Recently, I had an article published where I was highly critical of what I referred to as the process of “building shooting robots.” By that I meant firearm training that conditions students to become reflexive shooters who learn to press the trigger as some type of pavlovian response, but do not engage in active thinking prior to doing so.
While those who merely engage in games or play with firearms might not view reflexive trigger pressing as a problem, in regards to mortal combat or life and death situations, it can be a deadly problem.
Ballistic Problem Solving
Rather than just point out a problem, we have taken steps to fix it, to take corrective action, if you will. Somewhere around 2012 we at Student of the Gun developed a training curriculum that included what we referred to as “Ballistic Problem Solving: Thinking with a Gun in Your Hand.” After all, shouldn’t that be the goal of every firearms training program that’s promoted as “tactical” or for self-defense?
Out in the world — the world outside of the dirt berms and the square range — there will be no instructor to blow a whistle, press the button on a shot timer, or yell “Fire!” You must be able to make good decisions, to problem solve, to think with a gun in your hands. Also, there are far more things that should not be shot in the world than should be shot. We have to practice discernment.
While we don’t feel as though we will get pushback on the idea of thinking with a gun in your hands. We also need to pause for a reality check when it comes to what’s being taught and the behaviors that are being reinforced through either training or other shooting activities.
Many years ago, I read a book written by a former US Army Special Forces veteran. In that book he stated, “We need to consider every round we launch in training as a rehearsal for the real deal.” That quote stuck with me and I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment.
To expand on that concept just a bit, what we tell our students in the Martial Application of the Pistol course is that we need to view every iteration or every drill as a rehearsal for how we would want to respond and behave during a life-threatening encounter.
During a deadly force attack, should we be moving our feet if we’re not behind cover? Yes. Then we need to do that during training. Should we force ourselves to pay attention to everything going on around us, not just what is directly in front of our faces? Yes. Then we need to practice looking around and checking our world on the training range. Are there times when we might draw our gun and give commands to a threat, but not press the trigger? Ditto. You see where we are going here.
Gunfighting is Neuroscience
The presupposition that we encounter from the gun owning public in general is that professional training, at least in the martial or tactical space, is all about shooting our guns. People are fond of saying, “I don’t need to go to some school or training course, I already know how to shoot.”
To which we would respond in all earnestness, shooting is not the synonym of fighting. My good friend Jay Gibson likes to remind his students that, “Just because the noise stops doesn’t mean the fight is over. There’s still more to do.” Life is not an action-movie where we blast the bad guys, high five our buddy, and roll the credits.
True gunfighting — and the root word in ‘gunfight’ is not gun, it is fight — is truly the height of applied neuroscience. Taking of a human life is the highest form of liability or culpability in existence, nothing else comes close. You are either justified in a legal sense because you defended innocent life or you are not justified and will have to face numerous penalties. Also, unlike most other endeavors in life, the decision to either save an innocent life with gunfire or to negligently take a life is a process that can be measured in seconds. How can we make the absolute correct decision in mere seconds?
This is where your thinking brain comes into play. Consider emergency evasive maneuvers that you might have to make while driving your car. You’re driving along, going the speed limit, and suddenly an object crosses your path; an animal, a pedestrian, another vehicle. You have a second, perhaps a fraction of a second to react properly to avoid a collision.
Under the effects of sudden stress, you take your foot off of the accelerator, you turn the steering wheel, you apply pressure to the brake pedal. Many of you, if not most, have had a near-miss situation where you did all of the above and were able to avoid a collision. While it may have seemed longer, the actions you took to avoid the crash might have taken place in a second or less.
That’s neuroscience…your brain taking over and making your body respond correctly. The correct actions may have been a result of good driver’s training, a defensive driving course, and/or a combination of your experience behind the wheel.
When we’re on the training range, we need to be applying and practicing the same concepts. Let’s consider the parts of the brain that come into play, or should be exercised, during training.
Prefrontal Cortex (PFC): Responsible for decision-making and conscious thought. It initiates new behaviors, but as actions become automatic habits, its involvement decreases.
Basal Ganglia (Striatum): The core center for habit formation, particularly the dorsolateral striatum, which is involved in sensorimotor habits. It manages the “habit loop”—the cue, routine, and reward.
Anterior mid-cingulate cortex (aMCC) is a brain region involved in willpower, persistence, and motivation, often functioning as a “hot spot” that integrates cognitive, emotional, and motor information to drive goal-oriented behavior.
There are certain areas of firearms manipulation that we train to become reflexive; the drawstroke, removing any manual safety switches, indexing the muzzle onto the target, and moving our feet to get off of the “X”. Clearing an unexpected stoppage is another reflexive response that we work on developing.
This is where the basal ganglia comes into play. We are establishing the neuro-muscular pathways to clear away any hesitation or mental stutter that might have been present when we first started down the path to mastery.
However, the act of pressing the trigger and launching bullets can NEVER be allowed to become reflexive or thoughtless. The act of firing our guns must come from the prefrontal cortex and the conscious decision-making center of our brains. The decision-making process must be free of clutter and confusion in order to make the absolute correct choice in the small amount of time we have.
Training Our Brains
The human brain is an organ not unlike any other organ or muscle. We can take steps to make our muscles stronger and our organs healthy or we can neglect them and experience atrophy and weakness. While not often discussed in daily intercourse, we can strengthen and sharpen our brains and this includes our prefrontal cortex.
During previous contributions, we have considered much of the literature and studies that have shown how a heightened level of physical coordination leads to brain health and improved cognitive function. In other words, people who deliberately work on their physical coordination have a better ability to make correct decisions rapidly. But, coordination alone doesn’t complete the puzzle.
During the Ballistic Problem Solving training, students are put into situations where they must first engage their brains, the prefrontal cortex, and solve a problem prior to the decision to press the trigger and fire the gun. There are numerous drills where the stimuli to begin problem solving is varied so as to not become reflexive or anticipated.
Going back to the description of the prefrontal cortex and its job, we recall the admonition that when actions become automatic habits, its (PFC) involvement decreases and submits to the basal ganglia area of the brain governing reflexive habit. Understanding this tendency of the brain, we absolutely must make it our priority to keep the PFC in the driver’s seat when it comes to launching bullets out into the world. The only true way to ensure that situation is to devote our training and practice to true problem solving exercises.
Yes, when students are first introduced to firearms the program must be structured and organized to ensure that fundamentals of gun handling and marksmanship are developed. Nonetheless, after competency with a firearm has been developed, we need to challenge the brain as much as we are challenging the body.
The question that you must answer for yourself is this; does your training, practice, or recreational activity force you to sharpen your decision-making skills or does all of the above create a situation where you are reflexively pressing the trigger and shooting without first thinking? The choice is yours. Choose wisely.
Paul G. Markel is a combat decorated United States Marine veteran. He is also the founder of Student the Gun University and has been teaching Small Arms & Tactics to military personnel, police officers, and citizens for over three decades.