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The most important skills in self-defense are

1.

Know how to identify a bad situation

2.

Don't put yourself in them, or minimize your presence in them

3.
Know how to extract yourself out of a bad situation as safely and efficiently
as possible, and that includes de-escalation, fleeing, and having the skill and
determination to use of superior and potentially deadly force (weapons like knives
and guns), and the resolve to face the aftermath

Fighting prowess is far from the list of requirements for self-defense.

The best way to train is to be task-specific. That means if you want to be good at
self-defense, you need to train for self-defense, not martial arts (and again - learn
martial arts for exercise, discipline, etc to your heart's content, just know that you
aren't training for self-defense).

Marc MacYoung's No Nonsense Self Defense has a lot more in-depth explanations on
what self-defense is really all about.
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Stephen Lee, Black belt in Taekwondo, currently Shaolin Kempo practitioner.

Written May 21
The basic advice on this thread is that you need to find an art that is appropriate to
your abilities and interests, and in which you will actually take the time to train.
Very sensible advice.
I would add one dimension, which DJ MacIntyre touched upon: are you training for a
specific threat, or just in general? This actually is far more important than most
people realize. All martial arts training requires trade offs, so one way of
approaching any martial art is to ask yourself if the techniques and philosophy
comport with your reasons for studying it. For example, if you are the average
middle class woman, living in a reasonably safe city or town, how much danger do
you ever expect to find yourself in? Couple that with how much dedication do you
have to learn a martial art, and that will help you choose a style or school.

So following this line of thinking, if you are the average middle aged woman in a
relatively safe city, it is extremely unlikely that you will ever find yourself having to
fight for your life; or if so, it is extremely unlikely that you will have to do so against
a well trained opponent. So no need to achieve ninja status. For most types of
situations in which most women will find themselves relying on a martial art, they
need to break an attack (often from someone they know) and get away. In these
circumstances, a style such as judo, jiu jitsu or aikido is perfect. Their attacker will
probably be grabbing them, and all these arts teach their practitioners to redirect
their opponents energy and counterattack with throws or locks, and each style uses
a larger persons weight against him.
If you live in a higher risk environment, you might find it more useful to include
significant striking skills. For me, that means kicks over punches, simply because
kicks are more devastating. So I would prefer Taekwondo or karate over boxing. The
assumption here is that the danger level is higher, so the need to disable your
attacker very quickly becomes more important. A shattered kneecap does that more
reliably than a throw.
For many people, styles that emphasize realistic street encounters like Krav Maga
make the most sense. That is because Krav Maga is focused on the threats posed by
direct attacks, including the use of weapons. That can be very practical, as a rapist
will often use a knife or other weapon.
The question, however, as others on this thread have indicated, is which martial art
makes sense for you in terms of the time you will dedicate to it. These are very
personal choices, and I always recommend that someone who is interested in
martial arts visit a number of different schools of different styles, always interview
the instructors to understand the schools philosophy (and to determine if the
instructors are of good character which is very important), then try a couple of
classes to see if its something that you will be willing to dedicated at least the next
five years of your life to practicing. Because thats how long it takes at a minimum
to become proficient enough that you can say you are a fighter, not a martial
dancer.
2.5k Views View Upvotes

Max Loh, Musical Composer at Max Loh Music: www.maxloh.com

Written Sep 16, 2014
Well, if I had to pick for you, I would recommend you start by concurrently training
Krav Maga and MMA.

However, your question is very strange, because apparently your goals are to learn
self-defense for safety reasons when you keep saying it's a "must" and that you
don't want to put a lot of time in it so it's clearly not a passion. In which case martial
arts isn't even the right thing to do. Your requirement of #7 makes absolutely no
sense because it's incompatible with your requirements 1, 3, 4, 5, and 6. And you
are clearly delusional if you don't see the irony between #1 and #5! Fast to learn
AND able to disable experienced fighters! Do you think those "experienced fighters"
are training in ballroom dancing?

