What It's About
Irradiated by LabRat
One thing that I probably don’t need to explain to most of the people who read this, but sometimes find myself floundering to explain to others, is why I enjoy shooting and why I refer to it as a stress reliever. The people who do shoot are already giving the blank look and the “duh”, but it always feels like, when I try to explain “had a terrible week, but now I’m off to burn some brass at the range” to someone to whom guns are something that exists in the news and fiction but not in a way that really relates to them at all, that they’re getting completely the wrong idea even if they know and like me.
I like to think I’m a good person, but I also know I’m not really what you could fairly call a nice person in a lot of ways. I don’t suffer fools gladly, I’m introverted as hell and I find the company of most other people draining rather than refreshing or desirable, and you won’t find being inoffensive anywhere on any of my priority lists. I play Violent Video Games ™ (scare chord). The only sport I enjoy watching (boxing) could fairly be termed a blood sport.
So, to a person to whom guns and violence are a peanut-butter-and-jelly pairing inside their head, and who know I’m no one’s Mother Theresa, I always get the nagging suspicion that they think that, when I head to the range after a frustrating day/week/whatever, I’m acting out some kind of violent fantasy in a safe environment, or purging violent urges. And nothing could be further from the truth.
Oh, I’m not going to sit here and give you doe eyes and claim I’m above that sort of thing or never do it. It’s just that when I do, I jump into a game and tear the elf ears off somebody, or work it out with free weights, or anything else that allows me to do just that- safely and in a socially acceptable fashion act out aggression until I’m too damn tired or mentally fried to have any anymore.
The thing is, even if I wanted to have a fantasy about shooting people that frustrate me (which, for the record, I have never had and don’t expect to have any time soon, if you’re worried about me flipping out spree-killer style- I heavily favor the imagined slap upside the face over BOOM HEADSHOT), actually shooting at the range would make it very difficult to do that. The mindsets are incompatible.
The truth is, if I’m one the firing line with a pistol, a rifle, or a shotgun, I’m too damn mentally busy to fantasize about anything other than putting the shots in the black or knocking down the steel or busting the clay. What needs to be in my head is my sight picture, my stance and what I could theoretically be doing to improve it, not slapping the trigger, not limp-wristing, and all the rest of the things that go into making a projectile go where I want it to, which is a damn sight harder than the movies make it look. Even if I practiced as much as I should/would like to and all of that were long sunk into muscle memory, the mindset is *still* basically incompatible; the combination of focus and ritual is inherently calming, and just doesn’t let you sustain that adrenalined, aggressive jangle that makes catharsis possible and rewarding. From the Four Rules to the set of range commands that allow for safe conditions and a fast-paced, efficient running of a class or training session or sporting event or whatever, everything involved in shooting is highly ritualized.
Shotgun is even more pronounced in this respect- if rifle and pistol force you to focus just on stance and sight picture and all the rest of it, just about any form of shotgun sport will force you to stop thinking altogether, because you only have a few seconds to react in and if you waste that time on conscious activity rather than swinging your gun, acquiring the target, and firing, you are going to miss. You might not even get around to firing at all before the clay lands. And contrary to what sometimes seems to be the popular belief, firing a gun is not an inherently violent or aggressive act- just an inherently loud one.
That’s why I like shooting when I’m stressed; short of tranquilizing drugs I haven’t yet found a more efficient way to force my mind out of an angry or anxious little rut and my body out of that reinforcing set of stress hormones. It’s especially good for an introvert like me that tends to occasionally need rescuing from my own head, especially in a group where I’m often at a little bit of a loss because socializing isn’t always that natural to me- which is why it was a big part of why I was able to easily relax and joke and chat with a bunch of people I’d never met in person before last weekend. At least one person commented that they didn’t expect me to be like that given my prickly persona, and the truth is- in a lot of situations, I’m not. But range time can be a better social lubricant for me than alcohol, minus the hangover. (But just as expensive if not moreso, sadly.)
Shooter ready.
November 16th, 2009 at 9:06 pm
thank you very much for giving your readers insight into you.
November 16th, 2009 at 9:07 pm
Yep, same here. I’ll add that I’m discovering that the company of introverts doesn’t drain me like “normal” people do.
May be why I had such a great time visiting you guys.
More please!
November 17th, 2009 at 1:39 am
Besides … the guns like having their triggers pulled.
November 17th, 2009 at 5:31 am
Don’t think you can scare me. You’re still adopted!
