Welcome to Episode #125 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “Killer Instinct.”
Speed, power, and flexibility are all important, yes… but here’s the truth–
They’re not enough!
When it comes to surviving a real-life attack (or even just winning a tournament), you need killer instinct! You need to release your full fighting spirit! But here’s the problem…
Most of us are “too nice”. Even though the essence of martial arts is a study of death, most of us would rather not train in such an extreme mindset. Unfortunately, that is exactly what makes good people vulnerable!
So, let’s take a stroll back into the jungle and see if we can rekindle some of our primal power… before we get eaten alive!
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How to Train Your Killer Instinct
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TRANSCRIPT
Howdy! Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. Welcome to episode #125 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.
Yes, I’m back. After a six-month hiatus–I didn’t plan it, it just happened– I’m back. But I’m even more thrilled that you stopped by to say hello. So welcome back to you too. Let’s go!
What’s that? Oh, the sweater. Do you like that? I’ll explain that in a minute.
But let’s start off today’s show talking about frustration. My frustration. Years and years of frustration. Why?
Because I kept getting beat. No matter how hard I trained, no matter how much I studied, I feel that I was losing to people who trained far less than I did. People who took it far less seriously than I did.
And I would go to my teachers after class in the dark shadows. And I would confess this. I would say, Listen, I’m working really hard here, but I’m getting beat. Everybody’s beating me. New people are beating me. Something’s wrong.
And they were always very supportive. They’d say, No, no, you’re doing great. You’re a good student. But maybe you’re just being too nice.
Too nice.
I would argue with them. I would say, No, no, you don’t understand. In my head, I’m not being nice at all.
Of course, I’m a nice person, so I’m training with safety and respect. But I really am trying to win a lot of the time. I have an ego. I have a temper. I have a competitive spirit. So I’m not giving anybody anything once the action starts.
So, I would come back to the conclusion that I just need to practice harder. And practicing harder meant focusing on technical attributes. And it still wouldn’t be enough.
Another six months would go by. Another year would go by. I would come back to my teacher and say, I’m still getting beat. Something’s wrong.
And again, they would say, Maybe you’re just being too nice. I would say, No, I’m not being nice. And the cycle would continue over and over, for lo, these many years.
So what really is the issue? What has been the problem for me, personally, which perhaps you can relate to? I believe it all came down to one thing.
Killer instinct.
I have figured out– maybe it took way too long– that developing a killer instinct is a skill of its own.
You can focus all you want on speed and power, flexibility and mobility, pain tolerance, sensitivity. You can study as many books as you want, talk to as many teachers as you want to. Flow like water. None of it matters if you don’t have killer instinct to back it up.
If you can’t finish a fight, then you’re finished.
This is what I figured out. Now, that brings us to the sweater. Check out this sweater. This is getting me in the spirit of killer instinct. What do we got here?
It’s a big cat, a panther, a predator, a meat eater. In the wild, clearly, you must have a killer instinct. Either you eat or you die. And that’s whether you eat a plant, kill a plant, or kill a fellow animal. It’s eat or be eaten.
Now, in the last podcast, #124, the topic was to stop pulling your punches. And I argued six months ago that we need to push ourselves in training, to go to 100%. And I’m saying that wasn’t even deep enough. The language there wasn’t deep enough.
In the last six months, I’ve only come to a doubling down on this theme. We must release our fighting spirit in its most primal execution, most primal expression.
To be clear, the martial arts are all about death. You’re either training to stop someone from taking your life or you’re developing the capability to take someone else’s life to survive.
You may not think of every self-defense scenario as a life or death situation, but the point of training is to take it that far.
The bad news is, most of us are nice people, and we can’t, won’t, or don’t want to imagine these extremes. To think about the death aspect of martial arts. And that has revealed to me that the killer instinct is not actually in everyone.
Maybe you were born with a killer instinct, but then you were raised out of it. You were taught to be polite, and patient, and civilized. To play by the rules, to not cause a fuss. And now, even if you were born with it, that instinct is gone.
Or I think more likely, you weren’t even born with an instinct to kill. Some are, but I think many aren’t. I don’t think I was. Yes, we have a primal drive to survive, but that doesn’t mean we have a primal drive to kill to survive.
As a result, violence is shocking. Either violence perpetrated against us or seeing violence come out of us when necessary. A secondary effect of not having a killer instinct is that you may actually judge violence as barbaric. Something beneath you. Something you would never resort to. Even when it’s the only tool left.
