A self defense tactic is not to be confused with a technique or a style. In the words of General George Patton, “Use steamroller strategy — that is to say, make up your mind on the course and direction of action, and stick to it. But in tactics, do not steamroller. Attack weakness. Hold them by the nose and kick them in the pants.”

Self defense strategy should be single-minded: get away at all costs. That is the course and direction of your action, and it should be your single overwhelming goal whenever you are attacked. But in tactics — when deciding moment-to-moment what actions will accomplish that goal most effectively — you must frequently take steps that don’t intuitively seem to further your strategic goal. That’s what Patton meant when he said “in tactics, do not steamroller.” You can’t just mindlessly run and keep running no matter what your attacker does to you. That’s steamroller tactics, and it’s failure.

Instead, you have to attack weakness. If they’re slow and unarmed, you can run. If they’re fast and unarmed, but you have a weapon, use it! If you’ve taken the time to learn martial arts or military self defense — and your opponent looks unskilled — take a stand, incapacitate him, and then run knowing that he can’t follow. In fact, you can make a simple checklist of self defense tactics to exploit that don’t rely on a particular style or technique, but can be used by anyone.

1) RUN! Run fast, run straight, and try to outpace them. If you can, you’ve succeeded.
2) KEEP RUNNING! Run through crowds, around corners, anything to put a visual barrier between you and them. If you can move in a way they can’t anticipate, you’ve succeeded.
3) HIDE! Even if they do anticipate your choice of avenues, you can still put yourself in a place they can’t easily find you. If they give up and go home, you’ve succeeded.
4) SURPRISE! If they’re about to find you, don’t let them — get the drop on them instead. Grab whatever you can find to use as a weapon, and attack like a banshee, screaming your anger and putting the ‘fight’ part of ‘fight or flight’ to good use. If you can break down their morale and scare them off, you’ve succeeded.
5) INJURE! If they don’t run, then use whatever you’ve got on hand, and injure them as severely as you can in the shortest amount of time. This is the part where having taken the opportunity to learn martial arts earlier would be most helpful, but even if you haven’t, just remember the shortlist of most vulnerable places on the body: eyes, throat, solar plexus, testicles, knees, fingers, and feet, in that order. Attack whichever you can reach as powerfully as you can, as fast as you can. If you can convince them that you’re not worth pursuing, you’ve succeeded.
6) INJURE MORE! If they keep coming even after you’ve broken a finger or clawed an eye to bleeding, you have to double down, because by now, they’re going to kill you if you fail. At this point, don’t even think about anything except drawing as much blood — literally — as possible. Rip off their ears, find a sharp whatever and stab whatever body part you can reach, just be as bloodthirsty and vicious as you can. Before, you were trying to convince them that you weren’t worth it — now, you’re trying to scare the HELL out of them. If they back off, chase them. Don’t give them the chance to regroup. If they scatter completely, you’ve succeeded.
7) PLAY DEAD. If your attackers follow you even past the point of sanity and are willing to risk their lives to hurt you, the best thing you can do is take the first attack they offer, and go limp. Pretend to be unconscious. At that point, it’s best to just let them do whatever they’re going to do, and hope you survive. It’s amazing how much pain and indignity you can fake unconsciousness through when it means making it back to your friends and family in the morning.

This simple list of military self defense tactics is essentially a tool to help you exploit the most common weaknesses of criminals. They don’t like to chase, to get scared, or to get hurt. They want an easy victim, not one who has taken the time to learn self defense. If you’re ever the victim of an attack, use the self defense tactics here, and you’ll maximize your chance of living through the nightmare.

Lots of so-called ‘experts’ are prone to disrespecting the process of learning to protect yourself from a self defense DVD, claiming that in-class martial arts training or military hand to hand combat training are the only ‘real’ ways to learn self defense. Of course, there are a lot of issues with self defense training from a DVD, but they have a distinct place.

