Krav Maga How Easy
By Moshe Katz
CEO
Israeli Krav International

May 15, 2019, Israel

This is the kind of phone I grew up with, ours was beige. 

As a teacher I try to imagine what it is like for a beginner. First there is the anxiety, the feeling of incompetence, the feeling that "I will never be any good at this."

The student needs to be reassured that they are in good hands. It is just as when you check into a hospital, you want to have that feeling that you are in good hands, the people wearing those uniforms actually know what they are doing. Every student needs to know that no matter how awkward and uncoordinated they are, the teacher knows how to handle them and bring them to their goals. 

The next point I try to remember is that while this is my profession I cannot assume that the new student knows anything. When I am trying to understand something on the computer and Tech people start using their terms, their "language", I am lost at once. I keep telling them, remember, I hear your words but I have no idea what you are saying. You might as well be speaking Chinese. 

When most of us walk into the Garage, auto mechanic, and the professional auto workers open the hood and start with their language....well, looks like it could be a...reverberation of the cordial latitude combustion hypothermic carbonator...hmm...what do you say Jim, should be use the nine iron?

Most of us have no idea what they are saying. Now let's apply this to Krav Maga training.

We who live this way of life, we who have been immersed in martial arts, security, self defense, combatives, for decades, need to remember that we use terms that others do not necessarily understand. We need to use baby talk, we need to take baby steps. It is a new language for them. If we use University level talk we will only cause them to feel like they are drowning, and a drowning person just wants to get out of the water and go home. 

We cannot assume they know what a Fighting stance is, we cannot assume they know how to kick, we cannot assume they know how to make a fist and throw a punch. We cannot assume anything at all!

Our goal with IKI Krav Maga is to teach everyone, to give everyone the tools to survive in a violent world. This must begin with baby steps. We need to treat our students the way we want to be treated when we enter a strange new world. 

Last night after prayer services I was speaking to my friend, a fellow cohen, Rabbi Asher. He told me he attended a workshop where the teacher explained, Those of you over a certain age will never speak the hi tech language fluently. You will always have an "accent', you will always speak it as foreign language. You will never speak it like the generation that was born into this.

I grew up with phone in our house, you literally had to dial each number. I will never be "fluent" with today's smart phones and I will never fully understand all the social media stuff. But I must use them for my work, so I ask those in the know, remember, I am not fluent in this new language. 

But as my dear father used to say, the phone works both ways, so when I teach you Krav Maga, I will treat you as I wish to be treated. 

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