2  THINGS THAT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE

There are two main soft skills that will save your life. First lets break down what a soft skill is.

Soft skills are character traits and interpersonal skills that characterize a person’s relationships with other people. In the workplace, soft skills are considered to be a complement to hard skills, which refer to a person’s knowledge and occupational skills.1

 Sociologists may use the term “soft skills” to describe a person’s emotional intelligence quotient (EQ) as opposed to intelligence quotient (IQ). (Wikipedia)

Yes the two skills that will save your life are already inside of you and just need to be pushed forward, honed, and exercised from time to time to begin to develop a thought process that will essentially be like developing muscle memory when working out.

The first skill is SITUATIONAL AWARNESS

The second is DE- ESCALATION

These skills are both inside of everyone. You maybe exercising these skills and not even know it. Most commonly would be at work, with your kids, with your spouse ETC. Now its time to take the de escalation tactics you use to break up your kids fights over toys into the real world during a hostile encounter or the situational awareness you have when your watching your kids play at the park into the real world when your out at a restaurant or event.

What you have to remember is that you can not de escalate if you do not have empathy! Also remember that living in a situational forward mindset , does not mean you are living in fear.

Let's break these two ideas down. De-Escalation. The use of communication or other techniques during an encounter to stabilize, slow, or reduce the intensity of a potentially violent situation without using physical force, or with a reduction in force. Situational awareness is about knowing what is going on around you. This requires you to continuously watch out what is going on in the environment. However, you can't pay attention to every single detail. Instead you need to focus on those elements that are important to achieve a certain task or objective.

As your read through the break down and meaning of each skill. You should be now realizing that you carry these out all the time. You should start to have some examples and memories flooding back to you of certain occasions you have practiced these two skills without knowing you were practicing them. The next step is to decide to do it all the time. Pay attention all the time, have empathy all the time, stay calm no matter what, and make choices that give you the best vantage point, escape route, and survival rate as possible.

Yes I'm asking you to make a lifestyle change, yes I'm telling you that doing so will save your life, yes I know that it is true! How do I know that? Because I have saved my own life and a friends life multiple times due to utilizing these two soft skills. Even though We may not have been killed in the situations we could have been harmed or robbed which is also bad! In this life style change you will have to do a few things to turn up how much your tapped into these two skills. Here are some examples on how to ease your way into a De-escalation and situational aware lifestyle.

SITUATIONAL AWARENESS LIFESTYLE CHANGES:

• The way you park/where you park
• The clothes you wear and how you wear them (Especially if you are concealing a firearm)
• What you carry in your hands (Good to keep hands free)
• What kind of bag or purse you carry
• Where you sit/ how you sit in establishments with public access
• Paying attention to body language and other peoples interactions with each other

DE-ESCALATION LYFESTLE CHANGES:

• Be slow to anger and react
• Ask questions
• Show empathy even if you don't agree with something
• Never put your hands on or pull out your firearm based on emotion or intimidation
• Listen first speak last
• Give alternative solutions, warnings, and ways to make both parties happy
• Gather all the information before intervening
• Keep your tone and voice down

All of these changes are just the tip of the ice berg for both skills, but they are a good starting points that you can implement in your every day life and when you come across your first altercation, disagreement or issue after reading this blog. Not all things listed will work in every situation so use them when they apply. Living a situationally aware lifestyle will give you the upper hand over others around you. You will hear things before others, you will see things before others, you will be able to react to things before others. Due to that you will survive more than others.

Having a De-escalation first mindset will allow you to stop altercations in it's tracks, you will be able to stop harm at the moment it presents it self in most cases, you will preserve more life than taking it including your own. Life is lost a lot of the time to lack of communication. Just think of all those movies you watched where someone was talked off the edge of a bridge or roof all because someone talk to them with empathy!

THESE TWO THINGS HAVE SAVED MY LIFE AND CAN ABSOLUTLY SAVE YOURS AS WELL! " ALWAYS PROTECT YOURSELF "