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Personal defense: what is meant by negotiation

After having seen how to start to train our minds to self-control in critical contexts (read Lesson 7.3), we go a step further to talk about negotiation.

Note – This article has been asked by one of our Core Course practitioners on Patreon (see how to attend our home study classes here Learn Kung Fu online: a beginner-to-expert course).

In this lesson, we want to list a set of concepts and skills that, in relation to a potential aggressor, are aimed at:

Understanding / anticipating him
Barter / treat with him
Confuse / slow down him
Make desist / scare him
Deceive / persuade him
…

A note by Master Kongling – At the basis of achieving such ambitious objectives (ordered by complexity), there is nothing absurd or miraculous, simple common sense and knowledge of human behaviors.

The weak points of the human mind

To learn the basics of negotiation, it is necessary to understand and accept that the people who threaten your safety are:

Human beings like us – They have different ideas, experiences and IQs but they have a mental structure comparable to yours (never believe to be too superior or too inferior)
People with desires and fears – Every man (or woman) has goals to fulfill, limits that he / she does not want to overcome, insecurities to hide, etc.
People who have their own perspective of the world – In relation to which you can (involuntarily or voluntarily) assume attitudes that arouse complacency, neutral reactions and others that insinuate dislike (at various degrees)

A note by Master Kongling – If you are not able to face this (read Self-defense: the types of aggressors), negotiation is an extremely powerful weapon that you just cannot adopt.

Simple negotiation tactics

Before proceeding we have to stress that:

Real negotiation is truly an art and it is not easy to learn at all (as for martial skills, mental discipline, etc.); it requires a lot of practice and experimentation
However, there are a number of basic notions that everyone, with a little effort, can effectively apply in terms of Self-defense (more related to common sense than to persuasion)
One of the little advantages that you can exploit is that, when tension becomes higher, even a very intelligent person can lose a big part of his cognitive abilities (read Self defense: how to behave)
In most cases (during a quarrel) when everyone is dominated by simple but chaotic thoughts, who prevail is always the one with the best strategy to follow in his mind (read for example Self-defense: aggression in front of a supermarket)
…

What are the goals in terms of self-preservation?

Starting from the assumptions we have made, let’s identify our goals (in order of importance):

To safeguard your integrity (that of those around you and, possibly, even the one of the person you are facing)
Secondarily (when reasonable), to preserve your (most relevant) properties (or part of them)
In no cases to apply violence uselessly (eg. vengeance)

In relation to these specific objectives you can follow the indications provided in these tutorials:

When diplomacy become useless

The fact that we stress the option to prevent violence, unfortunately, does not mean that it can always be avoided.

Another ability indirectly related to negotiation is the one that, reading the body signals of the people we are facing, let us know if an aggressor is going to attack; in relation to this you can read:

In any case, we must be ready to react but knowing a few basic notions of body language can be more than helpful.

A note by Master Kongling – You can also read Personal defense: parry the first attack and The best way to hit first: a little trick. We will talk better about NLP, deception, persuasion (etc.) in the future chapters of this course. For now, this is more than enough.

In-depth articles

Self-defense: why 90% of martial arts does not work – The crude thruth about the relation between self-defense and martial arts
Personal defense: the S.A.F.E. method – The general rule of 6 Dragons Kung Fu to face a critical situation

<< Lesson 7.3 – Index – Lesson 7.5 >>

Author: Master Kongling

Founder of 6 Dragons Kung Fu.

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