The Old Grappler
The Old Grappler
Tony Caito's Journey: Retracing His Steps Back to Jiu-Jitsu, Strengthening Resilience, and Fostering Community Growth
Facing life-altering health challenges, Tony Cato, the Head Black Belt at Sensei Studio, embarks on an inspiring journey back to his beloved passion – Jiu-Jitsu. Through his eye-opening experience, he recaptures his physical strength, reforging his skill and emerging with an expanded vision of what martial arts mean not just to the individual, but to the community at large. Brace yourselves for an in-depth conversation that delves into the power of resilience, the human spirit, and a unique perspective on the role of martial arts in fostering personal growth and community connections.
Tony lays out his vision for martial arts studios, one that extends beyond the realm of physical training into the sphere of personal and societal impact. His mission to transform gyms into platforms for mental health support and community building has unfolded into a myriad of initiatives, from scholarships honoring lost friends to proactive steps towards supporting the youth of Modesto, California. Tony’s narrative is not just about martial arts, but the innate power each gym or studio holds to nurture safe spaces, encourage mental resilience, and provide a haven for personal growth and community enhancement.
In the latter part of our conversation, Tony places a strong emphasis on the power of mental resilience in overcoming life’s challenges. From insights drawn from the legendary judo master Kimura to his own experiences, he provides invaluable wisdom on harnessing the power of the mind. With an inviting outlook on inclusivity in martial arts, he advocates for welcoming environments that cater to everyone, elevating martial arts into a medium for personal transformation and community enrichment. This episode is a vibrant blend of life lessons, motivation, and a profound understanding of martial arts' potential to influence personal growth and societal impact.
The old grappler. Subscribe. Make some comments, drop a comment, do what you gotta do. I don't know how this works, but yeah, let's check it out, man.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to the Old Grappler. My guest today is Tony. I'll let you introduce yourself when you train or hear at your studio what your studio name is Beltrank.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. First of all, welcome, jose. I really appreciate you guys coming down, jesse, as well. I'm Tony Cato. I am the head black belt here at Sensei Studio headquarters in Modesto, california. We have about maybe 100 or so, 110 kids, maybe about the same in adults, 150. We're only less than three years old. Our three year anniversary comes up here in November. I hope you can come.
Speaker 2:That's what Mike was saying, yeah 11-11 is our anniversary.
Speaker 1:It'll be our three year anniversary. We're currently under Coyoteira CTA Really wonderful, amazing group out there, based out of San Jose. It's only for the people that don't know it's only about two hours less than two by hour and a half from here and I'm a first degree black belt. I'm doing my second here, coming up pretty soon, and I started originally back in the 90s Half, Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, Mountain View, California, a long time ago, 1993. But just like many of us that started way back in the day, life happened Right and eventually training for a little bit. I developed some tumors. I broke my collarbone. They did some X-rays. They found tumors in my brain, my cerebellum, spinal cord and my chest and had to take a long stay away from Jiu-Jitsu, but eventually made my way back, started all over, had to get my motor skills back. You might have seen from some of the videos on my Instagram I had to learn how to walk and talk again back in 2008.
Speaker 1:2012, I had the second part of the three-part surgery, which was the tumors in my spinal cord. So I had to have C3, 4, 5, and 6 removed, Cadaver bones put in and a metal plate right in this incision. Here you saw the big scar in the back of my head. Yeah, that was 2008. This one was 2012. And I'm praying now like not just turned 50. I told myself I was going to wait for the rest of the last surgery to get the tumors out of my chest to a 50. So my focus here has been to develop other trainers to kind of hold the reins while I go into the next phase of my life, which is taking care of the rest of it. But it's been a beautiful journey so far. Yeah, you have a wonderful place. Hey, thank you, man. I appreciate that. That means a lot.
Speaker 2:Really means a lot to me. Yeah, this second time that I've been here. Like I said, we came with Craig.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for his memorial. That was a tough loss for us, Very tough loss for us. Him and I have been friends many years. You'll develop these relationships with people that and it's a little bit of a sweet and sour relationship with people that you kind of train daily to beat each other up and then over the years you're kind of all banged up. You wake up one day and your 50 and that was, I think, 48. And we both shared the same heart mentality of serving the youth, especially on this part. This side of Modesto, Right on the other side of the freeway, is one of some of the roughest parts of Modesto.
Speaker 1:So reaching out to the kids right there, the freeway is right there on the other side, the west side, we have a lot of youth that we want to reach out to. So, even though he's passed, we started an academic scholarship in his name. You saw that that day. We've already given out, I think, seven scholarships, something like that, 14 in total, 14 kind of like in general youth in the area. But we're going to continue to do this.
Speaker 2:It's a good thing. Thank you, man. I appreciate it. It's really good. I mean, I've seen something on social media the other day like every kid deserves to train. The unfortunate part is, not every kid has the resources to train. Someone does something like what you're doing.
Speaker 1:It can be very tough and that's why, when this opportunity came up in this 6,000 square foot warehouse, I didn't know how we were going to make this happen. This is too big for me. This was at the beginning of when the first COVID restrictions started coming out and they were shutting everything down. I lost everything I had in the barbershop that we had downtown. We had to shut down and this opportunity came up. The bill was just bigger than I could ever imagine, but the owner was willing to work with us. I told him the vision and how I thought we could make a healthy contribution to the youth in this area, because even if they don't have the means to get here, maybe we could figure that piece out, but they can walk right across. They're within walking distance. How could I say no?
Speaker 2:The old grappler just awarded my blue belt. I've been coaching wrestling for about 14 years now. When I get in there, it is like everything just goes away. You're in there coaching on the map for Jiu-Jitsu. It's a way of therapy. The old grappler, I'm a Castro's pool service. What am I saying? Check. I'd like to say thank you to our sponsor, castro's Pool Service and Repair, phone number 209-675-5418. I am Castro's Pool Service and Repair. Thanks, so yeah, so originally you're from the Bay Area.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was born in San Francisco, raised throughout the entire Bay Area. My mom and dad split up when I was younger. We didn't live with a lot. There were many times we were homeless, living out of a car from park to park. She worked in thrift stores and she also worked throughout Redwood City, San Carlos area cleaning motel rooms. So a lot of times I had to switch schools almost every year throughout the Bay Area. The only toys I had was whatever I could fit in a shoebox. We were in a big Lincoln Continental. It was like a 1979 Lincoln Continental, four-door, like a big boat. That was just life growing up in the Bay Area for me. Like I said, I think God blessed me with those type of experiences so that I have compassion for the kids and situations out here Born and raised throughout the Bay Area.
Speaker 2:So you said, you started training in 93?.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so my prudential who started One World Judges too, him and I grew up together and through high school we were really big on martial arts. We thought we were pretty good at it. We were in Kaji Kimbo for a while Mike, just a little bit longer than I and I want to say, like in high school, we thought we could hold our own, you know. And then one day Mike said, hey, I'm going to quit Kaji Kimbo and I'm going to go do this jujitsu thing. And back then you didn't have like now where you could just Google stuff, you know. So I said, well, what is it you want to like? Climb walls and wear a mask? I thought it was a ninja too, you know.
Speaker 2:I didn't know what jujitsu was Like. We would throw ninja stars or something like that you know, and he goes no, man, it's not like that man.
Speaker 1:There's this little guy, poise Gracie. He's a Poise Gracie is out there killing guys. And I ordered a VHS tape. I want you to see it when I get out of the first UFC, you know, yes, and he goes. Anyway, he's got a cousin out this way named HALF and he's out in Mountain View, which is we were living in Fremont at the time, and he says so, I've been trying it out and you should quit and come with me. And I said well, try it out for a little bit longer and get back to me. You know, let me know how it goes.
Speaker 1:So he quit and I was still stuck at now, kaji Kimbo, pretty much. He was like my big friend, you know, my big sparring partner, yeah, so then one day he would just always ask me hey, you got to quit this, you got to come do this. So he showed me the tape and I was like bro, you want to wrap your legs around guys, man, what's wrong with you? Like I wasn't homophobic, but it was just like this is like you didn't do that kind of stuff. And during that time so this would have been the so early nineties, you know, so nine or 93. And he said man, I'm telling you right now, this is real, this is all that stuff we've been learning. Yeah, if you get the first punch, good, but someone can catch you too. What's going to happen when you go to the ground?
Speaker 1:He goes how many times have we been in fights in Fremont when we were in high school? We were in group fights being knuckleheads. He goes how many times did it get to the ground? I'm like, yeah, I get it. So I went for my first class and this 15 year old man, one round, tapped me seven times and 15 years old, literally. I went there back then. It was kick skin. They were like big bell bottom giz back in the day was that was the brand of G that they had at house back then. They had other ones too. But Dave Camaro was there. Cameron O'Roll was there. People don't know those names as much, but Cameron O'Roll beat Marcelo Garcia like twice.
Speaker 1:People won't really talk about that.
Speaker 2:To me.
Speaker 1:Marcelo is like a God to me, but there were some tough dudes in that academy during that time, but I was at the level of below this 15 year old and I was like man. It really opened my eyes. You think you're a badass until that happens, and then you realize, wow, if this kid had to fight this kid in the street he would kill me.
Speaker 2:So it was a very eye opening thing, it gives you perspective, right.