Classes, unless you can find a master willing to teach you and you alone, lack privacy. For people with social anxiety disorder — the kind of people who have mannerisms that make criminals prone to targeting them — this can make learning in a class particularly difficult. Similarly, people who simply don’t want to be judged by observers might not be able to develop the necessary self-assurance and discipline in a group environment. For these people, a self defense DVD can provide an appropriate level of martial arts training without the need for a crowd.

It’s becoming common for modern colleges to offer online courses to provide for the people who cannot handle the interpersonal pressure of being in class. In much the same way, a self defense DVD can be used in the privacy of your living room, giving people with social anxiety disorder and similar diseases the opportunity to practice potentially life-saving skills that have the added benefit of boosting their confidence.

By creating an engaging atmosphere within a comfortable space, a self defense DVD removes all of the distractions that public classes are prone to, from taunting peers to laughing onlookers. And with the ability to skip back and forth to any part of the martial arts training that you feel you need to review, a DVD really offers a lot of course customization that you can’t get from a group class.

There are two things you need if you’re learning from a self defense DVD: good discipline and a partner. Your partner can be someone that you are already comfortable with, who won’t trigger your anxiety, as long as they’re interested in practicing with you. The discipline is necessary because unless you create it, there is no schedule — no mandatory time that you must set aside to train. That can lead to a rapid breakdown of training, making it almost impossible to get started once the slacking has set in.

The partner is necessary because there’s simply no substitute for a target that has the weight and feel of a real human being. Of course, you don’t want to actually hurt your partner, so practicing full-speed and full-force is out — but even at half-speed and almost no power, the simple presence of someone actually receiving your attacks amplifies the effect of training a hundredfold; it’s practically the only way to really learn self defense.

It’s a curious thing that can happen when someone with social anxiety disorder has the discipline (and a willing enough partner) to follow through with martial arts techniques from a self defense DVD. It doesn’t happen for everyone, but there are those people who gain such a sensation of confidence — even competence — from pursuing such training that they learn how little of an actual threat most other people pose to them. It can help someone that is already undergoing therapy to have a new and powerful tool to overcome the disease.

So, if the thought of going to a group self defense class gives you the willies, be secure in the knowledge that a self defense DVD can offer you a perfectly valid and functional alternative that might even help you in more ways than one.

The first thing that anyone notices when they start to look into self defense training is that there are so many different schools, styles, and techniques that it’s almost impossible to pick one on any kind of a knowledgeable basis. You might feel an intuitive draw to something like the martial arts styles of Aikido or the hand to hand combat training of MCMAP, but you can’t learn enough to make the choice from a place of understanding.

Most people just go to whatever class is closest, cheapest, or has the flashiest-sounding name.

The truth is very disappointing to many would-be ninja: no matter what they say, there is no comprehensive self defense system. No one teacher — in fact, no set of teachers, no matter how large, can teach you everything you need to know about self defense.

There are a lot of ways of categorizing the various kind of self defense training as well. Some people who learn martial arts break them into the classic Eastern set (hard, hard/soft, and soft), but even that primarily addresses only the striking arts. A better way to break them down might be into a two-by-two grid with striking and grappling as the columns and aggressive and receptive as the rows.

That gives you a very basic but essentially complete framework for your hand to hand combat training: you should learn a little bit about each section. Hard striking like boxing or Thai kickboxing, soft striking like T’ai Chi Chuan or Xingyiquan, hard grappling like Krav Maga or Sabmo, and soft grappling like Judo or Aikido — each has a relevant application to self defense training. Whatever training you’re currently taking, it is almost certainly not covering all four bases.

However, there is an even more basic, and very rarely used, method of classifying self defense techniques, based not on what actions you take to subdue the enemy, but how you respond to the enemy’s actions. In any scenario in which you are the defender, before you take action yourself, you must first react to an attack. There are only four basic ways to do this.

