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Music.

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Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Self-Initiative Project Podcast.

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I’m your host, Jim O’Brien. Hello, and welcome to episode 23.

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Today, I welcome my guest, Andy Murphy of The Secure Dad.

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Andy runs another similar type of podcast as I do, of similar subject matter, I should say.

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And today, we’re going to be talking about how it is we can help people begin

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to take more of an investment and responsibility in their personal safety so

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that they’re better able to

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avoid bad situations should they occur and be better prepared in general.

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And most importantly, we’re going to discuss some ways that they can start easing

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into the subject matter without going crazy with it.

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So with that, I want to welcome Andy. Hey, Andy, how are you?

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I’m doing well, Jim. I appreciate the opportunity to be here to talk to you,

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to hopefully learn from each other and hopefully bring some value to your listeners.

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Absolutely. I appreciate you jumping on here and doing this with us today.

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I think this topic will be great. And, you know, just to kind of give the folks

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a little bit of background, you know, I saw your post on Instagram,

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I think, about getting together and possibly doing something.

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And I was like, you know, there’s an opportunity there because you’d mentioned

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family safety, and that’s right in line with what we’re trying to talk about, at least in part.

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And I think we’re on the same page too philosophically that we’re responsible

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for our personal safety and those of our loved ones.

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So I was excited to have the opportunity to do this.

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And, you know, we talked about doing, or you talked about doing family safety

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to start with, and then it kind of evolved into this,

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you know, why do people, why are people hesitant to think about personal safety

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and talk about bad things that can happen and be better prepared and all of that stuff.

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And I, it was funny that you had brought that up because I think as we exchanged

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in emails together, I said, that’s so funny you say that because I just wrote

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this note down, this question down for myself the night before.

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And it was, how do we start getting people interested in their own safety and

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following just basic, you know, procedure, if you will, so they can better learn

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to better avoid bad situations and just be better prepared across the board.

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Right. And it, you know, that’s,

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it’s great to talk about family safety because there’s a

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lot of people out there who are like you know i know i should probably

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do better with what i’m doing yeah and

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there’s people out there who are like hyper vigilant to the

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point that it is it actually takes away from what

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they’re doing yeah so you know it’s and

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and you know with the ads end of the internet and podcasting now people can

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listen to the self-initiative project they can listen to the secured ad podcast

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and hopefully we can be the calm voices that says okay start here and then just

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kind of work your way forward and move through at your own pace. So…

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Yeah. And you don’t have to go to your point. You don’t have to go to the extreme

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where it’s, you know, overbearing and a burden.

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Just get started. Just start thinking about things.

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Before we jump in. Yeah. Before we jump in a deep dive, kind of backing up here

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a little bit. I want you to tell our listeners a little bit about yourself,

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your background, who you are, what you do, how you got into all this yourself. Sure.

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Well, this all started, Secure Dad started way back in actually 1999.

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And that was the day I realized that my personal safety was my own responsibility.

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And we’ll talk more about that later. But fast forward to 2016,

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I have been practicing situational awareness for probably 16, 17 years at that point.

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And I decided to start a personal blog about what I was doing and my mindset

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and how, you know, I know there were other people out there who were probably

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thinking the same thing.

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So I wrote 100 articles for the secure dad dot com.

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It picked up a lot of momentum. I had readers coming to me and friends coming

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to me saying, hey, you need to start a podcast. I was like, OK, that sounds great.

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Maybe. We’ll see. So I kept going away from that, and I wrote a book called

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Home Security to Secure Dad’s Guide, available on Amazon.

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It reached number one bestseller status on Amazon in 2018, 2019,

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and even again here in January of 2020. So I’ve been blown away by the success of that.

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And then it was like, okay, now I’ll listen to you guys and I’ll do a podcast.

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And it has been one of the greatest things I’ve done.

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I love podcasting. I love getting to talk to people like yourself,

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having listeners respond, and being able to change it up with each episode to

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be able to adapt to the way I see trends in family protection,

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in home security, and just in fatherhood in general. That’s something that I like to talk about, too.

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You know, we can talk about family protection, but we also need to talk about

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what makes family great and those relationships.

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Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And, you know, I want to compliment you on your

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podcast and what you’re doing there, too.

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Again, I think for me, I found alignment just in your, it seems like,

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your general philosophy of responsibility.

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And you know i want to comment too and

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you made a great point i think on one of your more recent podcasts if

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not your last one about you know people have

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a lot of listening choices out here in podcast land

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and for them to take time out to listen to something that might make them think

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about things they never had before get them outside their comfort zone or maybe

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even i don’t want to ever scare anybody but just make them think about things

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that perhaps they hadn’t thought about a whole lot,

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you know, they could be listening to comedy or music or any other assortment of things,

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but for them to dial into the likes of you and I and listen to the types of

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topics that we’re trying to cover and get out there to them,

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I couldn’t agree more that that’s a big step,

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and I want to thank people for doing that too.

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Yeah. And, you know, and I appreciate your kind words there.

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But, you know, our listeners, your listeners, my listeners, they’re brave.

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They are they’re the ones who are saying, you know what, there’s something else

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I need to know. There’s something else I need to do.

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Where do I go to find that? And thankfully, they’re they’re listening to us

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and hopefully taking into account what we’re saying.

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It’s ultimately, you know, it’s their decision.

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It’s up to your listeners what they decide to do and what they don’t.

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You and I are not, you know, fire and brimstone telling you,

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you’ve got to do it this way.

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We’re just offering and, you know, we’re not offering advice.

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We’re offering information for you to make a good decision.

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Yeah, I’ve said it a few times over the short time that I’ve been doing the podcast now.

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And, you know, that’s I can’t necessarily teach you anything,

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but I hope I can make you think about something you haven’t before.

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And across the podcast, hopefully folks are able to take away one nugget of

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information that maybe certainly maybe makes them think about things,

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but hopefully even more so makes them take action on it.

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And that’s that’s a good thing, because hopefully it’s just going to make them

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safer and things better for them themselves and their loved ones.

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Yeah, that’s a great approach. Very smart. So, yeah, you know,

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on this topic of, you know, how how do we get people to get more interested?

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You know, I was just visiting a friend. I was up in Maine for the first time

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in my life this past weekend and met a friend up there from high school and

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they don’t even lock the doors on their house.

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Now, I haven’t lived like that since I was a kid.

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And I won’t tell you how long ago that was. But, you know, long gone,

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suffice it to say, long gone are the days of leaving your doors unlocked and

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your screen doors open and whatever else, you know.

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And, you know, admittedly, I think that’s part of the issue,

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too, is they live out where there’s probably not a lot of crime.

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Neighbors are all friendly, but still, you know, it’s like that’s just fundamental 101 in my mind.

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But in their mind, they don’t think about it, right? They don’t,

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and they figure they’re safe and the chances are slim.

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So, you know, why is it that people don’t think about those sorts of things?

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Well, you know, we kind of touched on it a minute ago. It’s scary.

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You know, we don’t want to think about what bad things could happen to us.

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You know, we have, and I think also, and this is something that I’m coming to

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understand a little bit better.

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I think I’ve always known it, but I’m actually really starting to explore it.

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Is that as humble as we may be, everybody has an ego.

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And we always want to think that we’re doing the right thing.

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What we believe is right. It’s called confirmation bias.

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So we all think that, hey, I’m a good person. Why would anybody want to hurt me?

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Why would anybody want to come to my house? I haven’t done anything to anybody.

