Author: Erik Kondo

The Never Complain Dictum – Mark Hatmaker  

In the world of street-response to potential violent conflict one often encounters the word “de-escalation.” I want to define that term, not to insult intelligence but to make sure we’re on the same page about a tactic I find of nominal value as it applies to the everyday citizen. De-escalation is, in short, a micro-version of hostage negotiation. I keep you talking with this or that bargaining chip or appeasement patter in hope of you not engaging in violence (or any more violence).

Now, law enforcement and security professionals (LE here on out) have a serious need for de-escalation tactics and strategies as LE, by the very definition of their job, must deal with the violent or potentially violent. Their professional contract, their sense of duty says that the LE professional must deal with what is in front of them and not walk away. Whereas, we the non-LE citizen do not have that professional onus to stand pat and work our way through a potentially dangerous situation with some possibly dubious advice. (We’ll get to why I regard de-escalation advice being of dubious merit for the citizen in a bit).

First, we would be wise to think of confrontation in the physical realm and the non-physical in the exact same way, with the exact same response continuum. That is, as non-LE professionals we have no duty or burden to respond to or restrain an offender. At the first sign of trouble if the exits are clear we would be wise to exercise the most important F of the Fight or Flight dichotomy and choose Flight. Training/Drilling/Accepting a de-escalation strategy is choosing to prolong a confrontation by default-when phrased that way, does prolonging contact with the violent or potentially violent seem wise? If assault looms imminent, you should get out of Dodge. If it’s too late to get out of Dodge when the violence is upon us, we should respond only long enough to create our flight opportunity. It is not our job to “see it through to the end” as, again, that is not our job as non-LE citizens. To move laterally into de-escalation where a simple exit is available is less than wise. It may feel “cowardly” in some circumstances and not as easy as our combative simian natures will allow, but it is wiser than engaging in wordplay with another simian in an agitated state.

[In regard to cowardly vs. “knightly honor” I can do no better de-bunk of this notion than the masterful distinction between honor and responsibility delivered in Schopenhauer’s “The Wisdom of Life.” In short, not everything is “fightin’ words.”]

Let’s look at how well de-escalation works in non-violent scenarios for a moment. I want you to picture the “ambush” seat on a cable news show. That is the seat or guest spot reserved for the partisan enemy; the guest spot where a single representative is supposed to stand-in for all of the “other side” while a bombastic anchor or table of the “enemy” goes to town on you.

For this example, picture a conservative guest on an MSNBC show and a liberal guest on a Fox News show. There should be something here for you no matter where you are on the political spectrum. Now, how often have you seen the “ambush” guest use de-escalation/appeasement/justification conversational tactics and win? The answer is never, if/when it happens that will be front page news: “Noted [Insert Conservative or Liberal of choice] says, “You’re absolutely right.”

Let’s take another example home. If you are already familiar with de-escalation ask yourself how often you use it in a debate/argument with your spouse/boss/co-worker (insert your personal arguer of choice)? How often do you really, really keep your eyes on the appeasement prize? If we are honest with ourselves, we often (before we move to resolution) realize “Hmm, am I actually a wee bit of the problem here? If so, why do I keep on opening my big mouth?” Appeasement/de-escalation doesn’t happen because, we simians dig in on contentious matters, we seldom shift our opinions in the heat of the moment-we must calm before (if even then) we can see the other point of view. In short, we’re an aggressive species whether that aggression is violence, threat of violence, finger pointing political argument, or passive-aggressive gossip.

Now keep in mind these examples where we don’t exercise our de-escalation skills occur with no threat of violence. Imagine how much more heated a scenario we are talking about when we suggest “How about some de-escalation talk?” If we don’t see it manifest in less-threatening situations (i.e., we don’t drill it in daily life) what makes us think we will be calm and cool enough to utilize it and utilize it well when it hits the fan?

OK, let’s pretend you see my “If it doesn’t manifest in low-stress situations it ain’t gonna rear its head in high-stress” point. Is there something that we can do in its stead, something that gets closer to the true intent of the Flight F, and also actually allows us to drill in day-to-day scenarios to get the gist of the thing down? Yeah, I think so.

I’m going to reference a strategy used by comic/magician Penn Jillette of the Penn & Teller duo. It’s called “Never Complain.” He uses it in a cost-to-benefit, return-on-investment (ROI,) don’t waste your time in matters of free market choice. We’ll explore how he intends it being used and then we’ll add some “You can complain here” allowances, and then move it to the world of potential violence.

Penn means for the “never complain” axiom to apply to low-key disagreements in everyday life. For example, poor service in a restaurant-there is often a strong inclination to make your dissatisfaction known (I was formerly that guy). But let’s ponder the strategy of letting it be known you were not served how you expected to be served. In essence we are telling the server or the manager “Go back into the past and fix what has already occurred,” “Here’s how I would run your business/do your job,” or at most we complain in hopes of “getting something” for being the squeaky wheel which allows you the privilege to return to the environment that you did not enjoy and potentially risk a bit of extra-ingredient comeuppance introduced into your meal.

The “Never Complain” dictum states that instead of putting the time in, raising your own “fighting ire” you consider the poor service or meal as market information, you simply move on and try different establishments. In most matters domestic we have plenty of choices, plenty of outlets where we will be offered good meals, good service, good prices, what have you. I wager that this strategy will be tough for some of us out there where the urge to stick to your guns and “go to the top because nobody treats me this way” will be hard to overcome.

Enjoy your victory, enjoy your fight.

For others who are piqued by the strategy and might be asking yourselves, “but what if money is involved?” Well, then sure you may have a reason to fight that fight, but only if the amount in question will warrant the time and effort involved. For example, if upon arriving home from a department store you discover that you have been shortchanged a hundred bucks, you might wanna drive back out. If the amount is $1.75, you might want to ponder the gas and lost time and do some math.

The “never complain” strategy once fully embraced frees up a lot of time if you are a “get your due” sort. It also allows you to find businesses, environments, and folks that dovetail with your tastes better than trying to re-make the world into your own personal whim. It also supplies real world training for conflict management-in that in situations that do not warrant your time and attention you simply walk away. That’s mighty freeing, and perversely satisfying to see the person who wanted to argue over a parking space not sure how to process your shrug and walk on to the next good thing in your life.

“Never complain” in small matters trains us in flight from trivia in a way that bargaining, negotiating, and “winning” with poor service-providers never does.

“Never complain” also allows us to get our nervous systems, our egos a little used to the practice of “If it ain’t worth it, and I’ve got options I’m taking a hike.” I wager that this trivial real-world practice may serve us better than hypothetical classroom encounters where we all behave as if we’re amateur hostage negotiators.

In short: Treat violence like a fire-get low, get out, and leave it to the firefighters.

 

Reading the Signs, Part II – Garry Smith

Welcome back dear reader, remember how in the June issue I asked you to pretend you were a visitor from another planet, with no experience of human behaviour of any kind. I asked you to suspend ALL your values and beliefs for a few minutes and take a look around you and at you. To reflect upon what you saw. The idea was to adopt the position of anthropological strangeness,  so that you could try to see how you look to others you look, how others look, how they interact, what appears to govern those interactions, I hope you tried it.

It is a kind of out of body experience and if we try it we can begin to see our day to day behaviour, the vast majority of which we go through on a form of autopilot, from a whole new perspective. Let us go back to our Goths, either type, the symbolism in their dress, jewellery and artefacts tell us who they are, what tribe they belong to, we do not need to ask them, the symbols they display scream out the message loud and clear. Spike Milligan’s ‘Cockanees’ in his spoof anthropological expedition had their own artefacts and culture too, I share their love for the fish and chips.

We all belong to tribes, we all display our membership. The rituals of tribes are important for their identities too as are their belief system. Our intertwining biological and cultural evolution are the two key forces that have shaped our identities and the identities of the tribes we belong to. Our very languages separate us, within the same language groups regional differences and dialects do the same. In the UK, one small island, there are people who all speak English but who’s dialects make them uterley incomprehensible to one another. Received pronunciation, (the posh BBC voice), is uncommon, dialects are not. I love them, I like the different sounds, the different things they tell me about a person.

