My daughter performed in her first ballet recital recently. She’s four, so her part was small, but we were there for the whole thing.

Before the show, the school owner spoke. He talked about why the arts matter, why it’s worth supporting them, worth training in them. His students were learning dance, he said. But that wasn’t really what they were learning. They were learning posture. How to walk into a room. How to carry themselves.

After the show, my daughter pulled me aside. Watch this, she said. She named a move and did it. Then another. She wanted me to see what she could do.

A few days later I was driving my son to class. He asked me to put on Lee Greenwood. I did, and he sang the whole thing from memory. He learned it in kindergarten. He just wanted to sing it. When you’re good at something, you want to show people.

It’s jiu-jitsu. You sign up to learn how to fight, or at least not lose one. But along the way, other things happen. You walk differently. When you’re out, you look around. You notice the guy who doesn’t fit. The anxiety you used to carry starts to fade.

But there’s more. At some point, you realize you’re good at this. Not good compared to the purple belt who trains six days a week and makes you feel like a beginner. Good in a quieter way. When a first-day student comes in and you’re the one showing them something, you feel it. You’re in the club. Membership means you know something most people don’t. You can do something most people can’t.

Being good at jiu-jitsu gives you confidence in everything else. Not because of the cliche about “applying jiu-jitsu to XYZ,” but something simpler. You know what it feels like to be good at something hard.