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I live by the golden rule. so I’m going to

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treat everybody like I want to be treated so therefore I

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am safe yeah and unfortunately that’s just

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not the way that the world works

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yeah you know I thought about your friends up there in Maine

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who don’t lock the door and I think well that’s great until there’s

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a man hunt and the guy is on the loose he sees

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a house out in the middle of nowhere and he decides to go try the doorknob

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and then all sorts of trouble breaks in you know so there’s

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just so many things that we in our world can’t

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predict and we can’t really fully

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know what’s going to happen to us from day to day so we

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have to take some precautions about what we’re going to do how we’re going to

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make ourselves safe and something as simple as locking the front door like who

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cares if you do it you know yeah the only person that’s going to know is the

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person who tried to barge in your front door right and like oh my gosh your

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door is locked well yeah my door is locked you know i used,

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I was in college, and a lot of my friends there were – it was their first time

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really away from home, and I was living in an apartment.

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And it was a duplex, and it was on a cul-de-sac, and there was no real foot traffic.

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And people were surprised that I would lock my door – excuse me,

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I would lock my car doors at night.

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And I’m like, well, why would, I mean, I want my car to be here in the morning when I come back.

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Yeah. And, and the irony there was on that quiet little cul-de-sac,

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we had a drug dealer and a prostitute move in and I moved out shortly thereafter.

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And I’m like, well, these are the reasons why I keep my doors locked on my apartment and my car.

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Cause you never know who’s going to approach your home when you’re,

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when you least expect it.

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You don’t. And, you know, talking about cars and unlocked car doors,

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you know, I had the opportunity last year to do a couple of ride-alongs with

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a local county municipality here, law enforcement. Very cool.

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And it was a fantastic experience. I wound up doing two 12-hour shifts with

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the guys, and it was an honor and a privilege to do that.

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But, you know, in every single instance of an issue with a car,

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do you know the one common thread that all those cars had in common out there?

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What’s that the doors were left unlocked in every

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single instance i thought that was really interesting

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because i can’t even fathom doing that right but it is a common thing and so

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yeah i think yeah you’re right i think the ego kind of keeps us unfortunately

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in this regard in check too too much right and then i think you know a lot of

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people think oh it won’t happen to me or That’s why I moved here.

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I’m in a safe place. You know, it doesn’t it doesn’t it can’t happen here because

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I made it a point to go where I thought or knew it was safe or heard it was safe.

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And, you know, fortunately, crimes, crimes against people, whether again,

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you know, it’s it’s, you know, property or body, whatever crimes there. They’re rare, right?

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If they were a lot more prevalent, we’d really be in trouble, right?

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And then perhaps more people would be more vigilant in that case.

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But fortunately, they’re not.

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But because they are generally low in the overall scheme of things,

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I think people think, eh, I’m not going to sweat it too much.

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The 0.04% chance of something happening here at my house or wherever it is is pretty slim.

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And then, you know, I guess my cynical side of says that I honestly think a

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lot of it’s apathy either.

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You know, it’s like, so, you know, I thought about the answer to my question,

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right? How do we get people interested?

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And my response was, you know, I don’t know and I don’t care.

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Yeah. You know, talking about the apathy that I think some folks have certainly.

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So I know that you had mentioned we had gone back and forth in email a little

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bit. And I know you had mentioned the things that had triggered you to start

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thinking differently, to start giving some credence to, hey, this could be possible.

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And am I prepared for it? And what would I do if?

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So can you talk a little bit about the thing? Because I wrote out my list of

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things I’m pretty sure influenced me over my life to start thinking more about

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my personal safety and home security and family safety. Talk about yours.

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Sure. You know, there is a lot of things that, you know, our life is a collection of experiences.

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And I was actually, you know, a pretty reserved person,

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not letting people get, you know, too close to me, you know,

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physically, because I realized, you know, that’s when, you know,

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through within arm’s reach of someone, they can hurt you like that.

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So I would only stand close to people that I trusted, things like that.

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You know, my parents were very, you know, safe minded people.

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You know, my dad was always like, hey, we got to put on light timers when we go on vacation.

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My mom was always a very good and still is a very good judge of character when I was growing up.

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And she and they imparted those

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lessons to me. But everything really came together on April 21st, 1999.

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The day before some guys decided to attack their own high school out in Colorado.

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And the tragedy at Columbine high school is what actually woke me up.

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And I’ll date myself here.

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And the fact that I was also in high school in 1999 and I went,

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we went to school the next day and this is all we talked about.

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Like we didn’t, we didn’t learn, we didn’t do anything. in each of the classes

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that we went to, you know, the teacher pretty much just said,

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okay, how are you guys doing?

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And people would just start talking. And in a sense, kind of like after 9-11,

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there was this sense of community there.

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And actually where I was in high school at the time in that community,

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there had been a school shooting at an elementary school.

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So in a lot of ways, this was just bringing up bad memories for some people.

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But I remember sitting, you know, I remember exactly sitting where I was In

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my homeroom class, I looked across the room and I thought, you know,

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if one of my classmates over there pulls a gun out of his book bag and start shooting.

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Yeah. My school resource officer is not going to get here in time to save me.

00:15:47.165 –> 00:15:49.825
Right. So what do I do? Yeah.

00:15:51.029 –> 00:15:57.449
And so that was this big moment of, wait a minute, you know,

00:15:57.729 –> 00:16:00.609
police do not just appear out of thin air.

00:16:00.789 –> 00:16:04.889
You know, they are human beings. They have other calls that they’re working on.

00:16:05.009 –> 00:16:07.789
They are a physical distance away from you.

00:16:07.909 –> 00:16:12.149
And as much as we need the police and they will respond when we when we call

00:16:12.149 –> 00:16:15.489
them, we’ve got to survive to the point that we can call them.

00:16:15.489 –> 00:16:21.769
You know, we’ve got to we’ve got to be able to to be able to look this uncomfortable

00:16:21.769 –> 00:16:27.049
fear in the eyes and realize I can be the victim of a crime.

00:16:27.549 –> 00:16:32.229
Something bad can happen to me. And that was where I started to develop situational

00:16:32.229 –> 00:16:34.789
awareness before I even knew what the term was.

00:16:34.949 –> 00:16:39.069
I just started to think, OK, I’m walking into this room.

00:16:39.509 –> 00:16:42.949
I’m walking into this building. I’m walking into my church. which if something

00:16:42.949 –> 00:16:44.569
goes wrong, where do I go? Yeah.

00:16:44.849 –> 00:16:48.249
And can I grab somebody on the way out? And that’s where it started.

00:16:49.229 –> 00:16:53.129
So that’s kind of where things came together for me.

00:16:53.329 –> 00:16:58.129
And it’s been every day since then, it’s been what do I need to do to make sure

00:16:58.129 –> 00:16:59.709
that I’m safe and I got married?

00:16:59.949 –> 00:17:04.169
And then it’s what is it that I need to do to make sure that myself and my wife

00:17:04.169 –> 00:17:07.849
is safe? And then we have a kid and it’s like, okay, what do I need to do to

00:17:07.849 –> 00:17:09.349
make sure that all three of us are safe?

00:17:09.589 –> 00:17:14.109
And so it’s just grown from there. And it’s become now just a part of who I

00:17:14.109 –> 00:17:15.769
am. It’s second nature to me.

00:17:15.929 –> 00:17:18.169
It’s just second nature now. Yeah. Yeah.

00:17:18.869 –> 00:17:22.049
Well, you know, out of that tragedy that happened in Columbine,

00:17:22.229 –> 00:17:28.149
I have to believe that you’re not the only one who kind of had their eyes opened, if you will.

00:17:28.429 –> 00:17:33.929
And so, you know, out of that tragedy, I hope that more good like for you came out of it.

00:17:34.009 –> 00:17:40.369
And I’m sure it did. That’s a pretty big, ginormous event to have to happen

00:17:40.369 –> 00:17:44.169
to get folks to think more about stuff like that.

00:17:44.349 –> 00:17:46.729
But that’s the good takeaway there.

00:17:47.569 –> 00:17:53.149
Yeah, for me, it was a, I didn’t, I don’t have that massive event, right?

