What Advice Would I Give My Younger Self?

What advice would I give my younger self?

Man, that's a hard one.

I've been trying to answer that question ever since Baz Luhrmann came out with the song "Everybody's Free" in 1999. I still don't know what I'd tell my younger self in regards to life to prepare myself for the future. Maybe that's as it should be. I probably wouldn't have listened to myself anyway. My life has been a journey of ups and downs, failures and successes, surprises of all kinds. And not knowing has always been half the fun. Overall, I have nothing to complain about.

Today, however, A Girl And A Gun challenged those on her facebook page to reveal what they would tell their younger selves in relation to self defense.

That, I can do!

It's a narrow enough scope that I can pinpoint specific areas where I could have been better prepared to face the evils of life.

The original challenge was "what would you tell your 20 year-old self?" Well, I'd have to go a lot younger than that to really do much difference in the scope of protecting myself or preventing some of the worst tragedies in my life.

How young? That's a tough one, too.

I decided to look at it from the perspective of a mother. I look at my two sons and my daughter and I think, "When should I start teaching them these lessons?"

The answer is now!

So, if I could go back in time and teach my younger self some self defense lessons I'd go back to the times of a little girl who was terrified of flushing toilets, learning how to tie her shoes, how to write the number "4" and stealing her mother's high heels out of the closet to wear around the house and these are the things I would tell her:

- It's okay to say, "No!" 
In fact, you need to say no. You need to have boundaries and it's good to have boundaries. People who don't respect your boundaries aren't people you should have in your life.

- Your body is your own. PERIOD!
With EXCEPTIONALLY few exceptions, no one has the right to touch you, hold you or ask you to do something with your body that you don't want to do. You don't owe anyone your body.

- Your parents are wrong.
A lot of society will be wrong, too. They will tell you things like, "You are safe here," "This person is okay," "Stay in public places. The public will protect you," "Good girls don't hit." It's confusing, I know, when people you trust tell you things they believe to be true and they turn out to be wrong. It doesn't mean they don't love you, it means they were human. You'll have to learn to discern the truth for yourself and that's where your own instincts, life experience and feelings will have to come in.

- Listen to your instinct.
When that inner voice says, "Something's not right," listen to it. Don't try to talk yourself out of it. Don't let other people downplay your feelings or talk you out of them. You're having those feelings for a reason. But here's a newsflash for you, sweety, you'll be wrong from time-to-time, too.

- It's okay to be angry. 
There are people who waste their lives on anger. They are consumed by it and use it for minor issues where it has no place or they use it disproportionately to the offense. Or they dwell in it, wallowing in it in misplaced comfort and failing to use it as the tool of action it should be. There are also people who never use anger for fear of it. They allow people to misuse them and abuse them and never get angry enough to change their situation.

Don't be either one of those people. Don't misuse or neglect anger. Don't be afraid of it, either.

Anger is a tool of action when you have suffered a legitimate hurt or injustice. Get angry--even if you need to get angry at someone you love. Use that anger to cut through the fear, the societal norms, the lies you've been told about how you or a "good girl" should act. Use it to give you the courage to act, to stand up for yourself, to do something about your situation. If you need to, use that anger to act immediately to save yourself. If it's after the fact, use that anger to give you courage to seek help. Learn to use it appropriately and to the right degree. Then, learn to put that anger away. As useful of a tool as it can be, it will destroy you and your relationships with those you love if you overuse it.

- Learn to hit.
Despite what you've been told, good girls DO hit. They hit hard and in the right way and at the right time. Be a good girl. Learn to hit!

- Get strong.
Seriously! Do it now. Lift weights. Screw running! Your life and the defense thereof will be way easier the younger you do this and the better you maintain it. You'll probably save yourself a lot of aches and pains and open up a lot more opportunities for yourself, too.

- Don't mistake your skill or defensive tool as a talisman.
I know you won't, but here's a reminder anyway. As you get older you will learn the hard lesson that there is no magic talisman against evil. Saving yourself will mean hard work. It will mean exercising your boundaries, your anger, your common sense, instincts, avoidance and learning proficiency with whatever tool or discipline you choose (Hint: choose as many as you can and take time working them all when you can). It will mean working that tool or discipline as regularly as you can which will demand money and time. You will need to keep working those tools and skills and it will become a part of who you are but it won't define you and it shouldn't. Avoiding or defeating evil is a tiny, TINY part of what will make up your life and the joys therein (as it should be), but that doesn't mean you should neglect developing and maintaining your skills in that area.

No one is as devoted or available to defend yourself as you are. You need to be in a condition--physically, mentally, skillfully--to do the fighting for yourself.

- Not everyone is out to get you.
There will be people you trust who will betray you. They will hurt you. They will make you question everything you thought you knew about life, love, trust and who you are. You won't be right about everyone and you will be hurt. Sometimes more than others. Sometimes just emotionally, sometimes physically. But there are other people who do love you. They legitimately want to help, encourage and support you. They won't test your boundaries, instead they will help you build new, stronger ones. They will love you. Rest securely in the love of those people. Seek out those people. Appreciate them, as I know you will. It will be your relationships with those people and the people you meet (and even create with a special someone down the road) that will make it all worth it in the end.

Why Read Words

I'll share a little secret with you: I don't particularly love to read. But I love to learn. Amazingly enough, the two often coincide. Therefore, I love to read. I am a very slow reader so sometimes it takes me a while to catch up but I keep plugging away at it and I'm better off for it because I do learn a lot.

