Miyo Strong: [00:00:00] my story of being a childhood sexual abuse survivor is not rare. It's very, very common. Um, in Utah it's one in three females will experience some sort of sexual violence in their lifetime.
Yeah. Same for Idaho. One in three. um, Utah has some of the highest rates of child sexual abuse in the country. So we're in the top 5% for our numbers. So while I am here and open and sharing my story, like the chances are that the two of you know, many, many survivors is very, very high. It's just not talked about a ton.
And that's part of why I am so open to it, open to discussing it is because the more we can remove the shame, you know, the more we can educate and really prevent it from happening, which is my goal.
[00:01:00]
Riley: Today I have Miyo Strong and Carl Sims . These guys have just cool stories. They're go getters, they get things done, they're in awesome physical condition, uh, they're fellow Jiujitsu athletes with, with me.
And, and that's where we got to know each other. Carl actually introduced me to Mio. And so we're, we're gonna hear the stories of, of Mio being an abuse survivor and, and her involvement in the, in the abuse world, um, helping other people who have been through that Carl and his, uh, athletic endeavors and new things that he's got going on.
And I, I just welcome you guys to the show. This is so cool and excited
Miyo Strong: Thanks for having us.
Carl Sims: Thank you, Riley.
Riley: Um, I. [00:02:00] Carl, let's start with you, man. Who, what, what was life like as a kid growing up? And who? Who's Carl?
Carl Sims: You bet. So, um, I was born in Southern California and, uh, lived there until I was 12, and then I moved to Preston, Idaho. So at that point I became in Idahoan, and that is my state that I claim. Um, I don't really claim California, but yeah, so I, uh, grew up a Jehovah's Witness, so my athletic endeavors were stifled, let's say, um, just part of the religion.
Uh, just briefly as there's, uh, they, they. They don't like the spirit quote of competition. So, um, in my adult life, I left the religion and, uh, yeah. So I, I'm married, um, with, uh, three kids. I have a son and two daughters. And, uh, my amazing wife, Callie, I met her, she was attending Utah State. I was a loser just, uh, hanging out, picking up hot [00:03:00] girls, and I picked up my wife.
So that's kind of me in a nutshell. I, I own a machine shop. Uh, she's pretty hot, but she's really intelligent, which is more important.
Riley: Nice.
Carl Sims: but yeah, yeah, I own a machine shop. That's what I do professionally. Um, a lot of people, uh, confuse. But, uh, I work with mechanical engineers with companies. I build the equipment, um, for companies primarily.
One of my primary customers is a plastic bag manufacturer. And then, uh, I've been doing jujitsu since 2008. Uh, I fought MMA before that from 2006 to 2008. Um, and then, uh, yeah, I've, I've ran a jiujitsu school. I've run several tournaments, uh, proving grounds invitational, the pit challenge, which Mio and I are currently doing together now.
And yeah, that's me in a nutshell. Yeah.
Riley: Oh, that's awesome. Who's mio?
Miyo Strong: Well, gosh, as a hard act to follow, Carl. [00:04:00] Um, yeah. I actually started jujitsu way before Carl in
Carl Sims: Yeah. Yeah.
Miyo Strong: Back
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: um, Pedro Sauer had one of his very first, actually his very first school here in Salt Lake City. So I joined, um, my freshman year of college and did, was like, fell in love immediately and got my blue belt under Pedro, and then I ended up quitting and took
Riley: It's like every blue boat.
Miyo Strong: Yeah. But I took like 15 or 16 years off. I finished school. I had chil, I had three children. I, um, yeah, I got married. Obviously that was all in different order. I did get married first and then I had my three children. But we, um, I, I came back to Juujitsu when my youngest. Um, turned three and she's currently 16, so it's kind of fun to, um, come back and I came back as a blue [00:05:00] belt and begged for my white belt back.
Didn't get it back, and have just received my black belt from Unified Jiujitsu, Johnny Carl Quist and James Gardner, my professors. And I received my black belt, um, last fall. So it's been about a year. It'll be a year this year.
Riley: That's pretty cool. So what, when did you receive your black belt? What was the, what was the date?
Miyo Strong: I'm not one of those people. Um, I think it was October of 25.
Riley: Yeah, so did I, that's why I'm asking, because I was
Carl Sims: oh. Okay.
Riley: 25th, I think
Miyo Strong: And where did you get yours?
Riley: got mine from, in Keith Owen's school. I don't remember
Miyo Strong: Oh
Riley: before he passed, but, uh, yeah, under Pedro also. So yeah,
Miyo Strong: cool.
Riley: a, it's a sub affiliation of Pedro's, but
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: yeah, yeah, yeah.
Carl Sims: Funny you say that. Ri so I actually, I should have said this, I'm actually a black belt under Johnny Carl Quest as well, and James Gardner. Um, even though I [00:06:00] live up north, I live in the Logan, Utah area. We were an affiliate, uh, of Johnny and James. So that's actually was kind of mio and i's first introduction.
Uh, I call me on my little sister. She's an amazing lady, so, yeah.
Riley: it. Yeah,
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: that is pretty cool. No, I'm excited. That's, uh, yeah, I, so there was this guy in Carlos's, um, Carlos Machado's affiliation I met. His name's Roger. And, and he and I were both supposed to test last spring for our black belts, we got kind of, uh, kind of whining together 'cause we both got sick and couldn't test last spring.
And so then it got pushed back to the fall. And somehow, even though we're in, you know, he's in Dallas and I'm, I'm up here in Idaho, he and I ended up testing on the same day and got our, got our
Carl Sims: Wow,
Riley: So it was just
Carl Sims: that's crazy.
Riley: So we, we share that, that experience of getting, having to put it off and, you know, the disappointment of that. But did you figure out your date?[00:07:00]
Miyo Strong: I was looking, it's October of 23 sometime, but the cool part is my husband Jason got to tie it on me with Johnny. So
Carl Sims: Yeah,
Miyo Strong: super.
Riley: As crud.
Miyo Strong: Yeah, that was super fun too.
Riley: That is super cool. So, question just for my own sake, did when you, um, back in 97 when you started, you know Keith Owen? Did you train with him then
Miyo Strong: Nope.
Riley: because he was still coming down there to, to, um,
Carl Sims: he was.
Riley: at the time? That was, he didn't have a school yet, but he was coming down there to, to train.
Miyo Strong: I don't
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: Yeah, I don't remember him from there.
Riley: Okay.
Carl Sims: know, coincidentally ri on a Facebook memory that popped up today, 15 years ago, I was in Boise competing at the Northwest Submission Challenge, and there was a comment from Keith, nice to finally meet you. And, and, uh, so I know Keith and I have a funny story about Keith. I went and trained at Keith's [00:08:00] gym when I was a blue belt, and Keith just kind of walked around and watched me train, and Keith ended up rolling with me and putting me in a twister when I was a blue belt.
It tapped me with it. Anyhow, for those that don't know, the twister is an embarrassing move to get put on you. So he, he got me. Yeah. Keith's great though, or was, yeah.
Riley: to get put in a twister.
Carl Sims: Yeah,
Riley: It's,
Carl Sims: yeah,
Riley: oh my
Carl Sims: yeah,
Riley: that's pretty cool. Yeah, I've got those stories too, where he just
Carl Sims: yeah.
Riley: dominated me. It was like that guy, I felt like there was force fields around him and I couldn't get anything from any dirt angle. And was, yeah.
Interesting experience, man. He was a cool dude.
Carl Sims: He was,
Riley: how about, um, Mike Diaz, you know, did you train with him too back
Miyo Strong: Mike was a blue belt when I started. Yeah. All of 'em. Like I remember. Yeah. Weaver, Sean Weaver, Paul Sizemore, Mike Diaz, Jorge Jimenez, like Rob Hanley, all the original OG crew, like it was before even Johnny [00:09:00] started Juujitsu. That's what's too.
Carl Sims: yeah.
Riley: You probably had no idea what you had in front of you, huh? As far as
Miyo Strong: No, actually I feel like I did because with Pedro, like it was still so new and the UFC had just started, you know, really making it into the mainstream. And that's why I started Juujitsu in the first place is because it was shown as this smaller person's, you know, advantage type of sport. so I was really drawn to it and, um, I mean, it, it's always felt cult.
Like any gym you walk into right, from like just a regular person's point, point of view, you're be like, oh, this is weird. It's like a cult, but like Pedro's so charismatic and he's so easy to just like fall in love with. And he really did like, obviously practice what he preached and like the proof was in the pudding.
He was not a large human and he was just an incredible, uh, and still [00:10:00] is an incredible juujitsu practitioner. So it was easy for me to believe the magic sauce of what Jiujitsu is.
Riley: Yeah. That's so cool. That's so cool. So Mio, I want to ask you about your survivor story. I want you to kind of talk about that a little bit, kind of when, stuff started to kind of go wrong, and then what, where Juujitsu does play into that. I, is not a really a Juujitsu podcast, but I do, I wanna bring this up because we're gonna talk about self-defense in this episode
Miyo Strong: And it is such a part of who I am and I'm very open with it, and not a lot of survivors are. So it's, it's a good way to
like
educate
and talk candidly. Um, but it's interesting, like my story of being a childhood sexual abuse survivor is not rare. It's very, very common. Um, in Utah it's one in three females will experience some sort of sexual violence in their lifetime.
Yeah. Same for Idaho. One in three. um, Utah has some of the highest [00:11:00] rates of child sexual abuse in the country. So we're in the top 5% for our numbers. So while I am here and open and sharing my story, like the chances are that the two of you know, many, many survivors is very, very high. It's just not talked about a ton.
And that's part of why I am so open to it, open to discussing it is because the more we can remove the shame, you know, the more we can educate and really prevent it from happening, which is my goal. Um, but yeah, I, it's not a special story. I was abused by a family member from the ages of like seven to about 14.
Riley: Hmm
Miyo Strong: um, a lot of the reasons why I came to Juujitsu was surrounding being that survivor. Um, and before I had met. I'd actually done, um, I, it wasn't called Salt Lake mo Tie at the time, but there was [00:12:00] a, a striking gym that did a women's self-defense seminar. So me and my girlfriends, we signed up. We had neither, none of us had done any sort of combat sport or martial art or anything, but we had all been athletes in different areas and so we're like, oh, we got this, we got this. And it was one of the worst experiences I've ever had on the mat. And the reason is it was a big roed out 280 pound cop basically shamed everybody in the room and then beat the shit out of us. And it was,
Carl Sims: Geez.
Miyo Strong: yeah, no, I know, I know. And that's why self-defense has such a bad rep within the healing communities and within the advocacy communities.
Like there's the coalitions against sexual assault here that are like organizations and they're self-defense and they hate each other and they don't ever, um, well, they're not, they don't hate [00:13:00] each other. They're very misunderstood on both ends of the aisle. And so my program, smart Defense, really is that bridge, and I'm very, very proud of the way we're able to kind of combine both communities because everybody is going to be required to really prevent and change the culture. the, um, self-defense, I, it, I had a terrible experience with it. Terrible. I was massively triggered on the mat. Everything I heard was like, well, why'd you do that? Why are you in that position? Why did you wear that? Why did you drink that? Now you're 10 steps behind, da da da da. Like, it was very victim blaming in the language and the rape culture was very pervasive. Um, and then on top of that, when we pressure tested what we learned at the first half of the day, there was no, like, he had no idea what disassociation looked like. He had no idea what, you know, what trauma responses looked like. so you basically just, it was bad. It was [00:14:00] really, there were many, many women on the mat that day that paid to get re-traumatized. And that was my first initial introduction into the self-defense world. And I was like, holy, no, this, there's something just felt really wrong about it. And I was really, um, like I was set back in my healing journey, though I was trying to take proactive steps to progress my healing journey. I feel like just that one week caused so much regression for me. Um, fear, night terrors, anxiety, like all these other physiological responses that I had already worked through came rushing back. And so it took me about six months to really like. Get a handle. Back night terrors were one thing that I was really struggling with. and I also had a stalker my freshman year in college.
And so that didn't help all of this, but this was, you know [00:15:00] before, before this. And, um, when I found Jiujitsu, I had been watching the UFC and seeing buzz about it. And I had been a, um, an athlete my whole life and was looking in college to continue to be active and competitive. I wasn't a D one athlete and I was going to the u and i, there's no way I was gonna make the U'S female soccer team.
So, um, I was looking for ways to stay competitive, stay active, and from the very first day I went to Jiujitsu, I felt hooked. Just I loved it. It was made me feel good and gradually I started to love and trust my body again and to really feel and be present in my body. One of the trauma responses that we see often is called Flight, which is disassociation.
And that was my flight and freeze were kind of my trauma responses just naturally as a child. um, so that disassociation is something that you [00:16:00] really have to struggle to work through. And staying present in your body is one of the goals clearly. And Juujitsu does that I had found that on.
Riley: I have some questions I wanna back up just a little bit cause this thing you talked about about this rotted out monster who wants to drag you guys in there and teach you self-defense but just the crap out of you head again retraumatizes the word you used
Miyo Strong: Yeah.
