Tony Blauer
May 16, 2008 | Leave a CommentPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog
Many people ask me, “What is the best kind of self-defense training?” Really, there is a lot of good stuff out there, and it’s sad how much of the self-defense industry just hates on each other. I mean, shouldn’t we all be suporting each other? Aren’t we all working towards the same goal to end violence and teach people to fight back? Anyways, the training I most enjoy is the real-world, studied, proven and tested methods of how a real fight or attack goes down. Martial arts is cool and a good work-out, but I’ve always preferred the grittier stuff like Krav Maga or IMPACT courses with the Bullet Man suits. There’s a lot of material out there which looks cool and seems to make sense for use in a violent confrontation. But add in some adrenaline, fear and all the physiological things that happen in a human body in these situations, and you have a whole other ball game. Through my mentor Bob Martin at Gavin de Becker and Associates, I was introduced to my friend Tony Blauer. In my opinion, he’s one of the best minds and fighters in the self-defense industry. He’s having a training camp in Virginia Beach, VA this August and I will be there. Any of my GFB peeps interested in joining me for a weekend o’ whoop-ass? Click here to read about the camp, and click here to read about Tony’s approach and philosophy. Holla at me if you’re interested in learning more.
A good quote
May 15, 2008 | Leave a CommentPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog
I have been very blessed with a business mentor/coach named Greg Walker. Today we met, and discussed all the awesome things happening with this crusade to educate women about personal safety and self-defense. For anyone who knows me, I pretty much live this mission and live this work. As a result of this, I tend to stress out and feel an unnecessary weight on my shoulders. Sometimes I can get a little caught up in the process and to-do lists of how we will achieve the ultimate vision: That every woman on the planet has access to safety & self-defense education. Yesterday Greg said to me, “Set an intention, and you’ll get results. Stop being so hung up on the mechanism to get there.” It kind of reminds me of yoga class, where you set an intention before starting any poses. If you set a real good intention, something that inspires or drives you, this dedication of sorts helps you push through the struggle. What’s your today?
Birthday in Iraq
May 14, 2008 | Leave a CommentPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog
Today is a special day, because it’s my little brother’s birthday. OK, so he’s not so little…he’s 27. But whatev, he’ll always be little to me. Seems like yesterday I was sticking his head in the toilet and giving him a swirly. Now he’s a Marine, serving in Iraq since January. My guess is that he’s kickin’ some arse over there, and doing his job well. So I just wanted to send a public shout-out to Andrew: Thanks for all you’re doing, little brother! Much love comin’ at you from all your supporters in the U.S.
Sue Simmons
May 13, 2008 | Leave a CommentPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog
So yesterday Sue Simmons, anchor of the New York City NBC news, totally dropped the F*bomb live on the air. This was pretty much my worst fear when I was live on the air with my radio show. Most people don’t realize this, but the talent (Sue) and the station (NBC) will likely get crazy fines for this. Not to mention, this is grade-A reason to get canned from live television. Man, she really dropped the bomb like she knew how to use it! I wonder what Chuck Scarborough was doing to make her react like that.
The Power of Now
May 12, 2008 | 1 CommentPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog
My friend Nancy Colasurdo turned me on to the book A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle a few months ago. I bought it at some airport, and tried to read it without much success. At the time it was too heavy and spiritual - neither of which fit in to my mindset as a tough business traveler, forging her way around 30 cities in less than 3 months. Sorry, but spiritual enlightenment would have to wait. But now that I’m back home and starting to relax a bit, I picked up the book again…and this time it really spoke to me. I finished the book while chillin’ in Atlanta this past weekend, and now I’ve begun Eckhart’s other work called The Power of Now. I’ll be writing more posts about these books in the near future, so I just wanted to warn you. Weed is gettin’ Zen, so watch out.
Cinco de Mayo
May 6, 2008 | 1 CommentPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog, Just Life
You know what I love? Unexpected randomness! Yesterday I started getting a taste for a margarita in celebration of Mexican independence, and I made some calls to my fellow degenerates. Next thing I know, the blender is out, tacos are being made and twenty people are at my house rockin’ it out sombrero style. We even made a campfire in the back yard, and for dessert we had something crazy authentic for the occasion: brownies. Who cares? Good people, good times…and we were also celebrating the official end to my Spring ‘08 Tour. A reflection blog to come shortly, but for now I can just say “muy bueno.”
Eastern Illinois Graduation
May 5, 2008 | Leave a CommentPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog
First I want to say thank you to all my peeps, for giving me ideas for the commencement speech I gave on Saturday at Eastern Illinois University. It was a totally wild experience. I flew to Chicago on Friday night, and my parents picked me up at Midway and we drove to Charleston from there. The ceremony was on Saturday at noon, and of course I wrote the speech about an hour prior. It definitely got me out of my element, that’s for sure. First off, the whole aura of graduation is so prim and proper and I had to wear the typical black hat and gown. It was all I could do to refrain from not demonstrating a palm strike on the university president after he introduced me, simply out of habit. Furthermore, this was one of the first speeches I ever gave that did not include the word “ass” in some fashion. (kick ass, bad ass, whoop ass, etc.) When I got up to the podium in front of thousands of people, I immediately learned two things. First, I could only speak to the graduates sitting directly in front and below me. If I lifted my head even slightly to address the crowd in the bleachers, my damn hat would fall off. Second, I had to avoid looking at the jumbotron video screen which was projecting a ginormous image of myself speaking. But anyway, it went very well and it was a really cool and exciting day. It’s always hard to be in Charleston, just because it’s a reminder of some pretty bad times. (mostly the murder trial for Shannon’s killer) but I try very hard to never let the few bad memories outshine the thousands of good ones. I’m going to post a video of my speech shortly…
Click here to read a newspaper article about the speech.
Commencement Speech
May 2, 2008 | 2 CommentsPosted by Erin Weed | Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog
Hi loves. Well I’m in and out…just got home Wednesday, had meetings all day yesterday and now I’m about to hop a plane to Chicago. Why, you ask? Because I am giving the commencement speech at Eastern Illinois University tomorrow. Yeah, I’m totally going to be the girl in the embellished graduation garb and spewing life wisdom to a bunch of recent grads. It’s exciting and scary, but most of all, I just want to say ONE THING that will help these young people start their post-college existence with a bang. So my question to you, my loyal blog readers, is this: What is the one piece of life advice you wish were told when graduating college?