Lately, a topic has been coming up among my teenage girls at youth group that is pretty common: Jealousy. Usually, it involves the attention of some boy. Girl 1 likes boy. Boy hangs out with Girl 2. Girl 1 hates Girl 2 so much that she wants to trash Girl 2's name to everyone on the planet.Girl 2 decides to retaliate against Girl 1 and spread equally damaging rumors. Meanwhile, both Girl 1 and Girl 2 are pretending to be friends to each others faces. Pretty immature, right?
It got me thinking about having that kind of competitive mind frame with your "friends" at the BJJ gym. Competition here is not usually about cute boys (At least, not usually!! lol) but about the pride of being "better" than your teammates. I do see it from time to time with people--usually white belts--talking about wanting to "tap out" so-and-so to show them they are better.
This mind set is not only destructive to a team atmosphere, but it is also going to get in the way of personal growth. In my opinion, thinking this way about your teammates is result of insecurity.
So what if someone is better than you? So what if some guy in the gym gets more attention than you? Are you doing BJJ to get attention, or are you doing it because you love the sport and want to improve yourself?
All of this got me thinking about myself, trying to see if I had the roots of this sort of jealously in my own thinking. I am a competitive person and, like everyone else on the planet, I want people to like me. These are some things I came up with to keep my mind focused in the right direction:
1. My self-confidence should not rest in the opinions of other people.
2. My worth is not based on my performance in BJJ, but my identity as a child of God and the strength of my character both on and off the mat.
3. If others get more attention than me, I will not change my personality/grappling style to try to get more attention.
4. I will work humbly, patiently, diligently, and with enjoyment toward my goal.
Just like girls in High School overestimate how important some boy's opinion is, I think sometimes people can get too wrapped up in trying to impress other people at the gym. It's not about how good people think you are. It's about coming to learn, have fun, get in shape and grow in your ability to defend yourself.
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Good points all.
ReplyDeleteI have noticed jealousy on my part. One of my training partners who is my size and maybe training for a few months longer than me... at the very beginning I was a little better than her, I think. I did well at my first couple tournaments. I got somewhat of a complex about it, because I felt all this pressure to keep up my performance, to keep representing the school well, but in grappling with her at home, I could tell she was improving much faster than I was.
It made me want to drop out of the competition thing entirely, because I didn't want to lose to her. Not competition at tournaments, but rolling with her at home. Which was stupid and lame, given that she's about the best training partner I could ask for in terms of dedication, size, and ability to challenge the heck out of me. Nonetheless my ego wasn't taking it too kindly so for a while I dodged her. I complimented her to her face and to others, but inside I was really unhappy about it.
Till recently, when I realized a few things-- I'd made progress too, and was not totally falling behind her... and if I was going to get better, I needed to train with her more... and that if she became the "golden child" it took a lot of weight and pressure off of me! Plus she's like 16 yrs younger than I am, so I can tell myself she has the advantage of youth :)
So... I needed to chill out. Your last sentence sums it up brilliantly.
I know exactly what you mean. There are three girls at Fabios--me, Steph and another girl--whoe are all around the same skill level and experience. We're all good friends, but even so we have to work to keep the "competition" mindset from getting in the way between us.
ReplyDeleteWhen we first started grappling, I had a bad habit of getting frustrated when people would pass my guard or get something on me. I'd get angry and frown and get intense when I was grappling. Basically, I was being a cry baby. I was more frustrated with myself for not "doing it right", whatever "it" was, but it translated into me being a poor sport and not a great training partner for my friends who I felt comfortable enough to have temper tantrums with.
I really had to relax and get over the idea that someone was going to "beat me". Now, if someone passes my guard, oh well. I will work side-control escape or whatever.
But it really is a struggle for me to KEEP that mind set.