Saturday, February 4, 2012

Las Vegas Martial Arts Blog

Wing Chun, Martial Arts and Self Defense

What are organochlorines?

Organochlorines are chemicals found in some herbicides and pesticides, in chlorine bleach and most chemical disinfectants, and many plastics, especially PVC (polyvinylchloride).

Organochlorines are implicated in causing and promoting breast cancer because they mutate genes and they cause breast cells to become more receptive to a cancer-promoting chemical called estradiol. Organochlorines weaken the immune system and lower your body s resistance to bacteria and viruses. They also act as a negative type of estrogen in the body.

How do they enter our bodies?

Organochlorines enter our bodies through our drinking water, by eating foods grown with certain agricultural chemicals, and through the plastic linings on canned or microwaveable foods. They enter through our lungs by breathing in the fumes of chlorine bleach disinfectants and by body contact with chlorine bleached paper products such as tampons, toilet paper and paper cups.

How can we reduce our exposure?

Step One-Reduce Your Exposure

The first thing to do is to reduce your plastic consumption, especially of convenience foods. On plastic containers, there is typically a triangle with a number inside of it on the bottom of the container. You can recognize PVC or polyvinylchloride as the type of plastic that has a 3 in the center of the triangle.

As for paper products, use oxygen bleached or unbleached paper products. Companies who sell non-chlorine bleached paper products typically say so on the label and they do not necessarily market their products as green products.

Buy the non-chlorine bleach and more environmentally friendly household products. Simple vinegar and water can be used for many household chores. Eating only organically produced meat and dairy products will reduce the amount of organochlorines in your diet by 80%.

Step Two-Help Your Liver

With help, your liver can metabolize organochlorines. Flaxseeds and organic egg yolks contain lecithin, a chemical that speeds up the elimination of fat-soluble chemicals such as organochlorines by making them water-soluble.

Beans, lentils, red clover, soy products and chickweed contain chemicals called saponins. Saponins help to break down organochlorines, prevent cellular mutation and can stop the reproduction of cancer cells. These foods are strongly recommended for anybody who regularly consumes organochlorines.

Members of the cabbage family including broccoli, kale, turnips, radishes, cabbage, bok choy or cauliflower can help you metabolize organochlorines by increasing the production of non-cancerous by-products.

Step Three-Mother Nature s Help

Woman-positive natural sources of estrogen can block entrance of organochlorines, estradiol and other cancer promoting estrogens when enough of them are in the blood stream. The reason behind this is that these positive hormones move quickly through our bodies whereas the cancer producing chemicals such as organochlorines move more slowly. If there are enough of these plant hormones in the blood stream, they can easily block organochlorines from attaching themselves to breast cells and from promoting cancer.

These plant hormones can be found in lentils, dried beans, tofu and fermented soy products such as tempeh and miso, parsnips, sweet potatoes, pomegranates, burdock roots, red clover, hops and ginseng. Regular intake of broccoli and cabbage is also helpful.

Post Transformation Tips

Making changes in favor of your survival and that of the environment often puts us in a period of re-adjustment, not only with the society we live in, but also with our family, friends and neighbors.

Several strategies we use to maintain positive social relations are Natural self-defense does not mean natural aggression, nor does it mean that it will cause you to develop a social disorder triggered by the existence of organochlorines. Foods and herbs that encourage natural self-defense make you lose the taste for products associated with organochlorines.

Allow self-defense foods to empower you to envision and work towards an organochlorine free future without any anger about the present situation. In other words, don t let the forces that encourage personal and environmental negligence push your buttons.

Chose recycled plastic toys or second hand plastic toys over new ones for your children.

Send lunches in reusable containers.

Bring a bean or lentil salad to the next barbecue or potluck supper. Invite friends who use a lot of plastic and organochlorine products over to eat. Explain why you eat certain foods and what you have done to minimize your contribution to its proliferation. Relay the information in such a way that your guests feel comfortable and leave them to lose the taste for organochlorine products in their own way and time.

Use organic foods to show your body what a natural food is and have confidence that your body will use this knowledge to recognize what isn t natural and respond appropriately to it. This is a goal that can be started even on a limited budget. The return of your natural body begins with one organic apple, especially a shared one!

Legal Disclaimer-The information contained in this article is for educational purposes only and is not intended to medically diagnose, treat or cure any disease. Consult a health care practitioner before beginning any health care program.