Riley: What I'm trying to figure out how to articulate what I'm trying to ask because you you also used the term victim blaming Right But that does play a part in things right Because there's there's the way I've heard it phrased before is you can avoid a lot of things especially um dangerous situations out in public more so than these private you know family things like you were dealing with But if you I've heard it heard it said if you avoid stupid people stupid places Stupid [00:17:00] times doing stupid things Right And and 90 of the stuff out there in the field if you will can be avoided Do you feel like that's a victim blaming thing or do you think that's just some wisdom that can be added to uh these situations I mean what what's your thoughts on that
Miyo Strong: I think there's some wisdom to it. However, I will say it's ignorant because, and not ignorant in a negative, you're, you're a bad person type of ignorance. It's just that not close to,
Riley: misses something it misses a component is that what you're saying
Miyo Strong: what you're not taking into account is that 90% close to it's, it's less, slightly less than 90% of all sexual violence happens at the hands of somebody you already know and have a relationship with. So the like, avoid stupid,
Riley: isn't one of those things right It's not a stupid time stupid place to be
Miyo Strong: right? Right. It's your boyfriend, it's your husband, it's your coach, it's your coworker, it's your bishop, your cousin. your biggest [00:18:00] risks are somebody that already is in, within your circle of trust,
Riley: You're
Miyo Strong: it's hard to say, Hey, like, I have a 16-year-old and an, and a 19-year-old daughter, and I definitely am like, okay, watch your drink, do da da, you know, da da.
Like all these stupid things, stupid places. But in reality, biggest risk is who they're in relationships with
Riley: Yeah
Miyo Strong: you know, dating and things like that. So it's, it's harder, yes, you don't want to go on a date but still, if you are drunk, you can't give consent. And so nobody still has a right to do anything to you. And anytime you switch the narrative from like, oh, you're doing stupid things in stupid places, and so therefore you deserve to get abused, that's absolutely not the, um, correct train of thought. And that's a hill I'll die on.
Riley: [00:19:00] Well and
Carl Sims: Hey Riley.
Riley: because I never took it to be what To be that um I never took it from that that point of view where I thought that the statement meant that the victim had some um You know deserved it somehow It I I've always felt like that was like Hey here's here's the a little part you can play in this will help rather than and here's here's what I'm thinking about you know is I did a I did a little self defense hour you know it was a one hour or an hour and a half something with some uh middle school girls at church right
Miyo Strong: Mm-hmm.
Riley: And I think they expected me to come in there and show em these juujitsu moves that was gonna take out this 280 pound re monster And I'm like there is no move in the world I'm gonna show you that's gonna you know this 90 pound junior high girl is gonna beat that guy up Um I can tell you how to run away I can tell you how to avoid contact with this guy but this is [00:20:00] the only thing I can show you in one hour And and in fact if I had a thousand hours I'm not gonna teach you how to beat that guy up So there's this like very practical side of it and that's how I've always viewed those statements is like there's a very practical thing you can do to avoid some of this But what you're talking about is more things done in private with people who you already trust and these
Miyo Strong: Authority.
Riley: not avoidable things right
Miyo Strong: Yeah, because like, say you're, you're teaching me, which by the way, kudos to you for. Like giving them the reality of like, no, there's no juujitsu move that's gonna
Riley: Yeah
Miyo Strong: you know, this physical altercation can go down. Um, but anytime you say stupid, right? So if you do stupid things or make stupid choices, that implies guilt and responsibility. Whereas that doesn't excuse the predatory behavior. Like, if I'm with you guys and I'm drunk off my ass and I'm naked, I'm not gonna get assaulted by either of you because
Carl Sims: No.
Miyo Strong: [00:21:00] perpetrator are not going to Right. You know what I mean?
Riley: Yeah
Miyo Strong: so you can see it a few different ways, but like a 14-year-old or a 16-year-old, whoever you're, you know, teaching their soccer coach or their whatever coach, right, who they already trust and are a little bit fearful of the authority, they have power over them.
And it never is like full blown rape, right? It's gonna be grooming, they're gonna test you, they're gonna, to see what they can get away with. Are your parents involved? Like, there's so many other factors that go into predatory behavior that it's super important that when you do or expose young girls to self-defense in any form, it's gotta start with, um, believing that they are not, that nobody has a right to touch them no matter what. Like if you go out and you wear, Carl always hates. When I wear like a bikini and I post it online. Right. He hates that. [00:22:00] But at the same time, right. It doesn't, just because I wear a bikini isn't an invitation for somebody to touch my vagina, right. It's gonna be, um, right people the right situations are always going to respect your boundaries no matter what. It's,
Riley: how would you better phrase that that statement I made with the stupid place stupid times Stupid people Stupid
Miyo Strong: um, I would say you preface, well, for myself personally, I preface every self-defense class that I start with. Um, you know, it does not matter what you wear, where you go who you're with. Nobody has a right to touch you without your enthusiastic consent.
Riley: Mm-hmm
Miyo Strong: Are there ways to mitigate risk? So there's my phrase that I tell my daughters, can you mitigate your risk factors? Yes. Does that changed the guilt? No. Like perpetrators are always going to be solely responsible for their [00:23:00] actions. Um, but my daughters are very well versed in like, we don't leave our drinks unattended. We have the buddy system, we share locations. We don't ever meet a blind date or somebody you've met online with not in a public place with friends.
Like there are certain risk mitigators that you can help and encourage them to do. But the most important thing is really to remove that shame and stigma and guilt, because, um, that will greatly impede their desire to share and heal and live their life to the fullest, whereas,
Riley: see
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: not wanting to admit
Miyo Strong: mm-hmm.
Riley: Because they heard the word stupid so then all of a sudden I don't wanna be categorized as that so I'm just not gonna say
Carl Sims: Yep.
Riley: Right
Carl Sims: Yep.
Miyo Strong: Yeah, and I would, I, but I love that you, you bring it up. But the way I would phrase it is there are certain ways to mitigate your risk. However, no matter what, you [00:24:00] are not at fault.
Riley: yeah
Carl Sims: If I may ri.
Riley: for sure Yeah
Carl Sims: it's interesting, um, I taught self-defense quite a bit before, um, meeting m uh, a lot of young women's group with LDS culture here in Utah, et cetera. The problem comes in as when we're teaching self-defense, is sometimes we're not educated enough on it, that we're teaching things that maybe are, are, are victim blaming.
And I'm gonna use an example, a couple of things. One, I realize what you're saying, Riley, and it's something that I've taught for years when I teach self-defense, is situational awareness. So you can mitigate the risk, like Mio saying by don't park in the under parking at college, don't, uh, park your car under a light, et cetera that you can do.
But it's interesting, Mio and I, um, taught at Southern Utah University, kinda launched the Smart Defense program in the [00:25:00] colleges. And when I was down there, and this is a, a, a mistake on my part, and Mio had to correct me. I don't know if you remember this, Mio it, it stuck with me because it's kind of going along the lines of what you're saying.
Ri one of the girls said to us, Mio, she said. I go, uh, running and the only time I can run is this time to this time. And, uh, I think she may have said that she saw a car following her or something. And my first response Riley, was, well, maybe you shouldn't run at that time. And Mio gave me the death stare, looked at me and then corrected me and, and made me realize, yes, mitigating risk, but I'm kind of blaming her for being followed.
It's not her fault that there's creepers out there. And I think at the end of the day, um, it's hard for us has meant another thing that they teach. And, and I realized this, one of the first classes I taught with Mio as well, she went around and asked every lady, and, [00:26:00] and it was at a college as well. it was was at SUU.
She said, uh, when you guys, uh, go somewhere, what are your thoughts? And they're always thinking about, I can't park here. I can't, they're, they're scared. And then she turned to me and she said, do you ever worry about when you go anywhere? And I'm like, no, because I don't. I'm a guy, I'm a physical guy. I'm, you know, uh, I carry a gun, et cetera.
I don't worry. Okay. Understanding the female perspective, working with the, the smart foundation, working with me, Mio and Smart Defense has opened my eyes to a lot of the things that we. We maybe take for granted that we don't understand that even when we don't think we're victim blaming, we are. Because we're saying, well, you shouldn't have been there, you shouldn't have had that drink, you shouldn't have done that.
And, and that makes them clam up and say, okay, I, I'm not gonna talk [00:27:00] about it. So we have to be really careful. And then the other thing is, is that the smart foundation is pushing now is men's classes and Mio, maybe you can elaborate a little bit on that because at the end of the day, Riley, if Mio says something to you in certain situations, it's not going to be nearly as maybe impactful on you as if I say that another man chastising you for being a douche when it comes to women.
So yeah. May maybe you can speak to that a little bit, Mia.
Miyo Strong: Well, and he's not calling you a douche by any means. Ri this is
Riley: I Didn't take it
Carl Sims: no,
Miyo Strong: yeah. This is all just a teaching moment and like, I'm so grateful
Carl Sims: Yes.
Miyo Strong: Um,
Carl Sims: Sure. Yeah. I didn't mean that at all. I was just saying, guys have to call, guys have to call guys out, is what it comes down to.
Miyo Strong: Well
Carl Sims: 'cause we're the perpetrators 90% of the time.
Miyo Strong: So along the lines of like true prevention work women's self-defense classes are not true prevention work
Riley: Right.
Miyo Strong: way you [00:28:00] know that we're the perpetrators and well 2 So 2 of sexual violence perpetrators they are female are men
Riley: Right.
Miyo Strong: you are not reaching the male audience for prevention then you're not moving the needle And so we do you know Marcus Johnson you should have him on He is I love him He's a Pedro SAR black belt as well Um but he and I have developed this men's program and it's more him that's developed this uh it is a it's called the Warrior within essentially like you want to teach these men to be capable and emotionally intelligent and all these things but also give them some skills to think if they need to step in And this is not like your average blue belt level right This is just the beginnings of how do you intervene safely so you pepper in some striking some basic wrestling grappling concepts um you get a chance to get these men in a [00:29:00] room that's a male only space Women are not allowed in the space which there's not enough male only spaces I feel like And um you get in there and you start educating them on what is rape culture what does consent look like What are boundaries what you know what can we do Everybody's got a mother you know there's sisters daughters there's you know loved ones And really educating the male population to what leads to perpetration can help Because like Carl said we see behaviors that are bringing us red flags like to me know even the men I just love love love And I'm tight with if they tell like a inappropriate rape joke like I'm talking I'm calling them out on it
Riley: Mm-hmm.
Miyo Strong: um because rape jokes especially on the mat don't belong there and
Riley: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: it's not um like and it's impactful when it comes from me because I'm well educated and I can speak to it in a kind and loving way But when Jason [00:30:00] calls them out about it on the mat immediately they're like oh shit Like a guy that I fear and respect and love is calling me out on this behavior You're more likely to change it than if somebody that like most men don't relate to women you know And A lot of women out there are so far overcorrected that they almost alienate those questions and those conversations with men because all men are bad We hate men We choose the bear blah blah blah But that's not the answer either We have to find this common ground and this bridge so that the whole culture and society then gets elevated out of this sexual violent e epidemic
Riley: Yeah. For real. No, I had a, um, I, I, I was in a jiu-jitsu like school one time there was some guys grappling. It was an open mat situation and I saw it was, it was all guys there. Right. Um. But one of the dudes, one of the [00:31:00] kind of, no, I want to call it more alpha guys in the room, was doing some really inappropriate crap to another dude just, and
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: it was, uh, you could probably categorize it as rape jokes, but he was, they were grappling at the time. And this dude had another guy pinned on the ground and he was, he was saying some things and doing some things, and it pissed me off and I, I, uh, him aside and I said, Hey, dude, no way. That's not happening anywhere in my presence. And it was one of those conversations, a very difficult conversation, and I think still to this day, I'm not sure he really felt like it was justified, the, the chewing out that I gave him.
But it was, uh, it was like, listen, there's a power disparity here, you are, you're putting this guy in a place of humility. You just humiliated him in front of everybody. And you did it sexually with, with sexual jokes. You know,
Miyo Strong: Mm-hmm
Riley: thought was jokes. And, uh, that guy is not feeling the same way about that conversation as you were. [00:32:00] have you seen those kind of things? Is that what you're referring to
Miyo Strong: Um it's been a while since I've been in that presence because unified is a gem in the desert Like it's such [00:33:00] a great environment so many amazing healthy men and it has the largest women's team in the state so they're used to training and being around women So I think that does impact the culture there But yeah I have seen that in the past and that's exactly um it's not only does that Alpha Black Belt well respected guy have that power dynamic And just that one on one interaction is in inappropriate but the younger like white and blue belts coming up who are just so like wide-eyed and they just want to take everything in if they see that behavior as normalized they're more likely to repeat it And then if it's normalized in public on the mat imagine what it's normalized in the private behind closed doors
Riley: no. And
Miyo Strong: I
Riley: was exactly my fear, right? 'cause there were some lower belts there, guys who I know looked up to that guy. And I, I'm like, dude, do you not see what you just did?
