This past weekend I attended a seminar led by Professor Pedro Sauer in Sandy Utah.   The guy I ended pairing up with to practice the techniques demonstrated was a kindred spirit.  We have the same first name, the same occupation, and both of us are family men who are fortunate to have wives who are tolerant of our obsession.

So the inevitable question surfaced; why am I studying BJJ?  My response is always ‘for purely spiritual reasons’.  Soooooo, what does that mean exactly?  And more importantly, why do I feel I need to explain this? On my blog no less?

Well, because I like to.

The definition of spirituality according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary is:

4. The quality or state of being spiritual.

And Spiritual means:

5 a : of or relating to supernatural beings or phenomena b : of, relating to, or involving spiritualism : spiritualistic

And Spiritualistic means:

1 : the view that spirit is a prime element of reality

And these definitions mean jack crap to me.  So, we turn to Wikipedia and get more of a definition of Spirituality .  From this, what I resonate with is:

Spirituality, in a wide variety of cultural and religious concepts, is itself often seen as incorporating a spiritual path, along which one advances to achieve a given objective, such as a higher state of awareness, outreach wisdom or communion with God or with creation.

I personally feel that there is a lot of misconception when discussing what is spiritual and what is religious.  The difference I see as to what is a spiritual perspective is the discovery of one’s own truth vs. acceptance and practice of agreed upon truth(s).

The most profound, deeply moving experiences I’ve had have been on ski slopes, in deserts hundreds of miles from civilization, windsurfing, climbing up or flying down some tasty single track, blasting through feet of fresh powder, on a pilgrimage in the butt crack of nowhere in Europe (El Camino de Santiago to be precise), or tied up on a mat. These places and these experiences are some of what I call  ‘church’.  Where I am at times forced to be in the moment.  This is where I find my truth.  This is where I experience oneness with God and the Universe.

With BJJ, time and time again I am enlightened with a greater perspective of who I am and what is my life’s oh so creamy goodness.

This is why I do BJJ.