Safer Sooner, Option 3; Semester 1, Year 2024-2025

Starting on 7 August and continuing until 4 December (13 weeks of course planned, including holidays) in-person meetings are once weekly Wednesday mornings at the Socialight Club on Congaree Road. These instruction, discussion, and training meetings will be available virtually over Zoom in the case that a student is sick or otherwise cannot make the session.

From the Syllabus:

The Safer-Sooner Option 3 course combines theory with practice to make the student a safer and more confident human being.

The student learns and practices personal security by way of detecting and avoiding potential problems early, responsibly de-escalating existing problems, and when necessary navigating non-consensual violence while minimizing liability, minimizing injury to all parties, and moving to safety as quickly as possible.

This course focuses on the acquisition of knowledge, self-knowledge, self-empowerment, and the development of skills and attitudes enabling students to take control of their lives now and in the future, in academic, work, and personal settings.

The principles to which the students are exposed allows them to be flexible, adaptable, and confidently aware rather than painfully alert or anxious in the face of modern-day personal security challenges.

This course’s brain-based learning, practice, and application approach, rather than linear block-based “if this - then that” training, allows the student to apply these principles for the rest of their life without needing to remember a specific sequence of thoughts, movements, or techniques to match specific circumstances.

In-person meetings are once weekly on Wednesday morning at the Socialight Club on Congaree Road. These instruction, discussion, and training meetings will be available virutally over Zoom in the case that a student is sick or otherwise cannot make the session.

IN LAYMAN'S TERMS:

This is Self-Protection as a Life Skill, Self-Awareness for Situational Awareness, and Self-Defense taught like First Aid. Students use a proven process to build and use their own personal self-protection system. Your instructor, Joe, uses the proven S.P.E.A.R. System of Self-Defense as the backbone of everything we do in the course.

So what will we learn in this course, exactly?

In short we'll answer these 3 questions and make you and yours safer as a result:

1) How can you detect and avoid trouble before it happens, and what is the hidden reason people don't do this?

2) What's the best way to de-escalate confrontations, and what's the most important part nearly everyone forgets?

3) How can you easily use your natural reaction to danger to make you safer INSTEAD OF a liability to yourself and others?

The S.P.E.A.R. System is the study of human movement as it relates to violence, fear, and aggression. I use it because it makes people safer, and does it quicker, than any other system I'm aware of, and I've been exposed to a lot. In addition, it's easier to remember, apply, and retain than any other system I know. I taught martial arts, military combatives, and self-defense before I learned to use and teach the S.P.E.A.R. System. I love it because it works.

"Can a person defend themselves without earning a black belt in a martial art? In a hybrid classroom and physical training format? And even online?"

-Yes, yes, and yes!

-Untrained people defend themselves from violence every day. If they do so, imagine what an educated, trained, and practiced person can do!

-The classroom setting allows us to delve into the mental and emotional aspects of real-world self-defense; arguably even more important than the physical aspects. The physical training is then fueled by the mental&emotional foundation.

-Online? I was just as surprised as you- until COVID-19 forced me to work with people clients online, and to my surprise it worked great. Once we we were able to meet in person (clients I'd never met in person) their movements were on track just fine because I'd coached them online and they were great students. More importantly, and this is the surprising part, online training really highlighted that the important parts of your self-defense are in your head and in your heart. Those connections are more important than any physical thing I can teach you, and those come across crystal clear over video coaching.

I believe this should be taught in secondary school, and I believe it's never too late to reconnect with your inborn Human Weapon System.

Host or Publisher Coach Joe Borovicka