Yes, I too am cross-dominant. (right handed/left eye). I'm very right hand dominant so no shifting to the left hand. It's why I spent a lot of time learning point shooting with a handgun.

I'm a right handed pistol shooter and right eye dominant....thankfully! But I'm a lefty long gun shooter, so I have to close my right eye to aim.

I’m in this club too.

When I was a kid and got my hunting license we did some rifle live shooting drills at the end. I couldn’t hit shit. Since I was a 12 year old kid, nobody payed attention to me.

I turn my head and close my right eye with pistols.

Paris Theodore demonstrates the
"Quell system stance"
Paris claimed by shooting right handed with your non dominant left eye was better in a stressful situation as it turned off the part of the brain that causes stress, and allow a person to focus on the target.


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Yes, I learned I was left eye dominant right handed in a shooting class.

Except, I've since can't focus well with the left eye. So I have to use my right eye.

Left eye dominant, and was probably born left-handed as well. Mom says that dad wasn't having any of it and made sure I used my right hand to eat and do things as a very young child (I don't remember any of this training.) I do know that I'm fairly ambidextrous, meaning I can hit a baseball either way and back in the day thought Handball using both hands was easy (anybody remember that sport?) . I write and throw things with my right hand but mostly eat with my left hand. Yes, I am weird.

That said, I am very comfortable shooting shotguns and bolt rifles left-handed. But I'm just a fleet-average right-handed pistol shooter. I can shoot semi-auto rifles from either shoulder (until I get tired of the gas and casings hitting me in the face).

This has been an interesting thread since I thought I was a fairly atypical shooter, but it's nice to see I'm in good company. Only nine days to Dove Season, so looking to do some informal testing with shotguns and other firearms as well. Knowing my buddies, we'll probably come up with some kind of game during the research.

I’m a very right handed person, so trying to shoot anything left handed is not happening.

When I go fishing, I’m some hybrid freak of left and right handed. I cast with my right and pass the pole to my left. I reel with my right hand because my left is so uncoordinated that I cannot reel with it.

I was told that approximately 90% of women are cross eye dominant. My wife is.

My wife and daughter are both right handed but left eye dominant. My youngest son is left handed but right eye dominant. I'm right handed, right eye dominant, so the bad genetics are clearly my wife's fault in this case!

Shooting hand gun, especially with a dot, it's not a huge deal. Keep both eyes open and just cheat it towards the dominant eye. I shoot left handed a lot and it changes basically nothing about my sight picture on a handgun.

Rifle is a bit more of a pain, especially because most of mine are either ARs, leverguns with right-side loading gates, or right-handed bolt-actions. My son shoots them right handed and just closes his left eye. That works pretty well for him, and let's him manipulate the guns as they were designed. The girls shoot long guns left handed and then have to deal with the annoyance of the controls being on the opposite side and brass flying in front of their face on the ARs.

Noah,

I too am right handed but left eye dominant.

Read somewhere that there are more folks with this cross dominance than are plain left handed.

And yes tilt the head when using a pistol but close the left eye when using a rifle.

quote:

Originally posted by Greymann:
Paris Theodore demonstrates the
"Quell system stance"
Paris claimed by shooting right handed with your non dominant left eye was better in a stressful situation as it turned off the part of the brain that causes stress, and allow a person to focus on the target.

I remember that article!
Made me feel better about how I shot handguns. ‘Course I was doing it before it was cool…

Beancooker, you definitely need to practice with your left hand! For an extreme righty (as we both are) it’s uncomfortable, feels awkward and it is an absolutely vital skill to have.
You may not always have your right hand functioning. Using both hands shooting left handed is a piece of cake.
Using L hand only is the one to REALLY work on.

I feel like we covered this in a different thread, but I can’t find it.

KMitch, your location is “Central Arizona”… I live in Central AZ, Clarkdale to be exact. Are you here in the Verde Valley?

I plan on going out shooting either tomorrow, Sunday, or Monday morning, depending on how my wife is feeling. I go out on FR9571 (across from Page Springs Road, where the county has their dirt pile dump. If you have the time and availability, you’re welcome to join.

Wait until you have cataract surgery and they do your right eye first. Your dominance will change.

quote:

Originally posted by Beancooker:
I feel like we covered this in a different thread, but I can’t find it.
KMitch, your location is “Central Arizona”… I live in Central AZ, Clarkdale to be exact. Are you here in the Verde Valley?

We did discuss it at one point and I don’t remember where either. I’m an hour away from you, SW of Clarkdale.
If you took the Perkinsville Rd out of Jerome till you hit Hwy 89 in Chino, you’d be about 2 miles from my house.
I’ll definitely take you up on the shooting offer, just not this week. I am also dealing with a spouse, she got the WuFlu somewhere. I don’t feel ill at all but “technically” I’ve been exposed.
My buddies that I shot frequently with are still living in Phx…poor bastards!

I'm right eye dominant.

I am a lefty.

I shoot pistols with my right hand, it's the most natural fit for me, but I do cross train shooting with my left hand as well.

Having said that, I am not quite ambidextrous 100%, it's a right handed world after all and us lefties just have to figure out how to function as such.

I use my left hand for a lot of things, my left-hand fingers are much more dexterous than my right-hand fingers.

For most other tasks, not requiring finger dexterity, I use my right hand. Not 100%, but probably 85%.

It's been a real bitch finding left handed scissors, for example, so I've had to learn how to use scissors right handed. But I can use left handed scissors in my left hand. Weird, I know, I can confuse people with that when they try to watch.

If all water fountains were made with the actuator on the left hand side, you righties would realize what a pain that is, not being able to use your right hand to get a drink of water.

I can and do use both hands (one at a time lol) to cut up and prepare vegetables with a knife, I can easily switch back and forth left to right. Those who have noticed think that's weird. I tell them that is what it takes in a right handed world.
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I am also RHLED.

The best right-handed baseball hitters are this way too. Left-hand batters are right-eye dominant.

I am right handed / left eyed as well.

My dad figured it out for me when I was 5 or 6 and he was teaching me how to shoot an air rifle. I shoot handguns with my right, rifles with my left, and bows with my right (somehow).

I’m right-handed but left-eye dominant as well. When I realized that, I tried using my left eye for aiming, and it was way better for me—like you said, I could keep both eyes open and everything was clearer. Switching to my right eye felt awkward and I had to close my left one. If you’re shooting better with your left eye on the sights, go with what works best for you!

If you ever make it up Prescott way, let me know. I work at the Compass Training Center in Chino Valley and we work with cross dominant shooters all the time. Doesn’t take much to get the process down.

quote:

Originally posted by Skull Leader:
I'm the same. I know it's bad form, but I close one eye when I shoot my pistol.

I slightly close my left eye. It’s still open but squinted. It works for me.

My youngest son was a terrible shot growing up. He couldn’t hit anything like his brothers. One day as a 15 yr old he switched to left handed aiming and shooting. Night and day difference. Now he hits as well as the rest of us. Shoots left, writes right. Weird as is par.