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The fastest way to ingrain the TFT System into your subconscious is to follow a specific path of instruction. Now there are two ways to accomplish this.
Target Focus Training is a “principle-based” system, meaning that instead of starting with moves or techniques we seek to identify and understand the elements at work in every successful use of violence.
Once you know why the winners win and the losers lose it becomes a simple thing to discard useless movement and technique and replace them with action that makes winning the most likely outcome. Instead of doing what’s popular or cool or fun to train — or even what seems to make sense from a sane, socialized perspective — we seek to do what the untrained victorious do, to physically emulate those who spend no time on the mats and yet win in spite of that lack.
The reason an imprisoned sociopath wins is the same as a highly trained military operator… or really anyone who comes out on top in physical violence. Not because of hate or rage or training or practice, but because of debilitating injury. Period.
Before we can discuss the principles that underlie game-changing/game-winning injury, we must cover some baseline assumptions for how to make the choice to “pull the trigger” on physical violence, in other words, first principles to drive the decision-making process and initial contact.
The essential problem is one of variability in the amount of force used, or the fact that half-measures expose you to greater risk. read this entry »
“I expect the idea of being able to condition oneself to take a real hit and continue as if nothing happened is BS. But I have seen people so unbelievably sensitive to pain as to render them helpless for a short time. I have developed a high pain threshold over my life by enduring pain. Not because I tried to endure pain but because I was in pain at times. I look at my grandsons, who have never even felt a lick on their butt and tell them to avoid a fight at all cost as the first hit will wilt them the other guy will beat the crap out of them.
“This bothers me as I can’t condition them to fight through pain. In high school boxing we got hit and learned to continue, no matter what. So many children now are so sheltered that they have felt very little pain. Consider that as a kid, I didn’t get novocaine to get a tooth drilled. Now I avoid the numb feeling as I prefer a short term pain over hours of numb mouth. Try to find a dentist who will drill without the needle!
“Yes, pain hurts but sometimes you have to ignore the pain and fight through it.
“I have taught my grandchildren all of the age-appropriate self defense I can, top of the list being avoidance. But if they ever have to mix it up I don’t think they will come out on top.
Injuring the Groin – Part 1 covered the myths and misconceptions of strikes to the groin. I appreciated all the responses to that blog and now want to focus on illustrating real injury to the groin.
To do so I have 3 different videos that clearly show the effects of a groin strike as well as some graphic pics of male anatomy showing the results of strikes to the groin.
I don’t show this graphic material to be gratuitous but to educate and ( at the risk of offending some people) I feel strongly that you cant sugarcoat this information.
As always, please leave your thoughts and comments below.
Tim Larkin
Founder, Target Focus Training
PS: Some of you are asking me to increase the size of the videos. This may easily be accomplished after you start the video by sliding your mouse on the video and clicking the full screen icon at the far right of the timeline bar (it’s a little icon with arrows pointing out at a 45 degree angle). This allows you to view the blog video in a full screen mode.
PPS: Don’t forget our Thanksgiving sale that’s currently in progress. You can check it out here.
The image I chose on the left functions more as a cypher to show your expectations and where you see yourself in violence than having a right or wrong answer.
It’s an inkblot test, or one of those optical illusions where you can see either a vase or two faces — people immediately see one or the other, some see both and can flip it back and forth in their heads, others can never see the inverse of their initial impression.
What’s interesting to note are the very different responses you get from two distinct populations: the sane/socialized and the sociopathic/or otherwise experienced in the use of violence.
Sane & Social
See themselves as the man on the ground, reacting to thwart the standing man (parsing attacker-defender, classic self-defense)
Are intensely interested in the story leading up to the image (who’s the good guy/bad buy, who’s in the right and who’s in the wrong)
Sociopathic or Otherwise Experienced in Violence
See themselves as the standing man (parsing winner-loser)
Are uninterested in the story or social roles (pure mechanics of winning)
As a teaching tool the goal here is not to shame those who reflexively see the image through the social lens, nor to reward those who know the “right” answer and parrot it because they think that’s what we’re looking for — the goal is to show you what’s inside of you, your most basic assumptions about violence and the role you expect to play in it.
I was recently asked how I go about helping the passive and meek develop the intent to cause injury.
This opens up an interesting pillowcase of rattlesnakes along the lines of the nature/nurture debate… is intent innate, or can it be taught and learned?
There’s evidence for both sides.
The most unlikely people become human demolition machines with a little training while the biggest, baddest guy in the room faints at the mention of gouging an eye and can’t bring himself to stomp people when they’re down.