• You can block, rather than evade, the attack. This puts you into a “taking charge” stance, and you must respond with aggression against his vulnerabilities to capitalize on your situation.
• You can back away, reducing his attacking options but also reducing yours as well. Unless you have a significant reach advantage, your only option is to attack the limb or weapon that you just evaded — but that’s often a good strategy regardless.
• You can move ‘inside’ the attack, stepping toward your opponent on the inner side of his attacking limb. This can open up a myriad of attack options, but it can also leave you vulnerable if your opponent is skilled in zero-range combat.
• You can move ‘outside’ of the attack, stepping at a 45-degree angle along the outside of your opponent’s attacking limb. This opens up fewer striking options, but is an excellent technique for grapplers and leaves him very few options for a follow-up attack.

Few if any self defense training courses really capitalize on these split-seconds, right as you react to an attack. Pay careful attention to which are the most common in your own self defense training, and you might find a profound insight into what your training is missing.

There are two very different styles of combat taught across America — the straightforward self defense schools that teach focus under pressure and incapacitation maneuvers, and the more spiritually advanced martial arts styles that teach philosophy and self-control in addition to complex physical techniques. Not that either one is definitively superior to the other, just that they’re used for different things.

If you’re worried that someone is after you, or that you’re likely to get mugged, you want to study self defense, not martial arts techniques. The flying kicks of Tae Kwon Do won’t serve you in a narrow alley, and the do-no-harm philosophy of Aikido won’t keep a persistent attacker down for very long. Moreover, martial arts styles tend toward complex movements that require a very clear head — in battle, the focus that serves so well in the dojo is likely to be completely absent, making those complex movements a distant memory.

On the other hand, if what you want is a fitness regimen that will lead you to a better understanding of yourself and the way you interact with other people and the world, martial arts excel. Krav Maga cannot teach you how to push yourself beyond your own limits through extraordinary training techniques, and there is little in Sambo that will lead you down a path of meditative introspection. Self defense classes, whether life on on a self defense video, will rarely encourage you to become flexible or develop excellent cardiovascular health — they’re all about what works, not what’s best for you as a person.

Self defense instructors — especially the ultra-aggressive types you see on a self defense DVD — always fall back to the euphemism of ‘the street’. If it doesn’t work on ‘the street’, who cares? Simple, classic motions that are easy to pull off under stress and have maximum impact on the opponent are the name of the game. The attackers on ‘the street’ don’t follow rules — they’re bigger than you, meaner than you, better armed than you, and there are more of them than there are of you. If you can’t put them down in one or two seconds apiece, you’re going to get stabbed.

Martial arts instructors consistently stress that your biggest competition is ‘the self’. You must constantly push yourself to outperform your previous best. You have to strive to do your best not just in the dojo, but in every aspect of your life. Everything you do is a form of competition, even if only to compete with your own last performance of the same act. It doesn’t matter if you win a kumite — what matters is if you really gave it everything you have.

The wisdom of studying both at once is questionable, as you run the risk of ‘confusing’ your muscle memory — but most certainly, once you’ve mastered the basics of one, it’s well worth your time to start the other. In short, there are excellent reasons to study both self defense and one of the many martial arts styles — whichever fits your personality the best.

The improper or ill-timed use of self defense techniques have resulted in thousands of lawsuits across the US and the UK. ‘Self defense’ is actually something of a misnomer, because in reality any technique that can be used to defend yourself can also be used as an attack. Because of that, it’s often up to a jury to decide whether a given strike or lock was actually self defense or was, in reality, an unnecessary aggressive action.

Legal definitions of justifiable self defense exist in every culture and every country, but they vary widely between those cultures and countries. In general, you must be able to prove that your physical actions were strictly intended to save you or another person from death, serious injury, or grievous property damage. If you can’t prove that — and there have been cases of people attacking robbers in their own home who couldn’t — your actions might be interpreted as a crime .

Learning self defense consists of three areas: self defense techniques, self defense tactics, and self defense training. Techniques are movements such as strikes and locks and throws. Tactics are mental activities such as sitting with your back to a wall that are designed to minimize the chance of an attack. Training is the method with which you make techniques and tactics an innate and everyday part of your life.

