Personal Safety and Self Defense for children, teens and adults

Personal Safety: Believing In Yourself

Self-defense, boundary setting, and awareness skills are strengthened by confidence

By Christine Schlattner and Michael Linehan

Personal safety skills are most powerful when you believe in yourself. When you believe in yourself, you are far more likely to:

• Trust your sense of what's going on.
• Pay attention to the warnings your awareness and intuition can give you.
• Stand up for your rights.
• Respect your own boundaries and react when someone crosses them.
• Believe in your ability to verbally or physically defend yourself.
• Receive more respect.
• Give yourself the caring, safety and security you deserve.

When you believe in yourself, most people looking to cause a problem will leave you alone.

FOSTER  EMPOWERING  BELIEFS

Any belief you may have about yourself, other people or your environment can either support and nourish you or diminish and harm you. If you have a strong belief in your self-worth, you will act to give yourself positive experiences - which will strengthen your self-worth that is likely to lead to more positive experiences, creating a positive cycle. If you truly believe you deserve to be safe, you are far more likely to do whatever it takes to protect your personal safety. If you believe you don't deserve to be safe, then you may not do much at all.

The majority of our beliefs are conditioned from an early age. It is important to realize that a belief is not "truth" in any absolute sense - it's a belief. A belief is something that we have learned, a partial view of the world, a model of how things work. And, as such, it is changeable. You have probably had the experience of some of your most cherished beliefs changing over the years. Something you were absolutely sure about when you were 15 changed quite a lot by the time you were 25, and maybe was completely the opposite by the time you reached 30. Y

ou can direct the natural changing of beliefs so that all your beliefs enhance and enrich your life.Three important beliefs to nurture are:"My self-respect is worth standing up for.""I deserve to be safe.""I have the ability to keep myself safe."When you fully believe in yourself and your worth, an attack on your person becomes unacceptable to you. You are far more prepared to be determined, strong and clear in response to the little, everyday intrusions as well as to an attempted attack. You are less likely to accept that emotional and physical hurt is just a fact of life that you have to tolerate. You will be more able to stand up for yourself in ways that can transform your life.Personal safety grows from the power, energy, and passion you want in every part of your life.  Having powerful and positive beliefs will help keep you safe. It will, of course, also help enhance your life moment by moment.

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