What do you do every day to protect yourself?

Hi folks.

I was at a workshop once and this question was posed to women and men separately, particularly around the issue of protection from violence.

The women began to make a list. The men were kind of stumped. Our gendered experience shows up here.

I know men have also been victims of violence. I know this from my thirty year work in the field of my career and from my lived experience. It is however, part of our culture for women to think about this issue daily and to make decisions and plans to protect our selves and our children from abuses.

Of course we know that people, all people, are more likely to be victims of violent interpersonal attacks than ever to be victims of terrorism. We know that women are more likely to be those victims.

So, as your ‘travelling agent’, and as a woman who has a purpose to encourage women holding hands around the world, I want to offer up this question.

What we do every moment of every day is witnessed. Either by our own selves or the people we are intimate with, friends, family …. And also someone, maybe many strangers, are watching.

The more I offer my travel consulting, the more people are watching me more closely and what I decide to do. I am in the public eye. My ethics and integrity have to be sharpened as much as I can at all times.

I make mistakes and probably can’t do everything I think I can …. Lol. I can’t be everything to everyone. I can, however, lead by example. We all can and we all do, whether we think we do or not.

How I show up in each moment is my politics and my beliefs.

What do I do on a daily basis to protect myself? I ask questions. I do risk assessments for safety …. Financial as well as my physical safety. I do what I can based on the information I have … From where I am at.

If you see me taking action and making decisions about transfers, excursions, cruises, flights, schedules, hotels, where I walk, what I say and don’t say …. You are invited to ask me how I came to that decision. Your questions assist me to evaluate, and re evaluate if it is still true for me, if my decision is still valid. Is this decision, based on what I know today, still the best course of action to ensure protection? Am I putting my own oxygen mask on first, as they say on the airplanes?

Insurance and hospitals are for when we have unexpected circumstances. Can we share with each other the information that goes into a risk assessment so that we can all, exponentially, make the choices that make life safer for all of us?

I need to know what you know. I need you to know what I know. We can and will do this ‘together’.

Thanks to mom, Janie, Deb, Anita and countless more ….. For your assistance in the last 24 hours.

Every day I am so grateful for the wonderful people in my life who show up and share my journey and invite me to share in theirs.

Ti Amo

Pamela