• By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted April 14, 2017
  • In flashlights, lubrication

Caring for your defensive flashlight

You do carry a high-intensity flashlight as part of your everyday ready kit, don’t you? If not, you should! I believe the compact high-intensity flashlight is the most useful self defense tool you can carry. It serves as a detection device, allowing you to spot danger before it can reach you; as a deterrent, using the […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted March 27, 2017
  • In carbines

The Pistol Caliber Carbine: the gun tactical hobbyists love to hate

If you ask a tactical hobbyist what he or she thinks about the pistol caliber carbine, you'll often be met with scorn. "They're not a rifle", they'll say, and that's true — but sometimes, not being a rifle makes them better for the person who isn't a tactical hobbyist. Here's why.

A gun on your nightstand isn’t the best idea, no matter who says so

One of the things I find myself doing on a regular basis is serving as a counterpoint to the fantasies running rampant in the defensive shooting world. I do this by bringing rational thought to the topic of personal defense, and today I’m doing it again! A recent article on the Concealed Nation website dealt […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted February 6, 2017
  • In confidence, security

“What is mindset?” — an excerpt from my new book!

Have you ever thought about what it takes to make the decision to protect yourself? Maybe it’s a matter of simply reframing your viewpoint. Here’s an excerpt on mindset from my new book, Protect Yourself With Your Snubnose Revolver:   Mindset First, you need to make a decision: that your own life and the lives […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted January 27, 2017
  • In drills, practice, realistic

Think before you shoot. A long time before.

A sad tale crossed my desk earlier this week. It seems one Billy Williams was awakened in the night by one of his children, who reportedly told him that someone was trying to break into their house via the front door. Mr. Williams retrieved a handgun from a safe in his bedroom and walked to […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted January 13, 2017
  • In drills, practice, realistic

Fort Lauderdale and the wisdom of traveling light

Last week’s shooting attack at Fort Lauderdale Airport gives us an opportunity to look at risk management from a personal standpoint. Airports are a favorite target of terrorists and are obviously attractive to deranged individuals as well. Part of the attraction is no doubt their status as a consistent no weapons zone; no matter where […]

The Fort Lauderdale attack: it’s not the gun. Again. Still.

Just a few days ago a man with a history of mental issues boarded an airline in Alaska, after declaring his gun in checked luggage as required by law. He sat down in his seat and the suitcase containing his pistol and ammunition was placed in the cargo hold beneath him. When he got to […]

Things people say: “Thinking while shooting”

I recently posted about the need for instructors to teach, and for students to learn, how to think during a defensive incident. Everyone agrees that it’s a necessary thing to do. The problem is that many of the people agreeing don’t really know what it means. Unclear on the concept Case in point: someone sent me […]

All training is an abstraction. Is that good or bad?

A couple of weeks ago someone posted an interesting video on social media. It wasn’t the video itself which was interesting, but rather the reactions to it. The video was of an exercise from a defensive shooting class. The exercise was a good example of forcing cognitive processing rather than a Pavlovian draw-and-fire response, which […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted December 5, 2016
  • In realistic

Questioning the premise of your preparations

My apologies if you’re not a fan of the show South Park, but an old episode has a training lesson for us. On that episode, some little people known as Underpants Gnomes presented their 3-part success plan: Phase 1: Steal underpants. Phase 2: ??? Phase 3: Profit! The joke, of course, isn’t that there’s nothing in […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted November 11, 2016
  • In awareness, mythbusting

“You can’t have everything. Where would you put it?”

The quote is from comedian Steven Wright. Wright is right. Think about it the next time someone says that the path to situational awareness is to see everything. You know what I mean: “Look for out-of-state license plates.” “What color shoes are the people in the restaurant wearing?” “Do you know how many left handers are […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted November 7, 2016
  • In integrity, teaching

Standards and integrity

If you're a fan of standards, you have to be sure that those standards have integrity. That's how you verify that they actually mean something.
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted October 31, 2016
  • In context, teaching

Time is running out to sign up for Threat-Centered Revolver in Arizona!

Just a month from now I’ll be teaching my Threat-Centered Revolver class in sunny Phoenix, and if you want to attend you need to book now! December 3 & 4 I’ll be at Phoenix Firearms Training, basking in the warm sun and teaching responsible revolver owners how to defend themselves with the classic double action […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted October 28, 2016
  • In instructors, security

Generally speaking, you shouldn’t specialize.