Miyo Strong: yes I love that you called it out and you can be nice about it You can do it in private [00:34:00] you can be an a--hole right in front of everybody too Like there's so many levels to starting those conversations but I love that you did that cause May
Riley: And, and, I, I thought about it in that regard too, because I could have done exactly the same thing, then. Embarrassed him in front of everyone. Now I told him to stop in front of everyone, but I had the conversation one-on-one. Um, partly because I didn't want to then take it to another level of me doing the same thing, you know, feeling like I'm embarrassing him in front of the other guys.
Right.
Miyo Strong: Yeah Yeah
Carl Sims: Yeah, you're very aware Ri so that, that's part of it is, is just guys calling him and under other guys kind of, uh, showing the guys the way. Right. That's, uh, it's, I think we talked about this before ri, about father figures or, or someone that's going to, uh, help you understand the way to treat women, to treat your fellow man, to treat people in general.
But, uh, now you can see why I partnered up with me and almost [00:35:00] everything I do, because she's so much more eloquent than I am. So she, she,
Riley: Oh
Miyo Strong: No
Carl Sims: she's, she's able to explain things.
Miyo Strong: Carl has brought me down in my feminine rage to like a very nice neutral
Carl Sims: My, my nickname. What, what, what's my nickname? My nickname for Mio was The Little Ball of Hate because, uh, she was, uh, when, when I started Proving Grounds in 2016, I met Mio shortly after, and then, uh, she kind of, uh, teamed up and was, uh, part of proving Grounds and, and half the time, I'd have to say, Mio, relax.
It's, it's, it's kind of what, what Mio was saying earlier. Sometimes people,
Miyo Strong: over
Carl Sims: go way too far the other way. Right. Overcorrect and, uh, and, and MiOS amazing. But we, uh, how do I say, uh, I had to pull her back a little bit.
Riley: No, Mia, you said, you said something earlier where you, you, you brought up those, those memes we see online, like we choose the bear,
Miyo Strong: [00:36:00] Yeah
Riley: right?
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: or choose a bear. It's, we will choose the bear. It's like, and we all know how foolish that that really is, but sometimes you can kind of identify how, how ladies got there, you know?
Um,
Carl Sims: Hmm.
Miyo Strong: Well it's funny you say
Riley: not a healthy place to stay. Is it?
Miyo Strong: you say it's foolish to go there or people can see it as an obvious it's foolish there but I legit would choose the bear be open No So here's the thing
Riley: I
Miyo Strong: Think about all the like literal translations of that running hiding
Riley: to hear, I want to hear this
Miyo Strong: right Like if I'm alone and again it's risk mitigation am I gonna go camping by myself No Am I not gonna fire Am I not gonna carry a firearm No But say my for some reason I don't have my firearm say for some reason I get separated from my group Say there's like all these you know literal women alone in the woods type scenarios that could come up Um [00:37:00] and the fear would be the same like the level of fear of like if I saw a man alone with and you can tell right away quick with your gut instinct
Riley: Mm-hmm.
Miyo Strong: women need to pay closer Men too need to pay closer attention to their gut instincts right And what does make the back of your hair you know the the hair on the back of your neck rise if you see a bear a hundred miles a hundred yards off and that obviously you're scared holy shit there's a bear gonna run the other way It's the exact same thing when I see a man a hundred miles away a hundred yards away in
Riley: man.
Miyo Strong: Yeah yeah yeah yeah I'm not gonna take I'm not gonna I'm gonna risk mitigate because I have a very healthy uh a very healthy um reality of like one-on-one with the man I don't care that I'm a fucking black belt that's had a cage fight and that carries I'm not even gonna engage Right If I feel like it's a risk I'm nope [00:38:00] sorry Not out of there
Riley: Mm-hmm.
Miyo Strong: um so yes it is to some people literally foolish but also from 99 of the women out there in this space it makes perfect sense
Riley: So,
Miyo Strong: there
Riley: Now, 'cause because one of the things that you, you said it, the, the meme was the original context or original place I saw it was any man or a bear. And I'm like, married. Right. You got Jason in the house right there with you. He's, he's a man, but you're not worried about him. So it's not any man.
It's the unknown man. It's the, the
Miyo Strong: And it
Riley: that's where the meme goes foolish, I feel, is because it's, it's not just any man, right?
Miyo Strong: No no no no It's like the literal translation of a loan in the woods
Riley: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: it's a it's a strange bear or a strange man I'm having the same fear reaction
Riley: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: but yeah
Riley: I'll
Miyo Strong: [00:39:00] there are
Riley: Carl, you speak to this too, but if I'm out in the woods, uh, my two, my, my son and his, his friend now, my son is, he's a, he's a blue belt in Juujitsu, and he is, he carries a gun with him and he's 210 pounds of physical 20-year-old. Right. he's an intimidating fella all by himself and his, his buddies about the same size as he is, but they were out camping one night out in the middle of nowhere, and all of a sudden there's this dude wandering around their camp and they did the same thing.
Both their guard hairs are going up. Like, who is this guy? What's he doing near our camp? We don't know who he is. Um, they're, they're arming themselves and getting ready for a fight, standing their ground sort of thing. Like, we're not leaving our camp, but we're gonna take this guy out if we need to. Um, it's not just a, a female thing, right.
Would you say that Carl.
Carl Sims: I would definitely agree. And I think Riley, um, I'm going to be that middle ground between probably what Mia was [00:40:00] saying. Um, I, I agree to a point, and it comes down to, like you say, situational awareness one and two, understanding every man is not a bad guy. Every, every man's not going to attack a woman. Um, and then in, in that scenario, like if I do a i, I, I cougar hunt in the, in the winter, and so I'm out in the woods.
If I came across a guy out in the woods, out in that scenario, I'd be like, whoa, what's he doing? This is kind of strange that he'd be out here versus a different situation. If, I mean, I'm out at, in the middle of the night, let me put it this way, this is how I explain it. I'm out in the middle of the night walking down the street, I walk in a dark alley and I see a guy in a dark alley.
I'm probably going to keep going a different direction just to mitigate
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Carl Sims: potential issues.
Riley: sure.
Carl Sims: [00:41:00] However, if I'm just in a crowd walking by, and so it's situational and I understand the whole bear versus guy in the woods thing, but I think it's just been taken so far that all of us men are, he's a creeper. He's gonna attack me.
And it, it gets to the point, Mio, and I have a friend who is like this. Just every man is hated. And I'm like, time out.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: guys like me. I'm the number one advocate for women. I have daughters, et cetera, et cetera. So I think that blanket statement, I'd rather take a man over a bear, uh, or sorry, a bear over a man, uh, or be isolated with a barrel of a man.
It's situational, like everything. And so, yes, but like your son and his friend, if I'm in the woods and someone's coming around my camp, you got a problem, buddy. Yeah. It's not, yeah,
Miyo Strong: flip that
Carl Sims: I
Miyo Strong: Say you're cougar hunting right And rather than a man you see a woman you're gonna try [00:42:00] and go help that woman not be fearful of that woman
Carl Sims: You don't live in the Cash Valley. Have you seen some of these ladies? I'm joking, but yes, I know what you're saying.
Riley: had a
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: here in Boise, a couple, well it's been, I don't, 5, 6, 7 years ago, maybe 10 by now. But these two ladies out on a trail and there was a guy camping out there. And these two ladies beat the guy to death for no one knows why, they went into his camp and they ended up killing him. They pounded his, like caved in
Carl Sims: Wow.
Riley: with a rock. I mean, they, they,
Carl Sims: Oh my
Riley: a, it was a situation where, I can't remember the details behind it, but it was, it, it turned out they were the predators and they, they, yeah, right here in our foothills. It was the craziest thing I,
Carl Sims: Oh my goodness.
Miyo Strong: before he got murdered
Riley: no, no, no, no, no, no.
There was no sexual part about it.
Miyo Strong: Because if it was switched
Riley: But
Miyo Strong: men would rape her first and then murder her
Riley: yeah, this is [00:43:00] probably true. Where'd you get balloons?
Carl Sims: We saw those. That's awesome.
Miyo Strong: did something and my balloons came
Carl Sims: It's a celebration.
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: that's kind of cool. That was neat, but
Miyo Strong: it was weird
Riley: time. You said something about
Carl Sims: She went like this.
Riley: murder and then the balloons came up,
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: the timing of the balloons was terrible.
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Carl Sims: Yeah. Yikes.
Riley: I love your, um, your take on it though, because I do think back to this, you know, stupid times, stupid places, the risk mitigation thing that I'm talking about. Um, there probably is, it's just a way better way to phrase that, you know? 'cause you know, you used risk mitigation, um, oh, what did you, you used a phrase too, Carl, and it's, it's, it's, uh, I'm losing the,
Carl Sims: Situational awareness.
Riley: situational awareness.
Carl Sims: I,
Riley: Those, those two
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: like, are just way better way to put it, you know?
Carl Sims: Hmm.
Riley: Yeah. So I, I will correct that and take the word stupid out of it. How's that?
Miyo Strong: you That's awesome But you know what's [00:44:00] interesting is
Riley: what I mean.
Miyo Strong: yeah
Carl Sims: hmm
Miyo Strong: yeah But it is the same thing I had a conversation probably two years ago because my daughter's 16 and 19 they are drop dead gorgeous They are just these beautiful smart amazing women But they like to dress like every other teenager dresses And to me as a mom I'm like freaking put some clothes on Like what are you doing But at the same time again that messaging of like well if you dress like that you're gonna then get raped and it'll be your fault Is not the messaging I want my kids to have So I actually asked the um executive director of uh U Casa which is the Utah Coalition Against Sexual Assault I asked her at a conference I'm like Hey I just need some help with like verbalizing under a trauma-informed lens Like what do you suggest And she's actually the one that said well we talk a lot about risk mitigation And I was like okay that takes the responsibility and the blame and the shame out And so [00:45:00] that's what I've used ever since So shout out to Liliana That was her idea
Riley: Boom.
Carl Sims: Nice.
Riley: That's a, great way to put it.
Carl Sims: Hmm.
Riley: something else you mentioned, 'cause I, again, this women's self defense thing and it's, it's self-defense period, but there's this meathead mentality of this, this 280 pound rotted cop you talked about that wanted to beat everybody up. That get these people that tend to kind of have a, oh, that machismo right. I, I've seen it in the firearms training. I've seen it in Jiujitsu training. I've seen it in, in, you know, kav, maga, whatever it happens to be. But it, uh, the self-defense kind of stereotype. How can we do it better? I wanna hear from
Miyo Strong: I
Riley: of you on this.
Miyo Strong: yeah Carl do do you mind if I because it it's
Carl Sims: Yeah. Yeah, for sure.
Miyo Strong: just cause this
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: yesterday and the day before for me And um so I [00:46:00] do weapons based training I'm not a weapon specialist by any means I do firearms training but I am not a firearm specialist by any means So I really like to um learn from whoever I can whenever I can But when people want to blend Self-defense smart defense women's self-defense with these weapons worlds I um so I I'm game like yeah let's work through it Let's troubleshoot it Like what would I do versus what would you do cause my size and strength difference is very you know Carl doing a move is different than me doing a move And so this week I filmed some content with um a pretty big famous weapons influencer online and we collaborated on a reel and the freaking comments of like that'll never work Or you're a pin cushion or you're so stupid Or if you don't have a gun da da da Like it's this like really negative shameful banter [00:47:00] one it's taken outta context Yeah motherfucker I carry a gun you think I'm not gonna try and shoot him first Great But that was not the drill And so we um I think part of changing that culture and that narrative requires communication and it requires communication Um from a curiosity standpoint like for me if I can tell the negative comment is maybe coming from just a place of ignorance I'm gonna actually take the time to explain myself and to try to educate but then also turn it around and be curious like what do you suggest Like because it's gotta be more than just pull a gun because that is not applicable In 90 of the scenarios like so what do you suggest Like I wanna learn but also I stand by what I do because I try to do it from a realistic point of view Like I'm going to get it pressure [00:48:00] tested I'm gonna be the student not just the teacher And so having that communication and that coming from it from a place of curiosity Like for example I used to think Krab MAGA was stupid right Like I was like oh Krab maga talk em in the eye whatever blah blah blah And then I started training Krab and I was like holy shit this is more effective for women than juujitsu when it comes to self defense The eyes the throat the groin all the things that are illegal in an MMA fight are what I'm gonna bring to the table I'm not gonna throw a flying arm bar on you like that's not gonna work right So then I I learned because I was curious and I was open-minded enough to go and start and train and pick what worked for me out of that So I think changing that black and white culture has to come from a communication standpoint but also just being curious and open-minded is um something we're lacking in society just this area
Riley: Yeah. I see this, this, um, kind [00:49:00] of thread in what you said there of being able to pull these nuggets out that were actually learning experience that you could, something you could actually get a hold of, even though there's these trolls and a bunch of, bunch of other just BS in there. Right. You, you find that thing that's, that works so you can pressure test that actually sticks, but the rest of you can disregard.
Right. And I think that's martial arts in general, you know, it's, that's life
Carl Sims: I was gonna say, it's what I, I say, Riley, when I attend a seminar, I'm not gonna learn or take away everything that I learned in that jujitsu seminar.
