The Future of Instructional Books

Publishing is changing.

That is not news. The industry has been in disarray for the better part of a decade, or maybe longer depending on how you look at it. As soon as Amazon entered the market, the brick-and-mortar distribution model began to crumble, and then e-books and on-demand printing followed not long after. Borders closed up shop, and Barnes & Noble is uncertain about its future.

Readers are consuming content in different ways, and the old guard is hesitant to admit that their original recipe might not match current tastes as well as it once did.

We’ve seen this shift in the world of jiu-jitsu publishing as well. The use of on-demand content sites appears to be growing, if the proliferation of such sites is any indication. MGInAction.com was once the lone player in the jiu-jitsu video on-demand market, but now Andre Galvao, the Mendes brothers, Eddie Bravo, and the Ribeiro brothers have entered the market as well.

The benefits seem clear for everyone involved: instructors can generate more consistent revenue more quickly and users can enjoy a quicker turn-around in new material and wider variety of content. The focus of DVDs and books tends to be narrow, and the production time can take months or even years. The video on-demand model is successful for many of the same reasons that YouTube as a service is successful: content is updated almost daily and the material is easy to digest.

Other jiu-jitsu content producers are taking advantage of digital distribution in a different way. Where Stephan Kesting and Roy Dean produced DVDs they are now producing apps. Budovideos has also taken note of this shift and being pushing its own digital versions of instructionals, seminars, and competition footage.

When I was the Editor-in-Chief at Lockflow.com, I saw the shift from photo by photo instructionals to YouTube videos, and it seems that this shift has touched every corner of jiu-jitsu instructionals, whether that content is being consumed on YouTube, in an app, or through an on-demand service—large numbers of short, specific videos.

This change in paradigm has some proclaiming that books are dead or dying. I don’t think that’s the case.

The written word, regardless of genre, can accomplish things that video and pictures cannot. In terms of jiu-jitsu instructionals, videos are great for demonstrating movement and for mimicking that personal delivery of information that we’ve become accustomed to on the mat. Video’s weakness, however, is its ability to organize and to synergize concepts and theory. When the discussion of idea becomes more lofty than a simple how-to, the edited and revised delivery of text makes it easier to present that information where a stumble in speech can muddle and confuse.

Again, not a new observation. Successful jiu-jitsu blogs like Aesopian.com and the Jiu-Jitsu Laboratory have proven this notion to be true over and over again for years, and their popularity suggests that a mixed-media delivery of technical information resonates with jiu-jiteiros worldwide. Grapplers love short videos that explain technique, but they also love exploring the depth of their art.

Jiu-jitsu instructional books may be falling from favor now, but that fall won’t be permanent. The written word has not become weaker. In fact, more people are reading now than ever with the spread of smartphones and mobile devices. The container that we call a book and the way we’ll deliver will need to evolve, but books aren’t dead.

This is a challenge that I’ve spent some time exploring, and I think I have the solution. It’s much more complex than simple coupling video with text, which I’ve been doing with Artechoke in a Can and which many others have done before, but it’s also not terribly complex. I’m looking forward to sharing that solution with you this summer.

Artechoke in a Can: Why I Share Jiu-Jitsu Classes for Free

If you follow me on Facebook or Twitter, you have probably noticed me promoting a series called "Artechoke in a Can." Artechoke in a Can is the online version of my weekly no-gi class at Steel City Martial Arts in Pittsburgh, PA. This week's lesson is on arm drags.

The content that I am now making public started as an experiment. After a couple of years of teaching a no-gi class once a week, I decided that I liked to teach in modules, lessons that connect and build from class to class so that I can explore one position or technique or topic in greater depth than is possible in a single class.

As I started to transition to the module format, I realized that some of my students, while they enjoyed the depth, were frequently frustrated by the approach for two reasons: since I only taught once a week, it was sometimes difficult to remember what we covered 7 days ago, and since every class built on the previous class, missing a class in the middle made it particularly difficult to get caught up and to enjoy the subsequent lessons. At the same time, the students that did make it to every class really enjoyed the way the classes connected to each other.

