The Self Defense conundrum

It's always there on the flyer for the new Martial Arts Club, but what is it? Despite the very obvious kinship between Martial Arts and self defense I have to be honest and say that there are a whole bunch of clubs which fail to grasp or teach the subject. I admit that no club is beyond this, because self defense is a very difficult thing to define. We would be at fault to suggest that because a student practices a Martial style they would instantly be able to defend themselves. To know something and to do something does not go hand in hand. The style (whatever it is) has to be adaptive by nature for it to function as self defense. It's has to be capable of instant evolution. As I have stated in previous blogs, stuff never goes down how you want it to. The very nature of teaching self defense is incongruous. Affecting a self contained scenario to promote a technique is almost a waste of time! I use "almost" to avoid sweeping statements, there is always  place to promote understanding and build a repertoire of moves
Incredible things happen to human physiology during times of stress and all fairly instantaneously. Do you want a brief biology lesson about fear response? Probably not but whatever it's my blog :) Our reaction to fear response goes two ways, the high road and the low road. The high road is thoughtful and considers the stimulus carefully in the Hippocampus. This is the memory part of your brain and cross references whats going on at that moment with what you already know and makes decisions based on that. The low road swings by the Amygdalae which is associated with emotional responses. If something is happening you don't like the signals move to the Hypothalamus which floods your bloodstream with approx 30 stress hormones turning you into either The Flash or The Hulk. Neural activity combines with the hormones to create the famous fight or flight response, it's pretty awesome stuff, but it comes at the price of degraded small motor functions like accuracy or complex motions. In general technique goes out the window, don't believe me google any kind of street fight and cringe at what you see. However I've been there, seen it, done it and unfortunately that is how it looks. Certain styles get criticised more than others when it comes to self defense. BJJ and MMA, you must of heard it yourself "The last place you want to be in a fight is on the ground" True, whilst you're fumbling with your failing complex motor functions to put a choke on, someone else gets stuck in! Yes it happens but what BJJ and MMA have as their weakness they also have as their biggest advantage. They weren't designed for self defense they were designed as sport. What do combat sports have in abundance?  A competitive edge, a striving will to succeed and better the other person! What do you need more in a situation of surmounting odds? The tenacity to fight like a caged tiger regardless of technical ability. This is what some clubs lack, never ever underestimate tenacity training when it comes to self defense, it should be a war not a battle. Self defense is about avoidance and de-escalation, valuable skills but arguably not a tenant of the true Martial Arts.  Martial after all is taken from the Roman God of war. So it's down to how you actually teach self defense, it's about what you promote as the fundamentals. Is an encyclopedia of moves enough or do you have to get students a bit hungry... A famous fable to finish sure you've heard it before. A Grandfather and a child watch a fox chase a rabbit. The child asks "Who do you think will come out on top Grandad?" Grandad says" The rabbit will escape" The kid asks how he can be so sure? Grandad replies "The fox is running for his dinner, the rabbit is running for his life".... That's how the fable ends but in my version the child concludes by questioning "how hungry do you think the fox was?"