Why Martial Arts Isn't Enough

I started training in martial arts when I was 13 years old. I got into it because at the time, my mom's boyfriend thought it was a good idea that I learn how to protect myself. During this training,  I learned discipline, control, respect, and a host of other useful life skills, but I wasn't learning how to defend myself with these techniques.

Taekwondo is a very sport-oriented martial arts. This means that there are rules that must be followed. Some techniques are legal to perform, others are not. This leads to a possibility of training only for the sport and not for self preservation. Martial arts inherently have rules and regulations built into it. This conflicts to the basic premise of self defense: survival.

Since then I have trained in various martial arts from the more sport-oriented Taekwondo to Judo, to the combative reality of Krav Maga, to the almost meditative Tai Ji Quan (Tai Chi). In my 20+ years of training, I've come to one simple realization: most martial arts lack is the practical skills for survival in a possibly violent situation.  The problem is that it is based upon on a system of rules, but self defense has no rules for fighting. Self defense has only one objective, and that objective is to survive.

Fighting for your survival is nothing like a sport fighting match: there won’t be any referee there to watch for the safety of the fighters, there aren’t any timeouts or opportunities to tap out and It isn’t always going to be one-on-one or a “fair” match. It is dirty, brutal, and violent.

One solution that I’ve heard suggested is to go to a mixed martial arts studio/training center, or MMA. The Ultimate Fighting Championships, or UFC, is a popular example. In the beginning, the UFC was as close to a real fight as one could get. It would put two people together, and let them duke it out. No time limits, no weight classes, and only a few rules (no biting, no eye-gouging, no groin strikes). However, as the years have passed, more and more rules have been added, adjusted, and dropped. As far as MMA in the UFC, it is now a sport with rules, legal/illegal techniques, weight classes, time limits.  The very things that made more traditional martial arts unrealistic, MMA is adopting as part of their training regime. It had been turned into a combat sporting event of which the goals are to win rather than to survive. This is the same issue with most martial arts taught today.

So how do you find a self defense class that will really prepare you for the unthinkable? The National Coalition Against Sexual Assault (NCASA) has published some guidelines  and answers to common questions to help.

NOTE: Because we believe that anyone would benefit from learning self defense, we have taken out any gender-specific language and made it gender-neutral.