You can never relieve yourself of being a good person

I learned about a year and a half into my training that sometimes it's not your day and that some days its your turn to help someone else. This was before I had gotten really into competition. I was still a blue belt at Romulo's and being heavily influenced by someone that would eventually run my whole life. I guess this was the beginning of that control but looking back it was probably the most "human" thing he ever said to me. For reference, I usually had to tell HIM how to deal with people and when I taught him the word "apology" and the application, he turned it into a way to tell me what I don't do well.. like apologize and how good it feels to do so, how I need to do more of it to be considered a good person. Ironically, it's a lack of knowledge of how to be a good person that is lost on people in the community today. Or at least the sport aspect of the community.

Anyway, I see this every day. I help my teammates whenever I can. I give someone advice often, I let people vent, I guide people to follow what I do in terms of building a website and starting a blog. I tell people about Ritalin because I take it myself and because I've made that known, people come to me about it. I try to be as transparent as possible in order to never misguide people and share the knowledge that I know. For this, I never expect repayment in terms of reciprocating from the people that I help because I know I can't control what people do and how they will react. But expecting to be treated in a positive way and gain something from others is an expectation that I can't help but believe in because believing otherwise would make me a pessimistic grump in solitude.

And on the contrary, I cut people off on the road. I don't always get back to people who email me, I throw temper tantrums, I write posts on a magazine site because I get paid to do so (oh wait I did that for years before I actually got paid.)

There is a balance and a very delicate one at that. Everyone's balance is different and

EVERYONE HAS A LIMIT, IT JUST DIFFERENTIATES WHERE THAT LIMIT LAYS.

The amount of leeway we give someone to be selfish is directly dependent upon how much we value that person and our understanding of respect.

Respect isn't just "please" and "thank you." Anyone can say those words and get through life but real respect is taking the time to understand someone and allow them to be themselves. That's part of respect that I believe is most misunderstood.

Allowing someone to be angry is respect. If you take it personal and immediately scorn someone for being angry or upset in your presence instead of allowing them to have those emotions freely, it is a disrespect.

Giving someone the time of day is respect.

Furthermore, gold medals and winning aren't everything. It is everything in JIU-JITSU if you are a serious competitor but it is not worth more than everything in life and does not negate a level of disrespect that I see embellished, embodied and encouraged on the trek to the gold.

You are and will be held accountable for your actions outside of the realm you think you're entitled to act selfishly within and any morally wrong acts you take part in will be judged, not within that realm, but upon general moral standards. It doesn't take a jiu-jitsu black belt to know when someone is knowingly hurting others to benefit themselves in training. It doesn't take a college English professor to know that someone is infringing on copyrighted material and that it's wrong. When something is morally wrong inside or outside a situation, you are held accountable for those judgements and possible consequences that may unfold thereafter. And witnessing something you can possibly affect in terms of immorality in your immediate realms, it'd be a really good and right thing to take action.

It's crazy how such hyperfocus can make people think they are relieved of being a GOOD PERSON. Above all, you can never escape the "burden" of being a good person. Because sometimes, often, a hell-of-a-lot of the time it is a burden as it takes a lot out of us. It's simply easier to be an asshole.

And again, there's a blurred line and a delicate balance and an indefinite limit that surrounds the definition of a good person but we all have internal justice systems and knowing what is wrong and what is right isn't a hard task to follow. If you don't know, it's the responsibility of others to let you in on what makes the world go round.

I'm not asking to be superheros or perfect. I'm an asshole sometimes and I'm selfish sometimes but above all I understand the line between success and success at a huge cost, regardless of whether that cost is ever acknowledged. I can't forget that gold medals and lots of money and fame will provide me with fulfilled goals and a checklist of attained accomplishments because it drives me but stepping on others to do so won't get me far and it's a route that won't allow me to last long.

I don't know, maybe you shouldn't listen to me because maybe I'm just a 97%er.

I'm ready to talk.

I don't know why I haven't updated with everything that is going on. With so many changes, it'd be easier to write a novel per week rather than procrastinating but the overwhelming, sensitive and drastic changes have accumulated all too sudden.

Let's have a refresher.

My name is Erin Herle. That's pronounced "hurley" like the brand. I work for Graciemag. I cover events, interview, report, photograph, promote Jiu-Jitsu and do a lot of other things.

