Episode #33 - Maximizing Your Mat Time Through Strategic Note-Taking

Ever walked out of BJJ class feeling like you've just learned the perfect technique, only to completely forget it by the next day? You're not alone. This episode dives into the game-changing practice of strategic note-taking for jiu-jitsu practitioners at every level.

The martial journey becomes exponentially more rewarding when you pair physical training with deliberate mental processing. Using the "3S Method" (Situation, Steps, Success/Struggle), you'll learn how to capture essential details from each class in a way that actually sticks. Whether you're struggling to remember basic positions as a white belt or refining complex sequences as a colored belt, this framework transforms scattered impressions into organized knowledge.

Timing matters enormously when documenting your training. Those who take notes immediately after class retain significantly more than practitioners who wait until later. We explore practical approaches to make this habit sustainable, from bench-side jotting to voice memos that can be expanded later. The format whether traditional notebook or specialized BJJ app should match your personal style and routine.

The true power of BJJ journaling lies in pattern recognition. By consistently documenting your training, you'll start noticing which techniques naturally work for your body type and movement style. These insights help you develop a personalized game rather than simply collecting random techniques. Plus, having a training history to revisit when you're stuck in a technical rut provides immediate solutions from your past successes.

Ready to accelerate your progress on the mats? Join our growing Instagram community @caffeinatedjujitsu and share your own note-taking methods. We'd love to see snapshots of your BJJ journals and hear how documentation has transformed your training. Subscribe, leave a review, and remember—drilling plus reflection is where the magic really happens.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Caffeinated Jiu-Jitsu
• 4:29 Why Take BJJ Notes?
• 11:54 When to Capture Training Details
• 16:58 What to Include in Your Notes
• 25:51 Paper vs. Digital Note-Taking Methods
• 31:26 Making Note-Taking a Consistent Habit
• 39:04 Final Thoughts and Community Call

Transcript

Intro/Outro: 0:02

Welcome to Caffeinated Jiu-Jitsu the blend of white belt enthusiasm, black belt wisdom and a dash of caffeine for that extra kick. Dive deep into the world of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu as we explore the journey, techniques, challenges and the sheer joy of the sport from a White Belts perspective, from intriguing interviews with renowned coaches and professors to playful fun episodes that'll have you chuckling mid-roll. We've got it all brewed and ready. Now stepping onto the mats and into your ears, here's your host, joe Motes.

Joe M: 0:55

Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of Caffeinated Jiu Jitsu. Glad that you are taking a listen to today's episode and all of listener base and you start getting communications from people asking questions and just engaging. And the caffeinated jujitsuitsu IG community is growing. Every month we're adding new followers and new listeners to the podcast. So thank you again.

Joe M: 1:53

As always, I appreciate the support and I'm going to be talking about a topic that was super beneficial to me when I was starting out in Jiu-Jitsu and continues to be beneficial through my journey now, and it's something that I'll continue to do and that is note-taking to do and that is note taking Right. So we're going to talk about in this episode how to take notes after a training session and so, and so they actually help, right. So that's what we're going to be talking about here for the next half an hour or an hour and I hope that if you're driving along and you're listening to this episode or you're working out wherever or however you're listening to it, that you get some type of good, informative nuggets, if you will, from this episode, and I hope to hear from everyone around kind of what their note-taking process or method is. So I am going to, I'm going to walk you through why, in my opinion, you should take notes. We're going to talk about when is a good time to do it and what to include, because sometimes that can get overwhelming knowing what to write down, what not to write down, and then how, lastly, to make it stick, and how to use your notes or your journal to actually help you improve in jujitsu. And this is whether you're a white belt trying to remember the difference between closed guard and open guard, if you're brand new, or a purple belt trying to refine your game if you will, or purple belt trying to refine your game if you will. I believe that this will give you, as a listener and a practitioner, structure to level up and do so smarter and faster.

Joe M: 4:19

I think that self-study and self-reflection is a big part of how I am improving in jujitsu, and I feel like it's probably the same for a lot of you out there. So why should we take notes? You know, if I think about it, jujitsu is like it's really like learning a new language, except you're learning it while being choked and tossed around, and there's no way you're going to retain everything by showing up to class and just hoping it sticks. I feel like taking notes isn't about being a nerdy or geeky student. It's about reinforcing what you've learned so you can actually use it when it matters, either on the mat or even out, more importantly, in the real world, in competition.

