#PNN E-Mentoring (Taiwo Akinlami): Personal Safety/Self Protection For Teenagers – Guidelines To Responses (8)

Hello friends, sure you had a great time during your mid-term break. I am here to continue this journey to self-protection. The importance of which cannot be over-emphasized. If you have been following us, you will see that there is much about your protection that you overlook.

Today I will share with you briefly how you can protect yourself from emotional abuse. I charge you to pay SERIOUS ATTENTION to the following:

I. Identify the people who are likely to emotionally abuse you: when you begin to relate with people, watch out for their traits. Beware of any one, who wants to control you either directly or indirectly. Controlling people are those who do not feel safe and secure until they have everything and everybody under their control. Therefore they find the most crooked ways to control people. One of the ways they have found is emotional abuses. They attack the minds of people around them with unpleasant words. Beware of those who feel insecure because of your presence.  In most cases, those who are intimidated by your presence puts up a fight by trying to run you down emotionally by making uncomplimentary comments about you in some cases in your absence and in most cases in your absence. Beware of those who antagonize you unnecessarily. Always make up your mind to relate with people of this nature from afar. Do not be their friend and do not be their enemy. Be careful with them

II. Be confident in yourself: confidence comes from having a good opinion of yourself. When you have very good opinion of yourself, you are confident about yourself and you become secured. When you are secured, you protect yourself against emotional abuse, you do not emotionally abuse others and when others try to abuse you emotionally, you are able to reject it, first in your mind and outwardly.

III. Be discreet: In most cases, you are the one, who gave your abusers the facts they are using against you. It is important that you are also very discreet when dealing with personal and sensitive matters. Nobody needs to know your issues except those who have demonstrated capacity to help in finding solutions to same. Do not make your personal matters subjects of open discussion. It does not always work for you. It will simply mean that you are flippant.

IV. Choose your friend carefully: Friendship means a relationship between people who share same values. You must be careful to choose your friends according to your values. One beautiful thing about friendship is that it is by choice. That someone wants to be your friend does not mean you should be his/her friend. That you want to be someone’s friend does not mean the person will be your friend.  Do not choose or accept friendship from those who do not share same value with you. I am assuming you are a young person with defined values.

I think I will sign out here.  I have three more tips to share. I think we should leave it till next week. Please be reminded that I am available on this platform for interaction. Do have an INSPIRED week. Stay SMART!