, I had a very long, you know, track
36:21
of being healthy for about a year or something like that. And then I had the rib injury. But
36:26
part of that is just, you know, bad luck, you know, you're going to be on the mats, things
36:29
are going to happen. You're going to say when you should have zagged and you'll get hurt.
36:31
But part of it is how you roll as well, because there are some upper belts that are gym that
36:34
haven't been hurt in years like they're achy, but they're not injured. It's a little bit
36:38
different, but that's kind of a little bit of an assessment of my game. But now I want
36:42
to transition into a message that I have to those people that are starting their jujitsu
36:48
journey. Okay, because I get messages quite often from people that are like, Kyle, I've
36:51
been listening to your show and you finally got me inspired. You know, I'm going to start
36:55
doing jujitsu. I'm going to this school. My gee just came in the mail. You know, I'm
36:59
a couple of weeks in and I'm already obsessed. And I get messages like that pretty often.
37:02
But I do have some, some advice, some messages from people that are just really at the beginning
37:07
stages of their jujitsu journey. The first one is check your ego. Obviously we've talked
37:11
about that talked about that a lot earlier, but it's a good reminder because just because
37:15
you know it doesn't mean you don't need to be reminded because I still have to be reminded
37:18
sometimes when, oh, that guy shouldn't attack me, just check your ego. Okay. Second message
37:23
I have for you is don't quit. Okay. Don't be the person that trains for a year and a half
37:28
two years, get your blue belt and then calls it a day. Don't be that person. You know, some
37:32
people have to quit, right? Because they, they got a new job and maybe they're a surgeon
37:37
now and like their hands basically, you know, heal people, right? I get it. But just don't
37:41
quit. Do what you have to do to be resilient and stick it out. Another message is don't
37:45
freak out. Okay. Don't freak out. And I mean that in a lot of different ways. Don't freak
37:51
out whenever you tap a belt that's higher than you and start bragging to everybody about
37:55
how you tapped out the brown belt and you're just a white belt or something like that.
37:58
You probably shouldn't happen, but don't, don't freak out and do that. Also, when you're
38:02
in a bad position, don't freak out the number of people that, that tap to pressure, right?
38:08
You put a buy triangle on them or you kind of smush them whenever you get mounted or
38:11
something like that. And they just tap. They're tapping because they're freaking out. They're
38:15
not going to die. They're not going to suffocate. You're not literally squeezing the life out
38:19
of them. They're just freaking out. So to those of you that are early in that moment,
38:23
learn how to be calm. If you're being smothered by a much bigger, much stronger, much better
38:27
person, just try to just pretend that you're calling me even if you're not. Take as many
38:33
deep breaths as you can. Control yourself. Don't freak out. Another message is figure
38:37
out what your jiu-jitsu goals are. Okay. So if you're 40 years old, you're just getting
38:42
into jiu-jitsu, you probably shouldn't make it a goal to be the ADCC champion. Probably
38:48
not going to be available to you. Okay. You know, are you going to want to be a guy that's
38:53
just maybe your goal is to be a really good, really solid, hobbyist teammate, right? That's
38:57
probably the vein that I'm in. Or maybe your goal is, Hey, you're 21 years old, you wrestled
39:01
your entire life, but you're putting a ghee on for the first time and you're thinking yourself,
39:05
man, I could be in my physical prime later in life between 27 and 32 and be a brown belt
39:09
or a black belt. I can maybe do this big time, right? But figure out what your goals are.
39:14
Because if that's your goal, you're going to have to train a whole lot. You're going
39:16
to probably have to go travel around, do some tournaments and all that. But if that's not
39:20
really what your goal is, you can kind of, you know, mold your jiu-jitsu life around
39:24
whatever your goal is. Another thing to focus on if you're early in your jiu-jitsu game
39:28
is be a good teammate. Be a good teammate. So if you're a particular body style for somebody
39:33
that's trying to get ready for a tournament, offer yourself up for extra rounds. Okay?
39:38
You know, you need to be getting better so that you can give other guys in the gym good
39:41
looks like that. That's a good thing for you to focus on is just to be a good teammate.
39:47
So don't be a jerk. Don't hold subs longer than you need to. If you're in a, you know,
39:52
I'm again, I'm talking to, you know, basic, you know, people, but let's say you're six
39:56
months in and you're physically superior to a guy that's his first day. That's not your
40:00
cue to kill him. You know, bring him along, talk him through some things, right? That's
40:05
not your time to flex. If you want to flex, go to a competition. All bets are off. Try
40:08
to hurt the guy. Try to kill him. Like it's up to him to tap, right? But just focus on
40:12
being a good teammate. And also that really gets into the next thing, which is compete.
