Don't Even Bother

#11: Trust Your Gut: Intuition & Situational Awareness

• Katiuscia + Megan • Episode 11

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0:00 | 58:30

Your gut instinct often picks up on things before your brain can explain them.

Today we're talking about intuition, situational awareness, and why learning to trust your gut can be one of the most important life skills.

We dive into how people recognize red flags, the subtle cues our brains pick up in different environments, and why so many of us ignore that internal alarm when something feels off.

From reading people to understanding the psychology behind gut feelings, this conversation explores how intuition works — and why trusting it can make a real difference in everyday situations.

If you’ve ever had a moment where your instincts were trying to warn you about something before you fully understood why, this episode will hit home.

00:00 Intro
02:10 What Intuition Is
06:15 Situational Awareness
10:40 Why People Ignore Their Gut
16:20 Recognizing Red Flags
22:50 When Something Feels Off
29:15 Real Life Instinct Moments
36:30 Reading People & Environments
42:10 Intuition and Personal Safety
49:00 Trusting Yourself
54:30 Closing Thoughts

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speaker:

Don't even bother.

Megan:

Good morning.

Katiuscia:

Good morning. Hey, so I noticed something the other day and it was a thought that I'm very grateful for living in a place where I feel safer walking around our downtown, for example, opposed to. San Diego when I lived there at night, I'm saying, but also having recently come back from Europe, I feel the landscape there has completely changed and everyone is just walking around like they're in an airport just looking at everything and not really paying attention.

Megan:

No situational awareness,

Katiuscia:

right?

Megan:

Yeah. Yeah. That's Situational awareness is a weird. Rabbit hole to go down because it will change your whole life. It'll make you a better person for sure. But once you have it, you will always notice the people who don't have it, and they will either annoy you or you will be concerned for them. And so that's, it's a rabbit hole. I've been down my whole life. It's a journey. There's never, you're never like done. With your situational awareness, but like my parents were divorced, right? And they lived in two different states from the time I was pretty little, and they'd have to fly me back and forth, and you can really only get so many people to fly with your kid back and forth between these two states. And so I started being an unaccompanied minor when I was four years old.

Katiuscia:

Holy smokes.

Megan:

Yeah, which you're not. You're supposed to be five and. So my mom was constantly on the way to the airport, like, what do you do if somebody tries to kidnap you? What do you do with this? How are you? Don't lean on the walls, don't lean anywhere. Don't, you know, body posture, all of these things. Be aware of your surroundings is, you know, is, is this person a threat? Who's a, you know, trust your gut, who's a good person to go talk to if you have a problem? So that started. Uh, very, very young for me and it's just been a huge journey and I have not always been great at it. So I can fully confidently tell you that every time I've been a victim of a crime, like when I got mugged, when I, well, not really. When I had my apartment broken into that one, I was pretty on point for that. But when I got mugged, it's 'cause I wasn't paying attention to my surroundings.

Katiuscia:

I feel, and I've always said I live with a healthy amount of paranoia because I never want people to think I'm too OCD or crazy or just, I'm just very observant. And I think like you divorced parents, but also I was traveling to Europe young also. So I've seen how that has changed and how you can literally walk any street in Europe and I mean. As someone who has both citizenships, but who will never shit on the country that I live in because I love it here. I feel there is a reputation and it's. It's very known there when you have that American tourist because they're just walking around everything open, asking anyone to take photos of them, and you see these things right in front of you, and nobody will help you. Nobody helps anyone if it's in a big city because number one, that person will disappear with your belongings faster than you can even say, someone help me or realize that. You just got robbed openly. But it's just, it's so fast that I just watch everyone thinking, why are you not walking around with a little more con, not confidence, but walking around with a little more, um, what is it called? I can't even awareness. Speak English or that also. Thank you, but. Walking with purpose also. Yeah. Why are you just walking, admiring everything When I know. I get it. It's great. It's beautiful. You don't see it here. Right? Europe is a beautiful continent of culture and we, you know, we're such a baby country that we don't have that, but when you see people that are just unaware

Megan:

mm-hmm.

Katiuscia:

Of anything around them, because they're in the mood to get this perfect picture of the Eiffel Tower. You're basically all you'll have is your pants at that point, maybe if you're lucky. Yeah, because they will just take it right off of you.

Megan:

Oh, absolutely. I'm gonna spoil it right now. There's no perfect picture of the Eiffel Tower 'cause there are 7,000 people around it all the time.

Katiuscia:

True.

Megan:

Just buy the postcard. Just buy the postcard and fucking scan it and then post that on Instagram and pretend like you took the perfect picture. I don't what it's, there's no. You gotta be in the moment and experience it.

Katiuscia:

Totally. Although I do have one really good picture of the Eiffel Tower, but that was eight years ago and I got it. It was a nighttime photo. Oh, okay. And that was way cooler and there were people behind me. But it was dark enough that you could kind of darken them out.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

So you didn't really see it. And it wasn't, I wasn't right there. I was pretty far, but. Yeah. I, I just feel when you have that and you saying that your mom was telling you this as a child, when we see all those Instagram videos or tiktoks or whatever, that it shows these kids that literally, it's, it's those lessons for parents. Like, Hey, I basically got your kid to come over to my van. Oh yeah.'cause I had puppies and candy or something. And that's the old joke. Oh, the windowless white van with puppies. Yeah, dude, it's Kids are still doing that.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

And I love that people do those kind of videos to prove to the parent, you need to do better at teaching your kid not to do this because it, what if it wasn't us? What if this was real?

