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The Protectors® Podcast
Welcome to The Protectors® Podcast, where the valor meets the storyteller. Hosted by Jason Piccolo, a seasoned veteran and retired special agent, this series is a must-listen for anyone intrigued by the courage and tales of those who pledge to protect us. Beyond the front-line stories of bravery and dedication, this podcast goes a step further, weaving in the perspectives of those who bolster and narrate the protector's journey—featuring a remarkable lineup including New York Times Best Sellers and acclaimed Hollywood actors.
The Protectors® Podcast offers a diverse array of voices, from those who wear the uniform to the authors and entertainers who amplify their stories. It's a unique blend that highlights not only the raw realities faced by our protectors but also how their sacrifices inspire the narratives we cherish in literature and film. Each episode is a testament to the interconnected worlds of service and support, bringing listeners an unmatched depth of insight.
Dr. Jason Piccolo is a retired federal agent, former U.S. Army Infantry Captain (Iraq 2006), and author.
Past Guests Include:- Sean Patrick Flanery - Andrews & Wilson- Mark Greaney- Stephen Hunter- Remi Adeleke - Florent Groberg - Clint Emerson - Travis Mills
The Protectors® Podcast
#480 | Jody Maki | Evolution into a Firearms Training Innovator
Jody's story is a testament to the power of evolution, as she details the psychological nuances in marksmanship and her pioneering Maki Method, a tool designed to perfect shooter form and amplify their abilities.
raining—one shot at a time.
Make sure to check out Jason on IG @drjasonpiccolo
You know you have to record automatically. Hey, welcome to the Protectors podcast. I've been looking forward to this conversation for quite some time now. We're Jody Mackey, and Jody taught me what it's like to be an instructor firearms instructor. Maybe you guys don't know that I love shooting. I mean, I really love shooting, and one thing I wanted to do, like during a pandemic, was learn how to teach other people how to shoot. So what did I do is? I looked up and I said, huh, how do I do this? And I found Jody's course and boom, there it is. Now we met. How's it going?
Speaker 2:It's gone great. It's going great. I'm teaching instructors.
Speaker 1:Well, I do want to say thank you for having me into your home today. I loved doing in-person podcasts. And one thing I do that I love talking about guns. I love talking about instruction more than I'd love talking about guns, and you've been doing this for a while. So what is your back. How did you get into this? And for a female to jump into a male dominated instruction base. I love that even more and we'll get into why I love that more later on. But how'd you get into this?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I've been in it now 10 years, which is a long time. It doesn't seem that long. And so I originally, when I was younger, I always thought I would be a fashion designer and design red carpet gowns. And now I'm a firearms instructor and I own a training academy, and so it's kind of funny. It's the antithesis of what I thought I would be doing.
Speaker 2:But I used to shoot in my backyard and I'm from Minnesota. That's what you do and my dad was a hunter and so he taught me how to shoot. And after I relocated to the East Coast, I actually never really did a lot of anything with firearms Like I never thought that that would be what I do. And so I ended up meeting someone who owned a firearms training academy and so I was doing marketing consulting at the time. I went ahead and did some training and got deeper into the business and did his marketing, and then I realized that he was not a good fit and he escalated every year. I was with him and I had a hard time getting out, and after I got out, I, within two weeks I had my website up and my company launched, and now I'm in 14 states and just published a book and getting ready for my concealed carry line, and I've certified over 4,000 instructors nationwide now. So for whatever reason, it was all meant to be 4,000, including me, which was great.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And that's one thing you know. So I can't even imagine how many gun owners are out there. How many have gun owners are out there post pandemic, because I know when I took the basic, the basic course, in order to take the instructor course, the people in that course were so diverse. There was like people from every religious denomination, every political party, and young, old, seniors down to like people in their early 20s just to take a basic firearms course, basic basic.
