 Body language can be one of the most expressive forms of communication when it comes to not only the martial arts but everyday life. Sometimes a person may say something verbally but their body is conveying a completely different message altogether. Now when it comes to self defense or perhaps trying to avoid aggression, learning how to read body language is an extremely effective skill. So today we're going to talk about just a few points and throw out some ideas and give you some tips on how to improve in your own ability to read body language. So in this topic we're kind of going to look at it from three different perspectives. Before a fight occurs, during a fight, and in your own body language. If you think a fight's going to occur or if somebody's starting to act in a threatening manner or you're getting suspicious, watch their behavior because a lot of times there's some tells that will let you know if they're getting more aggressive, if they're getting angrier, or if an attack is imminent. So there's a bunch of telltale signs you can watch out for this. One, if the person starts narrowing their eyes. If you talk to a person and their eye rate, and the more you talk to them, they start narrowing their eyes a little bit and more intense focus. That's an early sign of potential agitation. Also they start jaw clenching and there's a jaw clench and like the trust in the chin out. That's a sign of aggression as well because they've taken a stance of one subconsciously they're looking down the bridge of the nose at you, it's kind of more of a superiority gaze and the clenching is a sign of tension that combined with the eyes and also sometimes there's a chest puff out. The person starts taking a stance like that, they start puffing up and they start glaring you down. Be careful, they're elevating, their agitation and their aggression level is escalating. Also an obvious sign is if you start seeing them clench their fists. Now here's another one, a subtle one, but very important. People are very expressive with their feet. A direction that people's feet are pointed can tell you a lot of different things. Let me take this into a different scenario. You're at a party and it can be said a lot, you've talked to a lot of people who study like networking and psychology of social settings. Say you walk up to two people who are having a conversation in the party. If their feet are aimed directly at each other, they're engaged with each other. Generally that means they're not really interested in outside perspectives, they're in a conversation. But a lot of times they might be talking in an open stance with their feet pointed outward that subconsciously generally means that there's an opening there to jump in and contribute. In a situation like this, you can kind of look at the feet similar. If a person's got their feet pointed directly at you and they're not moving, they're kind of focused on you, they're engaged on you. So if you've got their feet kind of in their direction, in your direction and they're clenched and they're narrowing their eyes and they're puffing up, these are all signs. It's kind of like an animal that gives signs of being territorial or about a sign of attack. Humans have the same kind of habits, you just have to know what signs to look for. They might start doing this, they might start what's called blading the body or turning their centerline away. This is a sign that they're kind of getting ready. They're putting a strong side forward or they're putting a side forward. They're starting to cover up their vitals. Their hands might be up, they might be in a defensive position like this, they might already be in a position like this. They start taking the stance with these other signs. These are all telltale signs that they are escalating and you're going to want you to diffuse the situation or find a way to get out of it because it's only building up, pressure is building up. Some of the more subtle telltale signs to watch out for, one is listen to how they're talking to you. If they give a response and it seems unemotional or forced, that might not be sincere. If you bump into somebody by accident and maybe they spill the beer a little bit, you're like, oh dude, I am so sorry. If they go, hey, nope, no worries about it, we're all good. That's one thing. If they're all like, yeah, no worries. Or if they're real serious or if it seems forced, it's a sign that they're agitated, they're upset. If they start kind of adjusting clothes, being fidgety sometimes and adjusting themselves is a subconscious way of kind of a mental preparation that they might try something, especially if they start rolling up sleeves, that's not as subtle, but just watch if they start adjusting their clothes. And speaking of adjusting things, see if they start touching your stuff. Sometimes they might want to try to control your environment, so they might walk over where you are and maybe move a chair out of the way, or if you've got a bag, they might nudge it through your foot or take your beer glass or whatever and kind of shove it. If they start touching your stuff, this is a dominant thing. They're trying to exert control over you and your environment. Watch out for this. This is telling you something. This is body language you need to pay attention to. And if they keep getting close to you, we all have personal boundaries. Most of us feel very uncomfortable when a person is in our