Transcription
This is the Joo underground podcast number 94. Sitting here with Eko Charles, and we're going to talk about [Music] zugzwang. You know what this is? I do not know what this is. No, this is a German word. I guess technically it's two words in German, but German I think combines words together to make one big word sometimes. But it comes from two different words: Zug, which means move, and Zang, which means compulsion. So zugzwang means a compulsion to move, meaning you have to make a move. And this will make a little more sense when I tell you that this is a term that comes from the game of chess.
So in chess, there are times where you are—you have to make a move, and no matter what move you make, it's going to put you in a worst position. That just happens sometimes in chess. But guess what? It does happen from time to time in life as well. We get stuck in positions where we are going to be forced to make a bad move. You've got to make a move, and you don't have any good choices. So what should you do when you get in those situations?
And the first one—real obvious, and this is sort of like the Jiu-Jitsu answer you get sometimes—avoid it. Right? When someone's like, "How do you get out of a rear naked choke?" You got to avoid it, right? Are there escapes from rear naked chokes? Sure, kind of. I mean, if someone locks up an RNC on you, you're—look, people get out of them from time to time. Yeah, but it's unreliable. Very unreliable. You're very unreliable; you're in a bad way. So the primary thing to do is to pay attention to your surroundings. And by surroundings, I mean what's going on in your world, what's going on in your life. Pay attention to what's going on and don't allow yourself to be painted into a corner where you're going to have to walk into that paint. You have to—you have to—I mean, I guess you could wait until the paint dries, but then like, whatever, there's something going on that you need to stop. There, you know, the—the—the oven's on with the chicken in there. Now you painted yourself in a corner. You're either going to have to mess up the paint or you're going to have to let the—the chicken burn—burn the chicken, like, you know—and probably get a fire. Yeah. So pay attention, look around, be—be situationally aware, be detached enough to make sure that you don't get flanked on four different sides, and now you've got no good way to go. Okay, so that's number one: don't let it happen.
Number two: if it happens, take a step back, detach, and realize the situation that you're in. Because sometimes people won't accept the fact that they've got to do something that they don't want to do and that they have no option. They can either do this bad thing or this bad thing; they got to do one of them. You've got it. So then they end up doing nothing, and that ends up being worse—worse than doing one of these two bad things that you have the opportunity to do. So detach, recognize the situation for what it is, don't panic, obviously, stay calm, look for—look for opportunities, reframe it a little bit, look for some opportunities. Maybe it's an opportunity for you to get rid of something that you don't actually want. Right? Maybe there's a positive sacrifice that you can make. Maybe in a leadership situation, you can take one on the chin and kind of prove—as an example—a valuable—highly valuable example how you're going to handle taking one on the chin. So you can look at things and you can frame them in a way in your mind to go, "Oh, okay, I have to make a bad move, but here's a bunch of benefits that I can get out of this bad move. This other bad move, I'll get none of these additional benefits. Okay, I'm going to go with this bad move A instead of bad move B."
Yeah, you also have to make sure you're thinking about things from a strategic perspective and not a tactical perspective. Because sometimes the tactical bad move seems better, cuz it's going to give you some immediate relief. Yeah, and the—the—the strategic bad move seems going to like be painful—more painful—some prolonged pain or something. But you realize when you get done with that prolonged pain, you're going to be out of it; you're going to be in a totally different, better spot, yeah, than that short-term pain that you get over it real quick, and you're like, "Okay, cool," but now you didn't improve your position at all. So pay attention to that as well—as well. And here's what I think is the—I don't know if—I don't necessarily say this is a black belt move, sure, but I think there are opportunities that I have taken in my life when I was caught into a bad versus bad decision I had to make—do something unexpected. Do something unexpected. Sometimes you have a bad choice and a bad choice, and you've got the choice that no one even thought of. It's totally unexpected. M—it's so unexpected that people aren't thinking about it. You're not even thinking about it. So you don't see—you don't see this unexpected choice if you only think about the two choices and which one is going to be the—the best of two bad choices. If that's all you're thinking about, you might not see this other unexpected thing, which may actually give you an option that you didn't think of. So try and look to do something unexpected. That's my point. Be—you know, we did that one podcast where we talk about being a contrarian, just because it opens up your mind. Yeah, this is a similar thing. Think to yourself, "I'm going to do something no one expects me to do," and that will at least open up your mind. Hopefully you can see some possibilities.