In the same way I love the different uniforms different tribes adopt, their badges, hairstyles, preferred music etc. It helps me read them like I read books. People very often do wear their heart on their sleeves so to speak. The express their personality, beliefs and even their sexualities through what they wear and how they wear it. Graffiti marks out a gangs turf,  a tattoo can mark out many things, piercings, flags and all manner of iconography blast out the message, here we are, this place is our place, I have a tribe, I belong, I am in the group and you are outside the group.

I am not sure what this says about me but I love a bit of crazy and Jayne, formerly, Wayne County and the Electric Chairs do it for me, musical break.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_ZzPSjdQhI

Yes I went punk in the late 70’s and that hit the anarchic spirit in me that added to the skinhead defiance already in me helped shape the me I am now. Throughout life we leave behind old tribes and join new ones, we migrate alone and sometimes with friends, its a complex life and we do it largely without effort. Of course there are those who are raised to a kind of cultural certainty for religious/ideological reasons who’s tribes erect such effective barriers that it is possible to remain insulated from outside influences from cradle to grave. I will return to a discussion on the sacred and the profane later. For now it is enough that we begin to recognise that we do live in the time of the tribes, The diversification of most societies that we see reflected most in the western world has brought with it a conservative fundamentalist backlash from societies far away and from sections of our own societies (I refer here principally to the USA and UK).

I read Left of Bang a while ago, iconography was rightly recognised as a key source of information. We process vast amounts of information daily, hourly, we are quite expert at sifting that information for the key pieces.  If we buy products they often come complete with universally understandable warning signs and symbols often accompanied by explanatory texts. When Mo Teague writes about the cowboy code we all understand the symbolism that was imbued in the white hat black hat movies of old. Now we will have different visual clues as to who is good and who is bad, politically correct clues probably, but clues nonetheless.

Last month I mentioned the symbolic importance of the black belt to many martial arts. Last Saturday one of my students pointed out I had the wrong belt on as I had a plain black belt, no red tabs to represent my dan grades (lets not go there yet), I pointed out that it was a nice new one and not faded like my old one. In the last week or so we have graded a number of students who have all now got new coloured belts as they edge towards the desired black one. We all know, whether we have trained in a martial art or not, that there is a mystique attached to the coveted black belt, a kudos that many aspire to and few achieve…….. Or am I just believing my own bullshit?

Well that debate aside the point of this article is to explore the central importance of the use of symbols to all of us, that and the fact that we all belong to multiple tribes, hold multiple identities and ranks and nearly always we actually know this, we just do not think about it consciously in the hurly burly noise of everyday life. Conscious reflection often gets drowned out in the increasing pace we live our lives, I think that is why I like to walk and cycle, to escape into the green that surrounds the city I live on the edge of. To find a space where the brain can switch off from doing all those things and in the pleasant tempo of exercise let it wander where it will. As this issue goes to publication I will be in Austria, up in the clean air of the Tyrol, recharging my batteries for a whole week. No martial arts, no self defence classes, no Gi and no black belt, no bag full of equipment and other props. I will be wearing the uniform of the walking class, the shorts, the boots and strolling around with my knapsack firmly on my back. I will meet others of this tribe and share pleasantries, we may not speak each others languages but we will recognise one another easily enough, the signs are all there if you care to read them.

Next month I will conclude this piece by examining the use of symbols in conflict, nothing raises passions like a good flag waving parade or a flag burning protest. Flags are pieces of coloured material imbued with incredible amounts of meaning, they go beyond expressing our membership of nation or state and deep into the personal identity of individuals, love them or hate them, flags are the most used and abused of our symbols, so until next month, Auf Wiedersehen.

Secrets of the Elite – Karl Thornton

The Intentional & Unintentional Murderer.

I am an undercover operative as well as trained in, and a trainer of, the physiology and psychology of violence. As well as trained in human behaviour and operational areas of the anti-human trafficking profession.

The information in this article is sensitive yet supplied to give the general public an idea of some of the training that goes into working undercover in the world of special operations personnel, in the area of Anti-Human trafficking. It is only a taste of what is involved. But I hope it sparks interest.

My specialist field is training personnel for high risk environments dealing in child trafficking. I have, and am still involved in intelligence and surveillance operations, as well as undertaking rescue operations globally. I also have the unique opportunity of training other operatives in this specialised field. Not to mention also training law enforcement officers in Anti-Human Trafficking.

Much of an undercover operatives work in our field is unarmed, so there is a high importance on unarmed self-preservation and self-protection skills.

Unarmed, we face the need to deal with individuals whom are armed as well as unarmed, and one of the main things we need to understand is the enemy. So when training in our type of undercover work, we need to be trained in many different areas. One area we need to be highly trained in, is RPD (Rapid Prime Decision) making, we need to minimise information in relation to how we asses a threat as quickly as possible, and how a threat sees us as a confirmed target for assassination or whatever their purpose, or mission is.

This article is about the process of training, where we deal with the possibility of dealing with, or applying lethal force. And part of the RPD making process.

So when we talk about “kill or be killed” in a real life situation, we train operatives in the physical hand to hand combat skills of undercover tactics including dealing with blown surveillance and blown intelligence missions, as well as physical response units where things go wrong. But equally important is training in the psychological side of understanding the possible enemy.

Part of our specialised training, looks at what we call “The Intentional & Unintentional Murderer”.

The following will explain the classifications, not the training process on how we identify the classifications.

First, we will look at what we call, the Intentional Murderer.

The Intentional Murderer, is the hardest to deal with. In this classification we look at individuals like assassins, hitmen, gang members (from criminal syndicates) and those who are intent on murder.

For this article we will use the term attacker.

In the majority of cases here, you won’t see the attacker coming, you will be ambushed and before you know it, its lights out permanently. This includes attacks with knives, firearms, blunt objects or even their bare hands, single and possible multiple attackers. Basically, this classification is taught to our operatives, where you won’t know it is coming, but still train in hand to hand combat for survival. If you can, as you cannot fight off a bullet to the back of the head. However, where there is still that slight opportunity for survival, we train in a system of combative tactics where there is no prior warning. Working on the physiological and psychological aspects of survival under ambush conditions. Even under conditions of what we classify “deceptive engagement” where one deceptive attacker will distract the operative, while his associate completes the physical attack. Basically where you are blindsided.

As this article could go on to become a novel, I am keeping it as brief as I can.

In an operatives’ world, all the OSA (Optimal Situational Awareness) in the world cannot protect you from a professional individual that has intentional murder on his agenda. I am not saying you cannot survive the Intentional Murdered, what I am stating, is even when the likelyhood of survival is next to zero, we still train for survival.

Now let’s look at the Unintentional Murderer.

The Unintentional Murderer is easier, if you can use that word, to train to survive against.

The Unintentional Murderer is classified under 4 subcategories. Remember in the world of special operations personnel, we need to train in OSA, RPD (Rapid Prime Decision) making, as well as other physiological and psychological skills for high risk environments. And keeping in mind, that the vast majority of missions require the operative to go into environments unarmed, with only his training and improvised weapons as his self-preservation and self-protection tools.

So in the area of RPD making and OSA, we teach behaviour analysis, and clusters of behaviour to assess a possible threat. But we also train in what we call “Forced human responses”, Natural defensive responses and deceptive tactics to deal with the Unintentional Murderer.

So why the term Unintentional Murderer?

The 4 subcategories are set to allow RPD making, and to respond. As the unintentional murderer is not intent on killing you. Not to say that isn’t the case all the time, as we can never give a 100% guarantee of an attacker’s intent, or what we call their outcome. However, we still have the 4 classifications to help identify the attacker’s objective, and how we can deal with them, as in this category murder is not considered the intent.

The 4 classifications are:

  1. Evade
  2. Escape
  3. Maim
  4. Gain

Once again, as this is an article and not a book, the following are brief descriptions of the 4 classifications.