Speaker 1:So many people want to learn it and a lot of people want to teach it. And the reason I really liked your course was it, you know, coming from the law enforcement background, you know, in the military At the time I took your course as 20 years into the one and tatted what? 20 long time I'll say long time and I, you know, you kind of get stuck on your basics and your basics might not always be the best. And what I learned in your course to become an instructor has helped me in my own personal shooting as well, and I think that's one of the reasons I like I really wanted to get into competition shooting is because I slowed down a little bit and your method of instruction is very calming and very point forward. So I mean, I like that.
Speaker 2:So how did you learn how to just interact with people in such a calming, motherly way, you know, but when you're doing with shooting, sports, yeah, yeah, well, you know I train all levels, from the woman who sits in the class who cries when she sees the guns in the room, to the high level, you know, olympic shooter even. I've had in my classes and high level agency people on a regular basis, and what I find is that you know one, it's the anxiety level, because shooting is all mental, has nothing to do with shooting. Shooting is easy. It's the mental part that's hard, because we never want to feel the gun go off, and some people have their preconceived ideas or their bad associations with the gun where they associate it with violence. And so there's a lot of more, a lot more mental blocks they have to get over to be able to actually squeeze trigger.
Speaker 2:And so I've learned how to really work with those people to make sure that they feel comfortable, because they have to trust you and they have to feel safe to be able to actually and you really don't need to, you know get over those roadblocks to be able to actually do it. And so, for the high level people, I deal with a lot of egos on a regular basis, and so you know what they find usually is what I have to teach them is are things that they've never heard before, because it's all coming from a whole different, different place. Like, training in the agency is way different than training civilians. You know they're two different things and so there's kind of an evolution to all of that. But my method that I developed is a science, because if it's not a science there's no way to diagnose what you're doing wrong.
Speaker 1:Well, let's talk about it. You have a book, the Mackie Method Marksmanship Guide. So let's talk about what I mean. What is the method?
Speaker 2:Well, I have developed this over the years and I've had instructors throughout my classes ask me if they could record me. Can they take photos? I said no, you can't because I'm going to put in a book and you can buy it later. And finally the book is out and it goes deep into the method, on how it actually works, the mindset behind it and also the techniques that I use to get people on the bullseye quickly.
Speaker 2:Because, as an instructor, as anybody in the firearms industry, if you're going to train someone else, your credibility is really your students bullseye targets. You know, I see instructors all the time that have people that have their giant targets and they say, yeah, I shot today and I'm like who cares? You didn't really learn how. So I want them to be able to hit the bullseye and do it quickly. And so that is really what my method is about, and in my book I detail how to do that with your students, how to keep yourself safe, how to keep them safe Number one and then also the diagnosing of the targets and how to fix their certain issues, because people want to know how to fix it, Like we can say what it is but it, but actually how do you do. It is more important than anything, and so I kind of give the actual recipe of of how to make that happen.
Speaker 1:The last thing is about learning bullet trajectory and learning. I mean, listen, you're going to point out a target, you're going to shoot it and you're going to hit it. You're going to hit it, but there's so many fundamentals like rib trigger pull sights, everything in nerves. You mentioned nerves, yeah, and that is one thing I talked about with, like a lot of people when I, when I mentioned your classes, about the calming effect and not being up there and in their ass, especially when someone is first learning how to use a firearm. Not everybody has the same experience and when you're teaching a class, especially basic courses, some people have never even touched a firearm. Many, many many, yeah.
Speaker 2:And Maryland, when they take the class they have to take the class to even buy a gun. So they don't even have one yet. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So that's the majority of people that I'm teaching now that that are not in the instructor level, Like they've never touched it before.
Speaker 1:Are, you know, like people like me who have touched it and shot it and all over the years, like when you go through courses, you know especially law enforcement and military, it's usually not the most calming factor. Fire. Fire a rifle or a pistol is usually like your dumb ass.