Riley: yeah.
Carl Sims: But there may be a nugget or two that I gained. And also, I think along those lines, when you were talking about the big 280 pound meathead, um, teaching a self-defense class, that's one thing I I admire, I love about the Smart Defense is it's a women's led program.
So they have an assistant who's usually a male, but just, just so that the women can feel the [00:50:00] difference when I grab them or another gentleman grabs them versus when Mio grabs them.
Riley: Mm-hmm.
Carl Sims: I think it is important that it's women led for women, um, because Mio understands things that I'm not going to understand or realize that as a woman in society, what are you dealing with?
Or like, like I said, if, if I grab you, Riley versus Mio grabs you and Mia's a solid, solid world champion,
Riley: at those guns.
Carl Sims: in Juujitsu, she's great. But I'm 180 pound guy and she's 1 35 and I'm a small guy. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry. I,
Riley: went the
Carl Sims: she
Riley: that, Carl.
Carl Sims: brother, she's just so muscular. I just assumed muscle weighs more than fat. But at the end of the day, the point I'm making is, is.
Having it led by a woman is important, I believe, as well. Um, because typically too, women are more comfortable with women even in most of the classes at the college. They don't [00:51:00] introduce men into till two weeks later, isn't it? Is it four weeks? Two or four weeks
Miyo Strong: the program
Carl Sims: through the program. Um, but them seeing that, uh, a, a woman can do these things also.
I'm gonna tell you a quick story. I had fought MMA from 2006 to 2008. My first jujitsu class. The instructor's wife almost choked me unconscious. And I was like, wow, this isn't so, and I would tend to agree with Mio. Like if I were to get into a street fight there, there's a reason I'm saying if I were to get into a street fight, heaven forbid I'm gonna bite you, gouge your eyes, grab you by the testicles.
I'm gonna do all those nasty fight things
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: kav, ma gra. So, uh, so I think sometimes as Juujitsu people were like, oh, that's crap. This whatever. Ah, man. I'll tell you what I, I'll give you an [00:52:00] example. Damon Morgan, high level black belt, one of the best in Utah. I accidentally poked him in the eye with my thumb.
He's on the ground, squealing, screaming, holding his eye. So I guess the point in all this is, is. Teaching the right self-defense is extremely important. Showing a female that, it doesn't come down to just this, see that male bigger than yours? It doesn't come down to that because she can, she can hurt me in other ways,
Riley: For sure.
Carl Sims: groin, throat, you know?
So, uh, but, but yeah, I don't, I don't think, uh, I think the self-defense world has got it wrong, a lot of them. Um, and, and it needs to be maybe adjusted and, and, and I'm not just pushing for the Smart Defense program, but I think it is, it's on the right track, right? Where a lot of these other [00:53:00] programs are not.
Yeah. Because I wouldn't be part of it, whether me's my friend or not. If I thought this was bs, I'd be like, yeah, I'm out. I, I don't need to do this.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: enough other ventures and so much other time. But I think it's important, you know, especially with two daughters watching them in college and seeing the things this, the lack of situational awareness.
My daughter went to Westminster College in Salt Lake City. She played college soccer. She'd arrived to school in the morning park in this underground parking, that's where I brought this up earlier, where it's dark.
Riley: Yeah,
Carl Sims: not leaving till eight, nine o'clock at night and there's no cars in there at that time.
So now you're setting yourself up in a situation. I wasn't victim blaming, but I'm trying to make her situationally aware. So anyhow, to kind of bring this full circle, uh, yeah, it's, it, it's important to handle these things the right way with the right information, handling them, not victim blaming. [00:54:00] Um, having a female LED instructor I think is important.
Having a male instructor there as well, that you can feel the difference is important. These are all important factors that I see a lot of self-defense programs miss, so.
Miyo Strong: And on the lines of like that 280 pound out guy that taught me my first lesson the moves that are effective for him don't apply to me Right Like there's just a different that's why to have a female led program helps actually when we were even developing the program you know Jason he's o obviously he's my husband I trust him a hundred percent We were taking curriculum and going okay come at me 90 One I trusted him We knew how to tap like all these things And that's how we started throwing shit out I was like okay even at 50 it's not actually working And then you have to take into account like the height disparity the weight disparity the intoxication disparity Like there's so many variables that go [00:55:00] into it It's very very important I think for women to test the moves rather than the larger stronger faster males to test the moves It's gonna be a different efficacy
Riley: So. Will you speak to that a little bit? Because there is, I feel a problem just societally today where girls are being told that they're exactly equal with the male and when it comes to this physical strength and performance, it's not the case and they, but if they go through life thinking that being deceived and like, will you speak to that?
Miyo Strong: Yeah for sure Um and you know I'm a feminist through and through I a thousand percent have never wavered on like there is a difference in size strength speed all of that just biologically between men and women And it used to really bother me when I was younger when I was like in high school and college It [00:56:00] used to really piss me off that like just size and strength alone But on the flip side men cannot do anything that women can do biologically Like you can't grow a human you can't nurture a human You can't like there's so many amazing things that both genders have that we need each other for
Riley: For real?
Miyo Strong: there's with my own girls I raised them very specifically to know that they deserve every right opportunity thing Like there's equality in other places that they have a right to like they should be able to vote they should be able to own a home They should be able to open a bank account Like all the other equal rights that started with with men and women Um they just don't apply in the gender which is why you're not gonna see Carl competing in my division Right Carl would meck everybody Even the 19-year-old college [00:57:00] Olympic wrestler Carl's going to Merck Like it's just the way it is And um being open and honest about that as a female I think if you two try and tell women that that's not gonna go over so well But I think women acknowledging that But it's not like a you're weaker It's like you just have a different skillset in
Riley: yeah. But it's,
Carl Sims: but Riley. Oh,
Riley: that coming as a surprise, right. The first time a, a
Carl Sims: yep.
Riley: woman has a dude latch onto her wrist and goes, oh, that's a different grip than I'm used to. Um, we don't want that surprise happening. And I think that's, that's where I, I
Carl Sims: Right.
Riley: Mio, speak to that. 'cause I, I'm like, we are, we are doing a disservice to these, these young ladies to tell 'em
Carl Sims: Riley. Here's a funny thing. I'm gonna speak to that. Even from a male on male perspective. One, I think it's silly when we, we talk about jiujitsu and this old school mentality, that size, state speed, strength doesn't matter. [00:58:00] Are you kidding me? Ri you're probably, I, I don't know you. 200 pound guy,
Riley: too, I am two 30.
Carl Sims: right?
Riley: big dude
Carl Sims: I'm 1 75, 180.
Riley: now. I
Carl Sims: Do you think
Riley: I'm a little fluffy. So we're, let's call it that.
Carl Sims: Yeah, but here's my point, this silliness of saying, oh, Carl can compete with ri. Are you kidding me? There's a reason why there's weight classes.
Riley: Right.
Carl Sims: All things equal, we're both black belts. You and I get on the mat, it doesn't matter. This is my point. There's a, there's one of the, Gracie says something about this for every 10 pounds, it's like a belt, right?
So my point in this is, is this, this narrative that, uh, men should be, and I, I am sorry if I'm men should be able to compete in women's sport or trans athletes can, if I identify as a woman, I am winning black belt worlds at the adult division at 55 [00:59:00] years old. I'm just big, strong athletic. It is what it is.
The same thing applies though. When it comes to men on men, if, if, if I think I'm going to go, I'm a black belt world champion, master five,
Riley: Right?
Carl Sims: I go to the Purple Belt adult division, these young, stronger athletic guys are going to destroy me.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: don't preach this narrative that we're we're equal in these ways.
Physically, we're not equal.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: wife is 10 times smarter than me. My daughters are much more capable, Mio and I grapple her. Her flexibility is so much more, et cetera. Every time I grapple a female, I'm like, this is ridiculous. I can't do the things I do to other men because of their, their ability. But just, I think it's just a silly narrative to say that we're equal physically
Riley: No,
Miyo Strong: And I have
Carl Sims: and even amongst men's.
Miyo Strong: I have to add something that Johnny Quist told [01:00:00] me that changed my entire perspective on the mat So I came to Johnny as a blue belt from like a very toxic gym ACA like experience not my pager sour I quit for 13 years went back to a different gym and was there for three years and it was like a very toxic environment When I came to Unified I was like a four strike blue belt Took me a while got my purple belt under actually somebody else while I was training at Unified And then full-time switch to Unified And I remember coming up through purple and brown belt and feeling like I should be able to kick any belt male's ass Like what is happening Do I need to be demo Like why am I I can't tap this blue belt And I was getting super frustrated I was getting close to my brown belt I'm like what Like do I just suck at jujitsu Should I quit Like I was super frustrated and Johnny and I were training and grappling and he's like you do realize that even like the top level [01:01:00] female black belts out there you can call it a win If you can survive and keep yourself safe with these matches with these athletic young college blue belt and above even white belts And just this morning I was the only girl in class I went to an open mat class this morning at 5:30 AM only girl on the mat Grappled some monsters right And if I could keep myself safe I was like I won today Did I catch a submission on any of em Nope But did I keep myself safe Yes And that little comment from some you know a man that I was he's still on a pedestal for me and always will be And to hear it from like the top level martial artist just very much um not it I'm trying to think of the word It just validated it validated my experience on the mat and it validated a more realistic set of goals for me to focus [01:02:00] on cause I do think that's such a misnomer Like oh jiujitsu saves you Like if you like any purple belt girl should tap any white belt guy That's not reality Like anybody who's been on the mat for a long time knows that is not the reality so talking about it and changing your mindset and then I'm a coach I coach an all women's team uh in Jiujitsu but as well as a coach in self defense I'm the one preaching Johnny's message So it's really this like trickle down effect of how can you communicate that and help educate people um to just a more realistic understanding of things
Riley: Yeah. I had this conversation the other day. Um, do you know who, uh, uh, Luis Heredia is
Carl Sims: You.
Miyo Strong: Mali
Carl Sims: Sure.
Riley: from? Maui
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: Yeah. So
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: he was up at our school, did a seminar last week and, or this week, it was just a few days ago. But, um, I, I drove him back to his hotel. Right. And we were just talking about this [01:03:00] part of self-defense in the Jiujitsu context, but really in any context that, that is self preservation, right?
Um, we talked about the way we grapple as older athletes. I think Louis said he's 64 now. you know, I'm, I'm getting ready to turn 50. Carl, you said you're 55. How old are you, Mia?
Miyo Strong: 48
Riley: Yeah, so it's that like of cell preservation goes back to almost like situational awareness, right? Uh, risk mitigation.
It's, there's a, there's that aspect too, right? what do you guys have to say about that?
Carl Sims: Yeah. I, I am at 55 years old. I'm not the athlete I used to be. This is something that took me a while to learn in Jiujitsu because I always thought I'm going to be the athletic, stronger, faster guy. Well, that went away about 10 years ago. Uh, maybe 15. You have [01:04:00] to learn when I grapple, if I'm grappling a young purple belt that's big and strong.
A lot of that is exactly what you said, RI survival.
Riley: Mm-hmm.
Carl Sims: to survive. Hopefully he gets tired and I'll catch him,
Riley: Yeah,
Carl Sims: but I may not catch him. It may just be to survive. Period. You know who Hoffa is from, uh, unified. He's, he's,
Riley: I don't,
Carl Sims: been on the P uh, he is been on the PGF and now he's on UFC, um, uh, jujitsu or, yeah, BJJ when he was 16, 17.
I physically manhandled him. He's 18 now and he beats me like a rented mule. So my success is, is if I can survive without being tapped by this young athletic guy, and it's, it's, it's, it's a survival game. So it's very, that's why I always say it's being a small guy in Jiujitsu is very similar to being a female in Jiujitsu.
So I understand. I've gotta be more technical. [01:05:00] I have to be smarter. I have to just, risk management is, is the name of the game. As you get older and, and my body, like I've mio we were talking Mio and I talked last night. I've got a quote, super fight tomorrow, and I'm like, my body is so beat up. It's not what it used to be.
I can't go if I train back to back days, Riley. Well, I'm in bad shape, buddy, so I've got to, I've got to realize this is a different way of training as we get older. It's, I don't go as hard. And if I do go hard, here's the beautiful thing about it. I can go hard with you, ri I can go hard with you, Mio. I can't go hard with that blue belt purple belt.
I'll get hurt.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: And, and people think, well, you're a black belt. And I'm like, yeah. They spazz out and do things that you're not used to experience people doing. So I, I, I tailor my training more for [01:06:00] higher level guys. I don't train with the white belts, blue belts nearly as much as I used to.
Riley: Yeah,
Carl Sims: If that answers your question a little bit.
Kind of.
Riley: the black
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: not how not to hurt you. Right. It'ss like still have a, have a good role, but
Miyo Strong: Yeah And jujitsu is the ultimate ego checker always Right Like it checks your ego coming up through the ranks And then as black belts like my ego gets checked constantly because it's like not as good as I once was but I'm good once as I ever was You know That's saying like I
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: hard comp round and hang with any female right But then I need two rounds off Like I've got I've got
Carl Sims: Right.
