Toronto, Canada, Safe International Expands Women's Self Defense Lessons in Greater Toronto Area

Feb. 15, 2010 - PRLog -- Toronto, ON,  -- Safe International is the leading provider of self defense training in Canada for women and men in the private, corporate and high school settings. It currently operates throughout Ontario and is now expanding its women’s Toronto self defense lessons throughout the Greater Toronto Area. Safe International is a mobile self defense company which has taught more than 100 000 women since 1994!

Chris Roberts, teaching director, says that one of his favourite reasons for teaching women is how receptive they are to the skills that Safe provides. He attributes this to their appreciating the value in what Safe International http://www.safeinternational.biz offers. One in four women will be assaulted during their lifetime, so these skills may have very personal meaning. While most men are receptive, they are usually more interested on a different level involving the male ego and wanting to know how to fight. Women are interested in learning, based more on their survival in today’s reality. Each skill or tactic shown could potentially save their life and you can see it in the way they practice and adopt the new skills. Women have more personal reasons to learn these skills.

A major focus of the Safe course is the “Awareness and Intuition” training in which stories are shared and potentially dangerous situations are discussed such as being followed, elevator safety, taxis, dating, etc. The instructors find that women are very willing to share their stories and feelings of fear, since they don’t have the same pressure on them to be “The Man” like many men who find it a weakness to ever admit having felt fear. Chris Roberts has heard thousands of stories from his students. In a way much of the Safe course has been designed around the sharing of successes and tragedies of many of the clients.

The number one reason women tell Chris they love the course, is that it has been designed to be serious but also fun, which makes the learning experience that much more memorable. Chris once conducted a seminar for a large corporation and within the first few minutes there were literally 10 women shaking and looking unusually nervous. Chris asked the woman in charge what was going on? She indicated that they had once done a self defense course and within the first few minutes the head instructor had all the lights shut off and his assistants began grabbing the women to see how they might react. Chris was able to ease everyone’s minds. At the end of the session the women were so thankful to have been taught in a fun, yet educational manner, and felt that by using humour they would be much more likely to remember what was taught. You can refer to Chris’ blog titled “Teaching Self Defense To High School Students” at http://www.selfdefensecanada.info in which he writes about a young woman and her friend who were held up at knife point and how they remembered what to do due to his teaching style.

Chris was also invited to be the keynote speaker at the Annual Ontario Block Parents Convention. There were about 100 adults in attendance comprising of about 75 women. There were also about 25 police officers. He began his talk on how to avoid and handle potentially dangerous situations such as being followed, elevator safety, distraction techniques, etc and all the women were laughing while about 20 male police officers sat there with their arms crossed staring at him seriously. He was thinking this might not be going so well even though all the women were laughing. At one point, the senior police officer in the group stood up and asked if he could say something. At this moment Chris was thinking “Well, this is probably the end of my business and he is going to tell me not to make a joke out of personal safety”. He actually told the group of 100 or so that this was the best approach to personal safety he had ever seen! Chris spoke to the police officer after to thank him. The gentleman said that as a police officer he was sitting listening to the information and not focusing on the humour. He agreed that with the majority of the population the humour was a unique way to get the message across. This is a definite difference I find between teaching men and women.

Maybe the best proof Chris had that the use of humour was an effective and unique way to teach self defense was when he had a woman who managed a home for abused women came out to watch one of his seminars. After the course she approached him about doing a seminar at her shelter. He expressed his concern about teaching with humour and how would it go over in an intense setting like that. She said “Chris, I have never known anyone to get upset because you made them laugh. She said I notice that you make the topic fun to learn and you are not making fun of the topic”. That sealed it for Chris. It confirmed to him that he had found the perfect way to teach the topic of self defense.

Safe International offers a number of programs designed specifically for women to make them comfortable. Please refer to the Chris’ blog at http://www.selfdefensecanada.info and go the blog on “Why Take Private Self Defense Lessons” to explain why this might be the best environment to learn in or contact Chris at chris@safeinternational.biz to inquire about the “Safe Best Friends or Family Course”

Contact :
Chris Roberts
Safe International
Toronto, ON Canada
613-363-3286
chris@safeinternational.biz
http://www.safeinternational.biz