Speaker 1:Man, it really does and it's humbling. It's humbling A little bit of a rougher crowd. Back then, you know that Gracie time, during that time period, nobody kind of knew what this was really about. It was kind of like a hidden secret in this hidden gem for a while. All those guys were tough, all more tough. So I appreciate those days. I'm a different guy now, carlos Sopone, still really good friend of mine.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, he's been here a few times. He's been here a few times in the seminar.
Speaker 1:He was head black out over there for a while too and he's always still a dear friend of mine. He comes out here regularly. He's like a brother to me. We speak regularly but we're different people now those days are. You know, you gather what you can from it. But I think now the more gentler, more kinder side is the right way to train. You know it's not a bit. It's definitely a marathon.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, so you said Kaji Kembo.
Speaker 1:Kaji Kembo. Yeah, that was like the dirty form of karate back then. You know, there's a group of like guys from Hawaii that started like this grungy Kemos, like a grungy form of street karate back then. Oh yeah, we thought it was pretty cool. I mean, there's no shame on those. Those guys were good. Yeah, I was under Greg Ligera, who is a known kind of bad guy in the Bay Area. It's a poker. Oh, you did yeah. Yeah, there's not much to say. I also want to make a point to say that we shouldn't shun any other of the martial arts as well, yeah.
Speaker 1:It's just we didn't do any ground stuff at that time. It was very foreign, very foreign. I think these days you go to some of these karate schools, they know to incorporate some ground, at least some, they can't deny it. But back then you were kung fu, you were kung fu, right, you were karate, you were karate.
Speaker 2:There was no like mixed martial arts didn't come until later, later, yeah, later. There wasn't no cross training and all that.
Speaker 1:So Mike was doing. I remember Mike, I was already now hooked on Jitsu. He was cross training at Kung Lee's in San Jose. He was a pretty well known kickboxer during that time, so he was getting his striking in there and Jitsu over at house. But again, like time progresses, and then I developed these health conditions and kind of took me out for a while. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So when you went through that health issue, timeframe wise, how long were you out for A year.
Speaker 1:So I was also a single father raising my boys alone. I have five boys and one girl. My oldest son, anthony, he's one of the head black belts at Maraki's down in Sokau. He was just a kid.
Speaker 1:As I was recovering from the brain surgery I put my kids back in health school, but then he had a school in Dublin and I lived in San Ramon with raising my older boys and so I put them. As soon as health took over that school in Dublin, I put them back there and health remember me from the 90s, but I just wasn't very. I was a very high risk patient still with all the other tumors, especially the ones in my spinal cord. So as much as I wanted to train, I just had to wait it out to at least I got this one done. The ones in my chest don't really bother me, but the brain one was starting to cause a paralyzation on my left side and then the one in my spinal cord was starting to really impinge the flow of brain fluid to my brain.
Speaker 1:So there's very touchy time for me, especially being a single dad, you know, trying to figure that piece out as well. It's not like again, it's not like back then I think you had like the dial up internet, but you had these. They had this place called a library. I don't know if people know what that is. It's a place with books. I don't know if people know what books are, but there's these libraries, and I used to have to go to these libraries to read books on how to raise kids, because I was trying to figure this out, you know. And then so, just, it wasn't really. You found a book on that, huh, yeah, well, I'll tell you what it was?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It was a focus on the family. That's the title of it and it was some pastor guy that wrote on the Christian side of, or Christian perspective of, raising kids. So it was a focus on the family. I forgot which volume it was, but it was specific toward families that were like, usually, single parent families. But here's the turning point. The turning point was when my oldest son now a black belt, back then white belt getting his first stripes I have a picture of it that I'll send to you Half was putting on his first stripe on his belt and it was the first time I saw this glow at the time oldest son's face. He was probably seven years old and I remember being jealous.
Speaker 2:I remember looking at that like man, if I had not of quit you know, had I oh, I was jealous in the moment that you could have been.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like I could have been the one doing that on my son, you know. So it's bittersweet, right, because now we fast forward. And then I got back into it. I moved out to Modesto. Nobody knew me. I started training under another Academy over here where nobody knew me, and I felt horrible because it's like walking you guys just walk normal.
Speaker 1:For me, after the surgeries I have to actually throw my foot forward to walk. It's different. So it's kind of like I have Android, my wife and my kids, they all have iPhones, they all want me to get an iPhone. But for me to get an iPhone today and navigate is lost. But you understand screens, you understand where Google does, you understand what YouTube does, but navigating is hard. So that's what happened after my brain surgery and spinal cord surgery. I knew what the end result was supposed to look like in these techniques, but I couldn't get there because navigating there's like new screens, you know. So it was very frustrating.
Speaker 1:But this Academy that I was with they really allowed me to learn and then allowed me to teach kids class and then I worked my way up and then eventually, on my second life in Jiu-Jitsu, was able to get my black belt and then start all of this. But here's the sweet part of the bitter part of my son getting a striper belt. I wasn't able to tie his stripe on his white belt. I worked it out with his head black belt in the LA to bring him up here as a brown belt to promote him the black belt here. So I wasn't able to tie his stripe but I was able to tie his black belt. So it came full circle for me.
Speaker 2:That was special.
Speaker 1:That was the mission, that was my driving mission was I wanted to redeem myself from the time that I had to, well, quit for a while, but at the same time I felt what my son I saw the brightness in his eyes and spirit when he got promoted. I was like every kid should have that. Every kid should have that moment, that feeling, even if it doesn't come from their parent, but just to go somewhere where they feel a sense of achievement of something real. Not something where they win a high score on saving the world 12 times on some video game and then, once they turn it off, they're back to shit again, being nobody, and then they get depressed. So here the kids, achieve something real, Right?
Speaker 2:I like that and, coming from the adult side of that, we had a stripe promotion a few weeks ago. My coach is Craig. Yes, and we're fairly new. This month is two years that he's been there, that we've had a Jiu-Jitsu program in our gym.
Speaker 2:And when it first started I don't know, we had to have been maybe six months in or so and we got a stripe, and that day I was like that's cool, right. And then later on, we just kept going and going and going and I started competing. I competed right away, but the stripes didn't mean anything to me. Right, like after that first one. I was excited for the first one, but after that I got to tournaments and I seen guys with two, three, four stripes on their belt and like it's almost like you're, given those stripes valued. They're still a person that's training, like you are, yeah, that has to go out and see if their game is going to work against you. Sure, yeah. So when I went in and I seen these guys that like seen the stripes, and then we got on the mat and actually combat, right, and I felt like the stripes didn't mean anything.
Speaker 2:After that, I was able to win a couple of tournaments, so I was like, okay, like just keep training the promotions, the stripes, whatever, though, happened, they happen, yeah, and it does, you know, yeah. So I got one stripe on the white belt and then I got promoted to blue, right, yeah. And then he did like he did stripes the other day, yeah, so we had class on Thursday night. He stripes, like all the white belts, yeah Right, like. And then he striped me, and then the next that's Saturday or Sunday.
Speaker 2:We went to a seminar up at San Lorenzo and it was me and another lady that trains with us and he asked us about the stripes and I was just like, and he's all, what is the? And I'm like coach, you know, like we've had this conversation before like after the first stripe, it doesn't really for me, I didn't really care about the stripes anymore, like it's just, it's just a signal of progress, that's it Right Time spent in progress. But I know I'm there, I know I'm putting in the time when it happens, it's going to happen, yeah, and I think that's. You still need to show up.
Speaker 1:The interesting thing that, when it comes to the mentality behind promotions, different strokes for different folks some people don't need the piece of tape, right?
Speaker 1:For little kids, that piece of tape man, it's a world Huge right. But for the adults, like I've never really been big on stripes either. My wheels over there, that shows all my different belts on the journey to black, and some of them only have two stripes or three stripes. But I always remind folks you got to remember everybody's training to get better every single day too, and everybody's learning curve is different. Everybody has different availabilities to be able to spend the amount of time that they do on the mat. What you should be doing, if you do at all.
Speaker 1:Look at the stripes on your belt. Is you now as a two stripe or three stripe? What could you have done had you have fought yourself at one stripe? There should be a substantial, substantial difference. There should be substantial growth. So if you were to take your first stripe, which meant a little something, second stripe really didn't mean anything. But if you had to fight yourself to the death, fighting the guy that was at one stripe is nine day. Between stripes Is night and day. So maybe you don't see the progress against the guy that gives you a hard time on the mat today, but if you reflect on where you were back then is nine day between stripes, because sometimes stripes is what?
Speaker 1:Every six months, or three to six months, whatever that may be, yeah, but somebody who's training two, three times a day, they might get striped up in the next belt within the same year. You just never know. So the comparison should never be you versus your teammates, it should be you versus you. And even the guys that start here after three months like, hey, I don't know, am I progressing? I feel like I'm not progressing. How long have you been here? Oh, three months. If you had to fight yourself to the death the day you walked in here for the very first time, what would you do? You're going to learn something about their personalities, because the two popular answers are this I would fuck that dude up. That's one of them.
Speaker 2:Okay, that's three months, oh fuck that dude up, right.
Speaker 1:But something will be different if you're a blue belt going to purple belt talking about what you would do had you on the day that you first walked in. Typically what happens is they say I would subdue the person and I would show them mercy. It's a different mentality. So the white belts that usually come in it's like they already have this idea it's a killer, be killed mentality, depending on them.