00:17:53.269 –> 00:17:58.389
I think the biggest thing, I think the biggest event in my life when I was growing

00:17:58.389 –> 00:18:00.869
up was probably the space shuttle blowing up, right?

00:18:01.549 –> 00:18:06.369
That was a pretty big deal, but unrelated. I didn’t have, I didn’t have,

00:18:06.449 –> 00:18:10.269
you didn’t hear a lot about active shooter, active killer scenarios back in

00:18:10.269 –> 00:18:14.049
the day, even though I’m, I know they were going on here and there.

00:18:14.509 –> 00:18:18.909
But for me, it was kind of a combination of things. I think that over time…

00:18:20.170 –> 00:18:28.310
And I guess it had been in the last, what now, 11 years that it’s really sunk

00:18:28.310 –> 00:18:32.170
in and I really take things completely different than I once did.

00:18:32.310 –> 00:18:39.310
But over my life, you know, I grew up in what I grew up on the southwest side of Atlanta.

00:18:39.710 –> 00:18:44.530
And so my part of town was kind of questionable, at least at times.

00:18:44.530 –> 00:18:47.470
And in middle school I was

00:18:47.470 –> 00:18:50.290
bullied not severely but you know I got beat

00:18:50.290 –> 00:18:53.410
up in the boys room and had to go through all of that experience

00:18:53.410 –> 00:18:56.190
and then you know growing up when I

00:18:56.190 –> 00:19:00.790
was really young we were actually burglarized at least two times that I would

00:19:00.790 –> 00:19:05.050
remember if not three talking about the doors being open in the house right

00:19:05.050 –> 00:19:09.070
it just was a lot easier because nobody was thinking that way and you know the

00:19:09.070 –> 00:19:13.810
day that my dad decided to put the first security system in our house suddenly

00:19:13.810 –> 00:19:15.950
those things stopped, right?

00:19:16.330 –> 00:19:19.590
And detoured any further things.

00:19:19.770 –> 00:19:24.470
But those things happening early on in life where I grew up getting bullied,

00:19:24.630 –> 00:19:28.590
burglarized, I think that kind of set things in motion because growing up where

00:19:28.590 –> 00:19:31.670
I did certainly gave me some street smarts.

00:19:31.870 –> 00:19:35.190
I still to this day, I credit how I grew up,

00:19:35.290 –> 00:19:38.250
where I grew up, the things that happened to me is giving me my street

00:19:38.250 –> 00:19:41.590
smarts but then later in the mid 90s

00:19:41.590 –> 00:19:44.710
i started doing martial arts and that’s

00:19:44.710 –> 00:19:47.670
really where things started to click and i i trained

00:19:47.670 –> 00:19:50.810
in a more traditional korean style of martial

00:19:50.810 –> 00:19:54.050
art but you know it was starting to cause light

00:19:54.050 –> 00:19:56.730
bulbs further more light bulbs you know

00:19:56.730 –> 00:19:59.790
to fire off in my head about how i

00:19:59.790 –> 00:20:02.630
should be approaching things and thinking about things and

00:20:02.630 –> 00:20:06.770
being prepared and then after that about

00:20:06.770 –> 00:20:09.730
12 years ago i discovered krav

00:20:09.730 –> 00:20:16.090
maga and moved into that you know more standard self street self-defense straight

00:20:16.090 –> 00:20:21.670
up you know not so much not so much an art more martial than anything as it

00:20:21.670 –> 00:20:27.890
was described to me in the early days and then you know i became a krav instructor which.

00:20:29.001 –> 00:20:32.941
You know, kind of, I was already thinking that way, but now I’ve got students

00:20:32.941 –> 00:20:36.681
that I’m trying to disseminate, you know, not just physical skill to,

00:20:36.821 –> 00:20:40.561
but also knowledge of how things may occur for them.

00:20:40.661 –> 00:20:43.761
And, you know, it made me think even more. Right.

00:20:44.501 –> 00:20:48.501
And, you know, part of my growing up to your point, you know,

00:20:48.581 –> 00:20:52.721
my parents were good about setting the light timers and locking the doors.

00:20:52.721 –> 00:20:55.061
Even when we were home, it got to that point, right.

00:20:55.161 –> 00:20:59.821
Because over time things evolved or devolved where we lived right to the point

00:20:59.821 –> 00:21:02.321
where we had to start doing more of those sorts of things.

00:21:03.201 –> 00:21:07.161
And then in the last 10 years or so, you know, I’ve taken it upon myself to

00:21:07.161 –> 00:21:10.921
watch an awful lot of fights and attacks on security video.

00:21:11.161 –> 00:21:14.441
You know, you can go out, YouTube, live leak, whatever.

00:21:14.721 –> 00:21:18.301
And if you want to see this horrific stuff, it’s there. And it’s not about,

00:21:18.841 –> 00:21:23.381
scaring yourself, but it’s about understanding things that can happen,

00:21:23.381 –> 00:21:28.341
that they’re not as they’re portrayed in the movies or even sometimes in,

00:21:28.521 –> 00:21:33.561
as they’re taught in your martial arts classes or self-defense classes and that

00:21:33.561 –> 00:21:37.661
they can be, you know, everything you imagined and then some.

00:21:37.901 –> 00:21:43.021
So all of those things are kind of the things that culminated to get me to the

00:21:43.021 –> 00:21:46.981
point there I am now where I think more this way. Yeah.

00:21:47.881 –> 00:21:57.441
So what, what do you think folks can do or should do to help make them start

00:21:57.441 –> 00:21:58.701
thinking better this way?

00:21:58.821 –> 00:22:01.481
Because they’re not necessarily going to have the same life events.

00:22:01.641 –> 00:22:06.301
You know, you had the Columbine event at an age that was, you know,

00:22:06.541 –> 00:22:08.521
pretty tender still for you, right?

00:22:09.241 –> 00:22:13.621
Experienced that. I had all the things that kind of initiated mine,

00:22:13.621 –> 00:22:15.601
but not everybody’s going to have those experiences.

00:22:15.641 –> 00:22:18.021
So what can they do?

00:22:18.161 –> 00:22:23.161
What should they do to make themselves start thinking more like this, like we do?

00:22:23.961 –> 00:22:27.001
Right. You know, I think for, you know, everybody is unique.

00:22:27.181 –> 00:22:30.621
So they’re going to they’re going to come at this their own way.

00:22:30.801 –> 00:22:34.401
I think everybody needs to know. And I think everybody does understand,

00:22:34.641 –> 00:22:36.121
you know, bad things do happen.

00:22:36.421 –> 00:22:39.901
But, you know, it may be denial. It may be apathy, like you said,

00:22:40.041 –> 00:22:42.921
that keeps them from really embracing it. So I think.

00:22:43.693 –> 00:22:48.733
We need to share with folks, OK, hey, you know, when you’re going from your

00:22:48.733 –> 00:22:52.033
car to the store, make sure you’re not looking, you know, down into your phone.

00:22:52.433 –> 00:22:55.633
Simple. You know, when you go home at night, make sure your doors are locked.

00:22:55.773 –> 00:22:56.873
Well, you know, that’s easy.

00:22:57.153 –> 00:23:00.853
You know, when you go on vacation, make sure you’re not live streaming,

00:23:01.133 –> 00:23:05.573
you know, where you are so that somebody can pick up on the fact that your home

00:23:05.573 –> 00:23:07.693
is empty and they can go and break into it.

00:23:07.953 –> 00:23:12.833
And I think people will, you know, we need to just arm people with that basic understanding.