Joe M: 5:21

Writing something down, even if it's just a few bullet points, to jog your memory later, it forces your brain to recall the techniques and organize the steps and process really why a technique works, and just gives you a better and more full understanding of what you just learned and it creates a history of training that you can revisit later. You can go back and look at your notes that you took from the month prior or the week prior and if you're feeling stuck in a rut or forgetting how to do a technique or deal with a position, you know. Boom, it's kind of just right there, it's in your notes, it's in your journal and you've taken the time to capture that training so you can reflect back on it. And I've heard people say, just drill it more and it'll stick, and that may be true, but what I have found for me is that drilling plus reflection is really where the magic happens and and notes can help you also, and I really have seen this in in my notetaking. It helps you track patterns like what you're good at and what you keep missing. Three, two, one. And taking notes isn't about being a nerdy student per se. It's about reinforcing what you've learned so you can actually use it when it matters, either in live roles or competition or, even more importantly, out in the real world when you need to use jujitsu to defend yourself or others.

Joe M: 7:25

I think that writing something down, even just a few bullet points, to maybe jog your mind a little bit later, really forces your brain to recall that specific technique and it helps, at least me, organize the steps and process or kind of think through and visualize and see how and why something works. And it creates you know. Plus, it creates that history of your training that you can revisit later. You can go back and look at techniques that you worked, you know, the month prior. I have journals that are now filled that have techniques in them from my first week of learning jujitsu, all the way back when I was at Iron Wolf and I was like, like I said, the first few weeks, and I have just a list of moves written out.

Joe M: 8:28

And if you're also, it's good. If you're also stuck in a rut and forgetting. Maybe you're having a difficulty getting out of a certain position, like on your escapes of a certain position, like on your escapes, and if you've kept a good journal and taken good notes, boom, it's right there for you to find and revisit and kind of drill and practice. I've heard a lot of people say just drill it more and it'll stick, and maybe that's true for a lot of people. But what I found, at least for me, is that drilling, yes, but add to that reflection, and when you have drilling plus reflection, and I would even add consistency in there, that's where the magic really happens. In there, that's where the magic really happens and you start to improve. You're able to track patterns and notice what you're good at, what you keep missing and what keeps getting you tapped or or what helps you. You know when, when the rounds yourself.

Joe M: 9:41

I I, when I first started to learn las, couldn't really do much, especially if you know they didn't have as much experience as you and maybe there's you know specific ways to escape lasso. Not a lot of people get put in lasso, but I noticed as every time we, or every time we would train lasso, I would get the technique and it would all make sense. But I was very seldom having success with lasso guard when I was in a live round a role or you know. I never used it competition and when I did use it in a roll it never really really worked for me. But what I did notice worked and had a lot of high percentage of success when I looked back to my notes was was half guard and deep half guard. I had more sweeps landed from those positions. I ended up in a lot of those positions. I most of the escapes that worked for me came from those. You know those types of of bad positions when people had me in those. So it helped me see that, keep in a log of that and I think that you as a practitioner could gain insight from you know, keeping up with your stuff and looking at those patterns and looking for those patterns.

Joe M: 11:38

I think the other thing to think about when taking notes is when actually to do it right. I feel that time means really everything. The best time to take notes is generally right after class, while it's still fresh. At my last gym after our fundamentals class, there would be a guy who would just go and there'd be a couple guys who would just go and sit on the bench beside the mat. You know, right out they'd go from the mat right to the bench and start writing down what they had learned during that session. And you know I'm not talking about writing an essay here. I mean, you know five to ten minutes max. You sit down, you grab your phone or your notebook and just brain dump the key points. I think that you can keep it concise, you can write down something that will jar your memory for later. But if you wait to write something down until you get home, you shower, eat dinner, you typically find yourself scrolling or just being distracted by really anything. Your brain's going to already tossed out probably half of the details of what you learned during that class.