Speaker 1:The nature of your gym you know different gyms, different strokes for different folks. Right, I don't knock it For here. We're a very respectable, loving family group here. This is how I like it here. I've gone to gyms where the testosterone is pretty thick, right when you walk in through the doors. I don't knock it. It might be just the character of that area and they have to be that way and that's what motivates them in that area. So I don't knock it For us. It's not like that here. But I will say this over time, as you get off, maybe from the blue to purple, you should be thinking and your mentality should change where you're a little bit more merciful, this is why I get a little bit bothered when I hear comments from people saying oh, as a pro belt, you should just be beating up every blue belt.
Speaker 1:What does that mean? I have some blue belts that are really good, that could keep up, and then I have some blue belts that have no athleticism at all and they're up there in age and I have those guys too. Yeah, no, there should be a level of professionalism, but also there should be a level of where you have the right personality to know when to apply and when to not apply so much pressure. There should be a balance of that. There have to catch that mentality early, because as you're developing as a white belt, you're really just trying to figure it all out and you're just trying to survive, and so you're so wrapped up in that you're not thinking in terms of well, I would control the situation and maybe talk to the guy Like I tell my guys here, like, if you're going to bar fight out here, I would hope that you wouldn't do something to get yourself put in jail for a long time, if not forever. I would hope that you would control the situation and then tell the guy look, I'm going to let you go. Let's just pretend this didn't happen. I would hope you'd be that guy instead of the guy that's like I'm going to fuck you up.
Speaker 1:I remember that mentality from way back, when. It doesn't have to be like this. Now. I think you learn and you train so that you can be in control. This is a control game, right, it's not just a kill, break bones and choke. You're controlling the situation and then maybe let a little bit of your humanity out and a little bit of compassion for the person that you could kill if you wanted to, but you don't have to. This is what I would think we should develop more. So limit the damage, exactly, exactly. There comes a point like even you now, the little that we did earlier. I would think there comes a point where you know when somebody's just crushed and it's not going to teach them anything, to just crush them all the way through You'll have other people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know what?
Speaker 1:I mean it's better to be like you have it. They're not tapping, let it move on to something else. But don't ruin the dance. You have a full four, five minute, seven minute round. Enjoy your dance throughout. You don't have to kill everybody. I understand the people I came from that mentality. Health was all about kill back then, but I also know health now. He's a lot more compassionate now than he was back then.
Speaker 2:You could start there the times.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the times have changed?
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure. But the bigger picture, jose, is the nature of your gym. I would put it out there to the other gym owners. Just think about what positive influence you can have in the community. You're in Right More than anything else. It's not like that board of everybody, like all of our people that win at tournaments and stuff like this. Okay, that's cool, that's enough to tell people hey, the stuff we teach it works, works pretty good, we have all you know. But once that's out of the way it's, how many kids can you bring in here to make a positive influence on?
Speaker 1:We have a big problem now. I would say it starts with understanding the why behind what you're doing. I don't mean to ramble, but the reality is you're going to have all these gym owners that are going to listen to this and they have instructors under them, like I have instructors that use some of them today. Do they understand the why behind what they're doing? Is it just to smash people, just to let people know they're a badass, or is there a bigger picture in this and that's to help out in the community? God put you, whatever your belief is, mohammed, universe, god, whatever that is. This is where you are and and and. Are you exercising all your options to make a positive influence there? Our kids are in a big trouble right now. It's a big problem right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there's too much influence outside right.
Speaker 1:Like it's. I think it's worse than what people think. You know, I saved something on my phone. Do you mind if I read this to you? Anybody could look this up. This is 2021. Just some basic statistics. Okay, this is on the youth of today. That's on that Android phone. Yes, on the Android. You put this on an iPhone. I wouldn't be able to. Here's let me. Let me read you this statistic. According to the new data 2021, more than a third 37% of high school students reported poor mental health during COVID-19 pandemic. 37% Reported Jose. What that means is these are the kids that were brave enough to say something about it. Right, there's an even bigger number of people, kids that are afraid to say something. They're afraid to say something 37%. Okay, 44% reported persistently. They persistently felt sad or hopeless during this past year. This was 2021.
Speaker 2:It's up 30%, bro.
Speaker 1:It's up 30% going into 2023. Okay, but read the list of these statistics. More than half 55. So of that, 33% in 2021,. More than half reported they experienced emotional abuse by a parent or other adult in the home, including swearing at, insulting or putting down the student. 11% experienced physical abuse by a parent or adult in the home, including hitting, beating, kicking, physically hurting the student, so on and so forth. More than a quarter 29% reported a parent or adult in their home lost their job.
Speaker 1:I don't think. I really don't think. I have no way of wrapping my brain around this. I really don't think we spend enough time sitting down with our staff in these academies to say look, do you understand the why behind what you're doing, especially with the youth classes Very tough class, by the way. Jeff Glover used to say this if you want to help your academy out, help out in the kids' class. Yeah, that's the biggest contribution you can make in your academy, but we never go into the why. You realize how bad the situation is there. That's just focused on the kids, right, but where's the root of the problem? It's with the adults around those kids, this place. And you've been doing this for how long now Two years, yeah, two years.
Speaker 1:Have you witnessed people come in and become a better person in just two years? Yeah, nine day like night and day. If we would, through people like you, start talking more about the value of what these gyms have to offer outside of gold medals, competing and all the bragging rights and all that. If, through people like you, we could communicate to the gyms and community and say, hey, look, sit your staff down and let's talk about the kids in this area, imagine the impact you would not only have on the kids, but if we can change the adults to be better adults, how would we then impact the kids?
Speaker 1:I've seen it here. My staff will tell you the same thing. I've seen it where you've had the person with military PTSD from serving in some place had it in tears in one year come to me or any of my staff to say had it not have been for this place, I probably wouldn't have stuck it out with my family. I was a horrible, horrible, horrible person Because of a place like this. I can't thank you enough for keeping this thing going.
Speaker 1:That's a big deal, bro. That's a big deal, especially when that one person has four or five kids. What do you think that home life is now like, now that they've become a better person here? Then, when you see here the beautiful thing about here that I only know here, because this is where I'm at when you start seeing families with the kids training one session and then the kids are able to play out there in the patio area and then the parents are training, this is priceless, bro, bigger than any medal to me, bigger than any right. I think we can move the needle on this, but we have to talk about it.
Speaker 2:We're really trying to do that at our gym at Strike in Los Santos. What we have like we have all around gym there's Muay Thai, boxing, wrestling, jiu-jitsu and then a fitness side. Yeah. Sound familiar, so familiar, yeah Something for everybody the 430 class for the kids, so there's a 330 for beginner kids and a 430 for the advanced kids. So when those kids come in for Muay Thai, there's classes going on on the other side. So instead of the parent just sitting there watching, they can be there and get a workout in too.
Speaker 2:And if the parent is going to do the adult Muay Thai class, there's another class going on for fitness that the kids are welcome to join. Yes, so it becomes a family activity. We're really trying to push that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because what you're left with without that is what.
Speaker 2:You left dysfunction.
Speaker 1:Not just dysfunction, but when you have divorce one out of every two, which is apparently higher now these days but you have single family homes, the child is left to the influence of social media or the video games or the chat rooms in the video games, and this is not working. We know it's not working. So this is what I'm hoping we can leave your viewers with today, the ones that have academies Do just a little bit of research. Find out what's going on with the youth in your area and see how you can help. Fuck the cities and all the financing they get. Let me just say that because let me give you one example Fuck the city group in this place. It makes me mad. You know what they open to here. They got an over a million dollar contribution. You know what they open to here A fucking art museum. How does that help with bullying? How does that help with these kids that are exposed to drug abuse? And you think somebody who's contemplating suicide is saying you know what? I was going to kill myself, but thank God I saw a nice drawing at the art museum last week when we went on a field trip. How many people are just going to go out and just so. This is and I'm sorry for the cursing, but let me just I want people to feel the passion.
Speaker 1:Don't wait for a handout from the government. Don't wait, don't wait, don't wait, don't wait. Make that shit happen in your academy. Don't wait for some nonprofit. You know all that other stuff. You want to give out an academic scholarship. Give out the damn scholarship. We have what? Four or five people here giving us their report cards. They have to maintain a 3.0 or above and they can train here. Yeah, I mean, we're not rich Like. This is everything we have. We're not rich at all. Right, we're not rich at all.
Speaker 1:But if you're waiting because you want a nonprofit ID and you want, you're waiting for funding, what does it have to do with the kids right now? You waiting for what? Because the lifestyle that they're living right now that could be to their demise isn't waiting. It's trying to ruin them now. So for the viewers that own academies, I urge you, figure out where your hotspots are in your city, see what impact you can make with that youth and make that shit happen. Make it happen.
Speaker 1:If the funding comes later on, who knows, maybe one of the kids you help out has some rich dad or mom somewhere and they're like hey, you changed the life of my son or my daughter. Here's a checkbook. You know, I've seen it happen. It's happened here many times where somebody's like you did so much, here I want to give back, I want to sponsor some of these kids. I'll pay for their tournament, I'll pay for their ghee. It happens here. I think God, universe, muhammad, whatever you believe in Buddha, it'll put your heart in the right place and make that shit happen. Don't wait for handouts. Make that shit happen.
