You’re Not As Safe As You Think… Here’s Why | Pedro Rodriguez

Most people think they know how to defend themselves… but the truth is, they don’t.

In this episode of The Gold Coast Podcast, Eric Winegard sits down with a self-defense expert, Pedro Rodriguez, Senior Instructor/Owner of Boynton Beach Martial Arts Academy, to break down what REALLY happens in a street fight and why most training, mindsets, and assumptions are completely wrong.

From the dangers of knives and real-world violence to the psychology behind attacks, this conversation dives deep into practical, reality-based self-defense that could actually save your life.

You’ll learn:

The biggest mistakes people make in street fights
Why awareness matters more than strength
What to do if someone attacks you
The truth about MMA vs street fighting
Why most self-defense systems fail in real life

This isn’t about looking tough; it’s about getting home safe.

👉 Whether you’ve never thrown a punch or you train regularly, this episode will completely change how you think about self-defense.

📍 Connect with Pedro Rodriguez:
bestmartialartsboyntonbeach.com

🎙️ The Gold Coast Podcast
Hosted by Eric Winegard

Each episode uncovers the real challenges, lessons, and victories that define the Gold Coast business landscape. Whether you’re a startup founder, established CEO, or simply passionate about growth, you’ll gain valuable insights, strategies, and inspiration from those shaping the region.

👍 If you found value in this episode:
Like, Subscribe, and Share with someone who needs to hear this.

Thank you all for listening in on today's episode of The Gold Coast Podcast!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

In a street fight, what weapon, obviously a gun, I know you're worried about, what outside of a gun, what weapon are you worried about the most? The most?

SPEAKER_02 0:08

A hatchet or a cleaver. The short little axe with a short handle, that's the most. An axe is too long, a knife is too short, a sword nobody carries. But a meat cleaver that you can get in your much more than a knife.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

Because I I'm not saying I'm a tough guy at all, but I'm I'm more capable than most. I'm more capable than nine out of ten, but you're the one out of ten that's gonna get me, right? But I'm more capable than most. I've always felt like if a guy has a knife, I'm like, you better better stab me in my brain because you got one poke and I'm I'm I'm gonna kill you, right? That's kind of how I feel with a knife, but uh see what that knife doesn't scare me that much.

SPEAKER_02 0:47

And it shouldn't if you know what you're doing. The problem is when you're untrained, and if you have this cleaver, which is about this big with an edge, yeah, I'm not only I can chop, right? Or I can slice across to this and bow, if you just come close to me, what can I hold? That's the edge, right? So you can picture it here. So as his hand comes out and I just flick, so now I break the back of his hand, then the part that's not sharp, right? Then I flip back and I hit him in the head. I can use the edges, then I can use the bottom part. So I don't have it out. Now, when I go to court, because my biggest thing is street dependable, court defendable. That's where Krav Magad drops the ball, and they drop it hard. I mean hard, because they don't teach the legalities. Whatever you do, you're explaining it to somebody, and hopefully it's not your public defender, because you're definitely going to jail with one of those puppies. Then I'm gonna help you. So now I can use this thing, and they said, so this guy wore you out with a cleaver in his hand and never cut you. That guy obviously don't want to hurt you. You know how big, I mean, those 12 people can be like, Man, he hit him 13 times, didn't cut him once? Why didn't you just cut him? I didn't need to. Why would I? My job is not to hurt him because he's trying to hurt me. My job is not to kill him because he's trying to kill me. Just get home to Leo. That's my mindset. Get home to Leo. And I'm not trying to demean anybody or talk bad about anybody. But if you're missing something, we we've got to fill it, right? And like I was telling, I think he heard me before, and people ask me, Why do you always say the things you say? It's weird. Nobody says that. People ask me, How are you doing? My answer is oh good, man, having a great day. It's good to be me. Oh man, that's great. I'm gonna use that. And they see it just like every other thing that we use for no reason at all. Like, there's more than one way to skin a cat. Who's skinning cats? Nobody even really knows what it means. And why? Why are you skinning these cats and who and why, right? So it's the same thing. They'll go out and say, Oh, it's good to be me, because it sounds cool. But it's true, it is good to be me. And when people ask me, you know, how are you feeling? Like a god. That's what I feel like on a daily. He made us in his image. I don't live by the Bible, but just like every book I've ever written, whether it's by Zig Ziggler, which is old school, you young cats may or may not know, he's probably just a good thing.

SPEAKER_00 3:05

Oh, come on, sales god.

SPEAKER_02 3:07

That is just stuff, and I just pick and choose rich dad, poor dad, five rings, the art of war. I don't live by any of those books, but I take and I think to myself, if I'm thinking of you as a god and I'm thinking of you as a god, we're gonna have a great life. I'm not gonna disrespect another god. And if all the women in my life are goddesses, well, my job is just to protect them, right? So it's just how you have your mind set up. It's not a mind set, because everybody uses that word. It's just how you have your things in your head and what's the priority and what is it you're looking to do. And if you're all the way to this side in the good, when those bad times, I had an instructor tell me, I don't know, it was many years ago, I would rather be a warrior in a gardener, and a warrior in a garden than a gardener in war. And it's true. So I stay here, but when it calls to be on this end, that's where we're gonna be. But then I have to use, like I was telling you, it's so difficult because I have to make sure I keep you out of jail. So I'm gonna keep you safe, dependable, but defendable. So why is it that your system is better than other people's? It's because I use my head and everybody's system is better than mine. But my system is better than everybody's. Alright, you're crazy. Coop, what are you saying? I don't know. No, I do know. I'm gonna tell you what I'm saying. Every mother on the planet that I've ever gone to their house has a shirt, a mug, something that says world's best mom. Is best a superlative? There's no such thing as bestist, best or er. Only three-year-olds and four-year-olds say that, right? So if yours is the best and yours is the best, and yours is the best, and yours is the best, and yours is the best, how are we on foul language on this? That's a yay or a nay.

SPEAKER_00 4:51

Oh, you go rock and roll.

SPEAKER_02 4:52

Rock and roll. All right. You're all a bunch of damn liars, except for one. You're all a bunch of damn liars. You bought your mom that shirt. If there was a competition, one would be the best. So that means the other, we got 7.8 billion people on earth. How many women are there? I don't know how many of them are mothers. Everybody with that shirt is a liar. Do you rock a Greek flag in your car? Are you Greek? That's probably why. If you were Puerto Rican, guess what flag you'd be flying? Now, is your point that there's always someone tougher? Is that true? Absolutely. But everyone's job is to think they're the best. Your job is to think your mother's the best. It is my job to think my system is the best. Because without that mentality, I won't be out there searching for what's the best, so I do not look like a liar. So, in believing that, I'm always looking for the best, so I can be the best. And if I don't believe I'm the best, then I'm like, oh yeah, he's better. There's never a press conference that the guy says the other guy's gonna win. This guy's always whooping the other guy's ass. And then most of the time, he's the one getting whooped. But it's always the same. I'm gonna whoop you, I'm gonna whoop you, I'm gonna whoop you. And they don't. But that's your job to think that way. My system is supposed to be the best.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

Let me let me ask you a question. Are there, because you you've probably heard a lot of horror stories about self-defense. Do you find that there's situations that people put themselves in that make them more likely to be attacked or run into a scenario like that? Like, is it sometimes environment or how somebody's acting that almost makes them someone, you know, almost attract to being a victim?

