Paris is a Bitch

deterrence. If he is rash and acts at this point anyway, the inner layers of your security — locked and armored vehicle; defensive driving tactics; presence of a bodyguard; access to a firearm; again, most of all, preparing yourself mentally and emotionally for danger and possible violence — all have time to come into play.
    Other examples: if you needed fast cash, where would you look to rob someone? Maybe on the potential victim’s way from an ATM? If so, what kind of ATM would you pick? Where would you wait? What if you wanted to steal a car? Assuming you’re not a pro who can pick locks and hot-wire ignitions, where would you go? Maybe outside a video store, or a dry cleaner’s, a place where people leave the keys in the ignition because they’ll “only be gone for a minute”? Now, armed with a better understanding of the criminal’s goals and tactics, how should you behave to better protect yourself?
    One common element you might see in all of this is the vital need for alertness, for situational awareness. Understanding where threats are likely to come from and how they are likely to materialize will help you properly tune your alertness. If you are not properly alert to a threat, you almost certainly will be unable to defend yourself against it when it materializes.
    Notice that so far the discussion has included no mention of martial arts. This is because martial arts, self-defense, fighting, and combat, while related subjects, are not identical. The relationship and differences among these areas is outside the scope of this article; for more information, check the suggestions for further reading below, especially www.nononsenseselfdefense.com . For now, suffice it to say that martial arts can be thought of as an inner layer of self-defense. If you have to use your martial arts moves, then almost certainly some outer layer of your security has been breached and you are in a worse position than you would have been had the outer layers held fast.
    To put it another way:
    Thinking like the opposition; taking threats seriously and not being in denial about their existence; and maintaining proper situational awareness, are infinitely more cost effective for self-defense than is training in martial arts.
    Note that I have been doing martial arts of one kind or another since I was a teenager. I love the martial arts for many reasons. I do not dispute and am not discussing their
value
, but rather am emphasizing their
cost-effectiveness
in achieving a given objective — here, effective personal protection. No matter what her martial arts skills, the person who recognizes in advance and can therefore steer clear of an ambush has a much better chance of surviving it than does the person who wanders into the ambush and then has to fight her way out.
    So practice thinking like the opposition, and you’ll have a better chance of lasting as long as John Rain.
    I am indebted for much of what appears in this article particularly to the wisdom and experience of Marc MacYoung and www.nononsenseselfdefense.com . There is much more to this subject; this article is only a start. To learn more, I suggest:
    Gavin de Becker,
The Gift of Fear
, www.gdbinc.com/home.cfm
    Marc MacYoung,
Cheap Shots, Ambushes, and Other Lessons
www.nononsenseselfdefense.org
    Peyton Quinn,
A Bouncer’s Guide to Barroom Brawling
    If you’re interested in going deeper into the mechanics and psychology of violence, then:
    Tony Blauer’s tapes and courses, www.tonyblauer.com
    Alain Burrese, Hard-Won Wisdom from the School of Hard Knocks, www.burrese.com
    Loren Christensen’s books and videos, www.lwcbooks.com
    Marc MacYoung’s books and videos, www.nononsenseselfdefense.com
    Peyton Quinn,
Real Fighting
, www.rmcat.com
    If you want to go beyond self-defense and into the realm of combat and killing, then:
    Dave Grossman,
On Killing
and
On Combat
www.killology.com

Fiction
    Hard Rain
    Rain Storm
    Killing Rain
    The Last Assassin
    Requiem For An Assassin
    Fault Line
    Inside Out
    The Lost Coast
    Paris Is A Bitch
    The Detachment (Coming soon)
    Non-fiction
    The Ass Is A Poor Receptacle For The Head: Why Democrats Suck At Communication, And How They Could Improve
    Ebooks and Self-Publishing: A Conversation Between Authors Barry Eisler and Joe Konrath

Copyright © 2011 by Barry Eisler. All rights reserved.
    This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.