The Hardest Technique I’ve Learned Is My Voice

What if the hardest part of self-defense isn’t the fight—but the voice it asks you to find?

There’s a part of Jiu Jitsu most people don’t think of when they picture the mats.

It’s not the chokes, or the submissions, or the escapes.

It’s your voice.

In Women Empowered and the Bullyproof kids classes, voice is treated like any other self-defense tool. We’re taught to use it with intention:

• To draw attention when something feels wrong.

• To set boundaries that others might otherwise ignore.

• To use verbal deception—false surrender—in order to create openings and escape.

It’s a technique. A skill. Just like a trap and roll or standing up in base.

But for some of us, it’s not just a skill.

It’s the hardest thing we do.

Because when you’ve spent years learning to be silent to survive, yelling “back off!” isn’t just awkward—it’s triggering. And no one really talks about that.

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Voice as a Technique

In class, we treat voice as just another part of the system.

It’s taught with structure, repetition, and purpose—like any physical move.

We shout “Back off!” to draw attention.

We say “Don’t come any closer!” to set a boundary.

We say “I give up, I’ll do whatever you want.” in false surrender to create an opening, gain an advantage, or de-escalate a situation.

The lesson is clear: your voice is one of your most powerful tools.

But that lesson assumes you can access it. That you can call it forward, shape it, use it—on command.

And that assumption doesn’t always hold.

For some of us, using our voice doesn’t feel powerful.

It feels vulnerable. Exposed. Even dangerous.

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When Voice Is the Trigger

We talk a lot about “trigger classes.”

If someone says they’re triggered by chokes, or by the feeling of being pinned, no one questions it. We nod. We offer space. We understand.

But when someone trembles at the idea of yelling?

Or hesitates when asked to speak up?

That gets harder for people to grasp.

They understand discomfort. Stage fright. Awkwardness.

But for some of us, it goes deeper than that.

Someone once asked me, “What’s the worst that could happen?”—like yelling in class was just a harmless drill.

And I remember thinking: you have no idea…

Because for some of us, using our voice has been the worst thing that ever happened.

It’s gotten us hurt. Ignored. Punished. Dismissed.

Silence, not speech, is what kept us safe.

So when we’re asked to raise our voice—to shout, to command, to take up space—it isn’t just a technique.

It’s a confrontation with the very survival strategies that kept us alive.

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The History Behind the Silence

For some of us, silence wasn’t just learned—it was necessary.

We didn’t raise our voices, because doing so meant drawing attention we couldn’t afford.

We stayed quiet, because speaking up only made things worse.

We smiled, nodded, softened our tone—because survival often meant being small, agreeable, invisible.

By the time I was a teenager, I already knew how to keep quiet. But it was during those years that I learned something even sharper:

That using my voice—even gently, even reasonably—could provoke something dangerous.

There were moments when I asked for space, for safety, for the smallest bit of control over my body or boundaries.

And what came back wasn’t respect.

It was pressure. Escalation. Retaliation.

Not once. Not twice. Enough times that the lesson sank deep:

Your voice will not protect you. It just makes things worse.

After that, silence wasn’t just a habit. It was armor.

Even now, in a room full of people who care, I feel it.

That old tension. That flicker of warning.

The hesitation in my chest. The clench in my throat.

It’s not that I don’t want to speak.

It’s that some part of me still believes I’m safer if I don’t.

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Before Belief Comes Effort

There’s no dramatic turning point. No single class where I yelled clearly and everything changed.

Reclaiming my voice hasn’t looked like triumph.

It’s looked like tension. Like trembling. Like teeth clenched and jaw locked and trying anyway.

It looks like saying stop when my body wants to disappear.

Like speaking a boundary and flinching inside as I wait for the backlash.

Like practicing a line in class and wondering what it would cost me to say it somewhere else.

Because the truth is, there are people in my life I can’t avoid—people who make even simple conversations feel dangerous.

Where every word is a risk.

Where even quiet honesty can be used as ammunition.

So no, I don’t know that my belief about using my voice is changing.

Not yet.

Sometimes I still can’t get the words out.

Sometimes I leave the mat feeling like I’ve failed at something that should be simple.

But I keep trying.

Because trying is all I’ve got.

And maybe, even when belief hasn’t caught up, persistence still counts for something.

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What It Takes to Be Heard

What if we treated voice work the way we treat chokes or mount escapes?

What if we recognized that for some people, yelling “back off” takes just as much courage as fighting out of a headlock—maybe more?

What if we stopped asking, “What’s the worst that could happen?”

And started asking, “What did it take for you to say that out loud?”

Because the hardest part isn’t always the technique.

Sometimes it’s just finding your voice—and using it, even when your whole body is telling you not to.

So no, my voice doesn’t always come easily.

Sometimes it catches. Sometimes it stays stuck.

But I keep showing up.

And maybe that’s enough.

Maybe that’s where strength begins—not in the volume, but in the effort.

Not in the yell, but in the choice to try again.

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