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

And then that's it. And then you're on 2020 or something. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Megan:

Absolutely. Yeah. Situational awareness is critical for your safety, but also it just makes you a better person. Because then you're not going to be the woman in line at the sandwich shop with her purse hanging open on the phone, trying to place an order for seven sandwiches, holding up the whole line. I was kind of just hoping that this woman was, somebody was gonna just walk right up and take something out of her purse'cause she was so ridiculous. Be prepared, have the list before you walk up to the counter. Don't have your purse hanging open. Don't be on the phone at the grocery check stand if you see a friend at the grocery store. Don't just park in the middle of the aisle. Those kinds of things. So being aware of your surroundings makes you a better person, but also can really and truly prevent crime, and there's no statistics for that because a crime prevented is not a crime reported. It's the same reason that they don't have any statistics on, you know, if brandishing a concealed carry firearm stops that crime or not. Because if all I have to do is show a would be rapist or mugger that I'm carrying a gun and I will shoot him then and he runs away, then I have nothing to report. So there are no statistics on that.

Katiuscia:

Do you think even in other situations maybe where the sandwich shop lady did get robbed in maybe another situation, do you think that a lot of those crimes don't go reported at all and that could be another, an additional reason why? The statistics?

Megan:

Sure.

Katiuscia:

You know? Mm-hmm. Because who's really, I mean, you think about how many assaults don't get reported, or maybe on college campuses, how they might get reported to the campus police, and that never actually gets reported.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

I mean we've, there have been many things like that. Yeah. We're just in the news where you finally hear about it or stories coming out years after. So it's all manipulating the actual real statistics.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Of what could be going on. So it's the non-report, or like you're saying, the crime prevented is not a crime.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Reported.

Megan:

Yeah. And so there are some statistics though. Let's see if I can find them. According to the AI overview of my quick internet search, so approximately 75% of all aviation accidents are stemming from a lack of situational awareness. Awareness errors by anesthesiologists contributed to death or brain hemorrhage, and 74% of analyzed malpractice claims between oh two and 13. Human error is a factor in. An estimated 94% of all car crashes, obviously distraction, inattention, et cetera, are a lack of situational awareness. And then they say that individuals who attend just a self-defense workshop report a 25% increase in their situational awareness skills, which I have no fucking idea how they measure that, but we'll run with it. And then when self-defense training is combined with mental health and deescalation techniques. Outcomes can improve by 40%, but I'm gonna add avoiding the crime at all to the deescalation technique because again, if you can avoid it, then you don't need to deescalate anything. So it's just generally a way to make society a better place.

Katiuscia:

Well, I'd love you to share some tips for everyone. Okay. Too. To know how we can be more situationally aware or healthily paranoid. I will prep.

Megan:

Paranoid is what some friends of mine used to say.

Katiuscia:

Wow.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Okay. Paranoid.

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

I like that.

Megan:

So this is, um, what's the word I'm looking for? Not an obsession, but it's something I'm really

Katiuscia:

passionate.

Megan:

Sure. It's like a hyper fixation of mine, but I can't remember things, so I have to go back to my list all the time. So I am gonna say that growing up with brothers and being married and just having dudes in my life, I can tell you that men have a completely different relationship with situational awareness than women do because even my. My brother who adopted from Korea, who was no taller than me, wasn't concerned for his safety walking alone on a college campus at night in the way that I was. And I've never, ever walked around thinking I was gonna be a victim of anything. But it's just a different level of awareness. And so I do think that women are generally more aware of things. Potential assault to them just because it's women aren't running around raping dudes. So it's just a different, I'm gonna just put that caveat out there. It's a different relationship to it. We're

Katiuscia:

more of a target.

Megan:

Yeah. But I do think that everyone should know how to defend themselves. Whether you want to just go all the way to carrying a firearm or not. Irrelevant to me. Your self-defense tools. You should have a tool array, whether that's a gun or pepper spray, or a pepper ball gun or a knife or a, let me tell you that a pocket knife is not a self-defense tool. That's a last case scenario. A fixed blade, if you're gonna think of a blade for a self-defense, fixed blade is where it's at, but. Anyway, like a

Katiuscia:

dagger.

Megan:

Yeah. Okay. But that's all irrelevant because your mind is your first self-defense tool and situational awareness is the way to get there. It's a mindset. It's how you're looking at the whole world. And so there's two different, actually there are a lot of different, but two main modalities we'll say. So the first one that is the most commonly known. Our call is called the Cooper Color Code, developed by Marine Colonel Jeff Cooper, and he was a firearms instructor who founded what is now the Gun Site Academy in Arizona, which anybody who's into firearms knows that facility very well. But if you've taken a pistol class in the last few decades, you've learned his techniques. So he really was a, a pioneer in that. But, so the Cooper Color Code is. White is your baseline where you're totally unaware if you've ever driven home and gotten home and gone, holy shit, I don't remember any of that drive at all. You were situational awareness level white when somebody startles you, but walking into the room that you're in, you were in level white. We don't really want to be there 'cause you're just totally unaware. Level yellow is relaxed to wear. That's where everybody wants to be all the time. So I'm chill, but I'm aware. I know who's around me. I know what's going on. I know who's in this building. You know, you're just observing, scanning, and observing all the time. Level Orange is a specific alert, like, hmm, that might be something over there, but I'm going to continue to observe. Maybe redirect my actions or my behaviors, depending on how that plays out. Whereas level red is alert, action, state run, hide, fight. And that's always the order we wanna do things in.'cause I'm not a cop. I'm gonna protect me and my kids and we're gonna run. If we can't run, we're gonna hide. If we can't hide, we're gonna fight. And I'm prepared for all three of those scenarios. But you don't wanna live your life in level red. Or even level orange. But if you're in level yellow, nothing's gonna sneak up on you and startle you or any of those things. And then they, not originally part of the Cooper Color Code, but included in current Marine Corps standards is level black, which is panic, and you never wanna be there 'cause that's when you shut down. So the color code is great for beginners to just start thinking about where you are. So for example, I've taken my kids to the mall. And sat at the food court with them and had them point out what level they think people are in just as an observational exercise. And probably 90% of the people are in level White 'cause they're on their phone or they're just strolling around and they're not even, it's the people who stop in the middle of an aisle, not realizing that there are people behind them. They're just not paying attention at all. And

Katiuscia:

I would like to think that they're not paying attention at all and not that they're just assholes who don't care.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

You know? Oh. Or who think it all, they're

Megan:

mostly just not paying attention.

