Let me introduce myself. My first Blog.

Hello, first of all welcome and thanks for taking the time to read my blog.

On my homepage you may have already read a brief summary about me, in this post I will go into more detail about who I am, where I come from, what I do and of course what I'm passionate about.

So, without further ado lets begin, and where better to start than the beginning? I was born in a small yet beautiful town in the south west of England called Exmouth. In this part of my life I was only referred to as Benjamin, which at the time and even now isn't necessarily the coolest of names, cheers for that Mum. I grew up on the outskirts of Exmouth on the Thomas close housing estate. The whole estate was full of kids of all ages to play and socialise with, however I was a shy young man and often referred to as "mummys boy" partly due to being an only child. It was difficult to fit in with my peers and when I did i rarely came out of my shell, I believe the bowl haircut, no front teeth and the glasses had a lot to do with that though LOL (see image below).

I present you the "Benjamin bowl cut" courtesy of mum.

Growing up in Thomas close among all the other kids toughened me up over the years. From the disagreements and scuffles to the games of British bulldog in the play park and man hunt (extreme hide and seek) in the woods resulting in dump tackles, ripped t-shirts, bruises and abundance of laughs. Looking back on them times us kids never really had a lot (wealth, possessions or technology) but in reality we had everything we needed. I am truly grateful for growing up where I did, and for those desperate years where my mum would sacrifice her time and work so much just to put clothes on my back to make sure I had no different to anyone else. Moving along we have the Exmouth Community College days. During these years I would really try hard to fit in starting off in the first year the model student attaining good grades and in turn did not make a lot of gains in popularity. I Wanted to make my mum proud with my academics and would work hard to do so. Very soon I came to realise this didn't make me stand out at all and in fact made me absolutely average and blend in with the crowd. This feeling of average and ordinary would be a fear for me even up to now where I find it hard to settle and have to always aspire to accomplish more. This has been a driving force to strong work ethic and on occasions even success. In the first year of secondary school and at 13 years old all this feeling of being average and unpopular led to was his desperate attempt to shake off my shy and slightly socially awkward self. This is where decided to become more alike someone that would of irritated me before - the attention seeking "class clown". While getting the grades was keeping my mum happy and proud making my peers laugh and want to be around me became more of a priority and even slightly addictive as it would land me recognition in school and put me on the radar of the "cool kids". Gradually as the years went on I slowly gained the friendships I so often craved and nobody called me Benjamin anymore, people used my "cool" new nickname Reesy which although now seems ridiculous, at the time came with a huge sense of belonging which was highly more appealing than academic success, face palm. Reesy is what my friends mostly refer to me and know me as today. Benjamin is reserved for my mother. Especially when she is mad at me of course. I would go on to leave school with ever so slightly above average grades and never realising my academic potential at this time, I don't feel the standard package of formal eduction suited my style of learning at the time, maybe that will change over time and as I mature. Through becoming the class clown and devoted entertainer of others I had gained a new found confidence in myself and as crazy as it sounds whenever I took on the "persona" of Reesy I approached every task, goal or social scenario I did with assertiveness and convictiction that I would of never of achieved before which Is why I almost see Benjamin and Rees as two different people. Ofcourse not physically different or some split personality but more so as separate times in my life. I'm sure someone reading this can relate to the fact that as we go through life certain events, scenarios or lessons lead to us almost evelving and changing into different versions of ourselves. Hopefully for the better, right? I was always an all rounder and "jack of all trades master of none" when it came to sporting events with school I could perform in all the sports I tried, not badly but certainly never with outstanding talent like some of friends. Again this feeling of average kept haunting me in the back of my mind, and my high expectations of myself and competitiveness which I would only start to understand more later on in life compelled me to at least try and achieve more. I began taking some advice from a friend and went to trials for one of the local football teams (Exmouth Juniors Under 16s). I was so nervous as I had never trialled for a sporting team before and I was either going to get the result of acceptance and belonging which I badly wanted or I was going to get sent home with my tail between my legs plus the feeling none of us like "sorry, your not good enough".

Let the trials begin, my mum dropped me off and waited in her car for the full 2 hours ready to take me home either in disappointment or elation. I heard about the trials on short notice so I didn't have enough time to get football boots like everyone else so I turned up in the only trainers I had, high top basket ball shoes, face palm. Living up Thomas Close I had access to a park where I would practice with a football everyday for fun, often annoying the neighbours by using the wall to their house as a target or missing and hitting their car, apologies if your reading this and it was your car. At the trials the coach Clive Amor got us doing drills that would test our speed, agility, handling and shot accuracy. Surprisingly my poor choice of footwear had little to no effect on any of these aspects and Clive seemed happy with what I could do on the football field, although that didn't guarantee me a slot on the team. There were close to fifty other equally and more skilled participants taking part with only 5 slots available.