All contents are copyrighted in 2004 by Agoo Agii,inc. All rights reserved.

Written by Jennifer Rodriguez-Allen, B.Sc., Environmental Chemist and President of Agoo Agii, inc (http://www.agooagii.com/). This article can found in print form with Agoo Agii’s Aromatherapy Breast Self-Exam Kit. Gently encourage a loved one (or yourself) perform the Breast Self-Exam.

Tags: Wing Chun, Kung Fu, Las Vegas Kung Fu School, Las Vegas Wing Chun School, Lo Man Kam, Lo Man Kam Wing Chun, Martial Arts Self Defense

Popularity: 1% [?]

In this article I want to share a few ideas about mental preparation and some correspondence I recently recently received from subscribers to my self-defense newsletter. I’m hoping it will provide some context to your “self-defense readiness” and generate some thinking.

Self-Defense Performance Is The Result Of Mental Maps

I wrote about mental maps in “The Nuts And Bolts Of Awareness.”

Our awareness, understanding, decisions, predictions and behavior are directed by the “mental maps” we have about the way the world works. Our knowledge, beliefs, experience and habits are “packaged” in the form of mental maps (also called cognitive blueprints or schemas).

If those “maps” are detailed and accurate, you dramatically increase the probability of effective performance in high-stress situations.

If those maps are inaccurate, have gaps or are missing all together, you run the risk of an improper reaction, over reacting, under reacting or not reacting at all.

We have a term for that in self-defense training. Its called “NOT GOOD!”

Thinking Is Impaired By Stress

What makes matters worse is that people aren’t particularly “smart” in high-stress, urgent, threatening situations. At times like those, you are not operating in the same mental state that you are in while you sit here reading this article.

When the “Fight or Flight Response” (sympathetic nervous system) is activated, your ability to think creatively and logically is impaired. That increases the potential for confusion and mistakes during a dangerous situation.

Invest In Your Safety With Pre-Thinking and Debriefing

Science and psychology confirm that mental rehearsal or visualization has a huge impact on improving our physical and mental performance.

The good news is that self-defense encounters don’t happen often. The bad news is that self-defense encounters don’t happen often! Huh? Before you read that again, let me explain…

Its hard to “get good” at something that never happens. Unlike other activities requiring experience and skills development, you can’t rely on repeated exposure and previous events when preparing for a violent encounter. So how do you improve your self-defense effectiveness?

Physical practice is “part” of the answer… Especially, when you participate in role playing scenarios that simulate the types of situations that you might encounter. But even that isn’t enough to really get “street smart.”

What you need to do is create self-defense scenarios in your mind. You need to “pre-think” and decide in advance about what you would do in a critical situation BEFORE it happens.

Think about situations you are most concerned about or likely to encounter and what you would do if they did.

Don’t just leave it to luck. You can’t “worry about it when the time comes” and hope to perform effectively. Remember, your brain is impaired by stress, panic, and confusion! Without some sort of game plan, its unlikely that you will perform well.

The question to ask yourself is, “What would I do if (and then insert your most likely or bothersome scenario).

Debriefing is what you do AFTER an incident or “close encounter.” Don’t just walk away from a threatening situation and hope that it never happens again. Think about it, analyze it and learn from it. Ask yourself two questions:

* What did I do right?

* What would I do differently if it happened again?

That way, even if you handled the incident poorly, you can benefit from it and improve your chances doing better if something similar happens in the future. That, my friend, is the essence of developing effective personal safety skills.

An Email Example Of Effective Debriefing

After reading my “Tough or Smart” article, a subscriber sent me an email about an incident he was involved in.

Even though things turned out OK, the experience continued to bother him and he found himself second guessing his actions and wondering if he should have done something differently.

He began to worry that if something similar happened again, he would be just as confused as he was the first time. As far as he was concerned, the incident was unresolved. I commend him for asking the questions and looking for answers.

If you don’t ask, you won’t know! Whether you reflect on the matter yourself or seek an outside opinion (as Joe did here), it is important to examine the event and learn from it.

Be careful however, about seeking the opinion of someone who does not have the background or qualifications to be offering you advice about anything!