That being said, I'm always astonished how few people are interested in reading about the topics of self defense. Some may follow the occasional blog or visit forums wherein reading is presumably necessary but from time to time it's made very clear that even those are not actually read to be digested before they are commented on.

Worse still is the idea that reading is unnecessary to the understanding of the principles of self defense.

I've seen many a comment to self defense book recommendations that go a lot like the Snotlout quote from How To Train Your Dragon:

"Why read words when you can just kill the stuff the words tell you stuff about?"

Or, as one person commented to a Rory Miller book recommendation, "I don't need to know what makes a criminal a criminal or how he thinks, I just need to know if he's a threat."

There is a certain sort of logic to that but it's also pretty naive. I may set people up for assuming too much or too little in any given encounter and in every aspect no less.

A Mindset Aspect:
Mindset is pretty driven into people who carry guns these days. But there are still a lot of people out there who carry guns who ".. don't want to hurt anyone." They will just, "shoot someone in the leg." They have no concept of awareness, avoidance and they can't recognize a dangerous situation unfolding until it's already gone past the point of no return. Yes, you can get this information from classes but a lot of it comes from sitting down and digesting the written material of those who've already been there.


An Equipment Aspect:
Many people base their carry setup choices based upon the recommendations of those they know ("My friend, who is a cop, told me I should get..."), feelings ("I got this one because it has pink handles"), cost ("It was between this one and that one but this was cheaper") and assumed reputation ("The military carried the 1911 for 70 years (with an empty chamber, no less). If it was good enough for them, it's good enough for me.")


So much has been written about what makes a good, civilian fighting/carry setup it's impossible to list all of the resources. Despite that fact, many people still skip absorbing the seasoned advice of people who've been there and done it in favor of pink handles and cheap accessories.

Why read? So you don't end up with crap.

A Tactical Aspect:
You may not have $500 to go to the class you want, but you can afford a $15 book on the principles of carry or gunfighting. You may not be able to sit under an instructor who will demo for you the ways to utilize cover, set up your equipment, think about how you walk down the street, clear a room, etc. But you can get the basic gist from a good book or two on the subject.

One of the best students I've ever had came directly to our intermediate class and had never taken a firearms class in his life. All he'd ever done was read, test what he read at the range, watch a few videos online and take what he learned to heart. He was a FINE shooter and had a great rudimentary grasp of everything we were trying to teach. With a few tweaks he was flying and started competing in IDPA the next day.

A Performance Aspect:
What will your bullets do? What won't they do? How far will it travel if you miss? What is cover? What is concealment? What is the penetration of your particular caliber choice in your particular gun? What about your target? What are the best areas to target?

What about your body? How does it work with things like adrenaline? How can you expect to reasonably perform under that kind of stress?

Guess what... There are books about that.

A Potential Threat Assessment Aspect:
So, you don't think you need to know how a criminal thinks or works but when some guy comes up to you and compliments your shoes you have absolutely no concept as to whether or not this is just a nice guy paying you a compliment or a predator using charm as a way to get close enough to victimize you. You have nothing to do but wait until the situation escalates or attempt some sort of immediate shut down.

Why read? Because being able to distinguish between the types of criminals and how they operate can tell you how you might be able to assess them and even be deselected or deescalate the situation.

Why is that important? Because it's always better to deescalate than let it progress to a fight and how you deescalate a situation with one type of criminal is different from how you may deescalate from another.

An Emotional/Psychological Aspect:
So you had your day. You shot someone. There are people out there who are unaffected by this. But a lot of people go through a whole gambit of emotional and psychological stages. Knowing about and/or being prepared for them can help one process and heal. And there are lots of good books on the subject.

A Legal Aspect:
It still astounds me how many people don't care to read about self defense law in general or in their own state.

"I was in fear for my life," is not the begin-all and end-all of your defense.

You do need to know when it's legal to engage and (sometimes more importantly) when it's necessary to disengage. You do need to have a sense of the law so that you can articulate why you were justified in doing what you did.

You do that by reading. If you don't have your state statutes bookmarked on your internet browser yet, what are you waiting for? Get reading!

And I'm just scratching the surface. There are so many more subtopics and theories and principles laid out by great minds worth exploring.

If you're serious about it, you should be reading about it.

Want a good place to start? Greg Ellifritz's "Recommended Reading" link on his website and all of his "free book" links.

Rangemaster Tactical Conference 2014

Every year Tom Givens puts on a conference in Memphis, TN, at his facility. It is called the Rangemaster Tactical Conference. It consists of three days of instruction by top instructors in the firearms and self defense community. At any given time there can be three to five instructors presenting on any number of topics related to self defense, particularly with a firearm. Most instruction blocks are two hours in length but from time to time and with an important enough topic it's not unheard of to see a whole four-hour block dedicated to one instructor and his information.

After years of hearing great things coming out of the conference we finally made it a priority to attend this year.

The Conference was held on Feb 21-23 and the hardest part was deciding which instruction blocks to attend vs the others.

My schedule started with Shane Gosa, instructor with CQB Services International, talking about The Mental Trigger. This entire two-hour block was largely centered around mindset. Shane had a unique perspective on Jeff Cooper's color codes of awareness, how they were intended to be used and how to apply them to daily life. We did one group visualization technique, discussed mental barriers and the aftermath of violent encounters and finished up with a training exercise on what Shane called, "Accessing State." The exercise is meant to train the mind and body to work together and to limit or completely eliminate the freeze response and allow for a faster and more efficient aggressive, defensive or offensive response. Not only did it address turning the aggression on, immediately, but also turning it off (often the hardest and most damning part of self defense). The lecture concluded with a discussion on winning vs survival, the importance of combat breathing and other tips on getting the most out of training sessions.