After the training was complete we were all gathered in a group and Clive went on to read the names off the list that he wanted to play in their league game on Saturday, my name was the fourth to be called out which overwhelmed me with happiness and gave me the sense of purpose and belonging that I needed at that adolescent stage in my life to feed my confidence and belief in myself. I believe joining a sports team whatever it may be is such a benefit for any young person and their development into an adult as competition alone teaches so many valuable lessons. I only played football for a short time and was never the most skilled player or athlete on the team but one thing that set me apart from others would be my work ethic, I would never miss a training session and I was never late in fact I would go out of my way to train in my own time in order to be more skilled and fitter. That same drive to be better led to a conversation with one of my close friends from the football days Ben Collins who suggested circuit training with him at a gym he attended, so in the pursuit of being a better athlete I found myself on the doorstep of "The Lions Den" a gym under the tutelage of Dave Matthews. I wouldn't realise how much of an impact this decision, Gym and Dave would have on my life but I would soon understand the reality of the choice I made in the coming years. The moment I stepped in the gym it was like an environment I had never been in before. The Lions Den was completely matted out with a cage in the back, when the class began Dave would be stern and had a no nonsense policy when we were training using a military style of coaching I had never see before. All he required was from the participants of the class was 1) hard work 2) listening 3) tidy away you kit when your finished. The first requirement was no problem for me and in fact it was a perfect fit, the second took some time but when I gave Dave my full concentration and attention he not only aided me into, becoming a better athlete but also a better person and this remains true 10 years later. If I'm honest the last requirement I'm still working on, as I often leave my boxing gloves in inappropriate places, one time prompted fellow professional fighter and team mate Craig White to tape them to the ceiling of the gym leading to a long game of hot and cold in pursuit of them but thats another story I will go into more detail in a later blog. One night I attended the Lions den on a different night to what normally did, this wasn't the usual weight and fitness circuit I walk into, there were some tough looking guys wrapping their hands and putting on fingerless 4oz gloves. Suddenly I had realised I stumbled across an MMA sparring class, I didn't want to lose face and leave even if my gut feeling was "get the hell out of here" so when Dave called everyone on to the mats I joined. I didn't own any gloves but fortunately (or unfortunately) there was always spare. As I put the gloves on my hands my heart started racing and I got my first ever feeling of adrenaline the sport would give me. Dave gave me a brief on what we were about to do and assigned me a partner. At this stage I had never thrown a punch in my life. Me and my partner touched gloves and I went for the classic over hand right winding my arm up in a motion that Dave would later go on to describe as a "telegraph to her majesty the Queen". Unsurprisingly the guy saw the punch coming and before I could finish my epic attempt of a first punch he stuck a stiff left jab right down the middle squashing my nose and stopping my advance in its track. Blood went streaming out of my delicate yet fat nose and as the metallic and claret fluid hit my taste buds I experienced a unique and new sensation leaving me with one choice that would define my future. Fight or Flight. "the instinctive physiological response to a threatening situation, which readies one either to resist forcibly or to run away." so put simply "Get the hell in, or Get the hell out" In the blink of an eye I made the decision to go forward with very little regard for any further damage I may take I just wanted to get him back, I chose to fight. However Dave soon reminded me that I need to control my emotions and use what he would go on to teach me over the coming years as "controlled aggression". This one experience in the gym was life changing for me because I quickly realised what I wanted to do in life and I quickly swapped training on the football field for training my technique on the mats and in the cage. Getting better in every aspect of MMA along with the family environment and sense of belonging at the Lions Den would soon become more and more addicting to me to the point I would begin to put it before the A levels I was doing at the time. Eventually I dropped out of college to train full time, and after competing a few times at amateur accumulating consecutive victories around the country we made the decision to turn professional. A lot of people have something to fall back on if their fighting was to "go wrong" but I never had that, I decided to invest my all into MMA which meant I had to ignore advice from others to "get a trade" or "go to University and get a degree". Fortunately my mother and my close circle saw the passion and hunger I had for the sport and supported me in this decision even though it meant I had to work some low paid jobs and difficult hours to support myself. Now during my rest from training I enjoy self education and I'm using it to research ways to invest and manage my finances and tease entrepreneurial ideas. Discipline and confidence from martial arts and most importantly the close guidance and advice of Dave lead into my work, and whatever job I was doing would always work very hard, this led to me saving enough money to travel America to train with Team alpha male home to world class fighters competing on the biggest stage and where I want to eventually be - The UFC. I picked up so much knowledge making regular trips to California and even met my first love along the way, Angela who is also a dedicated martial artist who truly understands my passion and drive for sport. As I reached my early 20's i had fought Professionally on some of the most popular promotions in Europe like Cage warriors and BAMMA never taking an easy path with most of my opponents going on since to win or fight for world titles. After having mixed results against talented opposition in weight classes ranging from 135 pounds all the way to 155 pounds I have today finally found a home at 145 pounds where I feel I can perform to my full potential. Now at the ripe old age of 26 my 10 years of dedication to the sport has began to pay off as I received a job offer to move to overseas in the middle east as a close combat instructor giving the opportunity to teach what I'm passionate about while allowing me to finally earn enough to put into my savings and dabble in investment opportunities. Also most recently I am coming off a victory in my MMA career against an experienced and dangerous opponent which will undoubtedly propel me forward onto bigger opportunities in 2020.

This was blog was a bit longer than what some of my others will be in order to give you more of an idea of who I am and a bit of how I got to where I'm at now. I would appreciate any feedback on what you either like or I could improve on for the next blog and get some ideas on what you would enjoy reading about. Targets: UFC contract by 29 years old. Career: Gain further experience as an international instructor and establish more financial assets through investment to subsidise my MMA. Thanks for Reading. Ben.