Setting Healthy Boundaries: Elicia Ybarra on Red Flags in Martial Arts (Part 1)

A Little Bit Culty

Sarah Edmondson & Anthony “Nippy” Ames

Education, Society & Culture

4.6 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 29 December 2025

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In Part 1 of our conversation with martial artist and empowerment self-defense instructor Elicia Ybarra, we trace how a childhood love of ninja turtles and karate turned into a 30-year journey through grooming, coercive control, and abuse in multiple martial arts settings, and how she eventually turned all of it into a curriculum to help other women fight back before it ever gets physical.

Elicia described being groomed by a trusted instructor from ages 13–16, losing her community when she tried to set boundaries, getting pulled into a second “family” TaeKwonDo organization where a grandmaster weaponized rank, money, and humiliation, and how those patterns set her up for an extremely violent relationship she barely escaped. She walked us through the turning points: postpartum depression, COVID, therapy, watching cult docs (shoutout, The Vow), quitting smoking, and finally building “Pretty Hands, Hard Punches” and an empowerment self-defense model that starts with boundaries, intuition, and situational awareness—not just throat punches and palm strikes.

Be sure to follow Elicia on her website, prettyhandshardpunches.com, or on Facebook or Instagram @prettyhandshardpunches.

Trigger warning: This episode contains frank discussion of sexual abuse, statutory rape, workplace sexism and harassment, intimate partner violence, and suicide.

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The views and opinions expressed on A Little Bit Culty do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast. Any content provided by our guests, bloggers, sponsors or authors are of their opinion and are not intended to malign any religion, group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone or anything. Nobody’s mad at you, just don’t be a culty fuckwad.

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Executive Producers: Sarah Edmondson & Anthony Ames

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Transcript

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0:00.0	This holiday season has already been a little bit stressful. We went away for Thanksgiving and I had to go back to Vancouver for a last-minute family thing. And between that travel and figuring out what my kids want for Christmas and hosting and holiday band concerts and last-minute plans, let's be honest, money stress. It's really easy to lose track of where your cash is actually going. That's why we've been using Monarch. Rated Wall Street Journal's best budgeting app of 2025, Monarch is an all-in-one
0:25.6	personal finance tool that brings your entire financial life together in a clean dashboard on your
0:30.4	phone or laptop. Right now, I'm keeping an eye on our holiday spending category so we don't start
0:35.2	the new year with a debt hangover. Monarch lets you link
0:38.1	everything, checking, investments, retirement, even property value so you can see your true net worth
0:42.5	and stay on top of your year-end priorities. Nippy and I use it for quick weekly money check-ins,
0:47.6	which has made financial conversations way easier and far less stressful. Thank you, Monarch.
0:53.0	Ignoring your finances completely can get expensive fast.
0:56.1	If you don't pay attention, you might miss chances to save more, invest smarter, or move closer to big
1:00.1	goals. One of ours is buying a home in the next year, so we got to get on top of it. And Monarch keeps you
1:05.3	informed, even in the chaos of the holidays. Don't let financial opportunities slip through the cracks.
1:10.2	Use code culty at monarch.com
1:11.9	in your browser for half off your first year. That's 50% off your first year at monarch.com
1:17.3	with code culty. Happy holidays. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be
1:23.1	considered legal, medical, or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed do not
1:27.4	necessarily reflect the official policy apposition of the podcast and are not intended to considered legal, medical, or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed do not necessarily
1:27.9	reflect the official policy or position of the podcast and are not intended to malign any religion,
1:32.7	group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone, or anything.
1:47.8	I'm Sarah Edmondson. And I'm Sarah Edmondson.
1:50.9	And I'm Anthony Nippy Ames, and this is a little bit culty. We woke up from a cult, and that journey was captured in The Vow on HBO and in my memoir, Scarred.
1:56.3	Now, in this podcast, we break down the shame and secrets that make these experiences so destructive with
2:01.2	honest conversations on how seemingly benign groups can cross into the cult of us, and how to
	...

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