The Foundation and Structure of Learning

Years ago I sat in the audience at a brown belt test for a friend's dojo. It was towards the end and the guy going up for his brown belt had done all of his kata and one step sparring and all that stuff. Now it was time for the actual sparring. As they bowed and began to spar it became painfully clear this kid had no idea what he was doing. A much lower belt rank was just picking him off at will and he seemed to be just looking for a spinning backfist because he couldn't think of anything else. He had done all of his kata correctly and his one step spars and demonstrations went fine. So what happened?

This is something that is all too common that we will revisit later in the article. For those that haven't read my other articles I've been involved in martial arts since I was 4 years old back in 1977. For the last several years I've developed programs for Law Enforcement here in the United States. This gave me a greatly different perspective as a teacher and really changed the way I look at curriculums and structure.

You see with law enforcement I don't get the luxury of giving long term training. I have to teach in a way that they can learn and retain in a very short time span. If I can't break things down to a strong foundation within a couple days then I've honestly wasted their time. I think being forced into doing this made me a much better teacher and gave me so much more of an understanding of what I need to do.

As I’ve visited departments over the years and seen other programs out there I've noticed some striking similarities between defensive tactics training and martial arts that was both disturbing and enlightening at the same time. The problems I found in the short two day programs seemed to be a microcosm for the problems that plague martial arts programs everywhere. I was asked to develop a specific outline for a department that wanted to fully adopt our program and had difficulty doing it. It was at this time that I figured out the problem and I want to share with you all what I’ve learned.

You see, in these courses a lot of time there's a lot of material to get through. So the instructors come in with an outline and work straight down it like a checklist. If they get behind they may even speed up a little to make sure all the material gets covered.

This causes a very specific problem. The students memorize the techniques but they never learn them and that's a big difference. This is what happened to our brown belt at the beginning of the article. He got in a hurry and he memorized the belt requirements but never actually learned how to apply them under real conditions. This is a bad curriculum.

I'm not going to get into certain techniques being better or worse than others long term that isn't the point of the article.  The point is that the student lacked a proper foundation and the curriculum didn't have a structure that was conducive to learning. When the minimum time in grade came around the instructor was too worried about the student's feelings and wanted to give him a sense of accomplishment so he rushed the test. However it goes much deeper than that. This student had been let down by this instructor the whole time. These errors didn't just start with this belt test it had been ongoing since white belt and it was obvious. Now the type of martial art being practiced doesn't matter in this case because with a proper foundation and structure you can produce high quality students in any art form so it isn't really about tossing or bashing an art so let's look at some solutions to these problems.

The first thing is concepts over techniques. For the purpose of this article a concept is basically a general principle such as breaking balance that anyone can perform in one way or another. A technique is a specific task that must be performed a specific way. Now we all come in all shapes and sizes. The simple fact is that not every technique is going to work for everyone. When dealing with a beginner you should never force them to perform techniques that you know are going to be problematic. They often get frustrated and leave then never come back and it reflects badly on you and your dojo because now these people are going to go around and tell people your stuff doesn't work or even worse blame themselves and damage their own self confidence.

In the beginning concepts should be the part that matters most. Not everyone can do the exact same technique but they can execute the same concept. I'll give you an example. Let's say you want the student to begin learning how to break a person's balance. Now a big guy might be able to grab someone's head and control it breaking the balance that way. A smaller person may not be able to reach the head but they can attack the legs with knees, kicks, etc. Both break the balance by upsetting the person's structure. Both are correct in the big scheme of things. Later on in their development, because of this, the student will be able to adapt new techniques easier and make them work for themselves at a faster rate.

Now of course a technique is the execution of the concepts so of course there are techniques but the concepts must be fully understood before learning a bunch of techniques. There's a program here in the U.S. where police officers learn 165 techniques in 5 days. Under stress very few of them work and they can't even remember most of them when they leave. There will be plenty of time for teaching your student techniques but they will be understood much better when they are taught as an extension of a concept.

People retain things better when they can relate to them. Sure you may want them to try different techniques to find out which ones work for them and which ones don't. After that however don't force a technique on someone when it's useless to them it will only bog them down and confuse them as well as hurt their development.

I'm going to skip over the techniques in the middle for now and go to strategy. Strategy is a part of a good foundation and is what keeps you from basically being hung out on an island like our poor brown belt. Direction would be another way of saying it. There's nothing worse than being in the middle of something and having no idea what you’re supposed to be doing.

This goes right into learning instead of memorizing. It's about being goal focused. If you’re a judo guy your goal is to put that attacker on the ground. If someone is choking you then you don't just grab their thumbs and jerk their hands away and stop. You follow up and put them on the ground. This is an idea that needs to be established from the beginning. If your just memorizing techniques you will stop after you've gotten the hands pulled away and that is bad training and bad structure.

