She attended my security talk but the next day was a victim of an armed robbery (1st part)

Precisely she did the opposite to what I recommended during my talk: She worn an expensive jewel and drove down a known high-crime street. The theft could not be a surprise but the most likely consequence of a succession of events.

Once she had overcome the trauma, I asked her why she had worn that gem and her answer completely changed my approach to personal prevention: "It was given to me by my grandmother".

A thousand questions came down crashing on me. Why is it more important to use Granny's jewel? Is not more valuable to protect your life? Why not mitigate the risk of exposure? This was the starting point for my transdisciplinarity, it made me feel committed to understand human behavior, in order to help them stay alive and as far as possible from risks in any area of his life.

I will try to explain this succession of very complex behaviors, in the simplest possible way. Although it is a generalization that will not apply to all human beings in all cases, it is a very important guide for the understanding of these behaviors and to generate effective preventive tools that really keep people away from the potential risks.

That jewel brought her back very fond memories of a loved one, unconsciously, every time she used it she was remembering her, she was honoring her memory, in addition her mind injected her with doses of "emotional self-reward" since all of the above made her feel very good . Wearing that jewel was like a shower of pleasurable emotions, all of the above takes place through a series of complex mental processes that are usually unconscious and that are present in all human beings.

Now, that sentimental value should not be the reason to keep the jewel and prevent it from being stolen, putting at risk even her own life?

Here came another key discovery for me: During my security talks I usually exemplify with real cases, and discovered that when people feel fear, it is possible that their unconscious mind blocks the information that through synaptic processes will be stored in a new neuronal network . Because it is associated with fear, the unconscious will prevent it from being stored properly, in a few words: Even if the person is attentive, the information will not be stored as a learning and will go to our "mental spam" folder. That is why the learning was not stored to effectively prevent her the next day from being the victim of an armed robbery.

Between the pleasurable emotions of using that jewel, and the fear of experiencing a dangerous situation like the examples in my talk, her unconscious mind decided to stay with the pleasure and try to make the other invisible because it is unpleasant. If I have something pleasant, why to make room for the opposite. Keep in mind that all this is unconscious.

In the next article, we will expand a little more the details to understand these processes and thus understand how we can use them to develop effective personal protection programs.