Lynne McTaggart answers the question:

What is the nicest thing a non-family member has ever done for you?

The nicest thing anyone did for me occurred in a time of real crisis, a time when I was probably more frightened than I've ever been in my life. I was in a health food shop with my daughter Caitlin who was then three. We used to do this all the time. When I would go shopping, we would also then go to the cafe at the back of the store and have a snack.

We just returned from a trip to the bathroom there and we were about to have our snack when I looked up and there was a guy with a gun pointing right at my face. And he said, "You, get in the back." And he was pointing to all of the other customers in turn and ushering us all to a little cupboard in the back, a little closet. As soon as he got us in, he looked around at all of us and then he shut the door and he put a broom through the handle outside so we were in effect locked in. I was completely terrified.

I consider myself fearless but when it comes to protecting my children and my daughter, I'm not. I was hiding my daughter behind me just to make sure she was safe, and wondering when he was going to come in and rob us and possibly shoot us because that's the usual scenario that certainly happens a lot of times in the U.S. I was just petrified and said, blurted out, "Oh no, what's he going to do now? What are we going to do?" Whereupon a young fellow sitting by the door, and there were a load of us in this closet, just turned to us all and said, "Don't worry. As soon as I hear that it's quiet. I'm going to kick this door down." And he said it with such authority, such assurance, such a sense of calm, that that calmness just flooded me as well. It came over me, a sense, a true sense that it all was going to be okay. And he did just that. As soon as he heard the coast was clear, he kicked down the door and I grabbed Caitlin and I ran for my life out of the store.

It turned out that the fellow was caught. He didn't even have bullets in his gun. But the thing that stayed with me was the courage of that young man, his grace under pressure, and the way he transmitted that to all of us. We all knew we were going to be okay. So I took Caitlin back to that store the next day, not just to show her that health food stores aren't dangerous, but also to thank that young man for what he did and what he's done for my life.
 

Lynne McTaggart is an award-winning journalist and the author of seven books, including the worldwide bestsellers The Power of Eight, The Field, The Intention Experiment, and The Bond, all considered seminal books of the New Science and now translated into 30 languages. Lynne, who is consistently voted one of the world’s top 100 spiritual leaders for her groundbreaking work with consciousness and the power of intention, is chiefly known for the quality of her writing and in-depth research.

Lynne is also a dynamic speaker, who has spoken and held workshops before diverse audiences in most continents around the world, from Kuwait to Kuala Lumpur, and everywhere in between. She’s the architect of the Intention Experiment, a global “laboratory” involving thousands of readers around the world testing the power of group thoughts to heal the world. Lynne, her book, and the web-based experiment were prominently featured in Dan Brown’s book, The Lost Symbol, and Brown even created a character partly based on her.

As co-founder and editor of the world’s No 1 health magazine, What Doctors Don’t Tell You, now published in 14 countries worldwide, Lynne is a tireless campaigner for consumer rights in health care. Most recently, she has discovered The Power of Eight phenomenon — the fact that intention magnifies and rebounds in a small group, which is presently being studied by a major university.