You’ll get all kinds of “ham and eggers” more than willing to give you their off-the-wall advice about what THEY would have done… (you’ll see examples of “bad advice” in the correspondence below)

With his permission, I’ve included our correspondence in this newsletter. To protect his privacy, I’ll refer to him as “Joe.” (Pretty creative huh? ;-)

I’d like you to read this correspondence from two perspectives:

First, read what happened and put yourself in his shoes What would you do if the same thing happened to you?

Secondly, read it analytically and observe the “process” involved and the factors that impacted the situation. Stress, confusion, hesitation, second guessing?

Imagine the difference between a “prepared mind” and the mind of someone who thought that something like this would never happen.

OK I’ll shut up now and let your read the emails:

================================================================

Hi Randy,

I just read your new article about “Efficiency” or “doing the right thing” and I found it very interesting.

I just wanted to ask your expert opinion about something that happened to me.

Some months ago, I was driving my car with my girlfriend at 10:30 pm through a main avenue. Being a working day the street was almost empty, although well illuminated. Suddenly, while driving into an intersection we saw a robbery in progress.

A robber was stealing the purse of a middle age woman who was with a young man. A few paces away, another robber was waiting for the first one on a motorcycle ready to drive away. (This is the standard operating procedure for robberies in my town). The first robber already had the purse and was running away, but the young man was pulling the purse, trying to recover it.

I thought for a moment to speed up and hit him with my car in order to abort the robbery but on a second, and very quick, thought I considered the following. a) I could hit both the robber and the victim. b) If I hit the robber and he was severely injured, or worse dead, the complications would be major. c) If I prevented his escape, he may be forced to fight back and might hurt the young man. d) I didn’t want to put my girlfriend in danger, if something unexpected happened. e) The purse wasn’t worth the danger.

Of course, I didn’t rationalize that much at that moment. It was just a quick thought like, “hitting him is dangerous for everybody, the purse wasn’t worth it”. So I let them run away with the purse and called the police, but I’m pretty sure they didn’t catch them.

After that I felt bad, since I thought that maybe I should have done something else to abort the robbery and help the victims. I was relatively safe in my car and was driving a 3000 pound weapon. A lot of people have since told me I should have hit him, and I felt a bit like a coward. I worried that I didn’t choose to do the right thing.

I know that I’m not a coward. In fact, on another occasion I have not avoided a fight with a man much heavier and bigger than me to protect my girlfriend, although I’m a very very very reasonable and passive person. But when me or my beloved are in danger, I don’t hesitate to face the problem. Just in that particular case I decided that the right thing was to let them go. And in fact, I still believe that it was the best course of action, although I still have my doubts.

So, I wanted your opinion as an expert. What would be the best course of action in that situation? I don’t want to feel “justified” for what I chose to do, but really want to know the best thing to do in such a case, just in case it happens again.

I would be deeply grateful if you gave me your opinion about this, since I don’t know any other expert in “real life” self defense.

I’m hoping you help me with this. Thanks in advance for your kind attention.

Best regards,

Joe

===============================================================

Hi Joe,

Based on what you’ve told me, you did EXACTLY what you should have… and what I would have advised you to do, if you’d asked my opinion.

You are right, a purse is not worth the legal and civil hastles and the risk of “making matters worse” by over-reacting to a property crime.

Your decision NOT to attempt to ram the robber (and risk hitting the victim”) was a good one. Deliberately ramming into someone with a vehicle is considered a deadly force response and can only be justified if you reasonably believe that it is absolutely necessary to protect yourself or someone else from death or a serious life-threatening injury.

Based on what you’ve told me, the situation was NOT a deadly force encounter and you probably would have gotten yourself into as much legal trouble as the robber if you decided to turn him into a hood ornament!

It would be a different story if someone was being attacked and severely beaten. It would have been different if the assault was of a life threatening nature. Protection of life is our highest priority. Protection of property is not.

In that scenario, the best thing you could do is notify the police and be a good witness. Make note of their physical description, license number and direction of travel so you can provide that info to the police when they arrive.

But to endanger your own safety, the safety of your girlfriend, the safety of the victim and even the safety of the “dirt bags” doing the robbery, is not worth the value of a purse.

Purses and contents can be replaced. People can’t.

Your reaction after the incident is a normal one. Even when you do the “right thing,” its common to second guess yourself and wonder if there is something else you could have done.

