Welcome back!
Ando again from Happy Life Martial Arts and this is Lesson #9 in your Self-Defense Basics
Course.
Did you know that the #1 cause of injury-related death for people 65 and over in the United
States is falling?
When you add the number of people who take a fall and suffer brain injuries or broken
bones, the numbers are shocking.
I tell you this because you may never be in a life and death struggle with a violent attacker,
but you absolutely will take a fall.
Maybe even before the end of this video.
So, today, let’s first talk about defending yourself from the ground, then we’ll talk
about how to defend yourself on the ground.
When you were a kid, falling, rolling around, and throwing yourself on the ground were probably
fun, right?
Well, what happened?
At some point, growing up meant standing up.
Suddenly, taking a fall was embarrassing.
Taking a fall was something to be afraid of.
But that’s crazy.
It’s time to make friends again with Mother Earth.
Start off by simply standing and sitting down.
You can sit straight down or fold one leg behind the other.
If you need your hand to help you down, that’s okay.
The big idea is to start to appreciate those two soft pillows built into your body—they’re
called your butt.
Use them.
Trust them.
Love them.
Since you’ll be getting up while you practice, you might as well build some good self-defense
habits.
Keep your eyes open, one hand up, and stay balanced.
If you turn around or lean over, you might get kicked in the head, so get to a knee and
stand up in your stance.
If you think about it, falling is just dropping your weight, like we talked about in Lesson
#5.
You can drop to a knee, you can drop to your butt.
You can drop on your back, you could drop on your belly.
Of course, in self-defense, I don’t want you to drop your weight all the way to the
ground unless you have to.
But if you have to, you shouldn’t be afraid to do it.
Okay.
Now, let’s talk about protecting your head.
Think of your head like a fish bowl.
If you saw your favorite fish, Freddy, sliding off the table in his bowl, what would you
do?
You would dive and catch it.
Well, I’m here to tell you, my friend—your brain is just as important as Freddy the fish.
So, practice sitting down and catching your head.
Try rolling straight back.
Then try rolling to the side.
If you fall forward, try to turn as you fall and land on your side.
Remember—if you fall and break your shoulder, break your hip, or twist a knee, well, yeah--that's
a sad story, but at least you’ll be alive to tell it.
If you fall and hit your head, though, that might be the end of your story.
So, keep you priorities straight and keep your hands by your head.
One last thought.
In my experience, the most dangerous part of falling is trying to stop yourself from
falling.
You slip, you know you’re going down, but you stick out your hands and you hop across
the room trying to stay on your feet anyway.
No, no, no, no!
That just turns a small fall into a big fall.
My advice—don’t stall the fall.
When you know you’re going down, just say, “Okay, I’m going down,” and then control
it.
Sit down and catch your head as fast as you can.
Hopefully, you now feel a little bit better about falling on your own.
But what if an attacker knocks you down?
What if you take a hit or get tackled?
Or what if you slip or trip and pull the attacker down on top of you?
Does that change anything that we’ve been practicing so far?
No.
Not really.
Let’s take a quick look at the two main ways you might find yourself on the ground
with an attacker.
If you’d like to keep hitting that pillow you were using in Lesson #7 and 8, go right
ahead.
But I’m lucky.
I have this fancy pillow.
This is my training partner, Julio.
Say hey, Julio.
That is so Julio.
Okay.
Number one.
Let’s say we fall on top of the attacker.
Okay.
Let’s use the rules from Lesson #7.
I’m going to push in, go on the attack, and try to drive to the side.
The good news here is that all of the strikes you practiced in Lesson #7 still apply here.
You can still use your palm heels, you can still use your headbutt, and biting if you
have to.
You can still use your hammer fists, you can still use your elbows, you can even smash
his head into the ground.
Sorry, Julio.
And this time, you have the added benefit of having gravity to back you up.
Consider this--if you can touch your attacker, you can hurt your attacker.
And if you hurt your attacker or even just frighten them, there’s a chance that they’re
going to turn away from you on their own, which only helps your goal of driving over
to the side.
No matter how it happens, whether you turn them, whether they turn on their own, or whether
you knock their arm across, getting to the side is always your ultimate goal.
Then I want to get back to my feet.
So, I’m going to try and drop a knee on to the body, on to their neck, on to their
face, maybe both, whatever I can do to start building back up to my feet so I can back
away to safety.
The second way you might find yourself on the ground with an attacker is underneath
him, on the bottom.
First things first.
As you’re falling, I still want to follow the rule to sit down as fast as I can.
But one little difference here is that as I’m falling with an attacker, I would rather
catch his head instead of mine.
Holding on to the attacker’s head helps control the speed of the fall and control
what he can do to me.
If I let go of his head, or if I let go of whatever I’m holding on to, then he has
the chance to protect himself in the fall and to keep attacking me.
Now, don’t worry--if you let go reflexively because you’ve been training, and you catch
your head so it doesn’t hit the ground, that’s still a smart move.
