To some extent, jiu-jitsu is about solving problems — you have a goal, but something blocks you and you have to find a way to get past that obstacle. Usually that obstacle wears a gi.

Programing and designing are other areas that are often associatd with problem solving and they happen to be part of my regular job. When it comes to problem solving, there’s a process that works really well but is quite overlooked. I use it in design and programing a lot so I thought it might apply to bjj too. This secret-ninja technique is to take another perspective on a problem and I first read about it here.

The positionnal perspective

I’m trying to “figure out” open guard these days. Now it’s a very broad topic and there are many things to be learned. It’s not about learning one technique here, it’s about figuring out a couple of principles.

Usually we think about this stuff in terms of positions: I’m in open guard, I want a sweep or a submission and my opponent wants to pass. I pick a technique from my bag of tricks, he picks one out of his and boom, the better one wins. Usually it aint me.

Perspective switch

Now forget about the position, the hooks and the grips, all of it — the only thing that matters is distance. I’ll try to control distance and see what happens if he’s close to me, what happens if he’s far away. What is the ideal distance to set up attacks? How close does he want to come? How far away can I push him before it becomes a problem for me?

Honestly it wasn’t that much fun, because I got crushed. Since I neglected grips, hooks and everything else, well… I got passed. But after a couple of rolls I started to understand the effects of distance.

Now I need to do the same with grip management, body posture, pressure, etc. At some point it should only become a matter of combining everything I have learned from each perspective.