Miyo Strong: I've gotta like rest and recover and that's all so different now And that comes down to ego like can you put your ego on the shelf to keep yourself safe and to have longevity in sport Cool That's how you're gonna stay in jujitsu through your sixties seventies eighties
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: My [01:07:00] age.
Riley: sport. Right. I know, I know. These, um, runners, you know, that were, at one point they were, they were fast. They were, they were doing shorter distance, maybe five Ks, 10 Ks, but they were record breaker in their speed. Well, now they're in their fifties, that speed is gone,
Miyo Strong: Yep
Riley: but they can still go long. Right.
Carl Sims: Mm-hmm.
Riley: game, but they, they can still perform, but it's a different performance.
Carl Sims: And that's, that's difficult when you're like, I, I'm a fast Twitch guy. Sprinter high jump. I, I, that was my thing. And now I'm, I'm realizing, man, I, I don't have that. I, I I, I did a wrestling tournament recently and my mind told me, shoot, and my body said, yeah, good luck. By the time I went to shoot, the guy's gone.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: And, so it, it, it is, it's like I have to adjust my game and do things more, uh, more smartly,
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: to, instead of [01:08:00] just like using that. And, and the, the, the problem is, and Mio you can attest to this, I'm sure some of these younger kids will like, well, he's in shape, or she's in shape. They should be able to, and it's like, no, no.
In shape at 55 is different than in shape at 35.
Riley: For
Carl Sims: could have been outta shape at 35 and if I had this skillset, I'd have crushed me now just because of that, that physicality, the endurance, you know, it's so as like with the runners. Uh, I, I have to change my running pattern or my jiujitsu pattern.
It's a very different game now. I have that one time. Like Neil said, I can do it once I have one. I always save, like when I train one really good hard comp round, it's usually for Damon. Uh, but, uh, but there's always like someone that you, but you, you don't, you can't do 10 of those anymore. Riley,
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Carl Sims: basically what it comes down to.
Miyo Strong: Well and to put another female perspective [01:09:00] in this happens often in cycles in women's lives because even giving up or deciding when to get pregnant you know when cause you know that's X amount of time off the mat And then once you have your baby your joints are looser your milks coming in Like you have all these other physical things that are happening that you can't train like you did prior to pregnancy And then for this whole section of a woman's life and her childbearing years she has to tailor her training her competitions her goals everything if she chooses to have kids right That's that's something that you have to cycle through And then even after you're done with your childbearing years as you come through perimenopause and menopause are something that is not talked or addressed about enough on the mat and it's it changes everything Just like low testosterone changes for you We have three other factors right We've got other hormonal levels going on that totally impact your longevity in sport And you have to be so smart about [01:10:00] it if your goal is to stay on the map It's
Riley: a, there's a gal that we trained with that um, she's young. She got married a few years ago and then they had a baby, right. And then she came back to the mats. She's a purple belt. Right. And it was, for her, it was shocking. The like groin muscles and the everything around that, how she's like, I can't move my legs right here I am. I used to be able to, but I can't. Everything's changed. And
Miyo Strong: yeah all your
Riley: kind of a
Miyo Strong: stretch everything changes to to make your body open for birth Like women are remarkable creatures But it it does take a lot of um intentional strength training to come back after birth
Riley: Yeah,
And I remember hearing her talk about that and I was grappling with her and she's like, hold on, I, I gotta stop 'cause this, uh, I can't move my legs. And it actually is kind of painful. And was that she's, she realized she needs some PT there to kind of
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: that. So,[01:11:00]
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: yeah, hopefully she gets around to that.
'cause I miss having her on the mat. She's been gone for a while now 'cause I think that was pretty discouraging. But
Miyo Strong: yeah
Riley: yeah, she
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: training partner, but, um, so we have. It kind of almost invisibly transferred from the self-defense category into the, the athletic, um, subject. And I, I do wanna know, you guys are both, um, at some level in Juujitsu, right?
And multiple times. Um, from a competitor standpoint, does that day to day look like when it comes to training? You know, what, what do you do to prepare for one of these events?
Carl Sims: Go ahead, Mia. I'll, I'll take it after you
Miyo Strong: Okay It is probably gonna be very different uh for both of us
Carl Sims: very much.
Riley: Yep.
Miyo Strong: Which is good Which is good That's why we're that's why you get more multiple perspectives So for a while I was really um if I wasn't training three to five [01:12:00] days a week I felt like I had no business competing Enter Jason South into the chat He's like my biggest cheerleader I trust him He's definitely changed the way I compete from day one even from when we were friends and not even together His attitude and approach and perspective to competition has greatly shaped the way I compete now all the way through think he coached me my last match at Purple Belt Um and then he's been my coach ever since all through Brown and Black And his approach has always been Yes you may not be able to get three to five days in a week cause maybe you have two jobs maybe your kids are sick maybe you know whatever life happens have years of jiujitsu you know jiujitsu your body knows jiujitsu what is the goal Is the gold to go win and smash everybody Sure Always We want the gold medal That's why we're going But is it also to have fun and to be appreciative and honor your body for what it can [01:13:00] do Is it to show the kids or maybe like I help coach a high school wrestling team is it to show my high school wrestlers that like they can still get after it when they're pushing 50 Like what are your goals And I think for me my goals have evolved and changed and like I've won Master Worlds five times between purple and brown GI and Nogi black belt I've gotten skunked for two or two years in a row I've made it to the finals one year And um I got bronze the other year it is obviously it's different levels of black belt but also the amount of um energy time resources I'm able to put into competing I'm lucky if I train once a week for myself because I'm coaching twice a week So if I can get in and and learn and take class and train once a week I'm lucky And does that mean I'm not um worthy of entering worlds master Worlds You know No because for me I know I'm gonna rely on [01:14:00] those 10 years of juujitsu All that comp experience I've been competing since I was a white belt Like I know how to manage my mental approach to it and it's just trusting and believing in your juujitsu but also knowing that in my life is gonna love me less if I lose Like that was
Riley: that
Miyo Strong: thing for me to like back to home base And Jason was the one that's like do you think your kids care if you lose do you think they're gonna like love you less Do you think I that changes the way I feel about you If you lose no you're freaking getting out and getting after it When most people my age our ages don't they don't they don't compete It's it's rare It's rare So it's it's totally changed I used to train like five six days a week cross training CrossFit nutrition everything's dialed I'm obsessed and I go in ready But now it's like am I healthy Great I get a chance to get in the gym and do what I love Great Do I get to set the [01:15:00] example for some people that look up to me Great Like check check check Winning is just the gravy
Riley: Oh, that's well said. Top that, Carl.
Carl Sims: Yeah. Impossible. Yeah. So, you know, it's interesting. I started training. Um, I, I, I fought before I trained, and that's what actually brought me to Juujitsu. My first MMA fight. I fought one of Jeremy Horne, uh, his, his guys, and I just got smashed. And, uh, anyhow, I found Jiujitsu a couple years later. Actually, it wasn't even then, but, uh, I started competing early.
I started competing as a white belt. I competed early and often, uh, my training because, uh, where I was at in, I, I was 38 when I started Jiujitsu,
Riley: Mm-hmm.
Carl Sims: didn't start young. Yeah, I was 38 and, uh, it was a white belt, 38 competing with the regular kids. I didn't go in the adult any [01:16:00] or masters, anything. I always just competed.
Um. But I, I think that people put too much on winning without a doubt. Um, and so I competed at White Belt. I actually went to Worlds for the first time at Blue Belt. Uh, rich Nia Mio actually said, Hey, let's go to Worlds. I'm like, what's that? And I just went and I competed and, um, you know, I, I'm an athletic guy, and so I just kind of, I muscled through it, to be honest with you.
And, you know, I, I took silver at Blue Belt and I'm like, this is awesome. And I kept competing. And, uh, then I competed at Purple Belt, but, and Brown and Black, but I have never been a guy because of where I was at in my stage of life. I've had a business since 1999, a machine shop. Um, I had kids that I coached them in soccer and, and, uh, I, I'm very involved dad.
Like, I'm the last [01:17:00] person, right? Everyone else would come first. And so what I found is I was sacrificing sleep to do all these things. Um, I'd work at three in the morning so that I could get to my kid's soccer game, et cetera. So competing was something I always did, but it wasn't like I didn't have the regimen that maybe Mio did.
Um, I just, I've been a two to three day a week training guy my entire jujitsu career. So I would turn, uh, you know, these guys would be like, oh yeah. Meet these guys at Worlds that they're like, oh yeah, I'm training six days a week. And I'm looking at 'em like, the hell, how do you have time to train six days a week?
So anyhow, so, um, yeah, I, I just prioritized my family, my, my, my work. Those were more important. But, um, you know, I, I won purple belt worlds, brown Belt Worlds and Black Belt worlds. I've won twice. [01:18:00] I just, but I think less sometimes is more. So I think these, especially you gotta realize in the master's division, most of us are hobbyists.
We're not professional athletes. So, um, I think some of these guys break their bodies down too much by over training, you know, especially as you get older in age. And, um, I, I haven't competed at World since 2022, was the last time I competed. Um, I, I think this is what it is, is when you're not like chasing belts, I don't even know.
I'm five years plus into my black belt. So whatever that is, maybe 2021 is when I got my black belt. I competed quite a bit, um, at Black Belt. And then I, I quit in 2022 and I've done some super fights, but as far as training, I, I think I have a different mentality than Jason. A little bit. 'cause he teases me [01:19:00] about, uh.
I go to win. And, and if I lose, I am disappointed. And I'm not the just there to have fun. If I'm gonna spend a thousand dollars to go to California and take the time and do it, I'm there to win.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: If I lose, I, I, I can lose and I have lost. But my goal is to win. And, uh, but I realized this is me. My wife could care less if I win anything, my daughters could care less.
And I, I learned a really good, good, uh, this, this was a, a good thing that happened to me. And I, I'm gonna tell you this story because it, it's, it's applicable to this. My family usually doesn't come to watch me. I, I just don't like that. I'm not doing it for them. Purple belt worlds. My two daughters decided to come.
It's the first last only time I've lost in the [01:20:00] first round. And I came off the mat. I was so mad. And my wife, you know, and I, I didn't not like outwardly display that. I was mad at myself. I'm like, hell, the, I lost, my daughters are here. I'm Superman. I should never lose. Right? My wife said to me, Carl, this is good.
And I'm looking at her like, are you serious? And she's like, it's good for your daughters to see you lose because they're high level college soccer players and they lose. So they're gonna think that you always have to win. And I, I fancy myself a pretty sharp guy, but I'm like, how has it taken me this long for someone to point this out to me?
But the pressure that I put on as far as competing is, is on myself. It's not from any outside influences. But yeah, I love watching Jason compete because he is having fun. I literally go to just destroy you. And that is [01:21:00] when I go compete. It's like we joke some years ago, one of my friends said, most people don't know.
'cause in the gym, I'm not the gym hero. Everybody, including every white belt taps me. I cannot stand gym heroes on the mat. I'm a comp guy. And so my, my buddy Josh one time said, because people have made the comments, how does that guy win anything? And my buddy Josh said, uh, he, my buddy Josh is is the cougar hunter.
He's the real cougar hunter. And he said, I'm gonna do his, his kind of redneck voice. He said, these fools have no idea what competition Carl is like, right? And so it got shortened and I'm not sure if Mio shortened that or my friend Ace to comp Carl. It's a joke. But the point I'm making is in everyday life and everyday training, I'm pretty easygoing.
Competition, [01:22:00] man, I'm there to kill you. And that sounds terrible, but I'm there to compete and I'm there to win. And, and yes, I'm having fun ev but I'm there to win. So we have maybe different perspectives and that's good. Um, but yeah, I, I don't understand the training five days a week. I, I've, like I said, I've got a super fight tomorrow.
I've trained three days a week. I don't, I don't, I, I know how to do jiujitsu. I've been doing it for so long. It's literally a matter of just getting your cardio at a point when you get to, I say R level, as long as my cardio's there, I'm good.
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: know, I love what
Carl Sims: yeah.
Riley: said, um, was we, we have this like picture of athletes, right? That they, only exist in the gym. Like we'll see a UFC fight
Carl Sims: All right.
Riley: And you think all this guy does is that you see the snapshot of his life. You don't realize [01:23:00] that dude has a family. He's got a job.
Probably, maybe, maybe lives in his car. Some of those guys do, you know, but they, there's so much else
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: person's world, you know, half the time they're fighting injured, right? There's the realistic part of any, any endeavor, right? Carl, you've owned a machine shop since 1999, right? There's
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: something going on there, and it seems all glorious.
Hey, Carl's owned this business forever, but it's not, it's not easy,
Carl Sims: no,
Riley: know, it comes with problems and it
Carl Sims: no.
Riley: life and it comes with just like a, it's a drag sometimes, right? And, and so is training sometimes, uh, Mio you said you, you only get to train once a week sometimes. Great. That's what you get, right?
