Still scared, I circled around at a distance, maintaining my focus on Jimmy. Jimmy seemed hesitant, too. He kind of kept looking at me like he was waiting for something to happen. I circled some more. He waited some more. I circled around him EVEN MORE. And he KEPT WAITING.
Then I realized something. The reason Jimmy was waiting was because he had NO IDEA WHAT TO DO. He knew nothing. No single- or double-leg takedowns, no arm locks, no chokes—nothing. He had no idea how to fight.
Now me on the other hand, I was no pro, but I had certainly learned some good stuff over the last six weeks in jiu-jitsu class. That is why the instructor said I would be fine: because he knew that I knew jiu-jitsu.
As I looked at Jimmy’s face, my confidence went up, and I decided to go for it.
I reached toward Jimmy’s face with my hand to distract him for a moment. His eyes blinked, and he reached up to block my hand. At that moment, I shot in underneath his hands and grabbed both his legs for a double-leg takedown! Almost instantly, I had my arms wrapped around both his legs. I squeezed them together as I pushed him back and to the side with my head. Unable to step back and regain his balance because of my arms around his legs, he began to fall down. He hit the mat, and I immediately got control of him and held him down. He pushed hard against me, but it didn’t matter. Even though he was bigger and stronger than I was—it didn’t matter. He didn’t know any technique—and in jiu-jitsu, technique triumphs over strength and size.
The next thing I did was move into the mount position, and as soon as I did that, Jimmy began to get wild. He bucked his hips and thrashed from side to side and, finally, pushed his arms straight up into my chest to try to get me off him. This is the thing people do when they don’t know jiu-jitsu and that’s why we drilled it hundreds of times: when someone tries to push you off, they leave their arms wide open to getting arm locked. And that is exactly what I did. In a flash, I spun around, threw my leg over his head, and sat back with his arm under my control. Once I had his arm extended, I squeezed my legs together and slowly raised my hips to apply the tension, and almost instantly, Jimmy tapped out.
That was it! I had just tapped out a kid bigger than Kenny Williamson! I almost couldn’t believe it. I looked at my instructor, who had been watching, and he smiled and nodded at me. Then he gave me a stern look. The stern look was to remind me to stay humble in defeat or victory and to show good sportsmanship and honorable behavior.
I got to my feet, then reached down to Jimmy to help him stand up. I said, “Good job. You are really strong.”
He looked disappointed and surprised and said, “Well, it didn’t even matter. You are really good at this stuff!”
Stay humble, I thought to myself as I said, “It’s just that I have been training longer than you. Don’t worry. It’s easy to learn, and you’ll pick it up fast as long as you keep training.”
“Oh, I’m definitely going to keep training. Don’t you worry about that.”
I wasn’t worried at all. In fact, I was happy. Jimmy was nice, but he was also big. That meant I get to train with someone as big as Kenny Williamson ALL THE TIME. The more I train, the more comfortable I will be. So I was happy that Jimmy will keep training. And I WILL, TOO!
CHAPTER 21: SUPER AQUAMAN
Today I learned something that I will never ever forget. Today I learned about fear—and how to beat it.
Ever since I swam across the river on my own, swimming has gotten easier and easier. Uncle Jake has still been taking me to the river every other day, and we have been having a lot of fun—and I have become pretty comfortable in the water. I can swim to the other side and back really easily. I’m relaxed when I’m treading water. I can even swim about halfway across the river completely underwater.
But today I almost forgot about all that comfort. Today I felt fear because today was the day Uncle Jake wanted me to jump off the bridge into the water.
I thought it was going to be just another day of swimming. We got down to the river, started swimming around, doing what we have been doing. Then Uncle Jake called me over to the sandy little beach by the riverbank. I swam over, kind of showing off my skills!
When I stood up, he said, “Today’s the day.”
I wasn’t quite sure what he was talking about. “What day?” I asked.
“The bridge,” he said as he nodded toward the huge bridge that spanned the river.
