Boston Krav Maga - Personal Safety & Security
The Importance of Self-Protection Training
Personal safety training is an essential but often neglected part of an individual’s overall security training, with much more emphasis usually being placed on developing physical self-defense skills, rather than learning how to predict, prevent, identify and avoid violence in the first place. In professional circles, such as in Close Protection (body-guarding), there is a great deal of emphasis on the planning and preparation phases to ensure that you - and the principle you are looking after - never find yourself having to deal with an actual threat, or face a physical danger; or if you do, you’ll have been able to identify it, and prepare yourself, before it fully develops. There are situations and types of violence, which may not be preventable, however being able to identify the pre-violence indicators and warning signs that accompany them, allows you a better chance of physically dealing with them, rather than being taken completely by surprise.
When we teach and provide physical solutions to violence, we also explain how such situations might have been prevented, what non-physical solutions may have been available to you, etc. In training how to deal with real-life violence, context is everything, and this must be replicated in the training environment. Violence doesn’t happen in a vacuum, it happens in real-life situations and scenarios, and the various components of these, such as the location, the relationship you have with your assailant (it would be wrong to think that only complete strangers might/will attack us), their motive, people who may be with you, etc., are all important things that need to be considered and taken into account. Variables which exist in combat sports such as MMA (Mixed Martial Arts), Thai Boxing, etc., are non-existent and not relevant.
It is important to understand the format of real-world violence: that it is non-consensual, that it doesn’t follow rules or have easily defined objectives, and has no structure to it, etc. Such assaults do not happen in the ring, or have a referee overseeing them, or a way to determine who the “winner” is. Personal safety and self-protection training, teaches you how to understand the different phases of a conflict, and how to best prepare yourself when violence is inevitable. An attacker will not announce their intentions or give you time to prepare, and there won’t be a referee to start the fight, this means it is essential to understand the warning signs that let you know when violence is imminent, so that you can either disengage, de-escalate, or put in place provisions that will help you increase your survival chances. You can read more about personal safety and self-protection by reading some of the blog articles written by Gershon Ben Keren, which can be accessed by clicking here.
Our program will also teach you how to improve your situational awareness, and your understanding of what is happening in your environment, whether it is an active shooter situation (please click here to read about our terrorism awareness component, or click here to learn about solutions to active shooter scenarios), or dealing with a group of drunk and aggressive individuals in a bar. Simple things, such as being aware of entrances and exits, points of cover and concealment, etc., can go a long way in improving your survival chances in both situations.
Self-protection training is often bypassed during training because instructors either don’t have the experience to bring it into their classes, or have a compromised view of reality-based self-defense, blending it with combat sports such as MMA and Muay Thai, which take place in clinical and sterile environments where there are no unknown variables – you know that nobody in the ring or cage is carrying a weapon, etc. At Krav Maga Yashir Boston, we have one goal, which is to provide solutions to real-world violence (whatever form this takes), whether through prevention and avoidance, identification and disengagement, de-escalation, or through physical means.
To get a better understanding how personal safety and self-protection training is worked into our Krav Maga training, please use the button below to book an Introductory/Beginner Class. You can also read blog articles on personal safety & self-protection by clicking here
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