Evade.
 This classification is based on the attacker that the operative may face, due to interrupting the attackers assignment or objective. Say for example, the operative finds himself in a situation where he has cornered the attacker and the attacker is going to try to evade capture, and is going to physically respond to evade capture. If they are armed, then they may use this weapon to evade capture. There may be a verbal situation where you have a chance to deceptively negotiate to gain control in a tactical manner, to physically defend yourself when possible.

So the reason it is still classified as “Unintentional Murderer”, is that in any physical and violent encounter with a weapon (or even without a weapon) there is still the possibility of you being killed during the process. The attacker (especially if not well trained) may use the weapon, let’s say in this case a knife, to lash out and slash or stab you to evade capture. Their intention may not be to kill, but simply to evade capture. Yet we know that any trauma caused by a knife or any weapon, could lead to death. We need to train the operative to know that, if a weapon is involved, you are most likely going to sustain trauma, train for the worst outcome, and fight for the best outcome.

There are so many examples that I could give, to cover the “Evade” classification, but the above example should give you an idea.

So now we look at the next classification, Escape.

Escape, is similar to evade, except we use this classification to look at if an individual has been captured, and will use whatever they have at their disposal to escape. Once again the individual trying to escape may be armed, and will use whatever weapon they are carrying to escape. If for example it is a knife, they will produce, and or use the knife to escape. Now, in this article I am not going into all the physical techniques and tactics used. I am simply giving you information on how we classify for, RPD making, how we assess intent based on behaviour and what we call clusters of behaviour. And how we use physiological and psychological training to deal with these potential killers. So similar to the evade classification. The individual’s intention may not be to kill, but simply escape. Yet we know that any physical encounter, in these high risk environments, could lead to death.

Now we will look at the classification, Maim.

Maim, is where the operative is faced with an attacker that is trying to warn the individual off. Simular to say, gang violence, or a turf war, where an individual will maim, as a warning to the rival gang member. Keeping in mind that the “Intentional and Unintentional Murderer” also relates to general street situations as well. But we will go into that in another article.

So as an example here. If the operatives cover has been blown, and the attacker has found out who the operative is, they may inflict harm, be it a beating or weapon related attack. For example, a gunshot wound to the leg as a warning and as a deterrent. There is still a possibility of dying from any related trauma. It may be minimal, but where any trauma is caused, there is always the possibility of death. There have been cases where an operative has been slashed as a warning, and still bled out and died. It was meant to be a warning, but turned out to be a fatality. Many of us have heard of what could be seen as basic and superficial wounds, which have led to death. We need to train, that any trauma could be fatal, so your survival on a psychological and physical level needs to be trained to deal with all levels of aggression, violence and the related trauma. Once again simular to the other classifications. The attackers’ intention may not be to kill, but simply inflicting trauma as a warning, could still end in death.

Finally we will look at the classification, Gain.

Gain is basically situations like armed robbery etc. The attacker will utilize what it is they have, be it a weapon or not, to gain what it is they require. So in an operatives’ world for example, where we deal in anti-child trafficking. The operative may have gained some valuable Intel, or in the case of a rescue operation, where say a child is involved. The attacker may use what is necessary to regain their asset (the child that makes them money). Or regain the Intel the operative has. So the attacker will use the weapon to achieve the result they require. Once again, they may use that weapon as a tool to gain what they need and once again the attackers’ intention may not be to kill, but simply inflicting trauma while regaining their asset. Can once again, still end in a fatality.

The above are a few examples. However, it gives you a brief understanding, of how we train our operatives to make decisions in high risk environments, and with minimal time to make those decisions. How they need to be trained in specific physiological and psychological areas to achieve their objectives.

Combative hand to hand combat skills are no less important. Our operatives, as am I, are trained in unarmed hand to hand combat, as well as the use of weapons from sharp edge weapons, firearms through to improvised weapons. Yet the world of covert operations and undercover work, is a world where the physical is only one aspect. There is much to learn about human behaviour, but not just what we call normal human behaviour. But learning about criminal intent, sociopathic and psychopathic behaviour, as well as instinctive and learnt behaviours. We need to train to be deceptive and yet objective.

I hope this article has sparked interest in the world of undercover operations in the area of anti-child trafficking…

 

….In the next issue, I will delve into another Secret of the Elite.

“Covertly engaging the enemy.” Looking at manipulating the proxemic push and forcing proxemic pull. Learning to deceptively manipulate behaviour.

 

Why Personal Safety Rules Simply Don’t Work – Gershon Ben Keron

Many people believe that personal safety is little more than formalized common sense, and that by following a few sensible rules it is possible to thwart the plans of those who intend to cause us harm. They will gladly accept the top 10 safety tips that some magazine posts, and nod as they read each one, without questioning the credentials of the author, and whether these “tips” are the result of a study, or even somebody’s experiences (and experience by its very nature is limited). As long as the advice given makes sense, then it of course must be true. Whenever I do personal safety seminars and training for beginners, I come up against these rules all the time.

New students might insist that you can tell when somebody’s lying to you because they look away, that if you’re talking on your mobile phone you’re safe because somebody knows where you are etc. Every predatory individual we are trying to protect ourselves from, knows these rules, and has a plan to navigate round them; the pedophile soccer coach who is taking your child to see a professional game, will look you squarely in the eye as they tell you that no harm will come to your kid, and the sexual assailant who is looking to rape you knows full well that they can commit their assault before the person on the other end of the phone can get to you, or get others to you, etc. Next time you read an article on personal safety (including this one) be aware that there is probably a predatory individual reading it as well, and arming themselves with the same knowledge, but for very different reasons.

Even the rules that we think we would never bend, that we believe we’d always adhere to, can be broken if we are dealing with a skilled social predator. If you asked every woman who had ever gotten into a car with a stranger, let a stranger into her home, etc. and been assaulted as a result, if beforehand she would do such a thing; I guarantee they’d emphatically say no. This is not to blame these individuals for their actions, but to illustrate that these predators understand the rules we work to, and know how to either get us to break them, or to think that they don’t apply in the context in which we are interacting with them. You might think you’d never get into a car with a stranger, and if you’re thinking of a situation where a driver pulls up next to you and asks you to get in, you’re probably right – however few predators will target adults in such a direct manner, and prefer to create a situation where you would “willingly” get into their car, maybe because it would be socially awkward not to.

Imagine that you have met someone on the internet, on a dating site, and have arranged to go out for a meal with them, and towards the end of the meal they say, “This has been a really great evening, I’ve not had so much fun in a long time, it would be a shame to end the night now. I know a great bar across town, why don’t we go and have a drink there?” Throughout the course of the meal with this charming and interesting guy (yes, that’s the profile of many predatory individuals), you’ve been hoping that he’d ask you on another date, and it seems that he just has. He’s got you to want what he wants; something that many predators will work towards. This includes the pedophile soccer coach who wants to take your child to see a professional game – you’d love to take them, however you simply don’t have the time to do so, but fortunately this guy does and wants to and because of this you are willing to bend a few rules that you wouldn’t think you’d be prepared to do – why should your child lose out on this experience?

Getting back to the date scenario – as you walk out to the parking lot/carpark to get your car to drive to this bar, and have a final drink, your date says, “Tell you what, let’s take my car. It’s not the easiest place to find, and I can be designated driver.” You want to go with them to the bar and it would be awkward to refuse the ride; after all, they might be offended if you’re insistent about taking your own car. It would be very easy to convince yourself that your rule doesn’t really apply in this situation; is your date really a stranger? They seem so nice, and you have already spent the better part of an evening with them, with no ill result. With this reasoning, you may well find yourself getting into a car with a stranger.

Personal Safety Rules, just don’t work. Skilled predators can quite easily get us to convince ourselves that they don’t apply to a particular situation. Also, the more times we break a rule, and there is no consequence to doing so, the less relevant that rule seems to be. Let’s say you move to a new house, and there are two ways to access it: one is a well-lit route, enjoying natural surveillance, whilst the other means you have to go down a dark alley – the advantage being that it takes you half the time to get to your house. Normally, you take the hit on the time and use the safer route but one day, because you’re in a hurry, you chance the dark alley. On this occasion nothing happens. You still prefer, and believe you’re safer using the other route, but you’ve broken your rule of, “don’t walk down dark alleyways” without suffering any consequences.