40:18
Just flat out compete. You need to be able to compete. And so by that, I mean, in tournaments,
40:24
I mean in the room, you need to be competing. You need to be in a competitive mindset. Now
40:29
your goal should not be to try to kill your teammates or beat your teammates. You, your
40:33
number one goal should be to where you're, you're both getting better. And then your
40:35
secondary goal should be like, Hey, we need to both make sure that we're healthy at the
40:38
end of this thing. But you need to learn how to compete because there is a different level
40:42
of focus in a different level of intensity when you compete at a tournament. Because even
40:48
if you're going with somebody that you've rolled with before, maybe at an open mat or
40:51
maybe you did a guest spotted at, you know, someone else's school or something like that,
40:55
it's different. It's different when you're the only two guys rolling in that vicinity.
40:59
It's different when there's a referee out there with his, you know, suit jacket and socks.
41:03
It's different when you have your teammates watching. Because typically your teammates
41:06
are trying to get after their own rounds, right? But now all the focus is on you. Lights
41:10
are on. It's, it's cold in the room. You know, you're seeing the podium over there and you
41:13
want to make sure you're on it. It's a different level of focus, but compete. Doesn't mean you're
41:18
going to be a world champion. Doesn't even mean you even want to be me should at least
41:21
compete in a local tournament. Another really, really good lesson that I've, that I've learned
41:26
and a good lesson for anyone that's kind of still young in their journey. Just tap.
41:31
Just tap. A lot of my neck and back issues have been, like I said earlier, from getting
41:36
in bad positions and instead of just tapping, trying to show the guy who's trying on me
41:42
how tough I am by waiting till the very last minute to tap, right? You know, as the tunnel
41:46
is kind of closing in, you're about to pass out. Tap. Well, my neck's under a bunch of
41:49
pressure at that moment. I'm getting a head and arm choked and I'm trying to answer the
41:53
phone and I'm also trying not to die. Well, I'm, but there's a ton of pressure on my neck
41:56
in that moment and you know, everything's getting compressed and all out of whack, but
42:01
I don't want to tap, right? I want to show how tough I am. Just tap. Just freaking tap.
42:05
Like I've seen at tournaments. I've seen people rolling. They're in bad spots. They're rolling
42:09
with somebody that's trying to be a good teammate. And yet here's this person like trying to
42:13
roll out of this arm bar and try to pretend like this is, you know, the finals for the
42:17
world championships and it's just like, bro, just tap. Do you get to tap? You're not injured.
42:23
You slap bump and then you move on, right? So to those guys early, don't make the mistakes
42:27
I did. Just tap. And again, if you're early in your journey, another lesson is expect
42:31
injuries, but just deal with them. I've talked a lot about injuries on this podcast, expect
42:35
that they're going to happen. So get yourself pre in the mindset of just being able to deal
42:39
with it. And in that vein, buy an iron neck. Okay. Now I'm not sponsored by iron neck.
42:45
Hey, iron neck shout out to you. If you want to sponsor the show, I'm all ears, but that
42:50
was the one thing that really turned my neck injury situation around is I bought the iron
42:54
neck. So you can, I'll put it in the show notes. You can check it out. Joe Rogan talks
42:56
about all the time. It's a very expensive piece of equipment, but it's one of the best
43:00
ways, if not the best way that we've figured out in terms of training the neck muscles,
43:03
because a lot of the ways like neck bridges and all these kind of weighted harness things,
43:07
they're putting pressure on the neck discs while getting your neck muscles strong. Whereas
43:13
the iron neck is really just helping you get the muscles strong without putting the strain
43:18
on the neck on the discs, actually. So I couldn't recommend that piece of machinery anymore.
43:23
The iron neck is absolutely, absolutely fantastic. Also another thing for you to think through
43:27
is that breakthroughs will come, but they come from that time. Again, I've talked about my
43:32
breakthrough with X guard. I've had some other breakthroughs, a certain positions that I got
43:36
into that I was having trouble with, but you have to have Matt time again, Matt time, Matt
43:40
time, Matt time, if you train once a week, it's going to be really, really, really hard
43:43
to get good. You know, in my fight club group, I have some guys that have been training for
43:46
over 10 years, but they're training like once or twice a month. And so they're, they're
43:50
not really getting any better. They're kind of going to stay stagnant and stay at that
43:53
level because they're not getting the Matt time and once or twice a month, it's better
43:57
than nothing, but it's not very much better than nothing. Another piece of advice I would
44:01
give to people that are just started training is that you got to lift. And I mean weights,
44:07
heavy things, because there are some people that are good at jujitsu because they're flexible
44:11
or because they go to a lot of classes or because they're really, really smart and they chain
44:14
things together, but they're not very strong. So we have a kid at our school named Adam and
44:19
you know, he's been this really, really good guy, but he's smaller. He's flexible. He's
44:23
got a really, really hard guard to pass, but he's just started lifting weights here recently.