Next was Kathy Jackson, author and instructor for Cornered Cat. Her lecture was very bluntly titled "What Women Want" and centered around getting more women to attend professional firearms and self defense training. She opened with statistics about how many women were getting their carry permits and buying guns compared to men (hint, it's a lot more women than you think) and on the high note she dashed us down by showing the number of women who attend regular training past the basic carry class (hint, it's way less women than you'd hope). She drew parallels from other male-dominated fields and how they have fought to retain women. Her discussion on how women often feel in the firearms community (and other male-dominated fields) left my mouth agape in it's accuracy at how I have often felt. She then held back nothing as she talked about some of the common flaws in firearms training that set women up for failure or at least for being undermined in the industry. She slaughtered a few sacred cows (which I was gleeful to see butchered (there were at least two times I literally almost clapped)) and moved on to the best strategies for encouraging women. She was very frank that if you are going to teach women you have to be okay talking about and at least have a working idea of some women's issues like drawing around big breasts, discussing bra or thigh holsters, or even being able to address long fingernails and how it relates to shooting. In short, if you want women to come to your classes, you need to make them feel like they belong in a human space vs feeling like they are guests in a man's house.

After lunch I was off to Jim Higginbotham, a former instructor at Gunsite, from Riposte Training. His lecture was called "Fire for Effect" and entirely centered on how the body reacts to gunfire and how bullets may (or may not) physically stop a determined attacker. He discussed the factors that influence incapacitation, how one should train to maximize the effectiveness of their shots if they are needed and what physically needs to be achieved in order to stop a determined attacker instantly, rapidly or marginally. He addressed head-on the growing concept that it's better to spread your shots around vs making tight groups and how ineffective that can be. He addressed the issue of training scars developed through targets with poorly defined targeting zones and concluded with practice tips on improving ability to make better incapacitating shots.

My last class on Friday was Chuck Haggard, a former SWAT officer and current supervisory officer in Kansas. I had the privilege to meet Chuck at the Rangemaster Instructor Development class in September and we've kept in touch ever since. His block of instruction was on Active Shooters/Terrorist Events. Chuck has been personally involved in two active shooter events and his unique perspective was insightful when going through some of the information. A good majority of the class was going over many of the major active shooter events and discussing the tactics used by law enforcement and what worked and what didn't as far as slowing or stopping the events. He talked about what motivates active shooters and what civilians can do to better prepare for an active shooter event.

Saturday morning started with a four-hour block of instruction by John Hearne; a Rangemaster instructor, federal law enforcement officer and self-proclaimed research geek; called "Performance Under Fire." He gave the four-hour version of an eight-hour class and if I ever get the chance to take it in more depth you will find me there. A long-held belief is that humans are predestined to become quivering masses of unpredictable goo when confronted with traumatic events. John's lecture went over the brain, how it works and functions with other body systems to respond to emergencies, why it is conditioned to do what it does under stress and how it can be optimized to respond better or entirely differently. He explained the difference between the neocortex and limbic system and their roles in traumatic events and how to keep the neocortex in control. He defined what it meant to be untrained, to have learned a skill and what was an overlearned skill. My favorite part of his lecture was what he called the "Sacred Cow Slaughterhouse" that took on the concepts of heart-rate being a key factor in performance, the idea that a "natural" response is somehow superior vs an overlearned response, the famed "startle-response" we all train to start from, the supposed innate aversion we are said to have against killing other humans, and whether or not we really do loose our ability to perform fine motor skills and see something as small as a front sight when fighting for our lives. He concluded his lecture with training tips and tips for instructors on how to maximize student learning. All-in-all a very intensive and eye-opening block of instruction.

And from there I stood in line for twenty minutes waiting to attend Craig Douglas' workshop on Managing Unknown Contacts. Craig Douglas is often known through his former screen name "Southnarc." As his handle would suggest, he was an undercover narcotics officer who has since retired and started his own training company called shivworks. The man has a stellar reputation in the training community that is well-deserved. Many of his techniques were developed directly from his own experience interacting on a regular basis with the criminal element. The workshop was based around the simple premise that you are being approached by an unknown individual. You need to decide whether or not this individual is a potential threat with enough time and/or distance to do something about it if it turns out this individual means you harm. We spent most of the instruction block working his three-part interaction system of Verbalizing, Moving and preparing your Hands for action. He then went over four of the most common pre-fight indicators and we practiced identifying them in class. Lastly, we talked about what to do if we are still unsure of the genuine intent of an individual but decide we want to help them vs shutting them down. This was mostly a live-action class worked with other partners and a great exercise in staying relatively safe while deciding if someone is a legitimate threat or not.

My final Saturday class was Skip Gochenour, a retired police investigator who specialized in homicides and helped prepare cases for trial. Skip's lecture was titled "Problem Two: On Trial." In other words, you've survived a lethal encounter (problem one) but now you are being charged with a crime (typically some form of homicide). He opened his lecture with some pretty harsh facts about the law and legal system, the hardest to accept by your average gun-totter being that the truth has absolutely no relevance in a court of law. If a question cannot be clearly answered by the evidence it is what is considered "a jury question" at which point a prosecutor and defense attorney will both make a case on how they interpret the evidence and the jury makes a declaration and what they believe the evidence likely indicates what happened. He went over a lot of history of our legal system and broke down what four main questions a prosecutor will ask in order to determine whether or not someone acted in self defense. He then moved on to what criteria the jury will look at as to whether or not they will convict (or acquit) someone of the various degrees of murder. One of the quotes of the class that particularly resonated with me was, "When you decide you will take on problem one you agree to accept the bill and pay for problem two no matter what the cost." Be that emotional, financial, physical, legal or in prison. A sobering reminder of the responsibilities involved in carrying a firearm.