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: that's, the stage of life, the, the season of life we're in. So that is so cool to hear. 'cause I think that'd be encouraging for listeners of the podcast to that sit there and see
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: their own self instead of their, um, social media. You know, high points.
Carl Sims: One last brief thing on that, it's funny, I [01:24:00] had someone ask me years ago, what are you gonna do if you can all no longer do jujitsu? And I'm like, are you serious? Jujitsu is this much of my life. The majority of the time I'm in the mountains hiking with my wife, hanging out with my buddy Josh, hunting, being around my family.
Now I'm a grandfather. Those are the things that are important. My business, you know, these are, these are things that is my everyday life. I see guys that their whole life is juujitsu. Their whole identity is juujitsu. This, even though Mo a lot of people know me from Juujitsu, I if, if I couldn't do Juujitsu tomorrow, I'd miss it, but I'd be like, eh, next,
Riley: Yeah,
Carl Sims: it's not that serious.
Riley: a good
Miyo Strong: and I
Carl Sims: Mm-hmm.
Miyo Strong: yeah and I think it applies too to like when you were talking about you compete to win like I do too I'm competitive I hate to lose da da da But the way you win and the way you lose [01:25:00] talks speaks to your character And
Carl Sims: A hundred percent Yes.
Miyo Strong: and that's what shapes your experience on earth right is like can I continue to get better and to be kinder and to be the you know the best version of myself I can be I see women I I I don't really follow men's jujitsu I should but I don't um I see like the women who are winning things even locally or nationally or internationally right There's very different levels but there are some women who are incredibly insane competitors They never lose They're you know just everything works and they're a--holes And
Riley: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: so
Carl Sims: Right?
Miyo Strong: I'm like I don't give a shit if you won that because you're a jerk Like to me it's can you do it with grace and respect and kindness and can you better our sport and can you do something for the younger generation that you didn't have those [01:26:00] winners man will like follow your journey be your biggest cheerleader and if you lose it doesn't change how I feel about you
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: the quality of human you are is translated to the quality of athlete You are on the mat as well like you know there's there's so much overlay between your character development and the way you show up in competition
Carl Sims: I think that transfers though to everything. So Riley, this little, I go to kill everyone on the mat.
Miyo Strong: yeah Yeah
Carl Sims: you asked, if you asked anyone who knows me in Jiujitsu, this is usually, oh, he is the nicest guy. He is so humble inside. I'm a rage monster. I'm trying to just destroy you. But after I win, if I win, I'm humble.
I never brag about it. I don't say anything about it. I downplay my jujitsu ability. This is a podcast. So we're talking about it very [01:27:00] different.
Riley: Yeah.
Carl Sims: And it, I think the same thing applies in business. None of my guys call me the boss. If I take them out to lunch and they say, oh, this is my boss, Carl, time out.
We're coworkers.
Riley: We're homie here. Yeah.
Carl Sims: stand that arrogance in life in everything, whether it's on the mat, whether it's in Jiujitsu, jiujitsu, uh, in my, my work environment. My home life, whatever, you, you better stay humble because if not, you will get humble.
Riley: That's
Carl Sims: you're gonna get humbled. And so like, I, I think so I, I I, that probably came across a little bit
Miyo Strong: No no no no
Carl Sims: crass or whatever,
Riley: at all.
Carl Sims: it, but it's, you, you just have to be humble in everything in life.
And especially, this is a business podcast, right?
Riley: now it's, it's, it's
Carl Sims: Always remember.
Riley: Yeah. You, you're going to
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: of that on here. Yep.
Carl Sims: But always remember, like in, in my, my thought process is like, [01:28:00] you have to realize the most important thing in my life is my family. Number one. I had an opportunity, um, as a minority owned business to, uh, utilize that to get contracts.
Uh, and I said, not only no, but hell no. Why should I get a contract when maybe that Caucasian guy who has the same ability as me? You're not offering him that. People will look at this differently. I don't really care. My point is, is whatever I earn, I should get one. And number two, stay humble. Three, just to make more money does that.
If I had to, if I changed my business plan and went in another direction, I wouldn't be able to spend the time. I never missed a soccer game. I never missed a school play. I never missed anything. My kids did. I would go into work early. I'm saying all this because I think sometimes so many people [01:29:00] miss. The, the perspective in life and even in business is make more money.
Make more money, make more money. My mother-in-law died at the age of 48 from cancer. The lesson I took from that, I spend money and travel and hang out with my family, and those are the important things in life. All of this other crap about your Jiujitsu achievements or your, your, your, you have a business with 20 employees or 50 employees, or a thousand employees.
Are you a good person
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Carl Sims: that I usually, I'm not, I don't cuss as much as me, but I'm gonna tell you one thing that I tell my kids. Life is easy. Don't be an a--hole if you can. Just be a good person in life and be a person who's respected. I, I, I've been humbled so many times in my life in different ways, but at the end of the day, just don't be an a--hole.
Life's not that [01:30:00] difficult. All these people, and I understand there's mental issues, this issue, that issue, and a lot of people's childhoods, uh, change their lives, et cetera. I get all that, but life's not that hard, man. It's really not.
Riley: Yeah,
Carl Sims: And it's not that hard if you just kind of live life by, don't be an a--hole.
Don't be an a--hole to your spouse. Don't be an a--hole to your kids. Don't be an a--hole to your coworkers. Don't be an a--hole on the mat. So I've said a--hole enough, but you know what I mean, is don't be a butthole.
Riley: I am
Carl Sims: This life's easy. Just be life's easy. Ri it's not that difficult,
Riley: Love it.
Carl Sims: you know?
Riley: I love it.
Carl Sims: Sorry,
Riley: I, I want to talk about
Carl Sims: I,
Riley: the, the pit challenge, right? You guys are getting ready to put on this, this event. I'm excited about it. 'cause it's, I mean it just sounds stinking cool, but I want you to talk about first kind, kind of an intro, what the event is. So especially [01:31:00] non jiujitsu people can understand. But then I wanna talk about kinda what goes into one of these events. 'cause you're, there's a lot of moving parts, man. Neil, you
Carl Sims: I just went off for about 10 minutes, so it's mio,
Miyo Strong: You want
Carl Sims: please.
Miyo Strong: I can start
Carl Sims: Yes, please. Yeah.
Miyo Strong: And I'm just gonna keep pulling in the female perspective cause that's where my brain is Um Carl and I were working together with proving grounds Carl's the founder not me I hopped in um and was like their first female super fight and then first female quat first Like we we've we've grown the female part of competing And the reason we did that is cause there were not opportunities for women elsewhere not equal opportunities Right
Carl Sims: Mm.
Miyo Strong: especially in the pay So proving grounds has always been the leader the industry leader in that And um the
Carl Sims: If I may, I'm gonna interject Proving Grounds. Riley was an invitation only tournament I started in [01:32:00] 2016. From the inception, I paid women and men the same amount, whether you were white belt, blue belt, purple belt, whatever. So that's what Mio is speaking to with proving grounds
Riley: Okay.
Carl Sims: on.
Miyo Strong: yes So that was Proving Grounds was an invitational It was this amazing incredible event that Carl grew and built over the years and we decided to go a a new direction And um the pit challenge is the only kind the only tournament of its kind in the country in the world that I know of and I've been researching Uh so what it is is it's a regular grappling tournament but it's in these pit style matches So there's no
Riley: slanted walls
Miyo Strong: Yeah so there's no out bounds Um we have aggressive rules because you know we kind of asked a lot of our mentors like what would you change about competing What works for you What do you like what would what what do you want to see different And [01:33:00] overwhelmingly um like the I-B-J-G-F rules don't serve modern juujitsu is kind of what we heard And so we've adapted our rules a little bit um and which are some of my favorite things about the pit challenge is you get four points for crucifix I love crucifix I am under Johnny Quist who is the mayor of Crucifix town Like so we train and drill that a lot and it's an amazing way to control someone and I think it deserves points And so we give four points for crucifix control Um you don't have to put hooks in before you go right to the body triangle on back control Uh you get stalling So stalling is a little bit like wrestling If you get called for stalling your opponent gets a point rather than advantage and disadvantage We're just on this point system Um but it's where you know now when I say we're the only kind in the country I mean that because yes you see matches in the pit all the time That's very popular right now But you see one at a time and it's a very high [01:34:00] level Invitation You know it's very very hard to get into that as the average jujitsu you know competitor And so we have four pits running at the same time Just like you'd have four mats running at the same time at like say a regular Naga or whatever Um but with our more aggressive rule set and then the difference there's no out of bounds that changes things greatly cause a lot of I-B-J-J-F point players use the points to their advantage and the outbound rule is something that gets abused in my point or taken advantage of in in my opinion Um and so the action is very fast And then you take into account that um we have started taking some of what we love about um proving Ground's Invitational which was the invitation part of it And ma making matchups right If there's nobody in your division we're gonna do our best to create a fair matchup for you And I love that some other tournaments [01:35:00] have taken that into account So like Pro Open our friend Max runs the Pro Open he does an amazing job Um and he started doing supervisor individual matchups as well which can only benefit the entire community right I don't give a shit that you know he's doing the same thing we're doing I think it's great because then the level of jujitsu and the level of competition gets raised for everybody Um
Carl Sims: Support each other. That's, uh, I'm interjecting again, but that is the biggest problem I see in Jiujitsu. It's like they're our competition. Max is not our competition. I'm competing tomorrow for Max, bringing people to his event. Let's promote Jiujitsu.
Riley: Yeah,
Miyo Strong: Yep So anyways the pit challenge is kind of our baby and our dream and we wanna take it nationwide And we have incredible partners Matt and Mike are partners with us It's not just Carl and I and it's a very different business model which also helps [01:36:00] Callie and Jason let us do it
Riley: so every, everyone thinks that the business they own is the only business that really has, um, challenges we'll say. So what are the challenges of the pit challenge? Talk about that behind the scenes. yeah, you just did the, the floppy lips thing. What is that?
[01:37:00]
Miyo Strong: There's a lot of challenges especially cause we're new and
Carl Sims: Yeah. Uh.
Miyo Strong: so grateful that people have been patient with us Um because as we grow and as we figure this out it's brand new It's never been done before This pit style of Competings never been done um where it's multiple pits So people have been patient and we really appreciate that Um but some of the behind the scenes problems How do you make a pit
Riley: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: how how is it gonna be durable How are you gonna travel with it How are you going to you know do advertising on it How are you going to who can fix it right in the middle of the freaking show if some behemoth slam someone else into it Like there's [01:38:00] so many behind the scenes issues like how do you get your logo to be trademarked so that nobody else steals it How do you make fair divisions How do you advertise How do you price it How do we staff it How do you like endless How do we file our freaking taxes Like there's
Riley: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: there's
Carl Sims: Yeah. So for years, for a lot of years, ri um, grappling industries, when they would come to town, what they would do is they would get one person to kind of help organize referees, table staff, um, that type of stuff. I was that guy in Salt Lake for grappling industries for quite a few years, and so those were part of, part of the little obstacles is, uh, okay.
Staffing good referees, good table staff, because at the end of the day, that's what the pit challenge. We had a referee staff of high level black belts, Hoffa, [01:39:00] Damon, Shannon, it's Zelle. These are, uh, top of the line black belt referees, which is important in my opinion. Um, I've done a lot of refereeing throughout the years and having a good ref, uh, excuse me, ref, ref can make or break, you know, a, a match on when to get involved, when not to get involved.
Those are obstacles that, you know, come into play when you're running a tournament like we run, um, just in the pits themselves. I mean, you can imagine, Riley, these are wood pits, weigh hundreds of pounds we put together with mats on them. Uh, it's, there's a lot of, lot of little variables that are different than running a grappling industries or a NGA or they throw down some mats and have the matches.
That's not what we do. You know, we, we've we're, you know, looking at making metal pits now, I mean the, the, and that's a huge expense. You've gotta factor that into play. So, you know, [01:40:00] you buy some mats, throw 'em down. It's a big difference versus that, than actually having. Pits built. It's a lot of money. So those are some of the obstacles we've been running into.
Um, but, but overall, man, I'm, I'm just excited to bring Juujitsu, shared Juujitsu spread, juujitsu. Um, you know, for as much as I say Jujitsu's not a big part of my life. It is a big part of my life, right?
Riley: part of your life.
Carl Sims: it is. Unfortunately. Unfortunately. Yeah.
Riley: m you, you talked about, you know, how do you pay taxes? How do you, how do you find staff? How do you do all these things? And you know, it's that classic. You're a, you're both juujitsu technicians, but that doesn't mean can just directly translate that into business people. Right. And so the, the, the technician part doesn't, it's, it's a different art form from the business aspect of it.
Right. And so you've, uh, got some experience in that with proving grounds in that. But you're, man,
Miyo Strong: luckily I was a small [01:41:00] business owner for 20 years He's been a small business owner Mike and Matt are small business owner So like we we we're well versed in it but it is it's a lot you know it's just
Riley: even
Miyo Strong: it's
Riley: you're, it's still a chat. It's still difficult. Right.
