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Hi everybody I'm John Graden from the Martial Arts Teachers Association. Let's talk about
a very important subject and that subject is self defense. Many martial arts schools
advertise that they teach self defense and I'm confident that in most cases what they
teach you will improve your odds in a self defense situation but I want to just kind
of get away from technique right now and let's just talk about the essence of self defense.
What is self defense? Self defense begins with a sense of being worthy, with a sense
of self worthiness. In other words nobody is allowed to touch me without my permission.
Nobody is allowed to harm me, nobody is allowed to touch me without my permission. All good
self defense comes from the mind set that nobody touches me without my permission, nobody
touches me without my permission. So what does that mean? What is beautiful about that
is it is one of self worth. I'm not saying if you come near me I'm going to hit you with
my elbow or I'm going to give you a karate chop or I'm going to hurt you, no it doesn't
say that at all. In fact self defense is about survival it is not about always winning every
self defense situation, you may not, as long as you can survive and get away intact then
you've done a good job so in other words, even though I am being hit without my permission
by this gang of guys as long as I can protect myself and get out of Dodge and maintain some
sense of health and a strong mindset then I've accomplished the tenants of good self
defense because real self defense is not wiping out 20 guys like in the movies. Remember James
Colburn's great line. When it comes to self defense, stay away from places where ego and
alcohol mix. That's a really good lesson in terms of self defense but the first lesson
of all self defense is nobody touches me without my permission. Once we have that sense of
self confidence and self worth established, then we can go to work on teaching real self
defense techniques. I'm John Graden. For more information contact me on Johngraden.com.
Thank you.