After several more occasions of breaking your rule, you conclude that the dark alleyway is actually safe, and it becomes your default route; and it is safe, until the time it isn’t, and that’s the time you get assaulted. Our society is generally safe, and that allows us to do unsafe things, a lot of the time without disastrous endings, and the more times we break the rules that we believe will keep us safe, the more we become convinced that the rule doesn’t apply to us or our/a particular situation.

There are also times when it may be in our best interest to break a rule. Imagine that you are walking home, and just before you get to the entrance to the dark alley (that you have yet never taken, because you favor the well-lit route back), you notice that a large scale fight has broken out on the street that you normally walk down. You now have a choice, you can go down the dark alley, or you can keep walking towards the street fight. In such a situation – although it may be somewhat contrived – it makes more sense to ignore your rule of not walking down dark alleyways, rather than to blindly stick to it. In this instance you will have ignored the rule, and made a dynamic risk assessment of the situation that you have found yourself in, and this is how we should deal with all our personal safety issues and concerns.

Rather than blindly following rules, we should seek to understand the situations that we find ourselves in, and understand the processes that violent predators use. Armed with this knowledge, we don’t need to rely on our flawed common sense and specific rules, for our personal safety. We can question why a single male in their mid 20’s is so interested in taking our child to a soccer match that we can’t, we can understand why our date is so insistent, and is working so hard to get us into their car. It takes effort to make risk assessments, and it’s not as simple as blindly following our common sense (a skilled predator will be able to make everything make sense to us), but it’s the only way of truly ensuring our safety. On the one hand, we are fortunate that the relative safety of our world allows us to get it wrong so many times when we follow our rules, without suffering any consequences, however this does not mean that we or our rules are right, or should be trusted.

When you make a dynamic risk assessment, you need to first consider whether you are facing a High Risk situation, or one that contains Unknown Risks. If you have to make a risk assessment, then you are not in a low risk situation, and thinking in terms of low risk, will only get you to drop your guard. If it is a high risk situation, how can you mitigate these risks? Could you go with your kid to the soccer match (personal safety does take effort) or take them to another one? If it’s somebody offering you a ride, assess your relationship to them – do you know how they will act and behave in this situation? If you’ve just met them, then the answer is definitely no. Forget the rules, and think about the risks.

 

Principle Based Teaching, Part II – Rory Miller

Part 2: Principles

I have heard, since the very beginning of my martial arts career, that there are a very small number of principles on which everything else is based. It always sounded good, until I asked exactly what those principles were. Usually I got a blank look or a fragment of philosophy: “Hit hard!” or, “Him down now!”

It sounds obvious, it is obvious, but you can’t teach from principles if you don’t know principles. And if your system is based on core principles, every instructor in your system should have an answer to the question, “What are your principles?” And, all of those instructors should have the same answer.

What is a principle? A principle is a law of physics or a property of physiology that makes your techniques work. As such, they are universal and apply to all styles and systems. Leverage, for example, is a universal principle. I personally identify something as a principle if:

It applies to striking, grappling and weapons

  • There are no exceptions

Leverage, for instance. In a sweep, the greater the distance between the high and low force, the less energy is required. Every lock has a lever arm that should be maximized. And sticks hit harder than hands because the lever arm is longer. And no exceptions. Perfect leverage won’t always get the job done– it would take a truly enormous lever and an impossible place to stand to move the world– but good leverage is always superior to poor leverage.

This articles is going to get a little interactive, so go grab a pen and some scratch paper. I’d like you to sit and think and write down a list of your principles before we go further. I’ll ask Garry to insert an advertisement about here so that you don’t scroll down too fast.

Got your list? Good. Now let’s talk about what isn’t a principle. You’ll probably wind up scratching some things off your list, and that’s fine. Because something isn’t a principle by my definition, doesn’t mean it isn’t important.

Things that aren’t principles, but show up on a bunch of lists are goals, strategies, tactics, techniques, concepts, and aphorisms.

“Don’t get hurt” for instance, is a goal. It isn’t a principle. Getting injured makes everything harder, so not getting hurt is a good goal, but it isn’t even a plan. It is the result of doing everything right and a lot of luck. Where you want to end up is a goal, but it doesn’t help you get there, so it isn’t a principle. It isn’t even a strategy or a tactic.

“Do damage” Is a strategy. It is the vague path to your goal. Again, desiring to do damage does not increase the efficiency of the damage dealing itself, so not a principle.

Counter-punching is a tactic. It can serve your goals and implement your strategy, but it doesn’t make things work better. Rather, it is one of the things you use principles to make better.

“Use the appropriate level of force for the situation” is a concept. It is a way to think that can be very important and can inform every aspect of training as well as fighting, but it is not a principle. Nothing in that statement makes the level you decide to use more efficient.

Aphorisms are little bits of wisdom such as “Hard to soft, soft to hard.” They are sound-bite sized pieces of principles that are not understood. “Hard to soft, soft to hard” is only sometimes true. A solid stick, which is hard, does more damage to exposed joints and bones than to muscle. The principle behind “Hard to soft, soft to hard” might be, “Choose a target appropriate to the weapon.” Does this hold true for striking, grappling and weapons? Are there exceptions? Is there any time where using the wrong tool for the job or applying a tool to the wrong target is a good idea? “Choose a target appropriate to the weapon” fits my definition of a principle.

Note here that aphorisms will be one of the clues to discovering your principles. Dig in deep and find what the underlying truth is.

Another thing to note: Training trivia, like, “You must turn your foot at 45 degrees in this technique” is almost always a clue to a principle. When a principle is not taught or not understood, trivia must be memorized to fill the gap. Once the principle is understood, the trivia becomes unnecessary because the reason becomes obvious. And the principle will also show the boundary when the situation changes and the trivia becomes untrue and ineffective.

Good? So power down the screen, pour yourself a cup of coffee or whatever, and take another stab at writing your list of principles. I will share mine at the end of this article, but it is imperative that you write yours first. Humans, like all animals are lazy. If you see a good enough list, part of your brain will turn off. If you see my list before you write yours, you will either turn off or, at best, your list will be polluted with my ideas. If, however, you see my list with a strong and complete list of your own, the ideas can cross-pollinate and become stronger. Don’t cheat yourself on this.

Rory’s list of principles:

 

  1. Leverage: the longer the lever arm, the more power you can apply.
  2. Structure: Using bone instead of muscle. Bone doesn’t get tired. Bones are levers. Use and understand your opponents skeleton and your own, offensively and defensively.
  3. Balance: Understand the elements of balance (Base and Center of Gravity) and how those elements apply to you, the threat and the combined four-legged animal you become when you make contact.
  4. 2-Way action: When possible, hit things from two directions: push and pull locks; crash and sweep takedowns; exercise and eat right to get fit.
  5. Gravity: Gravity doesn’t telegraph, it is stronger than you and you can’t accelerate at 32 ft/sec2. Whenever possible, use your weight instead of or in addition to your strength.
  6. Action/Reaction: He who moves first lands first. Take and keep the initiative.
  7. Gifts: Each of the Threat’s attacks comes with momentum you can exploit. The world is full of obstacles and weapons you can use. Learn to see.
  8. Space and Time: A big one and complex. This includes ranges, fighting against emptiness instead of force, creating and using deadzones to be safe in a fight, controlling pace, mentally altering your opponent’s perception of time and distance, creating freezes, feinting… this one is big.
  9. Line and Circle: The geometry of conflict. Linear and circular movements have different possibilities, power generations, strengths and weaknesses.
  10. Environment: Use everything around you, from terrain to the social attitudes of the audience. This has strategic, tactical and immediate applications.
  11. Targeting: Some places hurt more than others. Hit the one that hurts most.