Katiuscia:

Okay.

Megan:

In my experience,

Katiuscia:

I do wanna interject and say, we've talked about it before, but how the majority of people, and maybe it's the way our society's been trained or programmed to always be looking at the phone to be lazy in the sense of not paying attention, but there is. You know, you always have these conversations with people who say, I can remember a face, but I can't remember a name, right?

Megan:

Mm-hmm.

Katiuscia:

Or then the people who are like, I remember names, but I can't remember the faces. I think a huge point is probably remember the faces. You need to remember the detail because then you have those people who are the hyper aware, probably in the red. Not black if the, if you shut down. But if they're in that red where they're so hyper aware or orange that you're gonna be able to tell the details. And as you were talking, I thought of, do you remember the movie Taken with Liam Neeson? Yeah. Which I loved that movie.'cause I love Liam Neeson. But it was so good that he had trained his daughter that when she was getting pulled away, she started yelling out the markings of this person and. That's something that he, I mean, he would've never been able to find her. And also it was a movie, but there's also that, but I always remember that as, oh, smart. Instead of screaming like, let me go help. Yeah. She was like, beard tattoo, this, that. Any kind of identifiers. And that's so huge because I think a lot of people, when you hear of these things, when you hear of any kind of crime online or when you're reading about it on the internet, a lot of time it's like. Male about this high. That's it. And there's so many races of people, you know? Yeah. From like white to African American to Hispanic to this. You can't just group everyone as, I dunno, tall, white, male, blonde, blue eyes. Cool.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

How many are there?

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

so

Megan:

it's, he was a vaguely white guy with brown hair and he might be about six feet tall. Oh, okay.

Katiuscia:

He was bigger than me.

Megan:

Great. Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Cool.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Continue. I'm sorry. No, not at all. I just had to go off on that.

Megan:

So the, the other modality that really is fascinating to me is called the OODA loop.

Katiuscia:

Uda

Megan:

oda, OODA.

Katiuscia:

Okay.

Megan:

Developed by Air Force Colonel John Boyd. So he was a fighter pilot during Korea and Vietnam. His theories have been highly influential in military business and litigation strategies and planning. So OODA loop is. Wild to me. The first time I heard about it, I wanted to just dive down that rabbit hole. I wanna know everything about this. It's so cool. Everything you do in your daily life is part of your OODA loop. It repeats all day, every day, every single thing that you do. Most of us live such routine lives that we don't even think about it because we have so many. It's each time you process your OODA loop, you are creating a file and. You. We have so many files to draw from for our routine lives that we don't have to consciously think about it. So you walked into this room and went through your OODA loop to end up in that chair where you are right now. So it stands for observation, orientation, decision, and action. Okay. So you walked in, you observed there's two chairs to sit in. You, you oriented. Your body decided and sat down there, that's one OODA loop closed. So if you think about everything you do in your life, you're constantly going through this loop. And the cop who taught me about this was talking about how in like police involved shootings, often the shooter. Is one or two steps ahead in the OODA loop than the police. And that's how you get the one up on somebody because they've already thought it through or vice versa.

Katiuscia:

Okay,

Megan:

that makes sense. And so this has started becoming like a law enforcement training technique. It's very cool. Some of the things that they put these guys through to train their OODA loop, and it's just to build more files,

Katiuscia:

okay?

Megan:

So that when this happens and you go into your lizard brain. It has a file to draw from. I've been in this situation before. I know exactly how to decide and act, and it's not necessarily always gonna be exactly the same, but

Katiuscia:

that makes sense when you're talking about a shooter having being two steps ahead. Because if you think of, remember all those stories we were hearing when there were mass like office shootings? Mm-hmm. Or even God, you know, like God bless the schools, things like that. Anything where there was a plan. Mm-hmm. You're saying that, yeah, that makes sense. Because it was, I'm gonna think, I'm thinking of doing this. This is how I'm gonna do it. And then it's all the steps. And this might be the result, right? Yeah. I might end up being shot.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

So they've processed that all. Mm-hmm. And they, yeah, go down with the fight.

Megan:

The body is not going to go where the mind has not already gone. And so if you build all those files in your brain, then you have more to draw on. In a stress situation, your prefrontal cortex starts to shut down and your amygdala fires up, which is your lizard brain. It's your reflexes, it's your instincts. And so the more files you can put in there, the more able you are to keep calm and be in control of your situation.

Katiuscia:

Repeat it again, the body.

Megan:

The body is not going to go where the mind has not already gone.

Katiuscia:

Okay? So squirrel brain, when I was really sick dealing with all of that. I would always say the body goes where the mind goes because if you have a strong mind

Megan:

mm-hmm.

Katiuscia:

Then you can have a strong body. Yeah. Like even through illness, you can still find the things that keep you strong. Anything in your control, you can control it with the power, with your mind doing it. Right.

Megan:

Absolutely.

