How To Get Mugged in LA

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 29th Apr 2019

It’s very easy to talk about muggings and robberies as if they are a universally similar phenomenon across all locales e.g. the way a mugging is conducted in New York, is the same as the way it’s committed in Chicago, etc. However, although there may be many similarities, there may also be distinct and important differences. Sometimes as instructors and/or students of violence, we fall into the trap of creating training scenarios that reflect our ideas about what a mugging/street robbery looks like, rather than what actually occurs. Sometimes this is based on the experiences of those we know who...Click To Read More

Scripts

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 22nd Apr 2019

We use scripts a lot in our conversations, and behaviors, because they allow us an expected outcome. When we say “hello” to somebody or ask them how their day was, we can be pretty sure they’ll respond with “hello” and tell us that their day is going well, etc., even if they’re experiencing the worst day of their life. As human beings, we like familiarity and predictability; uncertainty causes us distress, and it’s something we tend to avoid – it’s one of the reasons that when couples argue, about a certain issue or incident, the argument is soon brought back...Click To Read More

Giving Chase

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 15th Apr 2019

We all have our own personal reasons for starting to train in the martial arts, self-defense, combatives, or whatever we want to refer to our method of training as. Mine was largely – but not exclusively - because I was bullied as a kid, and wanted a way to level the playing field, with my much larger and more numerous adversaries. I can tell myself that this was a matter of survival, however ego was also at play, as, truth be told, I wanted to teach them a lesson, and be recognized as somebody who couldn’t be targeted as a...Click To Read More

I Can Handle Myself

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 8th Apr 2019

Over my years of teaching self-defense and personal-safety/self-protection, one of the most common rebuttals I receive when advocating the importance of learning how to protect and defend yourself is, “I already know how to handle myself”, with the sometimes addition of, “it’s all just common sense anyway”. Sometimes, these statements are qualified with validations such as, “I used to live in a bad neighborhood” and/or, “I went to a pretty rough school” etc. The issue is that we sometimes – me included – put too much emphasis on the value of our own experiences of aggression and violence, whether they...Click To Read More

Dealing with the Trained Attacker

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 1st Apr 2019

The last place you want to find out how good or bad you actually are, is in a fight, especially if you find yourself dealing with someone who has skills and abilities and is trained and/or has experience. I have been training in martial arts, combatives, self-defense since I was eight – nearly 40 years ago – and I am not physically the same person I was even 10 years ago; I have injuries I carry, and although I may be lifting similar weights to that which I was lifting in my twenties (strength I have been told is the...Click To Read More