Trauma informed self defence
Tap into your power, stop violence, build resilience, move, and thrive.
Sign up for a course, or bring us to your group or community space
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Empower yourself
Connect to your inner strength, build the skills and mindset to set boundaries and move through life with confidence.
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Empower your group
Partner with us to bring an Empowerment Self Defence programme to your charity clients or community space.
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Become an instructor
Ready to bring the life-changing benefits of Empowerment Self Defence to your community? Get certified as an instructor.
From participants
Sessions like the one we had today are really important because it’s a chance for women to realise they’re not alone with what they’re experiencing.
— December 2024
I could see and sense the huge amount of care and consideration that had been put into creating the day we had together and I'm very thankful, to you both and the whole team.
— March 2024
A very important moment for me in this session was when I learned how to say ‘no.’
— December 2024
Survivors
Thinking of learning self-defence or taking up a martial art? Maybe you already tried to get started, maybe you train regularly, or maybe you haven’t found the right environment just yet.
Coaches
Keen to support survivors but not sure what approach to take? Maybe you already coach someone affected by trauma, or you’d like to be ready the next time someone approaches you.
Tools for coaches
Think about how easy it is for typical activities like sparring, commands, or corrective body adjustments to remind survivors of the violent experiences that brought them to want to learn self defence.
Worryingly easy, right? That’s the bad news: martial arts practices can trigger trauma responses.
The good news —backed up by a growing body of research— is that self-defence training can be empowering and healing when trainers have the knowledge and resources to support survivors.
Fuelled by this research and the inspiring ways people are putting it into practice worldwide, we’re bringing trauma training to martial arts instructors in the UK.
Support for survivors
We’re building communities with self defence trainers who get it; who understand how backgrounds and past experiences affect how we learn, who can create space for us to explore, practise, and thrive with martial arts. You can tap into this community in the UK. Pretty soon we hope to have have a full map.
In the meantime, we’re sharing tools and ideas to help you practice martial arts if you’d like to —things like what to look out for when you choose a school, how to approach a coach, and ways to adapt your training so that you get what you need from it and maybe even have some fun!