When I first moved to Dublin, I felt that there was an edge to the inner city which I hadn't felt before in a European city.  As I had never learnt any martial arts or done any self defence or even been in a fight, I started to look for a course to teach me how to defend myself.  Fortunately, I stumbled across the Krav Maga Ireland "Learn to Defend Yourself in 24 Hours" website.  I took the course and then carried on with the classes which I still go to today.

One day in the pub after a class the instructor started telling me about NLP and said that it was "self defence for the mind".  This intrigued me and I signed up for various NLP courses with Owen and Brian at the Irish Institute of NLP.  I never really understood the instructor's comment until reading Owen's book, Conversations, recently.  Sure, the instructor uses a lot of NLP to teach self defence, but that didn't really help me understand what his comment meant.  

Towards the beginning of the book, Owen refers to one reason to do NLP as being to learn to protect yourself from feeling bad.  Yes, you can use NLP to teach or be more persuasive, but protecting yourself from bad thoughts, images, sounds and feelings is surely more useful.  This is what my instructor meant when he said that NLP was self defence for the mind.  Richard Bandler says in the book that he uses all of the NLP techniques he invented on himself so he is practising mental self defence.  Are you?

The core of NLP

There are many ideas in Owen and Richard's book.  We have thought and beliefs which frame our brain's processes to make us go into a state or respond in a particular way.  Our physiology responds to the brain's instructions by secreting chemicals to make us feel a particular way and by making us breath, stand, speak etc correspondingly.  Using NLP, we can interrupt and alter these processes and make them more useful.  We can install triggers (anchors) to start good processes.  All of the information we need to understand ourselves and other people is right in front of us and it is important to pay attention to the language, sounds and appearance of other people and to our own processes (especially the images, sounds and feelings we make).

The secret of self defence

What's this got to do with self defence - you need to know how to take a hit and hit back, don't you?  Ever heard the stories about black belts in this or that martial art who got mugged by teenagers?  It happens all of the time.  The hitting is only the second half of the story.  The first half is mental.

In Conversations, there is a chapter on dealing with aggressive people or people who say nasty things to you.  Richard says two things which sum up self defence.

"People who are really aggressive? … The best thing to do is to get the hell out of there and if you can't get the hell out of there, then you just have to deal with it. …If you don't think you can avoid a fight, then you should start it before the other person is ready."

How victims and attackers "do" an attack

One of the best books on self defence is by Geoff Thompson and is called "Dead or Alive - The Choice is Yours".  Unlike most books, the first hundred pages contain no techniques but focus entirely on the process an attacker and a victim go through before and during an attack. 

The basic idea is that most victims walk around in what he calls "code white".  This is the state of oblivion to danger, unawareness of the environment, people in the environment and how they might attack.  He says "Code white is the victim state that all attackers look for".  Instead, you should walk around in "code yellow" which is a state of "threat awareness", being aware of dark alleys or people who are behaving erratically for example.  Think of soldiers on patrol.

Code orange is a state of threat evaluation.  The dodgy characters across the road start coming towards you and look menacing.  If you are being aware, you can spot the physical signs of the process that they are going through to be able to attack you and you are in a position to decide what to do.  Code red is when you are threatened and you have to do something about it immediately.

Geoff Thompson describes how attackers use the four Ds as their process for attacks.  These are dialogue, deception, distraction and destruction.  At a general level, the attacker uses the first three to disarm you mentally before battering you (the fourth D).  You know how it goes:  "Hi there, how's it going [Dialogue and Distraction].  Excuse me but I am lost [Dialogue and Deception - they are locals!], can you help me [Distraction]… now give me your f**!**! wallet." and you get punched [Destruction].  In Dead or Alive are a number of interviews with muggers, serial killers and rapists.  Some of the most horrible of them were particularly skilled at using the four Ds.  An awareness of this process is vital to defending yourself from harm.

You can observe the physical signs of preparation for attack too.  These are things such as getting closer and closer, hiding the hands, the tone of voice.  Just before launching an attack, adrenalin will be coursing through an attacker's veins and you will see signs like neck pecking like a cockerel, bulging eyes, tensing up and dropped eyebrows.  You will also notice that the dialogue goes from full sentences to grunting and single syllables.  Think of a drunken lad is a pub trying to start a fight.

A victim's own processes will be operating as well.  Adrenaline will be pumping around the victim's system the moment that a threat is perceived.  This can make you oblivious to pain or run very very fast - the fight or flight response.  It can also come out as fear and you end up freezing.  This is how the black belt loses their wallet.  Being aware and in code yellow allows you to prepare for this instinctive response early and take action.

Being aware and copying the attacker's process

The good news is that you can alter your processes by training and being aware of what is going on inside you and around you.  Good self defence courses focus on this first and foremost.  For example, the potential attackers cross the road towards you.  You see a cab coming and flag it down and get in it and drive on. 

If it is too late to avoid confrontation and you are face to face with someone going through the early stages of attack preparation, you do something different.  You use the 4 Ds yourself in an impressive show of impression management.