Katiuscia:

But if it's something like an illness when you can't control a disease taking over, you can still control how your. Responding and acting upon the symptoms that you have, so, alright, cool. Absolutely. I just like that that tied in

Megan:

mind

Katiuscia:

over matter without planning

Megan:

would

Katiuscia:

be great.

Megan:

Yeah. And so a lot of civilian people who've experienced an active shooter have said later that they heard gunfire in the mall or their office or whatever, and their brain had no files to draw from because they'd never heard gunfire in their life. They just turn it. It's a bizarre, it's happened to me in trainings. It's a bizarre experience and I've heard, I grew up going to the gun club with my dad. Gunfire is not anything new to me, but in trainings where you have, you know, 20 people and you don't know who the bad guy is gonna be, I felt myself just standing and watching this whole scenario play out as though. I was watching a TV show. It's wild. And I will never forget that. I was so frustrated with myself for doing that. And so that's what a lot of people have reported because they don't have a file to pull from of what to do when shit goes bad. And we're talking about worst case scenarios here, but this applies to everything. It's not just about catastrophizing everything. It's about building that muscle. It's a muscle. Being aware, and it's been called free mental reps. 'cause all you have to do when you're not at your house, when you're out in the world, is build that awareness muscle and don't sit there and think, oh, I'm gonna, I'm gonna observe everything and I'm gonna know exactly like you're not a cop. You haven't been trained for this. You have to start small. So the goal is to build your baseline, and your baseline is gonna be a lot easier to do in like a rural little farm community than it is in a big city, because it's a lot easier to notice something out of the ordinary in your little sleepy town than it is in a big city where there's lots of things going on. Maybe there's a lot more weird people,

Katiuscia:

a hundred percent.

Megan:

And so there

Katiuscia:

are more weird people

Megan:

everywhere you go has a baseline. Just like you were saying, the baseline in Italy is totally different than the baseline in Boise. It just is different. The people are different. The sights, the sounds, the smells, all of that is different. So you have to be aware of the baseline wherever you go. And so if you travel outside of your normal life, it's gonna take a little extra effort to be aware of that baseline until you kind of get comfortable and notice what's normal and what's out of the ordinary. And just because something's out of the ordinary doesn't mean that you need to report it or that you even need to take drastic action, but any kind of action choosing to cross the street is an action that you can take. And one of the things that I'm really, really, really trying to teach my girls and their friends, any kid that I'm in charge of for any given amount of time is. There's nothing wrong. I'd rather you be rude than be dead. Cross the damn street if that person is weird enough that you get the little hairs on your neck standing up, or a weird feeling in your gut cross the street. Why? I feel like our generation of females specifically is so concerned about hurting other people's feelings. You're not, but

Katiuscia:

you're not either.

Megan:

I'm not either, but we were far more accustomed to being polite than staying alive. And so if somebody's going to make you feel weird, put that weirdness right back on them. A podcast that I listen to all the time says, be weird, be rude. Stay alive. Cross the street. If that guy is not a creep. And you cross the street to avoid him, he's gonna go, oh my gosh, what was I doing to make her feel like I was a creep? Oh, no. And he's gonna self-reflect and he might change that behavior. Or maybe not. I mean, maybe he or

Katiuscia:

he might not even resonate because

Megan:

he's

Katiuscia:

not paying attention

Megan:

to you. Yeah, exactly. But if he is a creep, then he's like, he's gonna know that you know that he's a creep, so take the action. That's my. My soapbox.

Katiuscia:

I feel in our lifetime though, where it has been, be polite enough has happened in our lifetime with different crimes, and I think something that I've always taken is if someone pulls up to you and. Pointing a gun at you and says, get in the car.

Megan:

Don't get in the car.

Katiuscia:

I would rather take my chances weave running hundred percent and getting shot than getting in a car and God knows what happens to me. Because a hundred percent you will end up dead. Yeah. But before that, isn't it just better at that point to have a chance to potentially get away? Mm-hmm. And get help and get shot running. At least you tried, at least you fought and didn't give in to the fear of having a gun pointed at you. I'd rather be shot than tortured Probably.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

And then shot.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Or having horrific things, unspeakable things done to me. And I think that that's a lesson. Guns, yes, of course. It's gonna be scary having a gun pointed at you. I've never had one pointed at me, so I can't even speak to that. But I'm sure it's terrifying, but I'm not getting in the car. You want me to also buckle up? Like No way.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

There's no way. So that's one thing I've learned. It's better to die on your feet than live on your knees.

Megan:

