Confidence in Grappling (Article)

**jasculs** · Posted On: 10/04/2007 2:20pm

Confidence in Grappling
Author: Jason Scully
www.GrapplersGuide.com

"Kill the snake of doubt in your soul, crush the worms of fear in your heart, and mountains will move out of your way" ~ Kate Seredy

Yesterday I was rolling with one of my students in class who has about 3 years experience and when we were rolling I noticed something, and I realized that this is actually an issue with many grapplers out there. As we were rolling I was paying attention to his movements and his facial expressions and it was clear that he was missing something very important. What was he missing? He was missing his confidence. That's right, it was his confidence that he was missing.

There's so many times when I train with someone and they don't seem confident at all in what they're doing. Even if they know a ton of techniques they hold themselves back because they don't trust themselves that they'll execute those techniques properly.

When you're in practice you should never have to worry about if something is going to work, or if your opponent is going to counter your attack. You should just go for it with 100% confidence that you are going to make something happen. That no matter what, even if your opponent counters your movements you should have 100% confidence in yourself that you can counter right back.

You see many times it's not the moves you know that makes the difference it's the trust in yourself that makes a difference. There is so many people who can execute moves perfectly when drilling, but when it comes down to performing them in a live situation they either freeze up, don't remember them, or they don't have confidence in what they know.
Have you ever rolled with someone more experienced then you and you were weary of coming forward and you had a technique or plan that you wanted to execute but you weren't sure if it was going to work? You ended up taking a second to think about what might happen and by the time you're done thinking your partner or opponent has already made his move, because they were more confident then you were. That's what can make the difference of being steps ahead of your opponent or not.

The person who is 2, 3, and even 4 steps ahead of their opponent is the same person who is completely confident in their abilities and their techniques. They don't care if they know what's going to happen or not, because regardless their going to MAKE THINGS HAPPEN. There is no waiting, pausing, or thinking about what might happen they just go and take that chance knowing that no matter what they trust in themselves that they will be the ones to come out on top every time.

Even if what you tried didn't work you still believed in yourself and you now know what would have happened because you went for it instead of just sitting back and not taking any chances at all and not even knowing.

This is also a very common when you roll with someone who is much more experienced then you or a much higher rank then you. Let's say a blue belt in BJJ pairs up with a brown belt. Many times that blue belt is already thinking of ways that the brown belt can beat him before they even started rolling. They beat themselves before the match even started. They never gave themselves a chance and counted themselves out right from the beginning instead of starting with their head high and their confidence in full affect.

When you are confident in yourself regardless of your technical ability you will:

Think clearer.
React faster.
Feel better about yourself.
Breath better.
Be less conscious.
Make things happen.
Be steps ahead of those who aren't as confident.
Attack better.
Defend better.
Trust that you can deal with any situation in the moment.

As your techniques and strategies get better and better and you mix that in with being confident in yourself you will be much more successful in your rolling sessions.

Before we finish up, I just want to clarify what being confident is not. Being confident IS NOT:

Being cocky or over confident - just because your confident doesn't mean you should be cocky. Confidence will help you improve your overall game, but it's not the only thing that will make you the best.
Being lazy - being confident doesn't mean you are lazy and you shouldn't work hard.
Being arrogant - A person can be confident in themselves without being arrogant and boastful. Show your confidence with respect and work to help others be confident in their grappling as well. Don't under mind your partners and look down on those less experienced or even less confident then you may be.
Comparing yourself to others - Don't compare your confidence to others, and your abilities to others. Just be confident in what you know and your potential and you'll be well on your way to a successful and most importantly FUN grappling experience.
Having an Ego - One can be confident and not have an ego. Always trust in what you do and regardless of what happens whether it is a positive or negative, be humble in your experience and see every opportunity as a learning experience.

To sum things up: The point is to trust yourself and what you know. Trust that even if you don't know how to do something that you will one day. If you don't have confidence in yourself, then you don't trust yourself. If you don't trust yourself, then who can you trust?

"Experience tells you what do to do, confidence allows you to do it" ~ Stan Smith

Thanks for reading!
Jason

**Xanen** · Posted On: 10/04/2007 3:08pm

Great post, thanks!