So that’s the disadvantage here. Bad guys will do whatever they want. They’ve released their fighting spirit. They still have a killer instinct, or have developed their killer instinct, to take what they want from you, including your life. And if a bad guy is willing to use 100% of the tools available to them, but you’re not, then you’re at a disadvantage. You’ll be too slow to react, or you won’t react when you need to. That’s a problem.
Let’s recognize that having a killer instinct allows you 100% of the tools available to you as a human being. And as a self-defense student, a martial arts student, you should have 100% of all the tools necessary.
Now the good news…
The good news is the killer instinct– and let’s just stop even using that word. Because like I said, either it can be trained out of you, so it’s no longer an instinct, or maybe you weren’t born with it at all. So, perhaps we should talk about this more as a killer mindset.
A killer mindset as a separate skill can be trained.
It’s an odd thing, but the toughest guys I know, and I’ve talked to a couple of them on this podcast, they insist that they were not born with a killer instinct. They’ve said, no, quite the contrary. They had to develop it because they had to, they needed to.
Because of the way they were raised, their neighborhood, their family dynamics, they felt they had to develop a killer mindset to survive. And I would say, so should you. So should I.
And even if right now, you’re not 100% comfortable with it, and even if you never achieve a 100% expression of a killer mindset, I believe every percentage point you can add to your personality will be of benefit to you.
So what’s the big problem here?
Not just civilization, not just your past and how you were raised, not just the fact that you weren’t born with a killer instinct. You were smart enough to seek out martial arts training. But the problem is many martial arts schools– I would never say all of them, I hesitate to say most of them, but let’s just safely say many of them– presume you do have a killer instinct.
So, most of the class time and the curriculum is spent teaching techniques, teaching you drills, teaching you all of the other attributes that are important, but aren’t necessarily the deal breaker, the scales-tipper.
So you will get faster and stronger, you will get tougher, but if you still don’t have the fuel of a killer instinct, a killer mindset, all that’s going to fall apart. I would say it’s almost worthless. That’s been my experience.
You can train for years and be a very sincere student, and hide the fact that you don’t have a killer mindset. You can excel at your drills, be the best student in the class, and still lack a killer mindset.
And it would be tragic if you didn’t reveal that to yourself until a real-life situation that calls for you to be a killer comes up and you fail. That would be tragic.
And by the way, we’re talking about a martial arts class where you are presumably safe. Even if you’re in a hardcore school, and you’re practicing MMA, or boxing, or Muay Thai, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, there are still rules to protect you. It’s still supposed to be a safe training environment. And even in tournaments, they’re supposed to be safe with rules and referees.
So, if you can’t play the part of a killer, even in a safe context, even with rules and supervision, then what makes you think you’re going to have a killer mindset when it’s for real and there are no rules and there are no referees?
The martial arts class is our first chance to really exercise the killer mindset while we can do it safely and then, hopefully, expand upon that to bring it out into our real lives. So we don’t want to miss that opportunity in our training.
Speaking of training, how do you train? Is there a killer mindset at play? I would say there are four modes of training in the martial arts.
Four Modes of Training
The first mode is oblivious. You’re just going through the motions. You don’t have any particular training goals. You show up, you do what they say.
You’re not really learning on purpose. It’s kind of just happening as it happens once in a while.
You’re not in a teaching mindset. You’re not in a learning mindset. You’re not even really in a fighting mindset. You’re just kind of oblivious. You just show up, do what you’re told, and go home, and that’s it.
Second mode you could be in is a teacher mode. That’s when you have some skills and perhaps your training partners are less skilled than you. So you purposely give them some room to work, to play.
You set up positions where little problems for them to solve, to figure out how to survive on their own. And that’s very giving of you, senior student type of stuff.
Third mode you could be in is student mode. That’s when you are purposely trying to learn something. You did come in with a list of goals, micro goals, macro goals, whatever they may be.
You are paying attention to what’s going on. You’re experimenting, you’re playing around, and you are charting your progress.
The fourth mode would be the fighting mode. That’s when– the heck with coaching, the heck with learning– I’m trying to win. Whatever the objective is here right now, for me it’s just I’m winning.
Whether I’m training for self-defense or training for a tournament, I’m just trying to finish this fight on top. So, that will be the fourth mode.
So, oblivious mode, teacher mode, student mode, and fighting mode. Which one are you? Which mindset do you find yourself in most often?
How should you be training? Which mode should you be in?
I’m going to give you a warning. If you are in mode number one, two, or three– oblivious, teacher, or student mode– and your partners are in fighting mode, then you are always at risk of losing or getting hurt.