For some reason—and I can’t explain why—I went into panic mode! THE BRIDGE?!?! I thought. THE BRIDGE. It was tall, and even though I was comfortable in the water, when I thought about jumping from the bridge and landing in the water—I don’t know, it just completely FREAKED ME OUT!! So I decided that maybe today wasn’t a good day for the bridge, and I tried to make it into No Big Deal.
“I think I’d rather just swim today, Uncle Jake. We can do the bridge jump next time.…” As I finished my sentence, I started actually turning around toward the river like I was going to keep swimming.
“Hey!” Uncle Jake said sharply and quickly. I tried to ignore him for another half of a second.
“Hey!” barked Uncle Jake, this time louder and with more force—a force I knew I couldn’t ignore anymore. I turned around and faced him.
“You’re going off that bridge today,” he said in a matter-of-fact way, the way that means Uncle Jake is 100 percent set in his mind, and his mind will not change.
But I couldn’t help myself from trying to change it anyway. “It’s okay, Uncle Jake. I’m just going to swim today. I’ll go off the br—”
“It’s not okay,” Uncle Jake cut me off. “You are going off that bridge. Today.”
I knew that arguing was useless. Once Uncle Jake has made up his mind, there is no reasoning with him. And more important, I knew deep inside that he was right. I was ready to jump off the bridge. I was just TERRIFIED!
“Okay, okay, okay,” I told Uncle Jake, trying to seem cool about the whole situation as I slowly started walking up the bank of the river toward the bridge.
“I’ll watch you from down here,” said Uncle Jake.
“Okay,” I said softly. I kept walking, and with each step I took, I got more and more terrified about the jump. Time started to slow down. I don’t even know why I was so scared—but I was!
Finally, I got to the spot on the bridge where I was supposed to jump. I looked over the edge. HOW DID THE RIVER GET SO FAR DOWN?!?!?!
“Okay! Let’s go, Marc,” Uncle Jake shouted up to me.
I couldn’t even respond. I just stood there.
“Go ahead, Marc. Jump!”
I still couldn’t say anything. But I stepped up over the little fence along the side of the bridge and shuffled toward the edge where I was supposed to jump from. I looked straight ahead and was really thinking of doing it. Then I looked down, and I got overwhelmed and scared and I just stood there.
“What’s the issue, Marc?!” Uncle Jake yelled up to me.
I didn’t know what to say.
“What’s wrong?” he asked again, louder.
I just sat there on the little wall along the edge of the bridge.
Then I saw Uncle Jake walking up toward the bridge, obviously coming to either yell at me—or throw me off!!!
But when he got up next to me, he didn’t yell at all. Come to think of it, Uncle Jake hardly ever yells.
“What’s going on, buddy?” he said in a calm voice.
“I don’t know…,” I said. “I’m just … I’m just…”
“You’re afraid, aren’t you?” Uncle Jake asked. But he wasn’t even asking. He knew. He knew I was scared.
There was no point in denying it. Uncle Jake knew it as plain as day.
“Yes,” I finally said in a quiet tone, embarrassed that I was afraid.
Then, to my surprise, Uncle Jake said, “That’s normal.”
“What?” I responded, shocked at Uncle Jake’s statement.
“I said, ‘That’s normal.’ You are doing something you’ve never done before. So it’s normal
to be a little hesitant. It’s called fear. It’s a normal emotion—and it’s okay.” Then he added, “Well, it’s okay as long as you can control it.”
This made no sense to me. “How am I supposed to control fear? And how would you know? You’re not afraid of anything.”
Uncle Jake sat quietly for a minute. Then he said, “I wish that were true.”
“What do you mean?” I asked him.
“Well, you said I’m not afraid of anything. And that is just not true. Fear is normal. In fact, fear is good. Fear is what warns you when things are dangerous. Fear is what makes you prepare. Fear keeps us out of a lot of trouble. So there is nothing wrong with fear. But fear can also be overwhelming. It can be unreasonable. It can cause you to freeze up and make bad decisions or hesitate when you need to act. So you have to learn to control fear. And that’s what you need to do right now.”
