Labels, Labels, Everywhere, But Not A Single One For Me.

For Christmas, my friend bought me Boston's Gun Bible and I finally had the chance to sit down and read a bit.

I skipped the first two chapters that, I will, of course, get back to, but I have been pretty obsessed with the whole sheep, sheepdog kind of thinking that is very prevelant in the gun world.

Chapter 3 piqued my interest in this area.

Not too far into the chapter he, the author, Boston T Party, declares there are only 3 kinds of people: predators, prey, and those who refuse to be either.

He says that if you do not have the will or training to defend yourself, then you are, by default prey.

I agree that if you know the facts and the dangers and you willing decide to do nothing to make yourself less of a victim and/or do nothing to defend yourself in the event that you are in danger, then you are prey.

It's not an opinion, it is fact. Bad guy after bad guy will tell you, they look for unprepared, defenseless people to "prey" on.

I was the perfect prey, but it was not that I decided not to prepare. I truly did not believe that I needed to. Well, believe is to strong a word. I didn't think about it at all. I bought into both the liberal propaganda and the religious rhetoric. Be a good person, don't go into "bad" areas, lock your doors, pray and you will safe.

I was never ever afraid to go to a grocery store in the middle of the day.

While I might have been prey, there was no conscious choice to be prey. Granted, there was no conscious choice not be prey either, but I didn't say, "Hey, this is dangerous, but I am going to do it anyway and leave it up to some "sheepdog" to save me.

The author, says, in order to avoid being pray, you must embrace the warrior spirit.

Now, that I can buy.

He says, as I have said, and as many others have said, "At some point in our lives, we all must fight."

It may not be a bad guy coming after you demanding money or your body, it may be cancer or other hardships, but regardless, at some point we all have to decide our life has value and consciously decide to fight for it.

Unfortunately, too many people live in a state of true ignorance and by the time the wolf comes knocking at their door, they are completely unprepared.

That was me. Once I knew the facts. Once I was staring the predator in the face and could no longer live in that dangerous state of bliss, I had a choice to make.

Being a victim was easy. Sticking my head in the sand and doing nothing takes no effort at all and there is an odd kind of security in living that lie.

Facing my fears and not turning away, took effort and work.

Lying in my husband's arms crying was easy.

Miserable.

Torturous.

Limiting, but comfortable.

There is comfort in what we know. As awful as the status quo is, change or the idea of it, is more awful.

It is often said, "The first step is the hardest."

A lie.

The first step was hard, but no where near as gut wreaching as the second or the third, which almost killed me.

Second guessing your choices can be a bear.

Once I decided to fight, I felt relief and thought it's over now. The fear and pain will be over, but they weren't.

Sure, there were moments of peace and I felt good about moving forward, but the fear and doubt kept coming back, again and again.

The daily struggle to continue to face those demons sucked, and I can't count the number of times I almost gave up.

Not giving up, that was the hardest step. Probably about 100 steps before, I no longer felt afraid, ashamed, guilty.

About a million before I could say, without an ounce of trepidation,

I will fight and you will lose,

and to believe it.

When I read...

"Mothers defending their offspring can exhibit terrifying ferociousness, but they must be trained to become ferocious when protecting themselves."

I actually lost my breath for a minute.

That about sums it up for me.

The old me.

I wonder what would have happened if my daughter wasn't with me that day. I bought some time by doing things to distract the guy while I tried to get her to a safe place. I never one time thought about myself. In fact, for weeks, she was the only thing I thought of.

I wonder, if I had been alone, if I would have bothered to fight at all or if I would have just given up the second he approached me.

I instinctively knew she was worth every effort to protect, although I was totally unprepared, I didn't just hand her over to the creep. I didn't have to be taught that she was worth my life.

What I had to be taught was that "he" was NOT worth MINE.

I am not sure if I am a sheepdog or a warrior. I don't know if any label fit me before or if any of them fit me now.

What I do know is that I no longer have to be taught to be ferocious.