Speaker 1:You're shooting wrong, fix it. And there's not really like a one-on-one instruction or even like a small group. You know, when you're dealing like with these academies, where you have 20, 30, 40, 50 people and you have three or four instructors trying to roll around and trying to get someone to hit the target, they don't have time to be patient.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:And even in law enforcement there's some people that have never touched a gun before.
Speaker 2:Right and.
Speaker 1:I would inform people if you're going to join one of these agencies, get a basic understanding and take like a course, like yours.
Speaker 2:Right? Yeah, because you can't shoot fast until you can shoot slow. And unfortunately, when we look at most of the agencies, they are shooting fast before they even learn how to properly squeeze their trigger. And that's a problem, because then you can't ever catch up. You know you can't get that amazing score, but most of the standards are low. People can still pass, but that's not helping them on the street be able to protect themselves or the community, and so I really want people to have a high level of accuracy and start shooting slow, because what you also see when you add speed is that you start to create bad habits in your body that you don't necessarily even know that you're creating.
Speaker 2:But the more habits we have, the more dynamics that we're incorporating into our shooting, the more inconsistencies and elements of error we are creating. And so that's why I you know, when I'm teaching grip, we're not gripping tight with our hands, because you're competing with your strength and your dominant hand will win. That's why most right-handed shooters are to the left. Left-handed shooters are to the right because we're gripping too tight. And you know, when we listen to the agencies and the industry, kind of stick that everybody says is everybody says hold on to the gun tight so nobody can take it away. But guess what? If you're in a situation, you're going to have adrenaline, you're going to hold tight. You don't need to practice that, and so I want people to practice with their perfect fundamentals, consistently, and then, when the incident comes, it won't be on crack when you're actually gripping.
Speaker 1:You know, I'm so glad you said that, because so much technique and everything comes from Hollywood, the Hollywood instructors.
Speaker 1:And a lot of the times people you find in the law enforcement field who have been instructors for a long time some of them never really. You know they get a lot of their methods from the good idea fairy Right, and they're going to grab your gun and rip it out of your hand, yeah. But you know when you're going and you're used to the basic fundamentals of grip and sight picture or not even use the sight picture point shooting, you know the last thing you want to do is be hold on to that death grip. In that firearm yeah.
Speaker 1:You know you brought up a good point too is in like. That's why I always tell people do sport shooting, get used to some, even if it's just sport. It's not realistic, you think. But having that adrenaline surge, having that buzzer go off, having to move from stage to stage because nine times at a time when you go to the ranch people are stationary Right.
Speaker 1:They're shooting a paper target. That's not moving. Right, they're not moving. If you watch all the law enforcement videos, body cams and everything, you analyze them, you look at them, and any good instructor should do that. Things are dynamic, people are moving, your body is moving. You might be crouching, you might be getting behind cover, you might be shooting at unfamiliar type positions, you might be shooting on your back, your side, through your legs, over your head, even shooting in every different way to get bullets on target. These are things that need to be in effect. Yeah, right, when you're, you're throwing all those different aspects in it and then it grips off and that shot has to be within like a foot diameter. At 20 yards it's over.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's over, and I was talked to people about the, the rounds, the ballistics between your shots at three yards versus 15, if you're shooting standard pistol rounds is not really much different. Your shots should look exactly the same at 15 yards as they do at three, but they typically don't, because in your mind you're like, wow, that's really far, I don't think I can hit it. So you grip tighter, look at the target and pull hard Right. So we're doing the opposite of what we're supposed to be doing because of the stress and adrenaline.
Speaker 2:And so I challenge people at the time started your close distance, get your perfect fundamentals with your shots in the same hole, keep bringing it out further. And as you bring it out further, you've got to mentally really get yourself to grip looser at. Imagine barely touching your trigger, because your body's automatically going to be more aggressive. And so as you're doing that, then you can start adding you know the other types of shooting and incorporate that and still control your adrenaline and and so there's some interesting things when it comes to the adrenaline aspects and and a lot of it comes with breath and you can probably speak to some of that. So do that. And then let me tell you a couple of things that I, that I've learned.
