BJJ is a martial art that simply doesn’t reward impatience. What we mean by this is that it takes years on end of dedicated practice in order to get good at it. Visiting a few classes here and there in local schools will get you nowhere. And sadly, this is exactly the approach that many casual practitioners of martial arts take.
First of all, BJJ is known to be one of the most brutal martial arts for a novice to learn. It’s also one of the most humbling experiences that you can have. There are countless stories where experts in other martial arts and sports have come to the mats only to have their self-confidence completely and utterly trashed by even the lowliest of white belts.
So, if you want to embark on a mission to learn BJJ, then know this: it will be a long and arduous journey. But if you persist, eventually, it will start paying off big time, as the average BJJ blue belt is by leaps and bounds better than the average person.
Is a blue belt in BJJ good?
Most people, when they hear about martial arts belts, immediately think of Karate. Back in the day, Karate was one of the best martial arts in the world, and getting a black belt was considered to be extremely hard and worthy of admiration. In time, the martial art of Karate got watered down and nowadays even young teenagers are known to get black belts.
Let’s consider the belt system in BJJ for a moment. There are 5 different belts: white belt, blue belt, purple belt, brown belt, and black belt. Also, the leading practitioners and promoters of BJJ around the world are awarded a red belt as the highest honor that you can get in the sport and martial art.
But where BJJ and Karate differ is in how difficult it is to get from one belt to the other. It’s estimated that most people take 2-3 years to evolve from a white belt to a blue belt. So, getting a blue belt means that you have a few years’ worth of practice under your belt, so to say. And it also means that you will be able to slam and dominate the average person very easily, almost regardless of their size and strength.
Blue Belt Vs Average Person in a Real Life Situation
Being a BJJ blue belt is great against the average person. Check out the blue belt below on a real life situation against a mentally distrubed man that bumps into him.
What percentage of people make it to blue belt in Jiu Jitsu?
Since BJJ is so hard for novice practitioners, and since most people give up easily on whatever undertaking they have in their lives, it follows that not a big percentage of BJJ practitioners manage to reach even the blue belt level.
If you want to train BJJ yourself, then don’t get discouraged by your first few training sessions. Even if you don’t think you can practice Jiu-jitsu because you wear glasses or have other things you believe will prevent you from doing BJJ. Enjoy the struggle as this will help you become humbler, which is always a good thing. You can always try different academies like a GJJ (Gracie Jiu-Jitsu) academy which is known for going easy when you first start.
Enjoy the process and learn as much as you can from your training sessions in your BJJ school. Also, make use of the times that we live in – we all now have access to world-class BJJ professors’ teachings that can help us improve significantly over our peers. And in time, you will do what many other BJJ practitioners have failed to do – reach the coveted blue belt and feel secure in your firm grasp of the basic concepts of BJJ.