Joe M: 13:10

What I would do in kind of the height of my note taking, which was kind of right when I got my third stripe on my white belt and I was progressing all the way from, you know, three stripe white belt to blue belt, mean I was addicted to taking notes and after every class, before I'd pull off or right when I would get to work, I'd take a few minutes and jot down some points so later that evening I could come back and write down the things that I could recall. And if there was something that I couldn't recall, the things that I could recall and if there was something that I couldn't recall, I would message or reach out to someone who was training that day with me, or the professor. My professor himself, you know to kind of is here that you want to really lock in the muscle memory by combining that physical training with mental processing and taking notes in either right after class or in a timely manner, in my opinion cements those natural pathways. And you know if I think about a hack you could do, you could pair note taking with that post close or post class, cool down, if you will. You know, if you go off to the mat and you stretch, maybe pull your notebook off and pull your notebook out and really just kind of stretch and jot things down. Or, like the gentleman that I talked about earlier, that would just go from the mat to the bench and just write down a few things. I think that's probably one of the best ways. I know there are times where my habit didn't work out well or my practice, and it would be the end of the day before I would circle back to it and I would have forgotten a good deal of the moves that we worked on and almost said in school and in class.

Joe M: 15:31

A lot of people Well, I won't say a lot of people, but the people who know that I am a habitual note taker and that I've showed some of my journals to they ask you know, what do you write down? What do you include in the journal? What should I be capturing? And you see these journals all the time on IG.

Joe M: 16:00

Bjj Fanatics has one now that you can keep up online. You got the BJJ logbook. I can't remember what it's called. What else do we have? We have the my BJJ Pal or Buddy. What is that? I have it on my phone. It's really good when you're in a pinch. But yeah, it's BJJ Buddy and it's a pretty cool app, relatively functional If you need something just to jot down really quick.

Joe M: 16:34

But my point in bringing all of this up is each one of them captures different information. There's not you probably won't see two journals that you can buy on Amazon or off IG or one of these places that it's going to be similar or that's going to be the same. They may have some similarities, but they're not going to be the exact same. So let's talk about how can we capture important stuff, and I had trouble with that when I first started note-taking and journaling for jiu-jitsu. But then I remembered, and I can't remember where I got this from, but it was a method for, I think, open-hand note-taking. Like I said, I can't remember where I thought of this, but it was for something in my past, either when I was in school or something, and you know it's called the 3S. It's a process, no method. The 3S method and it stands for.

Joe M: 18:00

And the way you break this down is you start with the situation and then the rest is steps, success, last struggle. So the situation, steps, success and struggle. Let me break that down a little bit further. So the situation is what was happening in the drill or the roll right? Was you know? Is this something we trained from the bottom, from the top? Was it a guard? Was it an escape? Was it retention? Was it a pass? Was it a sweep? Like what was the scenario? Slash situation, half guard, the opponent had a underhook, etc. Then what happens next? Right, you start thinking about it like that and you try to include that context and you ask yourself was this positional or you know did. Is this something we were learning through just drilling is? Was it live rolling? What triggers this movement and what insights did you gather from just the situation you were in, right? So, and if we think about the steps, that's, and if we think about the steps that's, I don't think I have to break this down too far, but what I do is I write three to five key movements or concepts.

Joe M: 20:05

Concepts and not every single detail, just the critical parts that I need to remember. And I use kind of my own words like cross face pressure or under hook, left arm, knee cut, pass through, or knee cut pass while turning the hips, something like that, right, some kind of phrasing. And I also like to quickly kind of draw little arrows between when I go from one step to the next, and I've used alphabet before you go from A to B to C to D, so on. But I really like using arrows. And don't worry about getting all of the terminology right, especially if you're in your first week. You're not going to remember any of that stuff. These notes are for you, right? So whatever you have to write to help you remember is the most important thing, and if you can remember it better by saying, scoop the leg like a taco than write that down. You can refine the language later on or you don't have to do anything to it if it reminds you of what you need to do in the technique.

Joe M: 21:12

And then we think of the third S, the success or struggle. What worked for you, what didn't, what was hard, what kind of confused you about the technique? And you know this makes it personal and tells your brain hey, pay attention to this next time. And you know. Example that is I didn't control. The far hip got regarded. Need to adjust angle. Where to place your grip, was it a c grip? Was it an s grip? I mean these are the kind of really quick details that you want to write down that maybe you need help remembering later. And this also is a great place to track your progress. And if you revisit a note and realize you fixed that issue, mark that down, put a star, do something. I mean journals don't have to be just words. I mean I have journals that have drawings in them on pages with words. I have journals that have stickers in them posted pictures, things to remind me of what I was writing about. And these, these are more of the personal journals I have. But doodle draw, you know, if you revisit a note and you realized you fixed something, put something on there to celebrate, right. Those things will add up, I kind of.