Miyo Strong: mm-hmm Oh yeah Yeah for sure And the goal is always to push forward better opportunities for the juujitsu athletes in the country That's kind
Riley: Yeah. Well, I'm excited. So say,
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: event is happening
Miyo Strong: May 30th and Boise at Meridian High School Registration is live now The pit challenge.com or the pit challenge on Instagram Um if you can follow like share engage in our content that helps a ton to get the word out It's a very grassroots you know effort to get us to grow
Carl Sims: we've had, uh, some competitors travel down from Boise, the Straight Blast Gym guys, Jason Flynn, who's been phenomenal throughout my proving [01:42:00] grounds. And the pit challenge always shows up, always competes for us. And so, uh, yeah man, we're excited to, uh, put on another event. We're excited to have you guys show up and yeah, man, we look, we look forward to, uh, spreading Jiujitsu in Boise.
Riley: That is so cool. Can't wait. Can't
Carl Sims: yeah.
Riley: said you
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: that that popped up just recently, right? Just in the last couple days.
Carl Sims: Thanks to Riley. Riley helped us out there as well. Yeah.
Riley: you end up
Carl Sims: So
Riley: so, but
Carl Sims: you helped us out still. Yeah, it did. Yeah.
Riley: Oh,
Carl Sims: we appreciate your time, Riley. Thank you so much.
Riley: I'm honored to. So listen, um, can we do just a few get to know you guys questions as we kind of
Carl Sims: Sure.
Riley: up?
Carl Sims: You bet.
Riley: All right. So this podcast is called the Go Earn Your Salt podcast, right? That's the tagline of my electrolyte brand. And, uh, when you hear that term, that phrase go [01:43:00] earn your salt, what does that mean to you?
Carl Sims: Ladies first, and I'll tell you
Miyo Strong: I love the
Carl Sims: please.
Miyo Strong: in anything I don't like being given shit I wanna earn everything Um because I got a chip on my shoulder I gotta prove stuff you know Yeah but go earn your salt Your salt is your is your gold medal right It whether it's a healthy relationship or a literal gold medal or a successful business or kid that excels at life like go earn it Like it's gonna take work but it's gonna be worth it
Riley: Love it. How about you,
Carl Sims: Yeah, I, I, yeah, mine's a little bit different because I, I love history and I understand the, the basis of earning your salt. The Roman times, that was your pay and you had to earn your salt. But I transferred even further. Um, uh, I'm a big fan of [01:44:00] Francis and Nu and Francis worked in the salt mines for years in Cameroon, and if anyone earns their p earns their salt and it working in a salt mine that just kind of, it brings it all together to me of earning your salt.
That's, yeah. Roman times, right?
Miyo Strong: I love
Riley: real, for real.
Carl Sims: yeah.
Miyo Strong: What does it mean to you Riley
Riley: you know, that,
Carl Sims: Yeah. Good. Good. Neil?
Riley: it was that, that realization that it was just nothing comes for free. we to get there and earn it. You know, I, I heard this phrase one time, this, this quote that said, our, our life is designed perfectly to get the results we're getting. And I thought, man, it's the best thing I've ever heard. You know, it just, it just struck me. And, and that's what go your salt means to me is that you, we gotta earn anything that's worth having, right. And if we, what'd you say? You don't like getting free crap? Is that what you said? Mio?
Miyo Strong: I like getting free electrolytes[01:45:00]
Riley: hoo hoo. Yeah. We'll hook you up for being on the episode here for sure. won't let me hook
Carl Sims: yeah.
Riley: you know.
Carl Sims: No. nope, nope.
Riley: um, alright, you too. What is your, uh, besides Jiujitsu, we've already talked about that. What's your favorite pastime?
Miyo Strong: Ladies
Carl Sims: first of course.
Miyo Strong: So like Carl mentioned how family is his number one thing Like family to me is everything And so anything I get to do with my kids my two daughters like that's makes me so freaking happy But I also love to garden like and I love to homestead and raise animals and we have chickens and I love to read books I'm a super introverted person I would rather be home with my family than anything else
Riley: It's funny you don't come across as introverted at all.
Miyo Strong: I can
Carl Sims: No.
Miyo Strong: just have to recharge after
Riley: Yeah,
Carl Sims: Yeah,
Riley: Yeah, for sure. Carl.
Carl Sims: yeah, [01:46:00] yeah, Um, yeah, I, I love to hike. I am an outdoorsy guy. I love the outdoors. I love to hike. I'm a granola cruncher. Uh, I, I love being in the mountains. I love, uh, my, my thing is I love the national parks. My wife and I, you know, we just have our bucket list. We're just knocking 'em off one at a time.
Um, I love, I love being out, out of doors. I'm not a, I hate being inside the house. Um, I'm not as uhm says, she's an introvert. And it's funny because I'm probably a lot more of an introvert. M has more friends than anyone I know. I am pretty, pretty private, so, yeah.
Riley: is so
Miyo Strong: And Ron
Carl Sims: she can pretend.
Miyo Strong: that Sounds weird to you Like
Riley: Yeah,
Carl Sims: not an introvert, but let's, anyhow.
Miyo Strong: circle's about this big Carl and you're in it
Carl Sims: That's true. That's true. That's true. It's true. That's true.
Riley: 'cause when [01:47:00] I, when I first met you Carl, I was
Carl Sims: I,
Riley: Gate City five tournament as a ref and you were the head ref for that, that event. And
Carl Sims: yeah.
Riley: sitting there watching you from a distance work that room and talking to people and interacting with everybody and I'm like, you're, I, it makes me think you're just full of crap when you say you're introverted.
'cause you're, any room you're in, you're like, you're involved
Carl Sims: I wouldn't say I'm introverted. I'm not introverted, but I'm pretty private, so it's like I've, I do have a very small circle, but I'm definitely not introverted. That was probably, I shouldn't have said that, but meal's definitely not introverted.
Miyo Strong: a new term called ambivert which my daughter's actually sent to me cause they just give me a lot of shit about being an introvert But an ambivert is somebody that can turn on being an extrovert
Carl Sims: Ah,
Miyo Strong: costs
Carl Sims: you go.
Miyo Strong: And so for
Carl Sims: There you go.
Miyo Strong: we do the pit challenge and I'm on we're kissing babies we're shaking hands we're doing the whole thing We're
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: I have to like shut everything off and out for the [01:48:00] next two days to like re
Carl Sims: Yeah. Yeah.
Riley: Yeah, I would, I would, I'm, I, I think I probably fall in that category too 'cause uh, you know, I go teach Jiujitsu class in front of a crowd doing that kind of thing all week. And then when Friday hits, guys are like, you coming to Saturday open mat? I'm like, no man. I'm done.
Carl Sims: That makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah.
Riley: Uh, what is your, your favorite band? Favorite music?
Miyo Strong: Ladies first
Carl Sims: ladies.
Miyo Strong: that
Carl Sims: Always.
Riley: It's
Miyo Strong: Okay Okay Let's see Favorite band Well Jason and I love to go to concerts Like that's definitely um something we love to do in the summer we saw Chris Stapleton live last year That man blew me away like live in the amount of like instruments he can play And I mean I so I love Chris Stapleton and then last night we go for a hike every night together And um [01:49:00] was playing him some Rai he like back in the day I'm like Bonnie Rad is classic blues this that the other
Carl Sims: yeah.
Miyo Strong: love good music I don't I'm not a huge fan of like electronic or simulate you know what I mean Like I like instruments and songwriting and voices I love the red clay strays Like I I freaking I don't know I went to Janae Igo with my daughters and she was incredible She played the harp and like beautiful voice and I just love good music I'm not too
Riley: I'm actually scared of the AI influence in music
Miyo Strong: yeah
Riley: I, I'm
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Carl Sims: Crazy.
Riley: 'cause that human part of the discipline it takes to get good at music and even the styles music that are coming out. Like, I, I remember used to play guitar a little bit. I've never gotten good at it, but I just to kind of strum songs.
But I was always frustrated. I was like, you know, I can play these four chord songs [01:50:00] and whoopy. That's not musical talent. That's, that's been those strum if you chords and I, I love it when you hear someone who's really good on an instrument. It's
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: But Carl,
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: favorite band?
Carl Sims: Yeah. I, I love a lot of different genres of music, but sometimes it surprises people. My two favorite are reggae and country. Uh, I, uh, I grew up in a small town, so I love country, but reggae and, and the main reason ri is both of them are typically clean. Sometimes country's not always positive, but.
Positive sometimes. And, and so, um, I really, really love reggae music. Even since I was a child. I discovered country more so when I've gotten older. Uh, but I hate, like pop music. I, I hate electric. What? Yeah. So, but my favorite bands, um, you know, some of my favorites, like, uh, I've always, [01:51:00] as, as cliche as it sounds, Bob Marley, but what has happened to reggae is reggae has been transformed into Hawaiian Reggae is amazing.
So Common Kings is a great band. Um,
Miyo Strong: Me and Conhi love him
Carl Sims: yeah. Yeah. So there's so many good ones. And then country years ago, Kelly and I, my wife and I, we won tickets to go to, to, um, Tim McGraw and Kenny Chesney, and I love Tim McGraw. I love his soul and his music. I'm not really a fan of the old, old country that's more twangy, but I don't like the new pop pop country either.
But yeah. So
Riley: that's
Carl Sims: yeah.
Miyo Strong: he
Riley: of music. Yeah. and country.
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: well and here's a
Carl Sims: Yeah,
Miyo Strong: Carl that a lot of people don't know loves lyrics he loves the art form to the lyric And so if he
Carl Sims: I do.
Miyo Strong: like he's been intentional and thoughtful about the pairing like I always love when [01:52:00] he
Carl Sims: Very much
Miyo Strong: family cause I immediately am like listening to the lyrics I'm like yep Like
Carl Sims: yeah.
Miyo Strong: it Like he's a big lyric fan and he's helped me pay more attention to that too
Carl Sims: Do you remember the song? There's a song I sent to Jason Emil before their marriage, before he got married the day before.
Miyo Strong: Ben Adams right
Carl Sims: Yeah, Ben Plat
Miyo Strong: Plat Yeah Yeah yeah yeah
Carl Sims: Grow as we Go. Yeah. So anyhow, side note,
Miyo Strong: me when I was having the worst ever mom moment and you sent
Carl Sims: I think it was Alicia Keys maybe, and it was, uh, you, you're, you're doing a good job.
Miyo Strong: that Yes
Carl Sims: Yeah. So yeah. I love lyrics. I know. Sorry, RI digress. but
Riley: to
Carl Sims: yeah.
Riley: Eddie Veder and when he just mumbles and, but I'm getting down with it and I'm like, I don't know what he just
Carl Sims: Yeah. That's a, you, you just make up some words that apply, right?
Riley: seen those memes of his right. Just remember when Eddie
Carl Sims: Yeah,
Riley: blah. It's his
Carl Sims: That's right. [01:53:00] Yeah.
Riley: Um, okay, so what's something quirky about you that don't know?
Carl Sims: Hmm.
Miyo Strong: Hmm That's quirky or or unexpected Maybe Um
Riley: Who knows?
Miyo Strong: little well and maybe I'm being stereotypical but I'm a super big Studio Ghibli fan so I'm a little And that's anime
Riley: that?
Carl Sims: I, I don't know either. What is that?
Miyo Strong: So it's kind Japan's Disney
Carl Sims: Gotcha. Gotcha. Yeah.
Miyo Strong: I have a studio Ojibwe tattoo It matches my daughters like it's it's kind of Japan's Disney but like way better Way better Just so I'm a little bit of a nerd that way I
Riley: Nice,
Carl Sims: Yeah. Quirky. Uh, this is, I listened, uh, I watch a lot of reality shows, one, and, [01:54:00] and it's not because I like reality tv, but I like to watch people's interactions and how people act with each other. Don't you dare tell every about I, I thought you were gonna talk anyhow.
Miyo Strong: No I have
Carl Sims: We have some
Miyo Strong: that's quirky about Carl
Riley: let's hear it.
Carl Sims: anyhow, so, yeah. Yeah.
Miyo Strong: Some reality shows
Carl Sims: no, that's it. I love it. Just because I love, I, I'm a real observer of people and how they interact and I can spot fakeness fairly quickly. And, uh, so I, I just like reading people, understanding them. You can tell a lot about a person pretty quick, I think, if they're genuine or not. Yeah.
Riley: Oh my
Miyo Strong: Okay So something quirky about Carl that I actually it's so endearing and that's why I'm sharing it Um he has separate deodorant for his
Carl Sims: Oh, geez.
Miyo Strong: But but let me tell you something you stink I got nothing [01:55:00] for you I got no time no energy nothing for you And Carl is one of the best smelling partners on the mat 24 7
Carl Sims: Oh boy.
Miyo Strong: he's fresh from seven rounds or whether he's just competed he always smells clean Always Like I love training with him because of I mean there's many reasons but that's one of them I'm a total smell of phobe Like if you smell bad no thank you But
Riley: what's, go
Miyo Strong: yeah tell em
Riley: What's the best, what's the best, uh, ghee soap. Then what's the, for your,
Carl Sims: Do you remember when I told you earlier we're a pretty old school family? Traditional. I think my wife uses Tide. I've never done laundry. It, you know, and, and, and let me clarify on this. I'm not an old school Archie Bunker. My wife does what she wants when she wants. I listen to her. She runs my books at my business.
