Embrace the Darkness

"...Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too. They live inside us, and sometimes, they win." – Stephen King

I wrote the other day of the problem that so many have when attempting to reconcile our instinctual nature with the moral systems of organized religions. My belief is that in everything we do, choice is the deciding factor.

The First Credo in my Philosophical approach is:

One must acknowledge his animalistic feelings are healthy and acceptable. It is the choices you make in acting upon those feelings by which you will be judged.

Choice is the single most important factor in evaluating the actions of an individual. One of the greatest gifts that we possess as humans is the ability, and the inherent right, to choose. It is a very simple concept. You get to make a choice, every day and for every situation, deciding how you will respond to the world around you.

This leads us to the Second Credo:

Your actions and emotional responses to thoughts, or events are a choice.

The choices you make, in response to events that impact you, or the way you are treated are 100% with in your control. You can choose to relinquish control over your thoughts and your emotions by allowing yourself to react to the things that others do or say, but that is a choice. Rather than react we as individuals need to respond to the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune" in a thoughtful and constructive manner.

At some point in each of our lives we have heard a friend, lover, parent or partner say, "You make me feel (fill in emotion)!" We each have probably said it ourselves. The reality is that no one can make us, nor can we make anyone else, feel a particular emotion. I can MAKE you feel pain if I pick up a baseball bat and hit you in the head. I can't make you feel worthless as a person. You choose to feel hurt or sad or worthless based upon the credence you give the words and actions of someone else. You relinquish a tremendous amount of personal power when you allow others to hold sway over you like that.

Of course, individuals are capable of saying things that are triggers for our personal hurts or insecurities. If my partner says, "You're a terrible father" I may begin to question my abilities as a parent. I may doubt the way in which I am raising my son. However that person hasn't made me feel like a bad father, they have simply said something which has flipped the on switch for one of my insecurities. I have chosen to react to by doubting myself. How can I respond though in a more effective, and beneficial way?

I don't react to the emotion of the moment; I pause, I consider and I respond in a thoughtful and emotionally neutral way. I may ask, "Why do you think I'm a terrible father." I may believe that the real issue is not my parenting because of my clear understanding of myself and instead ask, "Saying I'm a terrible father is mean spirited, are you trying to hurt me? Why?" Either of these responses keeps me from being wrapped up in the emotional assault and attempt to get to the heart of the matter. At other times I have found silence to be the best option. Just ignore the other person's silly bull-shit. The idea is that you are in control of you. You can choose to not be bothered.

Some people may be thinking as the read this, "Well that sounds good, but my partner is always being mean." Okay, why do you choose to stay with him or her then? It is your choice. Even if someone is holding a loaded weapon to your head and threatening to kill you if you do not do (fill in the blank), it is your choice. You may not like the options in front of you, but in all but the rarest of circumstances you have a choice. You are choosing to stay in a relationship with someone who is insensitive, mean spirited or just a jerk. Why? Well, usually we stay in unhealthy or emotionally damaging relationships because we do not feel worthy of the healthy alternative. We may say, "She's a bitch, I deserve better" or "God, he's just an idiot," but we have the ability to end that relationship. We choose not to. Why is it that we do not readily acknowledge our right to choose when it comes to "I have to…" or "You make me feel…"? I believe that there are two main reasons.

First, it is easier to blame someone else for our failing than to examine how we are culpable. We don't want to be responsible; we don't want to get in trouble. Think of the child who runs after unintentionally breaking a window. He is trying to avoid the pain that comes with being culpable for his actions. In dealing with our actions as adults it is less painful to blame our failings or misdeeds on the influence of others than it is to acknowledge our choice. If it is our choice then the buck stops with us. That is a heavy weight to bear and one that requires considerable strength of character and a tremendous amount of self esteem.

Second, most people do not have the knowledge of themselves to be able to truly understand why they make the choices they do. Many people do not own the fractured pieces of their self, of their subconscious which bring about the emotions that serve as the triggers for thoughts and actions. You must know yourself to be the best possible you. To own your self often means delving into the painful, darker corners of our experience and our soul to understand why we think and feel the things we do. You must find the shadow self, the occulted aspects of yourself that are so difficult, so painful, that you hide them from yourself.  This is hard; it is challenging and often requires the help of trained counselors, coaches or therapists in order to provide perspective and a safety net during the discovery. It must be done though in order for us to progress

So, in order for us to be able to fulfill the Second Credo:

Your actions and emotional responses to thoughts or events are a choice.

We must develop the skills to own our choices by owning "who" we are and how we have become that person. Some of those choices we made long before we could understand that we had a choice: events of our childhood, good or bad, that helped shape the foundation of the adults we have become. You have a choice how you will respond to those things in the now. Will you continue to react as though you have no choice?

We must accept our culpability for the choices we make and the impact that our behaviors can have on others. The only way to develop the strength of spirit and sense of self worth needed to acknowledge one's responsibility and culpability is through knowing oneself. This brings us to the Third Credo. They are not my words, but a quote that I live my life by:

"One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious." – Carl G. Jung

There is darkness with-in all of us. We have all experienced insults and injuries on the physical, emotional and mental fronts which have left us the scarred and battle weary travelers of life's roads. That is pain we must revel in. That pain, that experience, reminds us that we are alive. Often times I walk along the lake front, down in the surf zone, where the waves break across the shore. I delight in the feeling of the rocks under my bare feet. I know that the pain I was feeling was making my feet stronger. Another analogy is the old-time exercise mantra "No Pain-No Gain". When you are striving to be physically fit you will suffer. The suffering is good. The aches and soreness are signs that muscle is growing, bones are getting denser, and that you're mental toughness is increasing. Remember the Navy SEAL mantra: The Only Easy Day Was Yesterday.

That's the essence of Jung's statement, which I live so much of my life by. We can only grow and become the best people possible by digging inside of ourselves and uncovering the pain. We need to rip away the emotional scabs that are keeping us from getting to the real issues.

I don't think that the Third Credo needs much more elaboration, I believe that it is an understanding that one must find for oneself. Just know, that no matter how much it hurts, or how challenging it is, that you will be a better person. I've spoken so far of three credos:

One must acknowledge his animalistic feelings are healthy and acceptable. It is the choices you make in acting upon those feelings by which you will be judged.

Your actions and emotional responses to thoughts or events are a choice.

One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.

Once you really are able to embrace these Credo's, once you have gone down the road of self discovery and self awareness, then you can begin to make the next step.

Life is monstrous.

All life exists by consuming other life, but it is only through knowledge and acceptance of the monstrous nature of life that we can being to accept all that upsets us as natural: war, famine, death… these are all perfectly normal elements of the human condition. Parents watch their children die; children grow up with out knowing the love they need and rightly deserve to help develop them as normal people; we loose family member to conflict or tragedy. These conditions tax each of us to come to grips with a new reality, but the reality is that the randomness, the pain and the challenge are normal.

There is darkness all around us. It can be pervasive at times in our lives. We only truly set ourselves up for failure when we imagine that this darkness is something abnormal, something that "isn't fair." Like Wesley's statement in The Princess Bride, "Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who says different is selling something."

You must choose to embrace the darkness. By knowing the darkness of your life you can begin the transformative quest of becoming enlightened.

 

 

Death & Dying…

"Have the courage to live. Anyone can die." – Robert Cody

Obviously with everything approaching in our lives Heather and I have spent quite a bit of time of later thinking about death. I'd say it has been the undercurrent of our conversations ever sense we met. We knew from our very first date that we both have spent plenty of time gambling with our lives. The "Gift" of Cancer that I talked about is the gift of knowing that you are mortal. For me it is the "gift" of knowing that any given day could be my last. I have held the dead and the dying in my hands. I have watched the life ebb out of people and considered it an honor to be there in those moments. Sometimes I may have been less than reverent, but that dark-humor is a way of dealing with the grief that you feel when a fellow person goes into the great beyond.

A ways back a friend of mine was dealing with the death of her grandfather, understandably it was challenging for her. Loosing someone you love is never easy, and the emotions that come forth are challenging and difficult and confusing. I gave her my take on death and dying over the last few weeks as she prepared for that difficult transition. As I was looking back through my blogs and writing I stumbled upon these words and thought they were worth revisiting. It is something I want to share. You never know when you're going to confront this, but we all know somewhere in the back of our mind that we will.

Death is inevitable. The old adage of "You can't get out of life alive," is trite when you hear it, but it is true. So, why are we so scared of death? The obvious reason seems to be a natural fear of the unknown. We are raised with certain beliefs: Heaven and Hell; Reincarnation or Nirvana; Nothingness or Complete Unity with the Universe, but there is no proof. Every major religion has spent time trying to "prove" their mythology of an immortal soul because as people we are terrified of there not being something after this.

I think that fear comes from people who are unable to accept that this may be their one and only shot. Think about it, what would you be doing differently with your life today if you knew 100% that when you died that the electrochemical energy that drove your brain would dissipate and you would just fade into nothingness and once those capacitors in your brain were drained of their reserves of oxygen and sugar? Would you be setting aside time to work on that novel you've always wanted to write? Would you quit working so fucking hard at selling real estate and spend a few more days with your kids a month? Would you say, "Fuck this I'm going to party like a rockstar?" What would you do different?

So, I ask you… why are you taking the risk? If there is something more after this great, but the creative source of the universe put in motion the events that have brought us here to this point today. Why are we waiting for a better tomorrow? Seize the moments you have.

A few years ago a friend of mine from "Church" (church at the time was Chicago Street Pub in Joliet) was murdered after "services". The last time I saw John he had finished having a drink with friends listening to music he enjoyed in a place he felt at home at. He didn't know that he was going to walk into the middle of a burglary and get beaten to death. None of us knew it… and each of us reacted differently. Ben was just glad that as the last person to see him he gave John a smile and hand shake; Kelly was glad she'd given him a hug; Shoes wished he'd come down that night. The fact of the matter is you never know when that last moment is going to come.

I live a life that regularly places me in situations where I may not come home from work. I love my job. I love the thrill of it, and I know that at any moment I may not get out alive. February 11^th 1998, my friend, Tony Lockhart of the Chicago Fire Department Engine Company 120 died in a fire at 106^th and Western Ave. I was there. I was at the wakes for Tony and Pat King (who died at the same fire), I was at the funerals. I wake up everyday knowing that I may die today, whether it is in some fiery hell-hole in the suburbs of Chicago or teaching a class of recruits at the tower in Champaign. I put my body in situations that are just screaming to get me killed. People ask me why I do it, and my answer is always this: 1. I like to help people. There is something satisfying about being there to help your fellow man when he or she is at their worst; 2. There is nothing more satisfying to a man's soul than taking on the elemental forces of nature and kicking its ass. You feel powerful and capable of doing anything; 3. Chicks dig it. That's always been my stock punch-line to get a laugh out of a serious moment. The excitement and thrill and adulation are nice, it is a grand experience, but I also have had to come to grips with the frailty of my own life. I have had moments where I though, "Oh, okay… so we are about to see what's on the other side." I think once you have lived through that you change your out look.