When you’re working on executing a strategy from the beginning it teaches the student how to think and adapt. It also teaches efficiency. It teaches you how to deal with problems instead of just symptoms and is a great metaphor for leadership in daily life. In the beginning you never want to teach a technique that isn't moving towards executing your ultimate goal. An example of this in law enforcement courses would be that the ultimate goal is to get the guy in cuffs and in the car. Well if you have to do a takedown and don't have some control over the guy beforehand then you lose contact. Now you have to get on the ground and fight with his hands to get control, but if you hand an arm control and maintained it then it would be much easier to get them in cuffs. When you’re dealing with your beginners they will appreciate this. It instils confidence in them because they are able to accomplish something that's real and substantial right away instead of something hollow.

When you do this it establishes a great foundation and your students are already learning something useful. Now you can plug in techniques. Since your students have a full understand of what they are ultimately trying to accomplish and good sound concepts to always fall back on they can now adapt and deal with random changes. They understand the purpose of the techniques they are learning and they learn them faster. You never have students that don't know what to do. I've seen students invent techniques out of nowhere and make them work because when something failed they understood the concept so they made something else work. It's a great thing to see. They can take techniques and modify them to their needs. At this point it starts to become a real art because they are now expressing themselves.

My only caution would be when teaching new techniques you must protect the foundation. People have a tendency when learning something new of tossing out the old and you can't let them crack the foundation. Even if they are going up for black belt make sure they focus on the core techniques that they learned in the beginning. Everyone likes the new cool thing just make sure their foundation doesn't crack while they are playing with it.

In developing these ideas about structure we also developed a new program for the public called KONBATTO (Stonewall Tactical Jujutsu). In this program you not only learn some very simple, direct, and vicious combatives you will also learn how to implement this structure into your curriculum at your school that we discussed in this article as part of that two day course. We are happily launching this program in England and Ireland this summer. If you like these ideas and find them useful I'd be more than happy to show each of you how to apply them to your martial art in person. I thank you for your time and remember. Learn don't memorize.

To find out more about Stonewall Tactical Defense Systems visit http://www.stonewalltactical.com/index.html

A lesson from the past...

I was thinking the other day about the importance of feedback and listening to it if nothing more. 


Sometimes feedback can be crap and sometimes it's legitimate and can help your programs. Sometimes we get tunnel vision on something and an outside eye can bring new light. A good program is always developing and adapting. Being humble and dropping the ego will help a lot too. This led to a lot of other things to think about as well. It got me thinking about incident years ago that I want to recount with you.

Several years ago I was the Special Projects Director for the International Combatives Self Defense Association. I worked with the board and mainly the Director of Operations. I was teaching at a conference in Chicago, I can't remember if it was Tinley Park or Oak Forest (yeah I'm having a senior moment). A lot of the board and State reps were there as well, a lot of them heavy hitters in their field. Hell we even had guys from Spain there. 

My friend, Fernan Vargas, who was the Director of Operations told me to hang around at lunch as there was this guy that wanted to test to be an instructor with the organization, he had this system he wanted to demonstrate. I'd actually met the guy the night before and he was really cocky but he seemed like he knew what he was talking about. We all sat down at lunch and watched him do his thing. He was so sure of himself he basically phoned it in and thought we would be dazzled.

When it came to the interview portion he found out otherwise. His program was basically someone attacks and you move in penetrating then cause injury. A lot of it depended on pressure points which he referred to as an electrical knockout. He was VERY arrogant and dismissive and disrespectful during the interview. He actually thought his ideas were innovative.

First of all, when asked to explain an electric knockout, it was obvious he didn't really know what he was talking about it. For those that don't completely understand a pressure point is where at least two nerves intersect in the body and striking them sends the stimulus to the brain along more than one nerve channel, hence it's more painful. How they are hit affects the outcome, it has to be a specific way. Some have to be at a certain time of day and if on drugs, some people never feel them and some never feel them regardless or only in certain areas. In other words a successful outcome is marginal at best and it takes a lot of training to pull it off therefore it isn't a good fit for combatives.

Second of all it was one of those systems that are overly simplistic. You move  and do something to a guy and he reacts in a specific way, the way that he's told to react to your attack so it works every time. Ummm. No…….

Different people react differently to different stimuli. You have to be able to adapt, this is why overly simplistic courses don't work. Just because you kicked a guy in the nuts doesn't mean he's always going to bend forward. I've seen people fall backwards. I've seen people fall down. I've even seen some become even more pissed off and fight harder. This guy saw a video of a silly system then went and trained in it and thought he could be an instructor and we were just a bunch of goobers. You need experience to do this - you need to know how to put together an adaptive system and to do that you need research.

Even experience, though you need to have it, isn't enough because you can't experience something for someone else. So this guy got brutalized by us and if he wasn't so arrogant I’d have felt bad about it. This guy wrote something later, acting as if we didn't get it. Oh we got it! Then he GOT it! 