The other thing is—totally unexpected—if you're in a competitive environment, you know, if you're in a competition of some kind, you're—you're in a marketplace trying to sell something, or you're in a Jiu-Jitsu match—you do something that—that's unexpected. You ever catch somebody with just an unexpected move that they didn't expect? Yes. I think I arm-locked you one time, and you just did not expect it, and you were bummed out. Yes, I remember that too. Yeah, very much so—straight arm lock. Why didn't you expect that? Cuz I'm just such a Kimura person. Yeah, especially at the time. And—and I remember that very specifically. So you kept—okay, so we went through a phase—not to go too far deep—we went to a phase where you would get me with a Kimura or a guillotine, right? Every—every time—like pretty reliably for a long time. And I remember thinking, "Man, let me at least like find it within my skill set or improve my skill set to at least mitigate one of these, you know." So the Kimura—I remember I went for a long period of time with you—never Kimura me, you only guillotined me the whole time. And I remember thinking, "[__], I think I got it down, like the defense." And I said it—like after you guillotined me one day. I said it; I was like something along the line of like, "I—I finally got to the point where you can only get the guillotine." I said something like that. Then you did that on literally the next time, and it was kind of a flying one. But you're right, like just like how you're saying—that's a perfect example because—um—sure, I wasn't expecting it, and I remember thinking, "Oh, that was unexpected." I remember thinking that a little bit, but the more prevailing thought was like, "Okay, he—he had to prove to me—and hey, you did it too. I—there—I wasn't mad. Took it personal—I was—took it personal. I was—it was the opposite. I actually learned from it, like it's not all, you know—" Like in your mind, and this goes for you just said yourself, "Damn, he actually can get me with a bunch of other things, just doing whatever he wants." Yeah, like don't start telling yourself—and this goes for outside of Jiu-Jitsu too—don't start telling yourself this big elaborate story just cuz you have one little proving point—very small proving point too, you know—and then—so yeah, it was just a little humbling reminder that, "Oh, okay, like don't—don't look at it like that. Look at—there's a big picture here. You—I don't know what's going on with you—probably trained more than me anyway, like what the hell am I thinking about? I'm just like—" That's my litmus test. Well, what's interesting, I'd already been down that whole road with Dean Lis. I understand. So like, you know, I would get Dean Lis with the Kimura, and then, you know, he just is able to defend it, and then one day I just hoisted out that straight arm lock—he was unexpecting—and it's like, "There you go." D—and Dean—Dean Lis did that with uh heel hooks to me—heel hook, heel hook, heel hook, hook—and finally I started like, "Okay, I can turn out of this"—I learned a good—pretty good defense—then one day he goes—back four years worth of training—straight foot lock, cuz the—the defense is opposite—brings it back—just—just straight foot lock—unexpected. Yeah, so that's what we're talking about here—doing something that's unexpected, doing something that's bold. Here's—here's one: you get caught in an L-shaped ambush. Do you know what that is? Get caught in an L-shaped ambush. What you need to do is assault—you need to do the unexpected, which is—"We're—oh, we're caught in an L-shaped amb—we are going to assault the enemy right now. That's what we're going to do." It's unexpected; it's highly aggressive, and you can get the upper hand quickly. I mean, look, you're in an L-shaped ambush; you're in a bad freaking spot; you don't have too many options. But doing something bold and unexpected is a good mindset to have when you have two bad choices. Think, "Okay, what else could I do? What freaking crazy move could I make?" By the way, how much risk is there? Like—like I have a lose-lose situation—can I take a high risk? What am I—what do I stand to lose anyways? I'm going to lose, right? It's like you—if you're in a Jiu-Jitsu match and you're getting just smashed and you try and toss some foot lock at the end of the match—like you're already on the bottom—is a no-risk move. You're already down—nine points to zero—you're going to lose—might as well try it. Yeah, right? Do something, but don't try and pass anymore. You haven't been able to pass the guard for seven minutes—heel hook—like that's—that's the type of attitude. Mhm. Um, and of course, don't give up—that's also important. You can find a way—there are ways to win. Yeah, if you have that mindset as well—there's a way to win. Mhm. There's a way to win. And sometimes you got to take a loss to win. Sometimes that happens. Sometimes you got to take a loss to win. Yeah. But there are ways to win—go find one. Yep. That's what I got—that's what I got for—for today.
So the L-shaped ambush—is that—does it matter where they're coming from, or as long as it's just in the shape of an L—they're in the shape of an L? Okay, so it can be the side and behind you, the side in front of you, kind of—it's either going to be one of those two. Yeah, cuz they can't be—they can't be in front of you and behind you. Yeah. What do you call that—interlocking—and it's not in the shape of an L either. No, that would be the H. Yeah, but they're shooting at each other, so people—well, the—would set up ambushes like that—like on both sides of a road—unexpected. It's unexpected for sure, but we came to expect it. But see, they don't care if they're shooting each other—collateral—they don't care if they have a blue on blue—they don't care. That is a little excerpt of what we are doing on the Joo underground podcast. So if you want to continue to listen, go to Joounderground.com and subscribe. And we're doing this to mitigate our reliance on external platforms, so we are not subject to their control, and we're doing it so we can give you more control, more interaction, more direct connections, better communications with us, strengthen this legion of troopers that are in the game with us. So thank you. It's Joounderground.com. It costs $8.18 a month, and if you can't afford to support us, we can still support you. Just email assistance@joounderground.com, and we'll get you taken care of. Until then, we will see you mobilized Underground.