Training Environment

I tend to like underdogs.
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Those who came from a difficult background.
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Those who have experienced hardships from early on in their lives.
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Those who weren’t necessarily in a “great” (or even good) environment to get better at their craft.
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They often seize an opportunity that others may miss.
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They turn it into something bigger.
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They work hard and smart (or just work harder than anyone else) to reach their goals.
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They give us this hope that we could do just as well as them if we tried…
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After all, their starting point may have been way worse than ours.
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You have a bunch of people like them in BJJ as well. The BJJ players who grew up in a favela, etc. are obvious examples.
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And then you have some elite BJJ players like Adam Wardzinski, Tommy Langaker, Espen Mathiesen, Lachlan Giles, and Craig Jones.
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They probably grew up in a decent environment like many of us but didn’t necessarily have access to a high-class training environment.
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Among these people, I’ve only met Lachlan. I visited his gym (The St. Kilda branch of Absolute MMA) in October 2017.
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Here’s my bet…
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Many gyms around the world are just as good as the gyms these folks train at.
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They probably do have a handful of excellent training partners who could push them a lot.
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At the same time, the majority of their training partners/students aren’t like that.
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My experience at PSLPB was like that as well.
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You have absolute killers like Tiago Barros and Hiago George. There were some up-and-coming brown & purple & blue belts who could beat average black belts, too (Thalison Soares and Diego Pato were such blue belts at that time).
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But they were the minority if you consider the entire team of PSLPB.
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Anyway… my point is:
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Your training environment is probably good enough.
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You could become competitive on a global scale in that environment.
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What’s important is to train with a handful of enthusiasts who want to improve their skills and get better.
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Of course, if you can train under great mentors like John Danaher or André Galvão or whatever, that will help. There’s no doubt about it.
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But IF you are inclined to think that your training environment isn’t good enough…
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… AND that you cannot get better without having a famous coach or killer training partners…
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Think again and try finding ways you could get better even in that environment of yours.
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That would be more constructive.
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After all…
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Whenever you have a choice to complain, you also have a choice to do something about it.
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Choose well.