PHILOSOPHY
EXPERIENCE
Many years of experience in teaching the art of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu around the world makes Professor Rafael Gordinho a specialist in dealing with people in the martial arts business. His philosophy of teaching is based on creating a family style atmosphere where people can train in a friendly, clean and healthy environment, helping and developing together but always evolving and growing as a martial artist within individual skills and personal limits.
Great attitude, good energy and a lot of smiles are always following Professor Rafael Gordinho wherever he goes to teach and ever since he opened his very own academy, he started a way of teaching for a better future, one student at a time; because we believe martial arts should be character building and promote physical fitness at the same time.
START has already started to provide a perfect environment to develop great people through martial arts, promoting important values and principles that don’t seem to be a priority anymore in the modern societies but for us it is a very important part of a better living: tolerance, compromise, honesty, opening, freedom, love, balance, efficiency, patience and self-control.
TRAINING
START ACADEMY training process is based on hard work and dedication and focuses special attention to details and the development of discipline and willpower; focuses on building self-confidence through positive reinforcement to teach students how to trust in their own individual abilities and techniques. “…the practitioner of Jiu-Jitsu not need to be a competitor or just a trained athlete for a competition, he must be faithful to the teaching because then comes the soul of art, he should just let art be something good without pressure … competition just tests each technique, but art as philosophy is the most important, for it not only tests the technique, but the understanding and wisdom of each forehead … self-control over body, mind and soul. A true practitioner of Jiu-Jitsu is a leader and takes responsibility over his own life, he knows exactly where to touch.
Some are good competitors and others are good instructors, but we are all excellent students because we need to learn a lot about what we teach: dedication and respect and then the discipline as a way to transform the character. A master can and should question the behavior of his student, but a student should never question the wisdom of his master…”