Your scenario about fighting to protect your girlfriend Joe is a good one. By the sounds of it, your decision to stand up to your adversary WAS the right thing to do… Some things in life ARE worth fighting for and others are not. Its important to know the difference.

Your actions were definitely not “cowardly” Joe. If you ask me (which I guess you’re doing huh? ;-) you made a reasonable and effective decision in a stressful and challenging situation.

I think you made a wise decision Joe. Good job.

Randy

==============================================================

Hello Randy.

Thank you so much for your answer. Your comments about the situation were really interesting, since I’ve always been in doubt about this issue since it happened. I was not only trying to see if I did well, but also to know what is the best course of action in a situation like this one, because its very probably going to happen again sometime in my life. I think that the only way to react correctly to a challenging (and unusual for me) situation is to know in advance what is the right thing and instinctively react based on previous knowledge (and gut feelings, of course). That is why I found your answer so useful for me.

On the other hand, you are right, in some way I was asking you if I acted cowardly ;-) As I told you before, a lot of people told me I should ram the guy, when I told them the story. They told me that was what they would have done in that situation. And maybe they would, but I always thought that those people are probably more prone to an “action movie” reaction. By the way, I have to tell you that I’m a latin person, living outside US (that’s why my english is a little deficient), and you know how temperamental we latins are.

I’m very glad to have read your expert opinion about this, and to be sure now about the right thing to do in a similar case. Of course you may post our conversation in your forum and/or newsletters or emails. If this case could be useful for more people, I’d be very glad. Just remove my name and email address, but you may reproduce the rest of the conversation as you please.

Its good you are writing an ebook on this topic. I think that is very important for people to know as much as possible about those situations in order to react properly. I’m a subscriber of your newsletter, so I’ll know when you publish it.

Thanks again for your answer, and have a good day.

Joe

===============================================================

OK, Now Its Your Turn…

Time for YOU to do some thinking… If you want to share the results with me, I’d be honored…It could have a direct impact on the content and direction of future articles and information products. If not, at least do this exercise for yourself.

Here’s what I’d like you to do:

Write out the single, most likely or worrisome self-defense scenario that you can think of. Nothing bizarre or off-the-wall, but something you legitimately think you could encounter. What is the “ultimate” situation that you feel sparks your interest in self-defense and personal safety? What one incident, do you want to be prepared for if it were to happen?

In as much detail as you want, spell out a threatening, volatile or violent situation (real or imagined) that motivates your interest in self-defense training.

This could be a hypothetical situation or it could be something that actually happened to you or someone you know.

Don’t worry about coming up with a solution or explaining what you would do about it. Not at this point any way. Just spell out as specifically and conceretely and you can, the ultimate situation your are preparing for.

Who is the assailant or how many are there?… Would the person be known to you or a stranger? Would you be alone or with someone who could assist you or might need your protection? What would the “predatory intent” be? (what does your assailant want from you?) Where would it be most likely to happen. What time do you see it happening?

You might feel that exercises like this are silly or a waste of time. Maybe its too much work! I can tell you this, if something does happen and you haven’t given it any thought… stress, confusion, and the “Fluster Factor,” WILL impact your ability to do the right thing at the right time.

Consider exercises like this the equivalent of “Self-Defense Fire Drills.” Just imagine what would happen if a fire alarm sounded and you didn’t have a clue what it meant or how you were supposed to respond.

Enuff Said.

Take care, train smart and stay safe…

Randy LaHaie
Protective Strategies

Randy LaHaie is the president of Protective Strategies and has been teaching reality-based self-defense for over 30 years. He is the author of several “Toughen Up Combative Training Guides” (http://www.ToughenUp.com)

Subscribe to his FREE SELF-DEFENSE NEWSLETTER at http://www.ProtectiveStrategies.com

Tags: Wing Chun, Kung Fu, Las Vegas Kung Fu School, Las Vegas Wing Chun School, Lo Man Kam, Lo Man Kam Wing Chun, Martial Arts Self Defense

Popularity: 1% [?]

How do you overcome fear in a self-defense situation? Basically you don’t, you learn to use the fear instead. Making it a tool that you shape not allowing fear to control you. All fine and dandy, but how do you go about learning how to use fear?

Let’s examine what fear is. Fear is an emotional response to stimuli either eternal or internal. Fear has certain physiological responses.

