Guest post by Evolve MMA, Asia’s premier championship brand for martial arts. It has the most number of World Champions on the planet. Named as the #1 ranked martial arts organization in Asia by CNN, Yahoo! Sports, FOX Sports, Evolve MMA is the top rated BJJ gym in Singapore.

So you’ve been training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) consistently for quite some time now. You’re loving the classes and rolling with your friends, but come sparring time and you’re up against someone new, you find yourself wondering: What’s wrong with my game? Why am I not doing better? It’s normal to want to succeed and improve – in fact; it’s a big part of being a martial artist. The easiest way to get started? Simply by changing your mindset. To get the results you want, how you think on and off the mats needs to change. You need to think positive and go back to the reason why you started the martial art in the first place. Only then will you be able to achieve the success you’ve been working so hard for. Here are some tips.

1) Know that you can achieve anything you put your mind to

It doesn’t matter if you’re a lot smaller, younger, or older than everyone else on the mats. What separates someone who can succeed in martial arts from the others is his or her willingness to persevere. Regardless of whatever challenge may come your way, you need to come back to your goals and remember that you need to accomplish them, no matter what, The moment you start making excuses about why you can’t pursue your goals is the same moment you decide to throw away any work you’ve done. Don’t be that person. Set a goal, and work on accomplishing that goal.

2) Continuously set the bar higher for yourself

When you’re training and doing OK, it’s easy to get complacent. After all, you’re winning a few spars here and there, which means the techniques you do know actually works. Having this mindset won’t take you where you want to be, especially if you are looking to get better at BJJ. You need to get out of your comfort zone and set your mind to accomplish goals that are beyond what’s expected of you. Don’t get comfortable – know that you can achieve anything you want to and more. Always challenge yourself ­– you’ll be surprised at how much better you can become.

3) Just start NOW

Change won’t happen if you keep on putting it off. Sure, it’s nice to make plans and think about the future, but nothing will change if you don’t start acting on it. Our advice? Don’t wait for tomorrow, next week or next month. Start working on your goals ASAP. It doesn’t matter if it doesn’t pan out the way you expected it to. What matters is that you put yourself out there and actually got started. Starting is one of the hardest things to do, and by getting it out of the way, you’re actually a step closer to your goals!

4) Put in the wor

Anyone who’s become a World Champion knows that it takes thousands of hours to get to where they are today. They’ve challenged the best in their martial art of choice and worked and trained hard in order to get there. Why do they work so hard? They want to make sure that nothing will get in the way of them achieving their goals. It isn’t easy for the average student to put in all that time and effort, especially if they have other commitments, like work. But adding an extra class or drilling a few minutes longer each time will help you get to where you want to be.

5) Be in control of your ego

As a student, you get knowledge from your instructor and put those lessons into action during sparring. Learning is your main focus and everything else comes after that. There’s no need to go all out and spaz out on your training partners. There’s no need to prove to anyone in class that you’re better than everyone. Training is not a competition – everyone is just trying their best to improve. If you catch yourself using strength over technique, especially over someone a lot physically weaker or smaller, reset and remind yourself to do the opposite. Doing any of these does not reflect anything that your instructor taught you. Acknowledging that you still have a lot to learn shows that you are in control of your ego. It also shows that being a better student is more important to you than feeding your ego. The more you listen to your ego, the more reliant you’ll be on things that will hinder you from succeeding.

Make the most of each training session and take these tips into consideration. Who knows, this might just be the boost you needed to help you kickstart your journey into a better, stronger, harder working version of yourself. So go forth and train hard, you’ve got this!