College of Marin: Peaceful Warrior Woman: Protector of Your Body and Boundaries

REGARDING COVID

The classroom has large windows and doors that will be fully open to provide cross-ventilation. When registering, students (and instructors) are required to show proof of vaccination. And the college requires all students to wear masks. As instructor, I recommend and request everyone wear an N95, KN95, or KF94 mask to maximize protection for yourself and your classmates.

Please feel free to email me with any questions or concerns you have about the class: larry@larryberkelhammer.com

Peaceful Warrior Woman: Protector of Your Body and Boundaries

What is a peaceful warrior?

The term Peaceful Warrior may seem like an oxymoron. I took the idea from the book Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman and the Peaceful Warrior movie, which I highly recommend. I chose the term to emphasize that this women’s self-defense class offers much more than self-defense techniques.

As you begin to live in your body, the way animals in the wild do, you will see things around you that previously were not visible to you.

The fun drills that you will practice with your classmates train you to read the intentions of others. This happens as you quiet mental chatter and begin to develop a felt sense of people’s very subtle behavior that is normally missed.

This video provides a great example of enforcing clear boundaries. The self-defense techniques and especially the fun training drills you do with classmates will help you feel self-empowered and have the confidence that you can enforce clear boundaries even in the most challenging situations.

This unique women’s self-defense class offers training in four integrated areas:

Put your mind in your center:
When your mind is in your center, rather than in your thoughts, you will feel centered, grounded, confident, and assertive. Most predators will leave you alone because they will view you as a hard target. Even dogs will show you more respect when you move from your center. Also, with your mind in your center, you will quiet the normally loud mental chatter that otherwise prevents you from knowing instantly who is safe to be around and who isn’t.

In addition, with your mind in your center rather than in the mental chatter that we all commonly get lost in, you will more easily tune in to your bodily sensations that inform your intuition. As you quiet the mental chatter, you will better intuit when something or someone seems a little off. When we trust and honor our intuition, we can more easily detect potential danger and avoid it, whether the threat is a family member, stranger or someone we know.

Animals in the wild instantly recognize predators. Humans typically miss important cues because they mistakenly believe someone’s race, nationality, culture, economic status, clothing, tatoos, or piercings inform them of danger. Because they are paying attention to those useless, irrelevant criteria, they miss the only thing that matters, which is a person’s subtle behavioral cues including body language.
Situational Awareness
In order to not take up valuable class time, I recommend you learn this topic by studying the Situational Awareness page under the above heading COM Class.

In an actual attack, your situational awareness will allow you to see it coming, which will give you the opportunity to evade if possible or to preemptively attack the attacker as he is about to initiate his attack. That element of surprise will give you an enormous advantage. Rapists and other violent predators use the element of surprise to physically and psychologically overpower their targets.
Boundary setting
Predators, whether they are known to you or are strangers, prey on the vulnerable, and usually avoid women who are very aware, assertive, and maintain clear boundaries. In many situations, verbal boundary setting is sufficient to dissuade a predator. However, verbal boundary setting works well only when your body language backs up your words. Once you learn to move from your center, predators will view you as a hard target.

There is a tendency for us to let our guard down with trusted family members or authority figures, making it hard to spot something in that person that may be just a little off. As you gradually become progressively more skilled at placing your mind in your center, you will increasingly notice very subtle indicators in people that could serve as early warnings signs that certain individuals may not be safe for you to be around.
Self-defense techniques
If you are situationally aware and self-aware, and you act on your intuition, you will spot potential predators and won’t get targeted by them. Most people are not aware enough to spot and avoid predators most of the time. But if you spend time observing animals in the wild and adopt that degree of awareness, you’ll never have to resort to physical self-defense.

The self-defense techniques taught in the Peaceful Warrior Woman: Protector of Your Body and Boundaries class are for use specifically with the types of predators that prey on women, regardless of whether the predator is a family member, co-worker, boss or other authority figure, or stranger.

The techniques taught in this class are the most practical and effective techniques to use against an attacker who is bigger, faster, and stronger than you.

