Practice Until You Can’t Do It Wrong

3 min readJan 12, 2022

You’ve just attended a basic self defense class. Now what?

In your class, you probably learned a stance or two, some movement techniques and some simple strikes or kicks. Maybe you learned some methods to break away from someone that has grabbed you.

And now you’re ready to defend yourself.

But will you still be ready a month from now, or 6 months, or a year?

Like most skills in life, self defense skills are perishable. To keep them fresh, you must use them. And that means practicing.

You need to be able to use those skills in an actual attack… when you’re scared and your heart rate has just doubled…when your breathing is rapid and your fingers and brain are numb.

Skills needed for basic self defense are based on natural instinctive movement. And they involve mainly large muscle groups (gross motor skills, not fine or complex motor skills).

These types of skills are easy to learn and easy to practice, with or without a partner. Granted, having a training partner is always a benefit, but you can still practice them on your own.

One Way is by using Visualization

Visualization has been shown to enhance physical skills even without any physical movement.

For example, pretend that you are walking down the street. Then visualize attacks from different “attackers.” Practice using your skills on the imaginary attacker. Make sure you “see and hear” the attacker coming at you. Then react to the specific attack using your newly developed skills.

Standing in line at the grocery store? Imagine the person behind you as an attacker and then visualize how you would react to defend yourself.

Spend time physically practicing as well.

Practice the tactics and techniques you learned in your class. Having a partner would be great, but you can still practice them on your own.

Think how much more you can benefit if you use visualization while physically practicing the movement of an attack/defense.

Related Post: Get a Grip for Self Defense

Do you carry a (non-firearm) weapon?

I also recommend that you practice with whatever weapons (pepper spray, kubuton, pen and flashlight, for example) you may carry.

Spend some time practicing retrieving your weapon from where you carry it to being ready to use it.

To increase efficiency, make sure that you carry it in the same place every time. That way, you will only need to practice one method of deploying your weapon.

Inert spray containers can be used to practice using pepper spray. Or you can use real pepper spray. In either case, take it outside.

So how much practice is enough?

How much is enough to maintain or build your skill and confidence?

Honestly, that varies for each person and for the quality of the instruction you received in your basic self defense class.

But if you practice 10 to 15 minutes, three to five days a week, you will not only maintain your skills but also the necessary mindset to be successful during a real, personal (and scary) attack.

Practice your newly learned skills this week, next week, the week after that, and the week after that. In other words, regularly.

Don’t practice until you can do it right. Practice until you can’t do it wrong! And then practice it again.

For the cost of a little time (1/2 to 1 hour a week), you can gain the ability and mindset to survive a dynamic violent attack.

And aren’t you worth it?

Stay safe…

Dave

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