Death is not something I fear, because it is not something I can escape or avoid. I will die. It's actually a liberating realization. Much like the adage attributed to the Native Americans preparing for battle saying "Today is a good day to die." Once I knew that death was a certainty then there was nothing holding me back I decided to attack life with gusto. Why not party like a Rockstar? Why not write my screenplays and this Blog? Why not spend as much time with Liam as possible? Why not hop in the car and drive an hour to see our nieces? What could possibly keep me from doing those things? There are nights I sleep about 4 hours because there is so much living to do that I don't want to miss out. There are nights that jump into bed at ten, with Heather, to make sure I don't miss out on that embrace, that warmth, that sense of being safe and loved. I accept that my body may be sore some mornings or that I may be a bit tired. Living a purpose-filled life isn't as easy on the body at 33 as it was at 23; it will likely be harder in another ten years and harder yet ten more years on. That's fine; the wonderful thing about pain is that it reminds you, you're alive.

Let's get back into life. You need to learn who you are and do the things you want to do. What are you afraid of? If you always wanted to go skydiving… fucking go! If you get hit by a bus tomorrow, what will it have mattered if you took that sick day to go party?

Life is your choice. You can be timid and meek or you can go out and attack the world around you, own every room you enter and when it is your time there will be millions of people around the world who think of you and smile.

When I die I want those people who care enough to think of me to descend on Chicago with one purpose: Celebrate my Life. You can think back on playing Dungeons & Dragons with me. Remember being part of one of the countless Theatre productions I worked on. You can be sad that you wont get to do another Irish Car Bomb with me, but don't forget about the one's we did. You can miss watching those years when my eyes would narrow and my whole body engage when that Blond-9 walked by, but don't forget laughing at me every time I came back after crashing and burning on the approach. Remember most of all the unconditional love I shared with the most amazing woman in the world. It's going to be hard for Heather when she puts me in the ground, or up on the mantle (I hope many years from now), but she will know as I do that we celebrated and danced each day. Our meaning of life has been the experience of being alive. There is no greater Bliss!

When I die I want the old three-day Irish Wake. I want to be laid out in the living room. I want a band playing Irish rebel tunes. I want the Guinness and Jameson to flow. I want every person there to tell a story about me, raise a glass and say "He was a great friend." And at some point during the evening I want the band to strike up a chorus of "Finnegan's Wake" and when the row and the ruction begins pour that water of life on me and let's see just what the healing properties of Uisce Beatha really are.

Once upon a time…

That's the way most stories begin right? The best stories being with, "A Long Time Ago, In a Galaxy Far, Far Away…" but a bard far greater than I holds the copyright on that and the last thing I care to do is bring down George Lucas' wrath upon me.

We will go with once upon a time, though, to tell this story. I was raised Catholic and spent twelve years in Catholic schools. That experience was a good one for me. I was an altar boy, and went to mass, and for awhile gave thought to the Priesthood. Then I discovered the joys of the opposite sex and the Priesthood went out the window. Then I became enthralled with history and theology (as opposed to the "Religion" class I had most of my life) and began to see that there was more than one way to experience the grace of divinity.

Over the course of the last 15 years I have been on a spiritual and philosophical quest to define who I am in relation to the universe. I've pretty well got it within my grasp now and feel like it's time to start really sharing my discoveries of literature, spirituality, philosophy and life with those who care to listen. Much like any writer I bid you to follow and enjoy, but I will say this: I am not here to entertain a debate. You can read and think and ponder on my musings or you can chose not to. If you feel like you want to criticize me, you can leave. If you want to ask a legitimate question I will try to answer it. If you ask me what I perceive to be some kind of loaded bull-shit question I will mock you or ignore you, or mock and ignore you. Forewarned is forearmed.

The thoughts below were first published back in 2006 on a blog I maintained on MySpace. I've taken the time to update a bit and want to share with you the starting point in what can best be described at my philosophy, my way, my Dao.

The limitless source of the universe, the creative energy from which all of existence has spring, has placed me upon this earth to reach out to people. To explain the undercurrents of human interaction, and provide those souls seeking enlightenment with a perspective that may be of some help as they strive to expand their understanding of the world. This charge is a weighty one; I take the calling of divine inspiration to be a most serious cause. It is one that in order to avoid offending the great scholars and educators who have come before me I must commit the resources of my some times weary mind to with a rigorous intention.

There is an imbalance in this world. We are taught by our religions, our schools, our guardians and our mentors that we should strive to live a life of Virtue. Virtue is defined as "Moral excellence and righteousness; goodness". That is a wonderful sentiment, but there is a problem with it. There is a lack of balance in this definition. No one person can be "good" all of the time. We all experience feelings of hate, jealousy, selfishness, greed, sloth, lust and a whole host of human emotions that are sad to be "bad". They are not bad. Feeling lustful is not bad. Feeling hate is not bad. These are emotions that the creative source placed in us; so why is it "wrong" to feel them? The celebrated author, and man of letters, Samuel Longhorn Clemens in his writings as Mark Twain expounded upon this very point in his work Letters from the Earth. Think upon my point gentle reader before dismissing me.

The limitless source of the universe, by whatever name you call it brought about the conditions under which we have come into existence as we know it today. So, isn't it ludicrous to believe that that same grace would then condemn the very creatures which live lives based upon the desires it has imbued us with? Ah, the dilemma posed by the most common of religions. You must reject you very nature in order to find God's divine grace. Can't you hear them now: "Jesus died for your sins."

Really? Did he now? Well then, I should be good right? I can go forth and behave in the manner of Caligula or Nero or even El Supremo and "binge drink and fornicate" to my heart's content. I'm already saved. Thank goodness. I hear the argument now… "No, no, you must continue to live in the example the Jesus set for you!"

Oh, I'm supposed to work as a carpenter, live at home with mom till I'm thirty, and go out drinking with the boys the night before the cops pick me up and put me to death? It sounds like Jesus was a member of the IRA living in occupied Ireland to me, and I can live up to that example. The image of Jesus as the risen Christ, the savior of mankind and the holy son of a virgin birth is a construct of Paul. It is the view of a gentile with political aspirations who needed to set in motion a religion which would give his political aims justification. He succeeded by stealing some of the best parts of Zoroastrianism, melding it with Jewish teachings of a coming Messiah, and the continued lineage of King David. I applaud him for his creation of a faith which has been so incredibly successful in gathering adherents and in looting, plundering and dominating the globe for centuries. Why is it though that people do not see what Paul created for what it is?

The first reason that our view of Christianity can be said to be "clouded" is because we are so removed from the origin of the Christian faith that it is nearly impossible to relate to the circumstances and political climate of the time. The historical facts of the times are rarely presented without portraying the early Christians as having finally overcome their Pagan/Heathen oppressors through the Divine Inspiration of God and the acts of Martyrs. History is written by the winners. Secondly, Paul attached a very definitive reason for belief: hell. The idea of going to heaven or going to hell would certainly have been of even greater concern to man of the year 100c.e. than to the man of 2006. Why would this be? Modern man has become nearly immune to the "superstitions" that our early Christian era ancestors believed to be fact. We tend to be skeptical of that which science can not demonstrate to us, which is why half of us still can't figure out if we are supposed to eat eggs or not. Despite our tendency as a species to question the literal existence of heaven and hell, we have a cultural archetype that has been imprinted on the bulk of western society which still ties us to the concept of divinity as being dualistic and centered on the ideas of "Good" and "Evil". But, we must ask ourselves: what is evil?

We are animalistic creatures. We are here to engage in behaviors which will further our genetic code. That is the essence of our biology and the most basic building blocks of our DNA; we exist to recreate ourselves and further our clan. We are supposed to breed, carry heavy shit, hunt and gather, and generally behave the same as the cavemen did. That is the underlying potential energy stored in our genetic code. All the other "rules" we have come up with to structure societies have been a construct of men and at times in direct contradiction to our own natural impulses. We have in the last 2000 years developed some ridged social structures that are based upon social convention, politics and a need for human interaction to not lead to open warfare on a daily basis. So the first and most important credo of my philosophy is this;

One must acknowledge his animalistic feelings are healthy and acceptable. It is the choices you make in acting upon those feelings by which you will be judged.

Choice is the single most important factor in evaluating the actions of an individual.

 

 

Duty

"Duty is the most sublime word in our language. Do your duty in all things. You cannot do more. You should never wish to do less." - Robert E. Lee

 

The wonderful thing about having a birthday is getting to revel in the fact that you have persevered and can celebrate another year of life. As someone who considers myself to be a semi-functional writer it also gives me a chance to pontificate about the things I think are important. I sat down to write this yesterday with a lot of thoughts on my mind and deleted it because I felt, "Who the hell cares what I have to say?" That's a pretty common thought for me as a writer. I realize that there is certain arrogance in thinking that anyone else actually cares what my thoughts may be. However, I have no way of knowing if I am going to say something that changes one person for the better, so I better use the talents that I seem to have and put down a few thoughts when I have them. Maybe if nothing else they will offer Liam something to look back on when I have shuffled off this mortal coil to help round out his understanding of the lessons I've been trying to impart. You never know how many birthdays you have.

I have always loved my birthday. When I was younger, like 30, it was about adoration and presents and people paying attention to me. No one spends eighty percent of their life writing and trying to be published if they want to be obscure. I've come to realize that there is something bigger worth celebrating; there is a certain triumph in the act of perseverance. I posted a quote of Nietzsche awhile back that I truly love, "That which does not break my back makes me stronger." I like that at 33 I am hitting my stride. I've been thrown challenges, and continue to face some monumental ones, but I have also known victory, triumph, love, and the supreme joy that comes from persevering. Teddy Roosevelt is one of my heroes. He was a man who dreamed huge dreams but knew that he needed to work with diligent effort to achieve his dreams. He once remarked that real life occurs between 30 and 60, because the young have their heads in the clouds and the old are filled with regret. I like to think that I have banished regret from my life, but we'll see what I have to say 27 years from now. I think though that as I look at my life a quote of his from a speech at the Sorbonne is one I have tried to keep ever present in my mind, "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

As I look back on the past 33 years I do it with a fond reverence for each and every moment that has made me the man I am today: the failures much more so than the wins; the depths of despair that allow me to now appreciate the resplendent rapture of happiness; the constant struggle to find my way. Never did I feel there was a path before me. Each and every time that I chose to set out on a course it seemed to lead me to ruin, but when I gave up on the life I wanted to have, and opened myself to the course the universe has set out before me, then I have found success, happiness and joy.

