How Should the Proper Martial Arts and Self Defense Training Look Like? The Biggest Mistakes

Proper training is everything. Especially in martial arts and self defense. You just need to be sure that you can count on the moves and techniques you have learned. Like in any other sports, if you are not doing things correctly, you will most likely fail. In martial arts and self defense, you can not afford to fail, especially when fighting on the street and for more, when fighting for your or someone else's life.

Your training is the key and you have to make it the best you can.

So what are the most overlooked things in training martial arts and self defense systems?

1. You Never Actually Mean To Really Hit Your Sparing Partner

What you actually are taught to do, especially in martial arts, is that you repeat some scenario technique after your sensei. You hit, he dodges and throws you on the ground. That sounds nice but it misses the point of reality.

The most common experience is that you lead your punching hand to the place where it should be dodged. You don't even aim on the guy before you. You are just trying to reach the invisible point where your fist, or whatever it is, connects with your sparing's dodging technique and you leave the rest on him, so he can do the technique right and you won't mess it up... but it is messed up already.

In martial arts and mostly in real self defense you have to learn, that in training you must ACT LIKE IN THE REAL EXACT SITUATION - only in slow motion.

Your first intention must be to HIT! If your sparring mess the dodging technique, he'll get hit. Not very hard, but he will learn from it anyway. This way you both will get some added value from your training. You throw real punches and he encounters almost real feeling of failure if he fails to dodge.

Just understand that you all need to learn how it looks like in a real fight and if you won't be able to throw real punch on your training lesson... how would you like to punch someone for real? YOU WON'T EVEN KNOW HOW THE REAL PUNCH LOOKS LIKE!

Athletes can have another chance to show their skills if they fail to manage their training properly.. but when it comes to martial arts and self defense (especially when fighting on the street)...you may not be so lucky.

2. Lack Of Body Conditioning

Another great problem of Martial arts guys and gals is that they do not train their body and do not make it ready for the action. If you are serious about your self defense skills, and you should be if you are taking courses of real self defense, you must spend time conditioning your body so you won't get hurt and make the body harden - especially the parts you are hitting with.

Condition your knuckles, your elbows, shins... you name it. Just make sure you are ready for the hit, because an action always causes a reaction. Make sure you won't break your arm while punching your assailant in his face.

Hit some hard stuff and slowly increase the power until the pain is unbearable. After that just put your hands to hot water and make them relax.

You should also condition the areas you may get hit to. Like your jaws, ribs, stomach... make your body parts strong and used to the pain. This way it won't hurt that much when it is for real.

3. Shadow "Dancing"

I can understand when someone in martial arts or self defense, who is competing in Kata performance does these shadow moves and hits. He needs to get better and better and make it look nice and fancy. Or when you practice your speed with weights. Then it is all OK.

But what I can not and I will never understand is why the rest of people involved in martial arts or even the real self defense do that? If you want to perform good strike, you have to HIT SOMETHING! You have to have a target to aim at and you have to feel the thing you are hitting.

If you will do shadow training, you may get all the fancy nice looking move, but you will be useless on the battlefield. You can move like a dancer - but you will get beaten like a dog!

That's no self defense. That's learning how to get ripped off in a nice fancy way.

Go get some good old MAKIWARA or a HEAVY BAG, SPEED BAG... anything you can hit and feel.

Hope it helped you a little and gave you the idea of proper Martial arts and Self Defense training.

I hope you understand a little bit by now.

And that is far from what you can actually know about street fight and real self defense. There is much more you can learn.