Speaker 2:You know.
Speaker 1:Sorry, I'll be on a tangent, but that's what this place is about. It's not about a play. If we don't do this, if we don't start making better adults now, what's the future look like later on for these youth, you know?
Speaker 2:I love it. I love the trending in the right direction.
Speaker 1:No, everything's giving. We do Thanksgiving lunches here First thing in the morning. We have these stations where we make brown bag sandwiches lunches. The first year we did 110. Second year, like 250. Last year we did 330. 330 brown bag lunches. Somebody does 387. Yeah, so we make the brown bag lunches here. This is the first part of the morning. Then they go out with an adult and they give them out. It's showing our kids compassion to give back to the community. Where else are they going to get that? Who's going to do that Art museum? I'm sorry for my city that gets offended if they listen to this, but a damn art museum, bro. A million bucks. What could you have done with a million bucks more? They're still asking for more money for this stupid thing. I'm guarantee you, other cities are doing the same thing. They're using these funding things to make their. Oh, this is what we're doing for our kids. What are the issues? Mental health is an issue. Bullying is an issue.
Speaker 2:So mental health bullying. I follow a few people that are against bullying. Oh yeah, tom DeBlois. Oh yeah, good one. Yes, and that was one other place that has a ghee. That's anti-bullying. And I think, being able to Figure out how a kid, even adult, like you talked about the PTSD, yeah, right, if, if you can walk through the door and not be judged for anything and just train that hour or two hours that they're able to forget, they have that release About anything and everything that's going on in their life for that day. For those, for me and I talk about that in my mission statement when I open, when we started the podcast yeah, for me, like I'm a wrestling coach, the moment I walk into the wrestling room, everything outside the world just goes away.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like my focus is on making those kids better at what they're doing at what they're there for right and then, like I feel like the same thing, like in Los Banos, we we used to have a youth wrestling program at my high school I'm the high school coach, so and we have two high schools in Los Banos and both of them had a youth program. And then, a few years ago, money became an issue, right, yeah. And then they're like, hey, you can't have a youth program without paying for Renting the facility. And I'm like, well, wait a minute, how does that make any sense? Like they're telling me that we have to pay 65 bucks an hour for a janitor. Right, janitors, unless I put the trash outside, they don't come into the wrestling room. All right, right, unless I call them and say, hey, the trash cans fool, can you replace the liner? Mm-hmm, that they don't.
Speaker 2:We have the wrestling room, we have an office area. Unless I asked them to do something, they don't. Yeah, because we do it. Right, right, but you want to charge me 65 bucks an hour because the janitors got to be there? Yeah, wait a minute. Yeah, yeah, hold on. We run the youth program in the evening. Yeah, you know when the janitors at the school work in the evening. So why are you charging me over right now hours, right for somebody that's already there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, unfortunately, this is the era we're living, right back in the pioneer days, when they set up camp and they built homes and they set up a town. If your roof was busted, we all fixed that damn roof. Yeah, I mean, I really think we we could learn something by going back and and and and, instead of again. We can make excuses and and get frustrated all day long, but at the same time, time is still ticking. You know, time doesn't wait for us to free the shit out, so we have to. We have to think about what can we do with the resources we have, right, and just run with it. You know, when it comes to the kids especially, it's surprising to me and has been with me when I gone to mohawk a few times To talk to the troubled teens in their classes. It's amazing to me how none of the classes you take in All throughout school, all the way through high school, none of them are designed to teach you how your brain works. None, not a single thing, with depression being as high as it is. And that's just of the ones, again, that reported. Or there's the ones we don't hear of. Usually those end in suicide, by the way. But how come we never told that the only reason why you're angry is because you're thinking angry thoughts? How come we're never told the reason why you're sad is because you're thinking sad thoughts? Well, what does this have to do with anything? Well, when you come to a place like this, I don't have time to think of those thoughts. It's that fucking simple. When you come to a place to do the sport we have, you have a problem, you're my problem, and I don't have time to be like okay, jose, cross-collar choking me right now. I want to talk to somebody about it. Right, I need a counselor to go over why he's making me feel this way. This is bullshit, man. This is bullshit here. You have a problem, I'm your problem, you're my problem. We're training with problems, but we're also training in real time to deal with the problem and move on.
Speaker 1:This is what's happening to our youth. What's happening to our youth is they don't you know what the CDC's recommendation is for these kids that have mental issues? More counseling, more drugs. Drugs are mind-altering, not mind-changing. Right, talking about it with other people who sit behind a desk, who don't face the bullying, who don't face what their faith? That? How do they speak on a level of compassion. Now you put them in a sport like this oh, did you get popped in the face? Move on. Oh, you went to pass their guard. You got need in the face real quick. You can't just sit there and cry about it. You got to move on.
Speaker 1:I have the same yeah, you're feeling wrestling same right, wrestling class.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, I move on now.
Speaker 1:You move on now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you start to cry. I had, so I have like a I think she's probably six yeah, she got hurt and it. It's like when one bad thing happens that she as long as she's winning every situation. There's a smile on her face and nothing's changing the world for her.
Speaker 1:But when it don't go away that she loses a situation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, something's hurt, yeah. And the other day it was Hmm, she was grabbing her ankle or whatever. And I was like, hey, you need to get back in. Yeah, we're running live drills. Yeah, like you need to get back in. Yeah, hey, they're waiting on you. I just let her be. I didn't even go before. I would have walked over to her baby there. Yeah, now like I tell him listen, there's no time to cry. Yeah, no, if you want to cry, go off the mat.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I don't look, don't ever let anybody see you, cry, cry. I was right, I'm on. Do it. Wipe your tears, wash your face, get back on the mat because the practice is not over.
Speaker 1:Could you imagine every problem you face? Then you need to go take a drug and we'll talk to somebody about it, but we're setting our kids up to fail in life. Life is gonna throw so many more curveballs at you and then you're gonna fuck around and wait to just talk to somebody. Use your words, little Johnny, and talk about it. Well, you're setting them up to fail, to fail. So this is what I'm saying. You know, of all the arts and I'm biased because this is my passion, mm-hmm. Of all the arts, I don't know of one that teaches you in real time you have a problem, you have to deal with it now and don't stay there. Better move on that problems. But this, this is this is where I feel.
Speaker 1:And again, I didn't finish high school. I had to take my GD. I took care of my brother in 1989 because he had the AIDS and leukemia via AIDS virus and leukemia. So I wasn't doing good in school anyway, so I dropped out. So I'm not smart, I don't, but I do know this. I do know this plain and simply if you don't figure out a way to deal with the issue head on Right and not stay there and and move on.
Speaker 1:That depression is gonna take you all the way down, all the way down, has no choice. It's either constructive or destructive. Those are the only two files, by the way, and no matter what it is that you do, it's either something that will help you build yourself up or build others up, or it's something that will help tear you down or tear others down. There's no in-between. There's no in-between even remaining stagnant and playing video games as a kid eight hours a day. It's destructive for sure. We know this for sure. So what are we doing with the facts that we know? And what are we doing with what we know that actually works? And and that's that that I feel is within our power to to for the for the owners of other academies is Make sure your instructors, especially teaching kids class, do they understand how, how valuable their their role is and how big of an impact they have on these kids and how big the real issue is right. Do you do they understand that?
Speaker 2:and and then, and Then you'll see people taking different, different attitudes toward like teaching and so on yeah, I, I think it's hard, like, as, like going talking about my kids, my, my oldest son, he had a learning disability through school, yeah, right, so we were constantly Having attention towards him, yeah. And then my other two kids they did fine in school. They were all athletes, yeah, right, and they were always in a sport. That was my thing. You had to be in a sport because it made you keep your grades, yeah, and it kept them off the streets, yeah.
Speaker 2:And Then my middle son, he graduated, he came to play football here at Modesto JC, didn't work out and I didn't realize this, but he was going through some mental health issues, right, and like he Made a doctor appointment and I went with him and it was like deeper than you thought, yeah. And Like I come from a different time, right, I'm like my dad was a Marine. I'm a Marine, right, so the Mental, the mentality, is different. Sure, right, like I don't under. And Jesse, about depression, don't understand it, yeah, yeah, like I. It's not that I don't have compassion, for sure, yeah, but I just don't understand it. Like I don't Understand how they can let themselves get to that. Yeah, right, and maybe you know it's. I Don't know, but I know it's out there and I mean one of my kids was dealing with it. He's fine now. Yeah, right, yeah, he's married. He has a son.
Speaker 2:I have a grandson because of yeah but it was very eye-opening when I sat in that doctor's office and he talked about it and I was like Shit this is.
Speaker 1:It's a real. Yeah, there's a short story. I have a and For me it really outlines life for anybody. You're somewhere in this story somewhere. The story Is about a man who signed up for seminary school and it was given the final assignment the class Seminaries for guys that want to become a minister later on in seminary school. So the last final assignment from the teacher was Write a five chapter Story about your life from where you started, as early as you can remember, to where you are today. You know that was the final assignment. So the teacher was collecting all the assignments at the end of the week. Some of them were pretty thick, you know he got. He noticed one in particular was one sheet of paper from one of his students. So he gravitated to that one first to grade it and he pulled the sheet of paper and it said my life in five chapters.
