SELF-PRESERVATION…the path to empowerment
THE TOOLS OF OUR TACTICS...
Experts agree that there are 12 natural weapons of the human anatomy. Starting from the feet and working our way up let’s examine the various tools and their uses:
1. Feet-kicking and stomping
2. Shin-attacking the opponent’s legs or head and defending against low kicks
3. Knee-very potent and used to disable kicks in long range and attack the groin and head in close range
4. Butt-used to create space when grabbed from behind and weight distribution.
5. Hip-used for leverage with throws and takedowns
6. Hand/fingers-punching eye gouging, groin grabbing, eye and throat strikes
7. Forearm-delivering heavy blows to the head, neck or throat
8. Elbow-vicious strikes to the face, potentially lethal blows to the temple and neck, destroying incoming blows
9. Shoulder-creating space and an excellent tool for moving the body
10. Chin-creating pain and pressure in the clinch and on the ground
11. Teeth-biting
12. Head-very ballistic blows to the opponents face and the heaviest and hardest tool. (especially on us Irish/Italians)
Ok, we now have a grasp of the tools that are available to us in an adversarial and potentially violent confrontation. Let’s take a look at where these tools can or should be applied; to do this we need to first look at the fundamental ranges in which fights may occur:
1. Kicking
2. Punching
3. Trapping/Clinch
4. Ground
However, before we go any further, we need to look at what the ‘critical component’ of Self–preservation really is. The following event will provide some crucial insight to what this entails.
The Long Beach days… Vunak personally dismantles a whole bar.
“The year was 1987, just prior to the beginning of our Navy SEAL training. I had been training in JKD personally with Paul and attending Guru Inosanto’s classes on Tuesday and Thursday. On one particular weekend, I was in town for my Intensive Personal Training Program ( IPTP) with Paul. I was really excited because I was starting to feel like I knew what I was doing. Boy was I in for a surprise! Long Beach, in those days, was a tough blue collar shipyard town with more than its’ share of rough bars, and bad neighborhoods…Perfect for ‘field testing’. At that time I was mainly wrapped up in ‘accumulating’ techniques. After training we decided to go out for a couple of cold ones. As we walked into the bar one could cut the tension in the air with a butter knife. Apparently Paul had been in an altercation a while back with one of the patrons of this ‘fine’ establishment. After a short time a few of this guy’s friends, wearing leathers, walked in and joined him. It seemed to me that this fight did not simply start; rather it just unfolded in slow motion. First, Paul being Paul, went over to this guy. There was an exchange of words followed by an exchange of blows. The first guy probably lost most of his teeth when Paul smashed his face with a pool ball. It then just became a big mess. All hell broke loose. Bottles breaking, yelling and screaming, Paul was a blur. There was shoving, punching, a lot of elbows and head-butts. Paul was literally running at and hitting one guy; Turning to grab and head-butt another man; He turned again and was about to blast what turned out to be the cocktail waitress…in the middle of this crazy mess he was somehow able to stop himself in midstream, gently move this little lady aside, and then went on to finish the last guy. After that he looked over at me and yelled “come on, let’s get the ‘f’ out of here”! Needless to say I made a beeline for the door, jumped into the car and we bolted…..
This event forever changed the way that I looked at Martial Art training. To this day I still am striving to master the kind of control of emotions that I saw that night. The next day I asked Paul about what had taken place…where were all the Paksaos, Lopsaos etc….His answer was not what I expected. He stated that “in order to pull off any ‘technique’ in a fight one had to have control of their emotions. This is a lifelong pursuit and does not come easily. It is a process that you continue to get better at as your training progresses”. (He used the term stress inoculation training). He continued on to say that “the better you become at keeping a cool head and controlling, (not stuffing), your emotions then the better you could be at walking away from trouble and if the need arises, to engage in violence”.
On this night, in this one incident, I learned that forward pressure with hitting, (straight blasting), was more important than size and strength. Emotional content and control is more important than any number of techniques. That utilizing weapons, was absolutely critical in any mass attack or gang situation.
In the clinch, on the streets, when your life could be on the line, and quite possibly the lives of your family, you have to be able to make clear decisions that will not only save yourself, but quite possibly the lives’ of your family.
Emotional control…How to keep a cool head under combat conditions so that your ‘Killer Instinct’ can be unleashed. This is achieved in our training protocol by implementing 'STRESS INOCULATION/ IMERSION TRAINING''
"Killer Instinct is not what most folks think. Killer instinct is the proper choice of tactics and the ruthless, surgically precise, cold blooded application of those tactics under the pressure of combat."
This article is excerpted from Thomas Cruse's upcoming book " The Trappers Bible....the chronicles of street-fighting and history of Progressive Fighting Systems. From it's birth, rising from the teachings of Bruce Lee and Guru Dan Inosanto and the field testing of Sifu Paul Vunak and Thomas Cruse. The functional road map to spirituality through exploring violence is laid out for those who wish to achieve. |