“Okay. That sounds great, and I would really love to make you happy and overcome my fear … but I don’t know how!”
Uncle Jake thought about what I just asked him for a few seconds and then said, “Okay. Well, the first part of controlling fear you have already done, and that is preparation. You have done plenty of preparation to be ready for this moment—to face this fear. Starting with dunking your head all the way up to swimming all around and back and forth across this river. You have done little jumps off the riverbank. All of the last several weeks have been preparing you for this—this jump. And all that preparation works to help overcome the fear. Imagine how scared you would be if you still didn’t know how to swim? You would be horrified. But you have prepared.”
“Then why am I still scared?” I asked Uncle Jake.
“Simple,” he said. “Because there is still an element of the unknown. You have never jumped off anything this high before. So you don’t know what it feels like. People are afraid of what they don’t know or they don’t understand. But you have prepared. You know it is safe. You know you are ready. It is just this last little bit of fear that has to be overcome. And you know how you do that?”
“I have no idea,” I told him.
“You go.”
“Just go?” I asked Uncle Jake, now partly thinking he was just joking.
“Yes. You just go. You see, fear lives in the moment—that powerful moment—between when you decide you are going to do something and when you do it. Once you go—once you start—you won’t be afraid anymore. You overcome the fear by going—and it is the same in many aspects of life. Parachuting. Talking in front of a crowd. Taking a test. Running a race. Competing in jiu-jitsu. The fear is in the waiting. So. Once you have prepared and trained and studied and planned, there is only one thing left to do: go.”
“And that’s it?”
“Yes. That’s it.”
As soon as Uncle Jake finished those words, he stood up, looked at me, yelled out, “HOO-YAH!” and jumped off the bridge.
Just go, I thought to myself. I stood up, stepped up onto the edge of the wall, and looked down at Uncle Jake, who had just come back to the surface and was looking up at me with a big smile on his face.
With all my heart and lungs, I yelled out, “HOO-YAH!!!!” and I stepped off the edge of the bridge, past my fear, and into the unknown. I felt myself falling for a while, and then, WHOOOOSH, I was in the water! I came to the surface and had a big smile on my face!
“I can fly!” I yelled. “I can flyyyyyyyyy!!!”
Uncle Jake laughed and got out and ran up and jumped again, and I followed him—without hesitation. And then we did it again and again and again. And the fear? It was gone. All I had to do was prepare and get ready and then … I just had to take the first step—GO!
CHAPTER 22: TEN!
I never thought that this day would come. Uncle Jake had me rest for two straight days in the morning instead of working out. The first morning instead of working out, he took me to breakfast. The next day we ate breakfast at home, and he started teaching me how to play chess—which seems like a really complicated game but is actually pretty easy once you understand it.
Then, after two days of rest, Uncle Jake met me down in the garage in the morning to work out.
“Today is the big day,” he said.
“Why is that?” I asked.
“You will see,” said Uncle Jake. “Now, get up on the pull-up bar and do one pull-up.”
“One?” I asked, not believing that Uncle Jake would only have me do one pull-up.
“Yes—just one,” Uncle Jake replied.
I jumped up on the bar and did a pull-up. I was a little stiff, but it did feel pretty easy.
“Now another one,” Uncle Jake ordered.
“Just one?” I asked.
“Yes—just one.”
I grabbed ahold of the pull-up bar and pulled my chin over the bar. Now a little warmer, I felt even stronger. Then Uncle Jake had me do one more and then one more and then one more. As I got warmer and warmer and more loosened up, I felt stronger and stronger. Then Uncle Jake said, “Now you are going to rest for about two minutes.” I stretched my arms a little and waited for the time to go by. Then Uncle Jake said, “Now. Jump up on the bar and do ten pull-ups.”
I should have known this was coming. But the weird thing was, instead of being concerned that I wouldn’t be able to do it, I felt really strong and like I actually could do it. “Okay,” I said.
