Everything Self Defense: martial arts schools

Showing posts with label martial arts schools. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Psychological defense against violent intimidation

An effective and often neglected method of avoiding conflict is psychologically defending yourself against an intimidating person. Many self defense and martial arts schools teach that when faced with someone intimidating you, you should be ready to respond physically. They don't teach you how to deal with the psychological aspect. Physical self defense should be your last resort. This guide will give you insights into how to diffuse a potentially violent situation from an intimidating and violent individual. Down below, i've posted a helpful link to deal with intimidation.

I will create the following scenario and i want you to think about your responses. Imagine an abnormally large menacing muscular man approaches you at a bus stop or in a park and let's assume that you practice self defense. Imagine you both engage in the following dialogue:

Man : "..don't you practice self defense in X school?"

You: "..yea i do.."

The man then aggressively gets in your face and says in a more challenging tone of voice.

Man: "..well i think your a fraud...i think what your learning is garbage and it's what's gonna get you killed...you know i just got out of prison and i've beaten guys like you to a pulp...what's to stop me from crushing your skull in and having your blood flowing all over this ground right now?!? Think you can take me on?!? I will destroy you fool!"

Here are the some of the common mistakes people make.

1. Get defensive - When people are insulted or verbally attacked in any way, their response is to defend themselves. You may respond by insulting your offender back or justifying yourself in the face of accusations ex. being a fraud. Once you get defensive, you give your offender power over you because he/she knows your weaknesses. All your offender has to do is keep pressuring you until a fight breaks out because you are validating his or her judgement on you.

2. Not taking what your intimidator says seriously - Some people may laugh it off and say "yea man i don't buy it..." Your offender may say something like "oh you think this is a joke?!?" then start attacking you. This is bad because if your offender threatened you and there's some credibility to the threat, your verbal attacker may try to communicate violently that he or she means serious business. You should always take threats seriously.

3. Avoidance - Some people will shut down and try to psychologically avoid the situation by saying something like "i don't want any trouble." The person intimidating you may respond with "well trouble found you. Why don't you man up and deal with it?!?" Once you are in this particular situation, it's unavoidable unless there was a way of escape. If you try to back up without first disengaging psychologically, you give your offender power over you and he or she may end up attacking you.

If you don't respond with violence, the person intimidating you may try to keep pushing your buttons and finding out your weaknesses by saying something along the lines of:

"...what if i ended up hurting your loved ones, would you fight me then? I just threatened your loved ones and you won't do anything about it..your pathetic! Your a coward! Your a joke!"

If you've snapped out of fear for your loved ones safety then you've already given what your intimidators want and that is violence. If you suddenly freeze in fear, that's bad because you could get hit at any moment and not be prepared to respond.

What's the best way to diffuse the situation without resorting to violence?

* Know your enemy - According to behavioral theorists, people who resort to intimidation do so out of fear. It's fear of your race, your skills, your gender, your orientation, or some aspect of you that makes them feel inferior. Perhaps they grew up in an environment where they've been intimidated by authority so their way of coping is by intimidating others and believing that the only way to survive is to intimidate. Think about this. Why would someone who is truly secure in his or her knowledge seek to intimidate someone who is seen as weaker than him or her? Only someone who seeks to prove something to him or her self would go out of the way to intimidate you. Behind whatever image the person intimidating you puts up, there are hidden vulnerabilities.

* Keep your distance - Keep your enemy in your vision. Last thing you want is someone sneaking up behind you and hitting you with a weapon before you get jumped. Don't allow yourself to get too close.

* Focus on your body language - Show no aggression or any emotion. Keep a calm composure. Focus on breathing. Let the person intimidating you that his or her methods won't work on you. Don't look him or her in the eyes. Your focus should be on his or her body so you'll be able to respond quicker in case of an attack.

* Emphasize with your enemy - Learn to see the inner child of the person intimidating you. He or she may scream, destroy objects, and do many things to instill fear in you but there's a hidden message being communicated. Maybe he/she has never been acknowledged as a child or bullied. Either way, try to put yourself in that person's shoes. Show empathy by thinking "it must not be easy to come from a place where you had to compete to show dominance...it must not be easy living in an environment where you have to resort to violence to communicate your feelings" By showing compassion, you will become less afraid and less stressed out as you will begin to see the human side of your potential attacker.

* Don't assume the victim role - Resist the urge to fall into the victim mentality where you feel you are powerless to do anything in these types of situations. Change the way you view yourself and learn to see yourself as a problem solver. If you see yourself as a victim, you may end up blaming yourself for not fighting back afterwards.

* Focus on yourself, not on your enemy - Your intimidator will shift the focus from you to him/her and how "tough" he/she is ex. "..i just got out of prison and i've beaten guys like you to a pulp!" When you focus on your enemy, that's what creates fear. When you are facing an intimidator, keep the focus on yourself and what you've accomplished. Focus on your abilities and be confident in who you are.

* Communicate with your verbal attacker - Rather than assume everything he or she says is wrong, validate his or her words. That is, learn to see your attacker as a partner rather than a threat. Get your offender to express his or her feelings in a constructive way to get a different reaction. For example, you might ask something along the lines of:

Man: "..well i think what your learning is garbage, i think your fraud!"

You: "...thanks for your honesty, what makes you think i'm a fraud?"

This will cause the person intimidating you to process your question and think of an answer thus diffusing the situation to some degree. Continue to ask probing questions to get to the root of what the intimidating person really wants from you.

* Know your strengths and improve your weaknesses - In order for you to withstand psychological pressure and keep from losing self control, you must know yourself. What are your weaknesses? If your attacker points them out to make you feel inferior, realize how valuable your strengths are and how you are trying your best. For example, if you are insecure about your striking ability then focus on other areas which you excel at and stress their importance.