There aren’t a large number of principles. I think if my understanding were deeper, the list above would be shorter, not longer. A future article will talk about how to apply the concepts to training. For now, it’s important that you have your list.

Fighting is complex, but it’s not complicated. Here’s what I mean. There’s a lot that goes into it– physics, physiology, social constructs, internal states of all parties involved– but the effective solutions tend to be simple. Physics in school can be hard and take a lot of math, but in the end there are only six simple machines and almost all work from variations of one principle, leverage.

And that’s why, as simple as training through principles can be, as quickly as students can make gains, it can still be a life long study. There is incredible depth available at this game. When I first learned of structure, it was simply a tool to keep energy from being lost. “All of your joints and muscles give,” I was told, “and when they give, that power is not going into the enemy. So hit with bone, not with muscle.” Like most young men, I couldn’t even tell structure from stiffness at that time.

Fast forward thirty years and in a short introduction to structure we still covered power conservation. But also power, unbalancing, bone slaving, void defense, vectors along bones versus angled against, structure disruption, resting in grappling, and structuring against a lock. All just structure.

And as cool as all that is, I know I’m barely scratching the surface.

 

One Little Word – Kathy Jackson

There’s a sentence I don’t like to hear people use in my classes. Actually, I hate it. Hate it so much that I used to stop them from saying it.

The sentence is, “I can’t.” I can’t hit the target from here. I can’t shoot as fast as you’re asking me to shoot. I can’t picture making the choice to defend myself. I can’t…

I can’t.

“You’re not allowed to say that in my class,” I’d tell them when they said it. “It’s not allowed.” I’d say it playfully, jokingly, in a friendly way, working for the laugh. And they would laugh. And we’d go on with the lesson.

But I came to realize that I was being profoundly disrespectful when I said that. Disrespecting my student, disrespecting their learning process, disrespecting their decision to be part of my class. Disrespecting my own skill as a teacher – and my own limitations.

It was profoundly disrespectful because they weren’t lying when they said they couldn’t do whatever-it-was. They were telling the truth.

They just weren’t telling all of it.

“I can’t” is an admission of failure. It hurts. And we hate to see our students hurt. That’s why I always wanted to flatly deny the place the students found themselves when they declared, “I can’t.” It’s a horrible place to be.

Here’s the shocking news:

By adding just one little word to that hateful sentence, we can their world upside down. And our own.

“I can’t do that” is an admission of failure.

“I can’t do that … yet” is a promise of victory.

Always add the yet.

 

Mental Models – Teja Van Wicklen

Wherever You Go, There You Are:

Mental Models and Emergency Management Skills

You are walking down a familiar block. You have lived in this area all your life, the buildings, lampposts and trees are as familiar as the inside of your house. You turn a corner and there is an immense park where your house and your friend’s houses used to be. You were only gone for twenty minutes so this reality isn’t possible. It’s like someone erased your world and put something else here. You stare, close your eyes, open them, try to reconcile the discrepancy. Your brain hangs in the space between what should be and what is. Then you start to panic….

In Deep Survival, Laurence Gonzales talks about Mental Models, an important element in understanding why some people, trained or not, survive emergencies while others don’t. Mental Models are short cuts the brain creates–maps of people, places and things we count on so we can make other more urgent decisions like, whether to cross the street against the light. Early in the book Gonzales talks about how mental models work, “You scour the house looking for your copy of Moby Dick and you remember it being a red paper back book but you don’t know where you left it. When you search, you don’t examine every item in the house, that would be tedious…”  He explains that your mental model of the red paper back allows you to screen out everything else, but that if you are wrong and it’s a blue hardcover, you may not find it even if the title is right in front of you. In other words, we get into trouble when our internal and external worlds don’t match. We say we are lost or confused when what we see or hear doesn’t make sense.  Gonzales argues that being lost is more a state of mind than a state of being. If you are at home wherever you are, you are never lost. The feeling of being lost creates anxiety and hinders both instinct and logical thought. Anxiety gives rise to panic and in an emergency, panic is often the last thing we feel. Being truly lost can feel a lot like suffocating. Substitute the absence of comfort and safety for being lost and you can see this discussion reverberating across many different types of circumstances. Think the end of a long and deeply ingrained relationship or the sudden loss of a child. It seems that older adults who adapt better to the loss of loved ones are documented as living longer. Of course there are lots of variables in these studies, but they make sense. If we spend too much time holding on to what used to be or grasping desperately for the comfort of the familiar, we have less energy to expend adapting to our new and urgent reality.

Quicker recognition and recovery from emotional shock in emergencies large and small may be an emergency management skill we can cultivate during the course of daily life. As with most issues, the first step is to recognize the problem-then to learn to arrest it’s forward momentum and redirect our energies. Easier said then done. Again, action follows recognition. Remember Colonel John Boyd’s OODA loop: Observe, Orient, Decide, Act.

Lots of things contribute to survival in tough situations–widely varying and appropriate experience, self-awareness, physical fortitude, humility, determination and will to live. But if you refuse to accept the situation that presently assails you, all your training and worldly experience may be for naught. This may at least partly explain the many instances in which the most unlikely people survive things like plane crashes where lifelong pilots and survival experts fail. Some people are just born with an empty cup and the ability to start from zero with few expectations.

In general, we don’t necessarily train to adapt to a great discrepancy between the multitude of things that are most likely to be and the thing that goes vastly wrong. The emotional space we have not mapped and are not in tuned with is vast and can exert a powerful effect on how much of our knowledge we are able tap into. Gonzales talks about a firefighter lost in the woods who doesn’t make a fire because he knows it’s forbidden in the park. He might have been found earlier if he had thought to break the rules. Sometimes the answers are right in front of our faces but our mental models blind us.

In martial arts, survival training, rock climbing, long distance swimming, indeed any extreme endeavor, we can only train for what we think will happen. And, there are many emergencies that can only be partially recreated for training purposes. The military is probably the most experienced in this capacity. Even so, we can’t effectively simulate a rape without it actually being rape. We can’t effectively simulate starvation for the same reason. We are consistently wrong in thinking we are training for the scenario that will occur in the future. Only part of our experience will apply. Adaptation to the unfamiliar is something to keep constantly in mind. The worst thing you can do is assume you are ready for anything. You are, in effect, creating a static mindset that will be your downfall. The more set you are in your overall sense of yourself and the world, the harsher it is when those two things fail you.

The stages of being physically or emotionally lost are apparently virtually identical to the Kubler-Ross stages of grief–denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Gonzales explains, “The research suggests five general stages in the process a person goes through when lost…. first you deny that you’re disoriented and press on with growing urgency, attempting to make your mental map fit what you see. In the next stage the urgency blossoms into a full-scale survival emergency. Clear thought becomes impossible and action becomes frantic, unproductive, even dangerous. In the third stage, usually following injury or exhaustion, you form a strategy for finding some place that matches your mental map. It is a misguided strategy for there is no such place now. You are lost. In the forth stage, you deteriorate both rationally and emotionally as the strategy fails to resolve the conflict. In the final stage as you run out of options and energy you must become resigned to your plight. Like it or not, you must make a new mental map of where you are. You must become Robinson Crusoe or you will die. To survive you must find yourself. Then it won’t matter where you are.”

 

Masculinity, Emotions and Violence – Sharmi Gowri-Krisyk

Have any of you heard the saying “Boys will be boys”? As a parent, I have been trying my best to guide my son (Dino-Lover, 10) from a very young age to always use an empathic, compassionate and respectful approach whilst dealing with others. No matter what. Even if it is just “for fun”. To try his best to be thoughtful of others and be mindful of the emotional and physical boundaries of others.

As a result, he does never hit back physically or put anyone down emotionally – including towards children who can behave in an unempathic or insensitive manner at times. On the other hand, this has often resulted him in being perceived as weak. There are negative consequences he faces as a result of this, e.g. children calling him “girl”,”baby” or “wimp”.

That often makes me reflect on this issue is not the behaviour of these children but what I hear the adults say in the aforementioned circumstances, e.g. “Boys will be boys”. I hear this over and over again. Is it even healthy and appropriate to normalise aggressive or inconsiderate behaviour? What messages are we sending to children? To the next generation of adults?

