My greatest joys came from helping other people make their achievements. —John Danaher

My biggest joys in life came from not my own achievements at all...whatever small achievements I've made. Rather, my greatest joys came from helping other people make their achievements.
—John Danaher

“Where there is no certainty, we must strive to create a set of conditions where we raise the probability to the greatest degree possible of bringing about a set of circumstances we want.” — John Danaher

Fights are won on small mundane details. -John Danaher

Fear and anger are motor inhibitors - John Danaher

John Danaher on champions from Takedown: The DNA of GSP

From the book Takedown: The DNA of GSP:

If you look at the career of the average mixed martial artist...they win one, they lose one, they win one, they lose one. But then there are the champions. And one has to learn what makes them different.

John Danaher on the benefits of Jiu Jitsu off the mat

John Danaher speaks about Jiu Jitsu not being a skill that can be used on the mat, but something that can be translated into everyday life. We're not just talking about using BJJ in self defense situations, but the mental activity of making fast decisions and coming up with quick solutions under fire. At times fast decisions are needed to be made and if you have practiced coordinating your mind to fire off fast solutions under duress, that will allow you to have that type of mental acuity in everyday life. John Danaher noted this in an interview with Open Mat Radio:

“The deepest benefits of Jiu Jitsu come off the mat.  It encourages a world-view based upon the idea of rational problem solving.  Jiu Jitsu is all about solving problems that are rapidly changing under stress, and that gives you an ability to identify the crux of the problem in front of you, even in a stressful situation and adapt your body and tactics to overcome that problem and to continue overcoming it as the problem itself changes.  It encourages you to use a very rational trial and error method, basically the same method that science uses to overcome these problems.  So it gives you this sort of problem solving mindset, which I think applies throughout life itself.”

Great Quotes by MMA Coaches

Some of the most respected coaches in Mixed Martial Arts are Greg Jackson, Firas Zahabi out of Tristar Gym, John Danaher out of Renzo Gracie's Academy and who helps Zahabi with training Georges St-Pierre, and Ricardo Liborio out of American Top Team.

With Greg Jackson, a strong them in his philosophy is suffering and the getting used to that feeling of being unpleasant. His concept of combat lends itself to training to the bitter limits and consequently the fight is a relatively pleasant encounter. Jackson has used this coaching style to breed several champions including the pound for pound number one fighter in the world at the moment, Jon Jones.



Firas Zahabi believes in preparation over everything. For the Montreal native, he looks at the fight as something not so much won in the UFC Octagon, but the result of months leading up to it in training. And he also adheres to the philosophy of  focusing on the things you can control, and discarding all thinking about the rest.




BJJ wizard and coach John Danaher is a former professor at Columbia University. He no longer teaches philosophy at the university level, but takes that brilliant knowledge and applies it into the world of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and mixed martial arts. For Danaher, he is someone who focusses on perfection and routine.


Ricardo Liborio is a legendary Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu artist and head of the American Top Team gym in Florida. Liborio believes in humility and using that trait to learn from everyone, as well as keeping a patient mind on the road to improvement.

 

John Danaher on Georges St-Pierre's positive attitude

John Danaher, who has known and taught Georges St-Pierre since he was 17 years of age, stills sees a bit of that wide-eyed teenager at times, which is something that he finds unique and charming.

Georges St-Pierre on John Danaher and Perfection

 

One thing that Georges St-Pierre admires most about his Brazilian Jiu Jitsu coach John Danaher is his focus on perfection. Something GSP and him both share:

That’s why we get along—because John and I are both obsessively compulsive. We will spend hours repeating a single technique, over and over again until I get it right. We will repeat the move. We will sit and discuss it, then start over again. We will block out all other things. We will restart until the world dissolves completely. Until nothing else matters or even exists. We will repeat it until it is mastered, no matter when that will be. One certainty, though: it will be.

