Twenty-four hours a day. Making the commitment.
If you’ve made the conscious decision that you need to adopt new habits and attitudes to increase your personal security, then you have probably come to the realization that this is not something that you do. This is something you live. It is a lifestyle.
Don’t let this scare you off. Taking charge of your personal security is essentially no different from any other lifestyle choice you make. You will learn new techniques, and practice them until they become a part of your unconscious. Think of it as training yourself. Any kind of training teaches you new skills, and when you need to use these skills, they kick in automatically–self-protection is no different. Commit now, train yourself, and benefit for a lifetime.
The basics
The foundation of self-protection consists of a mixture or self-awareness and situational awareness. In order for you to become effective at protecting yourself from any given threat on a daily basis, it is of utmost importance (obviously) that you identify the threat prior to the point in which in becomes an immediate issue for you.
In many circumstances, simply identifying and realizing a potential threat before it becomes a real and manifested problem can prevent it from becoming an issue in the first place.
Take, for example, pickpockets. Pickpockets take advantage or people who are 1) distracted, and 2) unaware of themselves and their surroundings. Someone who maintains situational awareness will take note of everybody within a certain proximity to him as well as know who he will come into close contact with within the next few seconds.
What to look for – SITUATIONAL AWARENESS
Face and body language is first and foremost. While it is true that not all serial killers look like serial killers, there is a significant amount of information that humans derive automatically and subconsciously from facial expressions and body language. Some people are born with a better sense of this than others. If you feel you are lacking, consider some of the many books regarding reading a person’s body language. Trust me–this isn’t psychopathic, telepathy bullshit, this is science!
It comes less naturally to people, but something that can be very useful if learned and committed to the unconscious–immediately when you see someone, first, look at their face, and immediately after, look at their hands. Position of the hands is extremely important, along with body language, to determine someone’s intentions. For example, a face looking down and two hands on a cell phone while a person is walking indicates that that person is likely of little threat–their attention is off you, they are distracted, and their hands are both occupied with a harmless object. On the other hand, if a person’s eyes are shifty, and switching on and off of you, and their hands are in their pockets, this is cause to pay that person additional attention. Maintaining as much distance as possible without becoming overly obvious would make sense–turning around and losing visual contact would not be a good idea. When you identify a potential threat, stick with it. If that threat is realized and you are in imminent danger, then breaking contact may be advisable. That is a separate topic, however (bookmark us, we’ll get there).
I can’t explain every aspect of this to you– past a certain point, situational awareness is common sense. Keep track of your surroundings. If something/someone looks dangerous, pay them/it additional attention.
Stay lucid – SELF-AWARENESS
Sounds clear-cut, right? Sort of.
Self-awareness may be one of the hardest things to master. Most people are often distracted with their surroundings, internal stress or emotions, or any number of things, and tend to ignore their own bodies. Of course, if you are injured or experience some kind of definite physical contact, you will notice, however, if your wallet or cell phone is removed by a pickpocket, how long will it take you to notice? Right now, it is possible that you have something in your pocket. Until I mentioned it, it was probably not of concern to you–you can feel it pressing against your leg now that I have reminded you of it, but prior to that, you were likely too distracted by your reading to think about the item in your pocket.
This is very normal–you can’t always be thinking about everything at the same time, but it is something that you need to learn to do in certain circumstances. For example, if your situational awareness indicates to you that someone is a potential threat, and somehow you are unable to avoid that person, it is a good idea to immediately perform what I have come to call a “body check.” Simply check in with your body–is your wallet still there, your phone? Make sure everything is still as it should be.
Avoiding a problem is easier than solving a problem.
Keep in mind the ideas that I have explained, and think about and elaborate on them yourself. This really isn’t rocket science, it’s just something that requires thinking. This article was not intended to tell you how to protect yourself in the event that you find trouble, but rather to give you the tools required to avoid the trouble in the first place.
You don’t need to know how to fight if you make sure you never get in a fight.
Granted, it’s not always up to you, and we’ll cover techniques for those situations in the future.