00:23:12.833 –> 00:23:16.193
But people are not going to

00:23:16.193 –> 00:23:19.533
fully embrace it until they have

00:23:19.533 –> 00:23:22.413
that wake-up call like you were

00:23:22.413 –> 00:23:27.273
in martial arts realizing oh wait a minute you know things are different or

00:23:27.273 –> 00:23:31.133
for me at columbine where oh wait a minute i could definitely be affected by

00:23:31.133 –> 00:23:35.493
this i think for some people it can be you know something happens to a friend

00:23:35.493 –> 00:23:40.173
or it’s going to be something that It happens in a place that they frequent,

00:23:40.413 –> 00:23:43.713
you know, somebody, you know, gets mugs in the parking garage where you park

00:23:43.713 –> 00:23:45.553
every day and that’s their wake up call.

00:23:46.173 –> 00:23:52.333
You know, I think we just need to make sure that the people that we care about know what to do.

00:23:52.613 –> 00:23:55.953
Yeah. You know, generally tell them, OK, this is how you’re safe.

00:23:55.953 –> 00:24:00.073
Obviously, you know, you being an instructor, you can tell people what to do.

00:24:00.193 –> 00:24:05.253
So hopefully in that minute when the panic sets in and we forget everything

00:24:05.253 –> 00:24:08.893
that we know, that they’ll have something that they can fall back on that will

00:24:08.893 –> 00:24:11.173
hopefully save their lives or get them out of a situation.

00:24:11.673 –> 00:24:16.073
But honestly, until people choose to fully embrace a secure mindset,

00:24:16.073 –> 00:24:21.473
all we can do is be there for them and tell them these simple things,

00:24:21.673 –> 00:24:24.613
this foundation, the building blocks for a more secure life.

00:24:25.573 –> 00:24:27.633
Personal plant on it is,

00:24:28.326 –> 00:24:33.346
And even to this point, there’s a lot of people I care about who are still kind

00:24:33.346 –> 00:24:36.366
of apathetic to this. And they’re like, oh, I listen to your podcast.

00:24:36.766 –> 00:24:40.466
And I read your book, and I’m like, hey, that’s great. So what are you doing about it?

00:24:40.706 –> 00:24:44.066
Well, my neighborhood is nice. And I’m like, and it just goes.

00:24:44.146 –> 00:24:46.206
I’m in a gated community. Tied it downhill from there.

00:24:46.906 –> 00:24:50.526
Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I live in a gated community. I’m like, okay, really?

00:24:50.706 –> 00:24:54.686
Well, what’s your teenage neighbor doing after school?

00:24:54.766 –> 00:24:57.286
Is he getting high and going around and beating up mailboxes?

00:24:57.286 –> 00:25:01.886
You know, there’s always something or all the long care crews that come through said gates.

00:25:02.786 –> 00:25:07.426
Right. Right. Right. Or, you know, you know what, man, you say that my neighbor,

00:25:07.446 –> 00:25:11.066
as we speak right now is having his roof replaced.

00:25:11.366 –> 00:25:15.806
Yeah. And I walked out yesterday and I looked at the crew and there’s nothing,

00:25:16.006 –> 00:25:19.666
nothing suspicious about these guys, but I’m like, man, this is a great vantage

00:25:19.666 –> 00:25:24.366
point to study over the next two to three days, how this neighborhood works.

00:25:24.906 –> 00:25:27.526
Cause you’re up on the roof. If nobody’s really looking at you,

00:25:27.606 –> 00:25:31.686
nobody’s paying attention, that’s a great vantage point for someone to be able

00:25:31.686 –> 00:25:33.586
to learn who’s home and who’s not.

00:25:33.826 –> 00:25:37.986
So, yeah, it’s, you know, there is always something.

00:25:38.366 –> 00:25:43.486
But until people get it, they’re not going to get it.

00:25:43.566 –> 00:25:47.686
I don’t know. That’s a very, very random thing to say. So we just got to hope

00:25:47.686 –> 00:25:51.426
for the people that we care about that when they do have that moment,

00:25:51.426 –> 00:25:52.986
they do have that epiphany,

00:25:53.106 –> 00:25:58.586
that they’re safe and that they will come to us for guidance on what they need

00:25:58.586 –> 00:26:00.566
to do next. Information. Yeah.

00:26:01.506 –> 00:26:05.206
Yeah. I think, you know, as I was trying to figure out an answer,

00:26:05.466 –> 00:26:09.306
an easy answer to that question, and I’m kind of like you, there’s not one, right?

00:26:09.306 –> 00:26:16.586
I would hate, I hate to, yeah, you know, I hate to say that it’s going to take

00:26:16.586 –> 00:26:20.086
something bad happening to folks to get them to wake up, right?

00:26:20.226 –> 00:26:23.546
To become woke or more woke around the personal safety thing.

00:26:24.166 –> 00:26:27.466
I agree that that can certainly be a trigger.

00:26:28.226 –> 00:26:35.406
My thought was just dare to start thinking about it a little bit, right? What have I done?

00:26:35.726 –> 00:26:39.266
What, you know, do I really need to lock the doors? Okay, maybe I should lock

00:26:39.266 –> 00:26:40.686
the doors, because you know what’s interesting?

00:26:40.686 –> 00:26:46.866
My friend up in Maine, they actually, before I left Sunday afternoon,

00:26:47.086 –> 00:26:52.246
they started locking their doors, at least some of the time, some of the time.

00:26:52.826 –> 00:26:56.666
And the good news is when their children are home, their children are fairly

00:26:56.666 –> 00:26:59.786
vigilant about locking the door, evidently. So that’s good, too.

00:27:00.506 –> 00:27:05.386
But I think if people just start thinking, and maybe it takes folks like you

00:27:05.386 –> 00:27:10.266
and me and others to trigger some of those thoughts in the topics that we talk

00:27:10.266 –> 00:27:12.046
about and cover, like this one here today,

00:27:12.146 –> 00:27:15.986
hopefully this one here today, if nothing else we talk about makes people think

00:27:15.986 –> 00:27:18.806
more about it and go, aha, what am I doing or not doing?

00:27:20.486 –> 00:27:25.906
But I think one of the thoughts that should maybe wake up,

00:27:26.463 –> 00:27:29.543
some folks up is i listened to your podcast with tony

00:27:29.543 –> 00:27:32.603
blauer no fear k-n-o-w yeah

00:27:32.603 –> 00:27:36.203
and i thought that was an outstanding podcast and

00:27:36.203 –> 00:27:39.423
my thank you my biggest takeaway is

00:27:39.423 –> 00:27:43.283
something he said and i’m i’m not gonna get the quote exactly right because

00:27:43.283 –> 00:27:48.683
i didn’t memorize it but this is the general spirit and it really resonated

00:27:48.683 –> 00:27:54.423
with me as to aha if people would just think this one statement that he made,

00:27:54.663 –> 00:27:56.443
I think it could change things for him.

00:27:56.723 –> 00:28:02.663
He said, protecting your family is the most important skill you can possess.

00:28:03.043 –> 00:28:08.043
And I’m going to give Tony Blower credit for that because that’s what he said.

00:28:08.123 –> 00:28:11.063
And I think he said it a couple of times during that podcast.

00:28:12.163 –> 00:28:16.603
Protecting your family is the most important skill you can possess.

00:28:17.843 –> 00:28:23.943
And I think that is potentially a game changer if people just think about that.

00:28:24.143 –> 00:28:27.803
What are they doing to protect their children? What are they doing to protect their loved ones?

00:28:27.943 –> 00:28:31.843
What are they doing? What are they telling their kids to know to do when they’re

00:28:31.843 –> 00:28:35.663
home alone and the parents aren’t home? Because there are scenarios like that.

00:28:35.783 –> 00:28:38.703
It gets to a point where your kids, middle school or high school,

00:28:38.823 –> 00:28:40.623
and they’re home alone. Do they know what to do?

00:28:40.903 –> 00:28:44.423
Do they know to keep the doors locked? Do they know to keep the garage door

00:28:44.423 –> 00:28:47.603
down? Do they know how to get the phone to dial 911?