In order to be fully prepared for a physical attack, you have to implement all three areas in balance. Knowing the techniques and tactics without training them into your muscle memory is a waste of time. Knowing the tactics and training your mind to use them is good, but it’s pointless to be aware of an attack if you can’t do anything about it. And training endlessly in techniques is perfectly silly if you’re unaware and get caught off guard and taken out before you can implement them.

There is something of a desire to prove your abilities once you start learning self defense tactics. ‘How will I know if this is actually working if I don’t get attacked,’ the trainee thinks. This is especially true of those who choose to learn from a martial arts DVD rather than a live teacher. That can lead to improper use of self defense techniques, as the trainee becomes belligerent, attempting to provoke a fight in order to test themselves and the martial arts DVD.

That is the first step down a long slope that can easily end in jail time or million-dollar lawsuits. It is imperative to always keep in mind that the first goal of any system of self defense is to avoid combat, not win fights. The chief difference between self defense and asskicking is in intent and awareness.

As mentioned, they can be legally very difficult to discern, but in essence, if your goal is to incapacitate someone and thus keep them from harming someone or some property, you’re in the right. The instant you cross over and let emotions get the best of you — the moment you strike an unnecessary blow out of anger or fear — you are no longer defending yourself. That’s why mental training is just as much a part of self defense as physical self defense techniques are.

While it is always good to learn martial arts, there is nothing better than knowing how to use a self defense weapon. This is because more and more thugs are brandishing ones of their own so it’s only fair that you even the score. Even if they attack you without a weapon, the streets are not a place for rules. Once someone attacks you, all notions of fair play must go out of the window. There are a host of weapons available such as kubotans, pepper spray and stun guns. It is common practice for a self defense DVD to show you how to use such weapons which is absolutely vital. There is nothing worse than having a weapon, being attacked and forgetting how to use it properly. The attacker may take it off you and use it against you.

If you do possess one of the above weapons, there are a few things you need to learn about them. First of all, they are not some magic weapon that will make you invincible. No matter what weapon you have, there is still the small matter of knowing how and when to use it. There has never been a secret weapon that can defeat foes using only telekinetic powers, except of course in sci-fi movies. In the real world, a weapon is an inanimate object that can only be brought to life by the person holding it. Fortunately, some proper hand to hand combat training will show you how to effectively use a kubotan or stun gun.

There is an advert for American Express that states “don’t leave home without it.” This also holds true for a self defense weapon. If you aren’t carrying it, you cannot use it. You could have the greatest weapon of all time sitting in your garage and it will be as useless as a bag of air if you get attacked because you don’t have it!!! The problem with weapons is that many people buy them as some sort of novelty with soon wears off. Then it finds it way to your car boot or somewhere else where it is not easily accessible. If you have taken the time to attend self defense training classes and are serious about protecting yourself, you have to train yourself to always carry the weapon, to always have it on your mind. Otherwise, it will have been a pointless purchase.

Just because you have the weapon with you and know how to use it doesn’t mean that you can neglect the basic principles outlined in a self defense DVD. There is nothing on this earth that is 100% effective in combat situations so there will be occasions when you have to rely on a plan B. This back up plan should entail you being able to defend yourself with general self defense moves. Having all of this in your armory makes you safer than the vast majority of people walking the streets.

When you buy a self defense weapon, you are investing in your personal safety. You should always have it with you and learn how to use it properly but should never rely on it for all situations.

Women are seen as the ‘fairer sex’ which translates into ‘weaker sex’ for an attacker. Generally speaking, women are physically smaller and not as strong as men. Naturally, there are always exceptions but the average man will be stronger than the average woman. Thugs are not brain surgeons but they usually know how to spot an easy target. This is usually a woman walking alone with her head down whilst nervously clutching their handbag. If this sounds like you, then it is essential that you learn some martial arts styles or at least some form of self defence training. Failure to do this could result in you becoming just another statistic.

