... There is more gain in tuning the shooter than tuning the equipment.
... Some folks just slap on a gun sometimes and call it good.
Perhaps we might keep in mind that these observations aren't necessarily mutually exclusive.
Someone who has invested the effort to "tune" themselves might be satisfied with less attention to the nature of their "gear" when it comes to "everyday CCW choices". It's just "gear", after all.
Some might think it necessary to lean toward specific aspects on the "gear side" of the equation to give them the "edge" ... like "caliber", or even some lesser gear attribute under the topic of "caliber", like "velocity".
Well, people
do seem to like the comfort of the presence of their talismans, and people have long demonstrated that they can be attracted to, and influenced by, rituals. (Loading a specific caliber or brand of ammunition in their guns, for example. Like lighting a candle at your preferred altar.)
Learn to run the gun, because the gun isn't going to run itself. Running the gun is a user-driven task, and that task requires sound judgment and decision-making, as well as a sufficiently developed amount of familiarity and skill needed to use the gun to meet the task at hand in any particular situation or set of circumstances.
Carrying a guitar around doesn't make someone a guitarist, anymore than carrying a baseball glove and baseball around makes someone sufficiently skilled enough to play any level of game with others. Carrying the guitar or baseball gear might make a lot of folks feel better about themselves, though, as they go about their normal lives. Nothing wrong with that, if that's the extent of what they expect to derive from their possession and carrying of the gear.
Everyone's got to rationalize and justify their choices to themselves.
Very few may ever be required to face situations where they may come to realize the consequences of their choices, and having to learn if their choices will successfully stand the test.
Slightly off track ... The other night I was asked by someone how they could go about learning to safely use a gun. The first thing I asked was their purpose in learning to use a gun. Sport, leisure/pleasure, new hobby ... or defense? Turned out it was comfort against facing a home robbery. The gentleman wasn't sure if a handgun or long gun would be better for him and his family (which included small children).
He was open to the idea of renting guns to find something he liked, learning about firearms safety and having young children in the house, and which kind of gun might best fit him as he became familiar and trained to safely use a gun ...
and attending a basic firearms safety class at a local range ...
and then attending a class devoted to learning to use a gun for self defense, the relevant laws, etc (including safe storage to keep children and any unauthorized persons from getting their hands on his gun). However ...
I asked him further questions, and began answering his inevitable (but well thought) "What if?" questions, falling back on my time as a LE firearms instructor, Private Citizen CCW instructor and a career in LE (seeing the results of the actions of people, and the consequences of their decisions under stress). The more we discussed situations he'd imagined, and then situations he'd
never imagined (or would know how to imagine) ... and discussed various laws and how they were enforced, and some potential real-world consequences of all of them, especially if he made a poor decision under stress ... the less enthused he seemed to become about buying a gun.
He finally said it simply. He said he suddenly realized there was a lot more responsibility and potential liability in having a gun for self defense than he'd previously considered. He's a very intelligent gentleman, and he's aware of risk/benefit considerations. I neither tried to talk him into, or out of, learning to use and buying a gun.
