I was at a coffee shop in Arizona, trying to shake off a couple of weeks of off-roading in my jeep, and just came back on the grid. I was covered in dust, I smelled like someone had lit a campfire in a gym bag, and I decided that a shower wasn’t as important as sitting in a coffee shop and doing some journaling. It never is.

At that moment, a couple of large trucks pulled into the parking lot flying American flags, and on the side of one of the trucks, the words “MAGA Warrior” were written in a font that can only be described as “Paintbrush with Claws.” They got out, looked at my Jeep, and noticed me sitting there like an out-of-context hipster with a hygiene glitch. They got their coffee, and one of the men sat down and saw that I was as dirty as my vehicle. This earned his respect; he was spotless and used hair gel.

“You from California?”

I guess he saw my license plate.

“Yeah”

“Lots of y’all moving out here, we love y’all bringing new businesses here, just keep that California shit in California.”

“I agree.”

I made a joke about how I’ve been traveling for about a year now, and I noticed that everywhere I went, people complained about Californians and Californians complained about everything else. He laughed.

“Where have you been? You’ve been using the hell out of that jeep.”

“I just got out of a couple of weeks driving over the mountains, got a bit lost, so I camped out and had the best time listening to the elk.”

“What are you writing?”

“I’m writing about the Second Amendment and how I don’t think it’s really about guns.”

At that moment, you could see him ready to be offended. I was about to bring that California shit right to him, but then he asked, “What do you mean?”

“I think we’re being played, and 2a should actually be reworked because if you think about it, it’s about technology, not guns.”

He suddenly became interested in what I had to say.

“Seriously, think about when the Second Amendment was written. Guns were the height of technology. Gunpowder, projectile weapons — that was as cutting-edge as it got. The cotton gin and steam engine were right there, too, but the gun was the piece of tech that could balance power between citizens and an oppressive government trying to take their resources and freedom.”

“Do you own a gun?”

“Yes, I do. You got a sec? Come check this out.”

We walked over to my Jeep, which I named Mercedes. I showed him the special compartments I built to make sure my guns were stored safely and my ammo was protected. He really liked the way it was set up.

We kept talking, and he mentioned, “I have never heard anyone talk about guns as technology. That’s interesting, where did you come up with that?”

“I get to travel and talk to all kinds of people with my work.”

“What’s your work?”

“I’m a martial arts, wellness, and mindset teacher and really interested in mediation, de-escalation, and ways to communicate. I noticed that when something is at an impasse, like the 2a conversation, we can endlessly argue or try a different angle. Also, I journal a lot and teach journaling.”

“I was just talking about journaling. I need to start doing that.”

“Oh, it’s the best, and so good for seeing things through different lenses. I have a system called the 6/3/6 about just seeing things from as many points of view and angles as possible.”

Maybe he was trying to wrap his head around the idea, but he seemed surprised to learn there was a system for journaling. I always have a system. That’s my thing. I was surprised he cared.

“What made you think of that?”

I explained that I grew up studying strategy and all forms of violence, through martial arts, since I was 6 or 7 years old.

“I studied some taekwondo when I was a kid, but then got into sports instead.”

He then mentioned, “I want to try MMA, but I don’t want to get hurt.”

“Ahaha, we are old enough now to realize we got things to do later.”

“Oh yeah,  I went to a gym, and these college kids want to rip your head off.”

“Yeah, you need to find the right people. I focus more on longevity and healing arts now. You can only choke, punch, and kick stuff for so long until you realize it’s way easier to kill stuff than to bring it to life.”

“How did you get into that?”

“It’s the same, really, just beginning martial arts, you learn the fighting techniques, then later, those techniques can become more healing techniques. The theory is: poison becomes medicine with education, intention, and dosage.”

The fact that this man absorbed esoteric martial arts philosophy like a Chamwow made me feel like I was giving a TED Talk. These conversations can easily turn people into glassy-eyed wax figures as they drift off into a deep hypnotic survival state trying to find the right Bible verse to stop my rant and help them escape.

“So yeah, I look at weapons as a form of technology that compounds our decisions. Just think of how much cardio you used to need when you only had a sword or a stick.”

“Ahah, my cardio is horrible.”

