Haters Gonna Hate- Damian Ross, The Self Defense Company

I love the show Kitchen Nightmares. It's not Ramsay's over the top persona, or how he rips into people (if you get a chance to watch some of his earlier shows from the BBC he's a lot more mellow and tolerable) it's the combative attitude of the people trapped in a failing business.

He comes in, a successful, Michelin Star chef and Restauranteur and tells them exactly what they need to know and every time, without fail, they fight him every step of the way until eventually they break down and give in. When I watch the show with my kids we call it "When Adults Cry" and point out every time it happens. What else am I going to do? They're a little too young to play the drinking game...

The same holds true for the show Bar Rescue, Salon Take Over or most any other business make over show. The excuse for failure is ALWAYS something external: the economy, the competition, the neighborhood, etc. It's never something that the business owner does. Yet, upon further inspection it's always the product, service and atmosphere that are all lacking one way or another.

The process is always the same: expert comes in and tells them the truth, their product is awful, their place is filthy and how service is dreadful. The business owner goes through anger, denial, acceptance and finally follow through. Note that the ones that fail are usually too far gone or don't follow through. But the formula for success is always the same.

There's no place better to see this type of angered resistance than in the self defense world. People will fight me to the end, until one day they realize, I'm right because, like Chef Ramsay, I know the truth about self defense. I know what works. You can tell me that I don't own a black car all you want, but I know I drove up in one and it's parked outside. To me you sound like all those failed business owners on Kitchen Nightmares holding on to something that simply doesn't exist. I've been where you're standing and have the black belts to prove it. Eventually you will come around or quit or remain stubborn and cling to a method that really was not intended for life or death situations.

There's a reason that the majority of people who enroll in the SDTS are former or lifelong martial artists who have had real life, adult street fights. They understand the reality of what happens and have had enough insight to reflect on their training and identify the obvious problems.

The biggest issue with most systems is that they're only PART right. They have a few solid ideas and concepts and then fill it in with what ever they can think of to make it larger and more complicated than it needs to be. People get pissed when I tell them you don't need to spend all that time practicing and learning technique upon technique. It's like martial arts hoarding. They feel secure in the fact that they "know" a lot of stuff. But more is not better, it's just more and knowing a lot of things is A LOT worse than knowing a few things well.

"I fear not the man who has practiced 10000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10000 times." ~ Bruce Lee

In fact, instead of training in those complex moves, why don't you lift some weights and do some real cardio? After all, the over all tactical benefit of being physically fit will greatly out weigh the cool parlor trick you're trying to pawn off as self defense.

The road to self defense is simple...but not easy. How many black belts do I need to have to tell you that I know the f'ing difference? Sure, your style is different and your instructor knows the truth. I can't speak for every instructor on the planet, but after 30 plus years of this stuff I know that the vast majority of systems out there are WAY OFF! It only takes me about one lesson to determine whether there's anything worth while. To be honest, I can probably do it in 5 minutes, but I'm just being polite.

People hate me because I will tell you that all of the time and money you invested is pretty much wasted (unless you got yourself in shape and made some friends, than it's not completely useless). From a self defense perspective I can pretty much guarantee that what you're doing is useless. Sure a punch is a punch and a choke is a choke but do you really need to train 8 hours a week just to punch someone in the jaw?!?!? NO YOU DON'T and I don't care what your sensei says (I have more black belts than him, so there).

The funny thing about martial arts, self defense, yoga, pilates or any other subculture you can get your hands on is the people. More often than not, people seek these activities to fill a void in their lives. That explains why people loose their shit when you tell them they're wrong. They come back with the witty retort:
"1 billion Chinese people can't be wrong" my answer to that is, "Shit yes they can, explain communism?"

The truth is, most people are wrong (or right a small percentage of the time). You have to love Jack Nicholson's line in The Bucket List: “If life has taught me anything it’s that 95% of the people are always wrong.” Do you know who's right? The successful, happy people. Heck, they crucified Jesus so I guess I'm doing OK. (Did he just make a Jesus reference? Yes I did).

If you make a stand and no one reacts than either you don't matter or your stand doesn't matter. Hate me if you will, but for every one of you there's a free thinking. ass-kicking person right behind you who's done sipping the Kool-Aide and just wants to know the truth about self defense which can be summed up in a few words:

1. Inflict the maximum amount of damage to your target in the shortest amount of time possible.
2. Cause more injury than you receive.
3. Stay in good physical condition
4. Use whatever tools you have at your disposal to expedite points 1 and 2.

That's it. Hell, I don't care if you train in the SDTS or not. OK, that's a lie, I want you to train in it, that's kind of my point of this post. But, if you adopted that 4 point attitude you would quickly eliminate a lot of crap from your training.

Always seek to simplify and develop the skills you already have. Sure you can punch, but can you shatter a mans jaw in six places? OK, how about 8?

There's no such thing as overkill because you "can't over win"!
Train Honestly,


Damian Ross, CEO The Self Defense Company


Damian Ross is CEO of the Self Defense Company and developer of The Self Defense Training System, the most lethal and effective self defense system in the world, The Guardian Defensive Tactics Police Combatives Program, 60 minute Self Defense and the Family Safe Program. Mr. Ross also founded the Self Defense Instructor Program that helps people develop their self defense careers from the ground up. Mr. Ross is originally from Ridgewood, NJ where he was a High School Hall of Fame Athlete in football and wrestling as well as a varsity wrestling coach. He then went on to Lehigh University where he was a varsity wrestler and football player. Mr. Ross has 3 black belts, 4th Degree in Tekkenryu Jujutsu, 2nd Degree in Judo, 2nd Degree in Tae Kwon Do. In addition to his martial arts experience, Mr; Ross spent 8 years in the professional security and personal protection business. He is internationally recognized as one of the foremost authorities in reality based self defense.