The following section  while germane to the dysfunctional behavior commonly displayed in the MA/SD/WSD/RBSD/DT world also has vital importance to your own perceptions and reacting to them -- instead of what is actually happening -- in a self-defense situation. Many people use the term self-defense without knowing what it means anyway. When the further complications that we about to address here arise, it is no small wonder that people are "arrested for attempted self-defense" It doesn't matter what you "think" you were doing, what matters is what you were "actually" doing.

There was a demonstration that was not uncommon in psychology classes in the 70's and 80's. While discussing the subjectiveness of "reality,"  perception and how complicated they can be. An unexpected and outrageous event would be staged in the classroom. After order had been restored, the students would be asked to report on "what had just happened." It was not uncommon to get forty different versions; versions that seldom were anywhere close to what had actually occurred. 

This tendency towards perceptual differences, subjective interpretation/ misinterpretation and countless other factors is the study of entire fields in psychology. Rather than inflict you with all the terms and explanation that psychology uses, we will just use the terms that we use to explain the difference.

• Actuality is what happened. It is the nuts and bolts, these are the facts, these are the events. Putting it in simple terms this is what shows up on the video tape.
• Reality is your interpretations, perceptions, assumptions, cultural indoctrination, motivations and countless other subjective elements that make up what you perceive as what happened. It is what you think occurred. "Reality" basically means all influences and interpretations that don't show up on the tape, but determine what we think is going on. While they may not have tangible form, they are critical on how we view and interact with the world. Reality can also be viewed as: This is "why" what happened on the tape occurred. 

Reality and actuality are very much intertwined, which is why most people don't recognize that there is a difference. Actuality is what it is. It is the addition of subjective and conscious factors that creates Reality. In short, our reality is how we understand and organize the complexities of existence. We make a "model" of life and operate along those guidelines. In addition, this model serves both as a means to process incoming information, but also as a filter. It not only determines what we perceive of actuality, but what it means.

Knowing the difference between reality and actuality, it is not difficult to understand why the same event can be viewed in countless different ways. And each carries radically different interpretations. Even though the actuality might be pretty cut and dried, the reality is as much influenced by what people think is going on.

And that is something people aren't going to agree on. 

Although it isn't the only influence, the actuality we live in plays a large part in determining our reality. This is one of many reasons why people's realities can be so radically different. To start with our daily "actualities" can be wildly different. The environment, culture and different social conditions that humans live in all radically effect people's "reality" and how they operate within their circumstances. This is why a person living in a large city in a Western nation will have a totally different "reality" than a nomadic African bushman. 

Even within the same nation/culture, however, different people emphasize different aspects, assign different values and believe different things; they do this to organize/cope with/explain actuality. Therefore a poor, ethnic, inner-city, drug-addicted gang member, a WASP member of an affluent trust-fund clan and a lower-middle class Southern fundamentalist Baptist will all have very different actualities (circumstances they must operate within) as well as different realities (world views, opinions and beliefs). How well their reality fits with the actuality they find themselves in determines how well they will do in those circumstances. 

You can continue to take this idea down to smaller and smaller examples to show how even people in the same situation can have different realities. The example we use is a husband and wife. Even though there are many congruent points in their shared reality and actuality, there are still important differences.

By now you should realize a person's "reality" is largely subjective.  And yet, just because it is subjective, doesn't mean it isn't utterly real to the person. A paranoid schizophrenic can be locked into a "reality" where every sense/neurological interpretation/mental construct is telling him that the demons chasing him are really there. This is why it is critical to realize how often people are not reacting to actuality, but instead reacting to their reality. Knowing this you can begin to understand how many problems occur with people taking things the wrong way.

It may seem like this section is a meaningless side trip into intellectualism and sophistry, it's not. As well as being germane to the subject at hand, these concepts have two very critical points in regard to both self-defense and the training you undergo for it. 

First, is the adrenal stress/reaction that you will have in a live-fire situation. In a dangerous situation your body will react in a way that will greatly impact your "reality." What you perceive in those moments will very seldom be a correct interpretation of what is actually happening. This is especially true in cases where lethal force is being used. Entirely too often (especially with knife self-defense) your adrenalized "reality" will see the very presence of an attacker as a continued threat. As such you will -- in your reality at least -- "continue to defend yourself" by striking. 

When, in fact, the person has stopped attacking and is currently trying to turn and flee. But your lizard brain won't see it that way. As far as it is concerned, if he's still there, he's still attacking. Unfortunately, by continuing to attack you have legally turned into the aggressor. That is a clear cut example of the trouble that reacting to your reality can get you in. You need to react to the actuality of the situation if you want to stay out of prison.

The second point one must consider is how do you train for actuality? What must be involved in your training so that your reality doesn't hijack you into the legal trouble that we just described? How do you train to still succeed under distorted reality conditions? Unfortunately, most training regimens that we have seen do not take these issues into consideration. Once you know what to look for, you can immediately tell when these issues have not only not been addressed -- but even considered. These are small issues that have big consequences.  For example, by training the person to turn towards an attacker in the name of "defense" (instead of fleeing), the student is being set up to fall into this reality-trap of continuing to attack after the threat has passed. If you have been trained to turn towards an attacker and take a fighting stance -- if you ever do end up in a live fire situation --this is just one of the many problems that you will face. 

And this is over and above the problem of a person being unable to perform under the stress of his/her new "reality." As an instructor, how do you train someone to be able to do this in the first place? It isn't just enough to teach people to do a technique, if they are to be successful, you have to teach them how to do it under stress, under a drastically altered reality Furthermore, you have to figure out a way to teach them how to react to actuality, not just their stress induced reality. Otherwise, you are setting your students up for a world of legal trouble.

That's how important this subject is for self-defense and training, but where knowing the difference between reality and actuality is in keeping you from being sold a bill of faulty goods. You can spend a lot of money learning someone's reality. A reality that has little to do with what will work to keep you safe in a violent situation. What makes it difficult to tell the difference between good and faulty information is how convinced someone can be about their reality. Such a person will provide you with faulty information and do it with utter conviction and sincerity -- because it supports their reality.

And that puts us back into the realm of personality disorders, dysfunction and hidden agendas. Knowing what you now know  you can see why people carrying on about how they are training for reality tend to make us nervous. What they call the "reality" of violence is usually far from the actuality of violence. In fact, what they are promoting has usually has crossed into fantasy. As such, what is going on isn't about preparing for the actualities of violence, but more about reinforcing a personal reality. 

This is constantly demonstrated on Internet forums, at hard-core MA schools and in organizations who claim to teach "reality based self-defense." The words "reality" and "real fights" are constantly bantered in places like these. Ferocious verbal wars over the "realities" of fighting regularly occur; as do vicious personal attacks against anyone who dares to question dogma.  The odd thing about this is that most of the people arguing have very little experience with physical violence. But that doesn't stop them from arguing about how good for fighting the system they study is. Sad to say, entire training systems have been developed to fight these imagined "realities" -- instead of preparing for the actualities of violence. As such, the only reality they are about is reinforcing these biased perceptions

People who want you to accept their version of reality tend to do so for not so nice reasons. So you better pay attention to people who use the word "reality" a little too often and a little too freely, because the question you need to ask is "Whose reality?"

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