SPEAKER_02 6:27

Every time. 80% of the time. It's always your fault. It's never the other guy's fault. Emotions are this way. If somebody cuts you off in traffic, do you give them the thumbs up or the bird?

SPEAKER_00 6:40

Oh, I don't want no problems. I give them a thumbs up.

SPEAKER_02 6:42

There you go.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

I don't want no problems. That's me. I'm like, God bless you.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Go ahead. Most people are hanging out, my wife included. I love you, honey. I know you're gonna watch this. She's waist deep out the window. She's using every finger. You think she can't speak because she's sign languaging the ever-living out of everybody for anything. They shouldn't be in that lane, they got in the lane too slow, they break too many times, you're gonna burn out your bulbs for anything. And there's the situation. It's up to me. I can give you the thumbs up all day long. I can't control your feelings, their emotions. That's this way. So you choose, it's always you. You choose not to train with me an hour a week and spend two hours on TikTok. You choose not to do the research or the investigating to know what's true and what's not because it's entertainment. Just look at the word entertain, contain. We won't even get that into that deep. Entertainment is meant to keep you locked in on crap. So you're walking around, I've watched people, I sit and I watch. I got stories for you, you're gonna be like you will sit there doing things that make absolutely no, they put nothing in your bank, in your moral bank. Because most people in this country are morally bankrupt. They're morally bankrupt. So you're buried in your phone, you didn't see the guy over there, you didn't notice the guy that's 90 degrees out, and he's wearing a trench coat. You didn't notice the guy being shifty-eyed, you didn't notice the way these three people are moving. You know, even though they're not wearing those jerseys I was talking about, that they're together. 80% of the stuff is avoidable. Just go on YouTube and watch. There was a guy on a train platform, there's a bunch of women on this side, and then there's one standing here by herself, and he's just walking out, smacking them on the head. The last one here moved. He looks and he sees the one that was standing here buried in the phone. He takes like two running steps and punches that chick in the face because he saw she was buried in the phone. And you can see this is just a bad person. You could see the malice not only in his eyes, but the way he kind of, wow, look at that, runs to her and punches her in the face. So we're just not aware. We just awareness is so important. You should be watching everything, you should be assessing everything, but we just don't do it. And why not? Because we go to a seminar, put on by the police department or one by your fine, oh, Grandmaster Rodriguez coming to town, rah-rah. You're coming once a year. I'm out in Seattle and you don't have me back. You know, I'm out in Tampa only once every 16 months. But if people were paying attention, 80% of what happens to them wouldn't.

SPEAKER_00 9:21

Yeah, that's interesting. What something that just hit me is one of the reasons if someone drives by and is being a total asshole to me, one of the reasons I do stick my thumbs up is because one, I know he might have a gun and it ain't worth it. And number two, I know he might be able to whoop my ass, it ain't worth it. Especially if I have my wife in the car. Sure, I feel the urge, I feel that aggression, but I'm like, it ain't worth it. And I think the reason I do that is because I know I'm far from invincible. And you got me thinking here, if if we were teaching self-defense to every man and woman at a younger age, people wouldn't be doing crazy stuff like this. Because if you're on a subway and you know nobody on the subway can probably defend themselves and you're kind of tough, sort of, just because you're aggressive, you're more likely to go sucker punch people. But if you know that everybody is somewhat capable, then you probably wouldn't do shit like that. So why why do you think we're not teaching, why are we not teaching young young men and women self-defense at an early age?

SPEAKER_02 10:24

The reason we don't teach them most things is because the guys that are in charge of this don't want it that way. If you think, why do they teach us that? And I still remember this, this is not education, it's indoctrination. In 1492, Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue. 1492. I do not remember, honest to God, what year my father was born and my mother. Look, I get goosebumps again. I cannot remember for the life of me, but I remember when Christopher Columbus discovered America. What has it done for anyone? I could probably ask anybody in this room, in this whole office, how that has helped them in their life. It is zero. You could have taught that class and said tire pressure should usually be around 35 pounds per square inch. That would help them. If sometimes your door seems like it's stuck, maybe look at the striker. Why don't they teach that? Because they need worker bees. They need worker bees. Self-defense should be mandatory, like in some countries where the military is mandatory, but it's not in their best interest because they don't care. You need to be a good worker bee. Why don't you think they teach us in at least ninth or tenth grade the effects of compound interest? Not that difficult. That should be drilled into your head, not the 1492 ocean blue. So most of what's taught is not taught for the right reason or because they care about us. It would just make too much sense. And it doesn't help them in any way. It doesn't help the big companies, it doesn't help the Rothschilds or the Gates or the Rockefellers.

SPEAKER_00 11:55

No, I love it. I love this conversation.

SPEAKER_02 11:57

They don't. They're not meant for that. We were always meant to follow along, be good enough, college. It's good for a lot of people, but not for everybody. It's not meant. You're told go to college, get married, you know, two kids, a dog, a puppy, or a cat, and then a nice white picket fence, you go to work, mom can stay home. Because, yeah, it might be, but it's not again. Well, you're steering and you're way off the beaten path on what self-defense is. Absolutely not. Self-defense is about life. You have to think of yourself. If you don't feel you're important enough, you know what I've done to be able to help almost any woman, almost every woman's self-defense course is a bunch of, and this is a silly ass word, but hardwash. It's just hardwash. If you tell a woman, just simple, uh, how do you feel about your cubs? Oh, I love my cubs. You try to touch one of my cubs, I'll kill you. And you know what that guy over there is trying to do? You know what this system is trying to cause? You rile a woman up down that lane, there's nothing they're not gonna listen to you about. And then you start instilling what they need to do when they're going after your cubs. And your cubs aren't gonna make it out of this unless you do X, Y, and Z. And now you got them listening. All the other stuff doesn't matter. The R word, the assault word, none of it matters. Tell that woman that they're trying to hurt her cubs, and you'll see a totally different mindset. Now that's malleable. Now you start working that. That's part of mindset. But the mindset they teach you is you know, don't look down, don't look down, you know, carry a hand with a key in it, or a bunch of other nonsense. Just stick with that maternal instinct, cannot be changed. It's gonna be there. It just is with all women, every woman, animals, and they're the protectors. The female is the better protector of the male and female. These are facts, but we're just not teaching it right. Tell her they're gonna hurt her cubs, tell her they're gonna take her cubs away. Tell her they're gonna be what do you gotta know? If you're a DJ, it's the same thing. You read the floor. But what's gonna trigger her? How do I say it? Is it they're gonna take her kids away? They're gonna hurt her kids, they're gonna X, Y, or Z. And once you figure that out, that's the lane you take. And she will be one of the best fighters you'll have in your school. Watch women fighters versus men fighters. They are way more into offense than defense. Way more. You watch, they're just going for it more than men. That's just they're built for that. And we're just going about it wrong. Like we're teaching about Christopher instead of tire pressure, we're teaching women silly things instead of saying they're gonna hurt your cubs. Once you got that, you're in. You're in.

