By John Corriea
Hi friends. Welcome to today's lesson here at Active Self-Protection Extra on John's briefs. Today we are on the third part of our series on what it means to be a good, sane, sober, moral, prudent person. And that means today we're going to talk about being sober. Now, I know an awful lot of people look at this one and they're going to say, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. I mean, he means we can't drink alcohol. Well, we're going to start with what that definition means and know that's not what I'm talking about here. It's much deeper than that. To win the fight after the fight, you need help. After a use of force, I trust firearms legal protection to help me win the fight for the rest of my life. From their 24 7 attorney answered hotline to coverage for the use of all legal tools, firearms, legal protection has you covered get a discount by signing up at the link below.
We've already talked about what it means to be a good person whose heart is set on doing good things. We've already talked about what it means to be a sane person. You connect reality with your internal processes in order to make good judgments and judgments that connect your causes with your effects. Now, let's talk about why we would add sober before anything else. Of course, sobriety here, if you go look at any dictionary in modern American English, you're going to see the primary definition of not intoxicated with alcohol or other controlled substances. I actually think that is a colloquialism and is a means that we have taken this phrase and applied it to this one particular situation so often that they become synonymous when that probably and almost certainly was not the original idea. Bear with me on this because I'm going to have a application for you.
I'm going to have a task for you to do at the end of this week as well as we talk this through in John's briefs. Also, let me say thanks again to firearms legal protection for letting me kind of go a field from the legal discussions for a little while here to work through this good saying, sober moral prudent person, which is again, a different standard than the standard of a lawful person. We're going to talk about lawful at the end here. So again, first definitions in any definitional, any dictionary that you look up is not intoxicated with alcohol, but particularly in Miriam Webster, I want to look at the additional definitions that are now secondary, tertiary, and from there and how they became that witch became this idea of not filled full of alcohol or other mind altering substances. Definition number two in Miriam Webster is marked by earnestly thoughtful character.
So when somebody is considered sober, they were marked by earnestly thoughtful character by, I really like that definition, that's important. Number three definition is someone who is unhurried and calm. They're not frantic, they're unhurried. Number four, they're marked by temperance, moderation and seriousness. So that idea with somebody who's got a sober personality, they're not flippant, they're not impulsive, they are instead temperate, moderate, and serious. And number six, showing no excessive or extreme qualities of fancy emotion or prejudice. Lemme read that one again, showing no extensive or extreme, I'm sorry, excessive, not extensive showing no excessive or extreme qualities of fancy emotion or prejudice. Now, of course, I think in our modern context, people are going to look at prejudice and think merely racial prejudice, and that's valid, but also there's more prejudice than racial prejudice. In other words, giving priority to one group over another or one thing over another.
So the idea here of sobriety was this idea of earnestly thoughtful character that is calm, that is reasoned, temperate, moderate, seriously considering what's going on in the world, not prone to excessive or extreme fancy or emotion or prejudice. Well, if you think about that, when would somebody be most likely to show an excessive or extreme fancy or excessive or extreme emotion? When would they be marked by silliness or by lack of moderation? When would they be lacked? When would they be known by not having thoughtful character or would be frantic or not calm? Well, I mean it's when they're under the influence of alcohol or other mind altering substances. So that idea of sobriety versus drunkenness gets this idea, aha. We put that together so often that it became kind of the primary definition in our dictionaries, whereas kind of the underlying definition, and where I am going to talk to you about it from, comes from the idea of earnestly thoughtful character that calmly and with seriousness and deliberately considers its actions and isn't extreme or excessive, and in other words, is middle of the road careful sober.
Now, in order to do this, I'm going to go back to kind of the underpinnings of how we use language, because actually I think this more kind of defense minded definition of sober is built into the English language and probably came into it from the New Testament. And I'm not trying to proselytize you, if you know me, I spent 14 years in vocational pastoral ministry and I'm a follower of the way of Jesus. What I'm doing here though is showing kind of how that came there and where the history is and how this works out. So I'm not trying to convert you or any of that stuff if that's not your thing. But what we're after here is I want to look in the Apostle Paul's writings in the New Testament, just briefly, particularly in two places, Romans 12. In Romans 12 three, Paul says, for by the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.
