Self Control is one of the most important things that you learn in the Martial Arts. If a trained person gets into a fight with an untrained person and does more damage than is necessary to end the fight, even if the untrained person started it, the trained person can face legal troubles. So it is legally important to learn Self Control. Also at your local Dojo or Gym, nobody wants to spar or drill with the guy that has no control. When you go too hard on your partner, either they will start to be hesitant with you making the drill and sparring less realistic or they will also start to go hard in return and one or both of you will walk away so injured that you have to take a break from training for a while.

Distance Management is also an important skill that is learned in Martial Arts. Knowing how long your arms and legs can reach in a strike is vital for making sure that the strike reaches its target. Martial Artists also learn to quickly judge other peoples strike ranges and can use that to assess danger. 

However, I see many Martial Artists mistaking Distance Management for Self Control. Some people when they spar and drill, go with nearly full speed and full power in their strikes but do so where their strike is fully extended and just touching its intended target. These people are dangerous to spar or drill with because they don’t know how to truly pull their punches. If their sparring or drill partner makes a mistake, the strike is coming at full speed and can’t be stopped and then makes contact with their partner at full power. Training this way can also cause problems in real self defense scenarios because the Martial Artist will fall into their habit of striking at the distance where their fully extended strike just barely makes contact. A strike that is meant to hurt its target needs to hit the target and penetrate several inches, so your strike should have room to extend after the initial contact. The Martial Artist can make the adjustment to getting closer with their strike but it may not be a true habit (because they have been practicing just touching at full extension) meaning that it will take some mental focus to make the adjustment, taking some of their focus off of more important things like fight strategy.

Self Control requires the Martial Artist to “Pull Their Punch”. This means NOT fully extending the strike. Throwing a strike that COULD hit and penetrate several inches into the intended target, but does NOT do so because the Martial Artist doesn’t fully extend. To build up this skill, you must practice slowly and deliberately. Many Martial Artists just want to go fast and hard because it feels right to them and they never develop self control. Instead they develop a habit where they can strike quickly with power but just barely touch the target. Seeming to have great distance management, but actually being several inches off target. So you should strive to develop good Distance Management and good Self Control. That way if you do choose to fully extend your punch to hurt your opponent you are the right distance away.

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