I like sharing my techniques and knowledge with other grapplers in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. I’m happy to teach them how I do what I do. If they are beginners and not aware of defenses against what I do, I’m happy to teach them how to defend themselves against my techniques.

This might sound counterintuitive to you. Why should I reveal my secrets to others? Isn’t it better if I keep them to myself and make sure that others don’t know what I’m doing?

Here’s why.

I see this as a win-win situation.

If I teach others how I do what I do and how to defend against what I do, they will eventually learn to defend themselves from my techniques. So, they will learn something new.

If they get better, then I will have to improve my existing techniques and to learn something new. So, this situation will give me a new challenge as well. I think this is a winning situation for me as well.

If I help others get better, then that will help me get better in one way or another.

I’m talking about Brazilian Jiu Jitsu here, but the same way of thinking applies to other areas of life as well. What I aim to do through this series of writings follows the same principle.

If you help others get better, that will create a better environment for you and them to improve each other.

I believe your life will be more enjoyable if you share your knowledge and experiences with others.

When you tweet about an earthquake, the quake usually stops by the time you’ve opened twitter and tweeted about it. This might sound funny to most of you who don’t use twitter or don’t live in Japan, but this is what I do when I feel the earth trembling.

With the earthquake that hit the north part of Japan at 2:46pm on 11 March, 2011, it was different.

By the time I went online and opened twitter, the quake was getting even stronger. I felt as though this earthquake was never going to stop.

Books fell off a book shelf. Plates and cups fell off a cupboard and got smashed into pieces. That’s pretty much the largest damage we got at our place. Compared to what happened in the north east part of Japan, it was nothing. Having said that, however, it was the largest earthquake I ever experienced in my life and strong enough to make me feel terrible.

I felt many, many earthquakes throughout this one year since 11 March, 2011. I believe it is the case that many, many earthquakes hit Japan. At the same time, it’s probably because I’ve been alerted and sensitive about earthquakes. You never know when the next one is going to be, so it makes sense for me to be in this kind of state.

Now that I’m in Sydney, Australia, I don’t have to feel this way. But what’s funny is this makes me aware of how unusual and stressful it can be to feel constantly threatened by the possibility of a big earthquake.

A while ago, I learned about this video clip that makes a visual representation of the earthquakes that happened before and after the 311 earthquake. I started watching it, and when it got to that big earthquake, it was like hundreds of earthquake as well as a big one hit Japan. That visual representation freaked me out and I had to stop watching it. That was new to me–I mean, I never thought I would freak out and have to stop watching that kind of thing. But I had to. I don’t think I can watch it or anything like that.

I’m not even someone who suffered devastatingly from the earthquake or the tsunami, and I’m like that. It must be really, really tough for people who went through these natural disasters. I can only imagine what it’s like for them.

Around my place, everything was quiet and the sky was still beautiful a couple of hours after 2:46pm on 11 March. It made me feel surreal.

It’s beautiful today.

Many of us (i.e. you and I) get to enjoy ordinary things like drinking a cup of coffee, going to a park, and having a great conversation with friends, without feeling threatened by the fact that the nature could destroy us in an instant.

You are alive today and your life goes on. Is today beautiful for you too?

I’ve started reading this book called Women’s Infidelity: Living In Limbo: What Women Really Mean When Say, “I’m Not Happy”. It’s a 9 chapter book and I’m up to Chapter 3. Since the very beginning of the book, though, it’s been intriguing and insightful.

I’ll write more about the contents of the book when I’m finished reading it. Right now, I want to talk about some of the thoughts and questions I came to have through reading this book.

If you’ve been following me and reading my posts for a while, you probably heard this before, but I love women. So, reading this kind of books about women written by women is an interesting experience for me. I prefer to talk about these things with women in person, but books are informative too. The reason why it’s interesting is because I can learn and understand more about women; learning and understanding more about women help me create more curiosity and compassion towards women.

Misogyny, I believe, partly comes from the fear and ignorance against women. I don’t think I was a misogynist before I started being more curious about women, but I do think I had some misogynistic ways of thinking and beliefs that sneaked into my head under the name of culture and through my own upbringing.

If you are a man who wants to have better understanding about women, I recommend you to read this book and talk about what you read in the book with your female friends. If you want to learn about women, talking with women is the best way: they are the best teachers about the way of women.

Another thing I came to think about through reading this book is men’s insecurities. I’m guessing that a number of men have insecurities about themselves and probably the core of these insecurities is related to the desire to be approved… or even loved. It sounds plausible to me that men in the past made such a system that they could use to control women in order to cover up their own insecurities. Of course, the reality would be more complicated than this simple hypothesis, but as an outline, it makes sense to me. So, yeah.

Thinking about men’s insecurities gave me an insight about what it means to be a better man and what it means to be strong. I think being able to face your own insecurities and to do something about them is one of the keys. Not by covering them up, not by manipulating others into thinking that you are strong.

The first step, as I see it, is to admit your own insecurities and then you need to choose to be excellent. Just by making such a choice, I believe one can become a better man than the man who used to be afraid of their own insecurities.

You might have already figured out that I’m passionate about Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. I started practicing it in 2002 and it defines me who I am in a significant way. I did Kendo for 5 years, but the experiences I feel more natural and comfortable about Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. I can see myself trying to improve my skills even when I get really old.

I like martial arts as a way to support my growth. It helps me get fit and strong both physically and mentally (By the way, I’ve been thinking about what it means to be strong as a person too. It’s one of the questions I’ve been asking myself over and over). Brazilian Jiu Jitsu gives me some insights about my life too. I hope to share such insights with you someday.

But now, in the spirit of having conversations with you, I’m very curious to know what you are passionate about. I want you to tell me about it. If you haven’t subscribed to this blog, you can send a message from here. Or if you have, you can reply to this post sent to you via e-mail.

One thing I’ve noticed recently is that it’s not that hard to live a happy life, especially for someone like me who was born and grew up in a country like Japan. (Having said that, however, I should point out that there are many, many unhappy people in Japan as well)

What I mean by “living a happy life” is similar to living a healthy life, except it’s about both physical health and mental health. I do have worries, big and small, but overall, I feel I’m OK about my situation and with that feeling I can say I’m happy.

I’m grateful and feel lucky about my situation.

I bet most of you who read this post do belong to this group of people who can live a happy life without struggling for real survival.

Just like living a healthy life is a choice, living a happy life is a choice, too. If you want to live a happy life and find your current life not as happy as it could be, then I recommend you to change the way you live your life. Simply realizing something’s not working and being honest about it can help you get to a better place.

So, if living a happy life is relatively easy for me and I want to do something more challenging, what can I do?

I mentioned this in a recent post, but what I’ve been thinking a lot about these days is what it means to live a meaningful life. “Meaningful” is a tricky concept here. What I have in mind when I think of living a meaningful life is to live a life in which I give values to people and to the world, so I could probably say “meaningful” here is like “value giving”.

I don’t know how I can do it, but I want to give more and better values to people around me and to the world. This is very general. Nonetheless, it’s a guide I can follow. I have no idea where I will end up, but I know where I’m heading. Whatever I do to improve myself and to be a better person will be relevant to this aim of giving values in one way or another. Let’s go beyond personal growth for the sake of your own happiness and grow to be a better version of you who enrich lives of others.

On that note, I ask: what values can I or could I give to you?