  If your goal is to make you and your family safer, to learn how to survive dangerous events, you need a generalist’s perspective. That’s because there are a wide range of things you need to know to make safety happen consistently, which means that you need to study and prepare in many different areas […]

Do you need to modify your carry gun? Should you?

In the dim past (which wasn’t really all that long ago), if you needed to change something on your carry gun you took it to a gunsmith. You’d wait for him to do the work, pay him lots of money, and go home happy — more or less. That was the state of things largely […]

Will your kids know what to do in an emergency?

One of my recurring nightmares (probably influenced by television) is being in a critical, terrifyingly dangerous situation with my wife. In every episode of this nightmare she can’t see the danger coming and I’m forced to yell instructions to her — instructions on either what do do (“run!”) or what not to do (“stay still!”) Instead of […]

Things People Say: “I want to buy a gun to keep myself safe”

Anyone who’s been around guns for any length of time eventually gets asked for advice: “I want to buy a gun to keep myself safe. What should I get?” It’s tempting to launch into a discussion about shotguns versus rifles versus handguns, or maybe about 9mm versus .40 S&W, striker-fired versus double action/single action, or […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted October 3, 2016
  • In integrity, realistic

Do you want to be a better shooter or a better defender?

I received quite a number of emails, blog comments and social media interaction about Friday’s topic, “Meaningless increments of precision.” A large percentage of them asked questions or made statements which revealed that the person was fixated on the notion that becoming a better shooter makes or keeps someone safer. This is going to sound […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted September 23, 2016
  • In integrity, teaching

The difference between doctrine and dogma

The world of self defense seems to be full of polarizing opinions. While it can be said that any field of specialization has its strong opinions (and adherents to them), my observation is that this one is by far the most Balkanized. It doesn’t matter how you look at it, someone else will see it […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted September 19, 2016
  • In context, teaching

Choosing a defensive handgun: making the best of bad alternatives

An interesting question came up in a class I taught recently. It had to do with defensive carry firearm recommendations in states which restrict the models available for sale (such as in Massachusetts and California.) How is someone to pick the best of the worst options? The attributes of an ideal defensive handgun When picking […]

“We face the same criminals the police do!” Yes, but…

Every once in a while I see the tired old cliché “we face the same criminals the police do!” It’s usually used to justify some particular type of defensive firearms training, too often centered around the trainer’s police experience. The idea, of course, is that we need to adopt the attitudes, tactics, and armament of […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted August 29, 2016
  • In realistic, teaching

Are shooting classes all there is to self defense?

In the last couple of years I’ve had a somewhat radical change in my thinking about self defense. Rather, a change in thinking about teaching self defense. I’ve always focused on helping that half-percent* of gun owners who are interested in taking shooting classes to improve their gunhandling skills. In that respect I’ve been like everyone […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted August 22, 2016
  • In CCW, integrity, teaching

Why your CCW class isn’t enough

If you’re like most people who read this blog, you’ve already been through a CCW class of some sort. (CCW, of course, stands for Carrying a Concealed Weapon, which is a catch-all term for the practice, licensing and study to carry a handgun concealed on your person. The term ‘CCW class’ is generally applied to […]
  • By Grant Cunningham
  • Posted August 15, 2016
  • In realistic, security

Preparing isn’t about fear. It’s about serenity.

Just recently I ran into an interesting reaction to the idea of preparation for personal security and family defense. Specifically it was a reaction to hardening the home and making it more difficult for people to get in, whether to burglarize or attack. “I shouldn’t have to do that”, the person wrote. No, you shouldn’t. […]

Someone you know is attacking you. Could you respond appropriately?

Those of us in the defensive training world usually talk about bad guys as though they’re complete strangers. The rapist on the jogging trail, the masked home invaders, and the carjacker at the gas station are all anonymous. We don’t know them, they really don’t know us, but fate causes our paths to intersect. When […]

What do you do with all your situational awareness?

“Situational awareness”. It’s one of the throwaway personal safety tips that are always trotted out after a horrific news story. So you work really hard to have it; then what? No, seriously: what do you do with all that situational awareness? It’s one thing if your situational awareness finds an imminent attack, but that’s not […]