How to Set Yourself up for Success as a White Belt in BJJ

There’s no shortage of online content offering advice to white belts in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. A great deal of that advice boils down to “survive” or “learn how to survive.” While there is truth in this sentiment, it is incomplete and not terribly actionable. In fact, it can set up a helpless mindset that can make your experience as a white belt far from a pleasurable experience. After all, very few of us will stick with an activity if it’s not enjoyable or at the very least, we feel like we’re making steady progress. So let’s look at more concrete and actionable things you should be doing as a white belt to set yourself up for a productive jiu jitsu journey.

Build a habit

Training has to be a habit and a priority. You will always be able to find a reason not to train — especially early on. So make a commitment to yourself together on the mats at least 2-3 times a week. Less, and you’re not giving yourself adequate time to develop a new skill set, and more risks both burnout and/or an increased chance of injury. Once you have a better sense of how you recover and how jiu-jitsu fits into your life, scaling up might be appropriate.

Learn How to Move

Many students come to us with little or no background in other athletic pursuits. If this is the first time using your body athletically, you will need to focus a signinficant amount of time on just getting accustomed to how your body moves, and then how it moves in relation to another, resisting, body. Be patient with yourself.

Learn The Broad Concepts of the Game

Spend time learning and internalizing the broad terms and concepts of how the game is played. No, you don’t need to learn the names of 5 guards and 5 sweeps, but you need to know what a guard is and what a sweep is. If your coach cannot succinctly explain the game and the terms, find a new coach.

Learn When You are in Danger

This is an important one. I talk about it to my students as understanding the difference between discomfort and danger. There are lots of things that happen in BJJ that can be uncomfortable without being particularly dangerous. But there are also situations that can occur that may seem perfectly comfortable, but pose a serious danger. If you spend your time at white belt primarily trying to prevent danger, you rob yourself of the opportunity to understand where the lines are between danger and discomfort. This is your time to take it slow and find those lines — they will often be slightly different than your teammates.

Learn How Not Panic

This might be the greatest gift that combat sports bestows on its practitioners: stress inoculation. When starting BJJ, it is not unusual for your body to go into “panic mode” when faced with the aforementioned discomfort. After all, having a 200 lb man trying to squish you would be cause for concern just about anywhere but on the mats. The issue is that this panic mode can often make your body make jerky explosive movements that are both out of your conscious control and potentially dangerous for you and your training partners. During your time as a white belt, exposing yourself to those discomforts will allow your body to acclimate, so that you can remain calm(er) and begin to make decisions in spite of the discomfort and not because of it.

Learn How to Learn

Physical skill acquisition is a complex topic. And regardless of how much we would like our coaches to spoon-feed us, there will be a large measure of your progress that will be dependent upon you and demand more from you than just showing up. Learning how to set stepwise goals, learning what you should focus more or less of your attention on, and even learning how to pick appropriate training partners to help you meet those goals will all be meta-skills you need to develop to be successful. White belt is when you should be figuring this stuff out.

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Your ability to focus on these elements will dictate the trajectory of your journey in BJJ. Failure to adequately address these things early on can delay your progress as a grappler or even result in your eventual exit from the sport. Hopefully, by keeping this list in mind, you will set yourself up for a productive and fulfilling time on the mats.