My son recently told me that there was a particular cartoon (movie name excluded) where one of the cartoon characters cries and then says to himself: “Real men don’t cry” and then stops crying. My son concluded: “Even children are brain-washed, through the cartoons they watch, to believe that expressing emotions is inappropriate for boys and men”

This makes me wonder if violence starts in childhood itself, especially the violence towards women. “For many young people, male aggression is expected and normalised, there is constant pressure among boys to behave in sexually aggressive ways, girls are routinely objectified, there is a sexual double standard, and girls are pressured to accommodate male ‘needs’ and desires,” says Dr Michael Flood, Senior Lecturer in Sociology at Wollongong University.

So why are ingrained community attitudes so important in male-on-female aggression? “Attitudes are crucial to shaping wider social norms and cultures,” says Dr Flood.

“Boys are taught in subtle ways to push past girls’ resistance, that women are good for only one thing. This is reinforced by the media and by pornography, which is easily accessible to young people, and treats sexuality as violent and violence as sexy.”

It is tragic that our society has unfair expectations towards males and labels them as unable to feel or connect to the same degree that females can. Empirical evidence show that there is not much of a difference between boys’ and girls’ capacity for empathy during their period of infancy (Suttie, 2015). However, according to neuroscientists the reason for the empathic skills of females being far advanced than males is not because of any differences in their ability but simply a result of environmental factors; for instance, findings show that some of these environmental factors are that females are being allowed to express their emotions and to identify and understand both their own and others’ emotions (Eliot, 2010).

This indicates how society shapes males into human beings that struggle to be authentic with both themselves and with others. According to the study by University professor Niobe Way (2013) teenage boys began to “internalize society’s masculine norms by equating close friendships with being gay, a girl, or immature.” It was also noted by her that boys’ levels of loneliness and depression began to increase during this time.  

We live in a culture of violence that promotes male aggression such as through movies, music videos, video games, toys, lyrics (Miedzian, 2002)  – and even recreational activities like sports involve subtle level of violence. “It is our culture that distorts both boys’ and girls’ natural capacity for empathy and emotionally intimate friendships. This is not a boy crisis but a human crisis of connection” (Way, 2013) – and one that negatively impacts our families, our schools, our communities, and our political and economic institutions. We, as a society has the responsibility to ensure that, whether boys or girls, we influence children in a positive way; having a positive impact on the socio-emotional development of the next generation.  Just because the majority do something, it doesn’t make it right. We need to be authentic and not blindly follow the crowd by falling into conformity. Instead, we could be critical thinkers with a vision that focuses on making a difference. Towards a better world; towards compassion, respect, kindness, peace and integrity.

Copyright © 2015 by Sharmi Gowri-Krisyk & Stepping Stones Psychology. All Rights Reserved

REFERENCE

  • Chu, J. (2014). When Boys Become Boys: Development, Relationships, and Masculinity. New York: NYU Press
  • Eliot, L. (2010). Pink Brain, Blue Brain: How Small Differences Grow Into Troublesome Gaps – And What We Can Do About It. Great Britain: Oneworld Publications.
  • Flood, M. (2015, February 15). Boys will be boys: does violence against women start in childhood? Retrieved from http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/parenting/boys-will-be-boys-does-violence-against-women-start-in-childhood/story-fnet08ui-1227237623130
  • Miedzian, M. (Ed.). (2002). Boys Will Be Boys: Breaking the Link Between Masculinity and Violence . New York:  Lantern Books.
  • Suttie, J. (2015, June 10). Is Morality Based on Emotions or Reason? Retrieved from

http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/topic/empathy

  • Way, N. (2013). Deep Secrets: Boys’ Friendships and the Crisis of Connection.  U.S.A: Harvard University Press.
  • Zakrzewski, V. (2014, December 1). Debunking the Myths about Boys and Emotions. Retrieved from http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/debunking_myths_boys_emotions

 

Becoming A Contact Professional – Tim Boehlert

I have been doing Hospital Campus security for 7 years. When I signed on, I immediately undertook a journey into darkness. I found out within a year that I was going to need all the help I could find elsewhere. To that end, I am not a professional Martial Artist in the strictest sense. I learn from the traditional and modern martial arts. I pick and choose those pieces that I know I can use, and I know that I can justify and defend in a court of law. I train and educate myself as too many have excuses not to do so.

For the last 6 years I have sought out a different type of education and a group of professionals that ‘have-been-there-and-done-that’ – a small group of talented trainers, educators, teachers. Not everyone that deals with violence in our profession can articulate or try to explain the what, why, how things. I trust ALL of the people in CRGI for that, as well as some other like-minded professionals from other ares of expertise – LEO, Corrections, Military trainers.

In this group I totally support and endorse Marc MacYoung, Rory Miller, Peyton Quinn. They were my first clue as to what was out there, and how I was going to deal with it successfully.

What I can bring to the table is dealing with violence in a health-care setting. The way I see it, I deal with the same people that Rory did during his career as a Corrections Officer, but from a different set of guidelines – no in-house training, no support, no weapons, no first-strike capabilities, no striking/kicking/chokes etc., no backup, no staff support most of the time, no real outline of rules, lots of cameras and lots of monday-morning-quarterbacking AFTER the fact. In short, not a job anyone in their right-mind would take knowing all of these limitations going in. Add to that starting out at 52 years old. Getting the picture now?

So, I can share a lot of stories and examples of things that I have experienced dealing with those people that live alternate lifestyles – drugs, alcohol, abuse etc. Dealing with the physical may be the easiest aspect of this type of job, dealing with the verbal aspect IS one of the hardest, yet most rewarding aspects.

Marc MacYoung once told me that I’d already shown him enough ability with the physical aspects of the job, and he recommended getting more training on the verbal aspect – great advice. To that end, and at the time he and Rory were pairing up on a new concept – Conflict Communications is what they were going to call it. It was going to be a traveling seminar road-show, maybe a book, maybe a DVD. CRGI is one end-result of those years of collaboration by two of the BEST minds in the business of violence.

I own almost every book that Marc has produced, but not too many of his DVD’s – most of his early work was only accessible via VHS tapes. At first, reading Marc’s output was challenging. Not because it was difficult to read, but it WAS difficult to read from a ‘normal’ perspective. I had no real introduction to violence previous to taking this job. I’d led a fairly safe life – due in part to being white, middle-class, and non-violent as my norm. We’ve all seen a lot of violence, particularly of late, but in our previous adult years and teenage high-school years as well. What we were particularly not aware of though was REAL violence. The kind of violence that the mere mention of gives us concern. We don’t want to hear about it, know about, and especially see it or experience it.

Marc started to open that dark cellar door for me. SO, reading his stuff WAS difficult. Not knowing him personally, and reading how cavalier some of his thoughts were WAS disturbing to me. Kind of like sidling up next to a group of bikers – you WANT to hear some of it, but hope they won’t notice you’re eaves-dropping in on them. That’s what my first couple of Marc’s books felt like. “What kind of guy DOES this shit, and then writes about it? How’d he get away with THAT?” Well, that’s how it started. Marc admittedly came from a rough up-bringing, turned his life around, and then chose to educate others that could appreciate, learn from, and stay safe based on his lessons. Thank you Marc.

Rory I found probably through Marc, or maybe Loren Christensen – I cant recall specifically. I am immediately drawn to Rory because of what he does or did. He was working with the safe ‘clientele’ that I was, with the main exception being that he was in a prison setting. Without hesitation, I recommend him to all LEO, or Security professionals because his experience is directly related to what I do. Marc’s is as well, just form a different perspective. Rory was writing a blog at the time I ‘found’ him. Large parts of that blog became the first e-books that I purchased – Chiron Training. After reading the very first volume I was hooked. Here was I guy that I totally ‘got.’ I can’t tell you why in so many words, but he ‘spoke to me.’