Joe M: 22:47

The next thing I want to talk about is have you ever heard? Let's start with this. So I enjoy audio books. So I enjoy audio books. I enjoy podcasts. But it will take me years sometimes to read a hardcover book and I'm just, you know, it won't motivate me. I, for whatever reason, don't stay engaged. I get sleepy when I start reading a big book. I get sleepy when I start reading a big book, and so I like listening and consuming books audibly or visually, and audibly right. Like sometimes I'll have the book. Like when I first bought the 5 am Club, I loved it so much. I had the book and then I had the actual audio, audible book reading as I followed along in the book. It helped my note taking there.

Joe M: 23:42

But the reason I bring this up is because we need to understand this dynamic between physical note taking versus digital note taking. Now you know, should you go old school, like I do, with a notebook or keep it digital? The answer is really just whatever works for you. You know my son. He one of my sons. He reads and buys books and collects books all the time. It would take probably the rest of my life to read the books that are on his shelf. But he doesn't like an audio book. He likes to hold the book, he likes to turn the pages, he gets into the words and you know it's just really what works for you. It's the same way with note taking and journaling. A physical notebook is great if you do like writing by hand, and it's very distraction-free and kind of makes for me. It makes me slow down and really take stock of what I'm learning.

Joe M: 25:58

Digital format, like things like Notion or Google Docs or even some of the apps I was talking about, like BJJ Buddy, makes it easy to search and organize and you can tag positions, you can link videos, you can keep things neat and if it's something that you do on an app or something you keep on your phone, it's always usually with you to pull up. Like I don't walk around with four or five journals, you know, and I don't carry my journals when I travel. I probably should, but you know my phone's always with me and I do keep notes, like I said, on my phone. I do have the bjj buddy app, and it's really helpful. Alliance has their belt test system, and I have all of the belt test requirements copied and pasted and saved and locked in my iphone's notes app.

Joe M: 27:04

One thing I would say, though, is, if you are going to capture notes in a digital format, think of a way to categorize things right, and you know if you're doing notes or you know the notes app or whatever you're doing make sure it's titled something like BJJ Log, and then this is easier. If you're doing handwriting journals or physical journals, you know, make sure you section things out and guards and passing submissions escape. I like there's this certain type of journal. I have one sitting right here. I'll look at the brand that I really like, and I like it for a few reasons. One is it comes with a table of contents and the pages are numbered, and I'm able to really section my journal off. I can't believe I can't remember the name of these journals, but they come in packs and they're pretty cheap. Looking at it, yeah, anyway, just if you're doing something digital, make sure you have a way to organize your notes, especially if it's not an app.

Joe M: 28:28

You know another option that I haven't used myself but I think would be really good is the use of voice memos. If you're not into writing, if you're not into just listening, you know, say what you learned and listen back later. Listening, you know say what you learned and listen, listen back later. And there's also software. You can take these software, apps that you can take these voice recordings and they can transcribe them into you know written notes or things like that. There's at my, in my job, we use this software called Fathom. It records all our meeting, then transcribes it during the meeting and pulls out takeaways and things like that.

Joe M: 29:08

So you know, there's all kind of things out there and a lot of times and this is again, this is myself included people even combine formats voice memos right after class and then later they transcribe it or expand into their notebook and, you know, do really just what fits your routine and kind of your energy level. So we've talked about you know why it's important journaling and we've talked about what to include. We've talked about when to take the notes. But we can fill up a ton of notebooks or apps or logs or whatever, but if it's not benefiting us it's just a waste of time, waste of effort and a waste of energy. And knowing what to do is one thing and actually doing it consistently is another. So here's, you know how to make something like this a habit, link it to a routine.

Joe M: 30:33

I think a lot of people and a lot of self-help routine kind of making books out there that try to teach you this stuff Forget the importance of this. For example, as soon as I take off my gear or throw my gear in the trunk, I write three things I learned. Now I'm not saying I do that, but I'm just giving you that as an example. The other thing is set a reminder and just something like a daily ping after class that says write your bjj notes down. I would typically have kind of like a fail safe set in the evening. I don't do this anymore, but it's just because I've gotten more consistent and well, I really haven't trained a lot lately and I haven't had a lot to write down. But a reminder before the end of the sometimes it's like at eight o'clock, but I make sure if I've recorded well I haven't done the voice memo stuff but if I've jotted something down to expand on later that I don't let the week kind of end without going back reflecting and thinking about that, that and use that S or that 3S method.