My point is this guy's system will never improve it will always suck. He was too arrogant to think he could actually be wrong about something. If you’re training under someone and they don't listen to you, my advice is to get the hell out of there because if their system isn't outdated then it will be shortly. You've got to listen to your people and drop the ego or pay the price for it.

To find out more about Stonewall Tactical Defense Systems visit http://www.stonewalltactical.com/index.html

Beware of the fallout!

I want to tell you a true story today from my own personal life that happened 18 years ago. Generally, a lot of the things I've been through I keep to myself but I feel this may help someone else down the road so I'll tell it.

Now since this involves real people I'm going to give you the disclaimer now and tell you that I'm going to change names and use generic names for places because even though I'm ok with telling this story other people involved may want to keep their private incidents private so it's out of respect that I do so.

This happened at the ripe old age of 19, for me a couple years before I got into private security and even further down the road - personal protection work. I'd been doing martial arts since aged 4 but the physical training involved in that wasn't going to help me tonight...it was all mental.

I was with a cousin who was a couple years older and he had to sneak me into a bar. It was an old trick that I won't disclose because I don't want kids reading this and using it....because it would still totally work. We both had more dollars than sense and went right for the harder drinks - White Russians, screamin' blue mutha f$%kers; you get the picture. If I remember right we even broke out the bar book.

Well it got to be close to 1:30am and they were doing last call. We were feeling 10 feet tall and bulletproof and decided that we weren't done partying. We asked a couple of the guys around us and they told us about an all night place and how to get there. Since technically it was a club not a business it could stay open all night and all you had to do to be a member was sign in at the door. I'd never heard of the place but my cousin had and said it was pretty rough there. Well if you tell a tough 19 year old guy that, it’s just gonna make him want to go more and that's exactly what I did. So off we went as fast as we could get there.

When we got there it was just like those guys told us. It was a big place and they asked no questions, just had us sign in at the door. We got a couple drinks but didn't want to stick out too much because I was technically underage so we noticed a pool table in the back and went over there to play a few games. It was only 2 am and the bars were just closing so there were very few people in there, we'd beaten the crowd.

As we played our game of pool there was a commotion up towards the front. There were these two guys sitting at a high top table right in the middle of the place and apparently there was an argument and one guy punched the other. Well of course the staff jumped the guy that threw the punch and broke it up then threw him out and told him he needed to cool down. The other guy got up, sat back down and just kept on drinking. We kinda shrugged it off at the time because this was a lesson we had yet to learn.

By then the crowd was coming in and the place got packed. It was like every bar in town emptied into this bottleneck after hours. There was even a band that started at 3 am. Well we kept drinking, the band kept playing, the girls kept dancing, and the men kept chasing the girls that were dancing. In other words, everything was normal. We started to get to know the staff and talking about different drinks. Other than the two guys fighting earlier it was a pretty nice time.

About 4 am or maybe a little later we moved over to the other side of the bar by the door talking to some other bartender. I remember seeing him look at the door and get real serious. So I turned and looked and I recognized the guy. It was the guy from earlier that had been thrown out for punching that other guy. I heard him tell the doorman," Hey I was sittin' at home and got to thinkin'...I feel real bad about what happened earlier, I never should've punched him I should've let it ride. I'm not staying or anything I just wanted to apologize to him if he's still here."

Now a real doorman would've said I can't let you in, but this was the good ol' boy club in the Deep South where everyone thinks they know everyone. For the future, if you’re a newbie doorman reading this...that guy should never be allowed back in. I don't give a damn what he says.

Anyway back to the story. At the time everyone once again shrugged it off and I turned back around and took another drink. Then I heard the shot. All hell broke loose and the guy ran outside. The shot was right behind my head and it was loud....VERY LOUD! I was disoriented stumbling off the stool holding my ears. I looked to my left and saw a guy running for the door holding the side off his head with blood gushing down his arm screaming, “Call the cops!" I looked to my right and on the floor I saw it. It was his ear blown right from the side of his head just laying there between my cousin and me.

Some other guy ran up to the door and threw a chair outside and broke out running then I heard at least two more gunshots. Now bear in mind all of this was probably happening in less than 10 seconds. For some ungodly reason my cousin ran for the door too but he was going to run out right in the line of fire. I tried to tackle him but he fought it and we banged against the wall. I got his feet off the ground but another chair had been knocked over behind me so we fell over it and hit the back of my head on the floor but I couldn't feel anything.

I remember looking up and seeing the bartender come flying over the bar and over us as I tried to keep my cousin on the ground but I could see out the door. The original shooter either ran out of bullets or his gun jammed I can't remember but for whatever reason the gun wouldn't fire. He charged the bartender and the bartender popped him in the back of the head with the butt of his pistol and he went down. Some people grabbed him but I never saw where they went. I was talking to my cousin and making sure he wasn't running out there and getting up.