Speaker 1:Chapter one I was walking down a road. There was a hole in the road. I didn't see the hole and I fell, and I fell in the hole, okay. Chapter two I Was walking down the same road, same hole in the road, same hole in the road, but this time I chose to ignore it and, sure enough, I fell in the hole right. Chapter three walking down the same road. Same hole in the road. This time I thought I was big enough to step over it, but, wouldn't you know, I came up short and I slipped and I fell in the hole. Chapter four Walking down the same road. Same hole in the road, but this time thought I was smart enough to step around it, but, goddamn it, I got too close to the edge and I slipped and I fell in the hole. Fifth and final chapter I took a new road. I took a new road.
Speaker 1:Every time I look at adults dealing with Depression. I've had my share, mm-hmm, trust me, I've had my share, more than my share sometimes. But or I look at children. I wonder where they are on that on that spectrum. Are they all huffy, puff in their own pride, thinking they're big enough to take on anything in life? Mm-hmm, they crash. We all crash. Yeah, that's expected, just like riding a bike, you can expect to fall, but don't stay down.
Speaker 1:And the only reason why we keep putting our kids back up on the bike, knowing they're gonna fall down, is because we don't want them to be robbed of the joy of the feeling of riding a bike without the training wheels? Right, we know the end result With these kids. They don't know the end result, they don't see it. But for someone like you wrestling coach, teacher in Anna's case, michael, also teacher as well, outside of you know here, and we see the end result, they don't I get frustrated when I see parents, you know, and they're asking the kids do you feel like going to practice today? They don't see, they don't, they don't you.
Speaker 1:That's your job. Your job is to know they have to get through this. Giving them the option to just stay still or Hang out by the hole is not the right option, right, or ignoring it, pretending not to see the hole? That's that's even bigger problem. Where's most people are still stuck at pretending is not there. They know is there, but they're pretending as not there. Right, so they never get to the new road.
Speaker 1:This and for the again, for the, your audience, your Academy, might be the new road that saves a life. And If all your efforts were to just save one of those kids, one of those adults, would it be worth it? Damn right, damn right. Be worth it. You know they're watching, the kids are watching, and when they see adults of different nationalities, ethnicities, different financial, you know Securities and things. That when they see us all together doing one thing, supporting each other, that when pictures you see over there with a picnic we're doing a muddy run together, it can't be just about you two cannot. This is like a nice vehicle, but once they're here, they have nobody else to teach them what a community of people can be like as a family, regardless of your background, regardless of the skin color and your ethical origin. This is the example. This is so much more.
Speaker 1:Now Let me get to the last part. This is why we don't care for having douchebags in our gym, because when you start depleting the people that come here because they don't, they're just hurting everybody that's in the gym. This is what's not talked about. It's not that we don't like people to be aggressive. It's not that we want to shun the warrior spirit. It's just that when you become a threat to depleting the financial means, we need to keep this place open to support those kids. Yes, you're a threat to that.
Speaker 1:It's not that we're trying to be soft. It's not that we're trying to be a soft side of jujitsu. It's not that. It's just that in the big picture, two or three warriors. That's smashing through everybody carelessly, when they're just hobbyists at best we're all pretty much hobbyists at best, right, for the most part, then you're taking away potentially the opportunity we have to be a benefit to the community, right? That's the big threat. It's not that we're, you know. Oh, you know, we should be rolling hard all the time. We should be, you know. Okay, it's five minute round, we should be training 20 minute rounds, 30 rounds a day. It's like no, like wait, like there's a, there's a time for this. And then there's the bigger picture.
Speaker 1:The bigger picture is is how do we keep the lights on? Yeah, I'll guarantee you that you have a lot of viewers that aren't talking about how rough it is to just keep the doors open, brother, you know, yeah, it's nice, like hugamon janitor won't pick up shit. But it's another thing when it's like how do we get cleaning supplies? How do we replace all the toilet paper that's just being fucking carelessly thrown everywhere. And you see what I'm saying. This is real, I'm being real. I'm being real. You're gonna get a lot of people talking about oh yes, you know the gym, this, and I like these moves. I like being real. I like being real. How do we, how do we help these gym owners out? How do you help the guy? That's like I could pay the tags on my car or I could buy more supplies for the kids class. I think I'm gonna buy more. I think I'm gonna buy more supplies for the kids class lock it, the bigger pictures help these kids.
Speaker 1:There's those. Some of us are out there. Check my tags on my truck when you go out. Anyway, I, I really enjoyed our time. I really did, jose, yeah, I really enjoyed what you're doing and, and for the audience members that's watching this today, I hope not to offend any of the other academies.
Speaker 1:I'm just I'm too old to not keep it real. I'm too old man. I'm not impressed by things that are just a waste of time. It just I see a lot of things going on in gyms and it's like you're just a hamster in a wheel. You're not making any ground at all, you're just spinning yourself to death.
Speaker 1:The bigger picture is what? What do you want to accomplish? You have this gym. What do you want to accomplish? And if it's not to better, to make better adults through starting with the youth first, what are you doing? What are you doing this for? For what? Because you want to have some nice shirts with your logo on it and say this is me, and you want to go to a tournament and be like, yeah, we dominated, we got the team trophy, like, is that really? Is that at the end of the day? None of that makes any damn bit of sense, none of it. Who won the Nobel Peace Prize last year? Nobody gives a fuck. That's the Nobel Peace Prize. Who won it last year? They, me, three people that want it. Nobody cares. Everybody's gonna forget the things that you said. Everyone's gonna forget the things that you did. They're not gonna forget the way you made them feel they're not. So what can you do in what?
Speaker 1:yeah, yeah be that a be that example these kids need to. They already have. You know no such thing as a wasted life. You could always live as a bad example. Well, that's deep, that's gonna offend somebody, and if they're offended, you're the one I'm talking about. There's no such thing as a wasted life. You could always live as a bad example. Why? Not choose the other route.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah so get back to some of the yeah, so I stopped doing G in 2006.
Speaker 1:I didn't really believe in that. I was one of those guys that was like, okay, it's more real, realistic, fighting no G. Yeah, I thought that now that I'm older, who fuck, strips naked and fights, these people that are like I'm agitated with grips, like I'm at all, just bothers me, the grips. Fucking deal with it. Man, you're gonna fight someone naked or what I get. Some people take off their shirt when they fight in this. I've seen it, you know, but there's still hair. You gonna tell me like they're gonna be like okay, bro, like no grabbing, like no, grabbing fabric. Okay, we're gonna fight. Like don't, don't grab my shirt. Okay, we're just gonna fight, but don't you know? So I think that mentality was like there's a couple parts to this. Right, the big thing is is it's more realistic to fight no G because it's more realistic? That's not true to me. To me it's you're gonna fight in the street, it's gonna you're gonna have fabric. You know there's this new thing out where they're fighting in the pants. You know the they're doing jujitsu with the pants and the boots. They just in the dirt. It's in, it's in, like in Brazil. Now they're. They're coming out with tournaments now. So they're, that's how they're holding their tournaments fully attire and everything okay. But the other thing is is I understand folks that progress coming from wrestling as well, especially that you progress faster and you're able to resist the higher technical moves when you don't have the grip of the cloth. So I understand why that's so appetizing, because then you could be a blue belt giving a black belt a really hard time in no G, whereas in the G is very. It can be that much harder because of the grips. So I'm both think of it this way again in your academy, how many of you guys are hobbyists, right? John Danahur has got like I don't know thousands of students. You only hear of like ten of them, maybe of that, right, so those other ones are paying the bill for that, because in New York that I'm sure that building ain't cheap, so someone has to pay for it from us, right? Okay, so you have these people that are primarily hobbyists. Well, do they work out at the gym or just jujitsu? You'll have hobbyists that this is their only exercise. They don't. You know, I have a lot of people here, so this is another thing that we do here. I don't need to see them run in circles. I get it. This is our warm-ups. Here are two minute drills. So when we do warm-ups here, I don't for me personally. Again, if you're in an academy that does the, the shrimping back and forth and the in the running around in circles, I understand why I'm not in shining it here. Two minute drills, like what you started with Michael earlier. I have your back for two minutes, you know my back for two minutes and we is plant, we do our escapes. That's our warm-ups here. I don't need to see you do cartwheels and stuff for the kids. I do for the kids, I do their bear crawls and all those adults. If you're paying money here, I need to see you move and doing movements that actually apply. So it's just a little bit, a little bit different.
Speaker 1:But why the ghee? Because they need to sweat. We know this. So if you you need to right, you need to sweat like it. And if you need, if you like that nice air-conditioned environment, then that's great too. But we you do know, to get those, those things out of your system, you need to sweat, right, those toxins and everything, that's it. You need to sweat. So put on the ghee and sweat it out, and sweat it out, you know. So I go back to your original question. Both, both are important. Again, you know we do both. So we have ghee days, no ghee days. We also have wrestling days twice a week. Yeah, kids class, they have one day dedicated just wrestling Wednesdays, really just wrestling all day. Wednesday. Wrestling Wednesdays yeah, have to fight starts standing standing school yard. Fight starts standing, end up on ground but start standing wrestling. Big part of it, can't deny it, you can't deny it.
