The stress created by a deadly threat in a survival situation, can suddenly cause your body to respond with physical and psychological (biochemical) changes to prepare you for survival. Your breathing and your heart rate will become faster, blood with fill your large muscle groups and your body will become warmer in an effort to boost physical performance. This physical arousal of your body readies you for action, and is mostly caused by the release of adrenaline in your body. It is commonly referred to as the "fight or flight" response. Whereas some physical arousal is good for effective performance, too much is a problem. If your heart rate and breathing become too fast, you will experience a degradation in your motor skills and difficulty with cognitive abilities. In other words, it wil...

Being armed is an essential part of self defense.  Not every scenario can be solved by talking, running or even by using your empty hands.  If you do decide to arm yourself, you need to make sure you choose the right weapon for you and that you learn to use it properly.  This process starts with your personally outlook on life. Is Carrying a Weapon Right for You? You need to start by asking yourself some very important questions.  Are you capable of violence?  Do you believe it is ok to hurt someone else in order to defend yourself?  Are you willing to take a life in order to protect your own?  How about your family members and other loved ones?  Your religion, personal philosophy, and values will be your primary guides here. If you are not willing t...

Regardless of your level of training, defending against a knife attack is very hard.  No amount of training can reduce the risk, but training for a knife attack will help you survive.   When defending against a knife attack, there are a few things you should avoid doing and there are some things you can do that will help you come out of it alive. In learning to successfully defend against a knife attack, we must understand as much as we can about the attacks themselves.  The more we know about them, the more we can tailor our training to fit reality.  We must understand the offense in order to plan a defense. We also have to consider the special dynamics of an attack with a knife.  The knife may be hard to detect, so we may not even know initially that a knife...

To be able to defend against a knife attack, we must understand as much about edged weapon attacks as we can.  Knowing the mechanics of a how a knife is used and learning about the dynamics of an edged weapon attack will add a dimension to this understanding.   What is an Edged Weapon?   When considering the threat of edged weapons, there are more than just knives.  It is a category of weapons.  For the purpose of developing a defense against edged weapons, we can include conventional knives, blades, etc. as well as other objects that cause damage similar to a knife or blade in the same category.  These include things like homemade shanks, pens, pencils, scissors, screwdrivers, nails and anything else that can pierce flesh with a thrust.  This category al...

Knife assaults occur in a variety of circumstances and have a wide variety of victims.  Knowing more about situations that lead to knife attacks will help you better understand who and how you need to train for self defense.   Who are the Victims?   It can happen to anyone from anyone. There appears to no combination of personal relationships in knife related crimes that does not make the news.  Kids as young as age six are attacking others in school and in their homes.  Kids are stabbing parents.  Parents are stabbing children.  Siblings are stabbing each other.  Husbands are stabbing wives.  Wives are stabbing husbands.  Friends are stabbing friends.  And, of course, strangers are stabbing each other.  Threats range from those y...