I'm a Cobrinha BJJ purple belt as of June 2012. My only accomplishments at this belt have been 2nd place at No-Gi Worlds but I have started my preparation for the 2013 season and intend to win Pan Ams and Worlds among various other tournaments.

I am an English - Creative Writing student at Cal State Northridge. Hoping to finally graduate next Spring but I'll keep ya updated on that journey.

I run this blog and I run my site, Pulling Guard Zine. As my focus moved towards a million other things, I started delegating the content-producing to others. Now I'm focused on building a great community of writers who will cover events going on in the art as well as teach my readers something great from fitness to motivation to competition tips to who knows what. It will be great and alive as ever.

I manage the email marketing for Inverted Gear. Great quality gis that have a cute cuddly panda as a logo/patch. Check them out if you haven't.

I support Inverted Gear, Fitnex, Healing Tyler, Fighter Tech and Wa Ma Da. All great brands/organizations/communities.

My Starbucks addiction is strong.

Now let's begin:

I got hired by Luca Atalla of Graciemag purely by my own hard work being noticed. I got a call from my professor, Cobrinha, with a message asking me to call him ASAP. When I called he said he had good and bad news and asked which I wanted first. I didn't hesitate to ask for the bad news first and he didn't hesitate to say, "of course you would say that," but quickly followed with a "but there is no bad news." The good news was that Luca had contacted him about me after seeing my zine online. He found me.

I gave permission for Luca to reach out, I went to an "interview" a couple days later and came out with a new title, outlook and opportunity. Luca and I talked for three hours about various things going on and what our positions were, ideas for the magazine and a history of ourselves. It didn't feel like an interview at all.

Knowing that my hard work has paid off thus far is amazing. I have people who contact me about starting BJJ blogs, building websites, learning email marketing, interviewing, and more. I did this myself, I got to where I am in this position without some major handholding or shoo-in or luck. I had no luck. I went through the worst times this past summer but found ways through the help of people around. Tom Callos found me and gave me an opportunity to make some money with my writing and has looked out for me since. I am grateful for his mentoring because, at the time, I was a mess. I worked briefly for BJJPix.com but that ended sourly and although I'm grateful for the opportunity, I'm glad that I am no longer associated. I did this myself. I wrote and wrote and networked and researched. I asked for help from those who know what they're doing. I went out in tournaments and borrowed a camera to take pictures (thanks Daniela) and ended up selling a picture for commercial use on my first attempt at covering a tournament.

It is a learning experience. I live my life by trial and error and although I have been sheltered enough to be able to what I do (my mother supporting my basic needs forever) and various other lending hands, I have worked hard to carve my path.

In December I took a trip to the east coast with no real expectations. I knew where I would vaguely be and set up some places to sleep but only had some guidelines as far as visiting Graciemag Association academies to create stories. I did that and more. I ended up staying with Gianni Grippo nearly the whole trip and fell in love........ with New Jersey and New York.

I ran a blog at erination.us but seized all posts once the Lloyd Irvin rape was made public. I couldn't stand to write as if I could ignore it. So I chose not to write at all.

I have yet to release anything regarding my stance on what has gone on but Luca and Lloyd have released theirs. I can tell you that I do not agree with them and my distastes made noted to some people off the record are not quite refined enough to be posted publicly.

I'm not waiting for the storm to settle or trying to "cover my ass" because I have nothing to be ashamed of. I have nothing to lose if I were to state everything I feel and how I believe we should go about dealing with the tragedy as a community. Let me form my thoughts better and I will release something all at once.

Upon my return from the 20-day trip, I decided that "field work" would be best suited for my skills. It's all within the works but my schedule will be as follows:

Feb 16-17- Claudio Franca All Star tournament in Santa Cruz, CA.
Feb 24- IBJJF San Francisco Open in San Francisco, CA
Mar 3- IBJJF Boston Open in Boston, MA
Mar 9-10- AZ International Jiu-Jitsu Open in Phoenix, AZ
Mar 15-16- Fight for Charity superfight and UFC 158 in Montreal, Canada
Mar 20-24- IBJJF Pan American Championships in Irvine, CA
Apr 20- IBJJF New York Open in New York, NY

These days I keep to myself more mostly due to being busy all the time. The worst feeling is making a commitment to someone and not being able to fulfill the promise. Any time you tell someone you will do something, be somewhere, talk soon, you're making a promise. People are valuable and after realizing I don't need to confide in just one person all the time, I've had a more stable life.

I think I'm growing up.