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The most important, life-saving advice I learned during my Intermediate Pistol Class at Agape Tactical

The most important, life-saving advice I learned during my Intermediate Pistol Class at Agape Tactical

Last updated on: January 22, 2019 at 3:54 pm by Nancy French

The most important, life-saving advice I learned during my Intermediate Pistol Class at Agape Tactical 2019-01-22T15:54:09-05:00 Nancy French

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“You never rise to the occasion,” Ken said. “In an emergency, you will sink to your lowest level of training.”

Rise to the level of your training, not the occasion. pic.twitter.com/xVvvqrfM4D

— Everything Weapons (@EverythingWeapo) July 28, 2016

His point? We need to train, train, train so that our adrenaline doesn’t rob us totally of our skills when the moment arises. At the end of his talk, I asked him the question that had been nagging me… I knew he was a police officer, not a psychiatrist, but I gave it a shot.

“When I’ve been in trouble before, I always freeze,” I said. “I feel like I could be the best shot in the world, but if I don’t have whatever it takes to defend myself I feel like it’s all a waste. Can you help fix that?”

“Yes,” he said without pause. “It’s called the Moment of Puzzlement… when you are realizing that the situation has turned, that the bad guy isn’t doing what you ask, and that something needs to be done.”

He went on to confidently explain how to overcome that through various self-defense exercises.

“First of all, any woman who has survived an attack did the right thing… I know that because she’s still here,” he said. “But all women need to learn they can fight back.”

At the end of the class, Dawn described the self-defense classes and what is taught in the Advanced Pistol class — how to shoot from a restaurant table, how to shoot in the dark, and how to shoot from your knees.

That last one shook me. As some of you know, I’m a ghost writer, or a “celebrity collaborator” on various books. One of my recent books was about a family whose daughter was shot and killed by her fiancé. The family miraculously forgave the killer of their daughter, in a tale that is both inspirational and challenging. (It’s called Forgiving My Daughter’s Killer: A True Story of Loss, Faith, and Unexpected Grace if you ever want to see the jaw-dropping scope of one family’s forgiveness.) When I write, I get completely absorbed in the story in ways hard to describe; the closest comparison is perhaps an actor who is immersed in a role.

The daughter, in this book’s case, was shot while on her knees… that was the detail I couldn’t get over. Her knees.

When Dawn said, “how to shoot from the knees,” I literally gasped, causing the others in the class to chuckle. By now, these women realized my skittishness and were good naturedly amused.

But I felt a chill go down my spine.

That’s the thing about these classes.

In the bright lights of the gun store, the instructors’ lessons seem so academic.

“Shoot in the bad guy’s T Zone,” is no problem when you’re staring down a bad guy on a piece of paper.

But occasionally, just for a moment, the prospect of actually using these skills seizes me unexpectedly and I lose my breath.

Do I have what it takes to do this?

READ THE COMPLETE SERIES:

5 reasons why I decided to take my gun carry permit class… and carry this time for real

4 things I learned in my “women only” beginner pistol class

The most important, life-saving advice I learned during my Intermediate Pistol Class

What I learned when a man almost killed me

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Agape Tactical - Woman Warrior

Intermediate Pistol Class

Ken Alexandrow

National Rifle Association

Warrior Woman

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