Editor's Note: (Loretta Cusack-Doyle has been actively involved in judo for over 40 years. Crowned world champion in 1982, the eighth-dan judoka today spends her time coaching and commentating around the world. )
(CNN) When I started judo aged 10, I was hyperactive, dyslexic and found achieving at school very difficult.
I was exasperated with trying to learn, and I felt I was not only a menace to my family but also unable to channel my energies.
Too small to compete at first, I was made to sit on the sidelines for something like six months watching -- totally frustrated that I wasn't able to get out there.
Judo gave me that release, and it gave me that confidence to say I was good at something. Some 44 years later, that feeling has stuck with me.
After decades on the mat, Cusack- Doyle is now a commentator for the European Judo Union.
'An education in life'
Three years in, I started competing for Great Britain. I found that both at school and competing, judo was giving me more and more confidence. It was also giving me an education in life.
These life skills of interacting with other boys and girls of my age, learning about other countries, traveling the world. It just gave me something different, even down to learning a new language, which was Japanese.
You learn Japanese because your sport is Japanese, and all these words -- from Hajime to Ippon -- were giving me something more and something extra to what my friends at school had.
Those memories stayed with me.
The reason I started teaching judo, and the reason I continue to teach, is for the values it gave me -- confidence, discipline and respect -- not only for myself, but the people around me as well.
It gave me those life tools to be able to encourage others, and myself, to go on and achieve more in life.
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A positive mindset
You hear a lot of people in sport saying, "I did a bit of that, I tried and I didn't think I was very good so I stopped."
For me, I learned the tools to say, "Well, if you're not good enough, just keep trying."
As long as you put the work in, you'll achieve something. Instead of saying, "Oh, I don't know" or "maybe," you turn around and start saying, "Yes, of course, I will" or "I will be better" or "I am good."
Those positive values, instilled at an early age, helped me in adulthood as well.
Now I pass them on in my teaching. It's so rewarding because I see some children that come in to my classes and they won't even give you eye contact.
They look away, they're very shy, they're withdrawn. They're often just three of four years old, still hanging behind their mother or father as they walk through that door. They're terrified.
But I just say to their parents,"It's OK, let them sit there and watch."
Judo through the lens
Born into a life of judo, International Judo Federation photographer Jack Willingham goes through his work, picking out his favorite images and explaining why he loves the sport.
"I have been a judo fan all my life," says Willingham. "I was a volunteer at the Athens 2004 Olympics in the judo and watched Ilias Iliadis win Olympic gold at 17 years old (I was 16 at the time). So for me, it has been amazing to be able to document the ups and downs of his career so closely. He is one of the most spectacular judokas, when he's on the mat something extraordinary invariably happens! He is also one of my favorite judoka of all time. I have two shots of him that I particularly like. This is at the 2011 World Championships in Paris, which he would go on to win to become a double world champion. In the semifinal against one of his great rivals Kiril Denisov, he threw with this incredible Ura Nage for ippon to put him into the final."
"Not such an historic moment, but one of my favorite action shots ever. Both men clear of the mat, in mid air, this is Iliadis throwing Noel Van T End with Uchi Mata to win the 2014 Dusseldorf Grand Prix."
Maljinda Kelmendi has been one of the most dominant judokas on the planet over the last four years," says Willingham. "This is partly thanks to the efforts of the International Judo Federation and its president Marius Vizer, who recognized Kosovo as a nation on the judo circuit. The International Olympic Committee accepted Kosovo into the Games in time for Rio 2016, allowing her to become the first ever Olympic gold medalist from that country. This shot is her leaving the tatami after the Olympic final, completely overcome with emotion, her coach Driton Kuka in the background, also with tears in his eyes."
"The second shot I am proud of as it's IOC president Thomas Bach awarding Kelmendi her medal. Once again it's historic, but I also took a risk and snuck around to the side to see both of their faces and managed to find a gap between two of the medal hostesses to get the exact shot I wanted. This also meant I'm sure I'm the only person in the world with this image!"
