Why do jiu-jitsu?

Helio Gracie

With will power, courage, discipline and genius that insists on defying the impossible, he was the fundamental gear in the machine of the development of Jiu-Jitsu, the martial art that conquered the world through its efficiency.
Exerpts from an article written by Luca Atalla
http://www.graciemag.com/?c=146&a=6122

Rorion's Son Ryron Training with Grandfather/Grandmaster Helio

Rorion’s first-born comes from the United States to study Jiu-Jitsu for a season under Helio’s tutelage. Repeating his customary discourse, the master declares: “I’m not going to teach him Jiu-Jitsu. He already knows everything I do. The only thing he will learn here is to do the same thing, just without using force.”

And to illustrate his point, the instructor extends his customary invitation to visitors to visit the latest environment to be built at the ranch, the academy built on the far right of the house. There, he offers gis and puts on his own, tying it with a blue belt in place of the red one. His disdain for the color scheme of today is nothing new. When he fought the great Japanese champion Kimura, in his most famous fight, he wore the same belt. “He didn’t like it, he asked why I wouldn't use the black. I responded: “Because I like this one,” he recalls.

He says he is always getting better: "I don't have strength or stamina, but I keep evolving, using less force. I’m the best at the finer details, the subconscious relaxation”, he analyses. The explanation is as follows: “You might not want to use force and control that mentally, but if I stab you, you will become tense. To transform this relaxation into something instinctive is very difficult and takes a long time. I am relaxed even when I am sleeping. The minute someone tries to move on me, their tenseness warns me, and as my reflexes are quicker, I move forward and defend. Nobody can surprise me."´

If to most people a lesson like this one is as rare as a precious diamond, for a privileged group of students the story is different. Once a week the instructor goes to Rio de Janeiro to share his knowledge, through private lessons he teaches in the academy his sons Royler and Rolker manage in the high school Padre Antonio Vieira, in the Humaita neighborhood. He charges 200 dollars each lesson.

He does not attend to professional fighters, just to common people, who come from far away, such as Dr Jose Eduardo Camargo, a successful businessman from São Paulo who flies to Rio with the sole intention of learning from the master. Beyond him, Mrs. Maria Alice Dantas, Dr. Marco Aurelio Pacha and the writer Gustavo Barbosa, among others, also drink from the source. “I never liked teaching athletes,” he says. “Athletes don’t need it. The ones that need my Jiu-Jitsu are those skinny, scared, wimpy, insecure, defenseless guys.

Can you imagine that guy if he were sure he wouldn’t get stabbed, clubbed, stomped on, punched, kicked? He would learn how to get out of any situation and become invincible. His timid posture would change to become one of self-belief, and that is something priceless. It's as though you were to win a million dollars tomorrow. You will change completely,” he compares. “I still haven’t found a student that has wanted to sell, for any price, what they learned from me.

I created a means of providing people security", he says with pride, criticizing the Jiu-Jitsu taught in most academies: "There is no way to teach the method of the system in a group-class. Nobody learns the details, they forget about self-defense and made Jiu-Jitsu about competition, where only the strongest win. My own nephews, to whom I gave their diploma, know very well, but don’t teach the way they should,” he reveals with sadness.