I also went through Jim's program, and it helped me a lot. It is not a panacea, but it is a good program for people who's target panic has become so ingrained that it has become a conditioned response, like mine had. An example of a conditioned response is Pavlov's dogs, who learned to salivate at the sound of a bell, whether food was present or not. When target panic becomes that bad, one feels it every time one does the action that activates it. In my case I had a fear response that manifested itself as a nervous compulsion to release the shot prematurely whenever I drew the bow with the intention of shooting it. When the target panic reaches the stage of a conditioned response, it is no longer directly related to anything real, even though it feels like it is. In my case, I had nothing to be afraid of when I drew the bow and I logically knew that. Programs aimed at addressing the problem that originally caused the target panic are no longer effective, because whatever the original problem may have been, it no longer exists. It has been replaced by a physical nervous reaction to a stimulus, like a startle reaction to being unexpectedly touched.
Jim's program was effective for me because it numbed the fear response through many repetitions without feeling it. Every draw is aimed in Jim's program, whether it is shot or not. It is critical under Jim's program to start at a level when target panic is not felt, and to continue to the end of the program without ever feeling it again. If one takes time off in the middle of the program to shoot a fun round and experiences target panic again, one has wasted all the time in the program until then. Frankly, boredom is one of the tools Jim uses in the program to dull whatever destructive feeling is accompanying the target panic, until it can be replaced with a new conditioned response of relaxed concentration.
After completing the program, I have felt flashes of the old fear from time to time. When that happens, I go back and repeat the drills until the conditioned response is dulled again, which doesn't mean repeating the whole six weeks, just enough to feel confident again. Frankly, just understanding that the nervous reaction I was feeling had nothing to do with anything going on in the present, but was something carried over from the past, was a great help in itself: why should I let something bother me that has nothing to do with anything that is going on now?
Everything I said relates solely to my own experience with Jim's program. He just presents his program for whatever benefit people may have from using it, and has not, to my knowledge, discussed conditioned responses or any other specific cause. People whose target panic has not devolved into a conditioned response may benefit from his program for reasons that are different from mine.
Target panic has many causes. Some programs are very successful for some people without the many repetitions required in Jim's program because their causes are different. I'm not sure that the original poster has a conditioned response, because he describes his target panic as being transitory, but it could be headed in that direction. I truly believe that if someone with target panic looks hard enough and tries enough different things, they will eventually find something that works.
Topic: Hunting with TP (Read 2396 times)