They’re coming on strong. They’re not focused on safety, maybe, and respect. They’re just trying to beat you. And in that mindset, anything goes. So you have to be very careful with people like that.
My advice to you here would be to always presume that your partner is in fighting mode.
I don’t care how long you’ve known them. I don’t care if it’s a kid. And I don’t care what the scenario is. Always presume that they’re about to lose it, be erratic, be reckless, do something unexpected, and hurt you.
It’s much safer to have that attitude when you approach a partner than any other. I’ve been clocked so many times unexpectedly by people I never thought would hit me, simply because I underestimated what mode they were in.
Oh, I thought we were both in learning mode right now. I didn’t realize you were suddenly going to freak out and try to kill me.
I’m sure that’s happened to you too. Of course, by training in that mode, that also prepares us better for real life.
You’re approached on the street, you’re looking at people and evaluating them in a crowd or in your home, I’m just going to presume that if trouble starts, you’re looking for the worst here. You’re going to accelerate this really fast, and I need to be ahead of that. As a trained martial artist, I need to get there before you do.
Whatever action that may be– leaving, speaking, setting boundaries, pushing away– whatever your action is, I need to be ahead of it.
Now, for you, in your training, if I’m always expecting my partner to be in mode four, fighting mode, does that mean that I should always be in fighting mode? Should I always have my killer mindset turned on?
No. No, and the reason is if you’re always in fighting mode, then you’re not learning. And you’re also not giving your partner a chance to learn anything with you. Not on purpose anyway.
You’re not steering them where you want them. They learn how to take a beating and that’s helpful sometimes, but you get the point, it’s only happening as an aside. It wasn’t on purpose. And as a senior student or teacher, you like to guide your students and lower class people to a safe place to learn things.
3 Tips for Building a Killer Mindset
Number one would be to mix up your modes. Mix it up. Of course, you’re going to have an advantage if you’re sparring and rolling to be looking for that finish and stay in fighting mode. However, that’s a very limited way to practice.
When you do that, you’re more than likely just going to stick to a few moves that always work for you. You’re going to stick to your favorite moves all the time.
That’s okay if it’s self-defense, because maybe the person you’re fighting, you don’t know and you’re only going to fight this person one time. So, whatever your favorite move is, great– deploy it and I hope that worked out for you.
But in training, when you see the same people over and over again, you become very predictable. Everybody knows your favorite moves, and once they know your favorite moves, if they’re any good, they’ll take them away from you. And if you just keep trying over and over again to do that favorite move and force it down their throats, it’s not going to work anymore.
So you’ve got to get out of mode four, fighting mode, and come back to student mode. You’ve got to come back to experimenting, putting yourself in bad positions on purpose to solve different problems different ways.
So that would be my tip. Don’t stay in fighting mode all the time. Go in and out of it.
Try to win. If you get a win, then come back to learning mode. Try to learn something new. If your favorite moves aren’t working, stop. Come back to learning mode, student mode, and find some new tricks. Then try them out in fighting mode again.
Basically, any mode except for oblivious mode is what I would recommend. Just don’t show up and go through the motions and not pay attention and go home with nothing on your mind. There should always be something to mark your progress one way or the other.
So number one tip, mix up your modes.
Tip number two, when you do slip into your killer mindset, fighting mindset, fight to finish. Go all the way. Go for the hit. Go for the choke. Go for the tap. Go for that takedown.
You need to exercise the feeling of finishing. This is the skill that I’m talking about. It’s a separate skill. Speed, power, flexibility, great attributes. New attribute, I think that trumps all the others– can you finish?
Do you feel comfortable finishing? Can you go after them? Can you dominate? Is that a problem for you?
If you can’t dominate your partner in a friendly, safe practice session, why do you think you’re gonna dominate an unfriendly attacker in a real-life, life or death situation?
I’m gonna say you can’t. Use the class as a stepping stone to real life. Go as close as you can without hurting your partners to exercising the feeling of totally dominating the other person. That’s how it’s done.
And by the way, this is good for your partners too. I’ve talked about that before. Nobody comes to class wanting to learn how to defend against a weak kick, a slow punch, or a non-threat. For them to build confidence and for your partners to build skill, you need to bring them a real problem to solve.
That means you bring them your best, which is why slipping into your fighting mode and turning on your killer mindset here and there, is good for them. It’s necessary for you, it’s necessary for them if we’re all gonna be our best.
Just to back up for a second, at no time am I suggesting that we should be bloodthirsty in our martial arts training.
