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- You’ll miss out on life if you’re not an athlete.
You’ll miss out on life if you’re not an athlete.
Why I'm serious about Jiu-Jitsu.
Saksham Gaur
August 09, 2024 • Reading Time: 10 minutes
Quick overview of what's in this edition.
Life update.
How has mixed martial arts changed my life?
Whatever you do, become an athlete.
Resources of the week.
Life update.
The past week has been like the same day every day lol.
I have spent almost all my time finishing “Expert Creator Blueprint”. My digital product is for people who want to sell services through Instagram and build a personal brand.
I have trained daily and studied jiu-jitsu and weights. One thing though, I have slept the least this week.
I just checked my Apple watch and I have slept a maximum of 7 hours per day, never reaching 7 total.
But it’s all good. I need to get this product launched in the next few days. (I have already recorded almost 9 hours of modules, and about 7-8 are left just for launch).
In other areas, I have been slacking off on my work with the agency, since all my focus is going here. Hell, I didn’t even focus on my content. Everything that is coming out now, I created a couple of weeks ago.
I am in the process of building an insanely good brand machine, where you will see more sides to my journey.
YouTube: More bts, and vlogs coming in. Along with videos teaching stuff around what people ask me the most.
LinkedIn: I have already been posting for a while there, I have a writer who helps me out. We have grown nicely from like 1000 followers to 2100 there.
X: I will get back to it, this used to be my daily journal, but right now I hardly open X like once a day.
Instagram: I will aim to post every day on both my accounts moving forward. And it’s not to just increase volume, it’s to show all the different sides. To create my brand, and also bring in new revenue each month for the business, especially the agency.
Newsletter: I will continue the newsletter and talk about the most unique stuff.
The whole content machine will rock, and once this starts to work the entire game will change within a year. I am not looking for quick success with this.
It’s for the long term.
I give a lot of credit for being able to work like this in martial arts. The amount of time I spend at the academy daily is too much. lol, still, I can squeeze in all the work I want and still be left with more time.
Talking about this, let’s go to the main part of the newsletter.
How has mixed martial arts changed my life?
When I say MMA made me a new person, I’m not exaggerating. It’s been nearly two years since I began my martial arts journey from scratch, and I often wonder where I would have been without this.
Let’s take a step back in time.
Growing up, I was short-tempered and got into a lot of fights in school.
That started to change when I was preparing for JEE. During that time, I didn’t have the energy to do all this, so it started to fade away.
However, by the time I reached college, I swung to the other extreme. Becoming overly self-conscious, withdrawn, and lacking in confidence.
And a big part of it was that I stopped playing football after starting my JEE prep. From almost being selected for the states and nationals, to not even playing.
I lost the athlete.
Ask anyone committed to physical fitness what it means to them, and you'll likely hear responses like personal growth, an escape, mental clarity, or strength.
Of course, it’s all like this for me too, I have a slight addition to it.
I want to do my best, I have made peace with the fact that sports will not be my career, still, I want to be fucking good at what I do.
Whenever I work on a sport like this, I redefine my self-image. Football, jump rope, Boxing, Kickboxing, and Jiu-Jitsu all play probably the biggest part in doing so. (Not even talking about work here).
I’ve always been a skinny guy, and for a long time, I thought lifting weights and bulking up was the answer.
In 2019, I committed to the gym for 3 months, gaining about 12 kilograms. While I was in my second year.
I made good progress, got some confidence back, and the time after that in college was better. I felt better.
Still,
My true goal has always been to build a functional body—ever since I started playing football and doing home workouts. I never saw myself as the type to chase aesthetics or flex for Instagram.
I want to be able to do cool shit.
I read somewhere that “95% of people over 30 years old will never sprint again”.
This is just heartbreaking, just like there was a time you last played in the streets with your friends, there will be a time after which you will never be able to run, jump, and play.
For me, that means treating my sport like an infinite pursuit. As long as I have the energy to move my body, I will be in the pursuit to get better at this. Especially martial arts.
(I want to pick up running too).
It’s not about how I look, but about what my body can do.
One of the main reasons I moved from Ajmer to Pune was the lack of an MMA academy in my hometown, and I wanted to fully commit to my agency and personal growth.
Joining P-Town West MMA classes was probably one of the best decisions I made in my adult list.
It’s not like I was a natural at this, the first few months were incredibly challenging as I had to adjust to new concepts and unlearn old habits.
We often seek to learn new things, but rarely do we talk about the importance of letting go of outdated beliefs.
I had a certain outlook on functional fitness, and that all got pushed to a great extent with MMA.
If you want to start any martial arts, please don’t do it on your own. You can look at workouts and try them but do not, I repeat, do not start learning techniques on your own.
A coach is essential, I have always been all about learning from mentors and MMA reinforced the idea even more.
I am super lucky to learn from one of the only few jiu-jitsu black belts in the entire country, Professor Jonathan Roberts, and being promoted to a blue belt now.
It was not like this since the beginning,
My ego has been humbled daily since joining the academy. I have bled, gotten injured, hurt my foot multiple times, fractured my hand, and broken my nose cartilage too.
I loved every moment (Not the time when I had to take a break from training).
A coach shows you the way. You can’t be a coach as a beginner because you have no clue about the journey.
You need mentors, coaches, people to humble you, and those people to support you too.
Because the most rewarding aspect of my journey has been the relationships I've built.
Martial arts is a lonely sport, making a strong, supportive community is essential.
Many of my closest friends are from the academy—training partners and coaches who have supported me both on and off the mats.
These connections have been pivotal, not just in my martial arts progression, but also in my content creation journey.
When I first started posting voiceovers on Instagram, my coach Gaurav sir, got a lot of the students at the academy to share one of my videos on their stories.
That was the first video of mine that crossed 10k views. That was the push I needed.
The time spent at the academy is not just training,
I often spend about an hour more after each session talking and joking around with the people.
This sense of brotherhood has inspired me to get my friends and followers involved in the academy, making me feel like I'm part of a movement. (I'll share more on this in upcoming posts).
My obsession with the process keeps me going, even when it means spending 2 to 3 hours a day getting aggressively humbled.
I persevere because I know that with each challenge, I'm improving, becoming more fulfilled, and evolving into a better version of myself every day.
I am a different person compared to 3 years ago.
Whatever you do, become an athlete.
I have found this new drive inside me to promote the lifestyle of being an athlete and an entrepreneur.
If I look back on certain days, so many high-level entrepreneurs I met are unhealthy. Sure, they are doing 50-1000X better than I do in my business, yet their health is not taken care of.
At first glance you see them and you can say how much effort they put into their well-being.
Going to the gym is good. There’s nothing wrong about it. Yet,
If you have the chance, try living the life of an athlete. You don’t have to compete anywhere to put the pressure on yourself, give it a try for a year.
You will start to love yourself, and you will find people with this same pursuit, and those will be the strongest bonds.
You will be forced to be more productive, prioritize your diet, etc. because being worse than today would be your worst nightmare.
This mentality carries on to work and to your relationships too. It’s magical.
I know most of my brand is built upon my journey, my personal branding agency, books, learning, etc.
I know that no one else is talking about the athletic lifestyle like I am in this space. And I for sure want to be one of the leaders and to push my followers to be fucking great athletes.
You will see, that this is a long-term game.