Students in our classes learn to develop their courage. It takes tremendous courage to face your worst fears on the mat. Whether you’re most afraid of rape or murder, setting a limit with a friend or a family member and then being rejected, or afraid of hurting another person emotionally or physically, we address it in our classes.
Yes, it’s scary. But the good news-?

Everything after that gets easier. The practice pays off. You learn how to steady your voice when you’re afraid, and you learn to hold your ground through your fear and anxiety.

The next time that surge of adrenaline and fear hits, it’s not so surprising. In fact, you start to expect it.  You know what it is and how to get through it instead of being overwhelmed and feeling controlled by it.  Maybe you even welcome it when it comes.

Practicing in a supportive environment can change that feeling of terror in the face of a challenge to noticing that that rush means you’re doing something worthwhile. That surge no longer paralyzes but actually provides you with the energy to do what’s necessary and take action.

Living fully requires action and living with conviction. Courage can be learned and practiced.

I was on my way out, so I googled it later. Unfortunately, I consider it a part of my job to know about the horrible incidences of violence being discussed in pop culture.

According to the article I read on the LA Times website, 695,000 people watched it on YouTube in the week it had been up. That same morning, I got an email from Change.org asking me to sign a petition in response to a video recorded in a classroom of one student beating another student because he was gay. There was a link to watch the video.

We used to ask ourselves why we watched so much violence in the media—in movies, television shows, etc. Now the question I ask is: why are we watching these videos of actual, real violence? Before, unless it was my family or I lived next door perhaps, I wouldn’t see real-life family violence. I wouldn’t see the physical assault of a gay teenager unless I went to that school. These are the sorts of things that turn our stomachs. They should. That feeling in the pit of your stomach is your body’s signal to you that something is wrong. If you witness or experience violence or the signals of impending violence, that signal is there to tell you to get away, defend yourself, or do something to minimize the violence as much as possible.

Why are we watching these videos?

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I think—perhaps generously—many watch them as a way of thinking that they are helping. People think that by watching the video and talking about it that they will change the culture somehow. I don’t want to be crude here, but no—that’s gossip. Just talking about what happened next door or across the country is just another way of doing nothing.

The Change.org email was at least asking readers to sign a petition. You see, the student who physically assaulted the other student was suspended from school for only three days. Can you imagine how terrified the other student must have been to return to school and see his assailant again so soon after the assault? We may have differing ideas about what an effective solution might be (personally I would go for educating the aggressor about issues of violence rather than relying on suspension time alone), but that email at least was attempting to do something.

Watching videos of real-life assaults doesn’t just do nothing, it undoes something. It undoes your natural response to that feeling in your stomach. It normalizes the behavior that you are seeing. If you were appalled by violence in the media before, this is something that should make you scream. Seeing violence should make us act. Simple. It should make us all call the police. It should make us make a scene or defend ourselves or others in some way. It should make us call our local crisis center or mentoring agency and ask how we can get involved. It should make us do something. Talking and “awareness” alone doesn’t cut it.

Since my first class, my relationship to adrenaline has become more conscious.  I’ve noticed adrenaline when I: had a grant deadline to meet and experienced technical difficulties minutes before the cut-off, drove a stick shift in traffic for the first time, talked in front of important groups, had difficult conversations, had a near-miss while driving… and probably lots more.

Each time, I noticed my response was to grumble amusedly, “My friend, adrenaline” in recognition of its sudden presence.  I may have not been altogether pleased to see my friend, but I understood what I was feeling.  In the past before my first class, I might have labeled it “panic”, “anxiety”, or “irritation” and gotten more “stressed out.”  After the class, I was able to identify it as a natural, physical reaction to what was going on and have a different, more productive relationship to it.

While these more everyday adrenaline experiences do not have a direct relationship to staying safe, I realize that this changed relationship to adrenaline is one of the ways IMPACT can improve one’s quality of life.  Adrenaline (and conflict) are natural parts of life; we will never change that, but we can change our responses to them.

Fear can make a person more closed off from the world- loathe to trust others, averse to talking with strangers, and hesitant to try new things, be in new situations, or visit new places.  Living in fear of violence is one of the more oppressive consequences of violence in our society.

I firmly believe that self-defense and personal safety classes should address that fear.  It should alleviate those symptoms.  If a safety program makes a person go out less, be more mistrustful, be less open to new people or new experiences, it has perhaps succeeded in mking him/her safer.  But it has not succeeded in making that person feel less fear.  It has not made his/her life more full or more joyful – and it is not the only means to safety!

To feel and be safer does not require us to feel afraid.  We are often told that to be safe, we must feel afraid.  However, it is possible to feel safe and be safe.

If a violence prevention or personal safety class doesn’t make you feel safer and less ferful, if it tells you to close off your life even more than you already have in order to be safe, take another one.  Closing off is not the only way to get security in this world.  It may seem counterintuitive, but we can actually feel more safe and more secure when we open up, once we have some criteria for judging and some skills for defending.