Sunday morning opened with Cecil Burch, a career martial artist and instructor. His block of instruction was titled Immediate Action in Extreme Close Quarters. In short, you've just been taken by surprise in a violent attack and you can't get to or don't have a gun. What do you do? This was another live-action workshop and we spent much of it on our feet working with partners to protect our most vital area (the head) and work on switching from a defensive posture to an offensive one and gaining ground to either fight, access tools or flee.

Next I attended Tom Givens' Active Shooter lecture. His lecture differed from Chuck's in that he did not spend a lot of time discussing individual cases but rather patterns across many active shooter events. He went over a lot of information that is already known in the community such as the fact that most active shooter events happen in gun-free zones, a large portion of them being schools, and that the shooters tend to be lone, white males with one gun. He went over the phases of an active shooter from fantasy all the way to the shooting and how the best time to stop an active shooting is in the planning or preparation stage. He discussed the difference in outcomes with civilian's have responded to active shooters vs law enforcement with the results being in favor of a civilian response. Lastly, he talked about what to do if caught up in an active shooter event and wrapped it up with an admonition to be armed and fight for abolition of gun-free zones.

After lunch was William Aprill's lecture titled, "Fatal Choices." William Aprill is a psychologist who works with criminals in a law enforcement capacity and a brilliant speaker. His lecture was primarily about what makes a criminal pick a particular individual to victimize. His initial task was to distinguish between those who are targeted and those who are victimized. Anyone can be targeted but only a portion of those are actually chosen to be victimized and that comes down to a criminal deciding whether or not that target is a "go" or "no go." How does he make the decision? William went into depth about what is called "thin-slicing" and it's connection to the intuitive mind that allows us to make instant and more-often accurate decisions about people based on very limited, external data. Facial expressions, gait, appearance, even the amount of multi-tasking we seem to be taking on in a particular moment, can all be factors in what makes a criminal decide whether or not to victimize a particular target. He talked about what we can do to lower our chances of being targeted in the first place or even "deselected" as a "go." Of all of the presentations at the conference, it was William's that fascinated me the most and has made me want to research much more into the topics of thin-slicing and how it relates to criminal choice.

Finally, when I thought I could cram no more into my little brain I sat down in Greg Ellifritz's "Armed Citizen Response to Terrorist Bombings." Anyone who has followed my blog for any length of time has seen Greg's name before. He's one of my favorite instructors and this is my third class with him. He's the author and lead instructor for Active Response Training. He holds more instructor certifications than I care to list at the moment and his topic of the day was bombs. He went over what they are, how they work, how we might be able to identify them and how they are being used by terrorists and active shooters. After pretty much letting us all in on the terrifying reality that there's not much you can do about a bomb he dampened the mood even further by alerting us to the fact that most active shooter/terrorist bombs are homemade and unstable and it's not even a safe bet to try to shoot someone, even if you are 100% sure he has a bomb. If you choose to do so you're doing so with the expectation that you're going to die and generally not going to stop the bomb from going off anyway given the instability of the device, handlers who will set it off anyway, timers, or a hit to the device that triggers it early. He did try to end it on an upbeat note by assuming if we were involved in a bombing we were far enough away or able to get to cover quickly enough to survive. He talked about steps to take to identify secondary devices, how to manage other survivors of the blast and then talked about relative safe distances and cover from certain sizes of devices (which can vary depending on device).

On that happy note we piled in our car, went for some good bbq and just about crashed in an information-overload coma.

These were only the classes I was able to attend. There were so many more I missed and am disappointed for it.

I got to meet some of my heroes and other top-name instructors, got to network with some great people and trainers, meet some of the people who have followed me for years and generally rub shoulders with some great, like-minded individuals.

In addition to the instruction, there is an ongoing pistol match which I shot on Saturday night and learned later that out of 129 shooters I came in 22. To say I was pleased would be an understatement.

I'm not done processing the information from the conference and I fully expect to write more in depth thoughts on several of the training blocks I attended, but for now, I'll leave you all with the admonition that if you can even remotely conceive of going to a Tactical Conference you should do so!

I plan on returning often! I hope to see you there!

Looking For Nails

There's an old saying in the gun training industry that says, "If all you carry is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." The implication being that if your only option for self defense is a gun you will start to see shooting solutions to no-shoot problems. 

When I started out on my self-defense journey I had no clear idea of what a lethal force situation looked like. Yeah, I could make an educated guess that someone who was raping me or stabbing or shooting me was probably worth shooting but when we got into discussions of disparity of force and the legalities of using lethal force against someone or multiple someones who were unarmed I was a bit confused. As it was better explained to me I was actually surprised that lethal force may be used in many "weaponless" or bare-handed situations.

One could argue whether or not anyone gets a true grasp of all the dynamics involved in a true lethal force situation. I continue to study it regularly but don't claim to have any mastery of the topic. There are those who seem to understand it better than others but for the most part we all can grasp the general principles of deadly force and how that relates to reasonable suspicion of death or great bodily harm.

As scenarios are presented to students they start to try to evaluate whether or not lethal force is justified based on those principles and understanding.

All of a sudden, the man getting beaten may have a legitimate claim for use of deadly force if there's a sudden change in disparity of force. The woman being chased; the big, burly guy getting cornered by two other big, burly guys; the older man with a cane getting robbed by the younger, stronger man; the untrained civilian being decimated by the boxing champion all might find themselves in real and dangerous lethal force scenarios.