SPEAKER_00 14:34

You can see on if you ever go down to TikTok scroll or TikTok bender, you can see these high school fights sometimes where I feel like 10-15 years ago, if you saw a high school fight, it was always, you know, two knuckleheads fighting each other, and maybe one guy's bigger and stronger, so he gets the best of them. But there's all these videos now where you'll see, you know, the bigger guy picking on, you know, the quiet, unassuming teenager, and he starts punching him and punching him, and and you could tell the guy doesn't want to do it, and then the second he has to do it, uh-oh, you find out he's trained, and just his training alone, he grapples him up, gets him down the ground, gets on his neck, and the dude is the dude is yes, you know, and real quick, so it's you know, me, like I'm I feel blessed right now because I've become really good friends with a guy who's an was an MMA fighter, and he was actually ranked uh top 10 in a middleweight for a while. So he's a very capable man. I'd I'd love for you to meet him one day. You might guys might be able to uh do something together. But um, my child is, you know, Alexis is 16 weeks pregnant, and his uh wife is 15 weeks pregnant, so I know my child is just gonna grow up in an environment, probably being friends with that uh other child, and I and I feel good that you know I want to have my kid at least learn self-defense, wrestling, and just just be a capable protector of themselves, right? I think it's um I think the more I'm thinking about it, I'm shocked we're not teaching this at a young age. You know, it's almost I would argue it's more important than speaking a foreign language, right? Like how like how often are, you know, if you live in uh Wisconsin, how often are you speaking Spanish to somebody? You know, I think we should do that too. I think we should learn sign language too, but I'm really shocked we don't uh we don't do this. So how so how long how long have you been doing this? How how long have you had your business? Tell me about the company.

SPEAKER_02 16:36

I opened up my first school in '91 up in Virginia, and then I had that several years. Then I moved to Orlando, Florida, opened up two there, one in Orlando, one just outside of Orlando. Then I moved further south, and I had one in Wellington. Now I'm in Boynton. And always in between and to the left and to the right, I have the seminars, the seminar circuit picks up. So sometimes I'm like, you know what? Let's close the school. Because I'm smart. I never sign these three and five year leases. I'll do one or two. So now I have one year in and I'm like, all right, it's doing okay. Leave it to someone like I did in Virginia. I left the one school to one guy, and the other one we just closed down. But we don't really focus on the school as much as I do the seminars because that's where I can get to more people. And my mindset, it's not I'm not a bad entrepreneur, I'm not a bad businessman, but the problem is I'm more interested in how can I help you? Because I was taught many years ago, if you think about helping people, there's no way you're not gonna make money. Because if you can help someone, they're gonna pay you to help them. But sometimes it's not cut in stone, so or written in stone, whatever they say. So the situation with the school is to keep me fresh, and then I just go out and do seminars like I was in Panama. I'm gonna be out in Mexico next week, so I can touch more people by doing seminars because there's other people promoting it, bringing people in. And it's funny because you just what does it say? You're never uh a blank in your own land, you're never a king in your own land, or something like that. I can't remember how the saying goes. So when I go to other places, it's crazy. These places will pack out. I'm like, wow, this is this is awesome. Yeah, and then in the school, because again, the marketing is more important than what you get because most people, because it's not taught at a young age like it should, have no idea. Most soccer moms know that the diff don't know the difference between jujitsu and kendo, or you know, who flung dung, some young guy, they just don't know the difference. So they put them in the school like a 7-Eleven. Whatever school is the closest, that's the one they're gonna put them in. Whoever advertises the best is gonna get those students because if you don't have an understanding, you'll think sport and self-defense is the same. And if you see most schools, the curriculum is the same, they may dumb it down a little bit for a kid, or I shouldn't say dumb it down, just make it a little simpler when the curriculum should be totally different. A kid's curriculum, women's curriculum, and men's should be totally different. It should have some overlap, but it's mainly different stuff because the situations are different. A kid is never gonna be in a bar, a kid is never gonna have a knife pulled on him. And I'm when I'm talking to a kid under the age of nine, so maybe at 10, depending on the country, you you might have that, but at a certain age, there's just certain things you need, and and molding that mind is the most important. If they knew how to walk away from things, so it's it's been taught wrong for a long time because it's not all the same.

SPEAKER_00 19:23

Do you think you said something really interesting to me? Do you think that other countries, youth parents, are more self-aware for the need to learn self-defense? Whereas maybe in this country we're just a little too uh, you know, unaware of the importance of it?

SPEAKER_02 19:38

It used to be until TikTok and Instagram and Facebook. It was that way. Now everybody's just so buried in it. There was always an amount of people, there was always that number, whatever that X was, that oh, that would never happen to me. I live in a good city, live community, gated uh community 690 back before COVID,$690,000 house, now 1.3. So they just don't think it's gonna happen to them. I don't go to those places, I don't frequent bars, I don't do the wrong thing, say the wrong thing, be in the wrong places. That's what a lot of people's mentality is. So they won't go take self-defense. Then you have the ones that know they live in a crappy area, and that's why you see a lot of these inner city kids become badasses. You know, Tommy Hearns, Marvin Hagler, those guys didn't live in Beverly Hills, and they became what they became because they had a rough upbringing, a tough upbringing. So that definitely makes a difference. So not only in another country, but anywhere, it just so happens that those countries do have more of poverty, or maybe not poverty, just less resources. So it's definitely anywhere you have that situation, you're gonna have people that are more aware of it.

SPEAKER_00 20:43

Yeah. So, and I'm asking you these things for a reason. So give me, if you line up, how much do you weigh? 198. 198, you're a strong dude. Holy shit. So 108, 198-pound self-defense gentleman like yourself, versus 198-pound MMA fighter. How does that fight go down? Where does it go down, first of all? Street. He was talking trash about your mom. Called your mom a slut.