John Danaher on Georges St-Pierre's work ethic and insight

John Danaher has known Georges St-Pierre since he was around the age of seventeen. During that period of time GSP was taking half day long bus rides from Montreal to New York to train at Renzo Gracie's Academy, where coach John Danaher was teaching him Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Danaher has been able to see Pierre mature into the greatest welterweight fighter of all time, one of the pound for pound best in the sport, and the second most winningest champion in UFC history with eight defenses of the 170 pound strap. For John Danaher, it was not only the great work ethic of Georges St-Pierre that impressed him, but the insight, wisdom, and intelligence he possesses:

Georges is the hardest-working athlete I ever knew. But he’s hardly the only guy out there with good work ethic. Almost every guy out there works hard. Jon Fitch is notorious and  probably, in terms of hours, outworks Georges, yet we all know what happened when they met. It’s not just his work ethic that makes his great; it’s his depth of insight that gives direction to his work that makes him great.

John Danaher on learning from anyone

 

John Danaher on being able to learn from unexpected sources:

You'd be pleasantly surprised at how you can learn valuable insights from unexpected sources. Every so often I'll see a white belt student on my mats who do something ostensibly wrong but gets a good result. I look at what happened and I play with it and something valuable may come out of it.

John Danaher on him and GSP being perfectionists

 

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John Danaher on GSP making his dream possible

John Danaher watched Georges St-Pierre take a dream in his mind and make it a reality through a plan of action:

Georges didn't just have the dream, he had the plan of action to think about the circumstances to make the dream possible.

John Danaher on improving on his knowledge

John Danaher on his sense of identity

BJJ Coach to Georges St-Pierre (GSP), Chris Weidman, as well as other MMA stars, John Danaher, has a strong sense of his own identity:

For me this sense of identity runs as thus: I stand for the application of the powers of reason and knowledge to solve those problems we deem worth solving and to overcome our fears and weakness and make progress towards our goals.

John Danaher on his purpose in life

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John Danaher on how Jiu-Jitsu overcomes complex problems

John Danaher is a highly intelligent man, who earned a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Columbia University, but found that the knowledge found on the mats of Jiu-Jitsu gyms were more in tune with what he was passionate and interested in:

As a child, a big influence upon me was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's 'The Hound Of The Bakervilles', which is essentially the story of reason being employed to defeat our primordial and irrational fears and instincts. The sport of Jiu-Jitsu is a fine example of reason and of trial and error used to overcome complex problems in an environment that naturally creates fear and weakness. As such, it fits well with my sense of personal identity.

John Danaher on Routine and Greatness

John Danaher on what he feels is important in becoming great.

John Danaher on Georges St-Pierre as a student

See GSP transform from a late teen into one of the greatest mixed martial artists of all time is something that has inspired his Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu coach John Danaher. Danaher saw the dedication, drive, hard work, vision, and determination in Georges St-Pierre, which ultimate led to him becoming the greatest welterweight champion the UFC has ever seen, and the greatest 170 pounder the sport has ever produced.

John Danaher on what makes a great athlete

Many top level athletes sometimes just seem to have an effortless feel to their game. Partly it is due to massive amounts of practice, but also the letting go of tension and just having a sense of playfulness to their craft. Georges St-Pierre is the most famous athlete that Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu wizard John Danaher has coached, and GSP often does look like he's getting everything done in effortless fashion. Jon Jones, the UFC light-heavyweight champion, he also exhibits this trait. Perhaps more than anyone in mixed martial arts, Anderson Silva epitomizes this concept. Anderson has a lot of playfulness to him in the cage to the point where you see him do things that you just couldn't imagine were possible, and were only reserved for simulated greatness in movies. This concept of having a sense of play can relate to any sport, and some of the greats in other athletic domains have demonstrated it. Wayne Gretzky, who is arguably the greatest hockey player of all time, and has smashed several NHL records, always had a very calm, effortless flow to his game. He seemed to just be flitting around aimlessly, but was always able to know where the puck was going, be able to make a brilliant pass, and know the precise moment to shoot on goal.