I think a lot of people don't want to think about the bad things that could happen to them, so they just don't think about it. So then if, God forbid, you're put in that situation, you have no files to draw from and you don't have to be signing up at the Kav MAGA gym and, you know, going, putting yourself through all kinds of training, you can do it. In your own head. So I have a list of ways that you can start training your own situational awareness. So we're gonna start with the first two O'S in your OODA loop, your observation and your orientation. Okay? So we're gonna start by training your observational skills. We're not gonna take action yet. We're just gonna notice things. It doesn't matter if you live a boring housewife. Stay-at-home mom life. And I can say that'cause I've done it. When you're at the grocery store, notice things. Notice. Give yourself something to notice every time you go to the grocery store or wherever you're going. Facial hair, belt buckles, watches. How many men are wearing watches? How many people have belt buckles? How many people are carrying purses? How many, whatever. Give yourself. One thing that day or that week to just focus on noticing and then next time pick a different thing. I tend to pick watches and belt buckles because if somebody's going to draw a weapon, they're gonna drop from their waistband, but that's just me. It doesn't have to be that. You don't even have to do it in the vein of self-defense, but just up your noticing game and then. You can work up to the orientation, like recognizing patterns. Oh, another thing to notice is what vehicles are driving around you. How long has that car been behind you? That red car, how long have they been behind you? Have they followed you all the way to your own neighborhood? Maybe take a different, I've had several times where a very sketchy car was following me into my own neighborhood, so I have gone to a completely different neighborhood. Or pulled into the fire station or whatever it needs to be. But if you're aware of that, you can take an action that will deescalate that situation before it becomes a situation. And then once you're observing things and you're noticing patterns, that's when you're gonna notice if something is out of pattern. And again, that doesn't mean it's a threat, but it means that you're now needing to make a decision on what kind of action you're going to make. And so that's when you start walking into every building, whether it's the grocery store or church or your office building or the doctor's office or whatever, a restaurant and saying, where are all of the exits? Run, hide. Where are all of the exits? If I'm sitting here and somebody walks in this door, well, I'm not gonna be able to run through them to get out that door, so can I go this way? And if I can't go this way, where can I hide? If they only have a knife, I can hide behind this table. But if they have an AR 15, I'm not gonna be able to hide behind this table 'cause that gun could go through this table. Whatever thing it is, plan it out. And once you start planning your actions, you're building those files in your brain to be able to draw from if you ever are under duress. The other thing is that you can't be situationally aware if you're walking your dog or going for a run and you're wearing both of your EarPods.

Katiuscia:

Dude, this is wild because I see it all the time still, and in our years of, mm-hmm. Growing up into adulthood, when I lived in San Diego, I had that situation happen with someone in San Diego. Chelsea King was running God rest her soul. That was a terrible, terrible tragedy. You would hope that. That taught people to be aware and not run with both of your earbuds and do things a little differently. Right. Yeah. Because if you have both in, you can't hear anything behind you. Yeah. Now with these noise canceling ones, forget it. You can't hear anything.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

And I love a good jam session, right? We've discussed this. I love it. But if I'm walking my dogs, it's one earbud in. Mm-hmm. And one out. Yep. Or if they're both in because it's cold or something, and I don't want the air. It's on such a low volume that I can hear the people, I can hear their footsteps next to me.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

But then this just happened again a few years ago at a college campus.

Megan:

Mm-hmm.

Katiuscia:

Running with her earbuds at like 4:00 AM Do you remember that?

Megan:

Yeah. It happened to Molly Tibbits in Iowa too. There are countless examples of it, and we're not victim shaming. No. We're trying to get people to learn from this tragedy. It's such an easy fix to

Katiuscia:

help you. And again, they wouldn't have ever known. Right? Yeah. So, no, definitely not victim shaming. I'm just using it as that happened, and I think for a while people probably changed for a while they started being more aware.

Megan:

Mm-hmm.

Katiuscia:

Because there was this heightened thing and it was all over the, you know, coverage of the media, everything that it was. But then they forgot and it's, you can't forget these things because your life is irreplaceable To go through something and to have to witness a community going through that, it's so sad. And then it repeats. Yeah.'cause someone did the same thing.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

We are, women are going to be most likely the target women and kids.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

The' Megan: cause your average dude. Right.

Megan:

Is not going to be a target of a crime in that way, like a physical assault.

Katiuscia:

Sure.

Megan:

The people who are running down city streets just yanking people's phones outta their hands. That could happen to any old idiot. Sure. And so that's why you don't walk down the street with your phone in your hand. If you need to stop and look up something, you stop. You put your back to a wall, a corner, preferably, and then you look something up, but you're still constantly scanning. It seems so common sense to me, but I don't think that it is. When we were in Salt Lake and you were looking up directions, and so I was constantly scanning. I have a plan,

Katiuscia:

typically if I'm in a city, if I was alone, right?'cause I've been to cities alone and I need the directions on how to get from point A to point B. I'll have one ear button. Mm-hmm. I'll have Google Maps lady talking, or Siri. I made him my, he's my Irish Siri. So. Seamus is way nicer than Google Maps girl. And I have one earbud in low, the phone put away. Mm-hmm. And I'm just walking with purpose, like I know where I'm going.

Megan:

Yes. And that's where you fake it, till you make it if you have to. But walking with confidence, walking with purpose, with your head up is so important. And I struggle tremendously with eye contact. It really makes me uncomfortable. And so. But I got told by, I have lots of cops in my life, but I got told by a cop who knows me very well. You cannot try to avoid eye contact. You tend to shrink. I would love to be invisible. That's, if anybody wants to know what my superpower would be, I would be invisible. I would love it.'cause I only want attention from the people. I want attention from. And so when people are giving me aggressive eye contact, I wanna throw up and die. I hate it. And he was like, you cannot do that because predators look for that. Even though you're a fucking spicy meatball when you're cornered, you cannot do that.'cause that kind of invites them to think that you are prey. And so we have invented this game that I have had to play with myself called Creep Out the Creeper. Where if somebody gives me eye contact, I will give aggressive eye contact right back, which falls right in line with be weird, be rude, stay alive. And it's still difficult for me, but I've gotten a lot better with it. But then the caveat was put on it that if you are, you have to have nuance. Because if you're in a situation where it's like somebody strung out on drugs or mentally unwell, that eye contact could escalate the situation.

Katiuscia:

Sure. So.

Megan:

Use it with caution. But I have a neighbor who, anybody who is in our neighborhood ever, she knows that they're not supposed to be there or they're new or they're, they don't live there. And she will walk straight up to them and say, hi, how's it going today? And have a strike up a conversation with them. But nobody's ever robbed her because she sees them. Because seeing someone with a bad intention lets them know that you see them and then they're, you can identify them. They're less likely to really go about doing that. We're not talking about criminal masterminds here. We're talking about low level idiots.