SPEAKER_02 21:15

That's gonna do nothing. I mean, what's gonna happen is I'm just gonna back up. Just back up, back up. Now, when it gets to the point where I have to fight, it's because I made him want to fight me. And that's gonna happen because nobody will not come at me without thinking clearly. 198, I happen to know you're an MMA guy. Yep. And I'm spitting in your face. Because I know the only thing, and this is part of the trespass after warning, it's gonna be and then come forward. Nobody is not gonna wipe a nasty from their face and be incensed and crazy and come at me. That's the only way. If I square off, you could do a single, you could do anything. It's never gonna be my hand. Bruce Lee's attack by draw. And I said, you know, I've had enough of you. And then I'll say something about his race and spit in his face. And he's gonna wipe and go. And he's gonna wipe, I go. And then I start winning real quick. Because the second, it's just you know anything about pool? Pool? Pool. Billiards. A little. Very little. Do you have you heard the term running the table? Of course. You run the table. That's the only sport in what I do, it's the same. The only sport, I don't have to give the guy a turn. If the Celtics score a point, what do they have to do? Now it's LA's turn. If LA scores a point, every time I score, I gotta give you a chance. So I sync the first ball, set up the next ball. And I know what you're gonna do, so it's unfair. It's like when the cornerback reads the quarterback and gets that interception. That's what Bruce Lee's about, intercepting. So how do you know what he's gonna do? Because of what I said, it may not work 100% of the time, but 99% of the time, if I call you a dirty whatever race you are and spit on you, you're going to wipe and go. It's not gonna be wipe and go, it's gonna be white like a deep trying to build up, try to get as much of it off your face and build up as much, even if you've been taught not to wind up, even if you've been taught shoot straight in. And you're gonna go, and as soon as you go, I go in. And then it gets dirty fast. It's knees to the groin, things that he's not used to. So immediately instead of thinking, okay, he's got me grabbed, you know, four fingers in, thumb in, he's already thinking his next move, probably his next three moves, is what he's thinking. When he gets hit in the groin, it's usually it's time to call the ref. So just making that mind not work the way it usually does. When you're on the mat, your mind, there has to be a system. Donnaher, you've heard of Donaher, he's a beast. His system, his systematic approach to things is insane. So you have pop, pop, but that's the same bite. So if I spit in your face after I just called you a dirty whatever, and I get the first shot off, I have to run the table. Now, if I don't run the table, now he's got a chance again. I have to keep him from getting that pool stick in his hand. I gotta sink them all, grab the money off the table, and be done. And that's what I practice every time. So it's gonna go into the eye, into the going to the well, he could do that too, but has he practiced it for 36 years? And it's no disrespect to anybody because the first thing, like you said, is I'm gonna try to get out of the situation. But if you're a real MMA guy, you're not gonna put yourself in that situation. And if he does, then I know he's not an MMA guy. I'm not worried about that. I'm gonna take you out because you're a dirty piece of trash if you have that much skill and you're getting into fights, because that's not me. So that's already like I said, I'm setting myself up to know whatever this guy knows, whoever taught him has got a chip on their shoulder or something. But if I don't run the table, it's the same thing. Let's say you were born and raised, lived in the same house for 30 years. You go away to the military, you're gone two years, you were born on the block. You know every mother, you spend time with them. If you come back and you were gone two years, because you went right from basic things got crazy, you went to deployment. The whole block hasn't seen you in years. If you come back, let's say there was 30 people on the block, and you say, What's up, and you greet and you go by their house to 26 of those 30 people. What do you think is gonna happen with those other four? You think they're gonna find out you were there? For sure. You think they're gonna be pissed off? For sure. They're gonna be, oh, what's up? You came and you didn't come through, you were back in town, I haven't seen you, Joey. Come on, Johnny, come on, Billy, yo, Tony, whatever you want to go by. Whoever happens to have done the dirty deed, they're gonna be pissed. So another one of my concepts is on top of running the table, is if you're in the neighborhood, say hello. So wherever I am, whether I need it or not, if my head is positioned right, it's going into your cheek. If my knee is right by your growing, after I do that, there was that shot you just heard on the table. So I'm gonna say hello. So I'm gonna stomp the top of your foot, I'm gonna hit you on the shin because the mentality is you're in the neighborhood, say hello. And every neighbor doesn't get the same hello. The house you spent every weekend at, she's gonna get a big hug, maybe lift her off the ground. That crazy neighbor who's out there mowing his lawn three times a day, you're like, there's no more into that guy gets to like one of these. So you're gonna get the groin is getting uh hey you doing and a little smack to the cheek just to get you to react. If you get stung by 40 bees, you're not gonna go like this to every other one. It's like, oh, be number one, be number seven, be number five. No, you're gonna be like this, trying to get them. So every time I touch you, you assess. So if I keep you assessing while I'm running the table, you can't get locked in. And then when so much happens, you're gonna take that, just like the computer, that little circle of death. And that's where we lead you. So, yes, you're gonna learn how to get out of guard. You're gonna learn how to stay in guard and win. You're gonna learn how to win from the bottom, and you're gonna be great at those things, and I'm gonna be great at these. I don't go disrespect you and talk and say I can do it, you, because I cannot. I can't hang with a blue belt. But then don't disrespect me because now I'm mad. And I know because you know who I am, and you saw me at the bar, and you got a chip on your shoulder, and you got your purple belt finally, and now you're gonna try to make 59-year-old Pedro look stupid. It's it's not gonna be good. Because I may just go back and just tase you, not even fight you to make you feel worse, maybe want you to come back. I'm not gonna play your game when you can't. It's a different world.

SPEAKER_00 27:15

When you said blue belt, blue belt and what? What is Brazilian jiu-jitsu. Brazilian jujitsu. Okay, so what are what are the different what are the different high-tier belts and what's the difference in skill level between them?

SPEAKER_02 27:26

You have blue belt and brazilian, and it's not my thing. I'm just going, I trained at a long time, never even got to blue. For a long time, a long time ago. So you got your blue belt, then you got your purple belt, then you got your brown belt, then you got your black belt, and you got a bunch of stripes in between. But the colors are only blue, purple, brown, black. That's it. It could take you up to three years just to get a blue, maybe five or six to get to purples. It depends on the school. But nobody's getting black belts in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in three. Eh, some people do it in three. Other people are even doing it in two and a half, but usually the ones that give it too fast are in that three-year range.

SPEAKER_00 28:00

And they probably had some type of background, martial arts background, something.

SPEAKER_02 28:03

Outside of BJJ. Yeah, exactly. BJJ, no matter what, you know, you're not getting a black belt in four years. Unless you're, I believe it was BJ Penn, uh, Lloyd Irving. There's a couple out there that did it, but again, those they're special. Your average person is gonna take, let's say, eight to ten years, but your average blue belt will smack the crap out of an average person on the street. Just an average blue belt in Brazilian jujitsu gets into a street altercation with a regular guy, the guy with the dungries and the flannel. You know, not the street fighter because he's at Walmart and he's got a shirt that says Budweiser.

