Intent

There are many people who believe that simply spending time in a gym, regardless of the amount and level of exercise they do, will get them fit. They come with little or no idea of what they are going to do for the hour they have allotted as their training time, and so spend most of it wandering aimlessly around. They then wonder after a few weeks, why they're not getting fitter, not losing weight etc. Their training lacks real intent. The same is often true of martial arts and self-defense training; students attend classes with the hope (not the goal) of getting better, but they lack intent - this is often the fault of the instructor who fails to explain to them why they are training, and how they must train. The student has shown the initiative to recognize they need and want the training, but they may not have formalized in their mind the exact reason(s) why - it is the job of the instructor to help them understand these reasons. 

Despite all the evidence to the contrary there are still those people who believe they will never be the target or victim of violence. They are either id denial, or are paralyzed by their lack of faith in their abilities, even with training, to be able to deal with an aggressor. Sometimes they are caught between the jaws of both. When you talk to them about scenarios, they might face, they will tell you that their lifestyle precludes them from such violence, or that there is nothing anybody can do; everything is an impossible, worst case scenario. They trust in their good sense and judgment not realizing that every predator knows what good sense and judgment is, and how to use it against them. They are potentially easy prey. These people never walk through the doors of a self-defense or martial arts school. 

There are some who think it might happen to them; it's unlikely but there's a chance. These are the individuals who trust in tricks and techniques. They don't want to, or don't see the need to spend time developing the skills and attributes that will save them. Show them what to do, and somehow they will be able to do it. These are the individuals who know months in advance they are going to visit a hostile and dangerous country, and show up a week before they go, to learn what they must do. They do not take violence seriously. It might happen but they believe there is little chance of it. These individuals rarely stay long in a school - they are only one-step removed from denial. 

Those that acknowledge violence could happen to them, that in many ways they are equally at risk as everyone else, do not deny the possibility, but instead see and imagine the possibility, and they want to know what to do. These individuals already have a level of awareness and have a knowledge of what could happen to them, and have taken the decision to empower themselves. Intent though, lies on a spectrum, and they may at times fluctuate from training with the intent that it could happen to them, to an intent level where it might. Sometimes they are switched on to training sometimes they are switched off. There are times when their training is real to them, and times when it is imagined. We must train with an urgency and a zeal, that what we are learning could safe our life, or the lives of others. When I do medical training I take it seriously; I revise in my head basic CPR, as I don't want to be in the position that should someone need resuscitating I can't do it - my lack of knowledge, of seriousness when I learnt will have cost them their life. Likewise, I don't want to train against knife and gun etc. half-heartedly and without seriousness and energy because if I train this way, it could cost me my life - it is worth taking a moment to realize why we train: survival. 

The highest level of intent to train with is, it will happen to me. If we train each session with the belief that the moment we walk out of our school or dojo, we will be attacked, we will train with a new found dedication and zeal. We don't want to develop paranoia in our training but we want to train with the commitment of someone who believes that violence is inevitable, as if each attack and threat we practice against in training reflects a real-life situation we must deal with. As we leave the dojo/school we should change the direction of our intent away from the physical, and consciously adopt self-protection and personal safety protocols, until they become second nature. In doing this, not only will we up our skills and techniques but we will also get in touch with another side of ourselves; the one that understand what survival actually means.