Speaker 2:I wish that right. There's a hard. Yeah, my sorry, it's what opposed hard damn right, it's free that, like we'll do a wrestling practice and everybody will be like, yeah, but you play freeze tags the last time yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, everybody is running full speed yeah they're not tired. No, no, no, they didn't see it, they didn't see in between the stripes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they didn't see the progress. Embrace the suck. I saw it on the sticker. You ever see that. Embrace the suck. But you have to know how do you embrace it, not just tell somebody embrace it. You have to know why we don't have our why is right. You know, if you understood the why, be hearing what you do, then it makes the suck that much easier. Right? My why is is gone and my family and what I mean by family is my friends and my students all, or that's my why, that's my why.
Speaker 1:You know people used to say like, oh, think in terms of what would they write on your tombstone? You know, when you die, for me is not, it is, it's not that, for me it's understanding that your legacy, whatever legacy you could build, will go as far as possibly your grandkids. What do you know about your great grandpa? There you go, that's as far, doesn't matter how, how, all his achievements and accolades, I don't even matter what he like. There's hardly anybody who could give a clear, has a clear grasp of what their great grandma, great grandpa, was like. Your legacy at best is maybe two generations at best. It's a very small window, by the way. And then the older we get right you and I are very close in age the older we get it's you realize that there's no fun in being served anymore. The true joy is serving others and seeing others develop the best version of themselves. Knowing that you had a small part, a small part in that that's, that's your true satisfaction. There's no, there's. It's priceless.
Speaker 1:You can't buy that and the beauty of our sport here. You can't fake this shit. Oh, I could do this shit all day long, even though nobody does this shit when they end up fight. I could do all that shit all day long. Right, I could fake that pretty damn well, even if I never did it Right. You can't fake this and I need you. I Can't stand in front of a TV and practice Jews I have. I need you, I. So this is a. This is a group effort. No matter how you, there's there's no eye in this. This is a week. This is a we thing. This is a we thing another reason why I don't like it when we start damaging our and hurting our, our teammates. You know, I feel destroyed inside when you know Anybody that I've accidentally hurt while while rolling, because now I lose out on apartment for like three months, six months, you know, and I ruined. I Is not necessary, not necessary, but this is a, this is a we effort To to maybe not so much a legacy, as much as it is is is to get that feeling like wow, this person didn't believe in this.
Speaker 1:How many nerds have you come across? They came into the gym and I like badasses. Now, you know, bro, it's, it's, it's amazing. I look at some of these guys and I'm like, wow, when you first came here, I was like no, this guy, you're not gonna last. And now they're right and and then they tough it out and Then they feel whole. So you could see the, you could see how they they've developed a sense of like Right and something real right and nobody can take that away from them. Our kids need to feel this. Sorry to keep bringing it back to the kids, but the kids they don't get this from a video game, they don't get this room. These are real achievements, these are real emotions and they have to, they have to feel.
Speaker 1:You have to learn how to lose, man. You're gonna learn how to lose real quick in this sport when you first start. You gonna learn if you can't cope with losing Life will life will dish that out to you You're gonna lose big relationships, jobs. You're gonna lose big, you're gonna lose big. And if you just if you, if you just can't cope with it and deal with it, your only resort is then Poor mental health and possibly suicide. You know, yeah, but we can change that. We can, or we can at least have a positive influence on moving that needle the right direction. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Make it that for sure, I think we already are, think we already are pretty good, yeah, so what's something outside of Jiu-Jitsu?
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:My wife. We play ice hockey, that we're on ice hockey team together. She just started this year. This was a childhood dream of mine. I played ice hockey when I was nine years old but, again, money was really, really tough and it was in foster city at the time. And this year I just started back up again and we're playing adult ice hockey. She knows how to skate a little bit on the ice and she's a trooper, so she joined a co-ed ice hockey.
Speaker 1:So Wednesday nights is our date night and it's not like any other. We're on the high, we're on the ice, we're on the high, we're on the ice ramming in. The people had stocked in. We play what's the name of it? Oak Park, oh no, I wish Oak Park Ice rink. Yeah yeah, oh yeah, there's a. It's been there since 1969 or something like that. But we're part of a team. I did a three-day tournament in Vegas and man, that was. That was a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1:We also have three kids at home still ones in high school, ones, middle school ones in elementary school and as a school teacher, and so we're, we're, we're actively involved with with the kids and that occupies most of our days, but when it comes to free time, whatever that it looks like, which is very rare we love. Yeah, we try to do like outdoor it. We like go boogie boarding, we'll ride our kayaks, we'll go fishing. You know, really making sure we're keeping that, that family core unit, a Something of value to be cherished and by our kids, you know. So we're doing our best that we can there. But, yeah, lately it's been ice hockey on on Wednesdays and Definitely something different.
Speaker 1:Oh, bro, this is a again, this is there's. No, you know, it's just you. You, if you haven't already, you'll get to the point where you have these hubs to hide out in during a round, you know, where you kind of like locked down and you kind of can stay there and catch your breath. None of this happens in hockey. It's constant, going constant. You're constantly moving there and you can't, you can't slack because you're in. Everybody sees you. You got to keep moving, yeah, you got to keep moving, yeah. Even more reason why I need to get you out there. You might be a good goalie then.
Speaker 1:The other thing, too is it's humbling for me Because you're, you're out of your regular element. You know, here I have, like I have places where I feel safe under anybody right, but out there, I'm vulnerable, and you learn to embrace that vulnerable, that vulnerability. You know you, you learn it's a kind of it becomes exciting Instead of like, huh, I'm not that good at it. You know, it's like that's what we see with the kids today, like as soon as they, the minute, like you were talking about, you're one girl, yeah, the minute you can't cope with the idea that you're not as proficient at something as you see other people and you shut down. Well, what is it was left for you at that. You know what's you? Everything's gonna be new to you. So I was.
Speaker 1:Hockey humbles. It humbles me, you know, it really does. I feel the excitement of Again embracing the suck Not great at all, but it's, it's enjoyable, yeah. And then there's a lot of meditation, bible time. You know I don't shy away from being what people call a Christian, but I'm I'm really into scripture. I love reading my Bible. Why we do it together? We go to church on Sundays at shelter Cove, which is a a lot of my students go there as well, and it works for me. We love everybody from all different. We have a lot of people from different religions. I like learning about their stuff too, and so. But the Bible just has a way of certain verses hitting when they need to hit. In my life, whatever I'm, whatever I'm you know dealing with.
Speaker 1:Again, it's a matter of understanding the mind. If you, if you Allow yourself to just open yourself up to thoughts, the bad ones will creep in. People don't understand. Did you know? You can't make a thought. There's, it's an absolute impossibility to make a thought. All you can do is open yourself up to thoughts. So my mom passed away many years ago. Right, I can't make a thought about her. I could just open up the idea of thinking about her and these things will start dropping in. And so there's no such thing will.
Speaker 1:And this is part of people that go into depression. All of their stinking thinking they think are themselves coming up with their own thoughts. That's not even possible. You can't make a thought. You could just open yourself up to them and then you claim those bad thoughts as your own and that's what sends you into this depressed mode for those that have like PTSD.
Speaker 1:You start thinking like I could have been a better husband, I could have been a better father, I could have been a bit, and nobody knows you're. You're fighting these battles in your head but you and then you go home and you're all frustrated and then maybe your wife says something that makes you feel even worse again that you're bad, this, and then all hell breaks Looses because all day long you've been battling these thoughts already, and so you become short-tempered. Not because you're a short-tempered person, but because you've been worn thin already all day thinking these, thinking these thoughts. This is why, yeah, the number one thing I do when I go speak at high schools is I teach them how to, how their brain works. If you can, if you can, get rid of the stinking thinking and and and put something else in its place like this, then you don't have time to be, you know, just Marinating in that shit.
Speaker 2:This is like a good Bro it's right.
Speaker 1:It's right in your face. That's right in your face.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you seem to open.
Speaker 1:Yeah, bro, can I, before you go further, watching your face light up like that man, it it, it's like a high for me, you know. So when we're going over just basic movements like that, and then you, you see someone light up, I Would much rather see that on you than me. Feel that for me. It does so much more for me. Like you think it maybe it's a blessing to you, is not? It's a big blessing for me. So so I'm the one thinking you for those moments, you know. But anyway, good, and like.
Speaker 1:No, no, you were talking about, like even just today, going over the basic movements and and and how. That's like eye opening for you.
Speaker 2:You know Little details make it so much simpler.
Speaker 1:Yeah right. Yeah, I.
Speaker 2:Get into ball. It makes sure I was yeah, can't think of anything else right and then Process what's going on, and then it just makes me want to see more right, right. Yeah so instead of Me.
Speaker 1:Looking at garbage? Hey, man. Yes, that's it Right, there's no space for other shit. Yeah, no, right. It occupies with the right stuff, right?
Speaker 2:I'm like, oh how, like I was telling Jesse on the way over here, I hit a clock show the other night and was it good? Yeah, it was the first time. I had tried on previous occasions to do it and it's just by me watching a video, yeah, and seeing the placement, seeing what he's doing, and then me trying to mimic that in the room, yeah, in a live situation, yeah, right. So I hit it the other night and I was like, oh yeah, was it great? Yeah, no, was there details that I probably missed?
