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 In this lesson, you will learn:
I learned a lesson in confidence, when my own confidence was tested. Here is a lesson I learned. 
About 20 years ago, I was a second-degree black belt and had been studying karate for about 6 years. I was competing and although far from a champion, I was feeling pretty good about my physical abilities. Until, I started getting harassed by a local psycho by the name of Phil. Phil was a wrestling coach and fancied himself a wrestling expert. For some unfathomable reasons, Phil felt obligated to defend all forms of wrestling including pro wrestling. If anyone made any comments about wrestling being fake, he would explode in a tirade "Wrestling isn't fake. It's karate that's fake. Wrestling is real where you slam people down and choke them. In karate, you don't even make any contact. Karate is fake. Karate is fake.
Now, I seemed to have the misfortune of often running into Phil and he'd start in on me, "You know that karate is fake. Admit it. Wrestling is a real sport. Admit it. One of these days, I'm going to take a few of you karate guys out and make you prove it."Why did I have the misfortune of being the object of this lunatic's rantings? As these encounters continued, I hoped they would just end. They didn't. Maybe I was just reading too much into these outbursts. Who was this guy? I asked around and heard exactly what I didn't want to hear, "Seriously watch out for this guy. He's a nut case. He's been banned from the American Legion, the Elks and the VFW for fighting." Somebody else said, "Oh yah, I know Phil, poor guy, he's got some kind of a metal plate in this head." I never knew what that meant having "a metal plate in your head," but it didn't sound good. Then I got a real shock when someone said, "Why don't you just talk to his wife Barbara from the bookstore?" Yes, I knew Barbara from the bookstore. She wore long dresses, tied her hair in a bun and had three perfectly groomed well-behaved little sons. I never made the connection. How could this woman be Phil's wife?
I went to see Barbara; she smiled and laughed, "My Phil, he can sure be a hand full sometimes. I can't tell you the number of cold nights that I've had to bundle up the kids and go down to the jail and bail him out. He is a character." "Oh, he's a character all right," I said to her shaking my head. "But, Barbara, when he's out at night drinking and threatening everyone does he, has he ever come home and abused you or the kids? With that, the blood seemed to drain from her face. Her eyes narrowed, two eyes into one, her breathing became long and deep. It was as if she wasn't looking at me but through me. "If he ever, ever, laid one finger on me or one of my boys, I'd wait for him to fall asleep, then I'd go downstairs to the kitchen and get a steak knife, I'd go back upstairs and I'd kill him! This was a deterrent. Something tells me that Phil knew this. The next time I saw Phil and he started in about karate and wrestling, I looked at him with two eyes into one. I didn't look at him but through him. My face became white and in my mind's eye, I visualized myself standing over him with a steak knife. If you remember those old movies where someone shows a crucifix to a vampire and the vampire cowers away, this was the same scene. You could see Phil mentally retreat. He would look for another victim.
During the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, we won the cold war by having a stockpile of nuclear weapons. This was a deterrent. Russia knew this. How did we get into all this recent trouble with Bin Laden? Bad guys are looking for wimps. They may begin with simple harassments. They leer. They brush by you. They make inappropriate comments. They take something that belongs to you. They are testing you. How do you react? Are you confident and speak up or are you a wimp? What was America's response? Bin Laden blew up two of our embassies and we responded with a few cruise missiles to blow up a baby milk formula factory and an empty training camp in the middle of the desert. This was not a deterrent. What happens when you don't stand up to a bully? You empower them. You embolden them to push ever harder. We end up with September 11th. Who doesn't know this? You tell your teenager to be home at 11:00 and they come home with a lame excuse at 11:30 and you don't do anything? What happens next week? You tell a subordinate that you want a report submitted by Friday. She hands in an incomplete report on Monday. It's a little matter so you let it go by. What happens next time? In the vernacular of MTV, you are being "punked." Are you being nice, polite, liberal or compassionate? No, you are allowing your authority to be taken from you. You are losing control. What happens next time? The United States took direct action and the rest is unfolding - Wanted Dead or Alive.
 What has this got to do with self-defense? This is self-defense. You must learn to set your personal boundaries of behavior and defend those boundaries whether you are on the street, at home or at work. You avoid trouble if possible. You try to defuse the situation with words. You defend yourself with non-lethal weapons. You fight with your bodily weapons. You fight for your life with any and all weapons to end the violence.
You are challenged. You hold your hands up to your chest with your palms facing out. Say, "Stop, don't come any closer." This is called the "startle position" and it is used in both armed and unarmed fighting situations. The startle position is a good position from which to attack. Get that confident glare going. You are saying, " I am the boss. I refuse to be a victim." When someone physically crosses your personal boundary without your permission, usually three to four feet, and they keep coming or they arrest your movement, your are being assaulted. They just haven't battered you yet.
This is easy. If a mugger says, "Give me your handbag." You say, "Here it is." But if he says, "I don't want the handbag, I want some of you." Then it is time to think, "Ah, I don't think so," and get out your knitting needle, pistol, pepper spray, steak knife or whatever it is going to take to put this person in enough pain so that you can escape.
You want my wallet? Take it. You want to kill me. You want to rape my wife. You want to abduct my kids. Steak knife. Do I really mean steak knife? I really mean that you have to be psychologically prepared in advance to do what it takes, whatever it takes to end the violence, escape and go spend all the money that you've made in real estate or from your own small business.
You work in a convenience store. A robber enters the store and you correctly say, "Hey, take the cigarettes. Take the money. Take the beer. The Twinkies are fresh. Take all the Twinkies and the Twinkies display stand. Take whatever you want and get out." But, the robber has additional motives. He wants to tie you up in the back room. Or he wants you to get into the truck of his car. NO, NO, No. As a general rule, you never allow anyone to take you to a secondary crime scene. The odds dictate that you fight to the death from where you are. It is at the secondary crime scene where most victims get raped or killed!
Consider these odds. If someone pulls a gun on you, your best option may be to simply turn and run away! The odds are less than half that they'll shoot or the gun will fire. The odds are very small that they'll hit you. The odds are that if they hit you - the wound won't be fatal. In fact, the odds are 5% or 1 in 20 that you'll be shot, hit and killed. Drop what you're carrying and run. Get out your whistle. Get out your personal alarm. Get out your keys. Get out your knitting needle. Get out your gun. Keep running. When you are safely away, take out your cell phone and call the police. When you stand up straight and tall and confident and set and defend your boundaries - you know what you get in return? Respect! Go to Lesson 21 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10
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Master's Tip:
If you have the confidence to defend yourself, you have the confidence to make money - lots of money. And when you get tough and you get rich, a wonderful thing happens - you get happy. |
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