The Training Spirit.

Your background you were raised with firearms and learned to respect them as you were growing up, you served time in the military where you were exposed again to firearms but for a different purpose or you have no previous experience. The point is you want to exercise you second amendment rights in the most responsible way possible.

You've taken the journey.

You consider yourself to be a responsibly armed citizen and to that end you have taken steps to get the proper training to defend you and your family if a situation arises that calls upon it.

You can shoot, reload (both tactically and speed techniques), you have an understanding of trigger control, sight picture, muzzle discipline, trigger discipline, 5 point draw, drawing from concealment, shooting from retention, shooting from various positions, shooting on the move, shooting in low light conditions, trained drawing your backup gun, know the difference between cover and concealment, etc.

You have practiced shooting under stressful conditions to test your skills under adrenaline and noted the degradation of accuracy. You also understand that these skills are perishable to one degree or another and have to be practiced at certain intervals in order to stay fresh. You are able to put all these elements together while never violating any one of the four laws of safe gun handling. Also, during sustainment training, you are constantly vigilant to remove any bad habits that might creep in like anticipating recoil or "El Snatcho". You have also trained in multiple weapons systems: Handgun, Carbine and Shotgun just to round yourself out.

During the process of training you have been exposed to a variety of different instructors and met many people in person and virtually that have their opinions about training: what works and what doesn't, for them and you. Some align with your ideas and some are not quite in alignment but offer a new texture or flavor to your current training doctrine. Some argue about minor details others absorb the new info and meld with it. There is a common thread and that is everyone is on the same path but at a different place and with that the perspective is quite different. One thing for sure there is room for infinite variations.

Throughout all the training though, the hardest thing to prepare for is that time when you are called upon to actually use your skills. What will you do? Will you be able to decode the threatening altercation into its constituent pieces and act accordingly. Has your training involved enough tactical preparedness to maximize survivability and minimize the reliance on luck in a fluid situation.

Hopefully, you will never know the answer.