Before the attacker's processes get him into a state of being just about to attack, you put your palms up in a deceitful "I want no trouble" sort of gesture.  Actually what you are doing is adopting a defensive stance similar to a boxer's so that you keep the attacker at some distance, protect your head and prepare your main striking weapons, your hands, for action.  Imagine how much more aggressive you look if you suddenly do an impression of Mike Tyson waiting for a round to start and you clench your fists.  You are feigning conciliation and compliance while preparing to attack.

You can then decide to hand over your wallet if that is what the attacker wants so he can be on his way.  If the attacker wants something different such as for you to go with him somewhere else, this is a cue for guaranteed personal harm.  Never go to a secondary crime scene.  There is a high statistical probability that you will not come back and you play right into the hands of the attacker.  At this point, you can also use your tone of voice to your advantage to de-escalate the situation or reinforce the impression of submissiveness.

Interrupting the attacker's process

Up to this point, you can use a pattern interrupt. 

In Conversations, Owen describes one way to do this.  As a mugger is following him, Owen turns, walks straight up to the guy with a smile on his face and makes to shake hands with the guy.  The guy shakes his hand and the mugging is stopped before it happens. Ever seen the shaking hands hypnosis technique demonstrated by Richard Bandler?  It works in the same way.

Geoff Thompson recommends asking an attacker a random question which requires a fuller answer than just yes or no.  "How long is a piece of string?" for example.  This interrupts and confuses an attacker giving you time to deliver devastating blows while he is scratching his head trying to find an answer.  However, the question needs to be asked early enough before the attacker's adrenaline has begun to cause impaired hearing and reasoning abilities.  You can also interrupt the process by saying you want no trouble and talking things down, by spitting in the attacker's face, diving at their face and running away, screaming wildly and flailing your arms about.  Whatever works to interrupt the process.

Creating your own useful state of rage

Anchoring is also incredibly important.  Instead of freezing when you perceive a real threat, you can use that feeling to create a state of overwhelming rage.  In the defence classes, we close our eyes and squeeze our thumbs and fingers together while the instructor goes through a type of brilliance squared exercise to help us install an on tap state of rage in ourselves.  (He also anchors a reverse of this state to remove the rage after the class!)   We also do drills where we shut our eyes and other members of the class (we don't know who) come up to us and hit us or get us in a hold.  Only then can we open our eyes.  We then see the threat and very quickly have to go into a state of rage to maximise the effect of the strikes we are taught.

You can use other anchors.  Geoff Thompson's question can be your anchor.  While the attacker is thinking about a piece of string you start battering him with as much intention to destroy him as you can create.  In the attacker's eyes you are going from submissive body language to vicious attacker without doing the bits in between.  The confusion gives you time.  I don't know how fast you can strike someone, but I would bet that you can land 3 or 4 blows a second. 

Principles of self defence

The principles of self defence include using the closest weapon and attacking the nearest vital points (eyes, ears, jaw, nose, throat etc).  Once you start the attack you take advantage of the fact that the attacker is only designed to feel pain from one source at a time.  Lots of pain signals from different places cause distraction.  So you hit the throat, scratch the eyes, scrape your shoe down their shin, knee them in the groin, give a couple of elbows to each ear etc.  Make sense?

We learn lots of different techniques for when we get to the point where we have to use physical force but as you can see, these are a small part of the self defence picture.  In one exercise we did, I had to pretend to get some cash from an ATM.  The instructor was pretending to queue behind me.  He got too close so I did a reverse kick to his knee, spun around and started battering him around the head.  Has anyone got too close to you in a queue before?  Being able to read when a problem might exist and having strategies to escalate or de-escalate the situation are important.

What to look for in a self defence class

So, if you are looking for self defence lessons what do you look for?  Certainly training on how you get into a situation and what to do when you are there.  If you have to fight, techniques based on Thai Boxing and Ju Jitsu (or what to do if you falling / are on the floor) combined with escapes from grabs, headlocks and chokes are all necessary.  It also helps to do some sparring so that you know what it is like to be hit or be wrestled around the floor.  It's not very nice which can of itself act as an anchor to avoid getting into the situation. 

Also look for something that can be taught quickly and does not require much coordination.  In a stressful situation, your ability to be coordinated is chemically impaired by adrenaline.  Military based courses like Krav Maga are excellent for this because they are designed to be taught very quickly to grunts and yet still be effective.  They focus on gross motor skills and not fine coordination.

NLP for self defence practice

You can also use your NLP skills in day to day situations.  When you are walking around outside, notice where people might be hiding, discreetly observe what dodgy characters do (what is it that makes them seem dodgy, exactly?).  Also, run through in your mind what you would do if someone were to try to attack you in different situations such as at the cash point, in a queue, when asking for the time.  Crank up the submodalities when doing this to make it more believable.  Remember that your brain doesn't know the difference between an actual situation and a powerfully imagined one so this is important training.

Practice installing a state of anger or rage and have an anchor for it and an anchor to remove it.  Work out what your values are, what is most important to you, so important that you would risk life and limb for it.  It is only when these values are being threatened that you should be using physical force on someone who is a threat.  Otherwise, run away or talk your way out of the situation.

Remember as well the importance of learning to run your brain in the best way you can now.  The aftermath of an attack can be very difficult to deal with unless you already know how to run your brain well.  As Richard Bandler says in Owen's book, when someone is raped once, the victim continues allows themselves to be raped again and again every time they re-enact the attack in their mind.