You VS. A Weapon

3 months within my first year of Kung Fu practice, my dojo put on a 4 hour martial arts seminar to celebrate the one year anniversary of the Rochester, Michigan location. A 4 hour event covering basic strikes, grappling techniques, Tai Chi, and weapons self defense. It was an enjoyable, hard working seminar, and worth it in the end when everybody stayed for weapons self defense training, and probably the most rememberable part of the seminar. The one thing I will not forget, made a lot of sense when the Sifu said, “Fighting someone who has a weapon, is STUPID!” That comment alone put any egotistical behavior of mine to rest if I ever did come across someone with a weapon!

As the old saying goes never bring a knife to a gun fight. And if the other guy has a weapon and you don’t, get the hell out of there quick! Better be safe with a sour ego, then be destroyed and taken out. But with almost any problem does come with a solution and the Sifu showed how. Whether the thug (and I say this because “partner” is way too nice of a term to describe in a situation like this) has a knife, gun, bat, etc. pointing right at you, the first thing to do is breathe! With controlling the emotions with the breath, helps with a clear focused mind to get out of harms way by any means necessary. You never want to kick, grab, or swing at the weapon out of the perpetrators hand. While your breathing and not reacting frantically always make the move when that rotten partner tells you to. For instance it could be put your hands up, move here, give me the wallet and so on. From the demand the partner told you to do, you immediately go with the flow and maneuver with the proper technique. For safety purposes I wont go into the technique, but there are hundreds of right ways to get out of sticky situations like that.

It does sound very egotistical to try and prove to your partner how tough you are when they have a weapon and you dont, and running away makes you feel like a coward and they won. I felt like this before when dealing with people that didn’t have weapons but had a whole lot of drama and toughness ready to unleash. Obviously the whole point of martial arts is to learn it by destroying the ego which leads to clearly seeing the black and white in any situation and properly use the discipline to get out of it safely. In the end I have nothing to prove, or validate to people who want to harm me and teach me a so called lesson in there beliefs. So if there is one thing you do take out from what I just blogged about, make sure its fighting someone who has a weapon, is just STUPID!