SELF DEFENSE IS NOT ENOUGH
The biggest problem with ‘self-defense’ is that it says nothing about what has to happen to the other guy. Or, to be blunt, it says nothing about what you have to do to the other guy. And that missing something is probably whatever it is that he wants to do to you. Think about it […]
LEARN SELF DEFENSE: SHUT UP AND HURT HIM
You can’t learn self defense until your mouth stops. If we were training to be crisis negotiators, we’d need to talk to each other. A lot. All the time, in fact, to keep that line of communication open so it doesn’t collapse, go dead, and sink into the opposite of communication: destruction. If you can […]
WINNING VIOLENCE: WOULD IT MATTER TO A SERIAL KILLER?
The title of this article about winning violence refers to the way I like to answer questions that have nothing to do with the needs of violence—questions about legality, appropriateness, blocking, defending against this or that attack, “but what if he,” etc. The worst among us are the best at winning violence. They are feared […]
DO SELF DEFENSE LESSONS LIKE TFT REALLY WORK?
Regardless of your experience in self defense lessons, you may have already had the dream: at a park in daylight, with children, or a dark close-in space like an alley, or, the one I remember most vividly, a seedy gas station… regardless of the setting, they come for you. Many or just one, it doesn’t […]
SELF-DEFENSE FACT: INJURY IS WHAT WORKS IN VIOLENCE
It’s a universal self-defense fact that if something works in violence, it works because of injury. (Or capitulation, but we’ll get to that in a minute.) What happens if someone gets hit by a truck? Well, more often than not, they get killed. The faster the truck is going, the more likely that outcome. The […]
SELF-DEFENSE TRUTH: WORRYING ABOUT LOSING WON’T MAKE YOU WIN
“But what if he [INSERT AWFUL THING HERE]?” I get asked this question all the time. It tells me a lot about the person asking it. “But what if…” tells me about a person’s frame of mind, and how they see themselves in violence. They’ve chosen second place, victimhood, with a wait-and-see attitude that makes […]
LEARNING SELF-DEFENSE IS NOT ENOUGH
The biggest problem with learning self-defense is that it says nothing about what has to happen to the other guy. Or, to be blunt, it says nothing about what you have to do to the other guy. Or the fact that it’s probably what he wants to do to you too. Think about it this […]
PROTECT YOURSELF: BUILD A BETTER MONSTER
Invariably, when we’re giving instructions on how to protect yourself, we get questions along the lines of: “Okay, I get all that violence stuff — but what if he’s bigger/faster/stronger and has a knife/stick/gun/three guns?” That’s a great question. Or it would be if that were what they really meant. More often than not, people […]
LEARN SELF DEFENSE: THE DEFINITION OF VIOLENCE
This may sound obvious, but when it comes time to learn self defense, you’ll need to understand that there a lot of things violence is not. It is not a particularly rough cage-match; it is not a bar fight where everyone’s sharing beers ten minutes later; it’s not getting your nose bloodied. Many people who […]
SELF DEFENSE QUESTION: ARE THERE ANY DOWNSIDES TO LIVING IN THE CAUSE STATE?
Jason H. writes in this self defense question: “Do you really live in the Cause State every day? Do you find that it affects you negatively in any way (socially) and if so, how do you deal with that?” Jason, This is a great self defense question, and one we don’t hear about too often. […]