The Importance of Situational Awareness

Today I was asked to help explain the importance of situational awareness (SA); although I've been a 100% believer in SA all of my life, and especially throughout my military career, prior to today, I have never really been asked to put SA into words. Well this is what I think.

Acknowledging situational awareness is to acknowledge ones' own self at the core of your spirit. Bare with me; have you ever been in a situation where you could feel the hair on the nape of your neck beginning to stand? Everyone has, right? What usually happens as you are starting to feel that something is wrong, or off, or weird; I'll tell you what happens, you start hearing a voice in the back of your head that is warning you to create space between yourself and whatever you are seeing that is creating the feeling to begin with. That voice that we often ignore, even though it is trying to protect us is our situational awareness. This is because everyone has it, most people simply choose to ignore it. Think about it, how many times have you said to yourself, "I knew I should have listened to myself" or, "I knew I should have gone with my first instinct"?  The most important reason that situational awareness is so important is because it is a human self-preservation instinct!  

That voice in the back of your mind, a.k.a., your own situational awareness is always trying to protect you. It is always speaking to you; "Don't touch that, that's hot"; "Stay away from that guy, he's weird"; "It looks really dark outside, ask someone to escort you to your car." Your situational awareness is always trying to protect you. That's why it is so very important. Without it, simply sit and imagine where you would be today.....Think about all those times, all those close calls throughout your life. SA could equate to the four seconds you took to put your cell phone down and look up to notice a car veering out of control and heading toward the sidewalk that you are walking on; your SA felt it happening prior to you even hearing the screeching of the tires.  It's the voice in your head that told you to look behind you prior to verbally bashing your supervisor. Seriously.  It's the voice in your head telling you to cover all of the electrical sockets in your home because you have a toddler running around the house now.  Personally, SA is a gift that allowed me to move a fire team of my closest friends and former teammates out of an Afghani compound, five minutes prior to an enemy mortar landing right in the center of it. It's all of that because it was given to us to protect life in all ways, and at all times. That's the importance of situational awareness. So stop ignoring it. 

Hope this helps.