44:26
Good grief. He's going to be an absolute problem. I hate rolling with him, but I love rolling
44:31
with him at the same time, but he's getting so strong now. He's, you know, lifting into
44:35
his body like he's, he's literally growing into his frame now. So that's something you
44:40
really need to focus on like don't just ignore lifting because, you know, jujitsu is a lot
44:43
of fun. You still have to do the other stuff. You got to, you know, got to be flexible, be
44:46
strong, all that. Another thing, and this is maybe the biggest and I'll do these last
44:50
points together because they're related. Don't worry about the belts. Kyle is in this podcast
44:57
called purple belt like, isn't that what you're talking about this entire time? Yeah, but
45:01
don't worry about it. Don't worry about the belts with Matt time and with years of training
45:07
and with getting better and with competing with all that, the belts will come. You will
45:12
get promoted, but the belts don't need to be the goal. Because just think about, let's
45:16
say your goal is to be a black belt. Okay. So you, you train for 10, 15 years, whatever,
45:20
and then you get your black belt, then what? Do you just stop training now? Because this
45:25
is a skill set that will go away if you stop doing it, right? So don't worry about the
45:30
belt so much. Don't worry about is, you know, did my coaches see my, how good I rolled against
45:35
that guy at gym last week? You know, did my coaches, you know, talk after the tournament
45:40
about how well I did, and you know, how the fact that I got a gold or a silver or something
45:43
like that, don't worry about it. If your school has a regular, you know, schedule of promotions
45:49
or irregular schedule, don't worry about it. The belts will come try to be good. And so
45:53
the last point, and this is, I'm stealing this from Jordan Peterson, but it's a rule
45:56
four from 12 rules for life. And it's compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to
46:01
who someone else is today. Again, that goes back to the, the lesson that I got from Tyler,
46:05
which is like, what would you do to the you from six months ago, baby? Like, if you're
46:10
better than that guy, guess what you're improving. So don't worry about the guy next to you and
46:14
how good he's doing. Don't worry about the guy over there that tapped you out five times
46:16
while you rolled. Don't worry about it. Don't worry about belts. And don't compare yourself
46:20
to everyone around you. Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone
46:24
else is today. And this part here I'm going to get into now is I've, I've got given a
46:29
message to all the people, lots of messages, rather, to guys that are still training that
46:33
are training right now, but they're in the young early stages. But now's my message to
46:37
those of you that are not training jujitsu, okay, which it's a miracle that 45 or so minutes
46:43
into this podcast. You're still listening. But this is my message to you. Expect injuries.
46:49
Just deal with them. That's the same message I gave to the guys that were training. Some
46:52
people are like, I don't want to do jujitsu because I'm afraid I'm going to get hurt.
46:56
The reality is, is if you do jujitsu, you're going to get hurt. Like, and just think like
47:01
as a kid, where did you not play football? Because you were scared of knee problems or
47:05
head injuries? No, you played. Like, did you not play basketball? Because you're afraid
47:08
you're going to roll an ankle or have knee issues? No, you just played, right? The same
47:12
thing could be true as an adult. But now we're going to really get into the nitty gritty
47:15
with messages to people that are not training jujitsu. This message is so important. Honestly
47:21
assess whether your exercise hobby has any transferable skills. Now, I'm all for exercise
47:31
hobbies that don't really have transferable skills. Like I think they're fun and you can
47:35
play games into all those things and they're just fun. But does being good at golf transfer
47:42
into a situation where you need to protect yourself or someone that you love or even
47:46
a perfect stranger that's being taken advantage of? Because I've said something similar to
47:51
this before. If you can pitch it on, you know, to within 10 feet of the cup from 100 yards
47:56
out, that's not going to help you in a situation where your wife is potentially being violated.
48:03
It's just not. If you can consistently hit jump shots from mid range, that's not going
48:08
to help you protect your kid if someone's trying to, you know, kidnap them. That's not
48:13
really going to come into play. Like being able to leg out a double in beer league softball
48:20
is not going to translate well and just trying to stop a violent attack on a stranger in public.
48:26
So I'm not anti those things. I'm not a fan of golf. You know, I don't play softball anymore.
48:31
I played lots of it though. You're like, I love playing pick up basketball here and
48:34
there. But if that is your exercise hobby, realize that there are no transferable skills.
