Mental/Physical Head games?

[Matburn]

I posted this on another forum last week and last night I was on my back the whole night yet again...I lurk here mostly but the posts are always informative and encouraging.

I am only in the middle of my 5th month of BJJ and on a personal level I have seen an amazing amount of improvement both on and off the mat. Me 5 months ago would not want to roll with the Me today. With that said, I feel as though I am very passive. I react during every roll, I never act first.

I don't know if everyone I roll with, particulary other newb whites, are just stronger, more aggressive etc...(I am about 5'11" and around 210lbs) Now I know BJJ isn't about power, comparing yourself to others, etc... but I am finding I am constantly on my back and always in a "bad" position. I never attack, I am always "defending". Which I know is normal especially against more experienced guys and higher belts ( I have no problem with that and learn tons from them). But even if I am fighting someone with less experience than me and lets say I want to work a basic sweep I just learned, there is no way in hell I can pull it off and boom he passes my guard, side mounts me and the escpaes begin. Again, in one sense this is great. My defense and escaping is getting much better but I am questioning my aggressiveness.

Is this normal? Is it mental, is it physical? is it both?

I thought at first, well, I might as well "try something" first. Sometimes, something as simple as pull guard or a sweep and what is the worst that can happen, I end up mounted, big deal, I get mounted anyway. But I am never able to pull any of this off.

Is it just inexperience? but if it is inexperience, how are guys with less time than me continuously getting the best of me? or am I just that friggin passive?

Did this type of thing happen to any of the more experienced guys when they were new? or is it happeing to other new guys right now?

I know it is a journey and takes years. I am just hard on myself and get dissappointed with myself. Not that I would ever quit, I love this sport more than anything I have ever done and I will do it till I die even if I get mounted and schooled for then next 30 years...

[CrackFox]

I'm a judo beginner, and I'm starting to feel that I'll never pull off a proper throw against a resisting opponent. In newaza I can sometimes make things happen, but as for throws, I get the occasional one where my opponent stumbles and I fall on them, but never anything I actually planed. It's quite frustrating, to say the least.

I think you just have to try things and not worry about failing - but as soon as you actually go for a technique, you've got to go for it with determination and do your best to make it work. I also find it helps to take a second after a failed technique to figure out where it went wrong and visualise how I could have done it differently.

[pauli]

keep a log. write down some specific things that just aren't working when you try them. i spent six months writing down "i need to work on armbars." this gave me something specific to work on, and i started focusing on the steps... to great effect.

i know you're thinking "i need to work on EVERYTHING!" doesn't matter. there are bound to be specific techniques that you've got a pretty good grasp of, but either aren't going for, or are just plain fucking up. find out what those are over time. you'll see progress as you do.

also, see if you can get someone to coach you as you roll. this tends to do wonders.

[maofas]

I'm a judo beginner, and I'm starting to feel that I'll never pull off a proper throw against a resisting opponent. In newaza I can sometimes make things happen, but as for throws, I get the occasional one where my opponent stumbles and I fall on them, but never anything I actually planed. It's quite frustrating, to say the least.

I think you just have to try things and not worry about failing - but as soon as you actually go for a technique, you've got to go for it with determination and do your best to make it work. I also find it helps to take a second after a failed technique to figure out where it went wrong and visualise how I could have done it differently.

Standup wrestling/throwing is definitely more difficult than newaza. I'm definitely a bit better than 2 mos. ago, but it's slooooooow progress. There was a thread with some good advice here if you dig a bit (I started shadowboxing the entry to the 4 throws I use most, then I started shadowboxing 1-2 combos of the throws which has helped).

Even if I never learn to be great at throwing, as a standup guy I like that I'm getting lots of practice vs. opponents trying to take me down every which way.

[kultist]

I think pretty much everyone gets the passive "I can never pull of a real throw" feeling in judo when they start. After a certain amount of time it just goes. For me it happened when I started cross training in jujutsu (trad and bjj) and started going to several judo clubs, so instead of learning a throw a little bit, missing class one week and then trying it in randori a fortnight later I was really getting my throws right and had lots of opportunity to practice them.
Reading bullshido was also a great help. No matter how much people say the UFC has massively changed fighting, kids these days are still stuck into kung fu movie propaganda. In any school conversation about martial arts judo looks like guys hugging each other untill one falls over, wing chun is incredibly deadly and they were banned by law from sparring because they kept killing each other with single knuckle punches to the neck and Bruce lee in his prime could beat Cro Cop in his prime, if they had any idea who Cro Cop was. When I first heard of the UFC, I assumed judo would be one of the worst arts, whose practitioners always got beaten.
Both the UFC and Bullshido changed that for me. When I realised that what I was doing could be used in a fight as effectively if not more effectively than pure striking, I gained confidence in myself and realised progress could be made, so I strived towards it.
I barely noticed when the change happened. It just seemingly went from them stumbling and falling over my legs to me actively going in for a ton of reaps set up by my bad tai otoshis, and me landing those reaps most times. From there I started trying even more forward throws in randori, and I'm even hitting those. My instructor is always banging on about how at a certain point you don't even think about the throws, you're just in a competition and you realise you did something, the other dude is on his back and you're on top of him. I'm not at that stage yet, but I'm fairly sure that if I keep regularly attending sessions it will happen.

[AlienGunfighter]

keep a log. write down some specific things that just aren't working when you try them. i spent six months writing down "i need to work on armbars." this gave me something specific to work on, and i started focusing on the steps... to great effect.

i know you're thinking "i need to work on EVERYTHING!" doesn't matter. there are bound to be specific techniques that you've got a pretty good grasp of, but either aren't going for, or are just plain fucking up. find out what those are over time. you'll see progress as you do.

also, see if you can get someone to coach you as you roll. this tends to do wonders.

Thanks for the assist. I'm having the same problem 2 1/2 months in to BJJ. I could have written the original post word for word. And since I started out in striking arts, I also have to fight the "punch/headbutt that ************!" instinct at the same time. There's just a lot more thought that has to go into BJJ that you just don't need for a striking art. I guess part of it is that I'm still trying to re-wire my responses.

Still, it's frustrating to learn something new and then never be able to use it because I can't get around my gym's 3 B's (Blue Belts, Brown Belts, and Behemoths).