If there is anything that I can impart to Liam it is this: Do your Duty. You have a duty to your family, to your community, to your country, and to yourself. It is the idea of Dharma, the Indian concept of a virtuous path that needs to be the guidepost. It's a lesson that I saw in the Star Wars movies, that was cultivated in me through Scouting and a youth filled with volunteering, and ultimately laid a foundation for wanting to serve in a meaningful way as an adult. My duty has led me to the fire service, a trade that has brought me joy as well as quite a great deal of pain over the years. That wasn't the life I planned, but it was the one the universe put in front of me to follow. I didn't grow up wanting to be a fireman. When it was first placed before me I can honestly say that I had to look it over several times and more than once I rejected the call to duty out of a desire to follow the plan I had for myself. Somehow though I never turned my back; I kept one foot in this life, and I was fortunate to have the chance to grow, stumble, and finally find my way. I have no idea where that path it is leading me in the fire service. I hope that I am being a dutiful servant of the cause along the way. I know that there are amazing challenges ahead and amazing rewards to be had personally, professionally, and spiritually as I continue on. I am thankful everyday to have this chance to grow and to serve a purpose. It's amazing what happens when you surrender to your nature; if you open your eyes, and quiet the mind, you manage to find your bliss.

That sense of Duty fills my experience. I oftentimes chose to behave certain ways out of a sense of duty, an obligation. For example, when my wife and I were first dating we talked about a sense of obligation to care for our parents, now and as they grow older. We recognized in each other a trait, an affliction of character, the rendered us nearly incapable of looking out only for ourselves. Aside from knowing that we must meet our obligations, and we do so joyfully because we know that it is part of who we are, we also fulfill our duty in many ways. Being there for our son; performing jobs of service; lending a hand to someone who needs it.

We have a lot going on in our lives right now. Heather is likely having surgery to remove the tumor on her skull-base within the next week. In dealing with this I have come to realize that if you embrace your duty it really is a beautiful expression of love. What else can you call the action of running into a burning building, or diligently working with a first grader to make sure she can read, or having a forty-minute conversation about the attributes of your kids Bakugan? Those are acts of love. In the same way ensuring that the woman you love, who you have chosen, knows that for good or for ill you will stand beside her, ready to fight. The next week will bring many changes in my life. Regardless of the outcome of Heather's surgery, our lives will be different. We expect for the better; being two crusty old-souls though we prepare. That preparation for what to do if things don't go "well" is out of love, out of duty, as well. It would be unimaginable to find yourself suddenly pitched forward into the most emotionally tumultuous time possible, and not have a plan in place.

 

A Gift

Saying goodbye is hard. There is a certain sense each time you say it that it may be your last chance to. My niece June hates to say goodbye. When it's time for anyone to leave she just ignores every attempt to get her to say goodbye. It's as if she senses that by not saying goodbye the moment, her reality hasn't ended. I understand that better now than I ever have.

Heather and I are getting ready for the fight of her life. We are looking her surgery in the eye and have to confront all the issues that go with it. There are the logistical issues of time off work and post-operative care, wills and power-of-attorney forms, bills and insurance paperwork. Then there are the far more challenging issues: are you going to be an organ donor, or donate your body to science; if you have a stroke and they say you're "brain dead" do you want to be left on a ventilator; what songs do you want played at your wake?

It is some heavy lifting emotionally. I will say this though, Cancer is a gift. Those words, that sentiment, is not some original thought of mine, or even my turn of a phrase, but it remains true none the less. Since the day Heather and I met I have felt that her experience with cancer formed for her an understanding of what matters in this world; an understanding we share because of my personal quest to look death in the eye everyday and let the specter of death know it does not worry me.

Cancer is a gift that liberates the patient and the caregiver to recklessly abandon worrying about the petty and petulant. You give yourself permission to say, "Fuck it" to all of the little silly bullshit trials and tribulations of daily life that we frail humans become so easily wrapped up in. Not to say that we don't get annoyed with one another because of the same mundane things that everyone else does, we do. I think when you live every day with the understanding that you don't know how many days you have left, how many birthdays or Christmases, or Mondays, if you really embrace the beauty of it you see that it is a wonderfully crisp sense of life. The meaning of life is the experience of being alive, and the gift of staring at death is that it reminds you to embrace being alive.

A New Direction

I've used this blog very sparsely since starting it.  Up till this point, I intended for it to be dedicated to my thoughts on the Fire Service and my passion for the way of the Fire Service Warrior.  Today I am shifting directions though.  I am a fireman, but I also consider myself to be a philosopher of sorts, and a spiritualist.  This blog is about me, about my journey and about all that makes up who I am.  It is about the fire service, about warriorship, about the discovery of self and the process of becoming a full and complete person.  No one who was to sit and talk with me would ever think that I am "only" a fireman.  The whole of me is comprised of many facets, and I hope by sharing those facets I may open someone's eyes to an idea that they may have not yet experienced.  If nothing else I hope to capture here the thoughts that I have penned over the years and continue to write. 

One of the gifts of my chosen career is the awareness that any given day could be the last I walk this earth.  I've buried friends, and read all too often about the passing of brothers along my path.  I would hate for what has literally been my life's work to be lost because of laziness on my part.  Maybe, this may exist for one reason only, to ensure that my son will one day be able to look back and understand more fully who his father was and who he became.  I think that is a worthy mission. 

So I will be posting thoughts, ideas, and writing from the past as well as things I am writing now, with a certain amount of editing so that my voice is coherent for today.

The Fire Service Warrior

©2007, 2009 Christopher Brennan

    

According to Webster's Dictionary a "Warrior" is "a man engaged in or experienced in warfare". I don't particularly agree with that definition. Through out history wars have been fought by peasants or conscripts for the most part, men, and sometimes women, who were forced to go and fight for, or over, someone else's land. To me the term Warrior has a connotation of the legendary 300 Spartans, the Knights of the Middle Ages, Rodger's Rangers of the French and Indian War, or the elite men of the Special Operations Command today. In my mind a Warrior is a dedicated professional, who selflessly volunteers to place himself between his neighbor and a threat. That threat could come from a foreign nation, a terrorist cell, a criminal, or even the effects of unrestrained fire. There are Warriors in the Military, in Law Enforcement and in the Fire Service. Having a Warrior's mind-set though isn't something that just happens. It isn't issued to you when you get your uniform. YOU must make a choice to be a Warrior. YOU must view your life, and your responsibilities, through the prism of the Fire Service Warrior.

This article is about a philosophy, a mind-set that allows you to measure your experience against a set of guideposts. It is my view of what each and every one of us who calls ourselves a fireman should aspire to. I'm going to use the word fireman here rather than the more gender neutral firefighter. You the reader need to be able to distinguish a particular meaning in what I'm saying. For my purposes a firefighter is someone who has a job working for the fire department, but may not have a love for the job that inspires them to be the best. We all have met people who are just in this job for the badge, the pension, or the time off. A fireman on the other hand is anyone, male or female, who has chosen to embrace the ideals of the Fire Service Warrior. A woman or a man who has raised their hand to say, "When this primal energy we call fire endangers you, your family, your home or community, call on me."

In order to accept that there is, and should be, a Warrior culture in the fire service you must first accept that firefighting is a form of warfare. Firefighting is combat. It is not a battle against another person, but it is combat none the less. A Fireman places himself in a position where he must risk his life to protect his community. That calling, that selfless willingness to place one's neighbors ahead of oneself is rooted in the same noble drive as our Warriors who defend our nation on foreign shores. The risk is the same. You are risking all that you, and your family, hold dear, you are risking your life, to protect those who cannot protect themselves. At times in our history the relative degree of risk has varied; during times of war our Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines have born a much greater share of the risk, but in times of tranquility it is our public servants who have shouldered the burden of securing our homeland.

There are those who may not have looked at the idea of Fire Departments being engaged in combat before. There are bound to be individuals who would philosophically disagree with the very implication that firefighting is combat. Yes, the fire service has assumed many roles beyond "just" fighting fires. Most Fire Departments around the country provide Emergency Medical Services; respond to Hazardous Materials and Technical Rescue Incidents, and provide other services to aid their "customers", their neighbors, who they have sworn to protect. It is a reality that those same neighbors see us first, and foremost, as being there to crawl down a dark, hot, dangerous hallway that is being ravaged by the effects of unrestrained fire to save their loved ones, to protect their property, and to salvage their possessions.

If we look at both the statistics and the environment that a firefighter may find him or herself in I believe that the analogy is not only appropriate, but essential if the Fire Service, and the public we serve, are to understand the role we play in our communities. In 2007 there were 118 Line of Duty Deaths (LODD) reported to the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA). Additionally the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) has estimated that 83,400 firefighters were injured in the line of duty in 2006, with more than half of those injuries, 53%, occurred on the Fire Ground.

This should not come as a shock but Firefighting is a dangerous profession. We take a young man and send him into a building were most of the time he wont be able to see, he cannot breath the air, which is filled with toxic gases, the temperatures he will have to work in can reach 1200° Fahrenheit at the ceiling, and he is wrapped in a coat, pants, boots, gloves, hood, helmet and self contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) that hinder his dexterity, his mobility, his verbal communication and his ability to maintain an awareness of the environment around him. Oh, and as an added element that most pervasive of physical forces, Gravity, is constantly exerting its pull on the structure that our Warrior is doing battle in so that if the building has been sufficiently weakened by the effects of the fire it is likely to collapse on him. If you don't see that as being "combat" then I think you are being naïve. Why is it important to acknowledge the correlation between the fire ground and the realm of combat, though? Simply put, if you do not see yourself as being engaged in battle then you are unprepared to accept the serious and challenging path that it takes to become a Fire Service Warrior.

The experience of the Fire Service Warrior is different than the commonly understood "Warrior" of the Military or Law Enforcement communities. Both the solider and the police officer have as opponents their fellow man, another human being, and as such have a very personal context to their conflicts. The enemy of the Fire Service Warrior is unrestrained fire. That enemy is personified by firemen and by poets as being a thinking thing. We give fire the anthropomorphic qualities one might find in an Orwellian novel. To quote Robert De Niro's character in Backdraft, "It's a living thing, Brian. It breathes, it eats, and it hates. The only way to beat it is to think like it; to know that this flame will spread this way across the door and up across the ceiling, not because of the physics of flammable liquids, but because it wants to." It is a catchy turn of a phrase, but there is not a fireman who, when battling to quench a stubborn fire, hasn't felt as though he was fighting a living beast. Fire isn't a thinking thing, it doesn't have an intellect, but it does have a drive. It has potential. The very nature of the chemical chain reaction that allows fire to spring into existence also drives it to consume all it can. As long as physics and chemistry come together in a way that will cause organic material to decompose and release fuel into a properly balanced environment of oxygen and heat the fire will continue. It will continue until we kill it.

