Your MIni-mission: legal articulation
This game was originally created by Rory Miller and it’s a great exercise to program your brain for “when” you are legally justified in using preemptive force – essentially putting you in the role of having to explain your reasoning to a responding police officer.
INSTRUCTIONS:
- With a training partner, pretend that you are both standing in front of a responding police officer after you’ve defended yourself from your attacker (training partner).
- Taking turns (you first as the “defender”), describe to the imaginary “officer” why you had to use preemptive force against your aggressor.
- Next, your training partner (as the “aggressor”) will explain themselves to the “officer” in the same way – naturally trying to downplay their role and casting themselves as the “victim” you just beat up after “over-reacting”.
- Consider their statement, and then it’s your turn again to explain to the “officer” your side of the story based on what your aggressor just told them.
training tips
You can also perform this game solo by simply imaging yourself in front of the officer (after your “attacker” left in an ambulance!) to describe your justification of why witnesses reported you as the one who “hit first”.
For a more advanced version, add in other training partners to act as either the aggressor’s friends who are also making a statement… or bystanders who are simply reporting what they saw.