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Years after famous motorcycle daredevil Evel Knievel retired he had a business disagreement with someone in Geauga County, Ohio. Geauga County is home to several small police departments and my friend worked for one of them. One afternoon he told me that he had to make an official phone call to Evel Knievel. Evel Knievel! What for, I asked? He told me that he had entered into a business venture with a local resident and Evel thought that he was being cheated. Evil threatened to fly down to Ohio, walk up to his front door and bash his head in with a golf club.
Knievel had a reputation of being a bad-ass and also fearless as a motorcycle stunt rider who supposedly had suffered 433 bone fractures during his career. He also had a reputation of fighting and was convicted at least once for assault. Charges were never filed in the Ohio incident and the two business partners smoothed things out but it made me think of Knievel and one of his quotes, “Bones heal, pain is temporary and chicks dig scars“.
I teach close quarter combatives (self-defense) and many of my students work on dealing with fear. In fighting, everyone experiences fear but I found that most fear is not about possible pain, scars or even broken bones. It’s about looking bad, being completely vanquished, being embarrassed, not being good enough or not measuring up. Sure pain and the like is in the mix but those are negligible.
So how do we deal with fear? Take the plunge, that’s how. If its fear right before physically defending yourself and you’re trained, take the plunge forward and do what you’ve been taught. Go forward with disdain about what anyone, including your opponent thinks or may think of you. Go forward in what you know is right and take the opponent completely out of being a physical threat—never giving a credible thought that what you’re doing may be wrong or inadequate. And if you have a fear of the possible physical consequences, remember Evel’s words, “Bones heal, pain is temporary and chicks dig scars“.
Don’t worry about being wrong or being a possible failure. Move forward and crack a smirk knowing that you’re going to rock it.
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