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Knowledge is Power, Awareness is Survival, and Skill is Victory

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Knowledge is Power, Awareness is Survival, and Skill is Victory

Unfortunately you can not go a single day without hearing about the unthinkable happening: a kidnapping, shooting, assault, murder, suicide the list goes on and on. There are numerous reasons we hear about these things so often. One, is the media may be reporting it more often now. Another, is that we as citizens are allowing it to happen more often. We have gotten away from taking care of ourselves and we tend to put that demand on others. This presents itself in numerous forms: it could be a lack of individual awareness as to what is going on around us, or it could be a lack of confidence in ourselves. I'm not saying that these are the only reasons that we are hearing about these crimes occurring, but they are definitely contributors to these things occurring. I will get more in depth as this article progresses. The two areas I am going to focus on are individual awareness and self confidence. I am discussing these items with a focus on self defense and how dramatically it can affect our awareness and our confidence.

When I mention an "individual lack of awareness" I'm not just talking about being aware of my immediate surroundings (this is what the majority of people think of), I'm talking about a much wider spectrum. Yes, we need to identify and know what is going on in our immediate surroundings, but we also need to know what is going on in the world. This means the world, the country, the state, the city and the community in which you live. Everywhere we go the situation changes, culturally, financially, racially, and religiously. These are not the only things, but they are some of the bigger ones. I consider these to be the non-physical things that affect our setting. Some of the physical things that affect our environment are: is it rural, is it urban, are we inside or outside, in a confined area or an open area. Again, the list goes on and on. What I'm getting at is that it does us little good to be aware of our surroundings if we do not understand our surroundings. Everyday we find ourselves in numerous different environments and situations. They go unnoticed because nothing significant occurred; however, our awareness and anticipation of incident should have been elevated on several occasions. Examples of this being the night stop at a convenience store with a history of being robbed (unknown to you), or the business trip you go on and the hotel is not in the safest neighborhood (unknown to you). This does not get into the issues that are out there in the world of international travel. That's when things like culture and religion come into play.

We hear the term that knowledge is power. I also believe that knowledge is awareness and security. Just knowing more about world and national affairs greatly enhances your ability to be aware of your immediate surroundings. It helps develop the desire to care about what is going on around you and it develops a curiosity of what is going on around you. Yes, reading up on a country or city prior to going there is a method, but what I'm talking about is basically training yourself to be generally informed. It does sound like I'm trying to put the burden of knowing everything that is going on in the world on you, but I'm not. It is as simple as reading the newspaper, reading non-fiction books, watching the news, etc. This is all I'm talking about as far as developing national and international awareness. You may wonder how reading the Wall Street journal is going to raise your awareness to the possibility of being shot while walking through a parking lot. It doesn't directly affect that situation. However, by reading the Wall Street Journal you are training your mind to reason and calculate. This occurs anytime you are reading something that is more than entertainment. Reading or watching fiction is necessary because it creates relaxation for the brain. Watching and reading things that require focused interest, non-fiction, train and exercise the brain.

So, how does all this reading about stocks or being aware of China's economy affect the situation I find myself in and my awareness of it? The concept that I am trying to get across is the more aware you are of world and national affairs the more you will be aware of your immediate situation. This occurs because being aware of things on a large scale is easily adapted to a smaller scale, your immediate surroundings.

Does this have anything to do with self defense? Absolutely, we are training ourselves to recognize environments that may be a threat. However, the area that most think of when discussing self defense is the defense of an actual attack. That is definitely an area that needs to be focused on, but with constant calculated thought we can limit the chances of the attack. Granted, an attack may not be avoidable as attackers tend put a lot of thought into what they are doing.

This brings us to the physical side of self defense training, defending against the actual attack. Reading the newspaper or watching the news is not going to help much when somebody is taking a swing at you or slashing at you with a knife. This is where an active self defense training program comes into play. When I say an "active program" I'm talking about a consistent program. The majority of the skills required to survive an attack are perishable so therefore if we do not stay consistent with them they may have perished when the actual attack occurs. We all have heard of the attributes that martial arts of self defense develop, but what we hear less of is how fast those attributes go away. The attributes I'm talking about are technique, reflexes, timing, strength, endurance, etc.

I'm not saying that we need to train everyday, but enough to maintain capabilities that we have already developed. However, a training program that maintains our capabilities can only occur after we have developed that capability. When you start training in the martial arts or self defense program, you initiate the learning phase. In this phase the majority of what we are taught is new. Then you progress into the maintenance / learning phase. This is due to the fact that as we learn additional techniques and applications you need to maintain previously learned technique and applications. Lastly we enter into the sustainment phase. Yes, there is always new technique and application to learn, but this is the point in which we have developed our self defense capabilities to a sufficient level. What is a sufficient level? This is when we have come to the conclusion that we can recognize an attack, read the angle of that attack, react to it and mitigate it. This the area in which awareness comes into play during a self defense situation, i.e. being aware of the probability of the attack, aware of the possible angles of the attack, and aware of your capabilities and incorporating them.

To sum everything up, awareness of environment and possible incident combined with the ability to mitigate it (through a proactive training regime) increases your self confidence. It is going to happen automatically. When your level of self confidence increases and you begin to carry yourself in that manner, it is sensed and recognized by predators. Thereby, making you less of a target. And when we break it down that is one of our primary objectives. There are other benefits that a high level of confidence will provide, but that is another discussion. So, in closing, remember knowledge is power, awareness is survival, and skill is victory.

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