These students start to identify the legitimate nails that need hammering. And before they know it they are chiming in on discussions of nails, critiquing this nail vs that nail and the best hammers to apply to certain nails and how many times those nails should be hit, where they should be hit, at what angle they should be hit, etc.

Over the last weekend I attended the Rangemaster Tactical Conference. I was set to swim through a veritable sea of the most relevant and up-to-date information one can hope to obtain in the training, shooting and self defense industry. I also had the unique privilege to talk to and sit under some of the top names in the business. These people have dedicated their lives to training, self defense, the legalities and psychology surrounding it and have the experience, skill and expertise to not only have an opinion but to pass on their vast knowledge to the rest of us.

A reoccurring theme that popped up in discussion with many of these instructors was the fact that people are identifying way too many nails. They are practically obsessed with nails.

These people aren't emphasizing or practicing deselection techniques (if they are aware they exist). They aren't practicing good avoidance. They know nothing or seek out almost no knowledge on deescalation, social and verbal dynamics of dealing with potentially dangerous people and have no (or do not seek out) hand-to-hand or less-than-lethal skills and options. They know nothing about articulation and the actual legalities surrounding defensive shootings (outside of the basics) or the true cost of what the lack of all of those things might mean.

But by-golly you will find them at the range practicing their draw-stroke every Saturday. They are training at every known shooting school they can attend and the top competitors in pistol matches. They can do a sub-second magazine reloads one-handed. They will practice that 10 yard head-shot on that hostage target until they can't miss. They will argue until they are blue in the face about how justified they were at using their hammer in any number of self-defense situations and are top commentators on seven different pistol forums and facebook discussion groups.

I used to think it wasn't bad or that maybe I was missing something. I used to think that most people, given other options, would choose wisely. When someone would ask me to chime in on a self-defense scenario, I'd read all the "just shoot him" comments and cringe. Another would send me an article about this questionable "self-defense" shooting or that one or another or another and I would wonder what made those individuals think the gun was the best option.

I thought that this was was the fringe element. Surely, most of us can see a nail as needing a hammer and a screw as needing a screwdriver, right (not to mention identifying a flat-head from a phillips)?

Then I saw the results from Craig Douglas' force-on-force (FOF) scenario. I didn't even participate and the information frightened me. The scenario had a no-shoot solution and yet a gun was fired 10 out of 12 times and it was reported to me that those results were "about average." I've been in FOF scenarios before and understand how difficult they can be to think through. And the reason we do FOF is to construct a safe place to make mistakes. I can't say I would have fared any better. But if you aren't at least concerned by this data than I'm even more worried.

Later I visited a self-defense focused facebook page and commented on a scenario taken from a surveillance video of an altercation between one man and other that resulted in the first being hit a number of times (he never lost consciousness, they exchanged a few words throughout the course of the fight and both individuals eventually walked away). I said didn't think the scenario as it was warranted lethal force. I could have been wrong, I'm okay with that. But I was told my "attitude was what is wrong with society."

Over and over again in self-defense related discussions it is becoming more and more acceptable to proclaim lethal force as an only, early or at least earlier option. And those who are standing up to say it's not are being accused as fools.

After reading those results of the FOF scenario and seeing the trend in discussion groups I started  talking to other instructors about the importance of FOF training. I wondered if it might be time to start training people to identify no-shoot scenarios instead of having them identify shoot scenarios.

One of the responses I got was, "That sounds about right. Otherwise we are training them to look for the nail."

That statement had a huge impact on me as both a civilian carrying a gun and as an instructor teaching individuals to use a gun. Have I been trained to look for nails? Have I been training people to look for nails? Given certain scenarios am I able to identify other options quick enough to avoid having to go to the gun? Do I have the skill to use those other options effectively? Am I communicating to my students the importance--no, the NECESSITY--of having other options besides the gun?
 
Don't get me wrong. As someone who has experienced a violent crime I am an advocate for lethal force. People should shoot when there is a need. They should be able to recognize that need and be able to articulate it. They should have the right to defend themselves with lethal force and be able to delivery it swiftly and aggressively. They should be skilled in the use of deadly force and ready and able to use it effectively.

But they should also be able to identify when it is not needed.

As my Krav instructor once said, "The hard part isn't teaching people how to turn the aggression on. It's teaching them how to turn if off."

Yes, we need to teach people and/or learn to identify those nails. But after that it might be time to start learning how to identify screws and wires, paint and thread and the appropriate tools for those jobs.

Maybe instead of asking, "Would you shoot in this scenario?" we should be asking, "What would you do to keep from having to shoot in this scenario?"

Maybe instead of constructing all of our FOF scenarios to have gun solutions, we should be constructing far more of them to have no-shoot solutions.

Instead of lauding good shoot news articles on our facebook pages we should be praising scenarios that ended with no shots fired or less-than-lethal force.

Maybe as students of self-defense we should put more time into seeking out no-shoot solutions instead of concentrating so much on the shooting part.

The gun is a good tool. It's the best option in many encounters. But it's just a gun. It's not the only option, nor should it be.

Be able to identify a nail for what it is. But stop looking for them.

"Can't" And All The Lies It Tells

"I can't...."

One of the most self-defeating phrases in the English language. Probably also one of the first learned and most often spoken as well.

And if people aren't proclaiming their own self-made limitations they are busy projecting them on others.

"You can't...."

We know that "can't" is lie. Still we claim it as truth in our own lives and force it on others with a ferocity that can range from benign to flat-out criminal.