So what he's after here is this idea of a self-reflective analysis that is to think with sober judgment here means to analyze and assess yourself correctly and not to think more highly of yourself than you should, and to think through these issues seriously. The other place where we might consider this is in Titus chapter two, also another book written by the apostle Paul. It's a phrase, a word that he likes to use. And in verses 11 and 12, we'll talk to verse 12 in particular, that God has trained us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions. I'm reading out of the English standard version here, and he says, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age and that word, they're self-controlled. Let's translated by the ESV translators as self-controlled is the same word, soft ronans that is translated as sober judgment in Romans chapter 12, trying to get the English language to work correctly and help people understand what that means.
So this idea here in this one is that sobriety means self-control. It means not seeding my control to someone else or specifically, and especially of course to alcohol or other mind altering substances, but also to my passions. Also to my impulses. So the idea then becomes I am controlled by rational thought. I am soberly considering and thoughtfully considering the impact and the second and third order effects of my actions. And then I take steps to do that in a manner that is thoughtful, considerate, and not at extremes of emotions or prejudice or impulses. Now let's bring that back to a defensive context. If I am sober minded, what that really means is I seriously and earnestly consider what my capabilities are, what my mission is, and what can I do about that in order to successfully fulfill my mission. And that goes into the gear that I choose to bring with me into my understanding of when I would use force in my own defense and as well how I treat other people.
And it really means that I think through these things carefully that I consider me first, and I see this all the time in comments on YouTube and on social media in general that, oh, I'd rather be tried by 12 and carried by six or kill 'em all, like God sort 'em out, stuff like that, which of course we know is kind of abhorrent or people that think they're really good. I'll tell you again a story about a guy that I saw at the Range at a range that I was at a couple weeks ago who told me that he said he knew he could get his gun out of his carry method of choice, which was carried on his waist and get a shot in the chest and a shot in the pelvis in two seconds. And then his friend asked him about that, who was at the range with him, and then he showed his friend that from not a go signal, but a go, and it took him about six seconds, but in his mind he thought that was two seconds, not six.
And I didn't abuse him of that notion because that wasn't my job and I wasn't his instructor or any of those things, but that was not a sober reflection on his actual capabilities. It was instead a flippant understanding that he was way better than he thought he was, way better than he actually was. So that idea of sober reflection starts with what are my current capabilities and are they up to the task? This is one of the reasons I think the main channel is so helpful for us. It shows us what level of capabilities are required in order to successfully fulfill the task. That task might be different if I'm a private citizen, it's different if I'm an active law enforcement officer. We don't deal with active military engagements on the channel at all. But if you're in the military, different requirements and mission as well.
So it first starts with saying, am I going to carry a firearm or other defensive tool? Am I capable of using it? Do I have the requisite skillset to use it? Do I have my mind properly set in order to use it from an emotional, psychological, spiritual perspective? And that all takes time to really think through. And if you don't just go, yeah, I'm good. And that's flippancy. That's not being a sober thinker. That is instead being flippant and impulsive. And I really encourage you today, this weekend to maybe sit and think a little while about that. First of all, what are my capabilities? Secondly, I would strongly encourage you to think through when do I feel like the use of force is morally and ethically and personally okay for me? And am I really going to think through that? Now, we are going to talk about moral next week.
Trust me, that's its own discussion, but here I really want you to think about and consider the idea that says, wait a minute, I am not an impulsive person. I'm not a hothead. I'm not somebody who struggles with my ego. That's really where this idea of sobriety comes down. It's somebody who has controlled their ego to the point that they're willing to deescalate, escape and evade. They are willing and able to avoid a conflict to simply say they're sorry. Now, if you aren't that person right now, now this is the time for you to gain sobriety. Now's the time for you to say, gosh, man, maybe I need to go get some help with my anger issue. Maybe if you're, I know a lot of people that depression can express itself as anger, and that's very common, and that doesn't mean that you're a terrible person.
That means that there is maybe a biochemical imbalance in your brain case, which is a medical issue, just like maybe you've got type one diabetes or something, and so maybe go get some help with that. Go talk to a counselor, psychiatrist, psychologists, so that you can overcome that and gain sobriety to be able to have some margins in order to be the person that really thinks through these things and doesn't act in impulsive ways. We see so often on the channel people pulling firearms and using firearms in an impulsive manner or in a way that they haven't thought through entirely. Well, and instead, I really want you to think about this. Here's that other part of ego control and the word that comes at it at the end. This is where sober mindedness takes us. You ready? Humility, sober mindedness means, okay, I recognize my skillset and the higher my skillset becomes, the better I am able to deal physically with any problem.