In one of his blog/e-book entries Rory describes a ‘typical’ day on his unit. He was asked to respond to an inmate that was acting out in his holding cell. Rory headed a CERT team, and his job was to move this individual after subduing him using whatever level of force was necessary. The inmate had already made preparations for the soon-to-happen assault by unusual means. Rory’s team was prepped, kept just out of sight while he chose to offer an alternate solution before breaching the cell. In a moment of genius (and Rory really is a very deep thinker) he chose to keep the team out of sight, but ready to perform a cell extraction by overwhelming force. He pulled up a folding chair about 6 feet from the cell door, and simply sat down, crossed his arms, and waited… NOW, go find that story and learn from it what I learned. What happens next is sure to change your world like it did mine – if it doesn’t, your either in the wrong job, or you already possessed that knowledge and foresight, which frankly I find hard to believe. Thank you Rory.

Peyton Quinn – another of the unknowns. He is a character every bit as much as Marc is. THEY are two of the originators of what this group has been assembled because of. Violence. I have known Peyton for about as long, and did find him through my connection with Marc. Another book. Suffice it to say that Peyton is as unique as any of these commanders of violence. Peyton is also a Martial Artist, a rogue of a man with a huge heart, and some really intense depth of knowledge as well. He’s an educator, a writer, and he knows his stuff as well. He’s also willing to pass this stuff on. About four years ago I had the pleasure of working on a few projects with Peyton. Specifically a book that he was writing at the time about Musashi’s Five Rings. Peyton asked me to read it, and help him out with some editing, which I did out of respect, friendship, and admiration. Thank you Peyton.

There are many others here that have helped me along the way, and I am very thankful for all of those contributors as well. What I do is not unique, but you’ll be hard pressed to find anyone talking about let alone teaching what it takes to get out unscathed. I can only say that in 7 years, I have been assaulted more, hospitalized more, hurt more both physically and verbally, than in my entire previous life. Without the support of these proponents and educators, without their output, their advice, their willingness to share the ugly, I wouldn’t be writing anything remotely like this at all. I’d either have quit a long time back, been injured and beyond repair OR worse. It’s not an easy job, not just anyone can do it either – even if you are physically able to – and most of the young ones are that at least, it takes a LOT of maturity, it takes a lot of drive, it takes a lot of deflective capability to do this job to serve your community, and your fellow man. You have to do this job because you care, not because it pays well – it’s not even worth it for that alone. I do it to make a difference, to feel better as a human being, and because someone has to deal with people in crisis, period.

If you’re up to it, do the research UP FRONT. If you can get through several of the steps necessary to educate yourself, and still thin positively about it, MAYBE you’re the right person. MAYBE.

Conflict Resolution in Families – Vivek Patel

The way we communicate with our children, both in good times and difficult times, sets up a pattern that will follow them most of their lives. So it is in our best interest to communicate with them and deal with conflict in the most effective way possible. Effective both in how we resolve the conflict in the moment, as well as the long term effects that we are creating.

The environment that a child is immersed in as they grow and develop profoundly affects the way they see the world. It informs them about what their place in society is, and how they deserve to be treated by others.

When a moment of conflict occurs between you and your child it can be a source of pain, stress and distancing between the two of you. Or it can be an opportunity for teaching, growth and actually bringing you closer together.

#1 – Re-defining the Role of the Parent

The way it goes is largely dependent upon the perception you have of your role as a parent. It is so easy to get caught up in the day-to-day stresses of life and forget we are responsible for creating a foundation for our children to be successful and happy as they grow into adults.

Controlling and modifying their behaviour is not the main goal in parenting. That is an old school idea that was created when children were supposed to be “seen and not heard”. Kids were property; they were not generally seen as precious little humans. Let alone brilliant spiritual beings.

This created an authoritative model of parenting where the kids had to obey the parent, be quiet, act respectful and not get in the way. They certainly didn’t have an equal voice in the family.

Re-defining the role of the parent as a guide, an educator, a foundation builder and a source of inspiration brings a whole new view to the family dynamic and by extension on how to deal with conflicts.

If You Don’t Control Them, They’ll Control You

The common view on how to deal with an argument is that as the parent you have to win this argument or at least not allow your child to control you.

If they win the argument, or if you soften your position and allow them to dominate then they will get the idea that they can control you anytime they want. Be firm, be consistent and make sure they know who is in charge.

I profoundly disagree with this perspective.

Your Family Is a Community

The way we structure family should be after our ideal concept of community.

Do you feel like you have a concept of an ideal community?

Well I highly advise it. It is something worth thinking about because it forces you to create a philosophy of how you want to live with yourself and other people. If you can work at creating the conditions in your family that match the concept of your ideal community then you will soon find amazing transformation happening in your home.

You will find a greater joy and harmony in your family than you ever imagined.

And it won’t be an accident, it won’t be because your individual personalities just happened to get along. It will be because of the work you and your family do in order to coexist in harmony and in the upliftment of each other.

Conflict Resolution Is Vital To Community

Part of any really solid community is their ability to deal with conflict.

Conflict, disagreement and arguments can lead to growth or it can lead to destruction.

When two people have a disagreement, the way they deal with that disagreement makes a huge difference in their relationship. It also affects everyone else in the community.

Even when we have a disagreement about something as small as doing dishes or the arrangement of furniture in your bedroom or picking up your socks from the floor, it’s not really about those things.

There are always deeper levels to each issue.

There are always things under the surface that make situations difficult.

If we pay attention to them and work with them intelligently,

they can also make situations glorious!

Looking Beneath the Surface

The thing is how much attention do we pay to what is going on beneath the surface of things?

This is really where we must focus our attention if we want to learn to deal with conflicts with our kids and in our families effectively.

It may not be natural for us to always be looking under the surface when we are dealing with people. And yet this is a vital skill to develop. For when we are dealing with the surface we can only have an effect upon the surface. But if we look to the core, we can affect the core.

And this is one of the key elements in effective and long-lasting conflict resolution.

To get at the core of things.

If we keep practicing looking deeper we can make it a habit.

When this happens you will no longer be instantly affected by impending conflict with your kids. You will see the issues that are brewing and address them with love. This will often stop a conflict before it has time to begin.

#2 – Laying a Foundation

One of the things I am suggesting is to create an environment conducive to peaceful conflict resolution from the beginning. This will cause you to have minimal conflict in your family, and be prepared to deal with it well when it does occur. This work is done before any arguments even happen.

In fact it is often the work you do together between any moments of conflict that sets up how things go when conflict does arise. I would call this laying down a foundation.

A Communication Foundation

A Relational Foundation

A Practical Foundation

Once these different foundations are laid, when a difficult time does come around there is something in place to deal with it, to buffer it.

Create a Love Buffer

In chemistry a buffer is a solution that resists change when an acid is poured into it. If you pour hydrochloric acid into water it becomes very acidic. If you pour hydrochloric acid into a buffer solution the buffer absorbs the acid, not allowing it to make the water acidic. When the acid is poured in, it does have an immediate effect, but the buffer soon absorbs it and the long term effect is very small.

Creating a buffer in your family is much the same thing. If you have a consistent habit of treating each other well, building trust, listening and respecting each other and if your kids feel real confidence in you then you have created a Buffer. When  the acid of conflict is poured into the solution of your family, this buffer of love you have will absorb it and it will have very little long term effect.

This means that you cannot take any moment for granted because every interaction you have is affecting how you will deal with difficult situations in the future. Paying deep attention becomes standard operating procedure.

#3 – Building Trust

So far we have looked at re-defining the role of the parent. Seeing conflict as an opportunity for learning, growth and the enhancement of your relationship with your kid.

We have looked at creating an atmosphere of respect, communication, trust and love with each other in your normal interactions, day to day. Setting a foundation for dealing with conflict when it does occur.

Another aspect of dealing with conflict in the family is building trust. I know I mentioned it earlier as part of creating the foundation, but it’s so important that it needs its own section.

Believing in the good intentions of the other makes a huge difference to how open we are to resolving a conflict. Most kids and teenagers that I know do not inherently trust their parents to have good intentions. It takes a lot of work to make this a reality.

