INTRODUCTION

“I am not a policeman, I wasn’t a special operations warrior, and I don’t compete in national level shooting competitions. What I am is a student of the art and science of firearm usage. I am by no means a self-proclaimed or self-important gun-guru. I learn from every class I teach. I like teaching, and I particularly like teaching firearm usage.

That’s not to say that I have nothing to offer. I grew up around guns; I carried a pistol in the Marine Corps. I taught carry permit and armed security classes for many years before deciding to focus on firearm instructor courses. However, beyond all of those paper credentials that look nice on the wall, I am a father and a husband that believes in the safety of my family, and because of that I am one who chooses to be an armed citizen.”

I wrote the worlds above almost ten years ago in the introduction to my first book, Understanding the Use of Handguns for Self Defense. Those words are still true after all that time. In the years since I wrote it, I have taught hundreds more firearm instructors, a thousand more basic students, coached a pistol team, and switched careers and started teaching at a Correction Academy where one of my jobs is to teach basic firearm use to new Correction and Parole Officers.

I had the opportunity to update that first firearm book and re-release it as Handguns for Self-Defense. The basics remain unchanged. The fundamentals of shooting do not change. New technology, better techniques, and more experience do add to the body of knowledge and I have added and changed material where appropriate.

INTRODUCTION TO THE SHEPHERD SCHOOL MENTALITY

I chose Shepherd School Inc. as the name of my company a because I believe that there are human wolves in the world, and someone has to stand to protect the weak. I choose the role of shepherd because I love the sheep. This ideal is not new, as the Bible uses this analogy several times. I cannot hope to do as good a job of explaining the concept as the Bible does; however, Colonel Grossman, Retired West Point Instructor and US Army psychologist has written a book titled, On Combat. His book has an outstanding explanation of the ideal of the shepherd and the sheep. It is this type of thinking that caused me to choose the Shepherd School as the name of my company. This mind-set is explained by my company motto: In a World of Wolves, Don’t Be a Sheep.

WHY ANOTHER GUN BOOK?

With that being said, you are probably asking, why another gun book? It’s not like there aren’t enough people selling books, magazines, videos, or courses on shooting, and the Internet is busting at the seams with websites devoted to the gun.

I have noticed that too many times ego gets in the way of instruction. Some men are born with the idea in their heads that they can automatically drive fast, make women happy, and shoot a gun just based upon their gender. If one of those men decides that he can shoot a little better than most and later learns he can make decent money teaching firearm use, it could be very easy for him to get sidetracked into believing he is somewhat better than others.

Maybe that doesn’t happen to the instructor; maybe it is his students that attribute greatness to him because of their fascination with his personality. No matter the reason, sometimes the teacher’s knowledge becomes less of a guide and more of a commandment. While this doesn’t always happen, it occurs enough that entire cliques are formed based more on the loose talk of a gun writer and less on what actually works for the student.

Handguns for Self-Defense is written from the perspective that it is only successful if it helps cut through that personality cult and helps you make your own informed choices. This book is not going to say this gun is better or that gun is worse, or this skill will save you and that one will get you killed. It will provide honest information about each side and let you choose for yourself.

Not everyone likes (or loves) guns or what they stand for. Some are even downright afraid of them. I understand this, even though, by my own admission, it took me some time to understand that not everyone can (or wants to) identify guns used in an action movie based upon a quarter-second glimpse. It is okay to have a neutral feeling on firearms; it is also okay to be uncomfortable with violence.

My goal is to write for those uncomfortable with guns. I want to state that it is not the tool but the manner of its use that causes problems. Hopefully, you will learn that firearms are only tools that someone uses to change his or her situation

If a school resource officer defends a local school against a madman actively murdering children, it is not the gun that is the hero. It is the policeman. The policeman’s actions are not even in the same universe as the madman’s. The murderer is evil, not his tools. Does anyone attribute evil to the car that the killer drove to his crime, or the mask he wore? Is the government banning shoes because there are a higher percentage of bank robbers wearing shoes than using guns when committing armed robbery?

What I want is for you to come away with the feeling that you can safely and successfully use a firearm if you decide to do so.

HOW THIS BOOK IS DIFFERENT

Most gun primers are written with an emphasis on shooting. Any legal or psychological information is placed after the fun stuff. This book will take the opposite approach. We will start with the mind-set needed to use a firearm in defense of your life, progress to dealing with other self-defense issues such as what happens in a gunfight, talk about the laws and responsibilities entailed with owning or using a firearm, have an in-depth discussion on safety, move into the process of choosing a firearm and other tools, and then end with how to actually shoot a handgun.

Most books on this subject either take for granted that the reader has at least some knowledge of firearm use, or are written at such a basic level that they tend to insult the intelligence of the reader. It is my goal to inform, entertain, and in some small way reduce the misinformation on firearm usage in America.