So how can you cater to both audiences? That audience that can make it to every class and the audience that might miss a class here and there because life demands them to?

Make the content available outside of class.

So, with the help of my students, I started filming each class and uploading the videos with some descriptive copy to a class blog. After a few months, some students at our more distant affiliate schools were using the blog, and students that had no connection to our school whatsoever were using the material as well. At that point, after some long discussions with trusted friends, I decided to make the material public to contribute in my own small way to the growth of jiu-jitsu thought.

I am a purple belt teaching purple belt level material, this is true, and I don't claim that my instruction rivals that of any black belt. However, I know that I learned a lot from non-black belts when I was new to jiu-jitsu, and I still do. Matt "Aesopian" Kirtley was a blue belt when I discovered his blog. David Levy-Booth (of the Jiu-Jitsu Lab) is a purple belt--albeit a very advanced one--and I've learned a great deal from him as well.

My jiu-jitsu has grown because of people like Aesopian and like David, people who love jiu-jitsu and genuinely enjoy sharing what they've learned with others. In my mind, it's not fair to take and not to give back. It's like taking fruit from a tree: because others were willing to share their jiu-jitsu with me, I was able to plant a jiu-jitsu tree of my own. Hoarding that fruit, even if it's not black belt fruit, feels wrong.

If one person benefits from Artechoke in a Can, all of the work will have been worth it.

Learn more about Artéchoke Media by clicking here.

How to Write a Book in 30 Days (5 Tips)

My career as an author had only recently begun. The Cauliflower Chronicles was published the month before, and I had finished writing Marcelo Garcia's Advanced Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Techniques and Neil Melanson's Mastering Triangle Chokes. Marcelo's book took me about five months of full time writing, and Neil's book took about four.

Over lunch, Erich Krauss (CEO of Victory Belt Publishing Inc and the author of Got Fight? among a slew of other titles) and I discussed process. We both agreed that the classic author model of spending five years on a book was not professionally sustainable, especially in today's competitive market. Erich then revealed that it took him roughly seven weeks to write his first bestseller, Got Fight?.

To me, that seemed like an impossibly short amount of time, and when I said as much, he chuckled.

"I wrote Wave of Destruction in about a month," he said.

Wave of Destruction chronicled the aftermath of the tsunami that hit Thailand in 2004. Erich, a professional Muay Thai fighter and world traveler, spent a great deal of time in Thailand and jumped on the opportunity to  share the story of the tsunami almost before the waters had completely receded.

"My bed in Thailand was right next to the computer, so that while I was writing I could fall from the chair right onto the mattress."

Erich, in the literal sense, wrote until he collapsed. When he woke up, he would resume writing and push until he fell asleep again. It was an intense pace, but that pace allowed him to tell the story well before any other writer.

When I turned in Mastering Triangle Chokes a few weeks after that lunch, Erich asked me how long it would take me to write another book, saying that Victory Belt had a backlog of planned books that needed written as quickly as possible. I remembered our conversation from before.

"One month," I said.

"Really?"

"Yes." I really had no idea if I could do it, but I would try.

I tried, and I succeeded. Here's how.

1. Research is everything. Going into this book, which was BJ Penn's Open Guard, the research had already been done by another Victory Belt author that was needed on other projects. I had the photographs, and I had the fodder. It was well-organized, and it was thorough. From writing a travel memoir and from writing countless other articles and pieces, I know that the research is essential. It provides the lumber from which you build your house. If you don't have all of the lumber you need (and extra is always nice), it's very difficult to half-ass the construction without something going horribly wrong.