As a fireman, a Fire Service Warrior, you have a responsibility to yourself and to society. The relationship between Warriors and the society they protect can be described in many ways, but the most appropriate I have heard is the way Dave Grossman, author of On Combat, describes it. He refers to the relationship as one of Sheep Dogs to the Sheep. The Warrior is the Sheep-Dog, there to manage the heard and to protect the sheep from the wolves. For us the "wolves" are the dangers that our neighbors, the Sheep, face everyday. It may be the danger that comes from not being able to treat a life threatening illness or injury, the threat posed by a spilled toxic chemical, or the danger of a building which is being consumed by fire. Regardless of the nature of the threat we must approach the situation with seriousness and focus.

    To be a Fire Service Warrior, we must approach each day with a focus. Whether we are cleaning tools, presenting a public education class, treating a asthma attack, or fighting a structure fire we owe it to ourselves and to our neighbors, our "customers" if you prefer, to be 100% present in the moment. Why? We, as firemen, have a sacred duty to protect society. We need to break that duty down to understand how the Fire Service Warrior deals with the two responsibilities.

First, we have our duty to ourselves. By "ourselves" I mean you as an individual, and the collective whole of the Fire Service Team. If you are not devoting 100% of your focus to the job that you are performing, then you are placing your life in danger. When you place your life in harms way you must be fully immersed in the intense and vital experience of the moment. The Fire Service Warrior must embrace the emotional, psychological and physical elements that he will confront at each and every fire. If you have not dedicated yourself to mastering your responses to these three elements, then you are increasing your chances of being hurt or killed. Why? By ignoring, or downplaying the threats that you may face you will not have suitably prepared yourself for them.

Emotionally there is a stress that we all experience when it comes to confronting some of the "horrors" that are the day to day reality of our profession. Now, this doesn't mean that we all break down because we confront emotionally challenging moments. Some of us are very empathetic; we literally feel the emotion of the people being affected by the incident: the patient or their loved ones. Others are sympathetic; we can relate their pain to ourselves but do not have a visceral experience of feeling it. It is important for each of us to understand how we react. We will all face an incident, or have an experience, that pushes the buttons of our emotional stress. The worst thing we can do is think that it won't happen. If we ignore our humanity, and pretend to be some kind of emotionless robot, we are depriving ourselves of the ability to cope. We learn how to confront challenging emotional situations by thinking about them before they occur. Just like mentally rehearsing the steps you will take if you have an SCBA emergency, mentally rehearsing how you will confront emotional challenges prepares you. Once the emotionally stressful moment occurs you have to live with it and hopeful deal with it in a healthy way. None of us are big on acknowledging our emotions. It isn't "manly" to say that something scared you or made you sad. That is perfectly reasonable. Acknowledging the emotional pain of a situation puts a nick in the armor that we all wear to hold it together when things are difficult. The reality is that we need to open up to one another. When people meet me and find out I am a fireman the inevitably they ask, "What was the worst thing you've ever seen?" I'm unwilling to answer that question. To me it is inconceivable that someone who has never had the experience of someone dying in their hands, or carrying a dead child, or having to pull a mangled body from a car wreck can fathom the totality of any experience I might share. It is simply an auditory "gawker". The only people I am willing to share those stories with are my brother and sister Warriors. That "family" knows what it feels like, smells like and looks like. Lt. Col. Grossman in On Combat says that "Pain shared is pain divided." This is why it is important to sit around the kitchen table after one of "those" calls and talk. A well timed tailboard talk, or kitchen table conversation, may do more good in the long run than a "debriefing" at a latter date. In Critical Incident Stress Management CISM) circles our tailboard talk serves that purposes of "defusing" the incident. It may prevent negative thoughts and emotions from taking hold. It gives the crew a chance to review what happened, what went well and what can be learned. Hopefully our firemen operated according to their training, their Standard Operating Guidelines (SOGs) and made appropriate tactical decisions. If this occurred and a life was still lost then the guys and gals can take reassurance that they did their jobs as they were expected to. The leader must reinforce that no matter how much we wish it were so we will not save everyone. To some extent we must all have faith that what is meant to be, will be.

Psychologically we must understand the effects of fear on our abilities. In my article "You Want Me To Do What?" I address the psychology of fear and the affect it has on our breathing, our heart rate and our ability to perform. Fear is a distraction. It is that part of your psyche that is like a crying child, it pulls your focus. Allowing yourself to be distracted by fear, allowing yourself to be afraid, is the first step in losing control. When you surrender to being afraid you lose control of your heart rate, your breathing and your ability to reason in the moment. You may literally become paralyzed by fear. A Fire Service Warrior must approach life threatening situations, which would cause fear in "normal" people, in a "Zen" like way. Firefighting should be an altered state of consciousness. The alert of the station alarm, or the pager on your belt, should mentally trigger your understanding that something outside of your normal existence is about to occur. In religious rituals the sound of the organ music, the lighting of candles, and the invocations of the celebrant are sub-conscious triggers that tell your midbrain that something "special" is going on. Those triggers are supposed to have sacred meaning which cause your mind to focus and set aside the "unimportant" thoughts. That initial dispatch should be the same thing. That should be the trigger that shuts off your thoughts about the fight you had with your spouse, how your kid is doing in school, and even of your parent who is dying in a hospital bed. You can come back to those thoughts later. They are important, but they are completely irrelevant right now. The initial dispatch should trigger your mind to focus on the task at hand. Learning to do this can be challenging though. We all get consumed in our thoughts. Learning to flip a switch to shut out those other concerns will come only with practice. I teach the process this way.

1. Don't move for a second or two. Picture the address in your head. Remind yourself what kind of buildings you have over there. Try and picture the block.
   
2. SLOWLY get up and WALK to the apparatus. If you jump up and run to the rig you get your heart rate up and allow that dump of adrenaline to engage your fight or flight response.
   
3. While walking to the apparatus being using the Tactical Breathing Exercise ("You Want Me To Do What?) Inhale for a four second count, hold it for four seconds, exhale for a four second count and hold it for four seconds. Get your breathing and heart rate under control. DON'T PANIC.
   
4. Don your Personal Protective Clothing. This should be a ritual itself. You should do it the same way every single time. I put my feet into my boots, one at a time, and pull up my bunker pants. Then I fasten my pants and pull the "postman" tabs tight to cintch the waist of the pants. I put on my Truckman's belt, my Vulcan light hangs on my right side. I don my hood and leave it up. I don my radio strap, and snap the sway strap to the ring on the right side of my pants. I don my coat, snap the closures so that my radio microphone is outside my collar, and then close the storm flap. I step up into the rig and slip into my SCBA.
   
5. In route I make sure my portable radio is switched to the primary fire ground radio. I ensure that the straps of my SCBA are snug and free of twists. I think about my riding assignment, my tool assignment and what my job will be. Then I just continue with the tactical breathing exercise and try to shut my brain down until I am on scene or hear the size-up of the first arriving company.
   

If you are the Driver/Operator you will have a different process; you will be thinking about your route to the fire, where the other responding companies are coming from, where you are likely going to have to position your apparatus. The Officer has a different process; he will be considering which SOGs affect his "short-list" of Tactical Decisions, how the time of day and the weather will affect the fire, and what Box number to call if he needs additional manpower. By giving yourself a ritual to follow you keep control over how your brain responds.

Physically we have to be prepared to confront the strength, stamina and agility challenges that firefighting present. Firefighting is a full-contact sport. Firefighters, as opposed to firemen, tend to downplay this. Why? There are a bunch of out of shape firefighters, and if they were to acknowledge the physical nature of the job they have they would have to do something about it. It is far easier to sit in the recliner, the "ass magnet" and watch TV, than it is to pursue a rigorous fitness regime. If we examine the actually work load of firefighting we might approach things in a different way. Firefighters expend metabolic energy, measured in Metabolic Equivalent Levels (METS), at the same level as Navy SEALs do. How many people in your firehouse would cut it as Navy SEALs? I probably wouldn't, I hate running, and can't swim too well, but I recognize the level of effort and physical strain that I will have to expend and try to hit the gym to make sure I am prepared. You need to find a resource for developing a fitness program that can improve your ability on the fire ground. I cannot say enough about the work of Coach Greg Glassman and the folks at www.Crossfit.com. They provide, free of charge, a Work Out of the Day (WOD) on their website and an immeasurable amount of free information about fitness training. If you want to have a fitness model suited to a Warrior lifestyle check them out.

Being prepared emotional, psychologically and physically to do our job is a critical aspect of fulfilling our duty. The elements we have addressed so far lay a foundation to help us meet the responsibility we have to our-self and our brother and sister Fire Service Warriors. We must now take up the duty we have to our neighbors, the people we have a sworn duty to protect.

The standard Fire Service risk assessment criteria heard over and over again is a variation on: "Risk a lot to save a lot; risk a little to save little; risk nothing to save nothing." Who decides what is "a lot" though? Obviously if you have a good working fire and as you pull up Mom is on the front lawn saying that her five year-old is trapped in his bedroom, most of us would say that is "a lot". A life is on the line, and as long as the building seems even moderately tenable we are going to try and make the grab and get the kid out. In the same vain we can all find some agreement that a building that is obviously vacant, no squatters, homeless people, or "security" to worry about, removed from any exposure is a situation that we are going to try and "risk nothing". There is no reason for us to be committing our people to fighting this fire from the inside. Sure, it is "fun", and we don't get many fires, but that is a dangerous level of bravado that cannot be tolerated. There is no reason to put anyone's life on the line for a building that should get bulldozed anyway. Our two examples are pretty clear-cut, black-and-white, examples of making those risk assessment decisions. Life doesn't often present us with a ton of clear-cut choices though. Let's consider a more likely scenario.

It is three o'clock in the afternoon, and you arrive on scene of a two story, wood frame building with heavy fire volume on the first floor, and turbulent, brown/black smoke venting from the second floor windows. You can see from the front lawn that the fire has involved the rear half of the building and is beginning to compromise the interior stairs. Neighbors are screaming from across the street that "the kids are home from school!" What do you do? Offensive Interior Attack; Vent Enter Search; Exposure Protection? There is no right answer. It depends on your department's capabilities, first in manpower, and standard operating guidelines.

If we use our "normal" risk management criteria, the real question is "what is the value?" Is this a "risk a lot" moment to you? Is this a "risk a little" moment? We all have to make this decision. It doesn't matter if you are the probie with six months on the job, or the 20-year Battalion Chief, you need to decided: what is this worth? Is it worth your life? Is it worth the lives of your firefighters? How you make that decision is going to be based on your values, your experience, and most importantly your view of what is an acceptable risk.