personal space. So somebody keeps encroaching on your space like that, this is a sign of aggression. This is a sign of dominance. Either they're trying to intimidate you or they're trying to position themselves into a more advantageous position for themselves. So when you think a situation might be building up before a fight, these are all signs to look at. Their body language, their facial looks, their tension in their jaw, the way they speak, their feet, the way they stand, they turn their body towards you or they turn their body away from you but their feet are towards you, they start touching your stuff. These are all signs they're telling you they're unhappy, they're angry at you, and they want to smash your face. So be prepared. So a few things to keep in mind if they're getting close to you. And I'm talking about, you know, they're not across from not necessarily nose to nose, but they're starting to get within a couple feet of you. If they start getting close to you and they start to look away and their feet are still pointed towards you, watch out. This is very often the sign of a sucker punch. There's a lot of times people will turn away and they'll come back either with a wild hand maker or a cross. If they start doing that, if they start looking in other directions, if they start actually turning their body, it's one thing. So if their feet are facing towards you and their upper body just starts to move, don't fall for that. Just have your guard up. Be ready because there's a good chance something unexpected might come in. This is an important one. Somebody comes up to you and they're getting close and their hands are down and they've got a hand behind their back or they're kind of obstructing the view of one hand. Watch out. There's a very good chance they're holding the weapon. It could be a knife. It could be something else. Weapons get really, really hard and are very difficult to deal with, especially at close range. In particular, are incredibly dangerous. So if you see somebody getting close to you and they're hiding one of their hands, keep an eye on that hand. Be ready to respond if that hand starts to move because there's a good chance they're holding something they're going to try to use against you. It could be an intimidation tactic, but again, obstructing something from your view is a major red flag. Take it seriously. You know, it's always good to take. If you're starting to feel threatened like this, there's always good measures that you can take. You yourself can take this sideways stance. Man, I don't want any trouble. Or, you know, just get into position or arms folded, not necessarily folded amongst each other, but where they're up. So if something happens, you can bring your hands up in quick defense. So you've got your own measures you can take. If you start to see these signs build up, take precautions because there's a good chance something's coming. All right, so say you get to the point you can't avoid anymore. It's been clear now. They've made it very clear they want to fight and they assume a fighting stance. There's a lot you can tell from a person's fighting stance, but very important. Never, ever, ever assume what that person knows. You never want to assume a person has any more knowledge or less knowledge than you because no matter what you've learned, no matter what you've practiced, there's always somebody out there who's better. It may or may not be this person, but you don't know this person. So don't assume that they are not a threat to you. Or don't assume because you recognize the fighting stance of a particular art and you think that art is BS that they can't use it effectively. Take it seriously. But that being said is sometimes there are telltale signs that you can use to your advantage. If you can recognize maybe a potential discipline they might be fighting in. So for example, if they've got their bodies and their hands are up and their elbows are in tight and their knees are bent and their chin's tucked in and their shoulders are kind of squirt up and maybe they're kind of bobbing around a little bit. They might have a level, they might be an experienced street fighter. They might have a level of boxing. Boxers tend to also kind of stay light on their feet and they're not worried about kicks so much so that their feet are more torn, turned away, center lines turn away but those hands are up and those elbows are in. You see this stance, this person's a striker. So if you take that similar stance as a boxing stance but maybe notice that the front leg is turned slightly towards you and they do more of a rock on the front and the back and the hands are up and they're shifting their weight, there's a good chance they might have some experience with Muay Thai. If you feel this person has some experience with Muay Thai, you not only have to watch out for those punches but there's a good chance they have some powerful kicks as well. Speaking of kicks, if someone is Taekwondo student perhaps they're keeping a little bit more distance from you, maybe they're staying light on their feet, they might have a little bit of a balance, maybe hands might not be up here in this position, maybe they're a little bit lower. Watch out because they might be keeping you at a certain distance on purpose for some powerful kicks. So that might be one tell-tale sign that they have some experience with that. It's not concrete but it's something