We just have a pretty traditional marriage, so that sounds weird, but I [01:56:00] think she uses Tide like the pods, I think. But my geese do smell good.
Miyo Strong: Always And let me give you the best recipe And it's actually on my Instagram I need to p pin it cause so many people ask me I'm a laundry snob like Jason cooks and cleans and like does all the things cause we're not a traditional household but he is not allowed near the laundry Like I'm a total laundry snob so for gear like to strip your gear um especially like nogi gear if you get you know and you just can't get the stink out even though you've washed it So the the formula is you get a bathtub full of like the hottest most boiling water I even take boiling water and pour it in my hot tub or in my tub cause my hot water doesn't get that hot and then you put white distilled vinegar a cup of white distilled vinegar a cup of borax a cup of um bleach and a cup of Um it's the odor blaster oxyclean So it's specific it's like the blue [01:57:00] with the purple highlights It's a specific type of um oxyclean
Riley: mm-hmm.
Miyo Strong: that all together get it all dissolved before you put your clothes in there Like and that's why it's a bathtub cause a cup of anything is a lot So use your bathtub get the whole thing dissolved clean gear in there right gear that you've already washed You can't get the stink out Put clean gear in there soak it overnight And then I you'll see like within an hour you'll be like holy shit that's disgusting And then you like shove it all to the side drain the tub refill it with hot water rinse keep it in there for another 12 hours And then when you're ready to take it out wash it on hot with the same combination in the washing machine Uh maybe not the bleach depending on the color of your gear that you're putting in there But no I'm telling you like it's
Carl Sims: You should have did a just a meal podcast. She's so detailed. I love it.
Riley: I love it.
Yeah.
you should post it though. 'cause I, I want to get a copy of that post.
Miyo Strong: yeah I'll send it to you cause it's the whole it's the recipe[01:58:00]
Riley: was one
Carl Sims: You're so detailed. I love it.
Riley: kid. We were in the kid's class. I was grappling with this kid and he goes, you smell like popcorn. And it, I'm like, okay, that may not be the worst smell in the world, but when it's attached to the way you smell on a jiujitsu mat, it's, that's not good. So I thought,
Carl Sims: popcorn.
Miyo Strong: Popcorn's Okay But like
Riley: boil my stuff. I'll, I'll just boil it and then take it out. But I've, I, I screwed up one time and I boiled all my gear, my rash guards, but then I kind of for forgot and just left it in there. And the wrinkles that when I stuffed it down in there, they
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: it never came
Carl Sims: Oh
Riley: They, it
Carl Sims: wow.
Riley: like, and you could just, you could see it. And so it ruined the, the rash guard. So there is something there to art form of making this all work. Right.
Miyo Strong: Oh yeah
Carl Sims: I love it. I love it.
Miyo Strong: For sure Well and I can even tell
Riley: promise me I'll post that and I, I won't an
Miyo Strong: oh
Riley: it.
Miyo Strong: yeah for sure I should pin it up to my page There's even a guy that we grapple you know who he is at at Unified The the second I started grappling with him I was like you smell like [01:59:00] Mr Bubble Like I was so excited cause you know the pink kids uh bubble bath He's like yeah I have twins that are three years old and that's their favorite thing like the ice but
Carl Sims: Nice.
Riley: awesome.
Miyo Strong: smell That is my actually that's a quirky thing about me Like I have a ninja nose knows
Riley: Yeah, no, my wife does too, and I'm, I, yeah, I, I don't, but, but I have grappled with the occasional stinky person, and it's nasty when that
Carl Sims: Ooh. Yeah,
Riley: He's like,
Carl Sims: yeah,
Riley: Okay. Real briefly, what is the, the best advice you've ever received?
Carl Sims: yeah.
Miyo Strong: briefly and then we'll in life
Carl Sims: I can go first. If you need to think for a minute, Neil, my dad told me a long time ago, you gotta give up something to get something. And I've stuck this the rest of my life because most of the time it's your time. If you have a business, you gotta give up your time for your [02:00:00] business. If you want to relationship with your wife, you gotta give up something to get something.
And so I, I've, I've tracked that through my entire life. You always have to sacrifice somewhere. Unfortunately, for my health, most of the time it's sleep. But you gotta give up something to get something. Yeah.
Miyo Strong: And I
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Miyo Strong: I would say for me um anything in life worth having something right It's hard Anything worth doing is going to be hard So when you're in the middle of the suck like really embracing the suck and understanding if you don't have the suck you don't have you never have that perspective of when things are really good either
Riley: Yeah, well said both of you on that. So, um, tell me what is an item on your bucket list?
Carl Sims: Hmm.
Miyo Strong: I want a homestead
Riley: You already have chickens. What? What more do you
Miyo Strong: Yeah but I want like a huge ass greenhouse [02:01:00] and like I want hydroponic culture I wanna I want ducks and and lambs and goats and I wanna raise my own beef and like process my own honey Like I want a homestead
Riley: Shoot, I'm getting for reals. How about you, Carl?
Carl Sims: yeah, yeah. You know, I love to travel, travel's my thing. Um, I probably, I, I'd love to see the Northern Light Lights. That would be something that I'd think would be fun. Awesome to do. So, yeah, Northern Lights is on the bucket list for sure.
Riley: I've
Carl Sims: And one other thing, I have to see every, every national park in the US
Riley: so you
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: parks earlier, and this is, this is again, question for my sake and my sake. Only you go there, like I go to national parks, I love them, but I do not visit the tourist spots. I go
Carl Sims: Yeah, sure. Right. Yeah. So it, I think it's a, it's a catch 22 because those [02:02:00] are the hot spots. But where you, a lot of times what happens is most people are not gonna hike more than two miles. That's the general rule of thumb is you get back into the spots. So I do, this is where I probably OCD. We're getting ready to go to the California coast.
I will research it, research it, watch YouTube, watch videos, and it's like, my wife's like, oh my gosh. But, um, because a lot of times it's the off the grid places that are really cool. And a lot of times we, we travel very economically. We do a lot of car camping. Um, you know, just anyhow, so that's how, how we do it.
But definitely get back in, uh, you know, uh, I'm a, I'm a, I'll go 20 miles. Uh, my wife's 10 miles or less, but I will go 20. I, I don't mind going deep. Yeah.
Riley: I think that's a, that's a big deal. I, I like that off the beaten path. And you're right, [02:03:00] you don't have to get very far before you get away from most people. Right.
Carl Sims: Mm-hmm. Right.
Riley: Okay. Like I said, that was a selfish question. Okay. You too. What are your favorite book of all time? Something you recommend everyone read?
Miyo Strong: Okay so for work and just the general like the beginning of this podcast and everything the body keeps the
Carl Sims: Watch this. I, I know where she was going. Go.
Miyo Strong: It's still good The Body Keeps The Score by Bessel Vander Cole There's three Right Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Vander Kot Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker And then tr Transforming Trauma with Juujitsu is another So those three are really amazing as far as like work and learning and education goes Um my favorite book of all time like otherwise I probably couldn't nail it to one But I really like um historical fiction and Ken Fett has a really great series that I love um world Without End Like it's [02:04:00] it's like a six book series And so Ken Fett is probably one of my favorite authors I'm a sucker for smut You guys Like I love the vampire smut I love the famous
Carl Sims: That's right.
Miyo Strong: the like I love
Carl Sims: Oh my God.
Miyo Strong: is so heavy like every day I'm like working with survivors It's heavy We're moving legislative sessions we're doing like it's heavy heavy heavy I want to like use reading as a checkout a lot of times So I love the fantasy books and like the vampire series and the um I just finished one called the Gilded Prisoner series which was awesome It was like six books and totally like Faye and Warriors and like all so I love to read and I'm also you guys you gotta read yesteryear So I just started this book I'm like halfway through just started this week Um but it follows like a social media influencer who's like you know trad wives are so [02:05:00] like popular right now Traditional wives kind of but Carl you and Kelly don't even have this Like a trad wife is barefoot baking from the grain They grew that they had the mill by themselves you know what I mean It's not
Carl Sims: Ugh.
Miyo Strong: doable but yesterday
Riley: what they.
Miyo Strong: kind of But it's the the premise of the book is that it's it's take this woman who has millions of dollars at her disposal but she's an influencer kind of like ballerina farms or one of those famous ones But behind the scenes she's got four nannies and like a crew that you know Anyway so yesterday takes this influencer And it's so witty and funny the way the writing is And then it ends up being transported back to the same property in Idaho by the way um in 19 50 18 55 And she's like oh shit Like trad wife is like literal trad wifeing is you know it's just so far it's very interesting So yes your year
Riley: than I thought. Yeah,
Miyo Strong: I have so many [02:06:00] like I love to read
Riley: that's awesome,
Carl Sims: Uh,
Riley: Carl.
Carl Sims: my all time favorite book is, is, is Black like me, and I can't remember the author's name. It's, it's slipping me right now, but, and it's not for the reasons that a lot of people think I'm not a, a race is not an issue with me, but the reason why I like it so much is because it puts you in someone else's shoes.
And sometimes we don't do that. And so I love the book because it it what happens. Uh, give you a really quick, brief synopsis. There's a, it's a real, it's a true story. This, uh, um, reporter. Goes to a, a, uh, skin doctor. I can't think of
Miyo Strong: dermatologist
Carl Sims: right now, but the dermatologist, well, it's not even anyhow.
He gets, he takes pills that changes his skin tone to black. And then he, this is in, said in at, at real time, the late fifties, and he, he goes [02:07:00] around in the south and sees how people react to him as a black man versus a white man. And, and so it's like, it's like I said, this isn't about race, but it's just about putting yourself in someone else's shoes to see.
If I was a, a part Asian, uh, female, what would it be like to be a woman in today's society? Or right now being a white man in America is a little bit tough on certain things. Right. So just putting yourself in someone's else's shoes. That's why I love that book. I read that book probably when I was 12 and then again a couple of times, and it just an amazing book.
Yeah.
Riley: that?
Carl Sims: I highly recommend it black like me and I'll think of the author. Yeah.
Riley: Um, there was, that, that gal that herself up to look like a guy and then went to experience what guys experience in the world.
Carl Sims: Ah, okay. No.
Riley: cool. It's a, it's, it's, I think it's, there's more video. I didn't, it's not a book, but I
Carl Sims: Okay.
Riley: disclaimer that [02:08:00] it may be a book too.
But I, I saw the video part of the interviews that she went through and she's like, it is not what I thought at all. You know, like,
Carl Sims: Yeah, sure. Yeah. Mio.
Riley: man,
Carl Sims: Mio.
Miyo Strong: I will try it
Riley: so let's, um, let's talk about where you guys can be found. Social media tags, us, that kind of thing.
Miyo Strong: Um just Utah Ji's Mama on Instagram Ji's mama on TikTok I'm not really on TikTok yeah And Utah ji's mama.com is my uh And then that you can also find Jason on there as well for his blades
Riley: Nice. Yeah. 'cause he's the knife maker, right?
Miyo Strong: Yes He's a true artist Like it's the things he comes up with man He's he's the Renaissance man that nobody knows he is
Riley: Oh my gosh. No, I saw some of his blades at the train high camp last year and they were, it's
Miyo Strong: Yeah
Riley: awesome. Yeah. Carl
Carl Sims: Yeah. Uh, you know, um, my Instagram handle [02:09:00] is Carl Warren, G Sims, my real name. I was Warren G before Warren G the Rapper. So, uh, that's, yeah. Yeah. So that's, that's it. And then just on, uh, Facebook, uh, if anyone uses that anymore, just if Carl, Carl, Carl Sims. And then of course the pit Challenge, um, is, is on Instagram as well.
So, yeah, that's it.
Riley: Well, I'll have, I'll make sure that I have all that information. Um, if I don't have the websites and that thing, uh, send 'em to me so I have that so we can tag 'em in the thing. You both sent me a good description, so we're, we're gonna be great there. I'm excited to,
Carl Sims: Yeah.
Riley: this episode.
I'm gonna get this one out quick. Um, 'cause we got an event coming up that we wanna promote here. So, I'm,
Carl Sims: you.
Riley: really
Carl Sims: Thank you.
Riley: both came on. This was a fun conversation. I thought it flowed super well and it was, it was just fascinating to hear both your stories and kind of what, what you're doing in this world to make it a better place.
[02:10:00] So, thanks for being here.
Miyo Strong: you for having
Carl Sims: you.
Riley: Yeah. It was such a
Carl Sims: Yes. And I'm so glad I found your podcast, RI I listened to it now, and I was listening to the Barefoot Shoe guy. Uh, I know Mona and Mike very well, so I listened to their podcast. You're an excellent interviewer. I appreciate your time. Thank you.
Miyo Strong: Thank you
Carl Sims: Yep.
Miyo Strong: much
Riley: Go Earn Your SALT you two!