Increased heart rate

Increased respiration

Introduction of epinephrines into the body which constrict capillaries, increase strength and increase speed.

__________________________________________

There are various mental responses to fear

__________________________________________

Freezing up. Not being able to move at all though your mind may be telling to run, block, fight!

Anger. Anger and fear are very closely related. A reaction to fear of anger will at the very least help you to survive better than freezing up, but it could also inhibit your thought processes and get you killed.

Trained reaction to fear. Your body relaxes, your mind focuses. Adrenaline increases your strength and speed making you a very dangerous individual.

I’ve personally spent a long time studying fear and it’s various physiological and psychological effects on individuals. I’ve developed a very good method of dealing and working with the fear response, which directly and indirectly over the years has saved my life from avoiding car collisions to defending my life.

_____________________________________________________

There are two different ways of training to use fear.

_____________________________________________________

1. Place yourself in life threatening situations on a regular basis.

This method has the disadvantage of ending your training career at an early start.

2. Place yourself in life threatening situations on a regular basis mentally.

This method has the advantage of extending your training career while at the same time possibly saving your life.

Many martial artists spend their lives learning to block and strike. Going through situation after situation. Attacks from the front attacks from behind, from the side, multiple attackers.

Some martial artists don’t even practice these scenarios. Assuming the same defensive reaction from the front will work from the side and from attacks from behind. Some martial arts instructors when asked “what if” by their students will simply say, “just don’t put yourself in that position”. If that were the answer there would be no need to take self-defense at all. Just don’t put yourself in that position.

For those martial artists who do practice situational self-defense training, many of you are not allowing for the mental aspect of a physical attack.

Mental preparedness for a physical attack, I believe, is even more important than the physical side of preparing for an attack. Why do you think it is that a trained martial artist would fear a seasoned street fighter (weird term). Because the street fighter has been in real fights. The few tricks he’s picked up to win a street brawl have actually been executed by him under the mental stress of a life and death situation Most martial artists, fortunately, have not had this misfortune.

___________________________

My Method of Emulating Fear

___________________________

Let’s look back at the physiological effects of fear once again.

Increased heart rate and respiration are two major physiological responses to fear.

A tensing of voluntary muscle groups is another, more so in the untrained individual.

If you emulate these three physiological responses to fear, you will be on your way to emulating it mentally as well.

So first a slight tension of voluntary muscle groups. Now increase your breathing. Short shallow breaths are best to emulate this physiological response.

________________________

Now to The Mental Aspect

________________________

You need a padded up live partner. For this drill I would often take an air shield and tie it to the front on an advanced student.

You need to have enough mental control to remember to strike only the air shield of your partner.

Now your partner must do some acting as well. He/She must look both in the face and body language as though they intend to hit you and hurt you. Even emulating the foul language you might hear from an attacker in an attempt to intimidate you would help.

Now you put it in your mind that your partner is not your partner. He’s a stranger that intends on doing you harm, mugging you, raping, beating you senseless and unless you defend yourself and hit this !@#$ just as hard as you can and don’t get hit yourself that’s just what’s going to happen.

Start with a prearranged attack and counter-attack, but, put it out of your mind that you actually know what’s going to happen. Feel the fear and tension before the attack, then block or evade like you mean it, like your life depends on it and counter-attack (eventually at the same time naturally). Takes turns doing this with your partner. Be careful not to get so carried away you hurt him. Remember it’s his turn next.

Now from here perform the same mental and physical preparedness and move to my one step sparring variations you can find in my printable ebook Bringing The Martial Artist Out from Within. Continue to strike just the air shield for now.

Now put some pads on and remove the air shield. Do one step variations again. Same mental stress of a real situation, but strike anywhere and pull the technique so you don’t hurt your partner.

The combination of striking the air shield full contact and pulling the techniques on your partner when striking anywhere help prepare you both mentally and physically to strike full contact anywhere on your attacker, under the stress of a life threatening situation.

_______________________________

Ready to Become More Dangerous?

_______________________________

Start again with all of your self-defense drills. Emulate your fear for at least 10 seconds to put yourself in a life-threatening mental attitude.

Now consciously relax your muscles. Make your breathing slightly faster than normal to emulate a threat, but make it deeper as well as if you were trying to control rapid breathing.