Katiuscia:

I think with the eye contact also, it's almost like a I, I dare you to try it.

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

I dare you.

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

and I would feel pretty confident unless the strung out on drugs, the immensely unwell. Mm-hmm. If it was just an average person that you give that stink eye right back to. They're not gonna do it because now they know your guard is up. Mm-hmm. And you're not as easy. And at the end of the day, I don't think these low level criminals doing bad, bad things, I don't think they want that much of a challenge. No. They don't want a hard

Megan:

target.

Katiuscia:

No. They want it easy. That's the whole point. That's why it's the elderly. It's the women. The kids. They want someone just where they can do what they wanna plan to do and be done. Whether it's Rob, whether it's whatever, but. I, I feel that that would be almost like the dogs staring at each other.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

That it's a, a boss up situation.

Megan:

Yeah. It absolutely is. And it

Katiuscia:

just, my luck, I'd do it to like a rant, like a crazy tweaker

Megan:

them. Right.

Katiuscia:

And like,

Megan:

but, but you would know. You would know. You can tell when somebody's on drugs. You can tell when they're mentally unstable. You can tell. I mean, anybody who's been in a major city with homeless people who beg for money. Is pretty accustomed to just keeping your head up and you keep walking and you don't necessarily make eye contact, but that doesn't mean that you're, that you're a soft target. You know, there's a nuance to that. You have to just kind of read the room, so to speak. And another example is God rest your soul. That poor Ukrainian girl who got stabbed in Charlotte, and that was so devastating to watch. It was very clear when she got on that video on that train that she didn't feel safe based on her body language and that guy clearly was unstable. So probably not a case of creep out the creeper necessarily, but, and, and obviously that entire situation could have been prevented with the justice system, but that's a totally different conversation for a different day. But it just makes me wish that she could have felt. Strong enough to look at him, feel the vibe, and choose a different seat, or get off the train and take a different train or, you know, any number of different things. But the way that it happened was just so devastatingly tragic.

Katiuscia:

I think what's also really sad about that is maybe she didn't have, maybe that was the only train, right? Yeah. So unfortunately we're we live. In a world where not all cities back to the justice system are taking the proper action to protect the people who live there.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

And it's a very crazy concept to me that you want to be mayor or city council of all these different cities that you live in, and yet you give absolutely zero shits about the people who actually live there and keeping them safe. Or when people. Start pointing out all of the crime and all of the statistics and all of the life examples that have happened that have resulted in tragedy. And they brush it off as, you know, media blowing it outta proportion or propaganda, or now they're blaming political sides and it's human life should have no party sticker. Yeah. Or where you wanna get reelected. And that's something that's way more fucked up. In so many ways because they're all doing it for gain and not for actual care of the city. So had that city been properly, I don't know, ran in the sense of crime is cleaned up. Whatever's going on in that area of that particular city, there's, it's a beautiful city. There's obviously issues in every city. I'm not saying that that's a one off, but when you look at the history of that assailant and how he should have been locked up many times before and wasn't. We will reserve that for another day because Sure. But still it's just. To have that. To be able to have to get on public transport because that's how you have to get home and to not feel safe is really bullshit. Yeah. In this day and age, when we have all of the resources and money and everything at the disposal of these cities and they still do nothing. Bullshit, I call it.

Megan:

Yeah. Well, and even

Katiuscia:

also pathetic

Megan:

to swing it back around to situational awareness, how many other people were on that train?

Katiuscia:

That's

Megan:

with their noses and their phones. Oh my God. And I'm not saying that you need to be the defender of somebody, but the more crime is like mold. It doesn't thrive in the light. The more eyeballs are on somebody, the less likely they are to commit a crime. But when you can walk through a crowded train, a crowded city street, and everyone is so in their own little bubble on their phone, both ear pods in whatever, and they don't notice. Anything that's a huge problem. So I'm not a huge fan of like corporate culture, but this has started to be implemented in a lot of bigger companies, especially workplace safety. And they all have their own stupid ass acronym for it, but it's basically just situational awareness. And one thing I thought was interesting that you can take and use it to hone your own. Awareness skills is the 20 20 20 rule, and it started as a way to prevent ice. Train every 20 minutes, look away from the computer for 20 seconds, and look at something 20 feet away from you. Get some blue light glasses, you'll be fine. But the 20 20 20 rule has adapted to think of a factory setting or a blue collar setting or whatever. It's not really in your office building, but every 20 minutes. Take 20 seconds and look around 20 feet around you all the time. What is something that can be in the factory sense? Is there anything that's unsafe? Is there anything that needs to be cleaned up? Is there, whatever you get the point, but take that in your own life. Every 20 minutes, take 20 seconds and look around and notice all the things around you. Notice the things that you see, the things that you smell, hear, whatever. And just notice, and that's how you build your good baseline and then go from there. To getting to the point where if somebody busted through this door right now, what would I do? And you walk through every single step of that scenario, building that file in your brain, and those mental reps are spectacular. And that alone is gonna build everybody's situational awareness, making the world a better place. But then if you would like to take it a step farther. You are a woman. If you have a woman in your life, if you have a daughter, a sister, a mother, a wife, a whoever, and you want to help them be able to protect themselves more efficiently, be more aware, be safer in general, help them start learning these things. And then if, if you're interested in self-defense, pick whatever modality of self-defense appeals to you. Like I said, it does not have to be firearms. If you want to learn martial arts, go take that class. Go do that thing. Learn the skills because physical reps, in addition to the mental reps, are gonna just exponentially improve your odds.

Katiuscia:

Although I, I will add that even if someone is not comfortable around guns. They need to hear guns being shot.

Megan:

Absolutely.