48:40
Skills that you should have because no one that has ever won a fight or broken up a potentially
48:46
violent or deadly situation using their bodies thought to themselves, gosh, you know, I'm
48:52
glad I was physically capable and trained enough to take care of myself and that situation.
48:56
But goodness gracious, I really should work on my putting. Yeah, I mean, gosh, if I could
49:01
just sink more putts from outside of 10 feet, that would really change my life. Sorry, doesn't
49:08
really drive doesn't really work. You need to honestly assess that. And so those of you
49:12
that are not training, you need to also honestly assess whether you are cultivating mental and
49:17
physical resilience on a daily or regular basis. Again, undaunted life is here to equipment
49:22
to push back darkness by providing content that helps you forge spiritual, mental and
49:26
physical resilience. I've talked a lot about spiritual, mental and physical resilience.
49:29
I'm not going to rehash it. But there's a tremendous mental and physical component to
49:34
jujitsu. And so that's something that you can cultivate if you're doing jujitsu on a regular
49:39
basis. But again, to you guys are just golfing or basketball or maybe playing fantasy sports
49:45
or magic, the gathering, I don't know what the heck people do are playing video games
49:48
there. I can't believe I didn't mention video games. Like that's not helping you cultivate
49:52
mental and spirit and physical resilience. Like you might get sweaty. You might get excited.
49:58
You might be good at it, but you're not cultivating resilience. You have to do hard things. And
50:04
I don't mean beating the most difficult level on whatever stupid game you're playing. You
50:08
have to do hard things with your body so that you can prove to yourself that you have what
50:12
it takes to overcome if you're in a bad situation where you need your body to get out of it or
50:17
to get somebody else out of their bad situation. So you honestly need to assess that.
50:22
And so again, I guess my parting message to those who that are not training is what are
50:26
you waiting for? What are you waiting for? So here's here's my call to action. And I've
50:31
done this in other episodes. This is challenge time. I'm going to give you two challenges
50:34
that are very, very, very specific. Okay. So I'm not going to ask you to dedicate to
50:38
training jujitsu for your entire life. I'm not going to ask you to dedicate to getting
50:41
a black belt or a brown belt or purple belt or whatever. Here are my challenges. One comes
50:46
from Jocko Willink and Echo Charles and one comes directly from me. So Jocko Willink
50:50
and Echo Charles have said this on their podcast before that you should try to do jujitsu until
50:55
you submit someone that's on or a little bit past your level. Train long enough to where
51:02
you can legitimately submit somebody that's on or a little bit beyond your level. Train
51:08
that long because that may take you three months, six months, for some of you, maybe
51:13
longer for some of you, you know, certainly shorter than that. That's how long you should
51:17
train because the work and the fun that it's going to take to get to that point is probably
51:22
going to be enough to get you hooked. So that's the Jocko Willink Echo Charles challenge.
51:26
Now let's go into the undaunted life challenge, the Kyle Thompson challenge. 100 days of jujitsu,
51:31
100 days. Walk in to some school in your area. And again, I know there's affiliations and
51:37
I know the closest school is, you know, this many miles away and I'll get it. I know there's
51:41
a lot of things that you got to work through. It's contextual. Do 100 days of jujitsu.
51:47
Work out a deal with the office manager or the owner or something like that and say, Hey,
51:50
this jerk on this podcast challenged me to do this and I'm going to do it. I'm going to
51:54
pay for my first 100 days and they probably don't have 100 day challenges for their gym.
