[Consider this Part 2 of the offering Move Like a Scout or Indigenous Warrior. You can consume this piece in isolation but to really
follow the arc I’d recommend reading the mentioned piece [or even re-reading
it] to gather fully where we’re going.]
Many of us tout our bona fides as high-speed, low-drag, can-the-noize-boys
cuz’ I’m lock ‘n’load from bang to go!
It’s a fun little play-acting symptom we see in grown-ass adults
who wear the gear, talk the talk, but…do they walk the walk?
Before you answer, I’m going to drill down so we get mighty
specific with that question of walking the walk.
I have zero doubt that there is a squared away cadre that walks a
walk some of the time.
I wager there is a smaller contingent [not anyone you likely see
on the street in the day-to-day] who walk the walk more often than not. I refer
to those folks in war-zones, battle-zones, boots-on-the-ground, no time for drill
cuz’ this shit’s real.
Environment shapes behavior.
Behavior is not what we think, wear, post, or say, it is what we
do.
Animal ethologists do not scrutinize chimpanzee dream journals,
Facebook statuses, or listen to the “I’m so squared away” podcasts of
walruses.
They observe the animals themselves to see what they do.
Even if the mentioned animals were to devolve and began sharing
memes and GIFs I wager we would know far less about them than we do now as
language [spoken or written] is a poor indicator of behavior.
We all know this, and lest we are hazy on how poor an indicator
language or single instances of drill can be, allow me to refresh—“Till
death us do part.”
How often do you hear this lived up to [or died up to] even though
it was uttered with absolute conviction before witnesses, codified with
signatures, with the very Deity as a witness.
Our behavior is what we do. Period.
Back to Combat-Readiness
Saying we’re ready is not the same thing as being ready.
Dressing as ready is not the same thing as being ready.
And…Drilling for Ready is not the same thing as being ready.
It comes closer on this continuum as it shows intent, but it is still
not the same thing.
We’ve all seen or experienced this Drill-Failure ourselves.
Example:
“I’m gonna get this old bod in shape, Lose some weight, kick-ass and take
names. Here’s my gear, here’s me and look how hard I am training today!”
Compare that version of you [or the individual you observe] and
days when this mean little ass-kicker is not in evidence.
Walking the Walk is not cherry-picked instances of the self “getting
the job done and doin’ it right.”
Walking the Walk is something that imbues everything, including
your walk.
Again, environment being the key, those in war zones have this
drill-to-real ratio down, circumstances demand it. Survival demands it.
The Conundrum
In our day-to-day life living and behaving “as if” we were in the
actual shit 24/7 would be ludicrous.
Those who treat each trip to the local gas station as if it were
Fallujah are tedious.
Head-on-a-swivel “Step aside Jack Reacher!” can only be
maintained without true danger stimulus for limited periods. Even then, constant
riding in cortisol land will eventually fatigue the organism.
The conundrum is that what we have come to think of as “ready” is
some hyper-tweaked in-the-midst version of military readiness that is likely
not quite conducive to daily living and thusly not something that we can assume
as a daily walk.
The local convenience store is seldom Fallujah-like [thankfully]
and over time no matter our desire to keep the head in the preparedness game,
the very same lack of danger stimuli at this fabled convenience store that we should
be thankful for is the very same absence of stimuli that will allow our “head-in-the-game”
to degrade over time.
In Aesop form: If you start out looking for lions every single day
and get no peek at lions for 354 days straight, over time our lion peering gets
a little less diligent.
Peak-Military Combat Readiness Outside War Zones is likely not the
answer.
When Does Readiness Look Like “Not Ready”?
Indigenous peoples the world over do and have lived in a world
that requires more of them than our own daily lives.
[Again, see the article Move Like a Scout or Indigenous Warrior
for more context.]
Daily threats could occur, whether that be from predator animals, predator
humans, insecure environments, thrashing game, the elements, cautions ad nauseum.
Here, we have a class of human where we could justify demonstrable
hyper-vigilance.
Yet observations of such peoples do not relate this hyper-jacked “I
am always f-in’ ready, MAN!” state.
Observers of the past and anthropologists of the present actually report
quite the opposite.
What is reported is more of a laid-back vibe.
Does this mean no walk is being taken?
Does this mean that our indigenous cadre is just blindly lucky and
could use a heavy dose of “CAN DO!” podcasts to get their survival act
together?
No one believes that.
So, what accounts for this difference between the modern cortisol
spiked “Ready!!!!” and the also apparently ready languid approach?
Perhaps, the readiness is/was hidden in a different context.
“Earth Swimming”
There are multiple traditions, tips, tactics, aspects of indigenous
movement that are grounded in easy facile movement. Movement that was a
specific interface to the given environment….
“Here’s how you move on the mountain”
“Here’s how you run in the desert”
“Here’s how you move upstream.”
Ad infinitum.
There was even an assumed readiness about how to sit on the
ground.
How to lounge about.
How to be ready, even if you were not ready.
In the Comanche “Sokoob’i paha’ibit’u” translates loosely
to “Earth swimming,” a lovely phrase.
It refers to methods of lounging, lying, lolling, sitting,
standing, rough-housing that allowed for a fluid relaxed human [low-cortisol] that
could translate directly into bang.
Methods that allowed for hands-free movement for defense, to move
aside brush as one evaded, to grab the reins of horses or the hands of children,
or to access weapons.
Movement that was always primed for ready even in relaxation.
When one’s every action [or non-action] is keyed to this way of
“seeing,” way of moving, one articulates fluidly through the world as easily as
a facile swimmer with a good stroke moving lazily through calm waters.
That easy stroke may be used to frolic or to save a life, but the
root of the binary choice is always present in the action itself with no need
to shift gears. That is, we often behave with a duality “Here
’s my Prepared-Guy demeanor” and “Here’s my having fun at a party guy demeanor.” In the indigenous mindset, they are one and the same.
Sometimes walking the walk, is not walking at all, but if it’s
readiness we’re after then it’s all walking tall.
[We will be doling out tactics of “Earth Swimming” on upcoming
RAWs.]
[For techniques, tactics, and strategies of Rough and Tumble Combat, Old-School Boxing, Mean-Ass Wrestling, Street-Ready Frontier Scrapping & Indigenous Ability culled from the historical record see the RAW Subscription Service. http://www.extremeselfprotection.com
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