We are not after all wild animals. We are trained animals. Animals still have a killer mindset. We just figure out when to deploy it and when not to deploy it. And I believe with training, we learn that there are situations where other people may deploy it, the killer mindset, where we don’t need to, because we have control.
That’s what the training is for. Control the bad guy. Once you get control, then you have choices. Then you can say, I’m going to let you go. I’m going to talk you down. I’m just going to injure you and get out of here. Or if need be, I’m going to end your life. But you don’t get to make those choices, unless you have controlled your attacker.
So how do you get that control? You’ve got to get the killer mindset, get in there, and make things happen. So this isn’t about being crazy. It’s not about being bloodthirsty. It’s about being smart enough to know that I’ve got to turn on all of my attributes, including a killer mindset, to control you. Then I can protect you.
Tip number three–visualization. This is the tool, more than any other, that you need to exercise. Visualization.
Whether you want to call that meditation time, whether you want to do this in a waterfall, or sitting on the couch, or whenever. You want to stand in a forest, do it. I don’t care. But set aside time when you can visualize the absolute worst-case scenarios, the most frightening and horrifying things that could be done to you, and the most horrifying things that you could do against someone else. You’ve got to get into that mindset, otherwise you won’t be prepared for it.
It’s a funny thing. Martial arts is a very peculiar activity. Let’s say weird. Martial arts is one of the only activities I can think of where you’re not allowed to do the actual thing you’re training to do!
Imagine if you’re trying to teach someone how to drive a car, and you walk them to the car, you seat them in the car, but you never turn on that engine, you never put it into drive, and you never let them out on the road. But you spend years putting their hands on the wheel, talking to them about the pressure in the gas pedal, when to switch to the brake pedal, how to shift gears, how to use the mirrors, you explain what it’s like to be on the freeway.
Does any of that add up to driving skill? Of course not. Whether you’re playing piano, painting, cooking, playing soccer, driving, every other activity, you get to do the actual thing that you’re training to do. But martial arts, you can’t do that.
You can’t go around breaking necks, breaking backs, killing people. You can’t. We’re not alone.
Military exercises, police academies, people who are in the business of restraint and control and death have to simulate. And we can simulate many different creative ways, the military, the police, martial artists. We all find different drills and exercises. We can argue about methodology. But at the end of the day, it’s simulations. And only real is real.
So we have to get as close as we can to real without being real. It’s just the way it is in martial arts. And if we can’t physically be real, then we have to at least make the effort to be emotionally and psychologically real.
The only way to do that is imagination. Play-acting. Go through those worst cases in your head.
I find it to be a very intense experience. Just sitting down and really imagining a home invasion. Imagining what’s being done to my loved ones. What’s being attempted against me. And seeing how that would play out. Then imagining me intervening, taking action. And what would I have to do in the most extreme circumstances?
I break a sweat thinking about this stuff. I can feel my heart beating faster. I can feel the adrenaline starting to go. That’s the power of imagination. And I highly suggest that you do this. Because again, if you can’t even imagine it, if you can’t even think about it, how are you going to do it if you need to?
How can you face real life if you can’t even face it in your imagination? Give yourself that gift.
Then, after you’ve sat down with these thoughts, take it into your solo practice. In your solo practice, if you’re going to hit a bag, don’t hit that bag until you give yourself a context.
What’s happening? What’s really happening? Why are you punching and kneeing and elbowing?
What are you doing? Why are you doing it? Use your imagination, create a context, and you will get way more out of your practice, because it’s no longer physical. It’s psychological. It’s emotional.
Same thing if you’re doing kata. Same thing if you’re shadow boxing. Bring your imagination into that, and you will get more out of your training than ever.
Wrapping up.
Okay, just to be clear– martial arts should be a special activity, something different from everything else that you do. That’s because martial arts is as extreme as it gets, because it deals with death.
That should not be a downer or gloomy. It’s exciting. It should stimulate your life force, your primal drive to survive. And yes, that can lead you into a killer mindset.
Awaken it.If it’s an instinct that’s been long lost, bring it back to life. If you weren’t born with a killer instinct, then this is the next best thing.
Inject yourself through hard training with the mindset of a predator, of a big cat. We must train to dominate the bad guys. Otherwise, they win. And that’s not fair to the world, and that’s not fair to you.
Okay, big cat, time to get out there and strut your stuff. Maybe buy yourself a cool sweater or get a tattoo. Maybe just go roar into a mirror. Do what you gotta do to remind yourself how powerful you really are.
Until next time, smiles up, my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.
