De-escalation, Reflective Listening & Non-Complimentary Behavior

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 28th Aug 2017

I was bullied as a child. I was constantly told by my teachers, my parents, and other people in authority, who I looked to for advice, that if I ignored my bullies they would go away – I tried it, and they didn’t go away; in fact, it made it worse, because the more I ignored them, the greater the lengths they’d go to, to get my attention. Nobody responds well to being ignored. When working door/bar security, If I was on my own and I had to separate two aggressors, whilst I was talking to one, the other would...Click To Read More

Situational Awareness, Mindfulness & Curiosity

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 21st Aug 2017

Sometimes when I talk to people about self-protection, they come away with the idea that those of us who think about our personal safety are in constant state of highly strung paranoia, jumping at shadows, and ready to decimate anyone who has the misfortune to approach us, outside of our field of vision. Sometimes, instructors promote this idea of “good” situational awareness, by telling stories about how their wife, friend, acquaintance, tapped them on the shoulder when they were distracted or deep in thought, and they turned ready to deal a death blow, only to recognize at the last moment...Click To Read More

Stances

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 14th Aug 2017

In real-life confrontations, stances – as stances – rarely exist. If you have time to adopt a “Fighting Stance”, like an MMA fighter, at the start of a bout, you will have missed an opportunity to attack your aggressor. In violent incidents,  there is no referee, telling you when the fight will start, and if you have the time to get into a stance, you obviously recognized that the situation was turning physical, and therefore you should have made a pre-emptive assault, instead of getting into a position which sees you waiting for your aggressor(s) to attack you. If you...Click To Read More

Elephants In The Room

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 7th Aug 2017

Often, when people with little understanding of what real-life violence looks like - because they have been fortunate enough to never experience it first-hand - try to imagine incidents, situations and scenarios, they build their “models of violence”, from the media, the movies, and third-party anecdotes, imagining that common armed criminals such as muggers, are at some point looking to, “complete the task of termination”, rather than simply exit the environment with your wallet. A rich diet of action movies, and extreme news stories, can distract us from the reality of violence – which is more likely to comprises of...Click To Read More