Being honest about my training budget
Over the years I’ve been on this forum, I’ve read many passionate discussions about various topics. Some of these generated a great deal of information flow. Others seemed to generate more heat than light. At times this friction was largely due to the egos of some posters. The ones that bothered me the most though, were the ones where good members seemed to simply be on nearly the same page, but their frames of reference were different. This set me to thinking, and I came to my own conclusion. Simply put, a lot of these technique discussions over the years came because different people have different training budgets.
I think of a training budget as three parts. The first part, and probably the least important, is actual money available to spend. The second part, of middle importance, is available time. The third part, and most important, is your own motivation. This is not a three legged stool with each leg being equal, in my opinion.
Motivation is, in my mind, the most important part. You can overcome a lack of ammo funds with dry fire. This has been proven. But if you aren’t motivated to get up and actually do that dry fire, you will stagnate. Similarly, if you have a ten million dollar a year ammo budget, but not much desire to get to the range, you will not progress much.
Available time comes in second. You simply have to have enough free time, or be willing to make the time, to accomplish your goals. I think most of us can agree that 15 minutes a day of dry fire can provide a ton of improvement for most shooters. That’s not a huge time commitment. However, someone who wants to earn a USPSA GM card will likely need more than 15 minutes a day to achieve that. If someone wants to be a Super Squad Grandmaster, I am all but certain that 15 minutes a day won’t do the job.
Lastly, we have the least important part and that is money. Money can shorten the process. Money means class fees, ammunition stocks, travel to classes, etc. If you have the money to invest in your shooting skill set, it will make the journey shorter. I think we all mostly agree that quality instruction can solve a myriad of issues with our shooting.
Now, here’s where I think folks end up talking past one another from time to time. I’ve seen technique discussions come up from time to time where people come at it from two different angles. One angle is our members who are highly skilled competition shooters. These folks have a large training budget (particularly the motivation part) and it shows in what they can do. Those folks are incredibly good at what they do. They can execute techniques that others cannot because they have the motivation and time to hone those skills to a higher level.
The flip side of that is those that enjoy shooting but have other demands or interests. They have enough motivation to develop enough skill to defend themselves, but balk at the training schedule of a USPSA GM. Simply put, they have spouses, kids, other hobbies, whatever. Maybe they even used to train like mad but simply burned out (I know I did). Another valid part of this would be the law enforcement trainer that may have students that don’t even want to shoot at all, but they have to in order to keep their badge.
So when technique discussions come up now, I usually try to filter them this way: Does this idea work for me and my training budget. I know what mine is, and everyone else’s is probably different. That’s perfectly fine with me. I’ve got mad respect for the folks that have more motivation and time than me and can make those techniques work. For me, I know I need a technique, even if it is a few tenths slower on scored drills, that I can maintain with the amount of time and energy I’m willing to expend. Simply put, I’m a family man. If I have 60 minutes to do whatever I want, then I’m probably gonna give at least 40 of those minutes to playing with my daughter or talking with my wife. I’ll take the remaining 15 or 20 and use them on my shooting skills.