The bartender walked back up to the entrance and turned his back to us looking back into the parking lot. Then my genius of a cousin decides to dive for the gun. Well that went over like a turd in a punch bowl. To this day I don't know what got into him and when I ask him he doesn't remember. The bartender yanks his hand back then puts it towards my cousin. To this day I don't know why I did what I did but I’m glad if did it. I stepped in front of the gun. I looked at the bartender he was furious his hand was shaking.

I remember the conversation going something like this:

Me:”Dude, he's just drunk man we ain't gotta do this!”
Bartender: “What the hell is wrong with him I could kill you man?”
Me: “I know man, I know he's just drunk man, we don't even know them people!”
Me: “Come on man just let it ride let this one ride let's just chill. Let's all just chill”
Bartender: “That was really stupid!”
Me: “I know man it was just a mistake let's just calm down.”

I breathed a sigh of relief when he finally put the gun down. Actually, he bought us two drinks on the house. It's a good night when you have free alcohol and don't get shot to death.

Some woman came out and told the bartender the police were on their way and apparently he already had some type of warrant for something so he hauled ass out of there.

Then it hit me that once again, I was under age and she’d just said the cops were on their way. They quarantined the building and put us all on lockdown. They had a guy taking pictures of the ceiling. I was playing darts and trying to play it cool. They were investigating a shootout so they didn't ask for ID or anything like that. They finally let us go around 7 am. We were all dumb and lucky. We were lucky to be alive and had literally dodged a bullet.

A great lesson was learned on many notes that would help me in my profession for years to come and I still use this story to teach people. I alluded to this very same lesson in an article called Are You In A Sport Art And Don't Know It?

If you get in a fight win, lose, or draw, leave immediately, don't hang around. The fallout is usually worse than the fight. In this instance a guy got his ear blown off, another got pistol whipped, I got a knot on my head and a gun pointed towards it. In the years after this when I worked as a bouncer it was always a rule: if you have to fight a guy and put him out then you get your payout for the night and get sent home. He may come back looking for you with more people or better weapons.

These days they can use the wands to detect weapons that they didn't use back then but if the guy had left after he got hit before 2 am none of this would've happened. At least it wouldn't have happened in that bar and put those people in danger. We were all innocent bystanders; we shouldn't have been brought into some freaky redneck drama. This shooter went home, sat there and plotted this attempted murder. He came back and had every intention to do it. This could happen in any club on any given night when some idiot makes a bad decision.

There are a lot of lessons that can be learned from this story but this one is the main one to focus on: After a violent event no matter how small it seems don't hang around doing a victory dance or whatever the hell you do. This isn't UFC or some other sport. This isn't WWE this is real life and people get murdered over things like this every day. If you’re involved in some kind of bar fight or any other kind of fight do yourself a favour, for your safety and the safety of the people around you.....GO HOME!

To find out more about Stonewall Tactical Defense Systems visit http://www.stonewalltactical.com/index.html

Don't Look At The Floor or You'll Soon Be On It

I used to train in boxing quite bit years ago. Like everyone else I wasn't very good when I started, it took a lot of effort to get there. Sometimes you had to take a hit to give one. Sometimes you just had to let your hands go.

One of the lessons I learned early on was keep your head up don't stare at the floor coming in swinging. My coach would always say:"If you look at the floor you'll soon be on it." When you’re moving in to throw those blows you can't just do it blindly because you’re afraid. You gotta keep that head up so you'll see those counter punches coming or you'll probably get dropped with an uppercut.

I often think about boxing, as many have, as a great metaphor for life, especially the statement "Don't look down at the floor or you'll soon be on it." I think it has many true connotations. So often in life people go off half cocked. I have written several articles talking about this.

Very recently I did an article called As the World Implodes: When People Put Their Agendas Ahead of the Truth.  Basically a guy was running from Police Officers then shot at them. When they shot back he was hit and died. An entire neighborhood held protests accusing the police of shooting an unarmed man. They went in swinging without looking. They didn't have all the facts. Now, after the gun has been recovered it appears as though he actually shot himself to keep from going to jail. 

It happens all the time. Just because someone is boisterous and passionate about what they are saying doesn't mean they have a clue what they are talking about.  You can go after someone but your facts need to be straight.

I saw an interview on YouTube very recently. It was Bill O'Reilly interviewing Bill Mahar about religion. Bill Mahar is a famous comedian who also happens to be an atheist. He was basically trying to say that religion is bad and a lot of the stuff in the Bible isn't true.  Now, I'm a spiritual person myself, I believe in God but I'm not big on organized religion. To prove the Bible preached violence he quoted a saying from the Book of Deuteronomy. It was basically the part where it says you should kill your neighbor if you catch them working on a Sunday. Bill Mahar went in swinging with his head down.

As many of you know, in the Christian religion the Old Testament is basically used for parables only and life lessons, it isn't literal. The laws governing the religion are found in the New Testament only. If he had taken the time to research that and know the subject he was speaking on he wouldn't have made a bogus uneducated point. If you’re going to use aggressive speech you better know what you’re saying. It's like police kicking in a door before checking to make sure they are at the right house (trust me it happens).