Size, stature and presentation say nothing of what’s really deep down inside. You can’t tell, just by looking, who’s got a hard core and who’s got cream filling. Especially when the hard core will act demure to hide that fact and the sponge-cake crew will bluster and scowl to mask their fear.
Some people show up for training pre-set with intent — all I have to do is show them where to put it. I’ve had others take a year or more before suddenly throwing the switch and doing good work the way it needs to get done on the mats.
Once you get all those covered you can look at your skill set and find the bits you missed & sign up for yet another course to cover them. (Something tells me you’re in for a life-long pursuit.)
Sometimes I think it’s just simpler to refer to them all as ‘hyphenated’ fighting, as in ground-fighting, stick-fighting, knife-fighting, etc. That covers the whole sweep in one go.
It’s very much a “this vs. that” mind-set, with the fear that the missing piece in your repertoire will be the one that will take you out:
The stand up fighter is merely prey for the grappler should he actually get in. Or…
You have the stand up and ground game covered, but he brings a knife. Time to switch to knife defense… if you’ve got it.
There are some unfortunate problems with this mindset:
It is the moral imperative we use to draw a line between predatory and “civilized” use of force. “I will only fire in self-defense.”
It is the legal rule we use to judge whether or not that use of force is a crime. “The defendant claims to have acted in self-defense.”
It’s a catchall term used to describe physical training for such activities. “I’m taking a self-defense class.”
It can also refer to the unarmed techniques learned there. “If someone comes after me I’ll use self-defense on him.”
It means many things — and this vague imprecision is exactly why it is useless for our needs in training to do violence by hand.
The moral imperative and the legal rule are fine for what they do — one informs the decision process before the fact and the other helps society figure out how it feels about it after the fact — it is the carrying over of the term to describe physical training and technique that is harmful.
As was pointed out in the comments to the previous post, words mean things. A single word can connote entire constellations of meaning, in varying shades and intensities.
When you think of “self-defense” or “self-protection”, what do you see?
I see nothing.
Okay, maybe that’s a little too harsh, too fast.
If I try really hard to cut through the ambiguous fog of those phrases, I can almost see — at best — someone getting attacked, desperately trying to get away, maybe getting backed into a corner. Flailing like a terrified animal.
At worst I see someone curled up in a ball on the ground.
That’s what “self-defense” means to me. And that’s why I won’t teach, practice or do it.
I’m only ever interested in hurting people.
The term “self-defense” has no operational value. It does not paint a picture of me doing anything of consequence — it suggests passivity, being acted upon by someone else, moving second and hoping for the best. Rather than getting anything done.
“From what I understand, it is physiologically impossible to access complex motor movements under the adrenaline dump of the fight or flight response. Apparently, this is why “trained” fighters’ martial arts techniques don’t work when they are attacked. The techniques are too complex; gross motor movements would be more effective. My concern with the TFT training is that I would not be able to ”hit” a specific target during a confrontation while experiencing the physiological reaction induced by the fight or flight response (that is, I wouldn’t have the fine motor coordination required to execute the TFT techniques).
My question: Does TFT address how to manage the defender’s fight or flight response?”
——- Lou,
While there’s nothing anyone can do about the biological facts of fear — the kickoff of the fight or flight response — there is a great deal we can do to prevent it from blossoming into panic.
The number one way to mitigate the response is by training to have something to do once it’s on.
You’ll often hear professionally trained survivors of bad situations say something to the effect of,
And if the other guy has anything to say about it, then that’s just too damn bad. For him.
Over the years we’ve tried many different ways to talk about ‘the attitude’ you have to have to enter into violent conflict. Most recently we’ve talked about ‘intent’ and ’cause-state’–in the former you have to want to do it, and in the latter we give you all the reasons why you want to be doing rather than getting done.
In the end, all the different ways of talking around the subject swirl into the singular drain of ego. Namely, YOU. Violence is all about YOU, all the time. It’s about what YOU want, what YOU’RE doing to him and getting all of that done to the exclusion of all else.
The other guy has no say in the matter–if he’s busy doing something, that’s his problem, not yours. You are here to commit base acts of savagery on him, and he’s just here to provide motive and venue. (Injuries don’t happen in a vacuum, people…)
For him, his only hope is to escape or kill you. If he gets away, it’s merely annoying. If he kills you, well, by definition there was nothing you could do–so don’t sweat it.
This leaves you free to concentrate on YOU doing things to him. If he tries to block or counter he’s just delaying the inevitable. If he gets in the way or screws with your technique then do as my brother says and “take it out on him when you get him on the ground.”
Target Focus Training is a “principle-based” system, meaning that instead of starting with moves or techniques we seek to identify and understand the elements at work in every successful use of violence.
