My journey started in 2007 at the ripe age of 14, coming off of Wushu and Tae Kwon Do, I wanted something with more grappling. I started off doing Muay Thai (which I have recently picked up again) and BJJ; I ended up falling in love with the latter and focusing solely on it. Graduating into the adult's class, I got to experience a total flip in the learning environment; I went from what I felt was a deficit in information flow and intake to an excess and let me tell you, I fell in love even more with the sport. I tried to absorb as much knowledge as possible in as many forms as possible. This was the beginning of the formation of one of my four philosophies of BJJ, let's call it the spectrum view. I also got to taste my first loss at a tournament (2008), it was beautiful, honest, and raw; it fueled me to grow and challenge myself.

 

At the age of 16, I won my first adult weight and absolute titles at blue belt. This was important, it began to evolve my self-confidence and belief in technique conquering strength, speed, or size; interestingly enough, it was the first snowflake in the avalanche of the second philosphy I swear by, let's call it: the game of inches philosophy.

 

Fast-forward to 2012, I won a medal at my first major international tournament, the World Championships. It lit a fire under me because I was now realizing that many of the limits I had were self-imposed and breakable. I shortly thereafter received my purple belt and began to believe in something: work ethic can conquer all.

 

Jump to the present, 2014 I graduated from university where my spectrum view was strengthened and I started teaching outside of my gym; I took on my first private client as a favor. I got paid more than my regular job and I noticed something: it didn't even feel like work and I got incredible feedback. I did not advertise but clients continued to pour in and I realized something: doing something you are passionate about ensures you will do great work. I studied life sciences at the University of Toronto, and what I would constantly encounter were talks of spectrums in relation to illnesses, and I began to appreciate how applicable this was to real life. School also provided useful for my BJJ through two courses I took: computer science and metaphysics. In metaphysics, my amazing professor would always speak about considering the entire logical space, that is to say: every single scenario. I realized this could be linked to BJJ and combined with something I learned in programming: the simple 'IF x-THEN y' relationship. If I could understand a position's every scenario (the entire logical space of reactions an opponent will present), then I could have a counter (THEN) to each one of their IFs.