Joe M: 31:49

Checklist keeps you from overthinking, helps you really stay consistent. And you know, one of the things I did early on is I would take my notes, you know, daily, and then on the weekends I would pick, you know a couple days out of that week and go back and study those days, like what did we do? I would review the whole week. I would pick, you know, a couple of days out of that week and go back and study those days Like what did we do? I would review the whole week. But I would pick two days in one gi, I think, one no gi and just kind of mentally work through or try to kind of shadow drill these moves and just kind of mentally walk through them. And if you treat it like that's a good example, like brushing your teeth, something you just do after class, it becomes really second nature. It's all about habit forming. And you can also, you know, build accountability. And you can also, you know, build accountability. You can challenge a teammate to take notes for a week and compare what each of you wrote down. I think that would be an excellent idea and sometimes you'll catch details that they missed and vice versa You'll catch, you know they'll catch details maybe you missed or.

Joe M: 33:09

However right, and one of the things, if I'm you know it just kind of popped in my head this is kind of more from another benefit of videotaping your roles. I'll say roles and not the technique, because I think a lot of academies aren't real cool with you kind of filming the technique while they're teaching it. I think this has a lot to do, a lot to do also with just showing respect to the professor. I mean, if you're just sitting there and five or six people are surrounding them with cameras, right, they're not. They're not paying attention to the technique.

Joe M: 34:00

What I'm talking about really is when you get ready to roll or drill or positional training or what have you set your camera up, your phone or what have you on a small tripod, off to the side and out of the way so nobody can get hurt on it, and record that, record your rolls, and then go back, like for me, it was on the weekends when I was doing this, I didn't do this as often as I should but just go back and review it and say, wow, stay. You know, one of the things I noticed is I was staying too still for too long when someone had me in side control. I was looking at it as a rest time. I was looking at it as a rest time, but that's really when you're losing energy as their pressure is increasing. You're working to keep them from going to mount. So I noticed that on the, the videos that I was taking. So now you know, as soon as they get past and into that half guard, or not half guard, but into that side control, I'm moving. You know I'm I'm not laying there flat, I'm getting on my side and I just, you know, keep fighting through it.

Joe M: 35:14

So this is something that I learned by you know documenting and keeping up with with what's going on and how my training is going up with what's going on and how my training is going. So there's really no I guess you could say there's no right way to do this, it's really just your preference. The overall gist of it is find a way that works for you, to where you can capture reminders, knowledge, steps, the 3S method, whatever, to have something that you can go back and study at a later date and to help yourself improve. And you know, if we were to recap it would be you know, make sure you're taking your notes right after class or within that first hour or so is probably prime. I always remembered better when I was able to do it an hour after.

Joe M: 36:20

The 3S method. Again, that is situation steps, success or struggle, and you know, choose that format that works best for you and just like consistency right. It's the number one key factor in improving our jiu-jitsu. It's the same with note-taking You'll attain more, you'll roll with more intention and you will level up faster. You'll see your progress and notes are your personal cheat sheet and honestly, they show you kind of your future self, that you care enough to take your progress seriously and that initiative is going to take you far. And if you try this out, I would love for you to, if you're in the caffeinated jiu-jitsu Instagram community, reach out Love to hear your thoughts on this episode. I would love to hear your methods.

Joe M: 37:34

Send a snapshot of your journal if you want. Would love to see the type of information that you're capturing and you know what's your schedule. Do you go back every week and take a look at what you wrote down, or you know if you don't think there's value in journaling and writing down?

Joe M: 37:54

let me know that too, and maybe what are some of your thoughts or what has helped you over the years retain all of this stuff besides just using it, doing it every day. I mean, there's, of course, that, but I think this is a topic where we all maybe journal or not journal, but we all do things and retain things, and in different ways, and I think it'd be a great, great discussion down the road on this. And you know, if you got value out of this episode, be sure to subscribe, to leave a review. That's always helpful and but the biggest thing I would love to do is learn more about you and your note taking and, like I said, just how you're retaining all of this. So thanks for listening and, as always, stay caffeinated, stay safe and keep your passion brewing and that's the final tap on today's episode of caffeinated jujitsu a big thanks to all of our listeners, especially today's insightful guest, for sharing their BJJ knowledge and tales.

Intro/Outro: 39:14

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