51:58
They probably got, you know, 90 day thing or they just pay months a month or maybe you
52:01
buy the entire year, but you worked something out. It'll probably be a unique fun thing
52:05
for you. Change you jitsu for 100 days. Again, you're going to learn some amazing things
52:10
about yourself. You're going to make some physical changes. You're going to make some
52:13
mental changes. And from there, I assume that you're going to get the bug and maybe it's
52:18
not for you. Maybe it's legitimately not for you, but train for 100 days and just see what
52:23
goes on for you. So at this point in the podcast, I think it's very incumbent upon me to hand
52:28
out some thank you. So this is the part where some of you guys that maybe don't know the
52:30
people I'm talking about, uh, you know, it's going to kind of be like when people are at
52:33
award shows and they name a bunch of people you've never heard of before, but it's still
52:36
very, very important. You should be thankful for people and you should let them know that
52:39
you're thankful. So this is just, uh, just as much for, for me as it is for them. I want
52:44
them to kind of know this, but the generic thank you is first, you know, I have to be
52:47
thankful to God because without God, I'm not here. There is no consciousness. There is
52:51
no universe. There is no jitsu. There's, there's none of that. Right. So that's kind of the
52:55
generic, you know, I have to thank the creator God, the loving and judgmental and awesome
52:59
God that created everything. A second generic thank you is to my wife Kelsey. So she has
53:04
obviously been there whenever I've been injured, which has been a lot the, the amount of time
53:09
that I've spent away from home, away from the baby, away from the baby to come Lord willing
53:14
like she's been patient and understanding even though she doesn't get it. I mean, she just
53:19
straight up, she'd be the first one to tell you she doesn't get why I would want to do
53:21
something like this. You know, golf makes more sense, but she probably wouldn't like that
53:24
because I'd be gone for four or five hours doing stupid crap, but got to be very, very
53:27
thankful for that. I'm also thankful to the Gracie family. So the Gracie family, like
53:32
they're the ones that essentially invented jiu-jitsu. You know, there was Japanese jiu-jitsu, but
53:36
then they turned it into this, you know, this great fighting style that is basically revolutionized
53:41
mixed martial arts. So I'm very thankful to them. Obviously, I'm very thankful to Hicks
53:44
and Gracie. He came on the podcast here last year. I'll put that in the show notes so you
53:48
can guys can check that out. But without the Gracie family, we don't have jiu-jitsu. We're
53:51
not training, you know, we'd probably be doing something else. We'd probably be doing, you
53:54
know, karate or Wing Chun or kung fu or something like that, still thinking that it's an effective
53:58
technique. But instead, we have jiu-jitsu. I also want to thank Jocko Willing. So around
54:03
the time when I'm trying to figure out if I want to really try to go and do this thing
54:06
and you know, kind of figure out if I want to do jiu-jitsu, almost every week I was listening
54:10
to Jocko Willing on his podcast and other places, talk about jiu-jitsu, talk about it
54:14
all the time. He and I interacted a little bit on Twitter about it and now all that.
54:17
So I'm very, very thankful to him. And then the last generic thing you will be to the
54:20
forge. Again, I talk about the forge in Edmond, Oklahoma all the time, but I literally feel
54:25
so unbelievably lucky to be at the best school in the area to have gotten all these other
54:30
transplants from all these other great, great schools and great programs to be in our school,
54:34
to have such a good positive place to train. It is absolutely fantastic. I feel incredibly
54:38
incredibly lucky. The scripture that I said from the beginning of this podcast was Proverbs
54:43
17 17. A friend loves at all times and a brother is born for adversity. One of the big things
54:48
about jujitsu is you gain brothers and you gain people that you have a deep level or
54:53
respect for. You get respect from a lot of people. So I want to give a little bit of
54:56
an ode to some of my teammates here. So this first part, you know, none of this is in any
55:01
really particular order. This is how I kind of thought about these folks. The first one
55:05
is Rush Sweatman. So again, I talked about him earlier in this show, you know, he was
55:08
my very first jujitsu coach. And so, you know, for, I forget how long I trained just kind
55:15
of doing the once, you know, once every Sunday type stuff with with this crew of guys. But
55:19
I probably did that for close to a year before I started doing it like really full on. So
55:25
he was my first jujitsu close for a year. And so he kind of set my foundation. So I'm
55:28
very, very thankful to him. So thank you, Rush Sweatman. And also thank you to Rob Harper.
55:33
So Rob Harper is a very accomplished competitor. He is the main black belt at our school. He
55:38
just got his third degree black belt in jujitsu. Yeah, he's a very cerebral guy, not a terribly
55:42
expressive guy. But like he jujitsu is just that's who he is. He knows jujitsu. His his
55:49
technique is razor sharp. I love rolling with him because it's an absolute disaster for me
55:53
every time it happens. But you know, you're not going to get hurt, but you're no, you're
55:57
you're tangling with, you know, a jaguar like it's just, you know, it's going to be a hard
56:01
situation for you. But very, very thankful to Rob Harper.
56:04
Thank you to Tyler Murrah. I mentioned him several times on this podcast. He was the one
56:08
that challenged me, you know, what would you do to the Kyle from six months ago? But I have
56:11
rolled with Tyler Murrah more than I have rolled with any other human being on the planet.
56:16
Okay, which is a good and a bad thing because again, he's a world champion. He's he's potentially
56:21
the most the best guy at our gym, right? You know, all, all things considered. He's an
56:25
incredible, incredible athlete. He's dedicated to his life to jujitsu rolling with him. I've
56:30
never done well with him. I never will do well against him. But I'm so thankful to have
56:35
a guy like that. And I was so thankful to hear what he had to say. And the nice things
56:39
he had to say about me. And I posted it on our Instagram so you guys can go actually
56:42
listen to it. Just go to our Instagram feed. And I think it ended up on Facebook as well.
