If you do a search on Youtube for self defense, or self defense for women, you will find a variety of videos demonstrating various techniques for dealing with specific types of assault.
When you see an instructor demonstrate a specific technique for dealing with a specific type of assault, you can probably bet that instructor has never experienced a real assault.
Why can I say this with confidence? Because when you are dealing with a real life assault, you go through significant physiological changes that will prevent you from executing any specific techniques under duress.
Talk to a Navy SEAL about this and they will tell you that the only reason they react the way they do is because of their training. They will also tell you that they do not train specific techniques to deal with specific types of assault.
What they are trained to do is simply react with the few basic techniques they are taught until the fight is over. Simple as that.
I’ll give you a case in point in what doesn’t work…
Recently I watched a video on Youtube where I watched a kung fu instructor demonstrate to a student how to escape a simple wrist grab.
The video was about 15 minutes in length. Ten minutes into the video came the moment of truth…he grabbed his student’s wrist and she did not execute the technique properly.
Imagine how you’d react as your adrenaline has spiked, your heart rate has spiked, and all of the blood has started rushing toward your vital organs and away from your hands and feet.
Do you think you could remember what technique you should execute? Unless you’ve had thousands of hours of training, and this included simulation, the odds are that you would not remember.
When it comes to dealing with a real life assault, everything must be dumbed down. Your survival will simply depend upon your willingness to do whatever it takes to escape the assault.
If you don’t have a significant amount of training, you’ll to need rely upon your most basic survival instincts.
With all this in mind, the best way to survive a real life street assault is to AVOID it altogether.
However, if you’ve let your guard down and you find yourself faced with a life threating assault situation, knowledge of a few basic principles is what you really need to survive.
While I do teach kung fu to my students, it is mainly to help them develop their athleticism so that they have better ability to execute the basic techniques needed to deal with a real physical assault.
We ultimately focus on only a handful of striking and kicking techniques, and how to use them in all possible situations.
Additionally, much of our training deals with awareness and planning. That is really where self defense begins.
Thanks for reading!