Speaker 1:Keep it calm and you know, the old military adage was like squeeze, but like in reality. Just you have to breathe.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:You have to keep your blood flowing. You have to keep your heart moving. Yeah, you have to keep it going. You can't like a lot of times when, when stress hits, your body tenses up and you grip tighter, and you grip tighter and you shake yeah.
Speaker 1:And then what happens too is you're not breathing your body physiological ways. The tunnel vision is happening, but then your eyesight goes and then you're trying to focus on a small little front sight and you're trying to blur out the back sights or whatever techniques you do, and you're just like, oh shit, I don't know where that bull is going. Yeah, and add adrenaline and add the dump and everything else going yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a lot of people talk about wanting to time their breath when they're shooting pistols and the the valley of the respiratory side. You know all that. But to me it's better just to breathe because it's intuitive. To hold your breath Like I yell at people on the range all the time to breathe, I can feel when they're holding, it's just intuitive to do it because it's a you know, the adrenaline is there, there's, you know, stress, we're, you know, trying to focus, and they're automatically holding the breath. And so I always say just breathe.
Speaker 2:But I think that this is something that we should all practice in our daily lives to start making it our own muscle memory. So when you get to the adrenaline scenario, it's going to just be a natural response, just like anything else. And so if you're, you know behind the guy, the old man with the hat on that's driving, you know 20 miles an hour and you're in a hurry, take a breath right. You're at the grocery store, the lady's taking six years because the computer's not working right, please wait for assistance right, breathe right. So just those little incidents throughout your day to remind yourself to take a breath, to develop that muscle memory so that when you get in those situations it's going to be getting oxygen to your mind so that you can make those good decisions and incorporate all of those skills that you've hopefully learned.
Speaker 1:And when you mentioned you know, hey, talk about what you know, about breathing, and I'm like me with pistol shooting. I'm just like, I'm just breathing, I'm doing my thing. I'm keeping focused the back of my mind with the 30 years ago and basic training where they're telling you to shoot that 300 meter target with iron sights.
Speaker 2:You got to whatever in this squeeze, you know.
Speaker 1:But that's what you know. It all comes out to that basic line of training and stuff and you start thinking about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So it's it's it's so different. So your book, the Mackey method, would. Is that just for instructors or just for everyday people?
Speaker 2:Well, everyday people could also read it and it would break down the method at a different level. You know the understanding would be at another level, because I really break down more in detail the mental parts and how to deal with with those issues that you're struggling with in your mind, and and then how to get your students there so you can use them for yourself, of course, and and people are kind of surprised because it's truly the antithesis of what most people say, and and so they all look at me like what, what do you mean? And and I always tell them you know you're going to have your shots for the same hole by the time you leave the qualification and they all do, or they don't qualify.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they all do, and I can get everybody there in five, five shots and then they go practice it and then they do it by the end, because it's very, very simple. Is is the goal, because then we're eliminating those elements of error, and so that's really what I want to see. Is everybody consistent, because the center mass training is tough. You're not going to hit your intended target when you add this dress in adrenaline. So I want perfect shots, super tight, shocker, consistency and and then you can keep, you know, upping your skill level from there. But but that's really my, my goal for everybody.
Speaker 1:Now you talk about like, concealed and and everything else like that as well as well. You know, the big thing nowadays is, if you're coming off the line of like duty, like duty, you're going to have a duty belt A lot of people you know, big old holster and a mag managers and everything. But one thing we were talking about before we hit record was concealed carry. And it's a lot different when you're adding outer garments and your adding this and that and the type of firearm you're carrying. And one thing you know, I am very pro firearm. As far as carry, something that you feel comfortable with and I think we even talked about this in your class too was like, just because you're female doesn't mean you need to have a revolver.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, that's the worst one that I would ever recommend.
