You can ask any lifeguard what the most critical point is when saving someone from drowning and they will tell you; when you first approach the victim, the victim’s first response is to grab onto them for support and they end up taking the lifeguard down with them. It’s serious especially someone who is big and strong and it does happen a lot. Sometimes the lifeguard has to clock the person or punch them in the face and stun them in order to save their life, now that is scary stuff.

But, we all must understand that in life and death situations the chaos and controversy can get out of control and when this happens you can expect just about anything including uncontrollable outbursts of panic from folks you always believed to be completely strong willed. So the question in such a situation is; how do you calm them down, and prevent them from triggering similar situations in all those around them?

After all, just like laughter is contagious so is panic and when a mob gets panicked anything can happen, and it is amazing what that fear response on a large scale can cause. People will stampede out of stadiums and crush innocent victims under their feet, in a scene out of the worst horror movie. The trick is to recognize the tipping points of the mob and try to control the few that are psychologically over the edge.

Amazingly enough, talking to them like a child does not always work, and if you do you often get a similar response, they continue to panic and cry with emotional outbursts even more. Instead, you have to stun them, shock them or get their mind to switch into a different realm. There are many ways to do this and psychologists have all sorts of techniques, but its best to learn this stuff in advance of such a challenging situation and before all hell breaks loose; please consider this.