Traditional Parenting Does Not Inspire Trust From Our Kids

This should not come as a surprise to you if you think about it at all. If you spend a lot of time with somebody and you feel that there is a good chance they will block your desires or that they will try to control your decisions, your actions and your freedom, it is hard to really trust their intentions.

So when faced with this person telling you they want to resolve the conflict

it’s very likely the average teenager will instead think:

“They want to talk to me so they can get their way.”

“They want to talk to me so that I will see that I’m wrong.”

“They want to talk to me so that they can express their disapproval.”

or on the more extreme end

“They want to give me a consequence or punishment.”

But regardless of how extreme or how gentle is the control, the control is the point. The kid who experiences this, and most of us went through that ourselves, loses a certain trust in their parents intentions. And to be honest this lack of trust isn’t completely unfounded.

Becoming Trustable Is a Priority

So one of the major pieces of work we have to do is to live our lives in such a way that we are very trustable to our kids. We want to create a condition so that when we say we want to resolve a conflict their response is,

“Oh that means I’m going to be okay.”

We want them to feel that when you say you’re going to resolve a conflict that they know they will feel uplifted by that experience, that they can trust you to take their needs into account being as important, if not more important than your own.

How different this is from the traditional expression of conflict in the family. If they can trust you with these things they can relax into the process of conflict resolution. They can relax in the process of developing relationship with you. They can relax even into their own negative feelings so that they don’t explode, but have a healthy and safe place to be expressed.

When we can acknowledge and feel safe with our feelings that’s when we can really get into the heart of conflict.

Create An Atmosphere Of Trust

It is up to the parents to create that atmosphere of trust for their kids.Our kids naturally want to trust us and they want to be trustable. It’s us that have learned manipulation as survival method over the years.

Then we pass that on to our kids…

“Thank you very much for the gift mom and dad. I appreciate it!”

Let Go of Manipulation and Control

The only way not to pass along the idea of manipulation to our kids is to not manipulate our kids. That doesn’t sound like a very complicated concept and yet you would think I was speaking a foreign language a lot of the time when I share this idea with other people.

It seems really insane to people to share responsibility, to share authority, to share ownership and to share respect with their kids. Sharing respect means it has to be earned (by you) not expected.

Expected respect is no respect at all.

How Trustable Can You Be?

So that’s number 3 – being trustable. Proving that you’re trustable. Demonstrating that you are trustable over and over and over. Demonstrate it in the most difficult of situations and the most tense moments.

When your own emotions are boiling over, ready to explode can you demonstrate how trustable you are to your child? Can you rise above the very things that are trying to control you and have been all your life? They were implanted into you when you were a child and now the wounds of your own childhood are inhibiting you from being open, free and trusting with your own child.

Parenting is a Hero’s Journey

It is like a hero’s journey. Honestly parenting is a hero’s journey because we have to overcome all of our history to be fully present, accepting, open and loving with our children now.

#4 – Relational Well-Being

We have been talking about being trustable. We will now look at the wider implications of that.

Being trustable is one aspect of the larger concept of relational well-being.

Relational well-being is caring for the health of your relationship between you and your child. Of course we care about our relationship in general, but we don’t always base our decisions on how it will affect that relationship.

We are more likely to base them on behaviours, manners, rules and (if we’re honest) our own emotional response.

And yet the way we relate to our kids, the love, respect, safety and freedom, as well as the trust we develop, affects how open they will be to our guidance and influence. This means making the relationship between you and your child a major priority in your parenting decisions.

Look For Every Opportunity To Deepen Your Relationship

When you have a priority of developing your relationship with your kid then a lot of things that we’re used to doing have to change. The key is to make all your day to day interactions relationship focused rather than task or obedience focused.

For example, saying no to your kids on a regular basis is damaging to your relationship. Every time we say no to our kids it pushes them just a little farther away. It lets them know that we believe we have authority over them. As parents we can get so used to saying no that it becomes a habit.

If we can monitor how often we say no, and only say it when it’s really necessary then our kids feel we really support and accept them. The more we create an atmosphere of YES the more they will feel our respect rather than our authority.

An Attitude Of Authority Creates Distance Between You

How can one have a free and open relationship with somebody who has authority over them? There are always going to be bits of ourselves held back. I realize that in life there we always keep pieces of ourselves from others, but in the closest relationships there is lot less held back. I believe this is a desirable state to have with your kids, that they feel they can really be themselves with you.

So I encourage you to start to make a habit out of saying yes. I have written an article about the difficulties and benefits of saying yes. I recommend when you finish this article popping over there and reading that one on my blog because a lot of questions about saying yes are answered in that article.

But generally I want to encourage you to look for all the times that you can say yes to your kid that aren’t going to kill you or them. There’s always a reason to say no, but if we resist the temptation we can bring a transformation to our families.

I’ll give you a really good example:

Your kid comes to you and says “I don’t want to brush my teeth tonight, is that okay?”

How can you reasonably say yes to something like that?

They have to take care of their teeth. It has to become a habit. If we say yes then two days and three days and five days will go by and they won’t brush their teeth. It’s going to cost me money if anything happens to their teeth. So there are lots of good reasons to say no.

When we put our relationship with our children as a priority, the difficulty is all those other reasons have to become a secondary priority. All of them.

This is what I mean when I say it is very difficult.

If your kid comes to you and says I don’t want to brush my teeth and anything else is a priority before your relationship you can say “No you gotta brush your teeth.”

Your Response Changes When Your Focus In On Relationship

But if your focus, your priority is on your relationship then you need to say “Yes, it’s okay.”

Because they’re asking for autonomy over their own bodies.

They are asking for you to trust them and to believe in their decisions.

And if you say “NO, you don’t have autonomy over your body. NO, you don’t have that freedom and you don’t have my trust.” then there is significant damage done to how they view you and how free they can be with you.

When I was a kid there were times I didn’t want to brush my teeth and my parents always made me. So just stop asking them. I would go to the bathroom and fake brush. I knew they would check up on me so I would wet my tooth brush and smear toothpaste on my mouth so I would smell of it. And I didn’t brush my teeth. There were times weeks would go by and I wouldn’t brush my teeth.

Freedom Teaches Lessons And Creates Responsibility

It would have been better to have given autonomy over my body and at the same time taught me about the importance of brushing my teeth. Include acknowledging and accepting that there are times I didn’t want to brush my teeth, I wouldn’t have gone weeks without brushing my teeth. I would have missed the occasional day.

It is because I never learned those lessons, because I didn’t develop the ability to self-monitor, and because I was rebelling against the imposition on my freedom that caused me to not brush my teeth for so long.

True freedom, true independence and true respect can only be created in an atmosphere of freedom. So look for all the ways you can create this atmosphere of freedom in your family.

One of the primary ways is to become yes focused. When you are looking for ways to say yes and opportunities to say yes then your mindset changes, their mind set changes and the whole energy in your family will change.

Just to be clear, because it always comes up when I talk about saying yes, it’s a good thing to say no when your child is about to eat poison, run into a busy street, touch a hot stove or any number of Danger situations. It’s also sometimes necessary to say no when unavoidable scheduling issues arise. Like you have to get to work or you’ll lose your job.

It’s just that these moments are in the vast minority of our total interactions.

The rest of the time there are so many opportunities to say yes.

I hope these ideas will be helpful to you.

I honestly suggest trying them, even if they’re very different from how you already parent.

Try them for a short while and see if any results come.

Conscious Conflict Resolution Brings A Family Together

Wouldn’t it be lovely to reduce the amount of arguments that you have?

Wouldn’t it be lovely if moments of conflict brought you closer to your kids?

Wouldn’t be lovely to be best friends with your kids and they respected you and trusted your wisdom? That sounds like a pretty damn good combination to me.

I invite you to come and read more about these kinds of positive, involved, life skills and relationship building ideas that I call conscious parenting on my blog. I am sure you can find something meaningful to you. www.meaningfulideas.com

I wish you all the best on your parenting journey.