Speaker 1:The last one, oh my gosh, let's talk about the trigger pull and this and that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and there's more safety issues with the revolver and you have limited round count and people aren't practicing with that because it's not fun to shoot those small guns, so it's irrelevant if you're not going to be able to hit your intended target.
Speaker 1:You know my everyday carry transitions from like. I have this little Smith bodyguard 380 because I know I'm going to be able to carry it. I know I can throw a couple extra mags in there, to a SIG 365 with optics, to 1911s, to everything. So everything it transitions. And I think that when it comes down to concealed carry, having options and being comfortable with your options, including training with them, now what do you got going on with concealed carry?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I actually have concealed carry boots for women and they're we're on our last sample right now but, it has.
Speaker 2:It has Velcro on the inside I'm going to hear my Velcro here so it's Velcroed in and so that you can draw from either side, but you're going to be able to hide it and no one's going to know you have it on. And one of the complaints that we I hear a lot from most of the men that I train is their women won't carry on body. They want it in a handbag because it's uncomfortable or they can't legitimately conceal it. So this would be on body. Most people are not going to think that you're carrying in a knee high boot and you're also going to be able to easily draw from it, and safely, because a lot of the women's options I see are very unsafe, and so you can safely draw from it and be able to access it. And then also they're really fashionable, like I want it to look good, like I'm a fashion person.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I would. You know, we have a manufacturer in Spain who's amazing, and so they're using really high end leather and and so we're just really excited. So we're on our last sample now and then we hope to translate this to men's, because what a great way to carry and undercover agent. Women will be able to wear these because no one's going to think to search that and, and so we're excited to be able to get these out. And then I also have a clothing line that's going to be coming out for women that has safety items, less than lethal options that are going to be concealed within those items, because, again, the accessibility for women is what we struggle with the pepper sprays in the bottom of their handbag or in the console their car, like they don't have access, and so where is it so that it can be easily accessible, so that you can defend yourself, in that that's a quick little time period that you have available, if any, you know what do you tell women about what they should carry and how they should pick out a fire?
Speaker 2:You know, I always say, you know, just like a car, we're going to try before we buy. But you don't know what. You don't know until you train first. And people always say I'm trying to get a gun really quickly before your class. I'm like, what should? I bet? Do not buy anything until you train with me, and then I'm going to give you a laundry list of ones that I like and then you're going to go try before you buy and see which one you like. I don't like the super small ones either, because we never know what our incidence going to be. What if it's an active shooter at a further distance? I don't know that I'm going to hit them with those little, tiny, small guns. So whatever I carry, I know that I can hit my intended target at any distance. So it's not going to be super small and I can easily throw it in my pocket, and so it's going to be something that I can legitimately be accurate with.
Speaker 2:And in most states you can't have more than one firearm on your person for concealed carry. Virginia is one of them. So you can't have a backup gun. So what you have is what you have, maryland. You can't have a backup gun. Like. It depends on where you are Minnesota, I think you can have as many guns as you want. Pennsylvania, you know, go to those states if you want to have a lot of firearms on your person, but most women have a hard time even carrying one. How are you going to carry? They can't even carry extra magazines, like they're not carrying multiple firearms. So you need to know that you can hit your intended target, and lately I so.
Speaker 2:P 365 is not my favorite because there's three or four walls in the trigger. It's very sticky and so it's not easy to not pull your shots because of that, because it's not a smooth trigger. So that's one of them that I. It's a great size for women but I don't. But it's harder for them to be accurate. And one of my most favorite lately is the Canek TP nine. I don't know if you've shot that, but they have it in a compact version and what I like about it? The actual trigger is fairly short in light, but they have a lot of travel to the wall. If you have a concealed carry gun with a light trigger, you need a lot of travel before you get there or you're going to shoot it before you're ready If that finger is on the trigger, and so that's one of the other reasons why I really like the guns. You have to shoot one and see, but. But they used to be known for their really crappy guns, and they recently redid their whole line.