Katiuscia:

So maybe go with a friend of yours who likes to go shooting at the range and go hear it that way. God forbid if anything ever does happen. Mm-hmm. You're not stunned in that moment. You're gonna probably be stunned anyway as you were sharing. Mm-hmm. When you went through training, you'll be stunned anyway for many different reasons. But if you hear a sound so foreign and you can't. Pinpoint whether it was right there or hundreds of feet away. Mm-hmm. You should probably hear that and get comf not comfortable. Just be aware of it. Know what it sounds like. I know that if I go a long time without going to the range, and I go to the range, those first couple shots that I hear, the second I walk in, I'm even, even me.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Oh shit.

Megan:

I wear double ear protection going to an indoor range because it's jarring. Yeah.

Katiuscia:

It's a lot.

Megan:

And, but also if you know what gunshots sound like, then you're not gonna be that asshole on next door going, was that gunshots or fireworks? It's true. Very true. So let's all avoid that.

Katiuscia:

Yeah.

Megan:

Also, um, I'm a huge advocate. Even if you're not comfortable, even, you don't have to ever carry a gun, but go take a class. Don't let somebody's fucking boyfriend. Go take you out to the desert and try to teach you how to like, no, please God. Don't do that. Go take a class. There are tons and more and more all the time of ladies only. Intro to pistol classes everywhere. Go take a class. You don't ever have to touch a gun again. Just building that file in your brain, knowing what a gun can do and cannot do is massive to building those files in your brain and being able to just help you stay calm in a potentially froggy situation.

Katiuscia:

And that's excellent advice because even if you never wanna touch a gun again, God forbid you're in a position where somebody has a gun on you and somehow they're disarmed, and now you have access to that gun. Are you just gonna hold it and say, or kick it and say, I don't wanna touch it. Yeah. Or hold it and be like, what do I do with this?

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Go take a class is phenomenal advice and yes, they are everywhere in every state. In every city.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Uh, maybe not in every city, you know, depends on who's running it, but

Megan:

sure.

Katiuscia:

There are going to be classes that people could take everywhere. I will say that in my line of work over the years, it's gotten to the point where the past few years. Situa situational awareness and safety is really, really stressed because meeting strangers all the time. The, you know, back in the day when I did this, we used to be able to put like real ass strangers in our cars, go to vacant homes and what, what are you, what is that now? There have been way too many incidents and again, how unfortunate and just devastating that something tragic had to happen to really like poke the industry to say, you need to protect. We need to protect ourselves and we need to make smart decisions. And that just all kind of, you know, we're just a little more hyper aware, most of us, about that anyway, going into vacant houses and putting, I don't put strangers in my car anymore. I have them meet me because I'm never putting a stranger in my car. Yeah. Some way I'm not getting into a stranger's car. I'm not dumb.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

I do stupid shit, but I'm not dumb.

Megan:

That's a, there's a difference.

Katiuscia:

There is. So, yeah, I guess just protect yourself and be aware. Observe. I like the loop. Yeah.

Megan:

Yeah, the oodle loop loop is amazing. I'm obsessed with it because,

Katiuscia:

so, observation,

Megan:

observation, orientation.

Katiuscia:

Orientation,

Megan:

decision, action.

Katiuscia:

Okay.

Megan:

And once you're aware of it, you'll start noticing it in your life and everything is in action. Like I said, you chose to sit in that chair. That was the decision and the action upon that decision.

Katiuscia:

From thought to action.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

Yeah.

Megan:

You observed that it was cold outside this morning and so you oriented in your closet, decided to wear a long sleeve shirt, put that shirt on your body, OODA loop closed. Done. It's so cool.

Katiuscia:

Every action though, you know how many you go through.

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

In a day.

Megan:

Yeah. But you didn't even have to think about it because you have so many files in your brain that know it's fall slash winter. So you didn't even look at tank tops. You looked at long sleeve shirts because that was a file that's already been built in your brain, so just build your files.

Katiuscia:

I'm also extremely guilty of getting home and being like, how the fuck did I just get home?

Megan:

Oh, yeah.

Katiuscia:

All the time.

Megan:

Oh yeah.

Katiuscia:

Especially if there's so much other action items. Mm-hmm. In my brain or things that I didn't cross off my list that now I need to move to tomorrow, but is there a way to get it done and all of a sudden I'm home. But it's not that I am. Unaware on the road in the sense of, it's not like I'm running red lights, no. Or doing reckless things. It's a program, it's almost very robotic. Mm-hmm. That you get home. And that's why typically when I'm on a drive home, I'm either voice memoing or talking to someone on the phone. Because it's also keeping me in the moment and not just zoning out with a podcast. It's also why I stopped doing long road trips with music and added in podcasts to the drive, because podcasts at least, are making me think, even though I can kind of zone out listening and get really entrenched in this conversation or the discussion, it still keeps me aware instead of just jamming out mindlessly because it's something I've heard all the time. So. But man, when you get home and you don't remember how you got there.

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

I don't know if I time traveled or what.

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

there was like a glitch in my matrix or

Megan:

what. And it happens to everybody. The most well-trained cop, military, anybody who's trained in this still gets, goes into white zone sometimes. I mean, you have to rest your brain. And I'm gonna tell you that once you decide that you wanna try to live in yellow as much as possible, it's exhausting at first. It's just like any other muscle. It is so tiring, and that's why a lot of people are being more aware and they're not even consciously aware of it, like traveling airports. That's part of why airports are so damn tiring because you have been in hyperdrive the whole time, and so if you can build those muscles and build those files, it won't be quite so tiring eventually.

Katiuscia:

Okay, good. Well, thank you.

