Who knows what’s best for you? Is it you, or is it your instructor?
Stick around long enough in Jiu Jitsu and you’ll arrive at this inflection point. You’ve amassed enough technical knowledge and skill to reasonably determine what is for you, and what isn’t for you.
This ability is part of what adult developmental psychologist Robert Keegan calls the self-authoring mind. The self-authoring grappler decides what’s ultimately best for themselves.
The next developmental stage is the self-transforming mind. The self-transforming grappler synthesizes multiple viewpoints from multiple teachers, creating something that’s their own.
All mindful grapplers are moving along this journey. If you’ve achieved a baseline level of self-awareness and skill, you can sit with the paradox that you know and you don’t know what’s best for you. Your instructor has something for you, but not everything.
It’s up to you to put those somethings together.
Jiu Jitsu is a self-directed process, not a service rendered.
Category: Inner Work
Tag: Socialized/Self-Authoring/Self-Transforming
Recent Meditations