I can tell you this though: those people standing across the street expect us to go in there, and kick ass. They expect us to be willing to hang it out there, and try, even though it seems kind of "iffy". That is why they pay our salaries. That is why the public looks up to us. That is why we have a reputation that: politicians, corporations, and our local cops all would die for. We are the guys who make those selfless choices and do everything we can to save those things that are near and dear to our community. People love firemen. It seems corny, like something out of a Norman Rockwell painting, but it really is true. They love us because we are the guys who do things no one else will. They love us because we rush into the very building they are rushing out of. We have to remember though that we didn't earn that reputation. Not one little kid who comes up to a fireman on the street knows that you are a good Nozzleman. No one knows if you, personally, are a good fireman or a total mutt. The reputation we enjoy was earned by the firefighters who came before us. They earned it with their blood, sweat, tears and many of their lives. We owe it to the legacy of those who have given everything to honor their memory. We owe it to our citizens to either live up to their expectations, or tell them exactly what we will and will-not do.

I'm going to go out on a limb here, and say this: We ARE supposed to risk our lives. Taking risks is part of the gig. You wouldn't join the Marine Corps and then say, "Hey, what do you mean you're sending me to Iraq? I didn't sign up for that!" Yes, in fact you did. No one put a gun to your head and said, "You will be a fireman." You picked this job. You stood up, raised your hand, and said "Pick Me!" If you are a career firemen you probably studied your but off to get certified as a firefighter, paramedic, or earn a degree, took a half dozen hiring tests, and did everything you could to get hired. You did not just wakeup one morning and find out that you were in a job where someone expected you to risk your life. The Fire Service Warrior has a moral obligation to his neighbors, to the community he has sworn to protect. It is not enough to say that you want to help people. In my opinion there is no room for "Parade Day" firefighters. None of us have the budgets to be a social club for people who want to play at being firemen, and I feel that it is an insult to the memory of my fallen brothers and sisters for anyone to receive the honor of the reputation they earned with out paying into the kitty for future generations.

Honoring the commitment we have made to our communities means that we must be proficient in our jobs and capable of tackling the difficult tasks that we are responsible for. The Fire Service Warrior must approach the study of his craft with a passion. He must strive to know all he can about his trade. When we train recruits entering the fire service we do so in an incremental way: Safety, SCBA, Fire Behavior, Building Construction, Forcible Entry and Ventilation are all taught as separate skills. To an extent it has to be this way. There is so much information for the new firefighter, who aspires to become a fireman, to master that it needs to be broken down. The challenge is that once you graduate from the recruit academy you have to put it all together. The fire ground is a dangerous, dynamic place, where multiple tasks must take place in a coordinated manner.

The world of the fireman has many factors which will effect his survival. One of our primary concerns must be the building we are fighting fire in; its construction, general state of repair and the contents inside it. In the classic text, The Art of War, Sun Tzu, a warrior philosopher who lived more than 2,000 years ago in China, tells us "Therefore those who do not know the plans of competitors cannot prepare alliances. Those who do not know the lay of the land cannot maneuver their forces." We must master building construction. The manner in which a building has been constructed has the single greatest effect on how fire will travel. It sets the stage for everything that we are going to do, and yet is one thing that we have the least amount of control over. We will often be conducting our battle in a building that we have never been in before. We have no control over the intentional or accidental acts of the builder, owner, occupant or arsonist, which change the intended use of the structure, or reduce its natural ability to resist the spread of fire. We must have an understanding of how the homes, taxpayers and commercial buildings in our district have been constructed, though if we are going to try to reduce the threat that the building itself poses.

We must also have a clear understanding of fire behavior. We have our strategy and tactics, and we need to approach the fire as though it does too. The "strategy" of fire is simple; to keep burning as long as the chemical chain reaction can continue. Understanding fire behavior allows us to understand the "tactics" of the fire. We cannot effectively match our tactics to the fire if we don't understand the tactic the fire will take. There are many factors that we must take into consideration when evaluating fire behavior. On a basic level we must be able to recognize what stage of development the fire is in. Most of us were "raised" with incipient, free-burning and smoldering as the stages that a fire progressed through. Now, we are teaching our recruits about the ignition, growth, fully developed and decay stages. Knowing what stage the fire is in, whether you refer to it as "free-burning" or "fully developed", provides a critical understanding of what might possible happen on the fire ground. If we are in the growth stage of fire development we should be prepared that we might have conditions which could lead to a flashover. If we have entered the decay stage we need to recognize that there is the potential for backdraft conditions to occur. Beyond understanding the stage of fire development we must understand how to read smoke conditions. Dave Dodson has done an amazing job of teaching the fire service about the "Art of Reading Smoke". The three key factors in reading smoke are the volume, velocity and density of smoke issuing from a structure. Understanding the relationship of these factors to fire behavior can help us stay out of situations which may rapidly deteriorate, or help us instinctively "know" where to find the fire and how to extinguish it.

We must be proficient in the skills we use on the fire ground. You have to know all there is to know about your SCBA: how it works, what to do if you have an emergency, how to take care of it. Our SCBA is the greatest tool we have for protecting ourselves and being able to take the risks that we have to in a calculated manner. In addition we have to know how to use our tools. What is the best way to pull ceiling if I have a plaster hook? How can I use my Halligan bar to remove a security door or the bars from windows? How do I decide what ladder to take if I need to make a rescue from the third floor? The only way to develop these skills is through training. With our recruit firefighters we conduct repetitive skills drills. They swing the axe a hundred times. They chock the door open every time they go through. They start the saw. We are building muscle memory. Muscle memory is the training with a skill until it becomes automatic, like signing your name. You repeat a particular skill hundreds, if not thousands, of times until you have so ingrained the steps that you don't have to think. Our skills drills during the academy give us this foundation, but we must continue to practice once we are "on the job". Tiger Woods may be the greatest golfer to ever live. He doesn't just pick up his clubs on Thursday and go play a tournament though. He plays every single day. He practices the act of hitting a ball every day. Our training program does that for us. If we confine our training to skills drills we would be far from proficient on the fire ground.

The skills that we learn must lead to scenario based training. We assign our people a riding position and a tool assignment and then give them a scenario they must accomplish. This is a learning tool. It allows them to understand where a particular skill may be used on the fire ground. It follows the natural flow of learning. Once the recruit has mastered the skills of donning and doffing his SCBA, his emergency procedures, and ways of reducing his profile through shifting or dumping his pack, then we can introduce him to the SCBA Confidence Maze. We take our recruit and send him and his partner into the maze. They must negotiate the obstacles they encounter: reduced profiles like a stud space in a wall; wire entanglements; simulated SCBA emergencies, like an Instructor turning off their cylinder valve. The point of these scenarios is to build confidence in the SCBA and the individual firefighter's skills. This should not be an easy evolution. When we introduce the scenario it is kept "tame", allow the recruit to go through the maze with a few obstacles, the natural reduced profiles, and simple wire traps. Once a basic understanding of the requirements is met then make them do it with a black out cover on their mask. As they become more proficient increase the challenges of the obstacles. If you have gotten folks who are highly capable go ahead and add heat. Each time we increase the difficulty our people will become more proficient in a skill.

Building on the individual skills and scenario training we need to develop Full Scale Exercise (FSEs). The FSE is where we let out people play for keeps. There are no "time-outs" unless we have a real emergency or injury. We give out assignments for the day and then let them handle what ever incidents we through at them. The FSE is where we can arrange for our firemen to arrive on scene of a building with fire, or simulated fire conditions, people hanging out of windows waiting to be rescued, access problems, and all of the challenges of the real fire ground. They have to figure it out. They must make tactical decisions, they must use their skills to solve the problems. The Chief's have to give the strategic goals, the Company Officer's must make the tactical decisions and direct their people and the Firemen must perform. These exercises should not be easy. They should allow our people to experience the challenges of the fire ground in a realistic way. In the Roman Army it was said that dill should be bloodless battle and that battle should be bloody drill. Train like you fight, fight like you train is another way of expressing that. It is important though that the people who design the exercises never think of it as a chance to show how smart they are. Our exercises should be challenging, but they must be winnable. I can design an exercise scenario that you absolutely can not possible win. What do you learn from that? Absolutly nothing, except that I am a jerk.

We are best prepared to fulfill our duty to our neighbors by being prepared and proficient. The only way to develop that proficiency is by constantly challenge your-self as a fireman. You must train your mind, and you body, to be prepared for the challenges that you will face.

The role of the Fire Service Warrior is a noble one. It is volunteering to stand between your neighbors and the threat of unrestrained fire. It is not an easy calling to live up to though. It requires a disciplined mind. It requires focus and thoughtful action. It requires an awareness of self, and your commitment to the society you live in. The Fire Service Warrior immerses himself in the history, the tradition, the skills and the knowledge of his profession so that he may fulfill the duty he has assumed. It requires a mastery of your emotional, psychological and physical state. If you strive to live the life of a Fire Service Warrior you set an example for those who come after you and honor the memory of those who came before. For me this is a never ending process. There is always another book to read, another class to take, some way that I can improve myself and my ability. I hope that the ideas I have laid out can serve as guideposts for you as you find your way along the path of the Fire Service Warrior.

 

 

Fire Ground Tactical Decision Making

"You don't have time to think up there. If you think, you're dead." – Maverick

 

    My wife hates the fact that I make decisions in 30 seconds or less. She thinks about options, analyzes, I would say agonizes, and in general hates to be rushed to judgment. When we first met she did not understand how, if I was presented with a list of three options, I would pick something before she even finished reading the list. I finally explained it to her like this: In my job I have to make decisions in a fraction of a second, and I have to trust my life with those decisions. When you look at life that way it tends to stream line the thought process.

Firefighters must master the ability to take a mental snapshot of the situation presented to them and use that to make critical tactical decisions. Our business boils down to making decisions in a high stress environment with life and death consequences. It does not matter if you are talking about a structure fire, a heart attack, or a technical rescue incident. The reality of operating under those circumstances can be overwhelming, especially for a firefighter just starting out. If we want our people to thrive in that kind of chaotic, stressful environment, it is imperative to train them in Fire Ground Tactical Decision Making.

Every one of us in the fire service has worked with someone who was always cool and collected, and always seemed to know what the fire was doing a second or two before the fire itself did. Usually those are the experienced members, the "Salty Dogs", who have been around the block and have a chest full of war stories to share. There is no question that experience is the single best way to master the art and science of sizing up a situation and making your tactical decisions. Experience comes with time though, and we are not responding to the numbers of Structure Fires that we have in the past. How do we develop experience in a firefighter who may only respond to a handful of structure fires a year? We develop our experience through Training. Obviously Training is our "answer" for a lot of situations. Training our members to be skilled in the art of tactical decision making must be a particular focus though, if it is going to be successful, and it must rest on a solid foundation.

Combat Decision Making

    There is a concept that Fighter Pilots and Special Operations Warriors understand well called the Boyd Loop. We can prepare ourselves to make better decisions on the fire ground if we examine it, and use the concept in our training.

    The Boyd Loop is named for Col. John Boyd, of the US Air Force, a fighter pilot who wanted to understand how best to turn a tactical engagement in his favor. The decision making system that he developed has come to be known as the Boyd Loop, or the OODA Loop.

