The self-defense situations that you watch in the movies and television will be no help to you in figuring out what to do in a real life situation.  No matter what you may imagine you will do if you find yourself in a difficult situation, there will be one major difference between the movie and reality. This difference will occur on a cellular level, as a sudden flash of feeling, and how you will deal with it has already been set by evolution.

it all comes down to adrenaline. In a threatening situation the sudden ‘flash’ of adrenaline into your bloodstream causes a reaction that was put there eons ago through the evolutionary process. This reaction manifests as a three way choice, you either Fight, take Flight, or Freeze.

Fight

Flight

Freeze

Freezing may work well for animals in the wild that become aware of a predator before it sees them. Predators are alert to motion, and freezing may allow their prey to remain unseen. Predators also know not to eat already dead animals, and animals that ‘freeze’ in order to appear dead (playing Possum) will be often left alone to survive.

Unfortunately, freezing is exactly the wrong thing to do when a human means you harm. Action, either Fight or Flight, or a combination of the two, will be what is required for self-preservation.

In the cinema, everyone always acts, dishing out rough justice to perpetrators of all kinds. Women weighing 50 Kilos regularly destroy bad guys weighing twice as much. In real life?…not so much.

In the real world, the outcome will be based on Fight, Flight, or Freeze.

Amenability is a character trait that is useful in everyday life. It means that you are easy to get along with, flexible and responsive. People with this character trait will be popular, approachable, and helpful. They are ‘nice’ people, and most people have a desire to appear nice, as it is a helpful characteristic as one makes their way in the social world. Being amenable is a way of being lucky, as it allows the world and circumstances to bring things towards you. It is a great characteristic to have, as long as it is not your only option of how to behave in social situations.

Gavin de Becker has an excellent book, The Gift of Fear. In this book, he describes the Elevator scenario:

“A woman is waiting for an elevator, and when the doors open she sees a man inside who causes her apprehension. Since she is not usually afraid, it may be the late hour, his size, the way he looks at her, the rate of attacks in the neighborhood, an article she read a year ago—it doesn’t matter why. The point is, she gets a feeling of fear. How does she respond to nature’s strongest survival signal? She suppresses it, telling herself: “I’m not going to live like that, I’m not going to insult this guy by letting the door close in his face.” When the fear doesn’t go away, she tells herself not to be so silly, and she gets into the elevator. Now, which is sillier: waiting a moment for the next elevator, or getting into a soundproofed steel chamber with a stranger she is afraid of?”      http://gavindebecker.com/resources/book/the_gift_of_fear/

In de Becker’s example, the woman is amenable, and places herself in a potentailly dangerous position because she is being ‘nice’. If one is naturally amenable, one has to develop a non-amenable self for self-defense situations where it is important to be wary and able to set clear physical and social boundaries.

Nice is easy…and not nice is difficult, especially for nice people.

Effective self -defense training helps one develop options. More options allow more versatility in self-defense situations, and more versatility means a greater chance of staying safe.

Without options people tend to fall back on their particular evolutionary reaction, with its four basic paths; flight, fight, freeze, or faint. Though your body’s innate reaction may work to keep you safe, chances are it may not, and it is always best to have a trained option when it is time to respond to a threat to your personal safety.

Training creates ‘space and time’ to evaluate the situation before deciding on a response. Where does the space and time come from? It comes from practice, from having already found yourself in a ‘pretend’ threatening situation, where it is possible to try out techniques and responses, to gauge their effectiveness.

In this way you can eliminate the responses that won’t work for you based on body type and physical strength, (i.e.. A 60 kilo woman cannot hit like a 90 kilo man), and you can practice adjusting your outward behavior in order to stop potential threatening situations from escalating into physical confrontation. (see post: Nice, or Not?)

Preparation for things that may never happen isn’t a waste of time. If a self-defense situation does occur your preparation may make the difference between just another day in your life, and the day your life changed irrevocably.