00:28:48.978 –> 00:28:53.298
So I, you know, I thought that was brilliant. Yeah.

00:28:53.498 –> 00:28:57.178
And if you think about, he, he talked a little bit about the,

00:28:57.318 –> 00:29:01.138
the evolution of our society as well. And he has another stuff too.

00:29:01.378 –> 00:29:05.658
Yeah. You know, let’s go back to when we, humanity was hunter gatherers.

00:29:05.858 –> 00:29:07.978
There were people who had specific jobs.

00:29:08.418 –> 00:29:13.578
It was the parents job to make sure that the next generation survived to be

00:29:13.578 –> 00:29:15.738
able to keep the species going.

00:29:16.158 –> 00:29:20.998
You know, it was up to the adults. to raise the kids to make sure,

00:29:21.218 –> 00:29:24.798
not necessarily that they had polite manners or that they would go off to caveman

00:29:24.798 –> 00:29:28.378
college or whatever, but it was, you need to just live.

00:29:28.478 –> 00:29:32.898
It’s my job to make sure that you have food and shelter and that you survive

00:29:32.898 –> 00:29:37.418
to be able to be old enough to become a parent yourself.

00:29:37.838 –> 00:29:46.538
And I think in a lot of ways, we have lived in a world where we don’t necessarily

00:29:46.538 –> 00:29:50.878
have to worry about being eaten by a saber-toothed tiger.

00:29:51.018 –> 00:29:55.238
So we think that all the predators are gone, and they’re not.

00:29:55.458 –> 00:29:59.878
The biggest predator to humanity is humanity. It’s us.

00:30:00.278 –> 00:30:06.418
It’s the guy who just got fired from your office is going to go come back and

00:30:06.418 –> 00:30:08.458
light your building on fire.

00:30:08.738 –> 00:30:14.458
It’s the creepy guy down the street who’s trying to cozy up to your kids because

00:30:14.458 –> 00:30:17.038
he’s a pedophile, and we don’t know that yet.

00:30:17.658 –> 00:30:20.978
It’s, you know, all these things, all these threats still exist.

00:30:21.138 –> 00:30:25.618
They’ve just evolved to look differently. And they now, instead of blending

00:30:25.618 –> 00:30:30.558
into the forest or the jungle scape, they blend into our neighborhood.

00:30:30.738 –> 00:30:32.878
They blend in with us. Yeah.

00:30:33.338 –> 00:30:37.898
And so the threats are different, but they’re still there. And I think that’s

00:30:37.898 –> 00:30:39.898
what Tony was talking about, was we as parents.

00:30:40.534 –> 00:30:46.854
Have got to absolutely make sure that our kids, our families are safe and ourselves are safe too.

00:30:46.974 –> 00:30:49.314
It’s a lot of times that I think people miss that point.

00:30:49.994 –> 00:30:52.874
You know, you know, Jim, you and I have to make sure that we’re safe.

00:30:52.974 –> 00:30:56.134
And I think Tony brought this up too in the interview, like we’re,

00:30:56.274 –> 00:30:59.834
you know, we don’t have bodyguards, right? We are our own bodyguards.

00:30:59.974 –> 00:31:05.314
We are VIPs to our families. We are VIPs to our friends and to our, to our coworkers.

00:31:05.614 –> 00:31:09.394
So we got to make sure that we are safe too. But yeah, absolutely.

00:31:09.654 –> 00:31:12.254
Making sure that we’re safe is paramount.

00:31:12.554 –> 00:31:17.434
And then making sure that everybody’s fed and they have clothes and that they have what they need.

00:31:17.614 –> 00:31:21.814
You know, they may not have the best shoes in the world or, you know,

00:31:21.874 –> 00:31:25.654
the best clothes or they, you know, we can’t buy a Porsche for each one of our

00:31:25.654 –> 00:31:28.334
children, but we’re making sure that they’re safe.

00:31:28.434 –> 00:31:31.054
And that’s the important thing. Yeah, absolutely.

00:31:31.414 –> 00:31:34.894
And, you know, I had a note here because I wanted to talk about it.

00:31:35.054 –> 00:31:41.154
And again, you’ve kind of touched upon it throughout our conversation here during this podcast.

00:31:41.174 –> 00:31:46.734
But in addition to just starting to think about things to expand upon that further,

00:31:46.934 –> 00:31:52.174
one of the other things I thought that folks could start doing to make light

00:31:52.174 –> 00:31:53.554
bulbs go off for themselves.

00:31:53.554 –> 00:31:58.574
And again, you’ve covered multiple scenarios in our discussion today,

00:31:58.734 –> 00:32:03.734
just as examples, is to start thinking through scenarios of what if.

00:32:04.554 –> 00:32:08.594
Okay, I’m sitting in my chair at night watching a movie, my family’s on the

00:32:08.594 –> 00:32:12.414
couch watching a movie, whatever, and not, again, not that the chances are that

00:32:12.414 –> 00:32:14.634
great, but someone kicks in my front door.

00:32:14.874 –> 00:32:18.714
What do I do? Am I prepared for that? Oh, I’m not prepared for that.

00:32:18.854 –> 00:32:23.454
Ooh, maybe I should think on that a little bit more. or I’m walking into the

00:32:23.454 –> 00:32:26.934
gas station to pay for my gas, even though that’s rare these days,

00:32:27.094 –> 00:32:30.774
but whatever it is, I go in to get a drink and I see something unfolding,

00:32:30.774 –> 00:32:33.794
like something suspicious going on at the counter.

00:32:33.994 –> 00:32:38.254
You know, if I’m paying attention, maybe the guy has blatantly has a gun pulled

00:32:38.254 –> 00:32:42.214
out, you know, create whatever scenarios that you think are possible.

00:32:42.394 –> 00:32:43.994
Cause there’s a lot of them. Right.

00:32:44.194 –> 00:32:47.974
And then think what would I do? What could I do?

00:32:48.514 –> 00:32:54.734
And that Set off all kinds of, again, light bulbs in one’s head to get them

00:32:54.734 –> 00:33:00.654
to think more about that and then hopefully open up their curiosity to go and find out more, right?

00:33:00.834 –> 00:33:05.674
And learn more and hopefully look to podcasts or other forms of information

00:33:05.674 –> 00:33:09.254
like yours and mine to get more information and educate themselves.

00:33:09.254 –> 00:33:11.914
Because I think that’s part of it, too. A lot of people just don’t know.

00:33:12.826 –> 00:33:15.646
Right. Yeah, they don’t know where to look. They don’t know where to go.

00:33:15.966 –> 00:33:20.746
And, you know, sometimes you can land on something on YouTube and it’s good advice.

00:33:20.886 –> 00:33:23.066
Sometimes it’s not. And I always advocate.

00:33:24.166 –> 00:33:28.686
Yeah, most of the time, not. But, you know, I always advocate for,

00:33:28.706 –> 00:33:32.026
you know, folks like, you know, through the, you know, through the book,

00:33:32.226 –> 00:33:37.486
through the podcast, I can talk to you about mindset and I can talk to you about some tactics to do.

00:33:37.606 –> 00:33:43.466
But I encourage people to go find instructors like yourself who will actually

00:33:43.466 –> 00:33:47.286
physically show you what to do. I can’t do that through a podcast.

00:33:47.526 –> 00:33:51.246
You’ve got to step into a dojo. You’ve got to put your bare feet on the mat

00:33:51.246 –> 00:33:53.226
to be able to do those sort of things.

00:33:53.326 –> 00:33:57.406
And I’ve done it. And it’s, it’s a humbling experience when you pay somebody

00:33:57.406 –> 00:34:00.266
to punch you in the face, you’ve learned a whole lot differently.