My philosophy is to teach you just a few techniques that you can confidently master, rather than to teach a plethora of techniques that you couldn’t possibly be able to call up and effectively use amid the chaos and terror of a real attack. The few techniques taught in this class are intended to hurt the attacker just enough to allow you to get away.

To physically defend yourself, you must be able to move well. You need to be able to move with speed and fluidly because power is greatly magnified by speed and because your techniques won’t work if the attacker sees them coming.

In addition to practicing moving from your center, you must learn to read the intentions of potential attackers based on how they move. Learning to predict the movements of predators will give you a great advantage. Two-person drills with your classmates are designed to teach you how to predict each other’s movements and will help you to time your strikes and kicks to accurately reach the intended targets. To create safety in class, you will practice in slow motion with your classmates.

Many women’s self-defense courses include fancy, exotic techniques like this one to attract students. The technique shown in this photo won’t work in a realistic attack without considerable training. The few techniques taught in this class are not exotic or fancy; they are simple and effective.

The physical self-defense techniques taught in this class:

Simple techniques for beginning students:

Oblique kicks to shins and ankles as soon as you realize you are about to be attacked. This kick will either knock him down, allowing you to get away. Or it will cause him to instinctively lift that foot up off the ground, allowing you to then kick the shin or ankle of the leg he’s standing on.
Rear heel kicks to shins (if grabbed from behind)
Hard, fast, open-hand slaps to the face with palm heel striking his nose and fingers going into the eyes. In case your shin or ankle kicks failed to put him down, they will have at least distracted him enough to open various face, throat, and neck targets.

Slightly more complex techniques for experienced students:

Combination of the open-hand slaps and palm-heel strikes (following your kicks to his shins and ankles)
Knees to inner thigh and groin (following your palm-heels to his nose and slaps to his face and eyes)

Techniques taught to advanced students: These techniques may look simple but they require considerably more precision, speed, and power to be effective; therefore they are only taught when you are able to move with good body mechanics and are on your way to keeping your mind in your center.

Cupped palm claps to the ears
Elbows to the jaw, throat, eyes, side of neck, back of neck, and back of the head
Chops (aka knife-hand or blade-hand) to throat or neck
Hammer fists to the jaw, throat, side of the neck, back of neck, and groin

You also need avoidance skills because the reality is that techniques that work well in class often have no effect at all on an attacker who has adrenalin or street drugs flooding his system, which make him impervious to pain. Also, in a real situation, the adrenalin flooding your own body will reduce your accuracy due to loss of your fine motor skills.

When evasion or escape aren’t possible you must use violence and deception

Use of Deception

The best form of deception is to preemptively attack the predator as soon as it is apparent that he intends to hurt you; it will be your best chance to disable him enough for you to get away.

If you are ever in a situation where you are not able to evade or preemptively attack the attacker because he has already ambushed and overpowered you, deception may buy you time. For example, you may get an attacker to momentarily let his guard down by giving him the false impression that you are not going to put up a fight. Then, as soon as you see an opening to attack vital targets, you attack and don’t let up until you can get away.

Another use of deception is to ask the predator a question that confuses him and forces him into his head the instant before you begin attacking him.

Putting up a fence is still another form of deception. This is where you have your hands up at roughly chest height or slightly higher with palms facing forward as you try to verbally defuse the situation. This places your hands very close to the predator’s eyes, nose, jaw, and throat, which is advantageous if you need to attack him. However, unless you are well-trained and practiced in self-defense, putting up a fence could backfire, placing you even more at risk of being attacked.

Deception can also be in the form of acting supremely confident, but you must be convincing, and that generally isn’t possible when you’re terrified.

If you are ever in a situation where you can see that a potential predator is sizing you up, then in that situation, acting a little crazy is another way of deceiving him into believing that you would be a hard target.

This peaceful warrior woman is smashing her elbow into the side of the attacker’s jaw. When delivered with your body mass behind it, an elbow strike can inflict serious injury; eventually, when you get to the advanced level, it will be your most powerful upper body weapon.