    OODA stands for: OBSERVE; ORIENT; DECIDE; ACT. The four steps in the Boyd Loop.

Observation is the process of gathering data. This is where you are using your senses to get information about what is happening. The key is that you need to develop a filter, so that you are not trying to gather too much information. You need to focus on the critical information for your assignment and let the rest of the chaos become a fuzzy part of the backdrop.

Orientation is the process of synthesizing the available information and your personal mindset to deal with the problem. Put another way, this is taking your finely honed skills as a firefighter and matching them up to what you have observed about the task at hand.

Decision is where the rubber meets the road. It is taking the information and analysis and setting the best course of tactical action to achieve the strategic goal. You are using your Standard Operating Guidelines (SOGs), your training and your knowledge of the current fire ground situation to decide what you are going to do.

Action is what it is all about. Firefighters are pretty much task oriented creatures. We exist to "do" things on the fire ground. The other steps in the Loop have gotten us to this point.

It is important to remember that the OODA Loop is not a linear process. It is a dynamic cycle that starts when we are dispatched and, hopefully, continues until we have finished critiquing the incident. We do not simply pull up in front of the fire building, see that there is a fire on the first floor, recognize that because we are on the Engine today and assigned as the pipe-man that we will be pulling a hose line, decide to pull the line and then go put the fire out. That is an example of using the Boyd, or OODA, Loop, but we don't stop there. As we continue the fight we are constantly gathering more data, orienting ourselves to the threats that are developing, deciding on a course of action and then acting upon it.

If we use the Boyd Loop successfully, what happens is that we actually give ourselves more time to think. We are using a smooth and efficient thought process that allows us to maintain our focus and at the same time devote a portion of our conscious mind to continually working its way through the OODA Loop.

Laying the Foundation

    In order for our members to be able to apply the Boyd Loop successfully there are a few prerequisites that come in handy: well designed and exercised SOGs for Engine and Truck Company Operations, and a solid grounding in fundamental fire ground skills. Most of our departments are already functioning with these prerequisites in place. For those who do not, it isn't impossible to master fire ground decision making, but it becomes considerably more complicated.

    Why are Engine and Truck Company SOGs important? As a firefighter, like a computer, you only have so much "RAM" to work with. If you have to devote your mental energy to figuring out what tool to bring, or what your individual priorities need to be, you are behind in the Loop already, and you are at a disadvantage when it comes to maintaining situational awareness. Our SOGs should help limit the number of times we need to go through the Loop. They act as a flow chart for our common decisions. If you pull up in front of a structure fire, what is your assignment? What are your tools? If this is not spelled out ahead of time when we get on scene one of the first trips through the Loop has to be "wasted" on choosing a tool. The topic of riding positions and tool assignments has been covered in great detail by many fire service authors. I'm not going to start speculating what tool the firefighter behind the officer on the third arriving Engine should have. Those specifics need to be worked out based on your jurisdiction, with a nod toward what your "bread and butter" fires involve. If our SOGs are designed to provide clear direction about essential fire ground tasks we save our personnel a trip through the Loop.

    In the same manner, having a standing guideline for an Incident Action Plan spells out our strategic goals, which frees the initial arriving Officers from having to make trip after trip through the Loop. Building SOGs ahead of time, which function in a similar way to EMS Standing Medical Orders, cuts down on the amount of thinking you have to devote to a given problem. It is much like going to a restaurant. You walk into a "steak place" with every intention of ordering a rib eye, medium rare, with a baked potato, and a pint. The only decision to make is picking an appetizer. The waiter hands you a menu and what do you do? You Look At Everything On It! You knew what you were going to order, but because there were options in front of you, you still take the time to see what they are. Time is not of the essence when ordering dinner, usually, but the same dynamic applies on the fire ground. If you have a huge menu to pick from, because the SOGs didn't lay a foundation for picking the right "meal", then you waste time filtering through everything that you have learned to eliminate options that are not relevant to the situation at hand. Well designed SOGs that our firefighters have trained on, and exercised to make sure they work, help to reduce the time needed in the Observe, Orient and Direct stages of the Boyd Loop.

    Let's say that my assignment is to be the Outside Vent Man (OVM). Our SOGs take care of focusing me on what I need to observe, the orientation I am going to take, and they streamline the decision making process for me because I should know what my specific initial response tasks are. By having tool assignments married to a fire ground assignment I have reduced the confusion even further. I arrive on the scene of a structure fire and observe a two-story, ordinary construction, single-family residence with fire showing from the Division B/C corner. My SOGs orient me to take a 24-foot extension ladder, a Halligan Bar and a Pike Pole to Division C; throw that ladder to the second floor in a manner that allows it to be used for rescue; ventilate the fire room with my pike pole upon being notified that the attack Engine is prepared to make entry; and then open any exterior doors on the Division C side and make a primary search from the exterior, without entering an IDLH atmosphere, until I have met up with my partner, whose initial task was to mirror my actions in the front of the building. How difficult is working through the OODA Loop going to be? It should be pretty straight forward. The only element of my assignment that may require more brain power is choosing the right window to ladder on the second floor. I am able to think about (ORIENT) that as I am making my size-up and triaging the building.

    To make my way around to Division C, I choose to go down the Division D side of the building. As I pass between the building on fire and the Division D exposure (I'd call it a gangway, but using NIMS terminology makes this accessible to everyone) I OBSERVE a woman hanging out of a second floor window in need of rescue. What do I do now? Go through the Loop. I OBSERVE a condition. I ORIENT myself with my understanding of the circumstances as I know them from our SOGs and the current situation: there is a life safety risk; our SOGs say it is the job of the Second Truck to ladder the Division D side; the Second Truck is on scene. Now I have to DECIED. Do I abandon my assignment of opening up in Division C to rescue the woman, or do I make a quick radio call, "Command from Truck 1 OVM, I've got people hanging out second floor windows on the D Side. I'm continuing to the C side"? ( See Figure 1) Do you DECIDE to do something different if the second truck is a mutual-aid company that you know is five minutes out? There is no one right answer. Your decisions must be predicated on the observations you make, based on the current conditions, and the orientation you have assumed. Once you make your decision, it is time to ACT.

Having a solid grounding in fundamental fire ground skills is the key to reducing the amount of "static" in the action phase of the Loop. You have made it around to the D side without encountering any situations which may cause you to divert from your SOG based assignment. Your first task is to throw a 24-foot ground ladder to a second floor window so that in can be used for rescue. Can you do it? Do you know how to throw a ladder by yourself? Do you have the strength? Do you know where it is supposed to go for rescue? If you don't then you are once again slowing down in the Loop. Now you have to take a trip through the Loop to figure out how you are going to accomplish the task at hand.

The basics should be so ingrained in you that there is no need to "waste" any time in the Boyd Loop thinking about them. They are called "fundamentals" for a reason. They are fundamental to being able to do your job. If you are prepared through regular training how to throw a ladder, perform a VES, stretch a hose line, man a 2¹/₂" exposure line by yourself, or any other fire ground task, you are speeding up how long it takes to get through the Loop. You are compressing time by removing unnecessary items from the menu and giving your brain more time to focus on those things that are 100 percent specific to the situation you are in: sizing up the building, reading the smoke, observing the effects of your fellow firefighters' actions. Muscle memory is your friend. It works for Tiger Woods, Kobe Bryant, and combat marksmen. It will work for you.

Developing Fire Ground Tactical Decision Making Skills

    Even if you have good SOGs and are an all-star firemen your ability to use the Boyd Loop to make tactical decisions on the fire ground will be limited if you do not practice with it. Think of it this way, your brain and your butt are both muscles and if the only exercise they get is sitting in a recliner watching Maury or Dr. Phil, how prepared do you think either of them will be when it comes time to go to work? There is a quote from Braveheart that fits perfectly, "The good lord tells me he can get me out of this one, but he's pretty sure you're ******". So, how do we incorporate using the Boyd Loop into training?

    First and foremost our training needs to go beyond just teaching the SOGs and the fundamental skills. Once your people know what their assignments are and how to perform them, then the training needs to get more challenging. Both complexity and speed must be increased if your firefighters are going to continue to develop. Have the scenario thrown in where the OVM has to decide what to do about the lady hanging out the second floor window. Have your folks pull up in front of your tower, or an acquired structure, or even someone else's firehouse if that is your only option, for a simulated fire and have a role-player in front of the building pointing to a 2^nd floor window saying, "My 5 year-old is in the room, get him". What do they do? How do they move through the OODA cycle to get to acting on the problem? Build these unexpected developments into your scenario based training. Throw in an evacuation drill every now and again. The late Francis Brannigan wrote continually about how every sailor in the Navy is taught how to abandon ship. How many of us are practicing how to make an orderly tactical retreat if the air-horns start blasting?

There are bound to be guys and gals who resist challenging training, or training in general. It is important to remember that there are two reasons for this: first, they are worried about being embarrassed, and second they do not understand why it is vital. Embarrassment tends to arise from not feeling secure in your ability to perform the required task. Not understanding the importance of the training comes from seeing the department's values as incoherent or inconsistent. Fixing those underlying issues probably needs to be a priority. Remind them that just because you have been a firefighter for 10 years doesn't mean you know it all, or are perfect. Every professional sports team out there practices all season long. They are making millions of dollars because they are so good at what they do, and they still practice. Members of the Navy SEALs and Army Delta Force train constantly. Use these examples of professionals, in very exclusive organizations, as models for why we as firefighters need to take training seriously.

Once the drills are done, do a hot-wash on the tailboard and talk about what went well and what can be learned. How direct those sessions are will depend on your corporate culture. My belief is that sparing someone's feelings is less important than making sure that a dangerous error in a critical fire ground task is fixed. To quote my good friend Lt. John Tabisz, of the Darien Woodridge Fire Protection District, "We aren't delivering pizzas here." I will make this caveat though, if you are criticizing the person, and not the action, you are going in the wrong direction and will alienate people.

Beyond departmental or company level training though, each of us needs to do our own training: Mental Rehearsals. You need to spend time thinking about what you will do if you are presented with a particular circumstance. Pick a building in your district and think about how you would handle various situations. I play the "what if" game constantly, and I find it helps me make decisions on the fire ground more smoothly. My wife got passed being bothered by the fact that I was willing to pick out tuxedos for our wedding after looking in one store for less than a minute. She understood it was part of how I look at the world. She still has trouble getting over the fact that when we walk up to the door of a house I have not been in before I look down both sides and take a guess at where the kitchen, baths and bedrooms are. It's a little pop quiz I can give myself to mentally rehearse my size-up skills. You should be able to figure out what the basic layout of a building is by giving it a quick look as you walk up. We will not get to walk through every building in our district, but by spending time exercising that part of your mental tool box, you will be better equipped to figure it out in the moment. What would you do if you sudden fell through a floor? Are you training in calling a Mayday? It's the evolutionary step that takes us beyond our SCBA Emergency Procedures and prepares us to respond in a situation that has a huge potential to be mentally overwhelming. Mental rehearsals give us a low stress opportunity to work through various challenging situations we may have to confront. Thinking through what your actions will be if you find yourself in trouble will help reduce the stress if you suddenly find yourself lost, disoriented or trapped in a fire building. Mark Twain once said, "It takes me three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech." It makes sense if you think about it. You are not going to respond well the first time you see a problem. That is why we drill. It's why we need to practice applying the OODA Loop in our training. You can build your experience bank by analyzing possible situations, performing mental rehearsals, and conducting challenging scenario-based training.