56:46
But for him to have respect for me and my game and the things that I've done whenever
56:49
I have so much respect for what he's done in the jujitsu world is an incredible thing.
56:53
So thank you so much to Tyler Murrah. And then also thank you to Aldo Gonzalez, right?
56:57
So he taught me some things. Hey, start thinking like a purple bell. You know, he came up the
57:00
day before I got promoted to try and help me just figure out what I could do. He's one
57:04
of my coaches. I usually go to Saturday morning class. He's probably done the most to individually
57:08
help my game recently, right? And you know, because he and I have kind of similar body
57:13
styles, you know, I'm kind of on the same track as him in terms of, you know, being
57:18
in the early 40s, kind of, you know, knocking on the door, a black belt, that type of a
57:21
thing. So I've got a lot to learn from him. And I've learned so much already. So thank
57:24
you to Aldo Gonzalez. Also, I want to thank Steve Jones. So Steve is maybe my favorite
57:29
coach from the forge to learn from. Okay. He his style, you know, taking an O to Metallica.
57:37
I call him creeping death. Because when you roll with him, he's a physically big guy,
57:41
a strong guy. But when you're rolling with him, he's just smashing you. And it's kind
57:45
of like slow moving lava, just like consuming you up to your face. I've learned so much
57:52
from his style, but I really, really like his teaching style. You know, the Tuesday night
57:55
class of the forge is one of my favorites. That's the class that he teaches. And he's
57:59
been able to shake some things loose in my brain in terms of my style and the things
58:02
that I focus on. And he's also very, very willing and eager to kind of hop in and you
58:07
know, help a guy with a certain position, even while they're rolling while they're drilling,
58:10
I just really, really love his style. I also want to thank Livingston, McKinsey. So Livingston,
58:15
McKinsey is one of the best athletes that I've ever rolled against in terms of jujitsu,
58:19
which some people would say, you know, either like, Oh, that guy's a good, good athlete.
58:23
That's almost considered like a negative thing. That's not a negative thing. He's just a very,
58:26
very gifted athlete, but he's well rounded. He's an incredible striker. He's does incredible
58:31
wrestling. He's very explosive, incredibly athletic, but his jujitsu game is top notch.
58:35
He's one of our black belts. He's another one of those guys that, you know, we're physically
58:39
similar in terms of size, but I'll never be anywhere near as good as he is. But again,
58:44
he's another guy that can be unbelievably explosive and be in complete control. Every
58:49
time I roll with him, I'm not worried about being hurt because even when he gets into one
58:53
of these explosive positions or even when he takes me down or something like that, I know
58:56
he's got himself completely under control. So I know that I'm safe. I enjoy rolling with
59:00
him again. It's a frustrating role because, you know, you see someone that's about your
59:03
sizing. Like I should be able to do something. But again, whenever you roll with a guy like
59:07
that, just change your goals in that role. Your goal is not to win your goals to learn.
59:10
And I certainly do a lot of learning when I roll with Livingston, Mackenzie. I also want
59:13
to thank Chris Cunningham. So Chris Cunningham is one of our black belts, but he also runs
59:16
the gym. He runs the business side of the gym. You know, he helped me get connected at the
59:20
beginning because, you know, my wife and I were having some budget issues and, you know,
59:23
training can be expensive. And so, you know, he kind of helped me in the early parts and,
59:27
you know, he runs a good gym. Like part of the reason why we have the people that train
59:31
at our gym is because of his tutelage and his leadership. So thank you to Chris Cunningham.
59:35
I also want to thank JP Taylor. He is the first coach I had at the forge. So not my first
59:39
jujitsu coach ever, but the very first class I did was a 6 a.m. Monday morning class and
59:43
JP was my first coach. And so he's a brown belt now. He'll be knocking on the door of
59:46
black belt no time. And so I'm not a huge fan of his wrist lock game, which he always
59:51
tries to do on me. But again, I have to be very, very thankful for him to be my first
59:55
coach from the forge. I also want to thank Austin Morris. So Austin Morris is one of
59:59
our newer coaches. He's a brown belt knocking on the door of black belt. Young kid, very,
1:00:03
very strong, incredibly technical. But he's responsible for kind of changing the direction
1:00:07
of the forge because around the COVID time is when he kind of came into the fold. But
1:00:11
a huge portion of his game is leg locks. And that wasn't really a huge part of a lot of
1:00:15
our coaches games. And that's really where jujitsu is going. There's a lot of people
1:00:18
doing leg locks. And so Austin, young kid, smart kid, you know, he knows a lot about
1:00:23
the game. He's a student of the game. He trains all the time. He trains really, really hard,
1:00:28
physically big, physically strong. But he's very, very technical. And he wants everyone
1:00:32
else to be technical. He has a very technical teaching style. But again, I think the fact
1:00:36
that he's kind of helping usher in this kind of leg lock revolution in our school is going
1:00:40
to be very, very good, especially for a lot of our guys who are going to be competing.