Speaker 2:So many people shoot them for competition yeah they're amazing now and they're they're triggers the same from their low and their high end. Like they did an awesome job with it.
Speaker 1:And that's my problem with 365 was the first thing I did was throw the trigger out. Yeah, see, it's just the same thing with like everything I have the only gun I have not changed a trigger on is. I have a six Scorpion 1911, but it's already got a decent right, that triggers lovely, like everything else. I'm really trying to think right now, like Walter PDP, I changed trigger on that Glock 17,. I just changed the clock.
Speaker 2:You got to change trigger.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so many people. I've carried Glock for years Glock 19 for work. So I got a Glock 17 and I'm like I put a trigger on it overwatch precision trigger and I'm like it's a new gun, right, yeah, the.
Speaker 2:Glock trigger is horrible. Like people don't know that that don't shoot other things. Like they don't even understand how horrible that gun is.
Speaker 1:Well, the only other thing I have is I have a Smith MMP five seven, but that's more of just like a fun gun. Yeah, the triggers, a trigger, yeah, but like, yeah, when you think about something, you have to be able to control it and shoot for 3040 meters at least.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, you think about these active shooters nowadays and you're trying to put rounds on target at a decent distance because a lot of times that they're carrying something right, yeah, yeah, exactly so.
Speaker 2:And they might not stop. Like people always think that they're going to stop and they're bulletproof just because they have a gun. You know, I had an agency guy that was on one of the military bases during one of the recent active shootings and he was standing with two other agents next to him with double-pane glass between them and the active shooter. The active shooter was shot nine times with nine millimeter rounds and after that he shot and killed each man standing next to him. And so proximity, layers of clothing, adrenaline, drugs, like you know that probably better than anybody. And but the actual people out there caring don't have that idea in their minds that that's going to happen. Like they just think that.
Speaker 2:One, you might not even be able to access it, because the average crime's over in less than three seconds. And two, if you're not practicing drawing from the holes or forget it, you're going to shoot yourself or you ever even access the gun. And three, it might not stop and it takes an average of seven seconds for someone to realize they've been hit by a bullet. And if we look at the 21 foot rule, it takes less than three seconds to run to somebody at 21 feet. So what else do you have in your hand? What else are you going to do?
Speaker 1:And when we think about shot placement, how many targets have the shot, the 10 ring in the gut area? There's really no vitals down there. You need to shoot hearts, you need to shoot things that are going to stop someone, and that's why I think we need to start moving on to dynamic targeting, especially when it comes to like and this is like after you learn the basics, Everything always comes out to the basics, and that's the old adage too is like the only thing that makes a JV team not a pro team is because they're just, they know the basics.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. My Maryland classes specifically, I do four hours of range with each student before I sign off on them. So they do tons of classroom but they're doing four sessions with me. So I'm trying to get them to qual fairly early, because then we do call and command drills and, and you know, turning targets, and you know I start to incorporate all of that so that they can start to now then learn how to incorporate the speed. You know, are they ready after that? No, but they know what to practice now and how to get ready for that, because if we're going to carry we need to have those skills. And unfortunately I see instructors here's your 25 rounds, go out and shoot it and okay, you're on the size of a building target you passed. Like I don't agree with that they're. You're putting those people out on the street like there's a trickle down effect if we don't do a good job. You know it's those people in the community now that are in danger, kids that are in danger, like the neighbors, the.
Speaker 1:You know there's so many, so many facets to this that people don't think about you brought up an excellent point is because, yes, when an active shooter happens and yes, when you're drawing your, your weapon, your firearm, to fire a lot at civilian, you don't think about what's behind it. You think about you and you're you're listen, you're shooting a volley arounds, you're hoping something hits a target, little kids behind them. Bullets go through things, they go through walls like there's nothing.