Hailing from Cidade de Deus -- featured in the award-winning film the City of God -- Rafaela Silva is another judoka that boasts an amazing story. Here she is celebrating becoming world champion in Rio in 2013.
"This is effectively the same shot as the previous one, when she won Brazil's first gold medal at the Rio Olympics! Although not quite the same angle, I loved the symmetry."
"I have a great friendship with Kayla Harrison, so for her to pick me out and strike a pose as she won her second Olympic title in Rio was really cool. She's a great character, and probably the most determined and mentally tough athlete I've come across."
This image is in because I love working in Paris. The iconic Bercy Stadium (as it was called then) has the best public, atmosphere and energy of any tournament in the world. This picture is France's David Larose celebrating after winning the Paris Grand Slam in 2013. I love the story it tells: Larose ecstatic standing over a distraught Davaadorj Tumurkhuleg, the scoreboard reading ippon and the crowd going mad.
"This throw from the -90kg final of the 2012 Tokyo Grand Slam final by former world champion Lee Kyu Won against Masashi Nishiyama to me really shows how much drive with the legs Lee needs to finish the throw off. I love the expression on his face, I love the flailing arms of Nishiyama trying to scramble to avoid the inevitable, there's so much in this one. It is one my favorites on image alone but, for me, it holds a special place in my heart because 2012 was the first time I had ever been to Japan, the home of judo, and it was my first visit to the legendary Tokyo Grand Slam. So to come away with such a great shot made it all the more special."
"This is a portrait of Olympic and double world champion Kaori Matsumoto. One of the most feared athletes in women's judo, her nickname is the assassin. This is her waiting to come out to fight in the Tokyo Grand Slam final. I love the intensity and the focus this image portrays."
Shohei Ono is now an Olympic and double world champion at -73kg. But in 2013, he had none of those titles. This is him throwing France's Ugo Legrand for ippon in the 2013 World Championship final to become world champion for the first time. If I could choose only one picture to define my career, it would be this. Legrand is so perfectly vertical, which you rarely see in judo... let alone in a world championship final. This was the birth of a legend.
"This shot is in for a number of reasons. Teddy Riner is now unquestionably the greatest judoka of all time. Double Olympic and nine-time world champion (he's going for his tenth in November), so he had to be in my list for that. This is also in Paris, in front of his home crowd at the Grand Slam. It's a massive Uchi Mata (one of judo's classical techniques) and it's not all that often you see the men in the +100kg (some of them upwards of 150kg) launched so high and with such precision."
Before you know it, they're creeping on the mat. Before you know it, they're talking to you. And the next thing, they're actually showing you. And then next thing, they're actually telling you.
Very quickly they're an expert and they say, "I know what I'm doing."
Then you've got the other extreme of a child that walks through that door with behavior problems, perhaps hyperactive like myself all those years ago.
It's channeling that possible aggression or harnessing those behaviors into something that makes them very positive.
Sometimes they come to it having struggled on the sports field. Soon they become very very confident children, they become achievers.
Humility
Whatever size, whatever age, whatever ability or whatever disability you've got, you can do judo.
And those sorts of steps of building a child up to be creative and confident within themselves, for me, are so valuable and so rewarding.
I teach in an underprivileged area. For me, the reason I set up in schools was to keep children there. As soon as they left school, they were out on the street, they were up to no good. Some of them went home to an environment that either didn't have family waiting for them, or their parents were afflicted by drugs and drink.
Cusack Doyle with judo giant, Teddy Riner.
It was a poor environment. By keeping them in school and giving them something very productive that would build their self-esteem -- it was so much better than just saying, "Off you go, see you tomorrow."
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It made such a difference to anti-bullying campaigns in schools. As a judoka, the moral code means you support that. You protect others, even if they aren't in judo. You look after everybody else.
At the end of the day you find a lot of judoka that are very humble.
They're very humble people because of the discipline that has been instilled right from an early age.