Just make sure you get your hands back in between and back into the fight as fast as
you can.
Obviously, I don’t want to be crushed like a bug under the weight of an attacker.
So, like in Lesson #8, as I pull in my attacker, as I accept the fall, I’m also going to
start turning as much as I can.
Think of it like bullfighting, once again, but in the air and on your back.
Anything you can do to pull this attacker closer and start turning him past you to let
his bodyweight slip by you and go into the ground, that’s going to save you from injury
and put you in a better position.
Even if I end up flat on my back, the goal is still going to be the same.
Pull him in to limit his freedom, start impacting him with palm heels, and headbutts, and elbows,
or whatever you can do, and start driving to the side.
My goal is still to try to get to the side, get behind him, so that I can free up my legs,
put them in front of me, kick, kick, kick and back away to safety.
Again, did you notice how the strategies we covered in Lessons #7 and 8 are being applied
all over again here on the ground?
If I’m on top, I push in and try to turn them.
If I’m on bottom, I pull them closer and try to turn me.
I’m also using the same stance that we covered in Lesson #3.
My hands are up, my chin is down, and I’m keeping my elbows and my knees between me
and the attacker.
One more similarity--I also make sure that I’m always facing my attacker.
I don’t want to turn around and point all of my weapons away from the bad guy while
all of the bad guy’s weapons are pointing straight at me.
Don’t get me wrong--you can learn many powerful techniques specifically designed for fighting
on the ground, but for basic self-defense, I like to keep things simple.
And that means applying the same principles that we used standing up down here on the
ground.
Here’s the thing--if you think of the ground as a completely different situation, requiring
completely different skills and completely different techniques, you might convince yourself
that you have no idea what to do.
You might just freeze up.
But you do know what to do.
You just have to train to do it.
Okay, okay—there is one big difference between self-defense on the ground and self-defense
on your feet--footwork.
When you’re flat on your back, it’s easy to think that you can’t use your legs anymore.
But that would be a mistake.
Your legs are still the biggest bones and biggest muscles in your body, so you should
use them every chance you get.
Here are three ways to do just that.
The first way is kicking.
If you fall or get knocked to the ground, immediately find the attacker and get your
legs in between.
It doesn’t matter if he’s standing or on his knees or just trying to jump on top
of you.
Getting your legs in between puts your head farthest away from his weapons and aims your
strongest weapons straight at him.
So, however you hit the ground, remember--get your head out and your feet in.
And then start kicking.
Kick at his knees, kick into his groin, kick up at his face, whatever.
Just drive him back so you make the space to get back to your feet.
The second way.
Let’s say you can’t get your legs in between you and the attacker.
Maybe they’re just too close or already on top of you.
Okay.
That’s when we might want to use a bump.
That’s where I use my legs to lift up my core as high as I can and maybe roll up on
to a shoulder.
It’s just like a gymnast’s bridge, only more violent.
I also what to make sure I keep my hands by my head.
I’m also going to make sure that I never lift up my body and compress my own neck and
smash my head into the ground.
Last point, I’m not going to jump when I do this like a crazy frog, I’m always going
to keep both feet or at least one foot on the ground as I push up.
By pushing up, you make space in between you and the bad guy for at least a moment, which
will give you the chance to put your legs back in between.
Remember--if you have a bad guy on top of you, you never want him to feel comfortable.
You want him to feel unsettled and off-balance.
It’s like when you’re driving your car and you hit a speed bump that you didn’t
see coming.
It gives you a jolt and makes you spill your coffee.
Same idea here.
Your bump is the speed bump that he didn’t see coming.
So, give him a jolt.
Shake his body and shake his confidence.
The third way to use your legs on the ground I’m just going to call scooting or sliding.
Use your feet to walk yourself backwards.
Walk yourself forwards.
You can use your feet to jump backwards.
You can use your feet to jump forwards.
You cause your feet to run forwards.
You can use your feet to run backwards.
You can use your feet to switch so you can roll over quickly or just switch sides as
your attacker is moving around.
To me, I consider all of that footwork.
It’s also a lot of fun.
One little tip.
When you’re practicing on the ground, wear some pants and a long sleeve shirt.
That’ll help prevent rug burns.
It may sound like a pain, but believe me, it’s worth the trouble, because when it
comes to self-defense on the ground, if you want to get back on your feet, you have to
use your feet.
So, get down and have some fun.
Here’s what I recommend.
Practice your bump as soon as you wake up.
Presumably, you sleep lying down, unless you’re a bat.
So, when you wake, put your pillow on your belly, give it a bump, turn, kick off the
covers, and scoot yourself off the bed.
Call me crazy, but I think kicking off the blankets is a great way to kick off the day.
If you’re finding value in this series of self-defense lessons, please share them with
someone you love.
I’ll see you again in Lesson #10.
Until next time, spend some time with your mother--Mother Earth, and keep fighting for
a happy life.