2. Plan your process. I knew that I had 30 days to write the book, and I had a rough idea, based on the research material, of how many chapters (6) the book would contain. On a big whiteboard, I plotted out the month, day by day, chapter by chapter. I gave myself 5 days for each chapter. 2 to draft, and 3 to revise everything I had written up until that point. If I shaved half a day off of that budget here or a few hours off of that budget there, I dove right into the next chapter to keep the project moving forward and to save up time, just in case I hit a major roadblock. With that schedule laid out, I could craft very specific daily and weekly goals, which kept me organized and motivated (small victories go a long way).

3. Your best work is in revision. With a tight schedule to keep, I could not lose a day pondering a single sentence, at least not initially. My first draft of every chapter was a word dump, an extremely rough idea of what I needed to say and accomplish put to paper through a stream of consciousness writing approach. I just kept writing and did not look back to adjust word choice or sentence structure. With that very rough pass done, I had material to work with, to refine, which is much easier than trying to draft the perfect sentence on your first try. Having something there that you can critique and evaluate allows you to accelerate your writing, and as long as you dedicate ample time for revision, you won't sacrifice quality for speed.

4. Rhythm and focus are essential. I had an office to write in, an environment that I designed around what I found comforting and creatively stimulating. Thanks to that office, I could hide from distractions and shut myself off from the rest of the world so that it was just me and my book. I relied heavily on music to keep my energy level up, especially in the drafting stages. While this will vary from person to person, I use mostly techno (Erich's suggestion) or instrumentals to accomplish this. Music with words interrupts the conversation in my head, which disrupts my ability to communicate with my manuscript.

5. Time and ruthless determination are your fuel. My whiteboard was always a glance away. It loomed over my desk, reminding me every second of every day that not only did I have to write, but I had to write enough to keep me on schedule. For me, that was motivating. I had a promise to keep, which was more important than anything else. I can't see keeping a 30-day pace without that sort of motivation.

I fell into a routine similar to the one that Erich had described. I wrote until I could not physically write anymore, and then I would sleep. When I woke up, and it was easy to pull myself from my bed when I knew that my whiteboard was in the other room, waiting for me, I set right to writing. In that 30 day period, I had no semblance of a sleep schedule. As the hours ticked on, I stayed up later and later, writing until 6am and waking up at 1pm to start again. I checked off my milestones and plowed forward.

Toward the end of my third week, my girlfriend (and soon to be wife) Caris demanded that I go to dinner with her and her friends. In fairness, I had hardly seen her because I was always writing. I wasn't feeling quite right, so a night out for fresh air sounded nice. On the drive to the restaurant, I was quiet, and when we sat down, I realized that I couldn't read the menu. I couldn't focus on the words. They seemed to swirl and spill and dance just out of reach. When Caris's friends spoke to me, I had trouble forming sentences. I stuttered (worse than usual) and slurred my speech. I gave up on talking, and Caris had to order for me. That night, I cashed in on the bonus time that I had saved up and slept for 24 hours.

I returned to my keyboard the following morning and continued my process, finishing a 72,000 word manuscript in 30 days. I now use this project all the time, on projects big and small. I hope that it helps you too.

Your Humble Muscles Need More Reps

On Sunday morning, I dropped into my school's open mat to rehab a back injury and to teach an informal private lesson. After 20 minutes of solo movements, slowly and carefully increasing my mobility in an effort to baby and accelerate the healing of my strained lower back, one of my black belt instructors asked if I'd like to roll.

I was having trouble bridging without pain and any sort of twisting triggered an intense tightening of my core muscles. I had been dealing with the injury for a little more than a week and was doing my best to keep my training light enough so that the minor pain did not morph into a serious problem.

So I said yes and rolled intensely for an hour.

Thought my decision was not a wise one, I learned a lot from that roll, as I always do when training with grapplers that outrank me. I've been learning from this particular instructor for seven years now, and every roll is an opportunity to gauge my progress, to experiment, and to identify areas for improvement. I never win, but I am able to survive a little bit longer here or react a little bit more quickly there, and since I know I am losing to pure technique, I can map out what technical aspects of my game I should dedicate the next month to.

But the biggest lesson I learned from this black belt that morning did not come from the roll.