Before you attack a problem you need to understand the problem. When guys try to modernize martial arts more often than not they go into it with preconceived notions of what will work and what will not. They believe their traditional art to be superior to others so they invent ingenious solutions to nonexistent problems. So they have great defenses against the wrong attacks. They never really understand the problem because they never make the attempt. You can't teach a person who already knows everything. They go in without having all the facts about real attacks then invent a crappy unrealistic system so they can sell it to you as the newest stuff when it is just someone swinging with their head down.

We've all heard sports metaphors before. We know there's a much bigger reason to keep your head up. As time goes on it seems the world becomes more and more violent and people care less and less. With so many things going on to make you feel bad, keeping your head up can be harder than it sounds. The fight we are in is both metaphorical and literal at the same time.

Sometimes I hear folks talk about the innate good in all people; the people who say that need to lift their heads because there is no such thing as innate good in all people. Some people are good and some aren't. Some have had their heads down for so long they are disgusting.

I'm gonna date this article by mentioning some current events. Recently there was a terrorist attack in Norway. It was a horrible tragedy and our hearts go out to them. The people there will pull together the same way we did during the 911 tragedy. They will be uplifted because of it. People will help because it is a big thing. We are there for the big things but it's the small things we falter.

In July singer Amy Winehouse was found dead in her London apartment. She had a long history with drugs and public aggression. The belief, true or not, was that she wasn't a very nice person. When the story was posted on the internet the replies varied. Most talked about it being such a waste which is true in the context it was said but better words could've been used. A lot however went out of their way to say she was a junkie and who cares and that they hoped Lindsay Lohan was next. These are the people that you have to worry about. They have their heads down and can't see the truth. These are the ones that will drag you down to their level and make you suck as bad as they do. They have their heads down so that is precisely why you need to keep yours up. Makes it easier to knock them out.

Now I know this is getting off subject a bit but its bothering me and I want to address it. I want to answer the question posted by a lot of these jerks today. The question of who cares? I would venture to say a lot of people care. I'll continue to use Amy Winehouse as an example. She had to have parents right? I know she was married at one point. She had family and friends who are devastated right now as I write this commentary.

You see I want to share a truth to all you people with your heads down. All death is tragic. Death is a lost opportunity for the dead as well as the world around them. For people who have had a bad life it means they have no more chances to make it better or improve. Personally I always pull for the underdogs. It's my way of saying f@#k you to the powers that be.

When someone dies like that their future actions can no longer inspire us. Good, bad, or indifferent we can't learn anything from them anymore. We only have that short span to inspire us in one way or another. They are gone and those opportunities are gone with them. What if she finally kicked drugs? She was very talented. Would she have inspired others to get off drugs? Would her newer music inspire someone else to be a singer? We'll never know that because she's gone. That's what I mean by lost opportunity. When someone dies we all lose a chance at something because none of us know the future. How many of you have lost someone you wish were here right now? I would venture to say all of you. That's the answer to the question, who cares? So lift your heads up for once and see it.

As I talked in other articles about Personal Empowerment and You and Do You Have Dreams To Remember? Self confidence is important especially when there are so many people who want to take it from you; it should show you the value of it. In this life it's full of people that want to tear you down. We must educate ourselves to these basic truths to defend against them. When the ignorant come in swinging to take us out you have to know your stuff and be confident. Do be like those people. Don't look at the floor or you'll soon be on it.

To find out more about Stonewall Tactical Defense Systems visit http://www.stonewalltactical.com/index.html

The Startle Reflex: In Defense of the Truth

A few years ago a friend and mentor of mine, W. Hock Hocheim, wrote an article called, A Startling Study In The Startle Reflex. Hocheim used nothing but facts in the article. There were no opinions just true scientific data. This was done to counteract lies that were being told to the public for marketing reasons. There was a lot of bogus information out there about the startle reflex and a lot of people lying about it on purpose to sell courses even though they knew that it wasn't true. To this day people are still lying about the startle reflex to try to get people to take their course and disparage instructors who tell them the truth about it. 


Now, Hock tries to have some diplomacy in his articles, he teaches the public and it's smart not to step on anyone's sensitive toes and burn bridges, I think anyone should be able to understand that. However I teach mainly police and don't care who I p**s off so I'm gonna tell you like it's gonna be and to those that don't like it you can just go in a corner and cry like the sissy’s that you have become.

I'm not going to regurgitate all the data that Hock has already published, you can read all about it in his post. I am however going to shed a little more light on it for you…

Back in the 1930's tests were done to activate the ‘startle reflex’ when the subject was spooked by an audible stimulus. Now, to put that in basic terms I'll give you an example. Let's say you have to get up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom. You know how in the winter furniture creeks sometimes due to the cold? So you’re walking down that hall half asleep and you hear that popping sound… It scares you and you drop down and your arms shoot out. We've all done that, me included.

