Posting some reflections on the past week, spent in Leuven, Belgium.
I’ve been in Belgium the past week for jiujitsu camp.
Awhile ago, I wrote about hanging out with more young people (early-mid 20s), who have decided to pursue specific mastery in one thing. Here in Belgium, I had the opportunity to hang with athletes who were significantly younger than me. Part of it is because I’m curious about the nature of their jiujitsu life, but it’s also because they’re fun to be around. They’re an interesting case because they develop a different kind of maturity based on mastery rather than the standard education + job + hobbies route (not that there’s anything wrong with that).
My first encounter with the differences in young people was how much more degenerate genZ was compared to millennials (in a good way). Perhaps my opinion is based on small observed sample sizes, but millennials feel more like “structured process” types. These types follow some dictated path to get to a certain outcome. Most of my friends seem to have gone this way — college educated, get a job that’s kinda okay, “settle down”, and do well by best practices (not a bad life by any means).
The genZ-ers I know have this sort of high experimentation, shock-and-awe type of mindset that feels degenerate but surprisingly leads to decent outcomes. They have an intuitive feel with manipulating social media, understand what clicks and sticks, do a variety of odd freelance jobs, and try crazy ideas that work. Overall, they’re less concerned about some pre-ordained process. They’re seeking possibility.
My own jiujitsu coach is one of these young people, along with several aspiring athletes within our gym. There’s some sort of zen-like demeanor about my coach that I feel you don’t get unless you’ve really seen some shit or are a seasoned master in your 50s. He doesn’t overthink things in all the right ways and he’s cemented an unshakeable belief in himself and his peers along his entire jiujitsu journey. He always sees possibility. For myself, I sometimes wonder if I missed something.
I think reaching the upper bounds of any particular field naturally teaches the qualities of persistence, discipline, and self-reflection, so it’s not some unlearnable talent. Being young is a multiplier to these things — they’re ignorant in the right ways and they’ve still got some ADHD brain that moves at light speed.
I remember drilling the moves at the jiujitsu camp, and one of the instructor athletes comes over to drill with us. He did the move, but quickly introduced a dizzying array of other options. “What happens if you angle the elbow this way?” “Frame on me, this way.” “Can you move your leg?” “What happens if I do this?” All of this in the span of a minute or two. He’d sit there quietly, do it again, his eyes clearly indicating that he was deep in thought. “Hm, I don’t like the risk I’m taking here.” He’d explain himself. High experimentation, high curiosity, at high speeds. They’re not usually looking for how things were done before, they’re trying to understand games, heuristics, and cues. They don’t care if something is stupid, they’ll consider it regardless.
In all cases, these young athletes are also the opposite of meek, which is what I sometimes feel like, as if life had beaten something out of me in my older years. There’s some degree of healthy impulsivity, experimentation, and fearlessness that I find inspiring. They develop their own styles when climbing the competition mountain, but the ones I look up to all have an interesting mix of openness, quiet confidence, and self-belief.
What can I learn from interacting these young folks?
Clearly, I can’t turn back time to be young again, but what I can do is unlearn, or color over what’s already been colored in. As we grow older, we internalize things like embarrassment, shame, and guilt. Those are certainly not confidence inspiring. Resisting these usually kills curiosity and creates blackout curtains to a carefree soul. I don’t think there are any methods to “stay young”, or keep a “child-like worldview.” You just have to remove stuck on barnacles that have covered up a way of being or create situations where you can be creative.
not a care in the world, but still, do care
It’s not therapeutic advice, but not giving a shit is one of the best ways to unlearn. I took a card outta that athlete’s deck and tried a bunch of dumb shit while drilling, and hell, while rolling with others. I felt embarrassment in the mind, the red hot glow on my face while getting tapped in dumb places, trying weird things in even weirder positions, and all the while, ignoring the judgment of others. It wasn’t senseless though. There’s still some of that millennial procress mixed up in there. I just let more of the raw feelings hang out, and I learned things about my game.
I was called out that I don’t act my age (a lot younger than I seem), and I attributed it to the fact that I’m always throwing jokes around. In the moment, I didn’t know if I should have been more offended or honored. There was a time period in my life where I was looking to be a very responsible adult, because I was called out to be immature (clearly some trauma there 😆). During that time, I leaned hard into being responsible, “getting serious”, and following rules. Since then, I have slowly ratcheted back to degenerate experimentation. I’m honored someone noticed the effort. Perhaps this camp is symbolic of a milestone.
I came away from the camp quite rejuvenated and looking forward to loosening up a bit. If anything, I’ll be experimenting more with various aspects of my jiujitsu game, but also within my own life. Updates to come 🙏.