This was and still is often true with me. One of the black belts called me out on it during sparring several months ago: "You have to believe!" he said. Immediately, I knew he was right. Since then, I've made an effort to just go for things more. And, not surpisingly, my performance has improved. It's not so much because the immediate techniques are succeeding, but rather that they are now a credible threat and demand a response from my sparring partner.

**krazy kaju** · Posted On: 10/04/2007 5:04pm

Yeah, this is a BIG issue with a lot of wrestlers that start in high school, including myself.

A lot of times I know I should be shooting in for a takedown but I don't, simply because of lack of confidence, even though I know the only way my takedowns are going to get better is by trial and error...

**artard** · Posted On: 10/04/2007 5:08pm

This is an issue I often have as a white belt. I roll with a blue or purple belt and am expecting them to crush me before we even start and so am not as aggressive as I should be and end up playing defense/resist the sub attempt the whole time instead of watching for openings or opportunities.

**wakinonioi** · Posted On: 10/04/2007 5:25pm

Originally Posted by krazy kaju

Yeah, this is a BIG issue with a lot of wrestlers that start in high school, including myself.

A lot of times I know I should be shooting in for a takedown but I don't, simply because of lack of confidence, even though I know the only way my takedowns are going to get better is by trial and error...

Yup, that's particularly true with taking shots. You gotta keep shooting AND be willing to not get the penetration you need and be willing to scrap from there. A lot of takedowns is playing the percentages, which you can't do if you won't pull the trigger.

Just one more thing that competition teaches better than anything else.

**Roidie McDouchebag** · Posted On: 10/04/2007 10:04pm

When I spar with guys much, much, much better than me, I only use techniques that I am supremely confident in, which narrows down my focus to a few techniques. If I know something won't work, I'm not going to try it. If something isn't working, I move on to techniques that might. I figure confidence is important for competition, where you should assume your **** will work, but if you endlessly try to go for something that won't work, you **** yourself.

***JohnnyCache*** · Posted On: 10/04/2007 11:26pm

Jesus ICY did you just admit someone out there is better then you?

**ijay** · Posted On: 10/05/2007 4:11pm

I'm different in the way, that if I'm rolling with someone who's a lot better than me, I'll go for stupid **** like flying triangels etc. stuff that really doesn't work. (for me) I do it because I already know that they're going to make me tap in thirty seconds anyways, it doesn't really matter if I tap now or one sweep later.

If I'm rolling with someone who is as bad in bjj as I am, well, then the roll gets more competetive. I don't like tapping to someone I know I shouldn't tap to. But when I already know that the other guy is a lot better than I am, there's no competition and then I don't mind tapping so much, because it's going to happen regardless of whatever I do. I don't have to be so careful with maintaining position, for example I might go for a leg lock that makes me lose that position. But if I hadn't gone for the lock, I would have been sweeped anyways.

You don't have to worry about "losing" when you're going to "lose" anyways.

**krazy kaju** · Posted On: 10/05/2007 5:32pm

Originally Posted by wakinonioi

Yup, that's particularly true with taking shots. You gotta keep shooting AND be willing to not get the penetration you need and be willing to scrap from there. A lot of takedowns is playing the percentages, which you can't do if you won't pull the trigger.

Just one more thing that competition teaches better than anything else.

Yeah.

My biggest problems is with setting up my takedowns.

I'm not one of those big buff strong guys that can bulldoze through people in their takedowns without good setups... In any case, the single and the arm throw are the only two takedowns I can actually perform really good, which is usually what I'll go for anyways, but I know I should be going for them more often as well as for other takedowns.

**wakinonioi** · Posted On: 10/06/2007 10:04pm

Originally Posted by krazy kaju

Yeah.

My biggest problems is with setting up my takedowns.

I'm not one of those big buff strong guys that can bulldoze through people in their takedowns without good setups... In any case, the single and the arm throw are the only two takedowns I can actually perform really good, which is usually what I'll go for anyways, but I know I should be going for them more often as well as for other takedowns.

99.9999% of the time those "big buff strong guys" can only get away with that at a low level of competition anyway.

Keep drilling the basics, the basics, the basics, including setups.