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

lots of info and lots of, um, good tips for people to just be aware. Again, we've established that we live in a world where everything is just handed to us and fed to us and see what you, you need to believe everything that you see on TV and everything that you're told on all the media, but really it's taking the work out of it for your own brain or kind of, I'll go look on the internet for this and I'll get an answer in four seconds. Instead of actually reading through everything and making sure, or doing all the research. Mm-hmm. So just a reminder to never stop thinking for yourself and allowing the world to tell you how it should be, because that's where we're all so split and lost as a society, just as humans. And it's really sad because we've allowed so much to take over, but in allowing it to take over, you're also allowing it to take over your critical thinking skills. Mm-hmm. And. You're not using your mind and if you don't use the muscle of your mind mm-hmm. Your mind will deteriorate. Yep. In every aspect. So be aware. And what is it? Be weird. Be,

Megan:

be weird, be rude. Stay alive.

Katiuscia:

Nice. That creep out. The creeper.

Megan:

Yeah. Put put that onus back on them. To not be so creepy that you're uncomfortable, which is a form of self advocation.

Katiuscia:

Yes. Self selfing,

Megan:

and that's what we've talked about a lot.

Katiuscia:

Mm-hmm.

Megan:

Is be the advocate for yourself. You are your own first responder.

Katiuscia:

Also, listen to your gut.

Megan:

Yes.

Katiuscia:

Your gut

Megan:

is hone, which is also a muscle hone, that gut instinct.

Katiuscia:

It's there for a reason. You have these signs and the hair that, and the goosebumps and all the things that you feel. If it doesn't feel right, it's not right. Yep. If it doesn't feel right, if you just think that looks a little awkward, that could be something. Mm-hmm. I'll be aware of it. I noticed it, but if something doesn't feel right, why would you move forward in that direction?

Megan:

Yeah.

Katiuscia:

You're completely discounting your own intuition.

Megan:

Yeah. Don't override that. That's the body knows before the mind knows. Most of the time because it's a survival instinct, the body is programmed to survive. And so the body will tell you, you have to listen to it. So

Katiuscia:

listen to your own signs.

Megan:

And a lot of us have been really programmed and trained to override that or have somebody else's voice in our head louder than our own gut. And there's actually been studies that say that the actual gut microbiome. Like they've taken slides and looked at it under a microscope and they will change depending on danger or not danger. It's a real true scientific thing that your gut knows. That instinct lives in your gut for a reason.

Katiuscia:

I'm gonna add something here, because having just been to Italy, I think I blew my mom's world when in terms of how she raised me. And how tradition and culture is expected. I told my mom in Italy, you know, it's very customary to you go when you see people, you hug, you double kiss. Mm-hmm. All of the things. And I got to a point this time it really hit home for me where I thought I am really big on, I don't wanna be touched. With any, I just don't wanna be touched by people who I don't feel wish me well. I don't like that transfer of, I don't know, call it a superstition. It's a gut instinct and I don't wanna touch you and I don't want you touching me. So my mom was floored when someone came up to me. That I hadn't seen in years who's older and knows the family and yada yada, yada. I don't give a shit. He came towards me and I was like, nice to see you stuck your hand right out there. Which is a mind blowing thing in Italy because you just don't do it. But then as I explained it to the people that are our generation, maybe a little older, so all your Gen Xers, for sure. Our era. But when I was explaining it to them and I said, I don't feel comfortable and I don't want people touching me, especially if I know that they don't wish me well, I'm not gonna do it for just some cultural tradition that's expected, because at the end of the day, if it makes me feel bad and gross and not. Okay. With myself or just weird vibe and all those people were totally on board. Mm-hmm. So the generation has changed in terms of what we feel is expected. Was I rude? Absolutely not to that person. It probably could have felt rude because it's not customary. But I'm just here to break all the customs. Like I'm not letting you touch me and I'm certainly not touching you.

Megan:

Yeah. Yeah. I'm not huge. It's funny because I, I love hugs, but not from everybody. We have a joke that you have to have a backstage pass to be able to hug me. There's like a handful of people.

Katiuscia:

I'm one

Megan:

that I, that I am down with hugging and I don't, yeah.'cause there are people, there are people in my family who. I might still, uh, side hug, but my whole body is like recoiling every time it happens because I just, ugh. Because I just don't feel safe with that person. And maybe not even physically or whatever. It's just a gut instinct, but I just, no, thank you. I don't wanna,

Katiuscia:

and you listen to it. Yeah. And yeah, that could make us come across as a little rude or stuck up. Right. I own that. I understand that. If that's how you wanna interpret it, I'm sorry, but if I don't. Feel comfortable. I'm gonna put my own wellbeing and my own mental state, and my gut and all of my intuition. I'm gonna keep that in check before I allow anyone to make me, you know, blame me for being rude. Sorry. Yeah. I don't wanna touch you

Megan:

As a recovering people pleaser, that's something I'm still working on. But I'm definitely trying to teach my kids like, you don't have to, you don't even have to hug me if you don't wanna hug me. You don't have to hug anybody you don't wanna hug. And if somebody ever walks up to you and tells you to smile, you flip 'em off.

Katiuscia:

Or there's that. You could also,

Megan:

because it's just not like I'm tired of the world is, has changed. So I don't think we need to be politeness over gut instincts anymore. Ever done with that?

Katiuscia:

Yeah. Just protect yourself.

Megan:

Yeah,

Katiuscia:

that's it. Be aware. Protect yourself

Megan:

on that note. Have a great day to everyone except the people who put their turn signal on after they've already started breaking for a turn. Ugh, that's unacceptable.

Katiuscia:

Unacceptable. Straight to Joe. Bye bye.