Speaker 1:I remember when I was a kid I shot a 22 on my house by accident. Hey, listen, I was a kid just before I took Jody's class right 40 years ago and it went through like four walls you know it goes through 22, especially yeah. So I mean when you're thinking about there is so much more to like carrying a firearm than just learning how to draw on fire.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. And we look at the active shooter that was just with this and then this last year that shot at 40 yards and he was lucky. I mean he hit him. I think he shot 10 rounds but thank God he didn't hit anywhere outside of that. Like that's a really crazy shot to take, not knowing you know what's beyond all of that, because he probably couldn't see If he would have shot other people he wouldn't have been a hero, and you know so. Are you taking that risk and do you know you can hit your intended? Like 10 shots is a lot. And I always say I'm training to shoot the gun on the guy's hand because I'm super accurate. Now, at the adrenaline stress, is that reality? Probably not, but but that's my level of accuracy that I'm planning to, to you know, acquire if I can.
Speaker 1:Yeah, shoot the stop, and a lot of times it means a very small target. Very small target when you're thinking the size of a heart and like the blood pumping, or you're talking about a head and you got to be the right shot on the right part of the head too. You know, so it's not just anything counts. So there's so many different factors for it. So what's next?
Speaker 2:for you. So what's next? Well, I am.
Speaker 2:I'm still doing instructor classes and some random permit courses when I can, and I'm out doing more and more like crime prevention types of work where I'm speaking at at schools, because we're trying to change the mindset with with some of the bullying, like the active shooter, we need to prevent it before it happens, and I think there's so many ways to do that and we just aren't speaking about them. And so we need to start talking to kids about, you know, different levels of empowerment when it comes to the bullying and and trying to get them to understand their level of impact that they can have on their community by saying something or stepping in. And you know, we we don't see as much of this even in our communities because people don't want to get involved, they don't want to help. But if we don't start to do that, then how are we going to fix the issues? Because, as we look at law enforcement, the numbers on the vacancies are going higher and higher and we have less and less to protect the people.
Speaker 2:And so how are we protecting ourselves? We need to be a community, and our hashtag for our armoured village division is protect my brother. Like we need to start thinking in those terms. And and so for our school program, we have kind of a it's kind of like a big brother program where all of those kids get assigned to someone older than them as their big brother, so they always have a protector.
Speaker 2:So no one's on an island, because that's where we see the active shootings coming. When those kids are on islands, nobody's at home, nobody's listening to them in school, they're isolated, they're made fun of there, you know, and as we continue to see our new definition of masculinity as a guy with a big gun, what are they going to do when they want to feel like a man? They're going to go get a big gun, and they're going to figure out how to find one, and so so our goal is to try to, you know, mitigate all that at a lower level from from them just starting to think about each other as a community and start to get back the humanity aspects, because we see us losing that every day. And so we're doing more and more of that training within schools and assault prevention in colleges and all those other things. So we have a lot happening.
Speaker 2:Right, maryland, uh university, multiple times university of Mary Washington as well, uh, virginia university. So so we've been, you know, expanding that as much as we can because I want more people to be educated. And it's not just women, like everybody, you know, women are crazy. I always say to guys like the stalkers you know, I had a guy in Pennsylvania who was an instructor, who was stalked for three years and they couldn't find who it was and he was absolutely terrorized. So this isn't just about women. Like it's everybody, our levels of crime because of technology are increasing Now if you want to be an instructor through you actually travel around too.
Speaker 1:For that I do, yeah, how do we get in touch? So girl.
Speaker 2:Girl on fire dot life is the website and girl on fire, life is is all of our Instagram and Facebook and all those things, and we're trying to expand more videos so that we have more resources out there, so you can watch more for free. But but I do the instructor classes on multiple different markets and if you have a private group, if you have enough will come to you and I want to make sure that it's available to as many people as we can so that we can get more people trained. Well, to train the people. So so, yeah, so we're in a lot of places, but our carry line and everything's coming out. The book is is on the website to download, actually, and we're working on the print copy, but it's available now.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Well, thanks for coming on a show.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you so much, it was great.
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