00:34:00.706 –> 00:34:03.266
Yeah. That’s a whole lot. That’s a whole lot of different learning that you

00:34:03.266 –> 00:34:06.986
get on a podcast or that you get, you know, from reading a book,

00:34:07.126 –> 00:34:09.366
you know, when it’s actually happening to you. Yeah.

00:34:09.546 –> 00:34:14.086
That’s when you get that fear spike and when you, when your heart starts racing

00:34:14.086 –> 00:34:18.546
and all that’s just, that’s learning on a different level. And that’s another thing. Yeah.

00:34:19.286 –> 00:34:25.946
Right. And you’ve got to be brave to walk in to the classroom to go meet you,

00:34:26.126 –> 00:34:29.606
to shake your hand and say, admit, I don’t know what to do here,

00:34:29.686 –> 00:34:31.866
especially for guys. That’s real hard for us.

00:34:32.146 –> 00:34:38.666
In your experience, have you had a student who walked in who was very timid,

00:34:38.666 –> 00:34:43.446
who walked out a warrior? Is there somebody like that that you’ve trained?

00:34:45.666 –> 00:34:51.306
You know i of course i won’t mention names or anything i sure yeah i’m.

00:34:52.886 –> 00:35:01.526
I can recall a couple of ladies over time coming through that had made the bold

00:35:01.526 –> 00:35:04.206
decision to come to class, I guess you would say.

00:35:04.586 –> 00:35:06.906
You know, I was talking, I don’t know if you listened to this one,

00:35:06.966 –> 00:35:11.506
but I was talking to Ryan Hoover, who’s fairly well known in the Krav Maga community.

00:35:12.246 –> 00:35:16.326
And, you know, it’s when you get to the point where you’re ready for physical

00:35:16.326 –> 00:35:18.926
training, which is a whole new level of things to your point,

00:35:19.046 –> 00:35:22.886
it’s scary. And it’s really going to get you outside your comfort zone.

00:35:23.086 –> 00:35:27.666
But you need to be prepared for that because getting outside your comfort zone is where growth occurs.

00:35:28.006 –> 00:35:32.766
But, you know, Ryan was saying, and I completely agree, before they even come

00:35:32.766 –> 00:35:34.566
to your school to learn how,

00:35:34.966 –> 00:35:39.266
you know, to learn something, to train physically, they’ve already taken a lot

00:35:39.266 –> 00:35:43.046
of bold steps because they’ve been on your website several times.

00:35:43.046 –> 00:35:47.266
They may even called your school a couple of times if you have a physical location

00:35:47.266 –> 00:35:50.786
that, you know, people are coming to whatever it is.

00:35:50.866 –> 00:35:55.086
They’ve already taken a lot of steps outside their normal routine,

00:35:55.086 –> 00:35:58.026
right, to make the decision to get to you.

00:35:58.586 –> 00:36:01.946
So they’re already at that point when they walk through your front doors.

00:36:01.946 –> 00:36:06.066
And if you take someone that’s had a tragedy happen to them,

00:36:06.146 –> 00:36:10.226
or they’d say they had an abusive relationship with a boyfriend or a husband

00:36:10.226 –> 00:36:16.746
or whoever it might be, they come in, they’ve gone through a lot to get there.

00:36:16.906 –> 00:36:23.186
And so I’ve had a couple of ladies probably over time that I know,

00:36:23.326 –> 00:36:27.426
I don’t know specifics, but I know they’ve been through things. Yeah.

00:36:28.670 –> 00:36:36.190
The great thing about teaching someone self-defense is to see them transform

00:36:36.190 –> 00:36:42.910
and have more confidence and to get them to a point where they feel not just

00:36:42.910 –> 00:36:44.970
more confident about handling scenarios,

00:36:44.970 –> 00:36:48.470
but they have confidence in themselves over again,

00:36:48.570 –> 00:36:50.930
you know. So there’s been a couple of times where I’ve watched that.

00:36:51.410 –> 00:36:55.330
You know, to be a warrior, I think it takes more time than just coming to one

00:36:55.330 –> 00:36:58.470
self-defense seminar or something like that, you know.

00:36:58.470 –> 00:37:05.150
And that’s kind of the fallacy, too, in training is that seminars are kind of

00:37:05.150 –> 00:37:08.790
like, yeah, if you come for two hours, you’ll know what you need to know to offend yourself.

00:37:09.030 –> 00:37:12.490
Well, you’ll start to learn, but the idea is that hopefully that causes light

00:37:12.490 –> 00:37:15.310
bulbs to go off, too, to get you to understand you need to come back.

00:37:15.310 –> 00:37:19.210
And I know I’m kind of deviating off of your question, but yes,

00:37:19.350 –> 00:37:24.810
there’s been a couple of people that have come through that I’ve watched transform, you know,

00:37:24.990 –> 00:37:30.010
real mousy on the pads when they’re striking in the beginning and before it’s

00:37:30.010 –> 00:37:34.170
over with their kneeing and elbowing and punching harder than some of the guys

00:37:34.170 –> 00:37:36.770
in class. Right. And that’s, that’s great to see.

00:37:37.530 –> 00:37:41.770
And that’s awesome. You know, I’ll, I’ll share a story from my training and

00:37:41.770 –> 00:37:44.950
you being an instructor, you will, you’ll enjoy this.

00:37:46.170 –> 00:37:50.910
I’ve shared this on a podcast before, but there was this time where I was learning

00:37:50.910 –> 00:37:52.910
how to get out of the two handed choke. Yeah.

00:37:53.170 –> 00:37:56.690
And we had gone over, you know, repetition. We’d done it a bunch of times.

00:37:56.870 –> 00:38:00.710
My instructor was very good about, you know, walking me through every step,

00:38:00.910 –> 00:38:02.730
what I needed to do and all that kind of stuff.

00:38:03.050 –> 00:38:06.070
So, you know, we’re on the mat, we’re by ourselves. It’s a one-on-one class.

00:38:06.670 –> 00:38:10.430
And so he’s like, okay, you got to stand in a passive stance because you’re

00:38:10.430 –> 00:38:12.390
not going to be on guard everywhere you go.

00:38:13.370 –> 00:38:18.550
Okay, great. so as soon as he took a step towards me I would base out it was

00:38:18.550 –> 00:38:22.590
very casually like I was being sneaky or something I thought he was like no

00:38:22.590 –> 00:38:28.050
you can’t do that you have to be standing passive and I said I said Jim.

00:38:28.958 –> 00:38:32.778
I said, I don’t let people get that close to me. Right.

00:38:33.078 –> 00:38:39.578
And so a light goes off in my instructor’s brain. And he’s like, okay.

00:38:39.838 –> 00:38:43.238
He’s like, yes, you do. You do all the time. And I’m like, well,

00:38:43.338 –> 00:38:45.978
he’s like, you can’t control how close people get to you in public.

00:38:46.098 –> 00:38:47.218
It’s like, here, let’s do this.

00:38:47.518 –> 00:38:51.178
Like, you walk this way towards me. I’ll walk this way. We’re on the street.

00:38:51.698 –> 00:38:54.978
Okay. I was like, all right, sure. So I go walking down the street.

00:38:55.258 –> 00:38:56.838
I’m so into this scenario.

00:38:57.238 –> 00:39:01.498
My instructor looks right at me. He makes good eye contact. He’s like, hey, what’s up, man?

00:39:02.158 –> 00:39:08.738
And me being polite, I’m like, hey, the next thing I know, his hands are around my throat.

00:39:08.938 –> 00:39:11.038
I am facing the opposite direction.

00:39:11.278 –> 00:39:16.038
And all I can see are his angry eyes and big teeth. And my thought is,

00:39:16.178 –> 00:39:18.058
how on earth did this happen?

00:39:18.598 –> 00:39:23.518
I just learned how to get out of a two-handed show. I’m not getting out of it

00:39:23.518 –> 00:39:29.198
yet because my brain is still reeling from, wait a minute, how did all this happen? happen.

