Well today I just have to do something a little
bit different.  I received an e-mail yesterday
from a 10 year old female BJJ student that almost
brought me to tears.

Whatever you do PLEASE read this letter she sent
me.  I know it’s long but it’ll be worth it.  I hope
that you can use her letter as motivation for yourself,
I know I will.

I’m not sure about you but I’m so pumped from her
letter that I’m going to go out right now and tackle
a big project I’ve been putting off all last week.
_____________________________________________________________

Here it is, ENJOY.

Master Irvin,

I am Ashley Dimond, the 10 year-old orange belt under Jared Weiner.
(I wrote to you about your tips and won one of the shirts!)

As I promised in the original email, I wanted to let you know how
the tournament in King of Prussia went for me while using your tips.

When I arrived at the tournament I was very nervous.  At first it
looked like I wasn’t going to get to fight at all as there were no
other kids in my weight division that showed up; I warmed up a
little and then watched as the adults began to warm up.

Then a boy came in, who was clearly in my division.  I was excited.
Then he got out on the mat and began to warm up… WOW, he was
great!  He was a blue belt at 10 and was doing flying arm bars and
all sorts of advanced moves during warm up.  He then began to throw
kicks and punches… I was intimidated!  He had been training four
day a week since he was 4 years old!  All of the advice you gave me
went right out of my head.

When I got on the mat for the no-gi division with him I was really
scared.  He had a good six pounds of extra muscle then me and was
very aggressive.  But, as the match started I was doing ok.  I was
up 5 nothing, yet I was still so scared I barely realized it.

Then he got me in an upside down arm bar that was really tight.
(I had been passing the guard and he grabbed my arm and I tried
to stack him and I flipped him belly down… right into his upside
down arm bar! )

All I can say is OUCH!  It was so painful.  I had never had someone
really go full out with me before and really get hurt me like that…
I thought that my elbow was broken and I needed ice.  The guys that
ran the tournament came over and wanted me to see an EMT… all I
wanted at that point was to be left alone.  They also asked me if I
was going to fight in the gi division.  I told them no way, I
couldn’t my arm hurt too much!

As I stood there with the ice on, Nick the kid who I fought, came
over to see how I was doing which was nice… and we began talking.
He told me that he couldn’t believe that I had been able to fight
him off for so long.  Then his parents came over and were talking
to my parents and his Mom kept saying that Nick could be my goal
for future tournaments!

I started to think… up until my own mistake he was not tooling
me… it was my own fear and mistake that that made him be able to
beat me.  I then began thinking about the tips that you sent me.
About how you said that you can’t be afraid to fight people who
can beat you or you will never get better.  I realized that I had
not used the positive self talk at all.

I told my Mom that I wanted to fight again, my arm still hurt a
little but I wanted to try the gi division.  The tournament people
said we would be the first gi division fight.  I was still scared,
but wanted the learning experience at least.

Then I got to watch Jared fight in the Super Fight.  Watching Jared
fight really took my energy level up… he did everything right.
Slowly, but intensely, he racked up the points and won.  As I
watched him I knew that he and my Dad had taught me how to do the
same thing!  I kept thinking about the positive self talk and began
to tell my self that I could beat Nick.

When our match started he went for a take down and he wasn’t pushing
hard enough so I pushed harder and he stumbled… I got mount.  The
whole match I was using the positive self-talk to help me through
any tough spots I was in… at one point he almost had my back and
I began to get scared… then I used your postive self talk… I
told myself, ” I am the best in the world at this position and I
will be out of here soon.”  It clamed me down and enabled me to
get out… and back into his guard.

Thank you.  I won 7 to nothing!

Without the tips that you sent me I do not know if I would have
gone back in and fought in the gi division.  To come back and beat
him after being hurt and being scared was even better then if I
had won right off the bat!

I really learned how much my own fear can stand in the way!

Thanks Master Lloyd Irvin!

From,

Ashley Dimond

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