SPEAKER_00 28:37

So I gotta, and the reason I'm asking some of these questions is I'm trying to set you up to where it might get some views. You're trying to set me up. No, set in a good way, good way.

SPEAKER_02 28:46

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 28:46

Prop you up. When okay, so when is when is big too big for a fight? So for example, can a hundred and ninety-eight-pound you beat up the NFL's most physical, strongest linebacker, six foot three, two hundred and sixty pounds, freak athlete, and extremely aggressive. What happens if you two get into a street fight?

SPEAKER_02 29:15

There's uh what is it called? The law of attrition. He's gonna get to a place where he's just too big. And people say, well, he's still running a 4'4 or a 4'5, even though he's 330, 360. That's stretching a little bit, but there's guys out there that are really big, for sure, but they're still really fast. But the same thing still applies. I'm not putting myself in any different situation, whether you're one pound or three million pounds. So my hands are gonna be up and I'm gonna do the same thing. Can I reach your eyes? And then after I reach your eyes, can I run the table? And then when I'm in the neighborhood, I will continue to say hello. There's more of you to hit. Where do I hit? It didn't exist, even three. I think it was been less than three, where that calf kick got popular. Hasn't been that long. And now they're wearing people out with that calf kick. So no matter how big you are, the lower I go, there's even that much more weight. So it's gonna be the same thing. I'm gonna call you a dirty whatever, I'm gonna spit in your face, you're still gonna go like this. The back of the hand, see where I'm gonna hit you, it doesn't matter how much you weigh. See, if you just knock, just make believe your grandmother's house is on fire and you're gonna knock on the door, let her know. You're banging. You're not gonna bang because you're just here. You wanna hear? So you knock on that door as hard as you can. Do that to your back of your hand. Just try that as hard as you can. Hit the back. No, what are you doing? Hit it. He's like, no, never mind. So once I hit the back of your hand, because I poked your eye and your hand is here, and I can go this with the knuckles, you're gonna go just like what he's doing it, right? He goes like this. Now, this finger or this one is gonna get broken. How fat could his finger be? So it's never 195 pound, 998 pound Pedro versus 325-pound football player. It's 198-pound Pedro versus six-ounce finger versus almost one pound, even if you got bare paws, hand versus a couple ounces eye. So it doesn't matter if he's three, four, six, eight, twelve hundred. His athleticism doesn't matter either. Because you can't lift weights with the back of your hand, your eye, your throat. It was all the basic stuff, but the back of the hand, nobody teaches that. It's beautiful and it hurts bad. It hurts bad.

SPEAKER_00 31:25

I guess the taller they are, too, the easier it probably is to hit them in the groin. Like if he's six foot ten.

SPEAKER_02 31:31

And the sternum, just the straight Bruce Lee punch, that one inch punch he taught, you can you can generate a lot of power from a short distance, and you just hit the sternum and you know no one's gonna get hit in the sternum, and you see the reaction. Remember, I was I told you before I was gonna tell you a crazy story. This is the perfect spot for it. I would go to rest stops. This one is almost as good as the one I did with the Trespass After Warning. And I was wondering why is it I remember maybe once having caught my dinger in the zipper. But has every man in the world done that? Or how much do they fear it? That you will always see before a man pulls up his zipper, the hips go back. You will never see a man pull forward. So I was like, is this true? So I would go to a rest stop because people go in and out of a rest stop. I could stay there all day. Nobody's gonna know. The guy that walked in and peed now is gone. Now. Now there's a new guy. They don't know I'm chilling. So I'm chilling, watching crotches and hips. And the crotch doesn't want to get caught in the zipper, hips go back, hips go back, hips go back, and time after time, because I used to travel up. I told you it was in Orlando and out here. I hit a red stop, I'm like, let's stop. Are you tired already, puppy? My wife would say, and I'm like, no, we gotta, we gotta check some hips. She's like, you need help, bro. You need some Jesus in your life. Go. I'm gonna go to the vending machine. So she'd hit the vending machine, and I'm sitting there, you know, I it wouldn't that long. In the beginning, I would do 15, 20, 30 minutes. Then it would be only like four or five minutes, and you'll see seven or eight guys, and every time the hips go back, butt goes about. So either the fear is there that they're gonna catch their zipper or it has been caught. So you start knowing these things, the psyche of a person, and as soon as you go for the groin, you know they're gonna go forward. If I hit your throat, so I know if I hit your eye, you're on the beach and the sand starts blowing immediately. Nobody just goes like this and stays there. You're gonna turn, you're gonna do this. If I poke you in the eye, you're gonna take the closest hand to me and do that. Because you want that threat away, but you still gotta cover that eye. If you show me this, you're telling me to break this finger. Am I gonna tell you this one? You're gonna have to buy the video. No, why it's this one. This finger is the finger to break. Proven scientific, best finger to break if you wanna the ring finger. Yeah. If you want to make that hand. You buy the book. Right. Huh? I'll buy the book. I'll buy the book. It might be a video. I don't like to read it. But the situation is we don't like to hear it as a martial artist, as a self-defense instructor, that these guys figured stuff out and they're gonna tell you that, you know, he's just crazy. But do any of you guys remember who's Socrates' teacher was or who Plato's teacher was? They were called self with a deed, self-dedact of something. Deities? I don't know. Self-taught.

SPEAKER_00 34:14

Oh.

SPEAKER_02 34:14

And somebody became the first professor. You said, You're a professor. Somebody got to tell someone you're a master at this. So it becomes a point. I'm not saying I'm Socrates, I'm not saying I'm Bruce Lee. I'm not saying I'm, you know, any of those guys back from the past that were, you know, and then they're super famous now. I'm better. But enough about me, let's talk about you. We don't have the right mentality about most of the things we do. We just we follow along, you know, the 1492 thing. So when it comes to self-defense, there's things that will help you set up to run the table. Then after you run the table, you say hello to every single neighbor in town and you just don't stop. You just don't stop, you just don't stop.

SPEAKER_00 34:52

Is is there any, and I'm talking to the very casual person here, somebody who's never thrown a punch in their life, somebody that's um never done any type of self-defense training. Is there specific advice if someone could just hear something from you right now that would help them today? Is there something different that you would tell a woman versus a man?

SPEAKER_02 35:13

Oh, absolutely. Okay. Absolutely. If I'm gonna tell a man, well, it depends if he's gonna come to my class or it's I'm never gonna see you. Give me advice that I can use. Yeah, today I'm never gonna see.

SPEAKER_00 35:25

I get into it today, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_02 35:26

Okay. Every man needs to watch how he walks, and every woman needs to see and watch who she's walking with. A man needs to watch how he walks, and a woman needs to watch who she's walking with.

