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.