This will be a bit rambling because I want to write about a few things, so I apologize up front. The first thing I want to talk about is the title of the piece: Mentality Determines Lethality (which is a word, despite what the spellchecker is telling me). Had a great day on the range on Sunday with a group of shooters with varying degrees of experience. One was a relative beginner, but a bit of a natural. After just one tip from the most experienced shooter out there, she was bulls-eyeing every target. Before that, she was getting excellent groups, but she was a bit nervous because of the natural tendency to be unsure of oneself when put on a range. People think it is a competition, and if you're not hitting bulls-eyes you are failing. This reminded me of a very important distinction between competitive shooters and self-defense shooters. I don't aim for bulls-eyes and I don't train students to aim for bulls-eyes. So I explained to them that your measurement for performance varies based on your goal. My goal in training to shoot a pistol is to put a large number of bullets into the torso of another human being as fast as I can. That is a different goal than a marksman who trains to put one bullet into a bulls-eye. Neither one is better, they are just different goals. After that, she became less nervous and started being less self-critical of her shooting, which was truly way better than most experienced shooters. She picked up a gun she had never seen before and hit a bulls-eye the first shot.
Which leads me to the bigger point. Technique is not as important as mindset. I wrote about this last time regarding the mental strength necessary to kill another human being. I train people in techniques to do that, but I also tell all of my students at the end of every class that shooting is a self-defense method, but it is also a sport that requires practice. Or, in my case, it's a recreational activity. It is how I relieve stress, not get more stressed out about hitting bulls-eyes. But, sport or recreational activity, both involve practice. That is the technique. And technique is not as important as mindset. That is something that can be taught, but typically it involves months of indoctrination into a uniform of some type. That can be a military uniform, a police uniform, or a martial arts gi, but whatever the case, it usually won't come from an eight hour class on a range. I do demonstrate what aggression is, and sometimes that scares the hell out of students in my advanced classes, because I want them to see the mentality. You shoot until your out of bullets, then you start pistol-whipping the guy if he's still a threat, and stomping on him until he's no longer a threat. That is the philosophy of violence, not sport and not technically putting bullets in bulls-eyes.
Which is what I think is missing in 21st Century America. I wrote "Go Kill Something" because it has to do with that mentality of getting acquainted with mortality. We are very removed from it; which means we are very prone to it surprising us when people who use violence for evil show up in our lives. I phrased that deliberately, because I had a conversation last week with a well-meaning young person who said we had "evolved passed the need for violence." I asked him if his grandfather was still alive. He said he was. So, I asked if his grandfather knew how low of an opinion he had of the Greatest Generation. He was offended. But, basically, his assertion was that humanity today is more civilized than it was in the 1940s, when violence was used to SAVE CIVILIZATION. I doubt I successfully changed his mind from being a pacifist to being a warrior, but it highlighted a very offensive ideology in the civilization that the Greatest Generation saved. Most Baby Boomers, Gen X-ers and Millennials have lost the mentality necessary to be lethal. Obviously, there are exceptions, but we are outliers, and we are terrifying to the majority who have lost the understanding that violence can be used for saving civilizations as well as oppressing them.
Which brings me back to my title; Mentality Determines Lethality. I studied martial arts for almost ten years before I ever had to use it in a fight. I had absolutely no confidence in the skills until I had to use them. But, it turns out, I had the skills inside me to end the fight in a matter of seconds. This was not a self-defense situation; this was two dumb ass college students with big mouths, by the way. But what I discovered was that the technique was okay, but the mentality is what carried the day. The technique didn't go off exactly as I had trained on the mat over and over again, but I put enough aggression and violence of action into it, that it didn't matter. The same is true of shooting. The goal is not to be Chris Kyle (God rest his heroic soul); the goal is just to get home. If sloppy violence gets you home, you achieved the goal. Putting a perfectly aimed shot into someone's heart or snot box is indeed more technically impressive; but putting five rounds into their torso achieves the same goal. It is that Mentality that Determines Lethality, not accuracy. What practice does is give you muscle memory enough to execute the movements good enough to get home. "There's GOOD, and there's GOOD ENOUGH."
Which brings me to my last meandering point: self-defense does not require you to be a Navy SEAL. Navy SEALs do not go to kill Bin Laden with a concealed carry pistol or a pocket knife as their primary weapon. War and self-defense are not the same thing. There are a lot of guys out there who are very, very good warriors who are truly American heroes, that are trying to train civilians to be "operators." That's cool, if you have the money to spend on the ammo. But, I contend that you don't have to be an operator to kill a mugger, though certainly operators can kill them more efficiently, but the mugger can't tell the difference afterwards. That is not to contradict myself and say practice isn't important, it is, and you should practice the skills of violence as often as you can. But, don't make the mistake I made before that first fight and assume that your skills aren't good enough because you're not Chris Kyle. First of all, it's not likely you will be carrying a sniper rifle when you are mugged or carjacked, as most muggers and carjackers are not quite that stupid. It is more likely you will have a concealed carry pistol, or a folding knife, and with those tools precision is a lot less important than aggression. Not everybody needs to be an operator, but we all need to remember the faces of our grandfathers who did not believe violence was inherently evil, and were willing to be violent when it was necessary.
Perfection is irrelevant in defeating very fragile and highly mortal human beings.
Thanks,
Soule (Easy 6)
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