In this photo, compare her large blunt elbow with her smaller and fragile fist. The fist has a lot of very small bones and fragile joints, whereas the elbow is a blunt force weapon.

When escape isn’t possible you must attack the attacker

When you or someone with you is about to be attacked, the primary goal should always be to escape. But, if that’s not possible, you must use violent techniques that physically incapacitate the attacker. To do that with speed, accuracy, and power, you must be able to adopt the mind-state of a warrior rather than the mind-state of a victim.

Preemptively attack the attacker.

Always assume the attacker has a gun or knife even though it isn’t visible to you.

Because you must always assume an attacker has a concealed gun or knife, you must disable him to prevent the attacker from drawing the weapon. If you are attacked by a man, he will assume he will easily be able to have his way with you. If you only inflict pain on the attacker and fail to disable him, he will then draw the concealed gun or knife that he didn’t think he’d need before you struck or kicked him. Therefore, simply inflicting pain will not keep you safe. Your only hope for a safe escape is to disable him so he can’t chase after you and can’t pull out his knife or gun. You can never half-heartedly attack; you must fight for your life until you are able to escape.

Fight for your life

In the stress and chaos of a real attack, you must keep attacking every vulnerable target that you can access and not stop until your attacker is incapacitated enough to allow you to get away. Once someone has attacked you or is about to attack you, you must instinctively identify vulnerable targets on his body and keep attacking those targets as they present themselves, instinctively choosing your most available empty-hand weapons (hands, elbows, knees, feet) as openings appear from moment-to-moment. For example, the lead weapon taught in class is the oblique shin kick, delivered with your body mass behind it. However, it is not one kick. You will practice kicking with your left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot, and continue that way. As his various vulnerable targets open up, you will deploy your fingers, palm-heels, blade-hands, hammer-fists, elbows, knees, and feet. You will know when you can stop attacking because there will be a chance to safely get away.

In addition to your empty-hand weapons, you should also make use of any object you can quickly grab that you can use as a weapon. Any object you use for striking should be used the same way you use your empty-hand weapons. In other words, never telegraph your strike. The weapon needs to strike the targets (eyes, nose, ears, chin, throat, neck) without first retracting it if at all possible. The danger of retracting your weapons is that it creates an opening for the person to close the distance and neutralize your weapon or to use the opening to attack a vital target.

Theoretically, one well-placed strike to one of his vulnerable targets, such as his eyes, ears, jaw, throat or neck, with your full mass behind it could be all you need to allow for an easy escape. The problem is that with all the adrenalin in your system and your loss of fine motor control, along with the fact that he may not be standing still, you will have to keep fighting for your life until you can finally land a clean shot and get away.

A ponytail, braids, a scarf, or anything a predator can grab gives him the ability to control your movements. With practice, you will learn to center yourself and then use rotational forces to launch your counterattack even in this bad situation.

Someone can be very charming yet be very unsafe to be around

It is very common to meet someone who appears to be very nice and very charming, who later turns out to be abusive and dangerous. Some of the most notorious mass murderers were known by neighbors and friends as being very nice people. At some point we have all been in the presence of that type of predator without being consciously aware of the danger. One famous example of that type of psychopathic predator was Ted Bundy. You may have a family member, acquaintance, neighbor, boss, co-worker, or anyone in an authority position fitting that description; be wary of them. Learn to honor subtle bodily cues that inform your intuition. And learn to trust subtle feelings that lead you to sense that something is not quite right.

If you are not completely comfortable with someone, avoid unnecessary conversation with that person.

An extremely helpful method, adapted from Nonviolent Communication (NVC), which I taught for several years, is the following four-step process:

Observation: What objective information do I have, using my senses, on what is going on in my immediate environment in this moment?
Feeling: What emotion am I experiencing in this moment?
Need: What do I need in this moment? (Examples: space, safety, choice, respect)
Request: The request needs to be something that can realistically be carried out.

Below is an example of the four-step process that can be effective with the type of predator that values maintaining a previously existing connection with you (family member, neighbor, or co-worker).

