How to Save Your Own Life and Embrace Your Inner Badass
The following is adapted from 100 Deadly Skills: COMBAT EDITION by Clint Emerson.
That smartphone in your pocket isn’t going to save you from an unexpected left hook or a weapon you didn’t see coming. In volatile times, self-reliance and education are key.
While the first two volumes in the 100 Deadly Skills series prepared readers for a range of situational threats, the combat edition focuses on close-range encounters requiring hand-to-hand engagement or the use of defensive weaponry. To prepare you for a variety of unique dangers, the hundred deadly skills you’re about to encounter have been adapted from a variety of sources — the world of special operations and long-range snipers, along with a shadow realm of badass fighters populated by ninjutsu practitioners and outlaw bikers. The arsenal of weaponry is equally diverse, covering everything from a handgun to the improvised use of a hammer, wrench, or cane. You’ll even learn how to use environmental features, such as doorframes and curbs, to your advantage and your opponent’s detriment.
Borrowing communications protocol from the author’s military background, each skill is broken down into its most critical parts using what’s known as a “warning order,” or WARNO. The components include:
- Situation: A concise statement of the scenario and your goal — this is the “Who, What, Where, When, and Why.”
- Mission: An overhead view of the skill you’re about to learn.
- Execution: A breakdown of the steps you’ll need to take to execute the skill.
- Service and Support: Everything you need to know about gear and training.
- Command and Control: The remaining steps for gaining control over the situation. (In a military context, this part of the WARNO provides essential chain-of-command information.)
To illustrate WARNO, I will use the example of a skill called SPEAR: Spontaneous Protection (startle flinch) Enabling Accelerated Response (loading toward danger)
Situation: Fight or flight is the body’s survival response to a perceived threat or danger. During this reaction, hormones like adrenaline and cortisol are released, increasing heart rate, slowing digestion, shunting blood flow to major muscle groups, and changing various nervous system functions, giving the body a burst of energy and strength. A split second before hormones are released, the startle flinch engages to protect the brain and body. We all physically react somewhat the same when startled. Our hands fire up to protect our head, we widen our stance, we bend at the knees bracing for impact, sounds get louder, and our vision gets narrower. Embracing these physical response characteristics and directing them toward danger sets us up to survive, regardless of stimuli.
Mission: Use your startle flinch as a bridge to engage danger.
Execution: Upon confrontation, and especially when caught off guard, your nonviolent posture should adapt slightly to the threat. Move your strong side to the rear with a slight step to adopt a more solid sport stance. Your fingers are slightly curled and splayed wide open, and your elbows are outside of ninety degrees to act as both a spear and a shield. Your weight is distributed evenly on both legs and you anchor to the ground through the balls of your feet. There are three types of flinches: primal covering of your head, pushing away danger, and oblique, as you turn to the side with your chin tucked in and cover your head. Then, as you are now in an ideal position to engage, keep the fingers splayed, thumbs and index fingers touching to form a SPEAR, and drive your hands toward the danger while changing the elevation and the angle of your counterattack.
Service and Support: To simulate your survival response when training, practice getting your hands up and into position, followed by shifting to a strong sport stance, facing toward your opponent.
Command and Control: Maintain space or create it. Keeping your arms outside ninety degrees will allow you to maintain the space between yourself and your adversary. However, if your elbows are less than ninety degrees, it will be easier for your adversary to pull you in and reduce the space, and will potentially give him an unwanted advantage.
To learn more about effective methods of self-defense, 100 Deadly Skills: COMBAT EDITION is available on Amazon.
Clint Emerson, retired Navy SEAL, spent twenty years conducting special ops all over the world while attached to SEAL Team Three, the National Security Agency (NSA), and a Special Mission Unit.