“Weapons and technology can make a small decision have such a huge and final impact. Old wisdom would say, the sword isn’t a weapon, it’s a final decision. Today, the decision to twitch a trigger finger can have way more impact than all my years of martial arts combined.”  “I mean, think about how far our technology has come. What has more impact, studying jiu jitsu for 10 years, or hitting the button on an atomic bomb?”

“Yeah, we don’t have the same weapons anymore. Drones, missiles, bombs…”

“Oh yeah, your gun is as effective as a purse dog in that fight. Not to mention they’ll just shut down shipping hubs, fuel, and turn off your money.”

“I worry about that sometimes, but mostly I try not to think about it.”

“Yeah, there’s a strategy of distraction happening, and the 2A community is falling into traps defending guns and reacting. While food, fuel, and finances are being plucked right out from under us. We will be left frustrated and hangry, wondering what to shoot at.”

I took a breath and watched him slowly open up to not taking offense. Then I asked, “Have you ever seen any old west movies?”

“Yeah”

“That’s the strategy right there. Distraction. The villain sets the barn on fire, and as all the families drain their wells, passing water buckets to put it out, the corrupt sheriff is looting the rest of the town.” “The skill is to see the threat as a distraction.”

“I mean, think about how we get our resources now? Do you have a farm or a garden?” I asked

The man said,  “No, I should, though.” 

He owns a successful landscaping company and takes care of so many people’s lawns, none of them grow food.

I jokingly suggested that if we really honored 2a, we would have organized armed guards at shipping hubs, farms, and grocery stores, but we never talk about the “well-regulated militia” part of 2a. He laughed and mentioned how hard it is to just find time to get to the range or go hunting.

“Why’d you leave California?”

“If we all have to social distance, might as well do it for real and go into the woods.”

“I see some crazy stuff going on in California.”

“Seriously, that’s the technology working.”

“What do you mean?”

“We all have our own algorithm, and it feeds you what you engage with, not what you want. It makes your world small and creates echo chambers and isolation. The fear gets us to tribe up or just escape through online shopping.”

Then I got real woo woo on him, and he just hung right in there with me, like a true hippie. We might as well have been passing a talking stick or just kicking around a hackey sack. 

“Have you heard of the secret or law of attraction?”

“Yeah”

“That’s how the algorithm works, too. The law of attraction says that what you focus on is what you attract. Not, whether you want it or not, just if you focus on not wanting your guns taken away, it just hears that you’re focusing on your guns being taken away.”

Then I kept going; he leaned in.

“So now you actually have a metric, a way to measure what you are focusing on. Your algorithm. It shows you what you are focusing on in your news and social media feeds. It doesn’t know that you don’t like woke California culture; it just knows you are focused on it, so it keeps feeding it to you because you’re giving it your attention. Now it knows where to put ads. Plus, since you’re emotional watching it, it’s easier to get you to buy stuff.”

I saw it all make sense to him as he said nothing. He just got up, “Do you want more coffee?”

I gave him a journaling exercise to write about the world he wanted to see and to seek it out and engage with it on the internet, and see how his algorithm changes, then his worldview. He was excited to do it.

The next cup of coffee was a discussion about how technology is shaping the way we see the world, and, by the way, although we know this now. The real skill is remembering that it’s happening and knowing it as it happens. It’s easy to be an armchair critic, but things look different when you’re in the game, on the field, or in the ring.

I said, “How many times have you heard this stuff and thought, yeah, yeah, I know, and just want the other person to shut up and stop preaching so you can get back to your echo chamber? I just say, we are supposed to be citizens, not baby birds, right?”

He asked, “What do you mean when you say baby birds?”

“Do you seek out information and balance, or do you just sit there like a baby bird waiting for momma algorithm to regurgitate information into your open throat? Or as I just wrote, Num num gimme guns.” I showed him my journal as I underlined it.

“Man, I could talk about this all day. Alright, I’m gonna start journaling, but now I gotta run.” He got up, gave me his business card, and a huge hug. I sent him a couple of journaling videos as a gift for sharing such a powerful and fun conversation.

About a week later, he sent me an email saying that he had prayed for a teacher to come to him, and our conversation showed him that we are all connected.

I agree.