But I also recognize that I have responsibility because I've started with good. Secondly saying, I have connected reality. I've connected my actions to their consequences. And then I've thought through how all those work, what my capabilities are, what my mission truly is, which is not to change the world or to conform everyone to my behaviors. Then when I've done all those things, it brings me to this place of I know who I am. I know my place in the world. I know that I can use sober sound judgment to really firmly think about who I am, who you are in the world. And so I don't have to be a blowhard and I don't have to have a significantly large ego. Instead, I can simply treat you with humility, with goodness and with grace. So somebody I think who is sober minded at the end of things is not humiliated.
They are not pollyannish. They are not somebody who's like all shucks on nobody, but they are humble. They don't have to brag about who they are. They don't have to get their way. They don't have to be the alpha male in the room as it were. Instead, they can be a humble kind person. Now, I'm going to tell you, I get around some pretty bad dudes, thankfully just because of who I am and I get to train with a lot of people. I get to be around some tip of the spear, bad, bad dudes. And what's funny, the real actual no joke, bad dudes, not the guys that you see on the movies necessarily, but the real actual top tip of the spear guys are some of the most humble people you'll ever meet in your life. They are very kind. They are not boastful of who they are.
And if I start naming 'em, man, I'm going to cause problems because I will forget some. But I'll tell you who comes to mind darn near immediately, is somebody like my friend Mike Green from Green Ops, who is a bad dude and could kill you 87 different ways, and yet is very humble because he's a soberly thinking person. My friend Chris Cert from Citizens Defense Research, former tier one guy who is an absolute meat eating crime fighter, but is a very humble man. I think of good friends like AJ Zito, who is a masterclass shooter and a heck of a shooter, and also again, kind thoughtful, has thought through who he is and is very good at what he does, but treats other people with great respect and care. The list goes on and on. I could name a hundred more incredible people. My point there is, man, I think of guys like Nor McMahon, I call him Pop who Third recon battalion in Vietnam.
Legit, no kidding. Okay, I know there was 280 seals in Vietnam, and I've met a thousand of 'em, right? No, my pop really was, and he's not related to me by blood, but one of the kindest humblest man you'll ever meet and also stack bodies like you wouldn't believe with incredible capability because he's sober minded. So I want you to do that this week. I want you to think about being sober minded and ask yourself a couple of questions. Number one, truly what are my capabilities? And we've talked on suck less Saturday here for a while about timers and measurements and having an actual understanding. Now, maybe you might say, Hey, I recognize my empty handed skillset is just not up to the task. I don't have any, my wife recently recognized this and started going to juujitsu with me, which is really cool. And when you recognize that that set sober mindness and then I'm going to do something about it and fix it, maybe you say, man, I have a gun.
But I heard Chuck Ard talk about having something between a harsh word and a gun. I've just always kind of thought, well, Jack Johnson and Tom O'Leary will handle it, but maybe thinking this through, maybe having another option for a long range I poke would be a good idea. Or maybe I need to get some medical training because I want to be able to protect life, and that's my ultimate mission. And so having some medical training and maybe some equipment in the car or on my person would be a good thing for that. Think these things through, think through and really soberly reflect on when would I use deadly force? And I think if you do that, you start to recognize that distinction that we make on the big channel all the time about can I versus should I versus must I use deadly force? And we start shying away from can I?
We start really more tending towards should I and must die and must I being I think the best in order to be very clear that, hey, we only would use that as a tool of last resort. When would I use physical force? Only when I must in order to protect myself and those I love from physical harm? Soberly? Think through those things. Now, when you start doing that, you start building yourself a moral code of behavior based on principle, and we're going to talk about that next week. I want you, if you would, in the comments to talk to me about something that you've had to soberly think through, whether it's in your defensive mindset or in some other endeavor, and how really seriously and earnestly and carefully thinking this through and letting go of your extreme and excessive emotions, or fancy or prejudice helped you to get better in the world. I'm looking forward to hearing it. See you next week.
YouTube Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN8Z2-jtJNA&list=PLkjkKbdZgxVDVyMvzKn27k3rT7dL25j5D&index=5
Credit: John Corriea, Active Self Protection Extra