After we finished training, he asked me about my experience with the berimbolo. I admitted that I had played with it a little but found that I wasn't really cut out for it, in large part because of my physical limitations and partially because of my overall style of rolling.

"Why do you ask?"

"Well," he began, "I don't see it fitting much into my game either, but I'd like to learn more about it so that I can defend it and so that I can teach it. I've been playing with a few ideas, but I haven't used it enough to really say that I know all of the ins and outs."

Later, when I was partway through my private, I saw him talking to a blue belt about the berimbolo, discussing approaches, strategy, and tactics and even getting feedback on his technique. The black belt, a seasoned competitor and legitimately ranked instructor, recognized a hole in his knowledge and was humble enough to learn from a blue belt. Even though the black belt far surpassed the blue belt on overall technical ability, the blue belt had something new to share, and it takes a certain perspective to realize that that's okay.

It's very easy to forget that we are all white belts at something. There is no shame in not being an expert in everything, and we can sometimes forget that our gym as a community. Community means that everyone has the potential to contribute productively.

Billy Joel Was Wrong: You Should Ask Why

Billy Joel once said (sang):

Don't wait for answers
Just take your chances
Don't ask me why

These three lines reveal why Billy Joel's jiu-jitsu career was brief and troubled (this is even referenced in his Wikipedia entry). Billy, despite his natural talents, struggled to look beyond the surface level details of a technique. He quickly became a master of the how, but he could never bring himself to address the why. Because he avoided the why, Billy could not explore the depths of jiu-jitsu, and when he spent a brief stint as an instructor, his inability to explain his decisions on the mat crippled his ability to teach.

Billy was a failure, which lead him to begin a less difficult career in music.

Ignoring the why at the white and blue belt levels is forgivable, but as you enter purple belt, exploring the why behind the techniques that you use can help to propel your game and combat plateaus. For my first year at purple belt, I didn't realize I was ignoring the why.

Women in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu: A Guide for Dudes

My fiancee and two my favorite female jiu-jiteiros striking a fighter pose
with a knight at the Pittsburgh Renaissance Festival.

I apologize for my absence. I've been working on some big projects, which you can hear more about by listening to my interview with Inside BJJ.

For much of my career, I have given little thought to women in jiu-jitsu. I trained with female jiu-jiteiros at home and abroad, and I read interviews with talented female competitors and watched instructionals featuring gifted female instructors, but I never paid much attention to the challenges that they faced. My thought process stopped at, "Oh, it must be kind of awkward to be a female in a male dominated sport like jiu-jitsu--Oh, sweet. A new armbar video."

Recent months have changed my perspective dramatically, and now something seems very clear to me: Jiu-jiteiros everywhere, we have a problem, and that problem is how we treat the women in our sport.

Reilly Bodycomb's Sambo Wrestling Now On iPad

I met Reilly Bodycomb through Lockflow.com, an online technique community where I was Editor-in-Chief for some time. Reilly has earned a lot of attention for his entertaining competition highlights, which feature him rolling and diving and hopscotching into heel hooks, kneebars, ankle locks, and toe holds. Capitalizing on that exposure, Reilly has also proven himself to be an excellent instructor and has given seminars around the world.

Late in 2011, Reilly contacted me to discuss a book idea that he had. I shared with him what I knew about publishing and did what I could to help him navigate the self-publishing process. When Reilly asked me to edit the book, I was honored and also excited by the chance to see the guts of the book before anyone else. Reilly came out the other end with a polished book that looks better than the products coming from traditional publishing houses. Not only is the photography outstanding, but as a jiu-jiteiro I learned a great deal about Sambo and now get a lot more out of watching Sambo footage or out of talking with Sambo practitioners.

I am admittedly biased in my recommendation of Reilly's because I did some of the editing, but I think that most grapplers would enjoy this exploration of Sambo. It's available in print from Amazon and is also available as an iPad app, which I recommend because of the quality of the photography.