Progress or Plateau?

Lately, I’ve been talking about how to know if you’re getting better at jiu jitsu. Sometimes, progress can be pretty obvious. Like moving from not knowing how to hit a move to knowing how to hit a move.

That is clear progress.

But after you’ve been training for a while, progress can get harder to see.

Not because it stops happening, but because improving a technique can be far less obvious than learning a technique.

The improvement that comes from learning something new is so easy to notice that the gradual improvement that comes from refining something you already know can feel a lot like hitting a plateau.

And of course, you are not the only person refining things.

Everyone in the room should be trying to get better at something.

Sometimes the thing your training partner is improving is directly opposed to the thing you are trying to improve.

You are trying to pass.

They’re trying to retain guard.

You are trying to escape.

They’re trying to hold the position.

You are trying to finish a submission.

They're trying to survive.

So what feels like a plateau might not be your progress stopping.

It might just be the whole room around you getting better with you.

Additionally, refining your technique can feel like a plateau because it is not usually very exciting.

It does not always announce itself like a big breakthrough.

Sometimes it just feels like the same hard round you had last week, except you made one better decision inside of it.

A plateau is not always where progress stops - often it’s just where progress stops being so obvious.

That can be frustrating if you’re still grinding away, looking for improvements.

But the improvements are probably just smaller now, and jiu jitsu doesn’t always give you clear evidence.

One day, you roll with someone and everything feels like it is starting to work.

You get to your positions.

You create reactions.

You catch something you’ve been working on.

And for a moment, you’re certain you’re improving.

Then another day, with that same person, nothing seems to work at all and suddenly, you don’t know anymore…

Sometimes you only notice change when you look back at it over time, and jiu jitsu progress can be hard to notice when you try to see it from one day to the next.

It shows up in small changes over time.

That may not feel like much.

But it is not nothing.

So if you feel like you have hit a plateau, it is possible that you have.

Or maybe your progress has just gotten quiet.

Maybe you just need to look a little deeper to see it.

See you on the mats.