Time and time again we've seen the lie that is "can't" be exposed for the facade it is...

You can't travel faster than the speed of sound. 

You can't travel outside of earth's atmosphere.

You can't run a mile faster than four minutes.

Even though we know, now, that given the right time, about of knowledge, skill, tools and motivation darned near anything is possible, people insist on limiting so much...

I can't be happy.

I can't find love.

I can't get that promotion. 

I can't get cancer.

I can't be in an abusive relationship.

I can't watch my family be murdered before my eyes.

That took a dark turn, didn't it?

The act of throwing up a middle finger to "can't" and telling it to copulate with itself is not limited to the positive things we want in life.

"Can't" is as much of a lie when you are denying an ugly reality as it is when you are denying a positive opportunity.

And yet, I see this type of "can't" being propagated in the self defense community. I see if every day in the comments I read on Facebook and YouTube and blog posts all over the internet.

"You can't let him get that close to you."

"You can't let it get that far."

"You can't let someone pull a knife on you."

I've got some really bad news for you: YOU FUCKING CAN!

You may not want to. You may do everything to avoid it. But it can happen. And it can happen to YOU!

And now that it has happened, what are you going to do about it?

Some people respond, having seen you work your hardest to prepare for those worst-case scenarios, by throwing in an extra bushel of "can't" for your dying pleasure.

"You can't get out of that hold."  

"You can't hold, draw, shoot, load, etc your gun like that."

"You can't defend against that."

"You can't work that technique."

"You can't survive that."

Well, I'm certainly going to try!

I prepare for the worst-case. I don't believe that carrying a gun and a pocket knife renders me perfectly prepared to combat any foe. I don't live in a fantasy world that makes me believe I can't be taken by surprise or ambushed. I don't believe I can keep every bad person out there at a twenty-one foot distance from me. I don't believe I will be able to perfectly perform every defensive technique I've ever learned at any given time. I'm preparing for the possibility that I might panic, freeze, forget, be sick, distracted, exhausted, afraid but so damned trained I will at least do SOMETHING to the best of my ability to survive.

I've experienced some of the ugliest truth of what CAN happen to me and I've lived through it all to the end that I work my ass off to be as prepared as I can be should I have to face it again.

I share what I do with others so that I might be able to track my progress, be inspired and motivated by those more prepared than me and maybe inspire others to abandon the lies of "can't" in their own lives for both the good and the bad.

Some use that openness on my part as a chisel to try to break apart my own efforts and training. They try to tell me what I'm doing isn't effective or won't work or isn't good enough. They may be right. They may be wrong. But one thing I know to be a fact is that I'm out there doing the work. I'm learning. I'm putting forth the effort. I do what I can do in a way that won't cripple myself or those I train with. Sometimes I do well. Sometimes I get my ass kicked. But always I am learning and working to be that much better, quicker, and fiercer than anyone who might try to harm me. I may never be bigger or stronger but I believe I can train until I can outsmart, outmaneuver or just plain outbluff or outluck someone who thinks they can harm me or mine. 

And so I ask... What the hell are you doing?

If you're out there working beside me and doing what you can do in the limits of your own time, money and life, then bravo! We're on this road together.

So many are still hiding behind the mask of, "That can't happen to me." And not all of them are anti-gun idealists either. Some carry guns and hold on to them like magic talismans disbelieving that anyone could get through their "situational awareness." Their eyes are blinded to the dark possibilities of the world. They stand proud and secure in their own illusion of what can't possibly happen but does every day. And still others look at people like me and find nothing better to do than project more negativity because, surely, the little woman can't beat the big guy.

Shit happens. It can happen to you. The bad guy can get to you. And sometimes the little gal can win.

Own Your Skill Level

I entered an art contest my freshmen year of high school. I drew a picture of a little girl in braids. She was looking out at you, the viewer, with a sort of somber look on her face. I won first place at the regional competition and went on to an international competition where I placed within the top 15 in monochromatic pencil. I was good. Everyone told me I was good. I knew I was good.

That summer I enrolled in an art camp and we were required to take a drawing with us to show the instructors what we were capable of. I took my little girl.

The instructors were going through the other student's work. Some of it was good. Some of it was not so good. When he got to mine he said it was good and was about to move on when I asked him to critique it. He looked at me and said, "How honest can I be?" I encouraged him to be completely honest.

"Her right eye isn't looking the exact same direction as the left. Her left eye isn't a perfect circle. Her mouth is curved wrong. Her nose could be much more defined. You have very light shading. In black and white, skin isn't white, it's grey..."

I had a choice. I could have been offended that he was being so hard on me. I could have believed that I was good enough and I didn't have to listen to his criticisms. I could have gotten mad. I also could have defeated myself by thinking his criticisms meant I wasn't good. That I somehow failed. I decided neither of those choices would help me.

He looked at me and must have thought I felt he was being too harsh. I was just staring at my drawing and he said, "I'm sorry." What he didn't know was that I was in awe. I was in awe that he was seeing these things and instead of just patting me on the back and allowing me to continue doing them wrong he was willing to point them out to me and help me improve. I wasn't offended, mad or defeated. I was inspired to do better. I chose to improve.

Over the week he pushed me hard.

The next year I entered the same competition and drew a picture of a soldier sitting on his cot with his head in his hands. I won first at the regional level and second place at the international level. I went back to the same art school and took both the girl and my new work.

He immediately took it in front of the entire class set it on the podium gave a speech, "If you are willing to open yourself to honest criticism and listen to our instruction, this is what you are capable of."

He pushed me even harder that year and the following year I did even better.

