Posts by Mick O'Brien

MY FAMILY THE CARNIVAL

From day 1, April 11th 1994 when I first opened the doors of Senshido at the arrogant age of 24, I’ve attracted some of the best humanity has to offer to surround me across the never ending journey. It’s what set us apart.  If you were a misfit, if you felt alone, if you felt like you didn’t belong anywhere and were or are regarded as the proverbial ‘black sheep’, a freak, deemed ‘insane’ or just felt completely out of place amongst the norms; you had a home with us at Senshido. For the most part, Senshido and I attracted […]

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Top 10 Safety tips

Having been contacted by many organisations, newspapers and radio stations asking about safety tips, and knowing that not everyone can make it to a seminar or self defence class, I have decided to put this together to share with everyone. None of this information belongs to any one person, group, or organisation, but it is what we teach at Senshido seminars. This is not about self defence, a term I use loosely (The very term ‘self defence’ implies that I’m already a victim that is in the process of defending myself, a reactive act) but more about self-protection (Becoming a hard target through […]

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INTEGRITY VS COMMERCIALLY VIABLE SELF PROTECTION PROGRAMS

First, this is my personal opinion, if the shoe fits.. wear it. Real self protection, admittedly is not “palatable”. The potential purchaser clings to a perception acquired in the media, TV and cinema. The topic makes him uncomfortable, the real issues makes him uncomfortable. In other words, serious self protection training is a nightmare to market. What I loved about my situation is that I never banked on my teaching to make a comfortable living. So I taught it raw, honestly and if I went months without students …. no problems. If John Q. Public did not like the syllabus? […]

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DISTURBING TREND… ARE WE MAKING THE “SHREDDER STUPID” AKA WHEN THE SHREDDER GOES AGAINST THE 5PS OF SENSHIDO?

Huh? During my experimentation with bladed and blunt weapons, this phenomena would happen….  When a guy had a tool, it became his fixation to use it. He forgot everything he learnt about unarmed combat and he basically only worked his “tool”…. ignoring and /or forgetting to integrate all his other hand to hand skills. Well… dunno how to break it to you folks but watching clips after clips the same is happening to the shredder. First thing first, to my dismay, the attackers are too often looking to anchor a ‘shred” and the guy who is the “victim” passes 3 […]

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Happy birthday Senshido

April 11th 1994, I opened Senshido International. It’s been 21 years exactly this weekend and the journey has been nothing short of a pure mind blowing adrenaline ride.  It feels like I’ve lived 7 different lifetimes in those 21 years. I was told I was never going to make it by most everyone. I was told I was too young to operate a martial arts school especially in the oversaturated city of Montreal at the time, there were a total of 9 different martial arts schools within an 8 block radius from where I opened, some of them with already […]

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THE 5 PRINCIPLES OF PHYSICAL RETALIATION: REBOOTED

The 5 Principles of Physical Retaliation AKA “The Shredder” Once struck, there are generally 5 different reactions a human being will have after getting struck.  The individual who has been struck can react in one or more of these ways.  In no particular order they are: To create distance.The individual hit will back up and move away to regroup or protect themselves. To clinch.The individual will close the distance and latch on defensively to the other who hit him. To counter strike.The individual struck strikes back immediately (with or without a weapon), no quarter given on the counter. Drops semi or fully […]

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More traditional than traditional arts.

What we commonly refer to as traditional arts, at their origin, probably looked more like what we do at senshido. Those centuries old arts were without a doubt, a product of their environment. For sure developed with an eclectic methodology, and were quite functional in the socio-cultural context of their application. Just like us. Believe it or not, we probably use the same “exploration/experimentation patterns as they did 500 years ago. It simply had to work…. For example, traditional Japanese weapons… Tonfas, sais, kamas…nunchuks… more… were used simply because swords and weaponery was illegal in the hands of simple peasants. […]

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Don’t drink the Coolaid

In any sports, the drilling and technical work, mirrors the kinetic signature of the movement patterns used. I got to lie down after writing this sentence. It is simply common sense. Yet… In the wonderful world of martial arts, regular pedagogical principles don’t seem to apply. Another fucking fancy word.. sounds like gynecological… oh well sue me. Here’s an example, I saw a karate class spend 20 minutes doing gedan barai (downward block) and when the sparring started, a student blocked a low kick using the move and it failed. The teacher jumped in action and said with a straight […]

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Perspective

Perspective: Recently I came around a clip where a man disarmed a mugger who was asking him for his wallet at gun point. Wow!!!! Success no? Here’s the catch, he did it in a public place, surrounded by other commuters. He wasted no time grabbing the gun and torquing it out of the guy’s hand. In the process, the muzzle pointed in many directions, including himself and the other commuters. Pardon me if I don’t jump up to congratulate the hero who in the process of saving his wallet and maybe his portable, exposed himself and sadly others to an […]

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The Malevolent preacher is back

So those of you who were familiar with the old Senshido forum  no doubt will remember Marc Ste Marie, also known as The Malevolent preacher (MP). Its been a long time since MP has made an appearance on any senshido forum or website so heres the good news,  Well hes back!  So lets get the discussions started. Welcome to his first post.   Hmmmm Let’s start this thing with a statement gentle readers… If you had to fight a guy off, don’t be too quick to celebrate. The reasons you got to that point was a succession of screw ups, […]

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Coming soon…Senshido’s Fundamentals of personal protection

Coming soon…. Senshido’s Fundamentals of personal protection is Senshido’s core concepts seminar. It is a prerequisite to any and all Senshido seminars. Your journey into the Senshido philosophies and teachings start right here!This seminar is suitable for the complete beginner to the experienced martial artist, be it traditional or combative martial arts.The Fundamentals delves deep into the Senshido core principles of self defense giving you the foundation for recognising and understanding confrontation and violence, as well as teaching you the skills to defuse and the strategies & tools to defend against. Offering the participants various strategies and formulas to avoid violence and […]

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Competition

Senshido Ireland is now moving to a permanent location in Dublin where we will be offering weekly Senshido classes and structured courses. We will also be offering weekly ‘functional combative fitness classes‘. These classes will be run by our fitness instructors who are all military physical training instructors certified by the Defence Forces School of Physical Culture and possess the National Certificate in Exercise and Fitness, and diet and nutrition as awarded by The University of Limerick. This will give you a unique opportunity to learn and train the entire Senshido  protective offence and functional combative fitness curriculum. We will […]

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