Now start again and add a mental aspect to begin working with your fear and stress. Begin again with your drills and this time take your fear and turn it into anger. It’s not the final solution yet, but it will give you a better chance of survival than being frozen in place solid.

Turning fear into anger takes practice, but isn’t that hard to accomplish. As I said earlier the two emotions are very similar. Basically this can be accomplished with an example such as this;

Instead of, “Oh my gosh, this stranger wants to hurt me!”

You change it to something like, “WHAT!? THIS SCUMBAG LOWLIFE WANTS TO HURT ME! I’LL SHOW THIS !@#$!”

Now add your rapid breathing to this and slight muscular tension and remember YOU’RE ANGRY!

Now do your steps to relax and attempt to control your breathing while remaining angry.

After you can successfully emulate anger whenever you want to now take your final step.

Start again with your self-defense drills. Follow all of my above steps, but now empty your mind! Void it of emotion. Let your well trained reflexes from various scenarios take over guided by subtle consciousness and thought. You may need to practice a meditation exercise for this which you can find in my printable ebook Step by Step Learn Internal Energy Strikes with the bonus section Taking Strikes and Coming Back for More.

You must be careful not to hurt your partner during any of these drill phases.

Don’t forget other scenarios as well adding the fear factor to them as well.

With shoes

Without shoes

Street clothes on

Small space

large space

Those of you who have read my printable ebook Solo Martial Arts Drills, when you do your 10 minute workout, do you always make sure you have enough room and everything is out of the way? Always? Why? Is that the way it will be if a burglar enters your home.

“Just a minute I have to move this chair”

Do you ever grab a nearby “weapon” (a shoe, a belt, whatever) and begin using it as part of your training?

Think think think.

The more situations you can think of the more you will be ready for as many situations as possible both mentally and physically. To a slightly smaller degree, you can also apply your fear training to your solo drills training as well.

__________

Conclusion

__________

This training method, when done properly, will take a lot out of you. I do not recommend using this method all of the time, but definitely put it in your training schedule and practice the method on a regular basis.

For more information on utilizing your fear factor to increase your chances of surviving a self-defense situation see my printable ebook Bringing The Martial Artist Out from Within http://kirkhamsebooks.com/MartialArts/ or my downloadable video Self-Defense and Over Coming Fear http://kirkhamsebooks.com/MartialArts/Martial_Arts_Videos/

Enjoy,
Rick
Sensei J. Richard Kirkham B.Sc.

J. Richard Kirkham is a dual certified teacher and martial arts instructor. He has expertise in alternative teaching methods and positive reinforcement methodology.

Tags: Wing Chun, Kung Fu, Las Vegas Kung Fu School, Las Vegas Wing Chun School, Lo Man Kam, Lo Man Kam Wing Chun, Martial Arts Self Defense

Popularity: 1% [?]

The most surprising statistic that most karate and martial arts teachers discover is the one that tells them “why most of their adult students quit shortly after enrolling.” In fact, the greatest percentage of adult dropouts from martial arts classes occurs within the first 100 days!

This has sparked some groups to investigate the reasons behind this phenomena. Surveys have been conducted both in the United States as well as in Canada. Additional inquiries may also have been conducted in places like Europe and Australia as well.

What the researchers found was, to them, incredible. They found that, by and large, the number one reason for adult students dropping out of their programs was…

…no real-world self-defense training early on in their training!

“How could this be?”, was the question. The researchers were stunned. After all, they were martial arts teachers and they certainly taught self-defense as a part of their classes.

How could these adults say that they weren’t being taught real-world self-defense techniques?

Perhaps, the problem was not that “self-defense techniques” were or were not being taught. Because, even after these studies were conducted and karate programs started to “import” third-party self-defense packages into their product offering, adult dropouts remained high.

Maybe the problem was in perception. Maybe students just couldn’t see how the “stylized” movements of a centuries-old system could be applicable against a street attack against a stiletto or ‘Saturday Night Special’-wielding assailant.

It’s certain that students were not seeing and hearing what they thought they should in order to believe that they were getting what they needed to survive such an attack. Even if these students don’t know what ‘that thing’ really looks like, their gut-level feeling was that, “this stuff isn’t going to work.”