All that this test proved in the 1930's was that you did what you were already going to do when you heard that noise. That was it. It had nothing to do with combat or seeing punches coming at you or anything of the sort.

Fast forward to the 80's: You’ve got some guy going around telling people that his system is better than that of others because he teaches defences from natural reflexes – the ones that you would do anyway. Yup! you’ve guessed it, shooting the arms straight out and diving for it. He did this knowing that data had been disproved in the 70's and that it had nothing to do with visual stimulus but he just lied and taught it anyway.

If someone starts bashing on you, you’re gonna stick your arms out anyway so let's go with it. Now today people claim he never said that and he tries to backtrack on it but he's said it many times and many people including myself have heard him say it.
Now I'm not saying that you won't stick your arms straight out and dive for it. You very well may do that. You may also squat and dump in your pants. You may clutch your chest. You may break out running. You may not do anything at all. You may cover in some way. I've even seen some stiffen up like a board and just fall down. If it's heading towards your head you may swat at it. If it's on the ground you may jump or lift a foot and stomp it.

The simple fact is, and the point of Hock's article, is that nobody and I mean nobody knows exactly what every single individual person will do when startled under every single random condition the almighty God could possibly invent. Nobody has that knowledge. Not me, you, or anyone else for that matter. So for any person to stand in front of a crowd and tell them all exactly what they will do when scared is a joke and a farce. If someone tries to tell you that then run because they are either a liar or they are ignorant.

It doesn't have to be the arm thing it can be any startle reflex. I don't want to just bash a certain group. If someone tries to tell you there's only one possible startle reflex, regardless of what they say that reflex is, they are wrong. If they tell you everyone will always jump....they don't. If they say everyone will punch...they won't. I could go on with this all day.

The fact is people; there is no perfect technique because attacks are so random. This is why concepts are more important than techniques because concepts can adapt to us. You have to conform to techniques and try to make them work and they may not be right for your size, shape, or whatever. However, a concept will conform to you and your needs.

In my 34 years in martial arts I've seen a lot. I've seen people demonstrate a kick to the groin and a follow up when the guy bent over forward from it. I've kicked a couple of people in the nuts and they never bent forward, they actually fell straight backward. I've seen people tell others - I can enter a certain way and slam a forearm to the brachial plexus and it'll knock them out. Then I've seen people take 5 or 6 hard shots to the brachial plexus and never even acknowledge it and fight harder.

People are different and they react differently. There is simply no way to predict it. All these techniques you see against a startle in martial arts classes are learned techniques built into muscle memory. They aren't necessarily natural for everyone, they may be natural for some and unnatural for others it just depends on the person.

My advice for instructors is to pick something simple that makes the most sense based upon the type of system you teach. You have to have a starting point to work from. In what I do we use a cover and level change because it sets up what we do on the entry very well. To some it feels very natural and to others it feels odd for whatever reason. We work it hard and they get it built in then they love it and it works incredibly well for what we do.

If I was you I'd stop worrying about what the big names do and just pressure test everything and find out what works best for what you do there is no magic technique that is going to work for everything, we all just do the best we can to the best of our ability to try and help people.

What works for me may not feel right for you and vice versa but at least that's honest. We didn't get into this to follow someone else's dogma we got into it to be leaders in our community. So put together something great and get it out there and help some people. As far as Hock's article is concerned, it's a great article with a lot of great data. Keep your eyes on the prize and don't take things out of context. Have a good day.

To find out more about Stonewall Tactical Defense Systems visit http://www.stonewalltactical.com/index.html

Nothing works all the time, Everything works sometimes...

"Nothing works all the time, Everything works sometimes" - W.Hock Hocheim

It's a very profound statement if you think about it. It's simple....but profound. It's the way a good technique should be if you really think about it. It has depth and can be used for more than one purpose and mean many things. I remember the first time I ever heard it in Decatur, AL a couple years ago at a clinic taught by Hock Hocheim, a mentor of mine. He says it at the start of all his seminars. Now I'm one of these guys that think a lot, probably too much. If I come up with a tactic I then try to come up with a counter; then a counter to that until I can't even think of a counter anymore. This statement means a couple different things to me and I think everyone should learn it and understand it. Below I'm going to list a few ways that I apply this statement in my career and hopefully enlighten some to the value of it.

1. It’s just flat out true - You take the craziest most unrealistic technique you ever saw and you can find someone on YouTube being knocked out by it. However, just because it works for one person doesn't mean it will work for everyone. As a police trainer I see this stuff all the time. I see some of the worst courses you could think of with the craziest things. However, you can go on the websites for these courses and there will be all kinds of testimonials from officers that used that system and it worked for them.

As trainers and coaches if we are striving for the safety of those we teach it's best to use tactics or concepts that are most likely to work for everyone consistently. That's our job. When people use these high risk low reward systems and they work it can keep bad systems around and make it harder to convince departments to upgrade to a better system even if that bad system is failing for everyone else. In a way for them it's about perspective. I had a meeting with a police chief locally a few months back. He had done one of these big national courses that in all honestly most departments are abandoning because of its low success rate in the field. However he loved the course because he'd used a couple of tactics from it that had saved his life in his career. He's spent 40 hours in that class and learned 4 or 5 really good techniques.