There is no single way to learn any skill in the fire service. Fire Ground Tactical Decision Making is a complex process that is a synthesis of your experience, your training, your situational awareness, and your comfort level. The physical and psychological stresses of firefighting impact every one of us differently, and need to be addressed separately. Hopefully being introduced to the Boyd Loop, and taking the time to think about how your organization teaches decision making, you will be better prepared to confront the challenging environment of the fire ground. By ensuring that your firefighters have well planned SOGs, a solid foundation in the fundamentals of fire ground tasks, and have had the opportunity to be challenged with real-world scenario driven training you will prepare them to make critical, life or death, fire ground decisions.

    
 

 

 

    
 

 

 

 

You Want Me To Do What?

"Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear."

– Mark Twain

Human beings have a natural apprehension when it comes to fire. This natural impulse to flee from an unrestrained fire is perfectly normal. It is an essential skill for survival. Fire is one of the most essential tools that we as human beings possess, and it also has the potential to be one of the most destructive. The need to respect this "creature" is a cornerstone for being able to safely use fire in the myriad of ways that we do.

As parents we recognize the need to teach our children to avoid situations which may cause them harm. This training begins with essential survival skills ranging from "don't put anything in your mouth that isn't food," to "stay away from the stove, it's hot." When we are dealing with children who are younger than seven years old, when the child's level of cognitive ability is still developing, most of this training takes the form of a conditioned response. If the child starts to approach the stove or campfire they receive a sharp, loud yell from the parent, and in many cases a slap on the hand. The idea is straight forward: scare them and stop them in their tracks, or show them that going near the dangerous thing has painful consequences. There is no other way to teach our young children to avoid these dangerous situations. However this early, and often stern, method of imprinting a behavioral pattern also leads to individuals developing an apprehension of fire. As we mature we are taught how to safely use fire: to cook; to heat our homes; to create structures which were unimaginable to our ancient ancestors. Our early fear of fire is transformed into an understandable respect for fire and its power, but underneath that respect is the unchangeable imprint left upon our three-year old psyche of mom or dad slapping out hand when we reached for the stove.

Firefighters must behave in an abnormal way when they choose to enter a building that is on fire. Choosing to disregard the normal psychological response to fire by entering a burning structure causes an understandable stress reaction even in an experienced fireman. In order to operate safely and effectively on the fire ground we must understand the psychological and physiological reactions which affect our performance, and how to manage our stress responses. This is the part where I need to lay a foundation. It may seem a bit complicated, but understanding how your body reacts and why you respond in certain ways will help you to develop the skills to control your response.

The Physiology

    Firefighting requires that an individual willingly enter an environment which poses a threat to his health and welfare, and while in that environment engage in strenuous physical activity while being hampered by the very protective clothing that is necessary to keep him from being burned, and disregard the undercurrent of fear which tells him he needs to flee. He must physically perform at the level of a Navy SEAL while maintaining situational awareness, anticipating the next steps to complete his assigned task and providing progress reports to his supervisor. Firefighting takes a toll on the firefighter both physically and psychologically.

Through out the late 1990s and the early part of the 21^st century a significant body of research has been conducted on the physiological effects of firefighting. Some of the most comprehensive work has been conducted by Dr. Denise Smith and Dr. Steve Petruzzello, collogues of mine at the Illinois Fire Service Institute. Their research continues, and is adding to the understanding that we must have of just how the human body reacts to the effects of firefighting.

Studying the physiological effects of firefighting is challenging because of the multiple variables which have to be considered: firefighters range in age from 18 to 70 years old; not every firefighter starts with a common level of physical fitness; differences in heredity and the way you were raised all play a factor in how your body will respond to the stresses that are place on it.

There are some conclusions that are consistently repeated across several studies. During firefighting operations firefighters reach their maximal, or near maximal heart, rate. Maximum heart rate is measured by subtracting an individual's age from 220 (i.e. the maximum heart rate for a 31 year old is 220-31=189 beats per minute [bpm]). Studies evaluating the heart rate of firefighters performing fire ground operations during interior structural firefighting operations show that heart rates between 164.1bpm to 183.5bpm are common.
In other words a 31 year old firefighter will be functioning at between 86.8% and 97% of his maximum heart rate while operating inside a structure fire. This level of physical exertion has multiple effects on the individual firefighter.

First the firefighter is increasing the level of thermal stress on the body because of the metabolic action required to perform the required actions. This metabolic stress can best be measured by the metabolic equivalent level (MET). One MET is the amount of energy/oxygen that your body uses while sitting quietly. Based upon studies by Barbara Ainsworth of the University of South Carolina firefighters can expend 12 METS of energy while conducting firefighting operations. This is the same level of energy expenditure seen in Navy SEALs, and professional boxers. As a comparison your body is working at roughly 13 METs if you are running 7.5 miles per hour (an 8:00 minute mile) at a 1% incline.

Second the firefighter must contend with an increase in thermal stress on the body from the elevated temperatures found inside a structure. Ambient air temperatures can rise above 449°F inside a burning building. At this level of ambient temperature the firefighter would not survive with out his protective ensemble of turnout gear and SCBA.

Third the firefighter must contend with the limitations placed upon his body by the very personal protective equipment that he needs to survive in the building. The National Fire Protection Association standard on firefighter safety, NFPA 1500, specifies that all firefighters shall use Coat, Pants, Boots, Gloves, Helmet and Protective Hood in conjunction with their SCBA. These elements of protective gear reduce the risk of the firefighter being burned through the use of fire resistant materials and layered structures. The unwanted effect of these garments is that the firefighter is less able to relieve heat stress through perspiration, as the insulating properties which prevent heat from burning him also trap his radiated body heat.

All of these aspects have been quantified through study into the physiology of firefighting. We can use the accepted standard of 98.6°F as the "normal" human body temperature. One study has shown that on average the tympanic temperature of firefighters completing 16 minutes of firefighting activity were elevated to 104.1°F, after operating in an atmosphere varying between 170.1°F and 199.9°F This physiological effect has been shown to reduce the heart's stroke volume, the amount blood the heart can pump in one contraction, and increase the dilation of blood vessels closest to the skin. These two factors can lead to a dangerous drop in blood pressure. This has potentially significant consequences, and it can be assumed that a number of the firefighter LODD which fall under the "Stress/Exertion" category are a result of this cardiac compromise.

If we assume that a firefighter equipped with the common "30 minute" SCBA cylinder is able to perform 16 minutes of work prior to exiting the fire building we can expect that he will exit the building with a body core temperature of 104°F and a pulse rate of 175bpm. Interestingly, research has shown that despite this level of physical exertion firefighters do not show a corresponding psychophysical effect.

The studies of Denise Smith and Steven Petruzzello have incorporated an evaluation of Rate of Perceived Exertion based upon the Borg scale. These studies examine the RPE based on physiological and psychophysical factors, but they do not take into consideration the purely psychological aspects. Based upon their research we can see that firefighters will rate their exertion as being "hard", a rate of perceived exertion that we would expect to see for a person with a heart rate of 150bpm, yet the recorded heart rates recorded should have elicited a response of "very hard" to "extremely hard". There is no clear clinical explanation for this variation. A component that must be considered is the subjective nature of measuring effort based upon the Borg Scale; it is all in the mind of the individual what "hard" means to him or her. Additionally we need to consider that the thermal stress, dehydration and the previously discussed cardiac compromise may affect the ability of the individual responder to accurately assess the level of exertion.

These physiological and psychophysical effects can be seen as having an effect on cognitive function as well. In the Smith's and Petruzzello's 1998 study subjects were assessed for their cognitive function after each of their three trials. Subjects were evaluated based upon their response time and degree of accuracy using a Continuous Performance Test. Response time decreased across all three trials. The authors' conclusion was that this could be attributed to the ability for neural signals to be transmitted more quickly across the warmed nervous system. The Continuous Performance Test used required the subjects to determine if a displayed number was a 0 or 9, or a number between 1 and 8. While this does provide some understanding of the basic response time of the nervous system, it is not an accurate predictor of how the individual's ability to analyze and respond to multiple sensory inputs while functioning in the fire environment. Even the United States Fire Administration acknowledges this, "The physical and mental demands associated with firefighting and other emergency operations exceed those of virtually any other occupation."

The Psychology

People assume that firemen aren't afraid of running into burning buildings. My experience has been to the contrary. When new candidates start in the fire service they have an understandable apprehension of what they are going to be called upon to do. We know that we are raised to have a fear of fire. That fear needs to be controlled however if we expect our firefighters to perform. In order to be able to control your psychological responses you need to understand the effect that fear and anxiety have on you.

The psychological responses of firefighters to the environment and activities they face are an aspect of firefighting has not received a great deal of focus from researchers. We can use the work of researchers like Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, Bruce Siddle and Loren Christensen in to the psychology of men in combat to develop an understanding of some of the effects psychological stress that firefighters can be expected to cope with.

An understanding of the psychological reactions we confront must start with a brief understanding of our nervous system. Every person's nervous system is comprised of two main components: the somatic nervous system, which is responsible for the actions of our voluntary muscular movements; and the autonomic nervous system, which is responsible for all of the functions that our body needs to perform automatically. It is primarily the role of the autonomic nervous system that we are concerned with.

The autonomic nervous system functions through the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS). These two systems send signals to your organs, muscles, and brain directing actions, and they work in opposite directions. The SNS is responsible for increasing your heart rate and respiratory rate, diverts blood flow away from your skin through constricting blood vessels, and other actions that would be considered a part of our body's "Fight" response. The PNS has the opposite effect, it slows your heart rate when the need to move large quantities of oxygen have been reduced, and moderates your digestion, and you bowl and bladder control. The PNS is your body at "Rest".

During high stress situations like combat, your body switches its resources from the PNS to the SNS: your pupils dilate to enhance your vision, your heart rate increases to move a greater quantity of oxygen to the large muscles needed to fight or flee and you peripheral circulatory system contracts so that if you are cut you will bleed less. The downside to this sudden switch is that things such as bowel and bladder control can be quickly lost. You can urinate or defecate right on the spot. This is something that isn't often understood, and it isn't something talked about often, but it does happen. In The American Soldier, a study of the actions of soldiers in World War II, one quarter of all soldiers reported the loss of bowel or bladder control in combat. Responders who survived the September 11^th, 2001attacks on the World Trade Center reported numerous cases of uncontrolled loss of bowel and bladder control.

