Jiu Jitsu: The Art of Loving What Cannot Love You Back

photo by Hosanna Rull

Jiu-Jitsu is not for everyone, despite the common trope we use to market our programs. She is practiced by less than one percent of the population (roughly 0.037%–0.074%). She is a cruel mistress, a mirror that doesn’t lie, and the wake-up call you can’t ignore. She is brutally honest, not always kind, and she will strip away your excuses one by one. On the mats, your mistakes are naked, laid bare, and there is very little you can fake; that is a hard reality for most people to cope with, and I’m certain this is a contributing factor in the small population of practitioners.

To fall in love with Jiu-Jitsu is to fall in love with sacrifice. To love something that can’t and often won’t properly love you back. Birthdays, holidays, family vacations, nights out-you trade them for early mornings, taped fingers, ice baths, and another round when your body says it’s finished. I distinctly remember one year when my husband had taken another superfight, I had signed up for my third tournament in 3 months, and we just stared at everyone's plates at the holiday extended family dinner. We were surrouded by a chorus of “just try this _____ that I made” or “you guys are allergic to fun, huh?” It’s not about bravado or some badge of honor to be the “difficult one”. It’s about choosing to live differently, to give more of yourself than most are willing to give, and to never deal in the doubt of “what ifs.”

On these mats, you’ll meet people from all walks of life: preachers and felons, CEOs and laborers, soccer moms and soldiers. What unites them is a love for something uncommon, something the ordinary person will never understand. Why would you spend so much time loving something that doesn’t love you back? Why do you spend so much time with this strange group of people, in a sweaty uniform, who all have the same goal and the same irrational, obsessive pursuit of unattainable mastery? There is no ceiling in Jiu-Jitsu.

And yet, people come and go. Some leave because of ego, others because of injury, shifting priorities, or family obligations. Who you started with will rarely be who you finish with. If you are fortunate, you might make it to black belt alongside one or two of the same faces. Eventually, you look down at the line, and you don’t see a single face that remembers your first day at the gym.

But even black belts are not immune. Many reach that rank only to quit, afraid they’ll never live up to the weight of the belt they once worshipped. Others vanish because the achievement felt hollow. Usually, proof that they mistook the destination for the journey. We aren’t really so different.

Still, we keep showing up like some sort of humiliation ritual. We sign up for another tournament after a devastating loss. We train through injuries that whisper, then scream, then carve themselves into our bodies as permanent reminders to slow down, which we still ignore to this day. Whether we admit it or not, Jiu-Jitsu makes fools of us, and yet, we are the most willing of fools.

Because behind the pain and behind the sacrifice lies something that is truly rare: pure truth. You cannot fake Jiu-Jitsu. It works, or it doesn’t. You succeed, or you don’t. The mats do not care about your résumé, your excuses, or the story you tell yourself as to why you didn’t show up this week. They reveal you exactly as you are.

That’s why we keep coming back. Not for the medals, not for the rank, but for the quiet honesty it demands. In a world built on illusion, Jiu-Jitsu strips everything away until only the truth remains. And in that truth, there is no pretending and no hiding. There is only the slow, relentless work of becoming who you really are. In that work, you find moments of extreme joy, of fulfillment and pure ecstasy in the chaos. If you stay long enough, you will become the person you were always meant to be.