The Worst Parts of BJJ Culture

Red pill or blue pill?

Photo by ANIRUDH on Unsplash

It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

I don’t like writing articles like these, but I am convinced that part of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu culture is sick.

I’m not Buddha or anything like that, I’m just a concerned onlooker. I’m part of the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu culture, and I know for a fact that the way I once viewed the world thanks to my time in BJJ was highly distasteful. It was wrong — and I don’t mean that as virtue signaling.

I mean it selfishly.

For a long time, BJJ made me unhappy. The culture made me unhappy until I taught myself how to think differently.

But what’s wrong with us? What’s wrong with BJJ?

In my opinion, it’s not any group or even any individual. It’s a mental illness — one of the very things the community struggles so much to talk about.

It’s a spiritual illness.

Or, to put it as simply as possible, it’s a mindset issue. The way people in the martial tend to think about their life in relation to the sport is deeply disconnected from society and what makes a good life in a good society.

Here are the 7 parts of BJJ that I find are most profoundly ill.