Speaker 2:Yeah, probably, yeah, yeah but the concept like okay, I did this, joe, like, like, when we talked about using the lapels, to like pulling them out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, Well, right right.
Speaker 2:No, what the terminology could be Freehand it's a it's ahead of the game.
Speaker 1:You know, let me hand this to you. Okay, yeah, I Knew ahead of time what I was gonna do. The same thing with that lapel. We didn't. What we didn't go over was maybe, instead of putting that lapel over so fast, I Show it to so you reach for it and then I come inside. What does that mean? Means it like when, now, when you start thinking of techniques, how can I accomplish the same end result, but in a way that doesn't disrupt what you want to do? Remember, I told you earlier your your best Jiu Jitsu game is gonna be where he's getting what he wants. You also are getting what you want, but ultimately it benefits you.
Speaker 1:When I roll now with my students, these guys will tell you the. So, depending on what the round is, say, let's say it's a four minute round, the first three minutes of yours. So I lay down and I I earned my way on top. I don't just go out the gate, balls to the wall and just like you know, like I want to earn, I want to, I want to Grow my defense as well while you're growing your, your attacks, right, okay, but even then. So when now I'm on top, or if I'm practicing a finish, if I'm working so hard for it, and then I'm. Then I go home and I'm obsessing why was I working so hard?
Speaker 1:Where was my setup? How, what did I telegraph it? What could I do to get his hands up higher so that I'm not trying to push? You know, if I go north-south and I'm trying to push the wrist down to the waist, am I, am I? How do I get him to move his Hit hands down to his waist? So just a quick example if you're north-south, you're on top and I need to get his way hands down those ways, how can you get him to want to put his, his hands down to the waist? Go back to side control and neon belly, they go. Neon belly, they push your knee. Now the hands are there. Go back to north-south, keep the hands there, right. So maybe it's just a different path, a new road. You know, maybe, and and this is where the development comes over time.
Speaker 1:You know, is is just strategizing how to accomplish what you want without trying so hard. I'll tell you this is kind of a dirty secret of mine. I really don't care about finishes anymore, as Much as I love sweeping somebody. Have you ever pulled off a really clean, clean sweep on somebody when they're so off-balanced and their their feet like slap the ground when you like scissors. Maybe you get a really nice hitters weep when you can perfectly time someone off balance. I guess it would be equivalent to a judo throw or judo you know somebody. I I love a nice, clean sweep where I end up back on top and I'm in control of the situation, whereas, like if it was like a fighting situation, I'm on top dropping bonds. I know I could if I wanted to, you know. So I'm not. I'm not as impressed anymore by like the force, the force, or I really, really I'm trying to become less. I'm really filtering out a lot of the fluff and just focus on just just the technique it you know, instead of like Trying to crush through everything you know.
Speaker 1:And then, when you understand what the techniques look like, then you have to ask yourself how are, how, are efficient? Are you in those moves? Are you huffing and puffing at the end of the like? Are you really, are you holding your breath when you're trying to do the attacks as a killer, breathing just a lot of times when, if you see me at tournaments and I'm coaching my folks, I'm reminding them to breathe. It's a bizarre thing, isn't it? But some of these guys they're holding the position I could see them holding, holding their breath. Yeah, breathing like that, your mind is not clearing. What's the worst case scenario? You tap. So why do you have to breathe so hard now? Worst case scenario you tap, we start again, but yeah, just just Again.
Speaker 1:It's hard to teach someone. Your learning curve, I think, really makes a positive direction, makes a positive change, when you're able to control your breathing and you're not running so much from the dog anymore. If your whole focus is just constantly running from the dog and I'm trying to tell you, hey, I'll put your right hand down, you're still running from the dog, so you're not even, you're not even conscious, you just on a fight or flight mode, yeah, but the moment that you can control your breathing and then you can really rationalize what, what's the end result here? Okay, end result here I get caught, I tap, and then I go back and I do my homework. How did I get there? It's fine, but you don't have to. You don't have to hold your breath and be in a panic situation. You know, sit in a scenario the whole time you just tanking yourself, and then let's just say you just power out of it. Let's say you hold your breath and you do your one big push like a bench press and you get out. You got, you got shit left. Now you get. Okay, you got to turtle or something, but now you have nothing for the onslaught coming after that because you put it all in that one bump, you know. So maybe you just need to chill out, take an inventory my arms down, my arms, low neck is protected. Chill, just breathe for a while. You can't breathe, you can't open and contract your diaphragm. Well then, don't lay it on your back, get to your side, let your diaphragm breathe again. Yeah, make sense, yeah, so, yeah, it's little things like this.
Speaker 1:This is why, in the beginning for our white belts. Defense is the. This is what our two-minute drills are all. Defense, you know, get your movements down on on the defense side first. Anyway, you can't pass guard, none of your offense, it's all shit anyway, you'll never get there. You might know how to do it, but you'll never get there to apply it. And then you think you're not learning anything. Yeah, so defense first. Be a hard one to rape, right on the map. Be a hard one to rape and then, when you can control your breathing, now you can start thinking of countering. Now you can start thinking of sweeps. Now you can start thinking of attacks. But these are all things that are easy to say to the white belt. It's like I'm just trying to survive. I don't know. I'm trying to. I'm tapping to everything. I'm tapping to like side-control, pressure. How do I get these guys, you know deltoid off my face? That's smashing the side of my face and side-control you know, that kind of stuff there.
Speaker 2:So but it's time, wait.
Speaker 1:This, this art is very special in that you really appreciate Other people, appreciate your belt colors in this, because they know what you've had to invest the time and and the sacrifice You've had to make. Most especially, again, the kids. I know I've always circled back to the kids but you know you have some of these kids that are like gray, gray, black and they're like, oh that adults, just a white belt, it's like no, you don't understand, that's not the same. You know, yeah, it's not, the adult will still kill you, you know. But but what they they do appreciate is they, they know that that they understand the sacrifice on their level. How much more adults doing it. And they look up to you, even if you're just, you know, one, two stripe white belt, they know, they know to appreciate and have respect for you.
Speaker 2:What's your most normal moment?
Speaker 1:Man, there's a lot of them and it's it's hard to just pick one because then it makes a. There's a lot of them. There's one. Well, the one that stands out obviously is promoting my son with the one that I couldn't tie the white stripe on, giving him. Tying that black belt, you know, fix a lot of the things that I beat myself up over, I would have to say, and that's probably why God kind of put it in my heart to take a picture with Brad.
Speaker 1:2012. Just had my spinal cord surgery and I woke up, got all these wires hanging draining the blood from my spinal cord and everything. I'm sitting in bed, I've got this, I've got this neck brace on and I'm sitting there and I'm thinking to myself I'm done, I'll never be able. You know, I'll never be able to go back to just again. You know, because I was root. It was a very messy operation and I'm sitting there in the room looking at the ceiling and I'm quarantined because this type of surgery you can't be exposed to any kind of disease. You know, it could end your life fairly easily. Yeah, but Brad worked for the hospital at Memorial at the time and so they let him through because he was part of staff, you know. So Brad and I have trained together for many, many years. And Brad Comes in there, I'm sitting there and I'm just kind of like, looking at the ceiling, like I'll never be able to teach kids class. The kids mean everything to me. You know, if I haven't already, if you haven't figured that out, and I already missed the kids so much and I was thinking myself, man, the surgeon had come in and told me that they they had to do a lot more than the original Discs. It was supposed to be C3 and 4, but they had to get C3, 4, 5 and 6 out then put in cadaver bones After they got to the tumor in the spinal cord. So he said that, you know, swallowing would be an issue. He said that, you know, depending on on the healing process, might not have any mobility in the neck because of the metal plate and the screws, you know. So when he left, I'm sitting there just kind of like, like man, god, you could have taken me out at brain surgery, because I was paralyzed coming out of brain surgery. I had no function of my legs, for it took me six months to walk four months. Note, my speech was all messed up. Yeah, so I was in a walker for so it really took me out and I'm like, man, I'm done.
Speaker 1:So Brad comes in and he goes hey, buddy, this Brad, the guy we took a picture with earlier yeah, I was like, what's up, man, he goes. Well, you survived. And I was like, yeah, you know he's black belt at the time and he was a gorilla, black black belt. And I said, yeah, and he goes. Well, how long? Till you come back. I said, brad, I'm done, man, I'm done. And he looked at me, shake his head and goes you're not done, you're not done. His kids need you. Nobody can do that for the kids. I don't like those kids. I like those kids and you know the other instructors don't like them kids. He goes, we need you to come back. And I said, brad, I'm done. And he goes I got something for you.
Speaker 1:So he pulls out this book, because by Dave Camaro it's called submit everyone. And he sits bedside with me, hands me the book. See that I'm a fucking mess there, get out of here. He hands me this book and he says you might not be able to train with me now, but you better start reading this book and you better have you ready with some shit when you get out, because we're I'm gonna fuck you up. He goes I'm not, don't? You, don't play this. I'm crippled bullshit with me, because when you and I start training again, I'm gonna fuck you up. So you baby ready, you know. And so I'm crying. That's me crying and and the nurse took the picture and there's this guy, kimura.
