Domain Dependence

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No where else does this become more important to understand then in the realm of martial art and karate self-defense or self-fense as one professional likes to term it. Most SD training in martial arts and karate are theoretical in nature because most sensei don’t have the hands-on street experience and understanding of social and asocial violence, etc. 

They make a lot of assumptions, they observe a lot of supposedly experienced folks who currently teach and they watch a lot of movies; read a lot of book; and navigate a lot of socially driven media content to come up with what appears to be logical and applicable. Here is a quote on domain dependence with highlighted sections to focus toward this topic:

“Insights do not pass well from one field to another. Transferring knowledge from the world of academia to the real world often fails. The transfer from the professional realm to the private is particularly difficult to navigate. What you master in one area is difficult to transfer to another. Especially daunting is the transfer from academia to real life - from the theoretically sound to the practically possible. In short, book smarts don’t transfer to street smarts easily.” - Rolf Dobelli, The Art of Thinking Clearly

Since it isn’t easy and mostly not obvious enough that folks can see it within themselves it exacerbates the problem of transferring the practices of self-defense to the real world of violence and conflict. This has been the bane of military training and practice since the time man first crawled out of the mire and began to stand on land. It is impossible to gain the experience of violence without some form of learning most often through an academic format with training and practice as a supplement in preparation for it. One reason why one professional speaks to that, “First Step” from theory to reality is the most dangerous and toughest step to take. In truth, it takes, according to the experts, more than one step to transcend from one to the reality of the other.

This is yet another one of those aspects of training, practice and experience that must be provided if one teaches self-defense and expects the practitioner/student to actually use it in self-defense. Granted, there is a lot of academic aspects to self-defense that must be learned, encoded and understood before stepping off into the dojo floor to go hands-on. It is far easier to go straight to the fun stuff, the physical stuff, and give the more academic aspects a minimal of time and effort, it ain’t the fun stuff after all. In truth, the boring academic stuff is required in order to teach, learn and encode the fun stuff for self-defense. Without it, it doesn’t get taught and understood so when you face the repercussions and obstacles of self-defense you fail the SD litmus test the legal system presents - assuming you are alive to face it and face it you will. 

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