Maybe the problem – what adult students are looking for – is in something even more crucial to learning self-defense against violent attackers. And maybe this “thing” was easier to identify by novices than by trained instructors who had been indoctrinated into sport systems.

Maybe what was lacking in all of these programs was something the real experts like to call…

Experience!

Regardless of the subject, it’s fairly easy to see when someone has experience with the information they have, isn’t it? I mean, experience in actually applying that information to produce viable, proven results. As the old saying goes, “those who can – do; and those who can’t – teach.”

And, what adult students are looking for is someone who “can” AND “teaches” others how they can as well.

Now, this isn’t to say that most martial arts instructors don’t know their arts and the techniques and skills that come with them. Most certainly do. And these people are very good at what they do.

However; there is a huge difference between knowing how to ‘perform’ a skill – any skill – and being able to apply that skill in a particular context. And self-defense is no exception.

No matter how hard they try, most martial arts and self-defense instructors will not be able to convince most adults that they know what they’re talking about without the experience to back it up. Adult students are not children. They have seen far too much in there lives to let these less-than-able instructors slide.

And with the new threat of terrorism being added to the ever-present concern with crime, most adults have no desire to learn martial arts for purely ascetic reasons. They want – no, they demand – and rightly so, that the person they place their trust in, not to mention their very lives, knows what he or she is doing.

So, what’s an instructor to do if he or she lacks actual real-world experience? Should they rush right out and get into a few fights? Should they go hang out in the seedier side of town and wait to be mugged, raped, or beaten?

No, of course not. But, they can, like their students, go in search of real experts – people who have “been there” and who can help them learn what they need to know in order to help the people who come to them for this type of knowledge.

Of course, this may require that they suck in their pride and get a check on the old ego. But, as everyone knows who has been in an actual violent confrontation with a dangerous attacker, you need to “check your ego at the door” if you’re going to survive.

Teaching self-protection skills to others is a huge responsibility. And one perhaps that’s too great for a lot of people who are teaching for purely personal reasons.

There is another option available, however; just in case the primary one is totally unacceptable. And that option is simply to…

…stop trying to teach self-defense if they’re not qualified.

By all means, an instructor can, and should, continue to teach his particular style of martial art. But he should stop trying to convince intelligent, grown adults, that he knows what he’s talking about with regards to surviving a violent attack if he doesn’t. He should remember that people are placing their lives in his hands every time he open’s his mouth, or demonstrates a technique. I’m not sure whether or not many instructors have thought about this. But they should.

After all, most martial arts instructors teach honesty as one of the major tenets and character traits of a black belt master and leader. Wouldn’t this be the “honest” thing to do?

The moral here is that, if a martial arts or karate teacher wishes to teach self-defense – if he or she wants to get and retain adult students looking for this type of training for the long-term, they really have no choice but to do what they must.

They, like every other information-based professional, are in business to provide a service. They must decide what that service is and whether or not it includes real-world self-protection against violent attackers who don’t follow the rules of fairness and respect found in martial arts schools and karate tournaments.

They should also know this…

…no company, whether it’s a furniture store or a martial art school, stays in-business very long if it can’t give its customers what they want and need. Their clients and students may never tell them that they don’t believe or trust them. But, rest assured that if they’re not getting what they’ve paid for, they’re gone.

As a final thought, and one that I live by. What if, some day, “I” must depend on one of my students to protect me from a dangerous assailant for whatever reason. Wouldn’t I want to make sure that what he or she learned was really going to work?

I know I would!

Jeffrey M. Miller is the founder of Warrior Concepts International, a Pennsylvania-based company specializing in helping private, law enforcement, and corporate clients to develop time-tested and proven self-protection and personal development skills that work in the real-world. He is the author of the highly acclaimed, educational video, Danger Prevention Tactics. His latest book, “The Karate-Myth” shows the reader why most martial arts and self-defense programs don’t work and how to insure your safety in today’s violent world. For additonal information about having this internationally-recognized expert as a guest or keynote speaker for your organization’s next meeting, or to sponsor a seminar with Mr. Miller, you may contact him through his web site or by calling WCI in the U.S. and Canada, at (570) 988-2228.

Tags: Wing Chun, Kung Fu, Las Vegas Kung Fu School, Las Vegas Wing Chun School, Lo Man Kam, Lo Man Kam Wing Chun, Martial Arts Self Defense

Popularity: 1% [?]