* Diversion - Shift the focus away from yourself to other topics like the sun or the police to distract the initmidator from channeling his or her energy on you. For instance when the man in the scenario above instigates a fight, you could say "by the way, there's other people staring at us.."

* Assertively set consequences - If your intimidator persists in violating your boundaries and gets physical with you, set proper consequences. Make the consequences non-aggressive but also non-submissive. For example, if he or she persists on violating your physical boundaries then you might say something along the lines of "If you don't stop, i'm going to have to call the police. Is that what you want?" This may quickly turn from violation to respect for not backing down.

During training, practice these techniques with a partner or in mental rehearsals. Go through my scenario again and see how it's different from your prior response. Remember that someone who intimidates you is acting out of inner misery. Hopefully your offender will back away after he/she realizes you aren't intimidated or you'll have an opportunity to walk away from the situation when the opportunity presents itself.

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Sunday, January 15, 2017

Self defense against an aggressive and violent attacker

One of the biggest mistakes you can make is assume that because your trained in combat, you can easily deal with an aggressive and violent attacker. You should be more concerned with an aggressive and violent attacker than a trained one. Why? A violent and aggressive opponent is more committed to hurting you than the average person. The more violent and aggressive, the more dangerous. The problem with many self defense and martial arts schools is they train you to deal in a controlled environment. If your training to box with someone who is also disciplined in boxing then of course you will have time to respond both physically and mentally. Against an aggressive and violent person is a completely different story because his/her mentality and method of fighting is different. You don't know what he/she is capable of or just how brutal and violent he/she is. Against ferocious attacks at high speed, weapons, both physical and psychological pressure - you might find yourself knocked out or worse in spite of your training. This guide will help you deal with these types of attackers.

1) Defend yourself psychologically - If there's a build up of aggression and intimidation on behalf of your potential attacker, don't panic or get defensive. Remain calm and keep in mind that your potential attacker is acting out of fear or pain. Your attacker is just as human as you are. Focus on your breathing.

2) Learn how to defend against a barrage of attacks - One of the most common types of attacks is a flurry of punches and kicks in the streets. You must learn how to block effectively to shield yourself. You've probably seen martial arts films where the untrained fighter gets angry and starts delivering a barrage of attacks as the skilled martial artist calmly deflects or dodges each one. In real life, this would not work. As soon as you try to block one punch, you will get hit in the face or the ribs by another one. What's the best way to deal with these types of attacks? A good defensive measure. I personally like to use the pensador guard because it offers protection but also allows use your elbows to break your attacker's fists.

3) Intercept your attacker - If you move back, that gives your attacker a psychological advantage and you will likely get hit eventually. Ideally, you'll want to intercept your attacker and close the gap. If your attacker kicks, you deliver a stop kick and apply forward pressure (step in) as you knock him/her off balance. As you drive forward with the pensador guard, you control (grab) the elbows to stop your attacker from attacking and take him/her out (headbutts or other means of attack). You could also kick a charging attacker and move out of the line of attack (the direction of punches) before you attack from the side or other angles. The goal is to intercept the barrage of attacks and prevent your attacker from attacking period.

As i mentioned earlier, it's a bad idea to come unprepared against an aggressive and violent attacker with improper training. I'm not saying it's wrong to train with someone who's a skilled sparring partner. This training is good to learn how to attack and defend properly but you'll need diversity in your sparring partners. You'll need to learn how to handle the stress and pressure of various kinds of attacks via. wild ferocious aggressive quick strikes. Practice with a sparring partner who spars dirty (groin strikes, headbutts, bites, improvised weapons, etc.) and breaks away from the typical disciplined manner of attacking. Get into the mind of an aggressive and violent attacker then you will understand his or her method of attack.

Monday, December 19, 2016

Fight strategies vs. techniques

There are many people going into self defense wondering "which techniques can i use to beat bigger and badder opponents...what's the most effective punch to beating someone in a street fight.." They go into martial arts schools trying to learn how to deal with many different types of attacks. They want to learn techniques, techniques, and more techniques.

The problem is that you won't ever be able to excel in self defense if you rely only on techniques. There are many martial arts and self defense schools that teach techniques but neglect the strategies of self defense. Strategies, principles, and concepts of self defense are far more important than techniques. If you always rely on techniques, you will never become a proficient fighter in self defense. That's why you'll rarely see me teaching you any techniques in my blog posts. Techniques are just the tools to help you achieve a certain goal but they are not the foundation of self defense. You can learn techniques on how to deal with a hook punch or a headlock but if you don't learn certain principles such as keeping distance, balance, when to attack, efficiency, etc. then techniques are worthless. Not all techniques can be applied to every situation so it's important to understand strategy.

If you must learn techniques, which ones should you learn? The simplest ones. People will try to sell you flashy techniques that look good in demonstration but are impractical in a real street fight. You won't be able to recall everything under high levels of stress. Simplicity and efficiency are what determines whether or not a certain techniques are effective. If you perform a set of fancy techniques, someone can intercept with a simple punch and you'll be knocked out cold. The more simple a technique is, the faster you'll be able to recall it and respond. This applies to boxing, Karate, Wing Chun, Sambo, Krav Maga, Jiu Jitsu, or even basic punches and kicks. This video will help explain more in full detail.

Why are strategies more important than techniques? Because strategies are the plans to accomplish a specific goal. If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. If you have no guidance in dealing with specific situations, you won't know how and when to apply techniques. If you don't know when and how to apply techniques, you won't be able to apply them at all. Learn strategies, concepts, and principles of self defense. Only then will you be truly wise and able to see many different violent situations more clearly.

I hope that this post gave you some insights into how to improve your training.

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