I've found that people are intensely more interested in the phantom fury surrounding violence rather than the violence itself.

And so we'll go there, if only to get over it and get into what truly matters.

So what is this 'intervening terror?' This is the not inconsiderable space between where you are when you realize there's mortal trouble and putting everything you've got through a ruptured spleen. Or an avulsed eye. Or a broken neck. It's the space between NOW and INJURY.

Those who do not understand violence, how it works, what it means, what's at stake often have no real conception of this space--they tend to be far more interested at looking at the whole affair as a contest or a dance or indeed magic.

Those who understand violence are horrified by the idea of making a competition of it, after all, now we're going to play dice for your life? It would be laughable if it weren't so awful. But achieving that understanding, refusing to compete and being resolute in what's required leaves you with a newfound terror, that intervening terror. There's a no-man's land that must be crossed and it is in this space that you can die.

On either side of the gulf things are clean and mechanical. On the nice side we have your daily life and social interactions. We have what amounts to masses of luxurious boredom. On the other side we have an injured man, little better than a sleeping one for all the trouble he's going to cause.

It's the in-between that can keep you up nights.

Let's take it to the extreme for analysis: he's got a gun. Maybe there's several of them, with guns. On one side, there was you, a second ago, happily oblivious that such things could be. Across from where you are now is an armed man with an active brain riding around in a fully-functional body. It's all up for grabs. Anybody can get it right--anybody can die here. Will it be you? Will it be him? Both? Neither? You are smack-dab in the middle of the intervening terror. Oh, how you pine for the certitude of either side. Anything, anything but this yawning awfulness you find yourself mired in.

When do you go? Now? Then? How about now now?

Luckily, I have the answer for you:

I don't know. But you do.

Unfortunately, it's not the kind of answer you were hoping for. Sorry. But I'm a firm believer in reality over sugar-coated magical thinking.

So what's with the 'I wanna slap a Zen master' answer? I can't know--I won't be there. You will. And you'll have to live (or die) with your decision. Just remember that the only arbiter of success in violence is survival--that means if you walk out alive, you did the Right Thing. Period.

Still, it keeps you up at night. How will you function in there? What will you do? Will you do the Right Thing?

As I said above, when someone truly understands violence, what's at stake, the magic dance of competition melts like a Dali landscape into an expanse of pure nightmare. No matter how long you run, there's always more stretching endlessly ahead...

But this is an illusion. Remember that on either side things are mundane and strictly mechanical. Easily parsed with social skills or the sundering of precious anatomy. So here's the deal: keep it simple. Stay out of the no-man's land of uncertainty, or, failing that, keep your time there as brief as possible. Either keep it social, play the game, work it out or cross over like a bullet would and smash something vital.

That's all there is. That's were the certainty lies. Anything else is just telling yourself ghost stories before bedtime and giving yourself fitful nightmares.

And that wraps us around to training--the only thing that really matters. If there's nothing we can do about the intervening terror or in the intervening terror but resolve to keep to either side, then that's where we have to spend our effort and energy. On training.

You all are (or should be) facile in the social realm so we don't have to spend time there. Instead, make training a small habit, soak and absorb.

Just as you smile and hold doors as a habit, work the other side with just as much steady diligence. Showing teeth and breaking knees are two sides of the same coin, pressed together to minimize the space between.

Labels: criminal violence, lethal force self defense, self defense