“You just stepped toward me after I stepped back.” (my observation).
I’m feeling uncomfortable with that.” (my feeling).
“I need space.” (expression of my need).
“Step back.” (my request, expressed assertively). At that point, if he fails to honor your assertive boundary setting and you cannot get away, you need to aggressively attack and keep attacking until you can get away.

Many predators rely on trust

Although women are often ambushed by a stranger and taken to a secondary location, one of the most dangerous situations is when a family member or trusted authority figure takes advantage of previously established trust in order to molest or rape. Those of us who were abused as children by someone we trusted are particularly vulnerable to freezing. Men as well as women who are normally very assertive will commonly freeze in a situation where the attacker is someone we know and trust.

In the class we address ways to break the freeze; one of the best ways is to practice just a few techniques until you master them, as opposed to learning dozens of techniques that you can’t possibly master. This prevents the confusion of what to do during a real attack. If you have mastered just two techniques, you will be able to break the freeze much faster than someone who has hundreds of techniques to consider.

The Freeze

Although the freeze is common and normal for both men and women, you cannot think and reason your way out of it. It is important to utilize a heuristic, a hard and fast rule you can always fall back on. The one I like is: “Move.” As a heuristic, it will be your automatic response to break the freeze. Every second that you delay in attacking your attacker, your risk of being raped and killed increases. That’s why you will want to practice two techniques until they become an automatic response, which will also help break or even prevent the freeze. Having to figure out which technique to use during an actual attack is very detrimental to breaking the freeze.

The most common thought that people have when they freeze is: “Why is this happening?” If you have just two techniques that have become your automatic default techniques, you will be less likely to freeze.

Also, as you train in class to recognize subtle behavior of those around you, you will be able to avoid trouble.

There is an expression: “Keep your head on a swivel.” Paying attention to everyone around you will keep you safe because even if a predator decides to target you, you will see him in time to not be there when he attacks.

Watch for any subtle behavior that is a deviation from that person’s baseline behavior or any sense that something is a little off

Women are most often attacked by someone they know. You can use this to your advantage because you know that person’s baseline normal behavior. Any deviation from that person’s baseline behavior should be an immediate warning signal to you that you could be in danger.

Don’t be nice; be safe

You must take evasive action even when you aren’t sure if someone poses a real threat. This can be quite challenging for some people. Many rape victims have reported failing to take evasive action based on their intuitive sense that someone could be a potential threat. Had they acted on their intuitive sense of possible danger they most likely could have prevented the attack. When asked why they allowed the guy to touch them, why they got in the elevator, entered the room, or got into the vehicle, despite sensing possible danger, a common answer was that they thought they were overreacting and didn’t want the guy to be insulted. If you feel any slight discomfort with someone, whether it is a family member, neighbor, boss, co-worker, or a stranger, honor your fear and avoid anyone that triggers your fear. Sometimes that person may feel insulted, but you will be safe.

If someone feels insulted by your cold behavior, that’s their responsibility, not yours

You are never responsible for anyone else’s feelings. The more you set clear boundaries, the easier it becomes to maintain them. If you are uncomfortable with anything about someone, act on it. Maintain your boundaries with your voice and your body language.

Yelling for Help: Anytime someone is bothering you in any way, yell for help; bringing attention to the situation is often enough to scare off the predator and attract sheepdogs (protectors).

You must always maintain awareness so that you never get ambushed

If a stranger wants to kidnap and rape you, he will most often ambush you and then threaten to kill you to get you to comply so he can take you to a secondary location, which you have to avoid at all costs. Once he has your attention, he may tell you that he doesn’t want to have to kill you and that if you go along with all his demands you will be safe. The reality is that going along with his demands will put you in mortal danger. Even if he threatens you with a gun or knife, you must get away before he gets a chance to take you to a secondary location, because once he has you isolated, it will be too late, and he will have his way with you.

Attacks do not occur without warning, but the warnings are often very subtle and usually go unnoticed by the victims. However, if you practice a high level of situational awareness and honor your intuition, and NEVER tell yourself that you are overreacting, you will almost always be able to stay safe. In the very rare instance where someone attacks you, you will see it coming and will be prepared to effectively defend yourself.