November 17th, 2009 at 6:36 am
If you like watching boxing, you should take up watching MMA and kickboxing. I just watched Fedor Emelianalgkhalkghgiooo or whatever his name is KO Tim Silvia in 36 seconds yesterday. It was fucking rad.
November 17th, 2009 at 7:50 am
Shooting, is one of the few things that demands that you live totally in the moment.
November 17th, 2009 at 9:44 am
When Chester Nimitz needed to relax from running the war in the Pacific his doctor recommended pistol target shooting, since when you’re thinking about shooting you’re not thinking about anything else. I guess it worked.
November 17th, 2009 at 10:09 am
I was way too excited when I was shooting, I think. I forgot to breathe sometimes. I guess with more practice I’ll get there, but yes: I had so much running through my brain (regarding exactly what I was doing) that it pushed all else OUT. That can be a very good thing.
The best thing about Blogorado to me was feeling accepted. Nobody I know in Las Vegas really gets me, but I felt at home in Colorado. And meeting you guys was awesome.
November 17th, 2009 at 10:41 am
I haven’t really shot a gun (tried once or twice at summer camp when I was little) but a friend of mine who shoots once told me he found it extremely meditative.
It made sense to me - I do karate and as much as I do enjoy sparring, that’s not the part that works out any anger or frustration. It’s the mindset that starts as soon as we bow to start the class.
If archery and kendo can be “zen arts” that people practice without thoughts of killing, why not shooting?
November 17th, 2009 at 10:55 am
My favorite sport to watch is boxing too. We definitely need to hang out more.
And shoot more.
November 17th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
It is truly the ‘Zen’ of shooting. Excellent post and dead on the money! You CANNOT shoot well if you are not totally concentrating on the moment and they 1001 things you must do
You’ll know you are really good when you can slow your heart, then shoot between the heartbeats (and yes, I know people who do that)!
November 17th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
Yep. That’s it exactly. I can’t think about anything other than shooting when I’m shooting. Rarely, if ever, can I get so focused as to drive out everything else. It’s just me and the gun. Nothing else matters.
November 17th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
Exactly- explain it in the context of a martial art- most people have got enough exposure to a pop-culture understanding of Zen to get it when you put it that way. Serious martial artists are not fantasizing about killing someone when they practice, and when it’s real, they are too busy getting it right to have fantasies.
You do what needs to be done, from a place of muscle memeory and dispassionate, heightened clarity, according to criteria you’re thought out in advance.
November 17th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
I tend to fall into the same category. Shooting or when I manage it, fencing, is focus on what I’m doing. If I need to blow off steam, I log into a game. Closest I come to enjoying a blood sport is a rousing game of “Blood Bowl.” Yeah, I’m a geek.
For what it’s worth, I think you convey yourself quite well, even for the uninitiated.
November 18th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
I agree totally. I have a high stress job and my weekly trips to the range with my girlfriend are one of the few times I can really forget about work. I mostly shoot pistol and between us we burn 600+ rounds of centerfire ammo each trip.
All of the things that go into hitting the target where I intend to empties my mind of everything else.
November 18th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
You should try a real shooting vacation. I just got back from a week long trapshooting competition….7 days of nothing but me and the target. I even camped at the range. No internet, no phones, no TV. A true vacation is not one where you aren’t physically active; a true vacation is one where you can forget about your life completely.
It’s cheaper than a week long trip to (insert standard vacation spot here), and you’ll actually feel more refreshed when it’s over.
The only problem is that you’ll run into retired people who do it all the time and end up jealous of their lifestyle.
November 18th, 2009 at 11:31 pm
Totally agree.
The reason I took up pistol shooting is that I was working in a high stress job at the time and couldn’t find any other activity where I had to switch off from work and focus just on what i was doing.
November 19th, 2009 at 12:05 am
The stress reliever is picking up all of the damn brass.
Midway doesn’t give it away y’know.
Who loves ya kid?
November 19th, 2009 at 6:41 am
As a brand new shooter (been to the range twice and found it to be way too much fun!) you just explained to me why. All that concentration and ritual shut up, at least briefly, the rest of my brain, which is usually going far too hard on far too many topics. It gave me a clear challenge and focus.
November 19th, 2009 at 6:50 am
[…] Why shooters shoot. […]
November 19th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
I often compare shooting to bowling, but with bigger booms.
November 19th, 2009 at 9:26 pm
I’m glad you shoot. I was thrilled to see you shooting those clays- you’re damned good at it.
November 21st, 2009 at 8:22 pm
Wow, very well said. I never really have the patience or the words to explain why I like shooting so much, might have to keep copies of this handy and just pass it out to my non-shooting friends, /sarc.