I stepped up and grabbed a tight hold of the pull-up bar. Uncle Jake said, “Go,” and I started pulling.
One. Two. Three. Four. I wasn’t even feeling these yet. Five. Six. Seven. I felt a little tired but not too bad. And I was about to break my record! Eight. There were eight pull-ups. The most I’ve ever done IN MY LIFE. And I wasn’t done yet. I pulled again. NINE. Yes! Another record. I was a little tired, but I knew I had another one in me. So I pulled again and got my chin over the bar. “Ten!” Uncle Jake said. I dropped off the bar. And then I jumped into the air.
“I did it!” I yelled, and then quickly corrected what I had said: “WE did it!”
Uncle Jake gave me a high five and then said, “No, that wasn’t us. It was you. I might have told you what to do, but make no mistake: You did this.”
“Well, I couldn’t have done it without you, Uncle Jake,” I told him.
“Maybe so. But you did the work. You did the practice. You did the pull-ups. Well done, Marc,” he told me. And then he added, “Now get up there and do another set of ten.”
And I did just that! I jumped up on the bar and was able to do another ten pull-ups. And then I did another set of ten and then a set of nine and then two sets of eight, a set of seven, four sets of six, two sets of five, two sets of four, then three, two, and one.
And that was it! I was now officially a kid who can do TEN pull-ups. No more hiding from the pull-up bar in school. No more being embarrassed about being weak. This was real. As I thought about this, I looked at Uncle Jake and said, “Thanks.”
“No problem, Marc. And I want you to remember something: This isn’t just about pull-ups. You know what else this is about?”
I wasn’t quite sure. “I don’t know.”
Uncle Jake grabbed me by both shoulders and looked me straight in the eyes and said gravely, “This is about everything. Everything. Just think, two months ago, you couldn’t do any pull-ups. At all. Zero. Now you can do TEN. All it took was a good plan and the discipline to execute the plan. To DO IT. That’s what it takes. And you can apply that to just about anything. If you are willing to do the work—you can make things happen. And like I told you, no one else is going to do the work for you. Sure, you might get some help along the way. But you might not. Who knows? What we do know is this: Hard work and discipline are how you achieve things. You have to make things happen. And that is exactly what you did here, and what you can do with almost anything in life. Remember that.”
“I will, Uncle Jake. I will,” I told him. And he was 100 percent right. People say you can do anything you want in life. But what they don’t tell you is that you
have to work for it.
With hard work, anything is possible.
CHAPTER 23: STAND ALONE
It didn’t even hit me until last night when I saw Uncle Jake packing up all his gear that he was leaving. Just like that, summer was over, and just like that, Uncle Jake was leaving. I must have looked pretty sad, because Uncle Jake asked me what was wrong.
“What’s wrong? You’re leaving, that’s what’s wrong.”
“Yeah, but you’re going back to school, and you will be back with all your buddies.”
“I know but…” I tried to think of a way to say what I was thinking.
“But what?” Uncle Jake asked.
“But none of those kids can help me be strong. None of those kids can teach me to do things I don’t know how to do. None of those kids are warriors, like you.”
“Hmmm,” Uncle Jake mumbled. I thought for the first time that Uncle Jake was stumped.
“How am I going to keep getting stronger and smarter and better without you around? How am I going to be a warrior all by myself?”
Uncle Jake took a hard look at me; then he said, “The truth is, you don’t need me around to be a warrior. Oftentimes, the warrior stands alone. It can happen for many reasons. Maybe he got left behind. Maybe the rest of his team got killed. Maybe he just grew old, and his fellow warriors died. Maybe he got assigned a job that put him out there, on the battlefield, by himself. None of that matters. The warrior remains strong. The warrior must know how to stand alone.”
Only my uncle Jake could make being left by myself sound cool! But I still wasn’t buying it. “Okay, but who is going to train me and help me study? Who is going to make sure I get up in the morning? Who is going to make sure I don’t go back to my old lazy ways?”
Way of the Warrior Kid--From Wimpy to Warrior the Navy SEAL Way Page 7