The bad news is that as a woman, you are far more likely to be attacked. The good news is that there is plenty that you can do about it. Rather than living your life in perpetual fear, why not learn some form of martial arts self defense in order to make your life a lot easier? In order to learn effective moves to keep yourself safe however, you need to first shed any inhibitions you may have as well as educating yourself on the art of self defense. You see, it is unnecessary to be big and strong to defend yourself. Sure, it helps, but if you are not naturally strong there are other ways of looking after yourself. There are martial arts techniques that are thousands of years old which show how to defeat an attacker that is physically much stronger than you.

The majority of attackers will need to get in close to really hurt you via a grabbing maneuver. Any good martial arts DVD will show you how to defend against this. First and foremost, you need to keep them away from you. This is much easier to achieve than you might think. None other than the great Bruce Lee stated that you should strike your opponent’s nearest target with your longest weapon. For example, in a situation where your attacker comes at you from the front, hit them into the knee with a sharp kick. If you have learned how to get power into your kicks, your attacker will be badly hurt, regardless of how big and strong they are.

You should continue to strike to keep them at distance. However, there will be occasions when they manage to get beyond your initial defense and successfully grab you. This is where many people start to panic. A high quality martial arts DVD will show you how to react. A grab from the front can be countered by a head butt to the bridge of their nose. This move may seem crude, but it is unbelievably effective. A grab from behind can be countered by a reverse head butt or heel to the shin. If executed with enough force, the thug will have no choice but to let you go, allowing you to escape.

Sometimes, it will be necessary to cast off your genteel image in order to protect yourself. Women need to get it into their head that there is nothing ‘ladylike’ about being a victim. The streets are an unforgiving place and do not discriminate against age, religion or sex. Do yourself a favor, learn how to protect yourself and keep the street scum at bay.

Certain self defense videos claim that they can teach you how to defend yourself against street attacks but they end up doing nothing of the sort. Many of them are put together by people who have never been physically attacked in their life. Therefore, they are not an authority on the mental aspect to being a potential victim. When someone decides that they want to inflict physical harm upon you, the first question you ask is: why me? This victim mentality is precisely why so many people are unable to defend themselves. They feel that because they are being attacked, they are weak and deserving of the punishment they will receive. Yet anyone that has benefited from a proper self defense training DVD will know how to react.

These are taught by teachers with real world experience and they have the ability to teach you how to overcome fear. Yes, this is the number one mission of any real self defense instructor. You see, no attacker wants to fight someone on even terms. When they attack, they are banking on their victim subscribing to the usual order of things. This is when the victim just lies down and accepts their fate. The thug doesn’t think that the person they have chosen is capable of defending themselves and they certainly don’t believe their victim knows any effective martial arts moves.

This is why taking the time to learn martial arts is so important. It is a universal truth that street thugs are innate cowards. Stand up to them and watch as they disappear back to the sewer from whence they came. They love the power they feel as a meek and subservient victim cowers before them. This is why they attack in the first place. Thugs are sad, pathetic creatures and need to justify their existence by preying on weak and vulnerable members of society. Take a self defense course in order to give yourself the confidence to stay out of that circle of weakness.
It is guaranteed to pay dividends. All the best self defense tactics in the world will not help you if you freeze up when the moment to react comes. The very best self defense teachers know how to show their students the way to win the psychological battle. Once you have overcome that sickening feeling that comes with being the victim of an attack, you will have the ability to respond to the threat. This mental barrier is not easy to overcome but once you have, you will see how massive an effect it has. There is little doubt that standing up to the thug will see them flee. Once it becomes apparent to them that this will be a fair fight, they will want none of it proving that they are little more than cowardly victims themselves.

So don’t allow fear to take over. Listen only to self defense gurus who can release you from the shackles of fear. Once this have been negotiated you will see a knock-on effect. You will walk around your neighborhood with much more confidence than before which will automatically make you a less viable target for an attack as no thug wants anything to do with a confident person who is capable of self defense.

Martial arts techniques are one of the best ways to keep yourself safe in a world that is becoming more and more violent each and every day. Our grandparents fondly remember days when it was safe to walk streets alone at night but nowadays, even a leisurely stroll through an apparent ‘safe area’ in daylight is fraught with danger. Knowing how to defend yourself from an attack is one thing, figuring out how to avoid trouble altogether is a different story entirely. This is why any self defense video worth its purchase price will not only show you how to defend yourself from an attack, it will also show how to avoid the need to resort to violence.