What does that experience have to do with shooting and self defense? I'll tell you.

This weekend I went to the Rangemaster Instructor Course. I was good shooter when I enrolled. I knew I was good. I've been told repeatedly I was good. I was confident and ready. I knew I was going to be challenged but I didn't know how much. I figured it wouldn't be easy but I didn't expect to have my butt kicked.

It took me about an hour to see where my weaknesses were. Every thrown shot, every time I took a shot after my time was up, every time I struggled with a drill, I felt like I was failing. Like I was no good. Like I didn't belong at that class.

On lunch on the second day one of the instructors said there was only a handful of people in the entire class that he thought had a good handle on all of the fundamentals. I asked him if I was included in that group. With a look of apology on his face he said, "No."

It stung. Bad.

But then it hit me. I faced a decision. I could ignore him. I could think I was "good enough." I could puff out my chest and assume he didn't know what he was talking about. I could also feel defeated and give up.

I'd been choosing defeat all weekend. I was defeating myself by thinking I was terrible. I was beating myself up and feeling like everything I'd done to that point was for nothing. I was feeling like a failure.

I kept questioning everything I'd ever taught others. How could I possibly be a good instructor when I wasn't performing perfectly here?

But I remembered that art class. I remembered how I felt being critiqued by that instructor and the third choice I could make.

I could improve.

I had the choice to accept that all of the work I had done to that point was valid. I was good. But, I could be BETTER. I could stop kicking myself in the butt, get out of my own way, stop letting my pride screw with my head and absorb the instruction I was getting.

I asked him where I could improve and he critiqued my presentation (draw) from the holster. I could immediately see where what he was saying was valid. He wasn't telling me anything new. He was showing me that I'd gotten lazy. I wasn't applying every step of what I'd learned. It was time to hold myself to a higher standard.

I went back to my hotel room that night and drew my gun for twenty minutes.

I dry-fired, did magazine changes and committed myself to improving.

The next morning I shot my best score on the qualification.

It's easy to convince yourself that you are "good enough" or above criticism. It's also easy to defeat yourself when your errors are pointed out to you. It's harder to own your skill level for everything it is and for everything it isn't and accept the criticism of others to your own improvement.

At the same time, you have to be careful of where you get your criticism from.

I don't accept the criticism of people on the internet who I don't know to be an authority on the subject. I put myself out there and so I get a lot of criticism. The anonymous jerk who goes off about how stupid I am and tries to list all of the things I'm doing wrong doesn't make me bat an eyelash.

I also won't allow people to tell me I'm no good. Not even myself. I know I'm good. I have no doubt that, if shooting were necessary, I would be a formidable opponent. I know I can pick up any handgun and operate it to a basic standard. I will not allow some arm-chair commando tell me I don't know what I'm talking about.

But I also will not allow myself to think I'm above instruction. I have areas where I need to improve. I have a higher standard for myself and when I reach my next shooting goals I'm going to reach higher.

And if one of the instructors I know well and respect wants to critique me I am all ears. Every new instructor I train under or who reaches out to me to critique me will get my full attention. They are trying to help me. They are trying to help me improve.

I choose to improve.

What's your choice?

Childbirth, Self Confience and Leadership

I am a great follower.

What I mean by that is if there is an individual present who I perceive to be in authority I yield easily him or her. This has served me well in many instances with good leaders. It has also served me very poorly as there have been times I have followed the commands of "authority" knowing it wasn't the best course of action.

There is a lot of safety and comfort in not making decisions for yourself or anyone else. Being able to point at someone else and say, "I'm just doing what he told me to," is a safety net I enjoyed in my youth. It got me off the hook many times.

But it's really no way to live a life. Yes, there are times when you need to know how to follow orders completely and without question. There are other times when you need to stand up to authority and say, "I'm not doing that." There are also other times when you have to step up and be the leader no one else can be in the moment.

My first role as a leader was as a high school drama team leader. There were four teams and ours came in dead last. It made me never want to be a leader again and I avoided leadership roles as long as I could.

But leadership roles have found me and life is nothing if it isn't a series of things you have to do that you may not want to do.

As the movie quote goes: Sometimes I do what I want to do. The rest of the time, I do what I have to.

I've gotten more and more comfortable in a role as leader. When I instruct I take my role as leader very seriously. I am fun and we have a good time but I have no problem getting authoritative when it comes to certain things like safety.

I have not been given the opportunity to be a leader as an EMT. I've always been under the supervision of paramedics or senior EMTs and, much to my own surprise, I really want to be lead! I feel very confident in my skills as an EMT and I feel as though I would do a decent job... at least until I got more experience and then I would rock it!
 

Previously, even if I was on the correct path, being in a leadership role would make me panic. The higher the stakes the more the panic. It put a knot in my chest and I would doubt myself constantly. I was constantly on the edge of freezing up entirely and that scared me more than not knowing what to do.

I'm finding that EMT training has helped my self confidence more than anything else I have ever done to date. It has given me a sense of self awareness and preparation that makes me feel confident and ready for almost anything. It has given me far more confidence to look at someone and say, "You! Do this!.. You! Pick that up!... You! Start doing this... You! STOP!"

That being said, I've seldom been tested on my own. I've always had a safety net of other experienced people around me. When I have been tested has been in relatively low-stress environments.

Then I got a phone call at 6:30 on a Sunday morning.

My friend and neighbor was having a home birth and, trusting my skill as an EMT to recognize a dangerous situation and being close friends, she had wanted me at her birth.