Now to my ears that's evidence of a bad course not a good one to spend that much time in a class and 4 or 5 useful things is all you got but he was convinced. He was convinced because nothing works all the time, everything works sometimes and those times it worked for him. You may run into people sometimes that think they see a flaw in your system because of something in their background. If that happens and it will; remember that statement and don't blow it off.

Maybe what they are saying is unfounded but maybe since they came from a different background they see something that you missed. It could be a chance for your system to grow and have more depth so when someone else thinks they see the same flaw you'll have an answer for them. Then again they may be full of crap but you should at least think about it.

2. It’s a warning to the arrogant - The reality based self defense community can be filled with the most egotistical arrogant people in the world. They know the real truth about everything, but they are the only ones that know....yeah right. It would take 100 RBSD instructors to change a light bulb. 1 to actually do it and 99 to say they could've done it better and they'll have scientific studies to back it up too. They could go on for hours about how you should've tilted your hand more or applied more force when you pushed up and they'll make sure to unknowingly be as condescending as humanly possible when they do it. They just seem to have conveniently forgotten to never say never.

The technique everyone seems to jump on is high kicks. Now I personally am not a fan of high kicks and I don't teach them. With my background being Jujutsu when I see that leg in the air I'm thinking their balance is mine. In the confrontations I've been in I make sure I stay too close however so I'm not in kicking range. That's my perspective but it doesn't mean they could never work. I think for the average person it's too high risk of a technique because of the position it puts you in. However someone like Bill Wallace could kick you in the head all day.

I've grown to hate threads on boards and face book groups. I rarely post in them anymore just for the simple fact that people love to take things out of context so they can jump on them and make themselves look more intelligent than others that are trying to do the same thing. It's transparent and it makes me angry. Throw a discussion about high kicking into one of those threads and it's like dumping blood in a shark tank. I would caution them to remember this statement. It'll keep you honest before you open your mouth. We preach all the time that attacks are random and we don't know who the attacker will be. If you preach it then you should apply it to all your logic. Once again high kicks have a very very low success rate but that doesn't mean that someone couldn't kick your beak around like Daffy Duck.

To think that it could never happen is ignorant and could someday be your downfall. Not because someone might kick you in the head but that dismissive attitude will affect how you build your courses and how you apply your concepts as well as how you prepare others. Before you get on your lectern to pontificate remember the statement. Then remember that you’re not as smart as you think you are..

3. It's a disarming and diplomatic tool for trainers - I teach people from all kinds of backgrounds. Sure when I was younger I had a short sighted view of things like a lot of these other guys around. However I always tried to be honest with myself and put the people I'm teaching first. When I go to teach a seminar I don't know the background of everyone that's in there. If I go in there with a dismissive attitude about certain martial arts bashing them and silly things like that and how this and that is BS then I'm blowing an opportunity. If someone from that style is there they are just going to shut down and tune me out. I'll never get through to them. You can't just go in there and talk to people that way and tell them something they've worked their butts off in is crap. If someone had done that to me the first thing I'd think is this guy doesn't have much teaching experience he's too immature.

You open your seminar with the statement it's diplomatic. You allow them to clutch the thing they hold onto and by not taking everything away from them you get their ear. If you have a better way and you’re a good teacher they'll find it on their own you don't have to say that stuff. Be diplomatic when they ask questions about how it fits in with the thing they do. Always be positive and helpful. Build....don't tear down. This gets back to the negativity and dismissive attitude sinking you. If you still want to be negative and are thinking well I don't want those idiots in my class... then you’re the idiot. You shouldn't be teaching because you don't care about the people you only care about your dogma. Remember the statement.

I want to thank Hock for making that statement and I hope this short article even though I probably went to deep and over thought it will enlighten some of you in a small way. Thank you for your time.

To find out more about Stonewall Tactical Defense Systems visit http://www.stonewalltactical.com/index.html

Martial Artist v Black Belt

This is something that has been on my mind for a long time. I've wrote similar articles in the past but it's been awhile. I'm talking about the dumbing down of martial arts in this country until they are no longer martial.

There are too many dishonest people involved in what we do who are being dishonest with themselves if they don't believe that they are dishonest with the people around them. The divide between martial artists and black belts has gotten wider and wider as time has gone on and I feel the need to stand up and speak on it once again because I believe in what I do. Most of all I believe in the truth and I hate to see people being lied to and ripped off.

To get to the point right off let's look at the definition of the word Martial. Merriam-Webster defines martial as:

1: Of, relating to, or suited for war or a warrior;

2: Relating to an army or to military life;

3: Experienced in or inclined to war: warlike.

