Womens Safety

What is Personal Safety?

what is personal safety for women

Answering the question, What is personal safety?, is undoubtedly worthwhile. Personal safety represents the ability and right to live without threat or fear of psychological, emotional, or physical harm perpetrated by others. It has emerged as a key feature of human security, with great ramifications for individuals and social cohesion in general. Generally speaking, personal safety is defined in broad terms as liberty from physical harm, threat of physical harm, and liberty from hostility, aggression, and harassment. It is often expressed that personal safety is a matter of common sense, but common sense is not always translated into common practice. The disparity between the two underlines the importance of education, awareness, and strategies that are actionable to protect oneself. It also shows the need for change within society, whereby communities as a whole learn to place safety as one of the shared values. Defining Personal Safety I personally very much like the research piece titled Personal Safety on University Campuses – Defining Personal Safety Using the Delphi Method,in which Joanna Waters, Richard Neale, Sue Hutson, and Kevin Mears of the University of Glamorgan defined personal safety as “an individual’s ability to go about their everyday life free from the threat or fear of psychological, emotional, or physical harm from others.” This definition underlines not just physical safety but also emotional and psychological security, an increasingly critical consideration in modern society. Similarly, the World Health Organization identifies safety as a determinant of health and well-being. According to them “…safety is not merely the absence of violence but the presence of conditions that promote security, trust, and freedom from fear.” These perspectives provide a comprehensive framework for understanding personal safety in today’s increasingly complex and interrelated and integrated world. The Role of Situational and Environmental Awareness Personal safety pertains to situational and environmental awareness: the art of being observant and aware of one’s particular situation and environment. It allows the individual to identify any potential danger, make sound judgements, and take necessary actions to minimise the risk. It is an attitude and a skill that develops and improves with practice and learning. Principles of personal safety are: Trust your instincts: If you think something feels ‘off’—if you feel uneasy or scared, rely on your instinctive gut response. They are too often your initial defence. As Gavin de Becker, author of The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence, astutely writes, “It’s always right in at least two ways: it’s in response to something, and it has your best interest at heart.” Developing a close relationship with your intuition is essential in making timely and protective decisions. Be Aware: Be aware of your surroundings and the people in them, while projecting confidence. Know your environment and travel plans, as this knowledge can prevent becoming a victim. Know where the nearest exits are, allowing you to leave the area quickly if needed. Something as simple as walking with a purpose or maintaining steady eye contact with others can show that you are ready and aware; this can deter a potential attacker. Avoid Unnecessary Risks: Minimise your exposure to potentially dangerous situations by making thoughtful choices. For instance, choose well-lit routes, avoid isolated areas, and keep trusted individuals informed of your whereabouts. Pay attention to environmental factors such as available exits, crowded spaces, or areas with limited visibility, as these can significantly influence your ability to respond to threats. While it is impossible to eliminate all risks to personal safety, taking proactive steps to mitigate them can greatly enhance your sense of security and preparedness. Acting Under Danger: In the case of a threatening situation, try escaping instead of fighting if possible. Fighting back any aggression with aggression usually makes it escalate further and increases the likelihood of injury. You must make your objective to safely get away as fast as possible in such situations. Advance preparation and practice of confident responses can facilitate clear and assured action under the pressure of immediacy. But in those situations where there is no escape and the threat is imminent and life-threatening, one has to make surefooted and resolute action. At that moment, I want you to summon all your strength and willpower to neutralise the threat. For one brief, critical moment, allow yourself to set aside your inhibitions and moral code and use whatever force necessary to survive and create an opportunity to safely escape. For a more profound understanding of what real self-defence involves, from the legal, ethical, and practical perspectives, I invite you to my book, NEVER A VICTIM. It provides in-depth insight and strategies to help you take control of your personal safety. Incident Reporting: It is reporting even minor incidents that is a key factor in the protection of others and develops a pattern of unsafe behaviour. By sharing experiences, communities, personal safety app developers, and support organisations can build up databases of information that enable better-informed responses to future risks. Addressing Specific Challenges Some people have special problems and dangers that require specific strategies for self-protection. Statistics from around the world indicate that a significant percentage of the population, especially women, have experienced rape or sexual assault, stalking, drink spiking, or domestic abuse in their lifetime. This grim reality calls for sensitive and effective measures to help individuals lead their lives with freedom and safety. Practical Approaches to Empowerment Risk Factor Education: Understanding the dynamics of harassment, abuse, and violence as potential threats educates the individual on how such risks manifest. That is a good starting point. Practical Safety Measures: Self-defence training, personal safety apps or alarms, and mobile applications are just a few tools and mechanisms available to help one stay connected to their trusted networks in times of distress. Technology can provide real-time support and peace of mind when used thoughtfully for you and your loved ones. Community Support: It is much more than the building of support networks to share experiences and strategies. Such networks, provided through face-to-face interaction, community campaigns, or online platforms, offer

