jiujitsu: awareness

a big thing that changed my game was really tapping into what “awareness” actually meant and working on it

this is going to be a lifelong practice — this isn’t something you check off a list and never have to address ever again ✅

several years back, i attended a jiujitsu seminar in portland where larry hope, a workshop bjj black belt, taught stuff on octopus half

the real takeaway was when he said, “when i see people getting submitted, it’s not something complex, it’s not some deep setup, it’s just people not paying attention”

it’s a “well, no shit sherlock” piece of advice, but if you play things back when you do get caught, you’ll realize there were cues that you might not have been paying attention to

larry demonstrated this with casual, quiet sweeps from octopus half, initiated with a simple hand on the knee, just feeling for the right weight shifts

it wasn’t a complex sweep, but it demonstrated deep awareness of body positioning

if scott (red shirt) shifted his weight towards larry’s head and kept inside position with his left knee, the sweep wouldn’t happen at all

larry talked about paying attention to the knee and weight distribution of the torso, which made me question what the difference was between paying attention and awareness

attention is more conscious and specific — you can “pay attention” to where your opponent is gripping, a hand on the knee for instance

awareness is more subconscious, big picture, and contextual — your awareness may detect a slight pressure on your knee or a weight shift that begins to feel disadvantageous — it might not even register in your mind, but your body knows

done well and over time, paying attention translates to awareness

in jiujitsu, you’ll have to navigate traps and setups but awareness is what protects you

some examples¹

lachlan’s impassable guard includes framing, and he left his arm out just a second too long

kade took advantage of it

saunders fights the single leg x but fails to escape his left knee

big dan off-balances saunder’s weight and keeps a grip on his left knee straight into a kani basami

ramos chases the back so hard he forgot his leg was in danger

taza takes the kneebar

here’s a “setup” for a baratoplata — the defensive man should have had the awareness that his arm was immobilized and break joao’s grip asap

if he addressed that, joao wouldn’t have pulled off the baratoplata

again, it’s grey area — maybe he was aware of the grip, but hadn’t encountered what would happen if his opponent inverted, so there’s some knowledge gap there too

elijah was attacking an outside heel hook

he probably was aware that his own foot got caught, but didn’t strip the grip

pj was in a better position to pin elijah’s hip and finish

don’t take distal control lightly

i liked this subtle awareness of an impending arm saddle from kenta

kenta gets his arm isolated but quickly hip switches and postures up, avoiding mica’s attempt to use leg extension to trap the lower body and further break posture

beautiful

i’m sure at this level, all these athletes “know” about various counters, but all it takes is a millisecond, a grip, a slight weight shift that isn’t adjusted for, and the game changes

you could argue that these scenarios are dilemmas, closing one door opens another — the “adjacent movement”

to some extent, that’s true, but in some sense they’re also a game in being constantly aware of what’s coming next:

• framing hard for guard retention → limb isolation is easier for armbars

• single leg x thwarted → transitions to possible kani basami attack on far leg

• chase the back when your opponent rolls → trailing leg can get left behind

• get your heel caught without hip control → get your hip pinned and finished

• weird elbow leg grip → invert to baratoplata

• arm extended for possible arm saddle → early prevention allows posture

it is possible to defend or attack the next adjacent option — this is where knowledge and awareness begin to separate

i might know what’s coming next, but if my attention was focused elsewhere or my awareness doesn’t throw red flags, i’ll still get caught

my hypothesis is that at higher levels, what we attribute to a lack of technique or knowledge is actually a lapse in awareness

at some point in your journey you’ll want to understand two things:

1. there are no solutions, only tradeoffs

2. it’s not a knowledge gap, it’s an awareness gap

training awareness

here’s a good analogy for attention versus awareness:

it’s like using a flashlight in a dimly lit room — the flashlight is your attention, the dim background is your awareness

the flashlight is easy to train — counters and escapes to attacks, what do to expose and take the back, finishing mechanics on how to choke, use these grips that way to get an angle, put your hand on the knee and push — focusing on details is easy, we do it everyday

the dim background and making that brighter is the harder part — what’s going on around me while i am attacking, defending, and moving? this is the real game that’s being played around you

training sensory sensitivity and attention contributes to quality awareness

awareness dictates our subconscious ability to identify and respond to cues, setups, and dilemmas

“be more aware” is shitty advice, it’s hard to say that and have it be actionable

it’s like asking someone to do something that’s hard to control — telling people to “pay more attention” can actually be counterproductive because it focuses attention to the detriment of awareness

in reality it’s more akin to relaxing into it and experiencing it through yourself

yeah, sounds like woo-woo bullshit, so this is what i tell people to do to help activate it — during a roll, just soften your gaze a little bit

that means stare off into the distance, maybe a particular spot on the mat, or just look at your opponent’s chest and use your peripheral vision

i think it’s more that hyperfocus on visual stimuli leads to narrowed attention span and death grips, so this softened visual focus allows me to uniformly spread my attention out and sense what is actually going on in my limbs

while you’re doing that, i also pass along the advice that i was given about making sure that i am connected to my opponent and that i have tension in our connection

if we’re not connected, i can’t get a read on how they’re going to move — they can use quick footwork to get past my guard or shift their weight, and i won’t sense it

soften the gaze, think of yourself as one continuous move and the extensions of your body as sensory input

grips and connections in nogi jiujitsu are so transient that what you have one second will be different from the next, a simple disconnection can mean the difference between retaining guard and getting mounted

trust me, you already have some conception of what “awareness” feels like

while sitting down, ask your partner to do a cross step or backstep and start taking an angle on you

you immediately start feeling like you’re a little crowded on space, you don’t like it, you want to turn or fall to your back or start framing on their leg

it’s not something you need time to explain, you’re not focused on any one thing — you just feel this sense of pressure

that’s you being aware that someone is taking up your personal space, and there’s this feeling of discomfort and wanting to address it

if your attention was somewhere else, and you don’t do anything, they’ll take another step and take your back — the angled step was the cue

it’s not really a setup, but in this case, things are moving, and you’re either aware of it or not

try these things in your next roll and see how it goes, report back²

a last countering point

hyperfocus is not necessarily bad either, but awareness during these times is still necessary

another hypothesis of mine is that hyperfocus tends to work better in late stage, movement constrained finishing positions

we’re talking about positions where you have your opponent tied up in back control, mounted with both arms up, finishing the spiderweb armbar, or any number of leg lock positions where you have both legs trapped, as examples

because there’s much less chaos and movement, we can focus our attention on finishing mechanics

full body awareness is still required though — you wouldn’t want to be so focused on getting a rear naked choke that you lose hip control and they rotate out

maybe another follow up post for another time

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sources:

1. workshop bjj larry hope

2. adcc official youtube channel

3. dubious_dom ig channel

4. flograppling youtube channel

5. all the amazing athletes putting their body on the line

1. i’ll say this now before i get flamed

awareness is a big part of jiujitsu, but not the only part, otherwise our sport would just be about meditation or some shit

there’s speed, athleticism, actual technical setups, and creating diversions and reactions that can lead to all sorts of situations

this sport is fucking hard, even the best athletes in jiujitsu can get caught given the right circumstances

this is simply my effort at understanding what’s happening

2. less direct ways to train awareness also include breathwork and meditation, but i won’t address those here