00:39:29.698 –> 00:39:34.498
So I think like the biggest, and I was able to, you know, get it going and I

00:39:34.498 –> 00:39:36.738
executed the move and I got out of it and all that kind of stuff.

00:39:36.838 –> 00:39:41.238
But I think that was probably the most valuable lesson that I learned was that,

00:39:41.278 –> 00:39:43.598
you know, people get too close.

00:39:43.658 –> 00:39:48.478
I can’t let my ego think that I’m always going to be ready, you know,

00:39:48.598 –> 00:39:49.958
because random things will happen.

00:39:50.118 –> 00:39:55.438
But yeah, it was just this moment of, oh, I know that I don’t let people get close to me.

00:39:55.498 –> 00:40:00.538
And my instructor very much put me in my place on that one, which I appreciate now. Yeah.

00:40:00.798 –> 00:40:04.898
No, you know, it’s not until you walk through some of those scenarios in a physical

00:40:04.898 –> 00:40:08.998
sense that you begin to understand what’s going on, the timing of things, right?

00:40:09.598 –> 00:40:14.118
How long it takes you to recognize a threat once a threat has been identified.

00:40:14.318 –> 00:40:18.058
You know, once you identify a threat and something happens, how long it takes

00:40:18.058 –> 00:40:20.878
your brain to respond to that stimulus, right?

00:40:21.038 –> 00:40:25.338
And I know Blower and a lot of other instructors talk about that very thing. So, yeah.

00:40:25.880 –> 00:40:30.080
You know, kind of circling back to where we were, what we started talking on,

00:40:30.220 –> 00:40:34.260
you know, before you even decide to take physical training, which I think everyone

00:40:34.260 –> 00:40:36.720
should know how to do some things, right? Right.

00:40:38.840 –> 00:40:43.560
There are a lot of things that you can be doing before that point,

00:40:43.560 –> 00:40:48.180
because when when it gets to the point where you need to respond physically,

00:40:48.480 –> 00:40:53.100
either empty handed or, you know, it goes to, you know, a tool,

00:40:53.400 –> 00:40:56.300
whether that be a knife or gun or whatever else, stick,

00:40:56.660 –> 00:40:59.340
baseball bat, beer bottle, whatever you’re nearby.

00:40:59.660 –> 00:41:03.980
Right. There’s a lot of things that have gone wrong to get to that point. Right.

00:41:04.400 –> 00:41:09.300
Now, someone may have a plan and have their eye on you from across the parking lot or something.

00:41:09.520 –> 00:41:12.080
And, you know, again, you’re caught off guard. Right. To your point.

00:41:12.240 –> 00:41:16.520
But there’s a lot of things that you need to be thinking about and doing,

00:41:16.760 –> 00:41:19.960
even if even sans physical training.

00:41:20.120 –> 00:41:24.180
Right. And some of those things that I know you’re you harp on a lot and I do,

00:41:24.300 –> 00:41:31.980
too, situational awareness and avoidance mindset, you know, thinking more safety consciously.

00:41:32.120 –> 00:41:35.260
Right. That’s a huge one. And I know you’re big on mindset, too,

00:41:35.380 –> 00:41:38.180
Abe, because I’ve seen it in your stuff and we’ve talked about it.

00:41:38.300 –> 00:41:41.640
But that mindset, getting the right mindset in place,

00:41:42.360 –> 00:41:46.520
thinking about things differently than you have before, and then training yourself

00:41:46.520 –> 00:41:51.520
to be more situationally aware, because it’s not necessarily just a skill you

00:41:51.520 –> 00:41:53.660
have out of the gate, so to speak, right?

00:41:54.580 –> 00:41:58.540
Right. Right. You know, we all we all have intuition, but we don’t always have

00:41:58.540 –> 00:42:03.480
the skills that we need to embrace what our intuition is telling us. Right.

00:42:04.229 –> 00:42:08.669
Yeah. And allowing yourself to listen to that intuition. You can’t do that.

00:42:08.729 –> 00:42:09.889
And I think you mentioned this earlier.

00:42:10.049 –> 00:42:15.229
You can’t do that when your face is stuck in your smartphone while you’re crossing the street, right?

00:42:15.569 –> 00:42:19.249
Bad things happen when you’re not paying attention to your surroundings.

00:42:19.249 –> 00:42:24.109
So, you know, understanding what, finding out what the baseline is and looking

00:42:24.109 –> 00:42:27.889
for anomalies, but most of all, just paying attention and being aware,

00:42:28.089 –> 00:42:33.369
you know, those sorts of fundamental things we can all do and do a better job

00:42:33.369 –> 00:42:38.629
of long before things escalate to the physical, if they even get to that point,

00:42:38.949 –> 00:42:43.749
you know, whether it’s the bum approaching you in the parking lot of the concert,

00:42:43.749 –> 00:42:49.229
you just came out, you know, asking you for the 50 cents for the bus ride home or whatever it is.

00:42:49.249 –> 00:42:54.649
Is, you know, recognizing that you’ve got someone approaching you before they

00:42:54.649 –> 00:42:56.829
get right up in your personal space.

00:42:57.029 –> 00:42:59.969
Because it sounds like you’re like me, you know, you don’t like people in your

00:42:59.969 –> 00:43:03.789
personal space, and you’re very cognizant of it, and you don’t let that happen.

00:43:04.029 –> 00:43:08.449
So being aware enough so they don’t get the drop on you, or have less of a chance

00:43:08.449 –> 00:43:09.729
of getting the drop on you.

00:43:10.769 –> 00:43:15.009
Those sorts of skills. And, you know, you know, trying to keep danger distant

00:43:15.009 –> 00:43:16.689
is like the best thing we could do.

00:43:16.789 –> 00:43:19.729
I’ve been thinking about the scenario that you set up just a minute ago,

00:43:19.749 –> 00:43:22.929
and I think a good mental exercise for someone like you are,

00:43:22.989 –> 00:43:25.729
you’re sitting in your chair, you’re watching a movie, your family’s on the

00:43:25.729 –> 00:43:27.169
couch, somebody comes in,

00:43:27.851 –> 00:43:31.891
Well, you know, how do you fight your way out of the chair? Think about that.

00:43:32.031 –> 00:43:35.491
Yeah. Then think about, well, wait a minute. How do they get in the house?

00:43:35.851 –> 00:43:40.031
Well, they kick the door in. How do I reinforce my door so they can’t kick it in?

00:43:40.631 –> 00:43:44.991
Okay. That’s step two. What made them choose my house in the first place?

00:43:44.991 –> 00:43:50.291
Let me go stand outside at night and see, oh, I don’t have any lights on.

00:43:50.371 –> 00:43:54.651
This guy just like really walked up from the street unseen, had a running start

00:43:54.651 –> 00:43:58.531
at my front door. Well, maybe if I put a storm door on and I add some lighting,

00:43:59.091 –> 00:44:00.531
we’ll move on to another house.

00:44:00.831 –> 00:44:04.951
And you just take that concentric circle from where you are in the middle and

00:44:04.951 –> 00:44:08.271
you just add a new layer and you add a new layer and you add a new layer.

00:44:08.491 –> 00:44:11.771
And that way, if somebody penetrates that outer layer, you’re watching them.

00:44:12.231 –> 00:44:14.831
And you try to make sure that they don’t make it to the next layer.

00:44:14.951 –> 00:44:17.611
And that can be as simple as removing yourself from the environment.

00:44:17.791 –> 00:44:19.991
That could be as simple as looking them in the eye.

00:44:20.231 –> 00:44:23.611
Or it can be acknowledging that person like, hey, buddy, how are you doing?