This is the meaning of the word martial. The word itself is Latin meaning from Mars (not the planet, the God of War). Yes people, that's right - it's not Asian and no, martial arts absolutely did not originate in Asia. Actually there is some evidence that there were no canonized arts in Asia at all until after the campaigns of Alexander the Great. That of course is up for debate and not relevant to this article. So we now know the word itself implies that the person is either in the military or they are basically a fighter in some form or at the very least prepared to fight.

I like to sit around sometimes and listen to the old timers talk about how martial arts used to be. They talk about how back in the old days people would spar bare knuckle and you had to be able to fight to get your ranks. Everyone earned everything they got.

I know on my way to my Judo black belt I won a heavyweight championship on a State level, got a shoulder dislocation and one good concussion to go with it. You bet I earned my rank. I didn't have it easy but if everyone could have something then it wouldn't be worth anything would it? I think you see where this is going.

   

As technical director for an international organization I’ve visited a lot of schools and seen a lot of programs. I don't visit a lot of those schools anymore because frankly I'm just disgusted. I saw schools doing techniques on the same level at black belt that weren't much better than the white belts were doing. I saw an instructor in Madison, AL once change an attack because the wrist lock he wanted to use wasn't working against a real attack. So instead of using the technique correctly or trying it a different way he changed the attack to something unrealistic.

I was helping another guy in the area once. I'd go in and show these techniques and better ways of training to produce better students. They'd all nod and talk about how great the techniques were and I'd feel like I got through somewhere. I'd go back the next week and they weren't implemented. I'd give them more time then bring it up. I'd hear something like umm yeah I remember we talked about that last week. Well you know talking doesn't fix anything.

I gave him a link to my articles and he read a few. This guy actually sent me an email back saying he agreed with what I was saying but he was just trying to teach these students how to defend themselves he wasn't trying to develop Navy SEALS. He couldn't understand that he wasn't really teaching his students anything and what I was telling him was the basic information they'd need to defend themselves at all.

You know I once went to a Jujitsu school that didn't teach nage waza because they were afraid it would scare potential students and run them off. Yes I'm serious that actually happened.

Most use the excuse that they are just trying to empower people and build good character. This is a load of crap and a complete insult to anyone's intelligence. They actually want us to believe that you have to lower the bar on quality to make someone feel better. Well you know, the US Military has made a lot of men out of boys, do you think they shy away from rough training?

The fact is they are lying to people. It's all about money plain and simple. Martial arts aren’t for everyone and should not be for everyone. Martial arts are for warriors. Teaching someone crap to make it easier to fill your schools is not about character it's about money so you need to stop lying to yourself and others.

What you are teaching is not martial arts and you are not a warrior; you’re just a fabric salesman. Yes that's right; there is a huge difference between a black belt and a martial artist. If you spend more time going to marketing seminars than you do working on your program to make it better then you are not a real martial artist. You’re just a low rent con artist that takes advantage of people and fills them with a false sense of security. You are not helping anyone but yourself and you are disgusting.

These jerks have people so brainwashed it's mind boggling. You go in and try to help them out and they just looking at you like you dropped a load of dung on their circle jerk. Some people just don't want the truth; they only want the perception of it.

They'll come after you too if you stand up and fight it. I've had them go to the Hanshi of the organization before and say bad things about me and they even held up my 6th dan promotion for a year in Jujutsu but I finally got it anyway. You know I'd rather actually be somebody than just look like somebody any day. People, use your common sense. If you do not have to work hard for something then you’re not getting anything. Now, building character is important, don't get me wrong, but that can be instilled with any program. I recently wrote an article called Don't Look at the Floor or You'll Soon Be On it which used boxing as a great metaphor for positive life lessons. Can you imagine the looks someone would get if they claimed they studied boxing but never sparred? That doesn't even sound right.

Some others use the excuse that they are standing by tradition. This is also wrong. These arts were originally developed in ancient times for military use. The fact is, like any military, if those techniques weren't working they'd change them. They aren't going to die on the battlefield for loyalty to some technique, but apparently some instructors think it's alright for their students to die for them now.

If martial arts doesn't deal with modern problems and modify and change over time then they become a stagnant museum piece. They are no longer a living art. No art deserves that fate. I'm not saying go in there and bash skulls every night but you have train people to develop the attributes of the art that can work in a very real way. You should always pressure test your techniques. Your loyalty should only be to the people that walk through your doors and put the faith in you that you can teach them how to reasonably defend themselves.

It's a sad development of our society. Teaching people that the bar will be lowered for them and they don't have to work for what they get is not a good lesson. We are living in tough times and need realism more than ever. We need warriors not pretenders.  A black belt is not necessarily a martial artist anymore. There are a lot of good instructors out there; it isn't just about money with everyone. Some of us are still out here living and breathing this stuff. My name is Paul Green and I'm proud to be a martial artist.

To find out more about Stonewall Tactical Defense Systems visit http://www.stonewalltactical.com/index.html