When you have thugs that carry weapons such as knives and firearms, it is always best to walk away if at all possible. Therefore, walking through an area without being vigilant is asking for trouble. An attacker will always look for an opportunity to assault someone who is not on full alert. Ensure that you are always aware of your surroundings. This makes it much more difficult for someone to attack and hurt you. Thugs rely on the elements of surprise and fear. If you take away the surprise element, the fear one usually follows and this takes away their power. Most military self defense training videos will show you how important it is to stay alert.

Being fleet of foot is as effective as any training maneuvers initially. This means that your self-awareness should consist of scanning the area for ways to escape. It is a fact that most attacks take place in secluded areas where the victim has little chance to escape. This means that common sense should be utilized. Avoid alleyways and tight areas at all times of the day unless it is 100% necessary to take that route. Shaving a few minutes off your journey time is not as important as staying safe. Thugs don’t like drawing attention to themselves so if you are able to run away, it is highly unlikely that they will chase you for fear of being apprehended by the police.

Sometimes however, there is no way of getting free from an attacker’s clutches. This is where what you learned in a martial arts DVD will come in useful. While street attacks are unpredictable insofar as you never know where and when someone will strike, they are predictable in that your attacker will try and get close to you to cause maximum harm. This is where you use their aggression against them. They will usually be focused solely on attack and this guarantees that you will have ample opportunity to counter attack provided you stay calm. If you manage to strike them a handful of times with good technique, they will either succumb or else lose their desire to persist further with the assault. Either way, you have won because you get to go home safe.

Whether you learn basic self defense moves or practice military self defense, you are giving yourself the best possible chance of successfully defending yourself against thugs. Yet the fundamental step of self defense is to avoid getting into a dangerous situation in the first place.

Most people sit at home and feel that they don’t need to know martial arts or any other form of training. Sure, the high crime figures and news stories depicting muggings, beatings and rape are scary, but they think that it can never happen to them. That is, until it does. Then, they freeze up like a deer in a headlights and get badly hurt, or worse. This is not to suggest that martial arts training is the key to ending your chances of being attacked. What it does do however, is give you the kind of peace of mind that is worth having. Not having to live in constant fear is the minimum requirement for any person and being able to defend yourself is liberating.

There are a number of methods of defending yourself. The most obvious is to sit at home and cower, safe in the knowledge that you are protected from society’s ills. The flaw in this logic however comes in the form of the intruder. Yes, if someone was to break into your home while you are in bed, what can you do to save yourself? Obviously, dialing 911 is a smart move but it can take minutes for emergency services to come to your aid. In that timeframe, the burglar could come upstairs and you will have no choice to but to try and defend yourself. If only you had taken the time to learn self defense…

Thankfully, there is time for you to rectify this worrying situation. There are a myriad of self defense options out there for you to explore. The old statement that the simplest things are the most effective has never been more pertinent than when describing the field of self defense. While some courses try to confuse matters, the best hand to hand combat training courses will spell out the dangers you face in everyday society and help you combat them with swift and effective maneuvers. The street does not wait for you to become a kung-fu master so you will have to learn fast. Luckily, the moves are quite simple to learn and remember which is essential when you’re in an attack situation. You need to be able to fight back using instinct rather than trying to remember complex combinations.

Sometimes, a quick kick to the groin or gouge to the eyes is the best move you can do when being accosted by a thug. Most attackers will think you’re an easy target and will be shocked when you show the ability to retaliate. If you don’t have the capacity to attend a self defense training course, fear not. All you have to do in this case is to invest a few dollars in your safety by purchasing a self defense DVD. Most of the reputable ones available will show you moves that are easy to execute and remember.

Self defense is important and it’s not like it’s rocket science. Believe it or not, a handful of moves is all that you need to keep the street wolves from your door and ensure that you protect yourself and your loved ones.