Following “thinking” about your environment, next is using your vision in further securing your safety wherever you go. If you are thinking about your position, use of your vision to assess your situation should naturally follow. Getting out of a car, walking down a dark corridor, entering a shopping mall, looking to see how you are positioned is critical in securing your safety. After determining that it is safe for you to proceed in your intended direction, then you should use your peripheral vision, which by the way, must be consciously used. Peripheral vision is always there, but the brain naturally focuses the mental attention on what is directly in front of you which is rarely where a criminal assault originates from. You have to, with intent, be aware of what you can see on either side of you without turning your head. This is what enables you to act quickly in the event that you are approached from the side. If you see more than one person approaching you and one moves to the side, it should signal a mental alarm and cause acute awareness from a peripheral vantage point. Being able to look straight ahead at someone approaching you, while keeping an eye on the one who has moved to the side is critical in fending off an attack.

Assessing your surroundings visually will generally tell you whether it is safe to get out of your car, proceed down a hallway, walk across a parking lot, walk near an animal, etc. The signals that your eyes send to your brain and your brain to the rest of your body will let you know what to if a situation looks unsafe. If you see that it is not safe to proceed .....DON’T! Just leave, take another route, get someone to go with you, etc.

Now if self defense was that simple, this web site could end here, but there is much, much, more. Because vision very often doesn’t tell us everything. When it tells us what we need to know to determine something is not safe, that’s where it needs to end. But very often, everything looks fine. You don’t see any signs of danger, of an animal that may be dangerous, of a person or people who look suspicious, etc. So you proceed.

Criminals hide. Animals come running out from behind houses. Your awareness and consequently your vision is your first line of self defense in any situation. However, you can’t see through solid objects or around corners. Your other senses and your physical and technical preparation will come into play also. This web site is not about being afraid to go places and do things that we enjoy or by necessity must do. It is about going where we go safely and securely, knowing that we can secure our environment significantly. And after all we can do to stay in a safe position, if we are attacked we will be able to respond in a manner that will devastate an attacker. It is the right of law abiding citizens to go about their business of living, shopping, working, playing and enjoying their families with the confidence of knowing that they are secure and that they can defend themselves if some criminal dares to try to inflict damage on them or their property.

Next: AWARENESS - USING YOUR HEARING IN SELF DEFENSE

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