Krav Maga Self-Defense Rocks! If I Can Do It, So Can You!

This past Saturday I took a Krav Maga self-defense workshop after seeing an ad in The Washington Citypaper for a free workshop. If you aren’t familiar with the technique, the KravMagaDC.com website describes it as “the self-defense and fighting system of the Israeli Defense Forces ... based on instinctive movements that are quickly learned and easily remembered." If you've ever watched NCIS and seen Cote de Pablo's character Ziva David kick ass, you have a good idea of what the technique is like.

It's been over 10 years since I took a self defense class, so I was nervous going in, but my nerves subsided a little when I got to the studio and saw that there were more women waiting to take the class than there was men, many of which looked as nervous as I felt. The workshop consisted of about six drills, that I did with my partner Bob.

The first drill was relatively easy, so I was feeling pretty confident, but then came a drill that required Bob and I practice punches with a large pad called a tombstone, which we held at our chests while the other punched as hard as they could. The impact of Bob's punches at first knocked me off balance. But once an instructor showed me how to hold the tombstone to gain better control, the impact of the punches weren't so bad. I got through the rest of the drills without having to use my asthma inhaler and I realized that I had a lot more endurance than I thought.

Along with my newfound confidence I learned two really important things. The first was how to hold my head while blocking punches. I was told to keep my head down, not up, in order to avoid getting my eyes or nose hit. The second thing was how to grab someone’s shoulders when trying to hit them in the groin. I instinctively wanted to put one hand on each of my partners shoulders, but learned that it's better to put two hands on an attacker's shoulder, then kick.

What I liked most was that the things I learned actually made sense and didn't feel unnatural, unlike some of the dance moves I learned in my dance classes in college. I also liked that the instructors would come over and tell me what I was doing well, in addition to telling me what I needed to improve on.

I came out of the class feeling empowered, like I could do anything! While that was probably the endorphins kicking in, I still signed up for two more classes, the first of which I will take this Thursday. I'm still nervous about if this is something I can do well, but the only way to know is to do it, so I'm just going to give it my best shot.

I'm reminded of how a good friend who I was just getting to know at the time once told a fellow church member who wanted someone to do AIDS prevention outreach to "get April to do it. She's not afraid of anything." I remember looking at her wanting to say "Are you smoking crack? I'm afraid of EVERYTHING. I just do it anyway."

So that's what I'm doing with this Krav Maga thing. I'm scared that I might fail at it, but I'm going to do it anyway. If I fall down, I fall down. And then I'll just get back up, and in the words of Tupac Shakur I'll "stand tall and come back for more."