to look at. So what else can we look at? If you see a person takes more of a wider stance, just a little bit, they start putting them one strongly forward, their hands are open, maybe chest level and maybe their hips are sunken a little bit and they've got a slightly forward, then there's a good chance they might have some grappling experience, Brazilian jiu-jitsu possibly. If you come across somebody in the stance and they look like they've got a steady ability and they're kind of ready to fly, watch out because if they are a grappler, they're gonna have you on that ground quick if you're not prepared for it. If the person starts facing you and maybe the shoulders are more squared up and their hands are more in the center line, there's a good chance they might practice a Chinese art, possibly Wing Chun. Try to identify a little science here and there. A Kempo stance, you know, general Kempo stance. It's basically 50, 50 weight distribution on each leg, center lines face away, hands are up. And with Kempo, usually we have one hand, the front hand is high, the rear hand is more of the middle section and our feet kind of guard the bottom. Sometimes you'll see more of the stance with the fingers out and the open hand, that's the telltale sign, they might know Kempo. And there's other karate stances too, they're similar. So this is not to say that if you see these signs, that's definitely what they practice. But if you see any definitive stances or any rocking or our hands are in certain positions, there's a good chance that person knows how to fight at least somewhat and you don't know them. They might be really, really, really good at their art or they might be terrible at their art, but you can never assume that you have the upper hand. Always assume that person's better than you and be prepared to respond to that. So now we come to telegraphing. Basically telegraphing is any small movements that tell an opponent what's coming. So for example, you're in a fighting stance, your hands are up. You know, if I wanna throw a cross punch and I load up my back hand to throw that punch, I'm telegraphing. If you know what you're doing and you see me load up like this, you know I'm gonna punch. You know I'm gonna do something. I am not giving any surprise and it's actually working against my advantage. So telegraphing are little movements that dictate or tell your opponent what's gonna happen. Look for theirs, you know. Try to find out what they're doing. Look for signs. There's been so many times I've sparred people and I see them load up or I see a hip turn for a kick and sometimes you can tell what's coming. That being said, watch out for your telegraphs because whether you think so or not, you're probably telegraphing your own movements. So just like we were talking about the fighting stance for the punch, you know, instead of loading up from here, we have something in Kempo called point of origin and I'm sure a lot of arts follow the same method is that from your little point of origin, you don't have to load up from most of your strikes. Just from here, you can just fire it. From here, you can fire it. You don't have to load and fire. It takes time, it takes extra time to use that weapon and it also tells your partner or your opponent what you're about to do. So you should be able to produce most moves from a specific position without any preloading moves before it. So watch out for any habits you might have. Now I recently had the experience of sparring a high-end Kempo instructor and besides being in incredible shape, he kicked our butts all over the room. But what was amazing was though, he was actually teaching us to telegraphs that he was fighting. He was picking the smallest hells out and used them to his advantage. For example, he was fighting one guy and he noticed that, you know, his hands were up and his hands were bobbing and a split second before he threw a punch that hand froze and it launched. He didn't load up, he didn't make it obvious but it was a small little motion freeze, half a second and he realized that was coming and he was pointed it out to everyone. So it really behooves you to pay attention and learn how to read a person's body language. Sparring is fantastic for this and sometimes when you get good at it, you can start to set up fake telegraphs if you want to faint and set up patterns that you think the other person's gonna fall for. Superfootbill Wallace is famous for this and he talks about this in his seminars. If any of you have ever been to his seminars, he teaches this concept of trying to teach your attacker, teach your opponent how to defend and you set them up for something else and he has been very successful at that. You can't be too. So use sparring as a sandbox for that. Learn how to read body language and learn how to use your body language to convey what you want to your opponent. So body language is exactly that. It's a language and as martial artists, you should learn how to speak it, read it and become fluent in it. Thank you so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. Please let me know what you think. I would love to hear any signs or telltale patterns that you've picked out in sparring or any telegraphs that you notice. People can share it below. Please share it with our community. Put it in the comments. Like and subscribe to this video. Click on the bell icon for more notifications and we will see you next time.