Speaker 1:You know I'm talking about the famous Kimura. His last name is Kimura broke Elio Gracie's arm like three times with the move in his head and he's like oh, I'm gonna fuck you up Elio Gracie's arm like three times with the move and everything like that. Here's what the people don't know about Kimura Badass judo. Everybody knows that judo was this thing. He was destroying everybody. He lost four judo matches and quit. He was so distraught, losing four in a row matches, he was done and you could look it up on Wikipedia. Had it not have been for his friends To talk to him, to shake the shit out of him, to say, hey, look, you're bigger than this, come back. He wouldn't have came back. We wouldn't have a lot of the moves we have today. He wouldn't have the movie showed you today had he not have Persevere through that.
Speaker 1:So your question was what's most memorable moments? Had Brad Messes me up still, had not he not have done what he did, we might not be here. Isn't that crazy? I Tell this to people all the time if you feel moved by the universe or God or whatever to say something positive and speak something positive in a person's life, do that shit, because you don't know the generations of kids and people after people that they could have a positive influence on. If you, if you don't let that word come out this that was what Brad did. It's crazy. He this wasn't even planned. He's not even part of our Academy. I just give him free reign to come over here because he's he's a brother to me, so he just happened to be here the day you came working out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's crazy. Like they say, you never know what someone's going to Do. Just a simple.
Speaker 1:Hey man yeah yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like I said, I know a lot of people, but maybe not as often as a shit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, if something inside you is saying, hey, go back and see how that person's doing and I'll see this with me all the time. Cashiers are probably the ones that get abused the most, and so I always try to make small conversations with cashiers Just to, because I know that's a tedious fucking job. You know, even at a McDonald's drive-through, nobody gives two shits about them. Usually you know to say hey, look, or to crack a joke to make them laugh a little bit. And so I I'm now. I'm now through all that I've been through. I know enough that as soon as I, god, put something in me or whatever that is for other people. We were at a liquor store, gas station, I was filling up gas and three kids were acting up over there and I went over there and talked to one of the kids. I felt moved to do so and got to know him, got to know his name and invited him out here. I'm hoping to see him, you know. But what if that's all he had at that? What if he was just looking for a sign? How many times have you been looking for a sign to just come up with a? Just one reason to keep pushing? I just need one good sign to keep pushing.
Speaker 1:We have another student that we gave an academic scholarship to Shit grades for the longest time. God has grades up to a 3.8, right, his aunt finally allowed him. He has no family. Long story back in Mexico Nobody, he's got nobody. This aunt's not even an aunt. This aunt is a relative of a cousin, of a cousin in Mexico who was a neighbor to two druggy parents who overdosed and died and left these two children to this neighbor. That's all. It has nothing and all brought. This is nothing.
Speaker 1:Last week comes in, he got his grades up. We gave him permission to come back here and train, because that's the deal you got to give us the grades. You got to do your part. And I want to tell you all his fingers were taped. He hadn't been training. So I'm like, how do you fuck up your fingers? He hadn't been training.
Speaker 1:And the story was that his uncle said all right, yeah, your aunt's going to allow you to go back and train, but I'm not going to give you a ride there unless you clean this entire backyard, chop wood or something. Yeah, he goes. If you chop this, yeah, I'll consider giving it right here. This kid, yeah, literally all his fingers had blood coming through the tape Just because he got his grades. And then they made it even harder for him by making him do some god-awful shit. But where would he be, where would he be, or where would any of these kids be, if Brad, at that moment, didn't sit bedside with me, hand me the book, to say, no, I'm not letting you quit. I'm not letting you quit.
Speaker 1:First of all, nobody likes these kids. Like you, like these kids. Yeah, you're not leaving this shit to us. And since then and I have seen it I've had a lot of those kids come drive here now, right, patrick? And yeah, yes, they come here and we tell the stories of how I went back. As soon as I came out of the hospital. I'll show you just to tell them I was okay. See that picture, I'm still in my neck brace Just to let them know I'm okay and I'm coming back. A lot of them didn't know if I was going to come back. I said I'm coming back, but none of them really knew that it was Brad, that Brad. Same thing with Kimura. You wouldn't know what, kimura, had it not been for his friends.
Speaker 2:Last question, sure, what advice do you have for the new person, the older person, the guy that's having physical yeah, gosh, if I could echo Bruce Lee's empty cup, god, that didn't make any sense to me.
Speaker 1:You know, when Bruce Lee talked about having empty cup, empty cup, every day you come, be willing to absorb, you know, be willing to absorb, embrace the suck we talked about earlier. Being a good student, not hurting other partners, that's okay, that's all. Should be common sense type stuff. But if I could just speak directly into the heart of the person that's like oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, because that's all they hear. By the way, a new person on the mat All they're hearing in their head is oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. That's all they're hearing. Right, turn that voice off. Turn that voice off.
Speaker 1:The worst thing that can happen is you just tap Don't be these idiots that tap too late and now you're hurt. You're hurt because you didn't tap. You typically it's because they didn't tap sooner enough, okay. And the other one is the person applying the attack maybe went a little overboard too. So empty your cup. Come here with them.
Speaker 1:Don't come with any expectations. Never compare yourself to someone else. Like I told you earlier, if you're going to compare yourself, think about what you do with. Do do If you had to fight yourself the first day you walked in. Give yourself that. Usually academies have like a free grace period or whatever A beginner, like two week trial or something like that. Even just that you'll know enough that you could destroy yourself the first day you walked in For sure. Like hands down, you are so empty cup, zero pride, zero ego. Check all that stuff at the door. That stuff's going to leave that shit. Leave that shit wherever you found it, leave it where it didn't do you any good anyway. You know, a person that's really good at this shouldn't have to shout it out.
Speaker 1:By the way, yeah, people say like, like the special, like the belt chasers, you should get yourself to be so good that everybody would question why you're not promoted yet. You shouldn't have to. You shouldn't have to say anything about like hey, so what's up? Am I going to get, am I going to get promoted? The way you roll and your character, people think it's just your performance. For me, it's not just your performance on the mat, it's your character on the mat, it's your character off the mat. Yeah, we know, we know, marcelo Garcia, let go of a few black belts because they developed into something that did not match what they're about. Right, those guys are still losers today considered, right? I don't even have to say their names, but they're talented, they know a lot of stuff. But if we want this sport to grow to its full potential, I believe A it should be looked at as a benefit to the community, not a development of bullies. We're not trying to arm bullies into giving more stuff to be even more lethal, so it should be what. What can you do to be a positive influence in the community? And then and then, secondly, what can we do to not just develop good kids to be good kids, to be better adults? What can we do to develop the adults to be better adults?
Speaker 1:For the kids here, you don't know whose kids, who. You come here on a Tuesday and you see all the kids running around and the parents. You'll see someone lighter skin than Anna holding a kid, dark as this table, and you think that they're just family. Everybody's kids here is everybody's kids. Everybody here is like Auntie and Uncle, like Mike, is like big brother, big uncle to every kid. That's how they are, that's how. That's how you don't know who's kid blonde, who if you just came here on a Tuesday, so for the new folks is you're there to absorb, absorb, absorb, absorb and then, as you develop your skill, what can you do to give back to to the Academy? You know, help out with the kids class, even if you're a white belt. You know you can help out with the kids class just being an adult presence on the mat. I always tell them, just because you just started be here, you might learn more in kids class than you do in adults class. Right, have you said that before, jesse? Yeah, you, you just might.
Speaker 1:So zero pride, zero ego. Empty cup every day, every day, always a student. I'm still a student. I study. I study at least an hour, hour and a half a day. 45 minutes of it's in the shower. I let all my family take their shower and I run out the rest of the hot water and I have my, I have my phone on and I'm watching matches. I'm watching matches, current matches, not what happened 12 years ago in Abu Dhabi. None of that stuff. I'm watching what's going on right now, because I will never claim to know at all. I feel like I barely scratched the surface. You know how it is already. You open one door. Five more doors open. I opened that one, five more doors open and then you can't even find your back to the original door that you open, because now you're so engulfed in it. It just never ends.
Speaker 2:If anybody wants to get in contact with you.
Speaker 1:Sensei Studio headquarters on Instagram. There's a phone number, 209-485-4104, and everybody's invited to come. This is an open house, but we all we ask is that when you come here, bring a smile, have fun, and it's just know that it's a mutual blessing for you to come, because we get used to training with each other, right. When someone else comes, it's like I don't. I don't understand the whole flags thing. I understood it way back when, like, like, oh, we don't cross J because, whatever we're not that here Everybody's invited to come here and just as much as this is our home, like I told you when you first walked in, I could teach you the stuff I'm passionate about. That don't mean shit for you, right? Especially, we have size difference, okay, so I never let people leave here without being able to take a plate home, just like the Filipino, japanese tradition. With anybody who come to my mom's house, you always had to take a plate home. So I'll always ask at the end okay, where are they catching you? At your gym, and then we'll build on. We'll build on that. That way people feel like they got something they can use. That's tangible for them, you know.
Speaker 1:Thank you for coming out. You guys are welcome here anytime. Yeah, anytime, as much as you want. Greg, that's a good dude. I've known him for a while now and, well, anybody that's been under Mike. This is, this is the feel here is. I hope you feel the same like one world it's. We're like that. You know we don't have like, oh, you got to have this color gear. You got to. I like people expressing themselves through whatever color, gila Rash guard, I don't care.