Name: How Rickson Gracie Learned to Overcome Fear
Uploaded: 2021-08-10T17:56:19.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'How Rickson Gracie Learned to Overcome Fear' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-08-10. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'How Rickson Gracie Learned to Overcome Fear' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-08-10. Transcript available.

- The Joe Rogan experience.
- How old were you when you had your first match like that?
- My first professional was 19.
- 19?
- Fight King Zulu with 120 fights and four draws only.
120 victories.
- He was a big guy, too.
- Yeah, about 210, 220, and about...
Yeah, he was a big guy.
- How much do you weigh at the time?
- 174.
- Those matches are still available online.
People can watch them.
- Yeah.
- That's pretty cool.
- I think so, yeah.
- Is it wild looking back at 19-year-old you fighting Zulu?
- Was maybe the biggest experience in my life
because at this point I felt like I was good,
I was able to fight well, but I didn't have the experience.
So, and then one day I got home,
I saw my father talking with Zulu's manager in Brasilia,
the capital, and the guy tried to bring, to invite
somebody of my father's team, to fight Zulu.
And my father was saying, "No, I don't have nobody.
We don't fight Valetudo for so long.
Nobody's training for it."
And I get the idea, said, "Hey, Dad, pull me in, pull me in, pull me in."
So, I immediately asked him to...
And he looked at me, and he mentioned to the Valdemar Santana,
I said, "Yes, but I have my son here, 19 years old.
He want to try."
And the guy said, "No, Master Gracie, this is not a fight for him to try.
The guy is very tough, and this and that."
As the guy tried to pull my father off the deal,
my father becomes more excited to the...
"No, but I think he gonna go handle the challenge, this and that."
So, he's become excited with the situation.
So, and then we set up the fight.
One month later, I was there to fight.
And...
We start the fight.
And he has a trade, like a one move he does,
which grab you with the hands between your legs and lift you up
and throw you back on the floor.
And as he approached that, I moved back,
block his shoulders and hit him with the knee.
Right on his face.
It was the best knee I could possibly give in somebody.
And I expect him to just...
I expect to win the fight right in that moment.
But he just shook, he stood up, lifted his head, shook,
spit a tooth.
And start back ready again to go.
You know?
And then I felt like it was really serious.
And I think it was much serious than I expect.
And for the next 10 minutes, because it was
10 minutes rounds.
For the end of the round, we just engage and fall on the ring
and come back in and back and out.
And a lot of commotion, a lot of strength.
And at the end of the round, I kind of crawled into the corner.
And I said to my dad, "Dad, I quit.
I cannot go anymore.
I'm tired."
And my dad not even listened to me.
He said, "He's tired than you.
He's worse.
Now you're going to kick his ass, do this and that."
And I said, "Dad, I'm serious, man.
I'm dead.
I cannot go."
And then my brother Halls threw me a bucket of ice and water in my head.
I go, "Aaaah, aaaah."
And then, bing, the bell rings and I push in again.
And like my dad said, I could beat the guy in three minutes because he was
already tired,
wasted two.
So when I grabbed his back, he could not escape and I put him to sleep.
And then I confirmed my worst enemy was in my mind.
My enemy was in my brain telling me, "I have to quit.
I have to."
So I decided in that day, never heard my mind tell bad things to me anymore.
So either I'm going to die or I don't go.
But if I go, I cannot say, "Oh, I think I had enough.
I think it's time to."
So this was the worst enemy I could have.
And from that day on, I decided to either go to putting everything on it or don't
go at all.
So it was easier for me because I would start to deal with one enemy only,
not two enemies, my mind and my opponent.
It's probably the most common thing that happens to fighters
is they lose faith in themselves or they start to look for a way out.
Yes.
That's pretty much because you don't see the other side.
You see yourself and you see you're tired.
You're seeing with problems.
You start to see the negative aspects of you.
And you're not putting yourself like the guy has the same problems.
He has the same ideas.
So you have to keep going here as everything is normal.
And it's hard to people relate to that.
You know, when you start to getting the problems,
you start to see yourself bigger than the other ones.
You know, more problems and that's not going to be the right way to resolve the
matter.
It's interesting that you figured out how to handle these things on your own,
too,
because this is it's an area that fighters seek psychological help with.
Now they hire psychologists and they they get hypnotized and they do all these
different things
to try to figure out how to stop that negative conversation in the mind,
how to stop those negative voices and how to not give in to that weakness that
wants you to quit.
Yes, this power we all have within, but some people don't even go for that.
And they seek for different people to help them, which is good, too.
But once you become more intuitive, when you become more enlightened with your
own potential,
you're able to resolve all the matters yourself, you know, because it's all
about your mindset.
It's how you think and how you believe and what you're ready for and what you're
prepared for
and how you're able to to accept and surrender everything around you.
And that these moments that where you do want to quit, whether it's in training
or in competition,
for people who understand that and have experienced that and have overcome it,
life becomes easier.
Yes, I think, you know, martial arts when it's practice with with a complete
idea
is a metaphor for life.
You know, you become a good martial artist.
You become a good person.
You're going to become a happy person because you want to be able to to conquer
your your happiness
outside of the mat.
And to deal with your demons.
Yes.
And some people never fight those demons.
They never.
So when something happens to them in life, some adversity comes up.
They're not accustomed to handling it.
Yes.
And we're seeing a lot of that now with this pandemic.
We're seeing a lot of people freaking out because they've never really
experienced
any true adversity in their life.
Yes.
No, it's not only for that, but because they don't ever thought about how to
resolve those problems.
You know, they just thinking the problem is there.
What I'm going to do, but they don't thinking about how I can control the
situation,
how I can be on top of this, how I can, you know, just defend myself from those
demons.
And and and if you don't see the perspective of how I can resolve my problems,
you allow yourself to to to put your problems in somebody else's hands to
resolve for you.
And it's all about perspective.
It's all about focus.
Watch the entire episode for free only on Spotify.