This week will be part 1 out of a 2 part blog for our powerful word of the week. I had a very hard time choosing between two words, Embrace or Exclude. Both I feel are filled with awesome concepts pertaining to the mat and also our lives. We will start with embrace and finish next week with exclude.
The word embrace is interesting because it has a duality of purpose in the fact that it can be used as a verb or used as a noun. The verb form of embrace means to :
1. to hold someone or something in one’s arms, especially as a sign of affection
2. to accept or support a belief, theory, or change willingly and enthusiastically
The noun form of the word embrace means:
1. an act of holding someone or something closely in one’s arms
2. an act of accepting or supporting something willingly or enthusiastically
When i hear the word embrace i picture someone climbing a giant diving board. I mean like the tallest diving board you have ever seen and upon reaching the top; there is no hesitation. The person just walks right to edge and dives right in. There is no inner struggle of; to jump or not to jump. You make the decision to embrace the dive as you climb the stairs leading to the top! When you embrace something you push all the doubt out of your brain/ heart and go all in. When you embrace someone you don’t start to question whether you like this person or not. An embrace between two people occurs when you already know how you feel about that person. There is a conscious surrender and at the same time you take comfort from the person you are embracing. In a general sense this is the economy of intimacy and the word embrace has strong intimate connotations.
On the mat, the economy of intimacy is the same but different. Every time you are drilling, flow rolling, or live rolling; you are in an embrace with your partner. In reference to drilling and flow rolling you surrender to your partner for the drills sake but at the same time are gaining insight into the technique and also your partner. Embracing this concept is not as easy as it sounds. There are so many variables that come into play like; rank, how comfortable you feel with your partner, how confident do you feel with the technique that was shown, body type, etc. It is through this microcosm of intimacy on the mat that you start to forge life long friendships and everlasting bonds. In reference to live rolling, where someone wins and someone learns. You embrace the moment and act according to the situations that are presented by your partner. Only after you embraced surrender to your partner and then surrendering to yourself are you prepared to surrender to the moment. Here is where true optimal potential begins to be attained. For before you can ever truly win you must first learn to lose. When losing holds nothing over you then winning becomes easy. Embrace the concept of surrender
This week we have 8 of our students going to the kids pan american games in Long Beach California. I am very excited for each and every one of them. I also want to challenge each of them to fully embrace these moments. Squeeze the most out of this experience. Push all the doubt, negative emotions, and negative circumstances out of your mind. You all have been climbing the diving board and now you are almost at the top. Finish this last week strong and then when you get there dive in! Go deeper then you have ever thought was possible.
OSS!
Professor Jason Yerrington