Her midwife lived an hour away and so I knew that there was a good chance I would be the only caregiver for quite some time. If something went wrong or the birth was exceptionally fast it would be on me to make decisions and lead the family in the correct course of action. As honored as I was to be trusted in that role I was worried I wasn't ready.

But when her husband said, "It's baby time," I sprang into action.

I was at their house in less than five minutes and a little surprised at just how calm I was. Mom was doing well, laboring well and I took a moment to recognize what was going on and orient myself to what needed to be done.

We'd gone through childbirth in EMT training and having had two children of my own the process was not new to me but this would be the first birth I would be attending as a caregiver and not a mother in labor.

I realized that dehydration and a lack of energy is a huge complication in labor. I asked Mom what she'd had to eat or drink that morning. I got her drinking water as her husband set up the birthing area.

Between contractions we made a game of figuring out baby's position so I knew I wasn't dealing with a surprise breach. During contractions I was her support and couch.

When I recognized she was going through transition and the midwife still wasn't there I waited for the panic to come but it didn't. I moved Mom to the birthing area and started thinking about what needed to be done if baby came and there was no midwife.

Mom started pushing in earnest and still the panic didn't come. I started mentally going through the check list of things to do to assess both baby and Mom.

I made sure we didn't have parts of the baby coming out first that weren't supposed to be coming out first and told her to do whatever she felt her body was telling her to do.

I was ready... totally and completely ready to deliver that baby on my own with no hesitation when the midwife finally walked through the door.

Baby was born about fifteen minutes later into mine and the midwife's hands.

One of the most incredible moment in my life aside from delivering my own children.

Afterward, my job was to continue monitoring Mom's vital signs and assist the midwife. I fell back into the role of assistant, taking instruction from the midwife. Handling the blood and relative gore of the afterbirth was a breeze though when it came to that part everyone else was more than happy to leave me and the midwife to ourselves.

Delivering a baby may not be as stressful as some things people find themselves facing. But it was a crystal clear moment to me of how far I've come in my ability to handle stressful situations and leadership roles. I had a lot of responsibility resting on my shoulders. I was completely alone as a caregiver and trusted to make the right call when it came to the health of both Mom and Baby. I had no tools except my EDC bag, a stethoscope, a blood pressure cuff and a telephone. And I rocked it.

The best moment of the day for me was when a friend of the family arrived, looked at me and said, "Who are you?"

Mom said, "She is my birthing assistant. She was here for an hour before the midwife got here and I don't know what I would have done without her. She was helping me so much. She was amazing!"

That's right.

I was amazing!

Distractions In Class

I taught another basic gun class this last Saturday. It was small but it was a great group. Everyone there was eager to learn, excited and fired up about self defense.

One of my students I have known for a couple of years and have watched her explosive entry into the world of self defense. I've loved the random emails asking about all manner of equipment and self defense concepts. She's a fast learner and eager.

She went from working in a library to prepping to become a reserve police officer. She's started taking regular hand-to-hand combat classes and other training seminars for all manner of defensive situations. She'd already taken one carry class but felt it was a bit lacking and enrolled in mine.

She was, by far, the most interactive student. She asked thought-provoking questions, gave examples of self defense concepts I spoke of and generally engaged herself throughout the entirety of the class. I was thrilled to have her there!

When the discussion turned to the OODA (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) loop she was on fire. As I talked about interrupting someone else's OODA loop she raised her hand.

She said, "May I show you something regarding OODA loop interruption?"

I wasn't sure what she was up to but always up for a practical application I welcomed her to demonstrate.

She stood at one side of the classroom with an empty water bottle in her hand and said, "Okay, let's say you are the bad guy and we are walking towards one another."

We started walking towards each other and out of the blue she throws the water bottle as hard as she can into the corner of the room. I watched her carefully expecting some kind of a strike or furtive movement.

"No, no, no," she said. "You're supposed to watch the water bottle! It's a distraction technique!"

The whole room burst out laughing including the both of us.


"I'm sorry," I said, "but the threat isn't the water bottle it's you! I'm not taking my eyes off of you."

"This time watch the water bottle," she said as she retrieved it from the floor.

"I'll try," I promised.

Even knowing what I was supposed to do, when she threw the water bottle I kept my eyes glued to her.

Once again the room burst out laughing.

She threw up her hands and laughed, "You're too hard to distract."

"I'm sorry," I said. "I think I'm a little too conditioned. If I got distracted like that in my martial arts class my instructor would smack me in the head so I'm very trained to watch people vs objects. But, you're on to something. May I?"

I held my hand out for the water bottle and she gave it to me.

I said, "Now you're the bad guy coming toward me."

We started walking at each other from across the room and when she was just outside of my striking distance I tossed the water bottle straight at her face, striking her softly on the bridge of the nose and forehead. She threw her hands up, twisted sideways and stopped as she blinked a few times. By the time she recovered and looked at me I was several steps back, my hand over my gun, waiting for her.

"Or you could do that!" she said as she smiled.

Everyone was laughing again but the point was pretty clear.

"If you're going to use a distraction technique," I said, "make it count. People can be condition not to watch objects being thrown around them but it's hard to ignore something coming straight at your face. A water bottle, a cup of coffee, gravel, whatever you have, throw it right at their face. It will be more distracting." 

I'm not sure where she learned the distraction technique she tried to demonstrate. It may very well work if the attacker was in "task fixation mode" such as wanting your wallet or purse and you tossed that item to the side to gain distance, but as a general distraction technique throwing objects away may or may not be as effective as just smashing them in the face with said object.

I told my krav instructor about the incident and he smiled, "Yeah, I would smack you if that distracted you."