Why do people do martial arts? No, really why? Some people will give the deluded
answer: "To defend myself and my loved ones". That might be the reason they do it,
but if it is, it's a terrible misguided reason. The chances that you will be assaulted in
your life if you're not egotistical or picking fights, is extremely low. And even if
somehow that happens, it's going to be a mugging for your property 95% of the
time, which even the most skilled fighters usually say is not worth fighting for. And
even in the extremely rare case that it's not a mugging, the chances you actually
need to use martial arts (as opposed to running away), are infinitesimally small. So
what you have is probably a 1% chance that you will ever use your fighting skills in
a "street confrontation" in your entire life even if you live in a dangerous
neighborhood.

So if that's your goal, it's not worth it. You should read "no nonsense self-defense"
and/or "the gift of fear" instead. These attitude shifts will greatly increase your
chance of survival much more than martial arts training will. Stay alert, notice
abnormal activity, keep your distance from sketchy people, and run early if in doubt.
Don't fall prey to the mentality of "fear of racism" (such as refusing to avoid a
sketchy gang walking towards you just because they're an oppressed minority).
They will specifically train street defense. That means that, even if it is a sport self
defense, they will at least teach some techniques only appropriate to street
situations. Like head-butting, clawing, groin shots, etc. Arts that do this well - Krav
Maga, BJJ, Systema, Kung Fu (depending on style), Wing Chun, Jeet Kun Do,
Kajukenbo
They will train full range. A truly effective martial art needs to teach basic gun and
knife defense. It needs to teach both offensive and defensive striking to teach
students how to at least react to someone trying to beat their face in. It needs to
train takedowns and throws, so the student can choose to switch where they are
fighting, in case they face a larger opponent where strikes are not effective. And it
needs to train ground defense - that's where almost every involved fight will end up.
Arts that do this well - Krav Maga, Kajukenbo. Most gyms focused on other arts pick
up additional instructors in different arts to make up for range gaps.

Of couse, you can't always spar at all ranges. You shouldn't be training with live,
cutting knives unless you're a master at knife fighting already. Not everyone should
start sparring full contact kickboxing immediately. But it's important to train
somewhat painful, stress-inducing sparring regularly. And it's important to train
techniques specific to self-defense and in all ranges.

To get the best self-defense training, you want to look by gym as well as by art
because many gyms combine arts to be well-rounded. The best way is to attend a
few classes and see how they fit. For a bit more guidance, the martial art gyms that
typically fit the criteria above, from my experience, are the following:

Krav Maga schools that spar frequently

BJJ gyms that add some drills against striking and weapons (most seem to)
MMA gyms that add in weapons and street defense drills
Kajukenbo gyms that practice live sparring
Honorable mentions: Sambo gyms that add weapons and stand up can be good, and
Sanshou gyms that add a ground fighting art like BJJ and weapon drills can also
teach effective self-defense.

There are many other gyms in many styles that fit the criteria as well, but these are
the types that pop in my mind first for self-defense.

If your goal is really about self-defense, you should go to qualified self-defense

schools instead of martial arts schools. A retired cop who worked the streets can
teach you much more about self-defense than a martial art master can.

Due to the popularity of martial arts movies and all the fancy fighting movies they
show, few realize that martial arts are not self-defense.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying martial arts are not good. I've done some and
loved it. You can take martial arts classes to your heart's content, just don't mistake
them for self-defense skills.

Sparring sports like boxing or MMA are not self-defense, either. They are fighting
sports, and can make you kick ass in a ring setting, but they are not self-defense.
And for some, being good at fighting is likely to work against you in self-defense
situations, because you are more likely to think you can fight your way out of it,
when fleeing is the much better option.

From what I've heard, Krav Maga is the closest thing to self-defense in martial arts,
but I've not done it so can't vouch, and you might have harder time in finding them.

The promise of martial arts is that they render size and strength irrelevant, and
that's a very alluring and dangerous belief for self-defense situation as well.
Because until you are very well-trained, overcoming size and strength isn't like how
it's portrayed in the movies.

And on the streets, they don't come at you the way it's portrayed in the movies
either. Many elite fighters will never see the sucker punch from behind before it's all
over.

(The following video can be disturbing, and the victims aren't necessarily fighters,
but most fighters won't stand a chance either)