For firefighters the single most important side effect of the SNS taking primacy is the increase in heart rate. Emergencies are not scheduled events. When the alarm bell rings your heart rate begins to increase. Controlling that initial adrenaline dump is critical. The effects of an increasing heart rate because of anxiety have been documented by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and Bruce Siddle. The chart below is based on their published work.

Heart Rate	Physiological Reaction
60 BPM
80 BPM	Normal resting Heart Rate
90 BPM
115 BPM	Fine motor skill detriorates
120 BPM
145 BPM	Complex motor skills deteriorate
150 BPM
175 BPM	Cognitive processing deteriorates Loss of peripheral vision (Tunnel vision) Loss of depth perception Loss of near vision Auditory exclusion
Above 175 BPM	Irrational fight or flee
	Freezing
	Submissive Behavior
	Voiding of bladder and bowel

It is important to remember that these effects are only for stress induced heart rate increases, they do not apply to heart rate increases due to physical activity. Also, the heart rates should not be taken as concrete numbers. As always when we are dealing with people there is individual variation.

The "WHITE" zone is the level of anxiety and ability that we experience during our typical resting mode. We progress from "WHITE" to "YELLOW" as our heart rate begins to climb towards 115BPM. As your heart rate nears 120BPM you enter the "RED" Zone, where a loss of fine motor control begins to occur. Entering the "GREY" zone we are moving into a "panic" mode: cognitive ability, vision and auditory senses are all degrading quickly. If the heart rate exceeds 175BPM the psyche and the body essentially, "give up", and either flee or are unable to react.

The firefighter works in an environment where he may face an increase in his heart rate from both exertion and from anxiety. There is no conclusive study that has analyzed the effects of combining the effects of heart rate increase from exertion and a sudden increase in heart rate due to SNS stimulation. It is reasonable to expect that a experienced firefighter who is conducting interior operations, working on his first or second air-bottle will have his heart rate somewhere around the 160 to 180 beat-per-minute range. He will not likely be experiencing any significant psychological challenges, or a loss of cognitive function that impairs his ability to maintain his situation awareness. However if conditions suddenly and unexpectedly deteriorate, he may rapidly go from being calm and collected in the "Yellow Zone" to the "Black Zone" with out any warning.

There is some research we can examine though that can give us an insight into what happens when firefighters become disoriented. The Firefighter Disorientation Study examines the role that disorientation plays in firefighter fatalities. In 100 percent of the cases studied conditions changed suddenly from manageable for aggressive interior operations to prolonged periods of zero visibility conditions. We can expect that those rapid changes would bring about an understandable anxiety reaction. A flood of adrenaline, a quick shift from feeling in control of the situation to being overwhelmed by the conditions would all lead to the sudden surge of the SNS reaction. Couple that SNS surge with a near maximal heart rate and our firefighter is going to move into the "Black" Zone, and have a nearly overwhelming flight response. The dilemma is that when that flight response kicks in the cognitive function shuts down. Rather than calmly thinking, "I need to get my Company together, and turn us around here to follow this hose line out," the survival brain centers kick in and we will only do what we have practiced before. It we've never trained on what to do to maintain Company Integrity and maintain Situational Awareness under rapidly deteriorating conditions, panic will take over, we will become disoriented and those combined forces will result in us likely becoming a fatality.

Our goal must be to develop a training program and a philosophy that will help us stay in the "Yellow Zone", even under those circumstances where the "normal" fireman would be expected to suddenly jump into the "Grey" or "Black" zones. It requires a personal commitment to understanding yourself, your mind and body, and training yourself and your brothers and sisters to have the will to survive. It means becoming a Fire Service Warrior.

Conquering the Fight or Flight Response

    Developing survival skills has received quite a bit of attention from our brother and sister warriors in the Military and Law Enforcement Communities. Like us they can find themselves in a life threatening situation with little or no "warm up time". We have already drawn a comparison between the physical work load of firefighting and that of a Navy SEAL; let's see if we can learn some lessons from their survival skills as well. The SEAL, who is patrolling along the streets of Iraq, or the mountains of Afghanistan, is aware of the possibility of coming under attack; he is operating in condition "Yellow", alert and ready to respond. If he begins to take small arms fire from one or two enemy fighters, he has time to recognize and respond to the threat. He should be able to maintain himself in the "Yellow" zone. However if his patrol is suddenly hit by an Improvised Explosive Device (IEDs), or ambushed by a numerically superior force, the chances are that he could rapidly shift into condition "Grey" or "Black". The way the SEAL prepare for those sudden unexpected life threatening encounters is through Immediate Action Drills (IADs). In the IAD the entire platoon responds immediately by using one of several tactics which have been practiced hundreds of times, until the response becomes automatic. There is no need for the cognitive function to operate at 100 percent, because the response has become conditioned. It gives the SEAL Operator the tools to respond instantly and then get his cognitive reasoning back into the mix.

    Firefighters can also develop the ability to control the fight or flight response. The majority of training to be a Fire Service Warrior will be discussed in Chapter Four, but the critical skills needed by every individual firefighter will be talked about here.

    We have talked about how the sympathetic nervous system controls the "Fight or Flight" response. What we must do is develop the skills to control that response. We must train ourselves to recognize and identify that our body has started to go into panic mode, and have developed a conditioned response that will kick in to regain control of our heart rate before we enter the "Black" zone. Conquering the Fight or Flight response requires conscious effort. You must take the time to train yourself before you go out on a call.

    In my opinion the single most important element of conditioning yourself to be able to control your fight or flight response was summed up in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; DON'T PANIC! It may seem like a simple thing, but being conscious of how you are responding to the conditions around you sets the stage for being in control of you SNS responses. If you are not conscious of how you are beginning to respond then it is inevitable that your heart rate is going to begin increasing before you are even aware of it. You will begin to move from condition "Yellow" to "Red" to "Grey" with out even realizing it. Making the effort to stay aware of how your body is responding sets the stage for controlling your SNS responses.

    The hard part is how do you develop this kind of skill set? We each come to the kitchen table in the morning with different levels of self awareness. We see it in ourselves and our brothers and sisters. Some folks are aware of everything they say before they say it; others are constantly putting their foot in their mouth. We all know that brother firefighter who when the Company Officer asks him, "What were you thinking?" the response is "Nothing." That person isn't lying. He acted with out making a conscious decision about what he was about to do or say.

To develop the ability to be aware of your responses you need to start off by looking at yourself and asking, "What kind of person am I?" Do you regularly speak with out thinking? Do you hear the question, "What were you thinking," and not have an answer? Or, are you the kind of person who is able to articulate your thought process, whether you were right or wrong? Developing that understanding takes self reflection and honesty. You need to start there. Once you can honestly understand yourself then you can being working on how to control those primal survival responses that spring from the mammalian brain that trigger your SNS responses.

I find the best place to begin is with mental rehearsal. Think about the situations you may find yourself in. Think about what aspects of the job you are strong in, and where you are weak. Every one of us has weaknesses. I hate heights. I am not the kind of fireman who finds rappelling from the top of a water tower fun. So I work on it. I climb ladders every chance I get. I hop up and run around on roofs. I will practice self-survival techniques like window bail-outs just so I can conquer that fear. You need to do the same thing with the situations you may find yourself in. Rehearse what you would do if something goes wrong.

Picture yourself crawling down a hallway with your partner to conduct a primary search of a room immediately adjacent to the fire room. The Engine crew has a line stretched to the top of the stairway and is holding the fire in check, leaving you with enough room to get ahead and conduct your search. You are in the lead. Are you doing a left or right hand search? What tools do you and your partner have with you? Which ones do you have? You get to the bedroom door and just before you turn to enter the room the second bedroom flashes over. What are you going to do? If you haven't gotten blown across the hall what hand do you need to put on the wall to retreat? Where is your partner at now? Who is leading the way out? If smoke conditions have suddenly gotten worse, or you did get blown away from the wall, how can you orient yourself to the way out?

These mental rehearsals are important. First it gets you to think about the fact that things can go wrong. None of us want to think that we can get hurt or killed. We try to protect ourselves psychologically by thinking about how things seem to always work out. Unless you have experienced a firefighter fatality, or been injured on the fire ground, it is perfectly normal to not think about the fact that you could be in a situation that could cost you your life. We need to confront the reality that even if we do everything right, the possibly of everything going to Hell exists in every fire building we enter. The second benefit of the mental rehearsal is it gives you the opportunity to "War Game" your options. Think about the various situations you may find yourself in. Go through every action on the fire ground that you could find yourself having to perform: operating the nozzle, being the back-up guy, forcing the front door, being the pump panel operator, being the turntable operator of the aerial, being assigned to vent the roof. Think about the problems that can come up. What if the engine pressure isn't climbing as you throttle up; how do you fix it? What if four people are hanging out the front of a building calling for help; who do you rescue first?

I think the great many of the guys and gals who their peers look to as being "Kick Ass Firemen" already do this. They may not call it mental rehearsal, or even be aware they are doing it, but they are likely doing it.

The second skill set to develop is the ability to control your breathing. Remember how when you were a kid and excited about something that you could hardly speak? What did you mom or dad say, "Take a deep breath and then tell me what happened?" How rapidly you breath has a direct effect on how rapidly your heart beats. Biofeedback is the art, or science according to some, of consciously altering the responses of your autonomic nervous system by being consciously aware of how your body is responding. Breath control is one aspect of biofeedback that I have found to work for me. By consciously slowing your breathing, by concentrating on breathing in a slow, rhythmic manner you can slow your heart rate.

I use a tactical breathing exercise to control my breathing when I recognize that my heart rate is beginning to elevate because of anxiety. I got this exercise from Lt. Col. Dave Grossman's fine book On Combat, which has been referenced before. When you recognize that you are entering a stressful situation, and anxiety is beginning to kick in take that deep breath that mom talked about to a new level.

1. Inhale through your nose for a count of four. (One, two, three, four)
   
2. Hold your breath for a count of four. (One, two, three, four)
   
3. Exhale through your mouth for a count of four. (One, two, three, four)
   
4. Pause for a count of four. (One, two, three, four)
   

Repeat that series three times. You will feel your heart rate slow. You will feel the anxiety begin to ebb. You will be able to regain control of your SNS functions and give your cognitive ability the time to kick in. I've used this exercise dozens of times in the last several years when things get stressful. Whether it has been getting anxious before an interview, or trying to navigate through a complicated SCBA maze in zero visibility and high heat conditions.

The key is to use the tactical breathing exercise on a regular basis. You need to practice it. You need to put it together with the self awareness and the mental rehearsals so that when you are crawling down that hallway an conditions suddenly change you don't freak out, curl up in a ball and get ready to die. You will have the skills in place and the mental attitude to fight, and survive.