Martial Arts (A.K.A Learn to Flinch)

The reason combat sports/ fighting is one of the hardest things to learn is 1. People who have never been in a fight think they can fight and 2. You need to reprogram your brain to flinch in a whole new way.

We as humans flinch when something comes at our faces. Typically we quickly bring our hands up in front of our faces and turn our heads. In addition, we close our eyes. The first problem is, We are not actively stopping the object. second, We turn our heads away which impairs our vision. Last, but the absolute worst is we close our eyes which allows no new information to enter our brains.

Instincts are the enemy at this point. We combat instincts by lots and lots of drilling to learn the technique. The next step and the scariest is pressure testing.

Pressure testing is the sport version of whatever martial art you train. some martial arts use special names like judokas calls it "Randori", Boxers and other striking arts call it "Sparring", and Brazilian jiu-jitsu practitioners call it "Rolling".

Pressure testing is used to set those new techniques in your brain. This works because of stress. When you learn something under stress it quickly becomes muscle memory and that is how you learn to flinch correctly.