SPEAKER_00 35:40

Unpack that, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:41

Unpack that. So I'm walking down the street. Everybody knows what your gait is, how you walk. Does he look down? Does he look this way? Does he look that way? Presentation, chin. Where's your chin? Where are your shoulders? Are you looking around? Do you say hello to people, give them a nod so they know you've made contact? If you're thinking about doing something to me, now you're gonna be a little more aware. For a woman, you asked me that has zero experience, you gotta be walking with that guy. Meaning, again, women, if your mindset is to let that clown put his hands on you and you're still there for round two and round three, you're not walking with the right person. If you let somebody hit you, if you let somebody talk to you bad, if you just anything negative and you allow that in your life, you will not be good at self-defense because you don't have enough self-love. So when you as a woman are walking with that right man or woman, it doesn't matter, whatever floats your boat, I don't care. That's none of my business, you know, it's your personal business.

SPEAKER_00 36:37

Usually there's a more masculine one, so there you go.

SPEAKER_02 36:40

So now you have the man walking a certain way. It's gonna keep him. Again, we're trying to get out of 80%. I cannot, just like BJJ, teach you to be a badass in enough time as I can teach you to walk like a bad ass. So what is it the saying? Fake it till you make it.

SPEAKER_01 36:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:58

If you look the part, look at all the news stations, if CNN says something enough times and for long enough, it becomes gospel and it can be false as hell. And even the fact, uh, the fact, fact checkers, where are they checking these facts? So I really don't know what's true and what's not, but I know what I'm living. And I can tell you if you ever see a man on the side of the road just slunched over and he's banging his head on the wall and he's making weird noises, and I'm walking down that side. You know what I'm doing next? I'm crossing the street, and most people will be the same because it's that appearance of that dude is nuts. So it's the appearance of shoulders up. All you gotta do is breathe. You don't have to have a big chest, just now you breathe in, you feel a bit, just hold it there and just breathe it out slow. And you walk it around how you doing that confidence, that gait.

SPEAKER_00 37:43

I think at the very core, tell me if you disagree, but I believe at the very foundation of a guy walking like that, you gotta be in the gym. You you gotta work out, you gotta lift weights, like you gotta be doing something, right? To eat to feel like you, you know, just to have those types of shoulders, right? So, like at the very core, if a guy isn't lifting weights, like at the very foundation of anything, I would argue lift weights four days a week. So at least you have a presence. Would you agree with that? No, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 38:17

But then you have gymn gymnasts who have good builds and swimmers who have six packs and things like that, some of the rock stars that were really skinny and tall. And it was still because of that leather jacket, the way he's walking, puts the hair in the ponytail. He may not necessarily have those wide shoulders, but he still has that presence, you know, or you know, drugs, rock and roll, this and so that rock and roll, that leather jacket, that ponytail, that also does it. And if he's walking the way he should, he doesn't need to have there's just some people that don't like the gym. But if you have all these other things in the negative or not going for you, yeah, you need to get in the gym. And you need to feel good about yourself and in whatever it is, if you're in that band, you're in that band because you like it, you like music. So you have to like something which it gives you self-love. If you don't have that self-love, you're in a you're in a pickle. But that man that takes care of himself, I'm sorry to interrupt. No, no, you're going. That man that takes care of himself shows me a lot, right? If the man takes care of his hands, if the man takes care of his hair, if the man takes care of his beard, it's neatly trimmed, it's not all over the place. That's a guy I want to train with, that's the guy I want to learn from, that's the guy I want to listen to. You know, if you didn't have enough time to comb your hair this morning, what is that telling me? You're either out too late or you're not sleeping enough. It's telling me something that's negative. What am I gonna do again at the end of the day to make you want to hear my message? I look the part, I sound the part, I've done it, I've lived it, the magazine covers, wherever it is that I've been, that people gave me a letter of recognition. What am I gonna do to further myself, to help you further yourself in just that chain? But again, it comes back to you, like you're saying, how am I gonna listen to this ninth degree? It happens in traditional martial arts, not so much in BJJ, but in traditional martial arts, the guy hits eighth, ninth dime, he's got a gut out to ear, his belt is two little nubs because he's a size five when he got the belt 18, 19 years ago, and now they just become big and fat and complacent. I mean, like I was telling you, I just turned 59. I don't look it, I don't feel it, and I'm never gonna live it. I'm gonna live like I'm in my 30s always. When I was in my 20s, I was out of control. But my 30s, I'm gonna remember those times, and that's what I want to do.

SPEAKER_00 40:24

How so I noticed for me when I started the first time I ever did anything combat was I started five years ago and I started boxing. And I noticed, you know, in the course of you know, two years, it's a night and day difference just with my my movement and everything and protection. And then the past year I've been incorporating more MMA into it, you know, knees, elbows, and just even doing that over the past year, I can just feel the night and day difference, right? You know, I thought I was tough um four years ago, and today all I realize is how not tough I actually am, the more I've learned, if that makes sense, right? So the reason I'm asking you that is how long would it take someone, typically, the average person, you know, goes to the gym three days a week. The average athletic person, how long would it take someone to become self capable of some decent self-defense?

SPEAKER_02 41:23

It's kind of a little bit loaded. I did that on purpose. You're saying average person. Average person.

SPEAKER_00 41:29

All right, so you're talking about an old man, five foot nine, 160 pounds, played soccer in high school, works out three days a week.

SPEAKER_02 41:37

So not a Jim Carrey or a Jerry Lewis or a Van Damme or a uh we're not talking about Atkins or Yeah, some knucklehead uh tries to jump him for some reason, take some, take his wallet.

SPEAKER_00 41:53

He just wants to defend it.

SPEAKER_02 41:54

The average person, with what I do, I would say if it's a person that could throw a baseball pretty straight and it's not gonna be off by 15 feet, he throws a football and it doesn't go a hundred feet over someone's head. Your average person, six to nine months top. Tops. Six to nine months.

SPEAKER_00 42:10

Not long at all.