If everyone understood that violence follows a pattern, it would have a profound impact on communities:

1.     Individuals would only be appropriately alarmed when a set of behaviors happen, and would feel at peace when they don’t.

2.     People could grow closer, not feeling suspicious of one another because of stereotypes or profiling or past experiences.

3.     It would make a lot more sense to learn a systematic approach to preventing, defending against, and mitigating the impact of violence.

4.     Victims/survivors and others affected by the threat of violence in our society could learn practical skills to avoid, prevent, and diminish violence in their lives and feel safer.  By gaining knowledge and skills, survivors can change the idea that it was something intrinsic in them, or that they are victims.

5.    Good people regularly profiled as potentially dangerous (men, people of color, those wearing baggy pants or piercings, etc.) could walk down the street and get into elevators without having to worry and put effort into not scaring others.

6.     Perpetrators of violence would be seen as using a set of behaviors to hurt and scare (have power over) others, and the behaviors would be addressed more, rather than demonizing the person.

7.     We could address the roots of violence and prevent it on that level, instead of continually having to provide victim services and lock up perpetrators.

Violence will always be shocking and upsetting.  By focusing on patterns, we discover the tools necessary to change how violence affects our communities.

It was – and is – that sense of indignation or outrage that helps us change things.  Without that sense, we don’t know how much something needs to change and how ready we are to change it.

I certainly don’t want to live with outrage as a constant sensation or feeling, but that spark is so useful for making the changes, saying what I need, or removing myself from a situation.  It is what precipitates everything that makes it better and gives us a sense of peace again.

It’s rare that I feel it so strongly anymore myself, because I have adjusted the major areas in my life so that I am more comfortable and am treated the way I need to be most of the time.

So, it’s educational and refreshing when I’m coaching students in class and I feel the “How Dare You” on their behalf.  It reminds me that this is the place where change starts.  This is where we begin to get what we need.  Whether it is an outside force or our “inner assailant” crossing our boundaries, the only appropriate and natural response is to say, “How dare you?”  When we are able to hear that voice, change is possible.

This is why simple defense techniques work.  By setting a boundary verbally or yelling, most assailants go away.  98% of our graduates report they have used their awareness and/or verbal skills to keep themselves safe.  2% report using a physical skill to stop an assault – and it was usually one or two strikes.  Defending ourselves and staying safe has nothing to do with physical size, strength, or fitness.  Effective defense requires that we believe we have a right to protect ourselves, the adrenaline management to act in the face of fear, and some knowledge of effective verbal and physical techniques.

National statistics reflect this trend.  A study on effective resistance shows that 3 out of 4 attempted rapes are prevented (“Real Knockouts: The Physical Feminism of Women’s Self-Defense”, Martha McCaughey.)  Who knew?!  What a great statistic!  Most rapes are prevented!  But in that same study, they found that 13 completed rapes are reported for every 1 prevented rape by news media.   And then, when prevented rapes were reported, the headline generally still read “rape”, not “prevented rape.”  That gives us the impression that rapes – and assaults in general – can’t be prevented when that is not true at all!

We need to believe it is possible to stop an assault in order to defend ourselves effectively.  It doesn’t require great skill or strength if it comes to physical defense, but it does require this belief.  We must also have the knowledge that we can keep ourselves safe in order to walk truly confidently down the street – coincidentally, producing the effective body language that deters assailants.

*It bears reminding that the majority of assaults happen by someone that you know rather than a stranger, but I think it is important to address the physical aspect of this concern – we address verbal strategies with people that you know in other articles. 

• What goes up, must come down.
• If you touch something hot, you will pull your hand away.
• If someone tries to harm me or someone I love, _________.

It’s only natural.

Protecting each other and ourselves is natural.  Unnecessary aggression and revenge are not what I am talking about.  However, knowing that we can, deserve to, and will defend ourselves if someone tries to hurt us is acting in accordance with nature.

Unfortunately, the laws that our society operates upon do not always mesh well with the laws of nature.  At the beginning of our classes, we sometimes hear, “I know I should defend myself but I’m not sure I can or I would.”

There is no reason to criticize ourselves for learning from the system in which we were raised.  But it is a broken system in which people learn to freeze, to consider whether it fits their self-image to hurt another person (or their image of a good woman, etc.), to consider the person’s feelings…  It’s not your fault the system’s a little screwy.  And you do not have to continue to live within that framework.

The student who once wondered, “Can/should/would I defend myself?” can learn deeply, “I can defend myself.  I will defend myself.”

Owning our inherent rights to protection allows us to live with confidence and peace.  This is what it means to be aligned with our natural selves.

Pre-registration is required.  Basics includes all four class in the series.  All must be attended.