Are you carrying?

If you’re licensed to carry concealed in your state, Carry. Let me say that again. If you’re licensed to carry concealed in your state, Carry!! Perhaps you aren’t interested in carrying a handgun and would prefer a TASER, but please carry. I say this because I’ve fallen into the same sense of denial in the past. I’ve repeated that statement a couple of times because if you’re anything like me, (hard-headed) sometimes, you need to be knocked in the side of the proverbial head and be reminded.

I’ve been in Law Enforcement for the past 30 years. As a police officer, I have been able to carry under that banner for the entire time. Many years ago, I would only carry sporadically. If I were going in a bad neighborhood or something along those lines, I might carry; but even that wasn’t a guarantee. I often wouldn’t.

That all changed for me when I attended a training session conducted by Lt. Col. David Grossman. A world renowned speaker to First Responders and military. A speaker often praised for his style and compassion during his lectures. I even remember the day vividly. We were taking a class at a local hotel in their conference room and he asked the question of who carried concealed regularly. Some officers raised their hands but many, including myself, didn’t. Without berating us, he went on for some time about not carrying the life saving tools of our profession. The primary question he asked was: would we be able to live with ourselves if we were in an incident with our families and didn’t have those life saving tools of our profession and one of them were hurt or killed. Could we take it? Could we live with the fact that we may have had the opportunity to protect them but not the necessary tools because we decided to leave them at home.

Well I couldn’t live with that thought. From that point forward I’ve carried concealed…always. I want to be that Lt. Col. Grossman to you. I want you to ask yourself those same most profound of questions and ask yourself could you live with it. He may have reminded us that a firearm is a life saving tool of our “profession”, but I would easily say that if you are a concealed license holder in ‘Murica, that is your profession as well. You might have another job and give yourself another title but in many respects, once you took that concealed carry class and took the charge of protecting yourself, family and possibly strangers, it became your job. Your moral job if nothing else.

Sooooo. I implore you. Think deeply of why you took that training to get that concealed carry license. Carry, so that you will never be burdened with that question…Could I have done more?

Until Next time.

Be Alert! Be Aware! And Be SAFE!!

Written by: Instructor Jeffrey Washington