What if we lived in an ideal world where everybody who could benefit from learning BJJ actually did learn it? We had a chance to talk to Rickson last December, and it turns out he has been thinking long and hard about this. Enjoy part 1 of his answer about the concept of BJJ as a "conquering art" below.
"Martial arts is something we're all involved with. And martial arts is the art of war, battle confrontation, winning, losing, defeat, army, ammunition, resilience. So, when we're talking about warfare, we're talking about destroying your opponent, we're talking about fighting, we're talking about strategies of war; and all this is completely acceptable for any competitive guy, any tough guy, any warrior, any soldier—they can completely understand that.
"But for an average person, maybe 60% or more, they don't have this kind of competitiveness, they don't have this kind of desire for battle, for destroying the opponent, for competing. They live in a different mindset: sometimes they are in art, sometimes they are in Law, sometimes they are in relationships or different matters of, you know, a teacher or an artist... So it's irrelevant for him to think about 'Who I'm gonna beat' or 'Is somebody coming to beat me?' so those are facts which are not exactly involved in their lives and don't take too much attention from them. That means: if you try to introduce martial arts to somebody, he may love it, because it has something he likes to do, to compete, etc.; or maybe he's gonna say, 'You know what? It's interesting, but it's not for me. I don't feel the appeal to just be a fighter; I'm an artist, I'm a lover'—whatever.
"But if you change the words 'martial arts' for 'conquering arts,' anyone on the face of the Earth has something to be conquered. Sometimes you wanna conquer happiness, sometimes you wanna conquer relationships, sometimes you wanna conquer a car, sometimes you wanna conquer a new job, and it goes on and on and on. In terms of happiness, you have to achieve something to be happy, and that level of happiness is not gonna stay forever, because you buy a car today, you should be very happy about it; but ten years from now, the car is old—the happiness from when you bought the car is not the same that you have today. So you need either another car, or you need a new house, or you need a new... So you always need something to accomplish, to be looking for happiness, and accomplishment, and focus, and motivation. So, if you change the name from 'martial arts' to 'conquering arts,' who on the face of the Earth is not interested to learn about what I should do to conquer something? Because we all have matters to conquer."
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Excelent