If you read my post on awareness, you'll know that I said awareness was the second most important gift you have to yourself safe. The most important gift is your inner voice, your intuition. That little voice that tells you something just isn't quite right. What gives you a crawly feeling on the back of your neck? Intuition. That feeling is a gift from God to keep you safe. It is your first line of defense in a potentially nasty situation.
Everyone has had a moment where they were certain who was on the other end of an unanswered telephone. You aren't suddenly psychic, though it might certainly seem that way to an observer. Maybe you know your mother always calls on Thursdays, or at that time in the afternoon. Perhaps your sister just got a promotion at work that you heard about and were certain she'd want to share the news, or your cousin is approaching her due date so you know it to be her husband calling to say they had the baby. Something in your subconscious made the link faster than your logical mind could follow and suddenly you knew who it was.
True fear is a gift that comes straight from intuition. In my recommended reading column to the left of this blog, I recommend Gavin De Becker's "The Gift of Fear." In that book, he shares a story about a woman named Kelly who didn't listen to her intuition. Kelly has groceries and obviously has her hands full. She heads up the steps to her apartment building, noticing the door had been left open again. "Stupid neighbors. That's not safe! Anyone could just come in!" As she comes in, she latches the door behind her.
Kelly heads up the four flights of stairs to her apartment with her heavy burden of groceries. She doesn't manage to make it all the way up before one of her bags predictably gives out, and cat food cans go rolling everywhere. A charming man's voice calls that he can bring up a wayward can. She gets this feeling, this little spark of something telling her that she just does not like this guy's voice. When the man rounds the corner, he's friendly-looking and is picking up her dropped cans. He offers to help her carry the groceries up to her apartment. She refuses multiple times, but he is insistent. He claims he is also going up to the fourth floor and is running late due to a broken watch. He implies that she is being too proud, and she finally allows the man to help carry her groceries up to her apartment. "We better hurry," he says, "We've got a hungry cat up there!"
She's still feeling apprehensive of the man, but she shakes it off and scolds herself. He's so nice! And he's only trying to help. After arriving at her apartment, she thanks him and tries to take the groceries from him, but he refuses to allow her to take them, instead saying he didn't want her to drop the cans again and he would just sit them inside and be on his way. She hesitates (who wouldn't?), and she laughs, saying, "Hey, we can leave the door open like ladies do in old movies. I'll just put this stuff down and go. I promise." She gives in, he doesn't leave, and she becomes his victim.
After raping her, he gets up from the bed, gets dressed, and closes the window. He starts glancing at his watch and rushing around. "I gotta be somewhere. Hey, don't look so scared. I promise I'm not going to hurt you." Kelly knew, without a doubt, that this man was now going to kill her. He tells her he is going to the kitchen for a drink of water and promises he'll leave after that. Stay right there. Don't move. She assures him she will, but then follows him stealthily from the room. He pauses to increase the volume on the stereo and continues into the kitchen. Kelly does not follow him there. She turns right and walks through her living room, hearing the man going through kitchen drawers. She slips out of her apartment and into the apartment across the hall, knowing it would be unlocked. Kelly survived the ordeal, though she wasn't meant to.
We can learn from Kelly several things about intuition and preincident indicators. "We get a signal prior to violence," Gavin says. "There are preincident indicators. Things that happen before violence occurs." [PINS (preincident indicators) will be explored further in future posts.] The very first spark of intuition that Kelly received was a profound dislike of a man's voice. With her conscious mind, she had no reason to hate a voice, but her subconscious mind had picked up on ques that put her on edge. In this case, she knew she had latched the door to her apartment building behind her, yet here was this man she had not seen on her way up the stairs. The door had also been open when she arrived, so he must have been there before her, waiting.
After allowing the man to carry up her groceries, she still had a feeling of unease. Intuition was poking in again, warning her that something was off. In this case, she knows her neighbors on the fourth floor and had never seen this man before. She hadn't reasoned through that, but her intuition had done the work for her. Instead of listening, she scolds herself and continues to put herself at the mercy of a rapist. Finally, she allows him inside, despite her hesitation (a sign of intuition). By allowing him to move her to a more private venue, she becomes a victim of a terrible crime.
But that isn't the end of the story, is it? After her intuition has been proved correct, and the intentions of the man were made clear, she escaped. She got herself into a terrible situation by ignoring intuition, and got herself back out of it by listening when it came to call again. She followed her instincts, her intuition, her true fear, and followed the man from the bedroom, gaining safety in a neighbor's apartment. Intuition told her what would happen, and before her logical mind could process it, she escaped.
Part of her registered first the shutting of the window. The three hour ordeal had occurred with the window open. Why close it now? The same reason the man stopped to turn up the volume on the stereo. He was concerned about noise. If it were truly over, and he were leaving in peace as he promised, those wouldn't have been a details he attended to. Kelly's mind put a red flag on the window closing and gave her the energy and will power to escape with her life. The man proved that intuition correct too by digging through the drawers in her kitchen. His last victim had been stabbed to death.
"You're in a hallway waiting for
an elevator late at night. Elevator door opens, and there's a guy
inside, and he makes you afraid. You don't know why, you don't know what
it is. Some memory of this building—whatever it may be. And many women
will stand there and look at that guy and say, 'Oh, I don't want to
think like that. I don't want to be the kind of person who lets the door
close in his face. I've got to be nice. I don't want him to think I'm
not nice.' And so human beings will get into a steel soundproof chamber
with someone they're afraid of, and there's not another animal in nature
that would even consider it."~Gavin De Becker
Becker calls this list the "Messengers of Intuition"
- Apprehension
- Anxiety
- Curiosity
- Doubt
- Fear
- Gut Feelings
- Hesitation
- Hunches
- Humor
- Nagging Feelings
- Persistent Thoughts
- Suspicion
- Wonder
If you feel any of these, it's worth another listen. As Becker says, intuition is always in response to something, and always has your best interests at heart. Until next Friday then. Stay safe. Stay smart.
