The Reality of Assault -- Living Hero

Add caption

Here is a blog post from, Chris Feldt, a good friend of mine and a member of the 100. and UBBT. This article is a reminder of the important work that we, as martial artist, self-defense experts and educators are involved in (or should be involved in).

The Reality of Assault - Living Hero (by Chris Feldt)

Last week, I was having lunch in the honor's dorm on the campus of the University of South Carolina. I had just finished teaching my beginner karate class and figured I would share a brief visit with my son who is a sophomore there.

While waiting for my son, one of the cafeteria workers asked if I was an instructor at USC, and I replied yes, as I was wearing my gi.

She wanted to know if I thought it was possible for her to learn self defense.? Of course I said yes, but I could tell there was more to the question?

After chatting with her a couple of minutes, she bravely shared with me that she was assaulted 10 years ago and was still dealing with the psychological trauma it caused.

She was attacked from behind and drugged with a narcotic that made her pass out. She was kidnapped and assaulted for nearly 3 weeks in the basement of the attacker's house. She even showed me some of the scars on her arm where he cut her and threatened to kill her if she resisted.

My understanding is, the only reason she survived, is a woman who lived next store to this horrible man, heard whimpering one day and thought one of her cats was in distress, only to discover, that it was a human being that was making that noise. The man was arrested and sent to prison.

Fast forward nearly 10 years and she is still struggling with what happened to her. While she does not remember much of the physical torture, she is very fearful and has a distinct lack of trust for men and strangers. Thankfully, she is getting treatment with a psychologist to help her address these issue.

After telling her how sorry I was for what had happened, I invited her to my next self defense workshop (which happens to be this week) but asked her to speak to her psychologist first to make sure it was a good idea (if she was ready) for her to do this. If that was not good for her, I asked her to see if there were a group of women from the cafeteria that might be interested in learning self defense and I would come back and give them a private workshop.

I am sharing this with you for two reasons:

1. There are many women (and men) that are out there, just ready to be a victim of assault! In my experience, the average person has no clue, not only in how to defend themselves, but they lack simple knowledge in awareness and body language or how to use their voice.

When I first joined The 100 and UBBT, Coach Tom encouraged me to offer the free workshops and train as many women as possible. For me, there is something quite liberating when you do this work from the heart without looking for something in return (money). And if in the end, I helped even just one woman avoid the kind of assault this woman experienced, well, that would really be GOOD work!

2. I wanted to share this story with you because I have selected this woman as one of my living heroes for this year! Imagine, walking up to a stranger (a man) and having the courage to talk to me and share her story after what happened to her? Truthfully, I don't think I have half the "guts" that she has!

I know there are many women like her, that lead a life of courage, grace and dignity after something so horrible like this happens.

Remarkable!

Yes?

"Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and frogiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing. Use the pain as fuel, as a reminder of your strength." August Wilson

If you would like to see the great (and useful) comments on this article from other martial arts experts, Ph.D's, and education activist, go HERE.

This blog post is a part of The Ultimate Black Belt Test (www.ultimateblackbelttest.com), an undertaking of The 100 (www.the100.us), and a part of Samurai Karate Studio (www.samuraikaratestudio.net) and The Dream 100. (www.thedream100.com)