Compatible Intent

Communicate with your partners to ensure you have complementary training goals.

After reading hundreds of Reddit comments, I'm convinced many of our Jiu-Jitsu problems stem from simply not talking to people. 🤣

Before we train, we should communicate with our partners about goals for the roll. It's how we get on the same page and ensure we're training for mutual benefit.

If nothing else, here's what we want to discuss:

“Here are my goals and how you can help me.”

“What are your goals so that I can help you?”

“How can we best keep each other safe while rolling?”

I'm increasingly thinking this pre-roll conversation might be one of the most important elements surrounding our training — and not just for safety, but also for skill development. Here's why.

Rolling intent and safety

We're obviously looking to prevent injury when we roll. We need to share any concerns with our partner, such as pre-existing injuries, or if we just don't want to get that banged up today.

Beyond injury, we also need to get aligned on intensity. Failure to set expectations about rolling intensity is one of the most common mistakes leading to disaster in Jiu-Jitsu.

I suspect many training horror stories were partly caused by mismatched intent around rolling intensity.

This doesn't even address PTSD, claustrophobia, cultural norms, or any of the other perfectly valid reasons why someone might be uncomfortable training Jiu-Jitsu. That's an even better reason to have the “safety talk” before every roll.

Rolling intent and training value

Rolling is fun, which makes it great for learning Jiu-Jitsu, but it can also be a trap. Because it's so fun, we sometimes roll too much and neglect more structured training time.

Modern training tools like “designated winner” and the constraints-led approach require a degree of collaboration with your training partner.

Do we have compatible goals?

Beyond helping each other with our goals, we're also looking for compatible intent with our training partner. We don't need to share the same goals, but we do need to ensure our goals can coexist.

For example: We can easily work together if you want to work on guard passing and I want to work on guard retention. But if you want a competition round and I want a flow roll, we can't roll together because we can't satisfy both goals.

How do we do it? Look, just talk to them. Use your words. I know it's hard, especially for neurodivergent introvert Jiu-Jitsu nerds like us, but getting on the same page with your training partner is absolutely essential for your Jiu-Jitsu journey.

Beyond minimizing bad interactions and reducing injury, ensuring compatible intent with your training partners is also one of your best tools to unlock optimal learning in Jiu-Jitsu.

On the podcast:

• Ep. 326: Dropping In, feat. Rob Biernacki

Further study:

• The Golden Rule