Instructor Bio
Chris Pendas
Martial arts • self-defense • threat assessment • personal safety
Staying Safe, LLC
Real-world safety training shaped by martial arts, military service, and protection work.
Chris Pendas brings a practical, reality-based approach to self-defense: train honestly, think clearly, avoid fantasy, and focus on what actually helps people stay safer.
His work connects martial arts, violence prevention, situational awareness, threat assessment, and practical decision-making. The result is training that respects skill, restraint, uncertainty, and the real consequences of violence.
Background
From martial arts curiosity to real-world security work.
Chris’s path into martial arts started with the action films of the 1980s and 1990s, then grew into traditional martial arts training as a child and boxing as a teenager. That early interest eventually became something deeper: a lifelong study of how people protect themselves, how violence develops, and how training can better prepare people for reality.
After enlisting in the United States Marine Corps, Chris became a Marine Corps Martial Arts Program black belt instructor. His Marine Corps career placed him overseas, where he trained Marines and locals in defensive tactics and continued developing a practical view of violence, safety, and preparation.
His later work included security contracting in Africa, protecting cargo vessels from piracy in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean, executive protection work, threat assessment environments, and Department of State security work. That experience shapes the Staying Safe approach: calm, adaptive, honest, and grounded in the real world.
Experience
A broad foundation for practical safety training.
Staying Safe is not built from one narrow lane. It combines martial arts, defensive tactics, security work, travel awareness, executive protection thinking, and community service.
U.S. Marine Corps veteran
MCMAP black belt instructor
Brazilian Jiu Jitsu brown belt
Overseas defensive tactics experience
Security contracting experience in Africa
Anti-piracy cargo vessel protection experience
Executive protection and threat assessment background
Department of State security specialist experience
Teaching Philosophy
Training should prepare people for the whole problem.
Self-defense does not begin at the moment of contact. It begins with awareness, choices, environment, distance, communication, and judgment. Physical skills matter, but they are only one part of a larger safety system.
Absence of danger
The best outcome is avoiding preventable danger before it controls your options.
Escape from danger
When something begins to shift, movement, distance, exits, and timing matter.
Defense against danger
If avoidance fails, training should be simple enough to use under stress.
Aftermath awareness
Real self-defense includes what happens after: law, communication, injury, reporting, and recovery.
Community Service
Staying Safe began with service.
The original Staying Safe project grew from Chris’s work volunteering with women’s shelters and teaching practical safety concepts to people who needed useful, clear, and respectful guidance. That origin still matters. The purpose is not fear. The purpose is capability.
Training values
Calm under pressure
The goal is not panic. The goal is clarity when conditions are uncertain.
Simple beats fancy
Training should work when adrenaline, surprise, fatigue, and imperfect conditions are present.
Awareness before action
A good decision made early can prevent the need for a harder decision later.
Respect and responsibility
Self-defense training should increase responsibility, not ego.
Train with purpose
Bring practical safety training to yourself, your group, or your organization.
Ask about private training, BJJ, seminars, threat assessment, professional security assessments, or regional travel safety support.