1:00:44
But then also I want to kind of go ahead and give a shout out to all my other training
1:00:47
partners. And I won't get into too much detail on all these guys, but from my foxhole downtown
1:00:50
Jermaine Brown, Shelby Bullard, Brandon Vincent, Rocky Campbell, Mike Fick, Adam Smith and
1:00:55
Zach Martin. Those are guys from my foxhole that I've rolled with a ton in addition to
1:00:59
rush weapon that I mentioned earlier. And then from the forge, Chris Avon. The night
1:01:04
I got my purple bell is the night he got his black belt. I mean, super duper well deserved.
1:01:08
He had a really great post on his Facebook afterwards, you know, where he's talking about,
1:01:12
you know, reflecting on how much jujitsu he's done and the things that he's learned about
1:01:16
himself. But he's another guy that's very, very good to roll with. You know, he and
1:01:20
I have actually, I've actually hurt myself rolling with him before. So I still kind of
1:01:23
hate him a little bit for that. But, but it's just an accidental thing. It just kind of
1:01:26
happens. But it's always awesome when he trains so much with somebody I've rolled so much
1:01:29
with him and to see him get his black belt. It was such a cool experience. I was glad
1:01:32
I was there for that. Matt Varney is another guy, a very, very big, very, very strong guy.
1:01:37
But he and I are kind of on the same trajectory around the same time is a little bit older
1:01:40
than me. But he got his purple belt that night. And so it's kind of like, you know, kindred
1:01:44
spirits is like, man, that's my brother right there. Like he got his purple belt. He's trained
1:01:48
so hard for so long. And then he was able to accomplish that. I just love that. I love
1:01:51
rolling with him. I love rolling with him, but I hate it at the same time because it's
1:01:54
always a difficult role. Adam Stevens, he was the kid I mentioned earlier, young kid, real
1:01:58
flexible, kind of smaller, but then has been lifting lately and gotten really, really strong.
1:02:03
This is a guy who of all the people in the plan that I have the most trouble passing
1:02:07
is guard is him. And I mean, he probably weighs 140 pounds and it's I have a pressure passing
1:02:12
that I use and it's just so hard to do that. But rolling with him, it's like you're trying
1:02:17
to crack a Rubik's cube that's moving around and trying to kill you. It's like, that's
1:02:20
how he is. But it's so cool to see a young kid that at a very, very young age when he
1:02:24
was like 17 years old, had to get his mom to go in there to sign a waiver for him so that
1:02:28
he could start training and just seeing all the things that he's done. It's been incredible
1:02:30
to watch that. And then Michael Chandler, we just call him Chan, but he's a guy that's
1:02:34
I think he started doing Jiu Jitsu in his 40s. Very, very gifted, very, very strong guy
1:02:39
like ox strong, even though he's not, you know, physically that big, he probably weighs
1:02:43
160, 165 pounds. But rolling with him, it's like rolling, I make fun of him all the time,
1:02:48
but it's like rolling with a peck muscle with arms. Like it's just like, it's so hard to
1:02:52
pass his guard. It's so hard to do anything. But just he's an inspiration to me just because
1:02:56
he's an older guy that is on the journey. He's a purple belt and he's going to be training
1:03:00
forever. And this is just kind of part of what he does. But then to get into some other
1:03:03
guys, Josh Munson and Chuck Munson, that's a father son team. Two of the nicest guys
1:03:07
you'll meet at the gym, you know, very devout Christian supporters of undaunted life. They
1:03:11
got our rash guards. They got everything. So I love those guys. Matt Greis, you know, a
1:03:15
big MMA career came and was a part of the forage, even though he's moved on to another
1:03:19
gym, very thankful for him. Paul Ambrose, one of our black belts, love rolling with him,
1:03:23
Trevor Fulbright, he got his brown belt that night. So this was a guy that used to be like
1:03:26
350 pounds or something like that. He's lost like 150 pounds away and he looks great. And
1:03:30
he used Jiu Jitsu as kind of the center point for that. Tanner Stroder is another guy that
1:03:34
that trains at our gym. He was a big supporter. The last time I competed, I could hear him
1:03:37
yelling the whole time he came out. Robert Storksen, Jake the snake Coleman, I've already
1:03:41
talked about him. Richard Davis is another one of our black belts. Jack Carmack is a
1:03:45
young kid. He's a he's a purple belt. I don't, you know, he's been gone for a little bit.
