The Smallest Part Of The Problem

Most people are trained for the smallest part of the problem.

If violence is roughly 60% psychological, 25% emotional and only 15% physica, then most Self Defence systems are built upside down. They spend the majority of their time on the smallest slice, and then sell it as if it covers the whole threat.

That’s not just ineffective, it’s dangerous, because in the real world, violence is rarely about who has the better technique. It’s about mindset, perception, emotional control and decision making long before a punch ever lands.

The psychological side of violence is where conflict actually begins. This includes, threat recognition, situational awareness, ego management, stress response, decision making under pressure and reading intent and behavioural cues. Most systems barely touch this, or they reduce it to a few throwaway lines at the start of class. Yet psychology determines whether someone sees the threat early or late, whether they escalate or disengage, whether they freeze or act or whether they become a target in the first place.

A perfect punch means nothing if you didn’t see the threat pattern forming ten minutes before. A perfect block means nothing if you misread intent and stood in the wrong place.

Physical skill is reactive, psychology is preventative.

The emotional component of violence is the fuel. Most violent incidents aren’t tactical.

They’re emotional collapses. Pride, shame, fear, anger, humiliation, jealousy, these don’t just influence violence. They ignite it, but here’s the problem. Most traditional Self Defence systems ignore emotional control completely, or worse, they feed the wrong emotions. They build ego instead of managing it, they glorify dominance instead of awareness, and they create artificial confidence instead of emotional stability The result? Students learn techniques but don’t learn about themselves. So, when a real situation happens, the person isn’t overwhelmed by the attacker, they’re overwhelmed by their own internal state.

No system that ignores emotional management is preparing people for reality. It’s just selling choreography.

Most combatives and Self Defence systems focus almost entirely on physical mechanics because they’re easy to sell and easy to demonstrate. Physical techniques look impressive, can be drilled and measured, are visually convincing and create fast results in training environments, but they exist in controlled conditions, predictable attacks, compliant partners, clear signals, known distance and a safe environment. Real violence doesn’t give you any of that. In reality distance is wrong and timing is off. You’re mentally overloaded, your hands are occupied, your adrenaline is uncontrolled, your awareness is late and your judgement is clouded.

A system that lives in dojo conditions while claiming “street realism” isn’t selling protection, it’s selling comfort.

A system isn’t dangerous because it teaches physical skills. It becomes dangerous when it pretends physical skills are enough.

Many systems aren’t worth the money because they overpromise, they create false confidence, they train performance, not survival, they replace awareness with technique and they sell fear, then sell the solution.

If a system doesn’t prioritise Awareness training, emotional control, verbal de-escalation, boundary setting, environment reading, decision making, stress exposure and threat avoidance as a minimum, then it is not teaching Self Protection. It’s teaching movement, and movement without context doesn’t protect you. It just makes you feel protected.

Now here’s the uncomfortable truth.

People don’t like hearing this because physical training feels productive. Sweat feels like progress and techniques feel like solutions, but most real world violence could be avoided or defused long before it ever becomes physical.

Systems that truly operate in reality understand this: They train the mind before the body, they train awareness before action and they train emotional control before conflict. Anything else is just selling a smaller part of a much bigger problem, and when you’re talking about something as serious as personal safety, a system that trains only 15% of the problem doesn’t just fail…

it misleads.