When The Flag Goes Up - Brief Article

[DaveM55]

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...g=content;col1

by Ken Hackathorn

How do you know what is required to shoot well in a life or death encounter? After years of study -- and I consider myself a serious student of weaponcraft, not an expert -- I believe that the answer is that you must be able to shoot reflexively. Reflexive means that shooting is an habitual and unthinking behavior.

Under conditions of life threatening stress, your conscious mind does not work well. Only the subconscious mind performs well. Yes, you can do some conscious mental functions, but the analytical thought process is very difficult.

If you think that in the moments before you pull the trigger in a life threatening scenario that you will think about grip, disengaging the safety, sight picture and trigger pull, well, guess again. Any conscious thought process that may be required on the range to shoot well will hardly exist when your meter is pegged.

Shooting reflexively requires plenty of practice to program the subconscious mind and instill confidence in your skill so that you will be totally confident in your ability to strike your target. Under stress, you will fire your sidearm as fast as you are capable of launching rounds.

If you practice shooting so that you are always under control in your "comfort zone" of shooting, you are not teaching your subconscious mind to react as it will in a life threatening situation. Yes, constant, deliberate practice is good, but you must push yourself to shoot beyond your "comfort zone" if you wish to really know what will happen when the flag goes up.

[Shawn.L]

In class Ken would constantly refer to "when the lizard brain is in control". Good stuff.