The "one" thing to seperate good entangled skills instructors from silly ones

[SouthNarc]

Well I sure do hope someone surpasses my body of work at some point. That's just evolution.

When I first started publicly teaching this content in 2003 no one was traveling around and teaching this topic area in the way that I approached it. Namely having Glock simunition pistols which were only available to LE at the time and using the marking cartridges outside of the manufacturer's recommended safety window for stand off.

No one else had the equipment, was willing to use it the way I was using it, and was willing to travel around teaching citizens and not just cops or soldiers. Nobody wanted to incur the risk or liability.

I had a a LONG time, where I was the only person occupying that space.

Now there are more people doing what I started doing with the same kind of equipment. I would hope that they would continue to evolve the art in different ways and with different approaches. I've said for some time now that if entangled shooting doctrine is going to evolve as a legitimate field of study it should have all kinds of eyes on it including those that disagree with me.

That being said just because a guy does BJJ, buys T guns, let's guys roll around in the dirt, and hangs out a shingle doesn't mean he's my peer. There are guys like that now that say "Yeah I do what Craig does." They don't have my time, tenure, investment, curriculum development, eye for safety, or time management skills. A video on Instagram of two guys punching each other in the face is not a program of instruction with a consistent and cogent beginning, middle, and end. Also ECQC is a lot more than just the physical training and curriculum. The aspects of verbal agility, social literacy, and decision making are interwoven through out the physical instruction and the course literally represents my 54 years of life experience on the planet.

So absolutely. Go see what others do and take their coursework. They may very well have a piece that I don't and personally I'll NEVER be satisfied that ShivWorks is complete. I ask myself more often than ever if I'm actually full of shit and know what I'm talking about.

[runcible]

Responding in brief, ref: pressure testing;

I opine that any system must be judged both by whether it works on both those who know the "rules" and those who do not. Indicators for additional scrutiny may include when something works on one's training partner (e.g. dependent upon a conditioned response) but does not work on an uneducated stranger or when something only works on an uneducated stranger (e.g. dependent upon an unconditioned response) but not with one's recurrent training partner.

There's deeper dive implied about people consciously or unconsciously "honoring" someone else's techniques outside of the technical training modality, and by that potentially validating the techniques and their execution to a degree greater than is perhaps warranted. There's a whole realm of possible reasons: etiquette, the habits of technical training, and the intention of kindness. An example of that being in organizational FOF training where peer\coworker roleplayers drop like sacks of potatoes upon the first impact of a sim, or rush through the phases of compliance prior to specific commands being given.

(Which isn't to say that the lattermost example doesn't happen while out-and-about, but when it does it provides the sort of information that I think that I should be paying a little more attention to. Like... dude, we're not there yet, but we're still talking right now. We'll get to the point that you've clearly been at a few times in a moment.)

[Mister X]

Well I sure do hope someone surpasses my body of work at some point. That's just evolution.

When I first started publicly teaching this content in 2003 no one was traveling around and teaching this topic area in the way that I approached it. Namely having Glock simunition pistols which were only available to LE at the time and using the marking cartridges outside of the manufacturer's recommended safety window for stand off.

No one else had the equipment, was willing to use it the way I was using it, and was willing to travel around teaching citizens and not just cops or soldiers. Nobody wanted to incur the risk or liability.

I had a a LONG time, where I was the only person occupying that space.

Now there are more people doing what I started doing with the same kind of equipment. I would hope that they would continue to evolve the art in different ways and with different approaches. I've said for some time now that if entangled shooting doctrine is going to evolve as a legitimate field of study it should have all kinds of eyes on it including those that disagree with me.

That being said just because a guy does BJJ, buys T guns, let's guys roll around in the dirt, and hangs out a shingle doesn't mean he's my peer. There are guys like that now that say "Yeah I do what Craig does." They don't have my time, tenure, investment, curriculum development, eye for safety, or time management skills. A video on Instagram of two guys punching each other in the face is not a program of instruction with a consistent and cogent beginning, middle, and end. Also ECQC is a lot more than just the physical training and curriculum. The aspects of verbal agility, social literacy, and decision making are interwoven through out the physical instruction and the course literally represents my 54 years of life experience on the planet.

So absolutely. Go see what others do and take their coursework. They may very well have a piece that I don't and personally I'll NEVER be satisfied that ShivWorks is complete. I ask myself more often than ever if I'm actually full of shit and know what I'm talking about.

Well said.

A comprehensive approach is often severely lacking. If personal defense is truly the primary goal(I think it can often be something else motivating undertaking training), the physical techniques are only part of the equation. My focus was always mainly on the actual physical methods with everything else brushed over, but as a middle age man with a family, true security and safety is now actually the priority.

I’ve had a couple of recent incidents of individuals(a homeless man with a cane sword and another on a bike looking for a ride to the next town over) walking up on my wife and I. The way I handled them was inspired by your MUC material that I’m familiar with through videos and articles. Regardless, it worked very well in both instances.

And looking back at 50 years old, in my youth, I often relied on my physicality to make points regarding the effectiveness of my methodology if it was ever questioned. And I don’t recall really ever being called out on it. Someone athletically gifted can get away with doing things wrong and they themselves nor anyone else may not even realize it.

One of the national coaches pointed out to me at 19 years old some problems with my footwork. Despite what I was doing being effective even against the then current US team members, he said it just wouldn’t hold up against international competition. He showed me better ways, which no doubt were better in all circumstances. That lesson applies equally to learning effective self-defense as well.