1:03:49
You know, after college and all that. But I know that if he stays on the path, he could
1:03:53
do big things in Jiu Jitsu. Sean Issell is another purple belt from our school. Hey,
1:03:57
and Sean, you're the only one that'll get this, but you still owe me a bunch of starting
1:04:00
rounds where I'm on the back. Okay. Lance Southard, he's the only guy that he's one
1:04:04
of our black belts. He's the only guy I've ever pressured tapped to because I thought
1:04:07
he was smothering me to death. So that's my one pressure tap in my career. Trevor Callan.
1:04:12
This is a guy who, you know, before I started training Jiu Jitsu, he and I were doing this
1:04:14
little wrestling thing and he basically tossed me. It was in one of our early videos. And
1:04:18
so I still owe him for that, even though I'm not sure I'll ever be able to take him down
1:04:21
like that. And Blake Kerr, he was one of the first guys that I trained with. He's built
1:04:25
like a baby rhinoceros. That's why we call him baby rhino, but very thankful for him.
1:04:29
And then other guys, Kirk Walker, Luke Woodard, Trey Falk, Eric Blackwell, Alan Flores, Caleb
1:04:35
Parham, Carl Wolf, Wolfwood, a Musabraza, JR, Coughran, Zach Brun, Michael Tran, Robert
1:04:42
Lewis and James head. And here's the thing guys is I'm sure and Garrett, there's, there's
1:04:46
another guy that I train with a lot on Saturday mornings. If I miss someone, you know, give
1:04:51
me a break. I mean, like, I literally tried to think of all the people I spent the last
1:04:54
several days trying to think of the people that I've rolled with, even people that I've
1:04:56
moved on and gone on to other gyms, but here's just a generic group. Thank you to everyone
1:05:01
that I've ever trained with or competed against. And so guys, I really do appreciate you sticking
1:05:05
with me to the end of this podcast. I think it's very, very important to let guys know
1:05:08
that you're appreciative of them. So I really appreciate your patience with that. And I
1:05:11
hope that a lot of this stuff was valuable to you. But guys, before we let you go, we
1:05:14
are going to do a quick resilience boost add on Dawn to life. Our mission is equipping
1:05:18
men to push back darkness with content that for just spiritual, mental and physical resilience.
1:05:22
So here are the links I've got for you. So I've got a link to our donation page again.
1:05:26
I would really like you guys to consider hopping on to become a donor. Also, it's not a link
1:05:30
because I don't really know what you guys use. I don't know if you're a duck duck goat
1:05:33
person or if you're a brave person or if you're a Google person or a being person, go to your
1:05:37
nearest browser. If you're not training jiu-jitsu right now and type in jiu-jitsu gyms in my
1:05:41
area and go find one and go start training. All right. And then I've got my three episodes
1:05:45
that I've mentioned before, episode five, six months of jiu-jitsu, episode 62, blue belt
1:05:49
and episode 242 with Hicks and Gracie. Those links are there. I've got a link to the Iron
1:05:53
Neck website. Again, I'm not affiliated with them in any way, shape or form. I just think
1:05:56
it's a very, very good piece of equipment. And then recently Lex Friedman on his podcast,
1:06:00
he released an episode that's an incredible episode. I may have to do an episode breaking
1:06:03
down this episode later, but it's with George St. Pierre, who's the greatest MMA fighter of
1:06:07
all time. John Donner, her who's probably the greatest mixed martial arts coach of all time.
1:06:11
And Gordon Ryan, who's probably the greatest submission grappler of all time. And so it's
1:06:15
that episode. So wherever you get your podcast, you can check that out, but I've got a link for
1:06:19
it so you can get there easily. All right, guys. Thanks so much for listening to the podcast.
1:06:22
We really do appreciate it. Wherever you're listening to this, please subscribe, rate and
1:06:25
leave us a positive five star view. If you want to come speak live at your event or on your podcast,
1:06:29
shoot me an email to info@undontanotlife. That's i-n-f-o @undontanotlife. You can follow us on
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everything else, including how to donate to keep more content like this coming your way. Just go to
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www.undontanotlife. And we also want to thank the band August Burns Red for allowing us to use their
1:06:47
music for our content. The music on this podcast is our song Cutting the Ties, which is off their
1:06:51
10th anniversary re-recording of their album Leveler. The links are in the description.
1:06:55
I'm your host, Kyle Thompson. Remember, keep pushing back darkness, keep forging spiritual,
1:07:02
mental and physical resilience, keep seeking the Lion of Judah.
1:07:21
You'll be revived.