Get by with a little help from my friends

Jiujitsu wunderkind Meggie Ochoa had a lot to overcome, but that didn’t stop her from going for the gold.

It seems like a story made for Disney. Except this one is a bit more feminist, doesn’t involve much singing, and has social media playing a pretty big role.

Once upon a time, 24-year-old Meggie Ochoa posted a promising status on Facebook:

Hi friends and family! As some of you may already know, for the past year and a half I have been dedicating a great deal of time and energy to Brazilian Jiujitsu, training with team Atos Philippines. This summer, I am hoping to compete in the Brazilian Jujitsu World Championships.

Meggie was making a straightforward public announcement to all her friends and family: she wanted to compete in the most prestigious Jiujitsu competition in the world, and she wanted a gold medal. There were only two things getting in the way, she says: a US visa, and money.

Having quit her day job to train two to three times a day, Mondays to Saturdays, she admitted that funding was sparse. So she signed up for makeachamp.com, a crowd-funding website that allowed people to contribute to athletes who want to compete but don’t have enough compensation. This was no cutesy lemonade project. This was big boy stuff. Having trained in Jujitsu for only about a year and half, but already with 13 gold medals under her belt, this was a girl who meant serious business. Meggie’s profile on the website featured a video of her in action, plus a 1,200-word essay that spewed gusto, and heart.

Have you ever experienced feeling so strongly about something that you would do everything in your power to make the best of that something, no matter how seemingly irrational to others?

It sounded like she was talking about fighting for an unrequited love, but she was actually talking about her sport. Friends of hers have mentioned that she once said it might be hard for her to actually find a boyfriend, because she had devoted herself wholly to Jujitsu.

But for Meggie, this championship wasn’t just about her self-fulfilling dreams — it was an open invitation. She was inviting people to join her journey, because she was positive it would be a good one. She writes: “With the collective efforts that will get me to the gold, every victory will not be mine but ours.”

It’s a strong battle cry.

In the end, she was able to raise $2,360 via the website, and a corporate company had promised to sponsor the rest. But another hurdle was in the way. Her bid for a US visa was rejected. “I really fit into a profile that the Embassy would be wary of,” she says, noting that the officer did not get to ask questions that would even allow her to share her story. But giving up was not an option. A reapplication was in the works, and she was determined to be able to fly.

On her scheduled second interview, the most peculiar thing happened. Meggie and her mom were assigned the same consul officer who had rejected her first visa. But because there is a rule that the same officer cannot interview you twice, they were reassigned to another window, and the new officer (miraculously) granted her biggest wish. She was off to America!

Suddenly, Meggie’s newsfeed was filled with inspiring stories of meeting new people, training name fighters and learning for the experiences every day. In one of her posts, she shared that she is able to train with Kyle Maynard, the first quadruple amputee to ascend Mount Kilimanjaro without the aid of prosthetics. Friends from home were captivated by her stories. She kept her promise when she said that this was a “shared journey.”

When D-day finally arrived, Meggie felt no pressure. She was pumped. She wanted that gold. Her mom even styled her hair for her. Her opponent was a Brazilian fighter from her respective belt and weight division.

“Normally I always do a takedown; that’s when both of you are standing up and you wrestle them to the floor. That’s my usual technique. But since she was physically strong, it would be harder. So what I did was I initiated a pull to guard. It’s when you grip the person while you’re on the ground and she’s up, so that you can sweep her and turn her over until you end up on your feet and she’s the one lying down.” In the end, the score was 10-0. Meggie had won.

“The way I see sports, it’s not just because you want to excel in something for yourself. For me, after you reach your highest potential, I think it’s also time for you to give back.” By that, Meggie means inspire. She means that by achieving her own dreams, she hopes that in return, it will inspire other girls to be so crazy, hungry, intensely passionate about something that it’s almost irrational. It’s insane. And it’s something that only you can really decide to just go for.