00:44:23.611 –> 00:44:26.911
Like the bum who approaches you, you know, the parking lot after the concert,

00:44:27.031 –> 00:44:28.911
like, hey, man, how are you good?

00:44:29.031 –> 00:44:32.331
And when they realize that, you know, they no longer have the upper hand.

00:44:32.491 –> 00:44:37.691
Right. Things change. And that’s just a way that you can keep them at a distance.

00:44:38.611 –> 00:44:42.411
Yeah, you bring up a really great point that I hope people take away.

00:44:42.411 –> 00:44:44.891
So I’m going to go back and talk about it again.

00:44:45.211 –> 00:44:50.291
You know, when we talk about scenarios, whatever they are, especially when you’re

00:44:50.291 –> 00:44:53.331
in your home, whether alone or with your family, you know.

00:44:53.911 –> 00:44:59.551
Take that scenario and to your point, work outwards in those rings outwards

00:44:59.551 –> 00:45:02.551
to see, okay, why did that happen in the first place?

00:45:02.751 –> 00:45:06.211
Like, is there lights on the outside of the house? Is my door locked?

00:45:06.371 –> 00:45:10.171
Whatever it is, is the alarm set when I’m home? That’s one that people don’t do.

00:45:10.451 –> 00:45:12.831
I’m guilty of that myself sometimes, right?

00:45:13.811 –> 00:45:19.851
And then saying, what about my routines or what is it about me or my family

00:45:19.851 –> 00:45:24.091
that we’re doing that would have caused someone to be attracted to my house to begin with?

00:45:24.171 –> 00:45:28.271
And that goes even beyond the lighting and the security and the deadbolts and all that.

00:45:28.471 –> 00:45:33.671
That might be because we know that most home invasions are driven by someone

00:45:33.671 –> 00:45:37.231
knowing that there’s drugs around the house or in the house,

00:45:37.391 –> 00:45:41.931
or there’s copious amounts of cash, which means they’ve been watching us.

00:45:42.051 –> 00:45:44.691
So what about our routine needs to change?

00:45:44.851 –> 00:45:50.151
And so to your point, working those rings outward, you can begin to see all

00:45:50.151 –> 00:45:54.491
the little things that you may need to dial in to begin making yourself safer.

00:45:54.871 –> 00:45:58.171
And I think that’s really important too, when you’re working through those scenarios.

00:45:59.486 –> 00:46:02.526
Anything else you’d like to add? I think this has been a really good talk.

00:46:03.426 –> 00:46:07.906
Yeah, man, this has been fun. It’s like, it’s great to sit down and talk with

00:46:07.906 –> 00:46:12.646
a like-minded person and be able to share stories and ideas and get excited

00:46:12.646 –> 00:46:13.566
about that kind of stuff.

00:46:13.626 –> 00:46:18.346
Because most of the people I encounter are like the apathetic folks.

00:46:18.486 –> 00:46:23.286
You know, I hate to say, I feel like people who think like us,

00:46:23.386 –> 00:46:25.086
who have a secure mindset are in the minority.

00:46:26.186 –> 00:46:30.186
In most people, if you’re, you know, law enforcement or if you’re military or

00:46:30.186 –> 00:46:34.266
you’re a first responder, you know these things because you’ve seen them for

00:46:34.266 –> 00:46:38.486
the for the average civilian. It takes just a little bit more to kind of get into it.

00:46:38.726 –> 00:46:42.666
But no, man, this is this has been great. I appreciate what you’re doing and

00:46:42.666 –> 00:46:43.826
your instructor side of stuff.

00:46:43.986 –> 00:46:47.706
I appreciate that you’re taking your own time, your own money and your own talent

00:46:47.706 –> 00:46:49.766
to do this self-initiative project.

00:46:50.086 –> 00:46:53.166
This is phenomenal, man. Keep up the good work. Yeah, you do the same.

00:46:53.166 –> 00:46:55.806
I think what you’re doing there with the Secure Dad is great.

00:46:56.146 –> 00:47:01.946
And hopefully between us and others like us, folks continue to be brave,

00:47:01.946 –> 00:47:04.586
as you say, to come and seek out that information.

00:47:04.806 –> 00:47:09.826
And they’re able to, through this and other outlets, they’re able to take away

00:47:09.826 –> 00:47:13.566
nuggets of information. I always say that. I don’t know why that’s stuck in my head.

00:47:13.686 –> 00:47:18.306
But nuggets of information to, if nothing else, get them to think more like

00:47:18.306 –> 00:47:21.446
us and hopefully get smarter about their personal safety.

00:47:21.866 –> 00:47:25.046
So this has been great. And Andy, I appreciate you coming on.

00:47:25.306 –> 00:47:27.566
How can folks find you and get a hold of you?

00:47:28.726 –> 00:47:33.986
Sure. You can find me at thesecuredad.com. You can pretty much go anywhere from there.

00:47:34.146 –> 00:47:38.686
If you’re on Instagram, you can find me at username, thesecuredad.

00:47:38.706 –> 00:47:43.746
And if you like Amazon, like I do, go to the search bar and type in thesecuredad.

00:47:43.906 –> 00:47:47.246
And my book, Home Security to Secure Dad’s Guide, is right there for you.

00:47:47.686 –> 00:47:51.386
Awesome. Awesome. Well, Andy, I appreciate it. And we’ll talk to you soon.

00:47:52.106 –> 00:47:53.666
Hey, man. Thank you, Jim. I appreciate it.

00:47:54.607 –> 00:47:58.947
I want to take a moment to once again thank our listeners for tuning in.

00:47:59.107 –> 00:48:02.207
There’s a lot of, as Andy and I talked about in this particular podcast,

00:48:02.567 –> 00:48:05.207
there’s a lot of choices out there in podcast land,

00:48:05.707 –> 00:48:12.987
everything from comedy to politics to psychology to whatever other things that

00:48:12.987 –> 00:48:14.447
you might be interested in.

00:48:14.447 –> 00:48:18.907
You had the option to choose something else, and you didn’t.

00:48:18.987 –> 00:48:22.227
You opted to choose this, to listen in, to see what we had to say today.

00:48:22.227 –> 00:48:26.387
And hopefully this kind of sparked your interest in other topics of personal

00:48:26.387 –> 00:48:30.307
safety and taking responsibility for the personal safety and preparedness of

00:48:30.307 –> 00:48:31.727
yourself and your loved ones.

00:48:31.967 –> 00:48:34.247
And so we want to thank you for listening in again.

00:48:34.547 –> 00:48:38.387
If you like what you’ve heard here today, feel free to go back and listen to

00:48:38.387 –> 00:48:39.507
any of our other podcasts.

00:48:39.507 –> 00:48:42.347
I think you’ll find some good subject matter out there that, again,

00:48:42.487 –> 00:48:48.587
if you can take away a nugget of information or that makes you think maybe like

00:48:48.587 –> 00:48:53.387
a way you hadn’t before or makes you start doing things you hadn’t done before,

00:48:53.507 –> 00:48:55.367
then we’ve done our job here, and that’s great.

00:48:55.647 –> 00:48:59.047
If you like what you’re hearing here, go back and listen to others,

00:48:59.167 –> 00:49:02.527
but most importantly, tell your friends and family so they can listen in,

00:49:02.547 –> 00:49:04.167
too, and get that same information.

00:49:04.707 –> 00:49:07.707
And we’d also like to ask you to take a moment to review

00:49:07.707 –> 00:49:12.867
and rate our podcast too we’ve gotten some good feedback to date but we would

00:49:12.867 –> 00:49:16.127
appreciate if you would review and rate us as well and let us know what you

00:49:16.127 –> 00:49:21.887
think you can also find us on instagram and our our weekly post over there so

00:49:21.887 –> 00:49:25.607
again thank you and we’ll look forward to talking to you in the future.

00:49:26.640 –> 00:49:45.312
Music.