SPEAKER_02 42:11

No. But the problem is, and people ask me, and I get this, so the question is kind of great because people will ask me, oh, Pedro, you know, when you do seminars, you talk too much. And I'm like, do you understand that in anything you do this that way? Do you know that when you go to medical school, it's more theory than practice? Absolutely by far. When we did driver's ed and we thought we were gonna be scooting around the parking lot in go-karts, and you end up taking driver's ed because you thought it was gonna be cool and it's three-quarters theory and not practical. It's the same thing. I can teach a monkey. There is literally, if you search, I hope it's still up, it's up 10 years ago, it's a monkey, a chim, that breaks boards, gets out of bear hugs, knows the forms in Taekwondo. He is a black belt. This dude gave the monkey a black belt because again, sayings that we say we don't pay attention. Monkey see, monkey do, he can't conceptualize, he can't fight. Well, actually, a lot of monkeys can fight, but he can't fight taekwondo. If you put him in a competition, you wouldn't know. But if you show him a low block, he'll do it, a high block, he'll do it, a middle block, he'll do it, break it out of the bear hug. So I can teach it to a monkey. But you have to listen to me. So this is what happens. They don't want to listen to me because they want more techniques. It's like the show me state. Show me, show me, show me, gimme, gimme, gimme how many techniques you guys have in your system with the black belt. Why why is this quantity thing having anything? It's it doesn't quantify, it should be quality, not quantity. So the problem is that there's so much stuff out there that's junk. So getting back to the question, because I will get off like I always do on a wrong tangent. I'm gonna take this funnel of stuff and just bring it up to here. And then I have to be able to read you a little bit and be like, okay, you're a good boxer, but this is the route we're gonna take. So you can defend yourself. You're shorter, stockier. This is I'm not saying go to the ground, but you'd probably be better there if you know there's not more than one person involved with these things. I'd rather you not be on there, but I'm not gonna teach. You had to be a snappy boxer when you're that stocky guy, you look like the wrestler. So if you follow the lead, but if you want to start doing what you like, how you like it, and not taking the experts, if you told me X, Y, and Z in marketing, that's what I'm gonna do. But if you're gonna ask me, then go ahead and do it. And that's where a lot of people fail. But if you follow the script, follow your body type and follow the you need a blueprint and a roadmap. The blueprint is gonna tell you what to do. Then the roadmap's gonna get you there. And you'll see a lot of things. Oh, the roadmap to this, and they're selling and marketing and the blueprint to that. Well, you need them both. You need the blueprint and the roadmap. And when you have both of those things and you pay attention and you just spend as much time as you would, your average TikTok person is probably putting hours a week in for sure. If you have a seven-day week, you're not in a hospital or something, and you're doing your thing, going to work, coming home, probably in a seven-day period, you're doing four hours of TikTok. If you do four hours of jujitsu, four hours of tactical self-defense, six to nine months. And then you just follow those concepts. You're gonna run the table when you're in the neighborhood, say hello, you're gonna go for the eyes, then the hands, and the throat, then the boy. If you if you chamber something, it should hit twice before it chambers again. There isn't a one-two, it's a one-two. Half beats. And it's fast, it really is. I mean, it doesn't take that long, but most systems have so much stuff. Like you got to learn the terminology in that language: Korean, Japanese, Chinese, learn how to tie the belt, learn some of the lineage. You know, who was Helio Gracie? Who was Carlos Gracie? Who is this? I don't care about any of that. You know, who was Christopher Columbus? It's part of the same thing, it's just unneeded stuff. Somebody grabs you like this, do this.

SPEAKER_00 45:40

I'm gonna butcher this name, but uh uh, what is it called? Cum de gra? Cum de gra? How do you say that? Krav Maga? Krav. You know where my mind's at, right? Krav de Gras. Krav Maga. Krav Maga.

SPEAKER_02 45:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:55

Is Krav Maga something that's incorporated in your training?

SPEAKER_02 45:59

It says so on my website because my website guy doesn't know what he's doing. He thought it would be cool, but no.

SPEAKER_00 46:04

Okay. Uh why is it not and what's the difference?

SPEAKER_02 46:08

What we were talking about before, the legal aspect. I don't think they teach enough of it has to be street dependable and it has to be court defendable. And that's my own saying, so obviously, hopefully they're not going to steal it. But it has to have both. You just can't teach a bunch of stuff and then throw people out there and hope it works. You know, I don't, my personal opinion, and then again, that's might not be all instructors, but from what I have seen, they will teach, I don't know, whatever it is, 80 plus percent just tactical, strategical, you know, stab, hit, punch, hit with a club or a bat. It's cool, it makes sense, but you're not keeping people safe. And the thing is, in any system, that there's no such thing, anybody who believes that, and I don't want to piss off the traditionalists, that martial arts started, people say, oh, it wasn't in China, it was in India, or it wasn't in India, it was here. Well, you look at the world, however you want, if you want to look at it as flat or as a globe, there's no way that someone here that was doing their Indonesian whatever. You got the guy down here going, oh, can't wait for those Indonesians to get here. We're tired of getting raped. I mean, these women are really taking it, and you're doing nothing about it. So you're telling me cavemen didn't know how to pick up a rock and hit somebody and figure out, even though it didn't have a name, that if I cut the femoral, they bleed out, or if I cut it on both sides, even better, or the karate, and that that started somewhere, that they learned how to do Kode Gaesh, and from here it moved here, and these guys were just getting their villages destroyed, and they're hoping and praying that you know Mr. Miyagi's gonna get there soon, is just a lie. Martial arts was everywhere when they're like, oh, they stole that from nobody stole from nothing. That's just you know, if you grab somebody by the neck, what happens, and then you teach the next guy, the next guy, and the next guy. It happened everywhere. So Karab Magaz got a bunch of stuff from a bunch of places, not martial arts, because martial arts started before it was called martial arts. They put stuff together, then named it. It didn't work. They didn't say, oh, martial arts. That's a cool word. Let's take this stuff. They did stuff and it was like, wow, this stuff, what is this? Oh, martial arts. I grab you like this, I cut you like this, I put the sword here, I go you rah-rah-rah, I give you a belt. See, that didn't exist either. So it's just again, the wrong education. So Krav Maga, nothing wrong with it, but it just took a bunch of stuff from a bunch of places. You know, uh, I think his name was what was his name? Emy Lichfield. Something, I'm probably butchering it. He did some boxing, he did some wrestling, got a gig in the military, and then put it together there. It's not like there was Krav Maga and we're gonna go teach it somewhere. It just became, and again, I'm gonna get a lot of flack from the Krav guys, but it's what it is.

SPEAKER_00 48:49

Let me let me do some rapid fire questions, kind of do like short, quick responses, right? Um, you know, um what's the number one mistake people make in a street fight?

SPEAKER_02 49:00

The number one mistake? Hesitation.

SPEAKER_00 49:03

If someone grabs you from behind, what's the first thing you should do? Hit them in the groin. Bottom fist to the back. If someone pulls a knife, should you run or fight?

SPEAKER_02 49:13

Run.

SPEAKER_00 49:16

What's the most dangerous self-defense myth people believe?

SPEAKER_02 49:21

You can disarm a knife. I thought it would have been, I'm bigger than you, I can beat you up. No. No, because you get beat up, but if you make the mistake with a knife, that's the that's why it's the most dangerous. If you make a mistake with a big guy, you lose a fight. If you make a mistake with a knife, you lose a kidney, or you lose liver, or you lose your life. Yeah, there's no such thing as disarming a knife. Unless, again, the guy doesn't know how to use a knife. A trained knife guy, most dangerous thing you could do is think you could take it.

SPEAKER_00 49:50

How about, okay, so how much did Bruce Lee weigh? He was he was slight.

unknown 49:56

He was probably 140, 145.