Trust Your Intuition: A Woman’s Greatest Ally for Personal Safety

Trust Your Intuition - Women's Safety

Your intuition is an incredible ally when it comes to your safety, a gift that’s always with you. But in a world that prioritises logic and reason over gut feelings, countless women have been taught to silence this inner voice. Tragically, this conditioning has left many vulnerable, sometimes with devastating consequences. How many times have you had that quiet little voice inside telling you to change your plan or question someone’s motives? That voice, that intuition, is no mystical entity; it’s your innate survival system, honed for your safety, helping you to prevet falling victim to rape and sexual assault, domestic abuse, or stalking. I feel the best way for me to start this important article is by exploring first what intuition is. The word intuition comes from the Latin verb intueri translated as consider or from the late middle English word intuit, which means to contemplate. Two great resources to help us further understand what intuition is are the distinguished online publication Psychology Today, as well as Dr. Lois Isenman, Resident Scholar at the Women’s Studies Research Centre of Brandeis University. Psychology Today identifies intuition as: “…a form of knowledge that appears in consciousness without obvious deliberation. It is not magical but rather a faculty in which hunches are generated by the unconscious mind rapidly sifting through experience and cumulative knowledge. Often referred to as gut feelings, intuition tends to arise holistically and quickly, without awareness of the underlying mental processing of information. Scientists have repeatedly demonstrated how information can register on the brain without conscious awareness and positively influence decision making and other behaviour.” Dr. Lois Isenman, Resident Scholar at the Women’s Studies Research Centre of Brandeis University mentions three distinctive levels of intuition in her book “Intuition: A Journey in and Out of Science”: “At one level, the content level, intuition refers to insights that pop into the mind without effort and reorient understanding in important, novel, and sometimes radical ways. At another level, the processing level, it refers to a specific way of integrating information that occurs below awareness and supports direct knowing or knowing without conscious thinking. At yet another level, the evaluative level, it refers to an unconscious mode of evaluation that allows us to judge whether our own or others’ ideas are true.” Neuroscientist and Psychologist Joel Pearson of the University of New South Wales, who has studied this subject for 25 years, also found a way of explain it extremely well: “It’s processing all the things in the environment: the time of day, how well it’s lit, how well it’s not lit, the pace someone’s walking, the shadows, the tone—and a hundred other things. It’s making a prediction based on prior learning, situations you’ve been in, movies you’ve watched, and everything you’ve experienced in life.” Belief in yourself and trust your intuition This article is committed to helping you believe in yourself and defend both yourself and those around you through the use of your intuition, sometimes even by countering social pressures and societal norms. Intuition may have a supernatural quality to it, but it is most certainly not some random delusion, it is in fact a cognitive process. You cannot possibly pay attention to all the information that you are processing, so your subconscious does that work for you. Your intuition is based on your subconscious observations, individual experiences you might have had in your life or on the processing of relevant information in your subconsciousness. Intuition helps you to subconsciously consider and contemplate information without you being aware of the underlying mental processing of the information, and you are doing that at an incomprehensive level of speed. Intuition is so much faster than the step-by-step thinking that we rely on. It is knowing without knowing why. Your intuition will usually discard the irrelevant and value the meaningful. Your intuition will also recognise warning signals you may not consciously recognise, helping you identify potential threats or dangerous situations before they escalate. However, please note that your personal safety can be directly compromised if you choose to dismiss your intuition. You offer no greater cooperation to a potential attacker than by subconsciously acknowledging certain information, feeling uneasy because of your intuition, but then deciding not to take any action to change the situation. Allow me to give you an example: A female lone worker, employed by an insurance company is entering a block of apartments. On her agenda today is a visit to a family on the seventh floor, to discuss the details of a new insurance policy with a young husband and father of two. The woman who is usually not easily afraid is waiting for an elevator, and when the door opens, she sees a man inside. Something tells her that something is not right, something just does not feel right. She has got that feeling in her gut. It may be the late hour, his size, his facial expression, him avoiding eye contact or the way he looks at her, the rate of attacks in the neighbourhood, an article she has recently read, or the type of training she has recently undergone in her company – it does not matter at all why. The critical point is, she is now starting to feel a little anxious. How does she respond to her intuition, that exceptionally helpful tool nature has given her? She suppresses it, telling herself: “I’m not going to live like this, I’m not going to insult this guy by letting the door close in his face, I’m not going to make a drama out of this, and I’m not going to be silly.” Which is sillier: listening to and trusting your intuition, prioritising your safety, and waiting for the next elevator, or getting into a soundproofed steel box with a stranger who made you feel anxious or uneasy just 10 seconds ago? Why do so many women ignore their intuition? Despite its power, intuition is often suppressed in women due to social conditioning that prioritises politeness and