Never underestimate the usefulness of a swift kick to the shin. I love this technique! It’s fast, painful, and gives you a little time to heel-toe express out of the situation. And, that’s exactly what your butt needs to be doin’ if someone’s after you. Create distance and RUN! (A zig-zag pattern could prove useful.)
Note: As with every technique I post, 1) you need to practice with a willing adult participant, 2) I don’t endorse any of the sites or teachers, and 3) you need to be aware of and know the self-defense laws in your state. The purpose of these posts is to provide you with information about techniques I would use in certain situations. If you really want to become an expert in self-defense, then you need to find a dojang or dojo. If you have questions about how to identify a good dojang or dojo, post your questions in the comments.
Check out this video:
Let me take a minute and add this tidbit of advice:
Pay attention to your surroundings.
This is known as situational awareness. People like to laugh when they see someone texting and walking, and then see that person fall into a fountain, but this is an example of focus lock. The person’s attention is completely focused on that one activity, and she or he is completely unaware of any, and all, possible obstacles or dangers. Avoid focus locks while walking, driving, or during any other transitional activity.
In any environment you should assess the baseline. This simply means that you know and understand what is normal in that space at that time. For example, let’s say you’re visiting your kid’s school during lunch. You’d expect it to be a bit noisy. You might even expect that there’d be a bit of chaos with all the children going to and fro. But, if you walked into that environment, and didn’t hear or see those things, that should make your brain say, “huh?” If it was always quiet and orderly, then that’s the baseline, and anything outside of that should also make you pause and assess.
Be aware of normalcy bias. This means that while we might recognize something just isn’t right. We choose to ignore it because we don’t want anything to be wrong. We want normalcy. We figure if nothing has happened before, then it’s not likely to happen now, so we ignore the possible threat signal. You have to train yourself to avoid this bias.
If you want to learn more, then check out the article below.
Dez
Source: 3 Effective Techniques to Train Your Situational Awareness and Recognize Change