SPEAKER_00 49:58

Okay, so Bruce Lee, 140 pounds, versus the 10th ranked UFC guy at 140. Who wins that fight?

SPEAKER_02 50:07

In the ring around the street.

SPEAKER_00 50:08

Street. Bruce. Whoa. Unpack that. Bruce.

SPEAKER_02 50:14

His finger jab was so incredible. And his headbuts, knees, and elbows. What happens is this the guys that have trained with Guru Dan and Paul Vunak, who know the real stories of what he was training and why he trained it, he'd look into things to see how he could beat them, and look, meaning arts. So let's digress. He would look into a martial art to see okay, what do I need to do to beat this art? What can I take from this art for me? And he would put it in. He said the best things were headbuts, knees, and elbows. And his mindset was to fight. It wasn't he did the movies because he wanted to be the best actor. That's was his thing, not only to be an actor, but one of the best ever. So he took stuff that he needed for movies, four movies, and the street was the street. And he was just an extremely, extremely relaxed person. That there was no anger. So, meaning if you were to kick him in the nuts, he'd be like, all right, good shot. Now it's my turn, because that's their job. And people will do that. The second you call them a name or do something, anger. You hit him in the groin, anger. You bite him, anger. You don't, you just like I said, relax, bat, and just go to the next thing, give them this number, you know. But that's how simple it is. Just stay calm. Those other guys won't stay calm. And he was just too damn fast, just too fast. And speed equals power. His technique was crisp, his technique was fast, and he's going to the right points. And then again, we're talking the street. You just a build G to the eyes, just you're not gonna beat it. And he his his build G was unstoppable.

SPEAKER_00 51:46

So you think Bruce Lee 140 pounds versus the top-ranked MMA 140-pound guy, you think Bruce gets him too?

SPEAKER_02 51:55

Wow. On the street. Now we're talking about on the street. Yeah, totally different mindset. Now, I don't know how deep he was into that mindset because I can just tell you what people said about him. I could talk about myself, and I'll tell you, it's say I graduated high school$1.32, 33, wrestled 132. I was a skinny run. I hit about 40 and I was like, you know, I'm sick of being skinny. I was still about a buck 60 when I was 45 years old. I didn't lift my whole life. I wasn't ever big. I still don't consider myself big. I was big when I did steroids for one cycle. I don't know if any of you guys know what Bacney is. Don't do it, bro. It was so bad the Bacney and the oil. I was like, so I got off the stuff and then I was like, what do I do? I gotta grow. So I take Shila J, Tongara Ali, Fa Doja, Maka, Muira Puama. I mean, all the stuff that I'm on, and then my protein and carbs are timed right so I can grow because otherwise I will lose weight and mass just so fast. But yeah, at 140 pounds, it doesn't matter how I'm unless, again, you're talking about that perfect maybe 195 to 200, where the guy's pretty massive but kind of fast. But it's just again, Bruce was just so damn fast.

SPEAKER_00 53:06

So I trained with my my buddy Ian, and I love it because he'll he's kind of been upping the aggression. And I think the reason why he's been doing it with me is he wants me to know what it feels like to actually be in a fight a little bit. You know, two weeks ago he he punched me so hard in my stomach I couldn't keep going. I said I was like, woof, shorted. I said, woof. I said I said, I can we just give me a little break, and uh, but but what it made me realize is how important it is to defend my my stomach, but also how uh disabilitating it could be if I land one myself, right? And and the other day it was funny, I I got a little aggressive with him. I was like, you know what? I think I'm a little bigger and stronger than him. I go, and he's a capable dude, he's probably he's probably my height, probably 215. I'm I'm about six foot two fifty-five. But I was like, you know, let me just let me just muscle him a little. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, exactly. And I got him down to the ground pretty good, and he got me in a guillotine so fucking quick, bro. I was just he was choking me out like crazy. And uh, and I didn't realize he wasn't gonna let go until I tapped, but it didn't even hit me. So he's just strangling the shit out of me, and I'm just going out. And I go, Oh, yeah, that's right. He's MMA. I went like this. And what another thing he helped me do is he goes, get up, keep fighting, keep fighting, keep fighting. So I'm literally seeing stars, bro. Stress inoculation, seeing stars, and he's like, No, he goes, What this could be real, this could be real, and he had me keep going, going for another, you know, maybe 30 seconds or so. But um, the more I've learned in combat sports, it's almost it's the most humbling thing ever. You actually realize how tough you aren't, right? So it's almost like the better you get, the more you realize how how uh unequipped you actually really are. So um, but dude, I appreciate you coming on. This was this was fun. This was really fun. We we got a solid hour and a half here um in here. We got a lot of good content for you. What I want you to do uh over the next minute or so is I just want you to look in the camera and you know, if somebody who are you interested in potentially working with, and let us know who that person is or that group is. And if they are interested in potentially working with you and learning more about you or reaching out to you, where can they find you?

SPEAKER_02 55:30

Anyone who's looking for reality-based practical self-defense is what our main concern is. You just want to learn how to defend yourself, not and even if you've had a bad situation, it's not about I want to learn it so I can get back at my ax. It's about don't let it happen ever again. Don't come to me with vengeance, because I've had people do that before, looking to get back. Now you learn some techniques, you're gonna go to your old boyfriend's apartment and rip them to pieces. But if you truly want to learn how to defend yourself, reality-based stuff, working off what you have, working off what's meant for you, what you're built for. We have a school in Boynton Beach, we have videos, we have an online program. COVID proved to us that you can learn from the video. A lot of people say you can't learn from the video with the right mindset, a couple of what's that, voice uh video messages, whatever they call them. You can get some good training. So you do the videos, you do some online training, come to our academy that's at Boynton Beach. But the easiest way is check us out on the bestmartial artspointonbeach.com. Bestmartial artspointonbeach.com. Go on there and then you'll go to the different pages, the online stuff. We have some great retreats we do in Panama and different countries. And as long as you're looking for pure self-defense, you know, everything we've said here, it's it's it's all in fun. But if you're looking to defend yourself, you have to believe in something. And uh MMA is great, judo jujitsu, hapkido, who flung dunk, they're all good. It's just you gotta find it, it's in there somewhere. Get someone to help you out with that. It doesn't necessarily have to be me, but you have to learn something because when it's time to need it and you don't have it, it's scary and it's sad. Some of it'll stick with you forever. Not having been able to help your son or your daughter or help yourself because you didn't take a couple of months of self-defense, so it's basically that simple, man.

SPEAKER_00 57:16

That was awesome. What one of the better interviews I've had in a while, man. Seriously, it was fun. Um, guys, thanks again for watching the Gold Coast podcast. I'm your host, Eric Weingard. Uh, make sure to like and subscribe and forward this on to someone who you think might find some value. We'll see you again.