While I enjoyed listening Gavin De Becker's The
Gift
Of Fear, I'm fairly certain Shira didn't appreciate it nearly as
much. That's because I kept trying to recount the latest
anecdote I'd heard from the text, and I'm sure it all
fell
felt hearing this second hand. I'd almost always end my
attempted retelling with, 'babe, you've just got read the book.'
The Gift of Fear is Becker's prescription for staying safe in a
world filled with hazards. Here's my very brief summary:
- Fear is good.
- Worry is bad.
- Violence has warning signs.
While these concepts may appear provocative, I found Becker's
arguments to be convincing.
Fear is good. Fear is one of the signals that our brain sends our
body. Other less dramatic signals include curiosity, gut-feelings,
intuition, worry and
anxiety. Becker's suggestion is that these sensations are quite
valuable, and should be respected like our other senses. That's not
because they're mystical in nature, but because they are our own bodies
communicating what our other senses have already learned.
Just like you dull your senses when you put on noise canceling
headphones and walk through your neighborhood, you dull your senses
when you write off, and ultimately ignore, worry, anxiety and fear.
Continuing the analogy, if you are strolling your neighbored and
here a loud noise from behind, your first reaction would be to turn around and
look to see if you are in danger. Becker calls for you to do the same thing when you get a 'bad
feeling.' That is, acknowledge the feeling and use your other senses
to determine what action you should take.
And finally, some sounds are programmed for us to take action.
Years ago I was running at night and
heard
a sharp cracking noise, I instinctively took off like my life
depended on it. And that's because it did. I happened to be steps away
from a massive tree that gave way due to wet conditions.
Fear, Becker argues, is a
signal that deserves action first, analysis later.
Worry is bad. In a sense worry is a signal, so it's
inherently useful.
Respect it, unpack it and move on. But constant worry is a
problem because it leaves no space for other signals to get
through. If you worry every time you approach a specific intersection, then
you can't depend on the fear signal getting through when you really
should be concerned at that intersection.
If you find yourself in a regular state of worry, then it's time to
take action to figure out why and take steps
to alleviate this worry.
Violence has warning signs. Becker argues that nearly all
violent events have markers, often times going back years. The
employee or boy friend who acts violently had no choice but to show
you months or even years of warnings. Much of The Gift of
Fear goes through examples of these warning signs, though Becker
makes the point that you need not memorize them; just listen to
your intuition. Still, hearing these warning signs inoculates you
to them, and makes recognizing them easier.
While I'm ready to recommend Becker's book to all who are college age and
above, I do have some points to quibble with. At times, the book
reads as a sort of advertisement for his mega-elite security firm, which
may turn off some.
The book's 'Get off the X' approach to violence may also be a point
of contention for some.
'Getting off the X' refers to the principle that the most urgent
need in a dangerous situation is to get away from the threat.
Becker's approach
throughout The Gift of Fear embraces a similar idea. For example, the
goal is to safely
decouple yourself from a dangerous partner or employee.
Becker doesn't explore
what society should do with these problematic individuals, or how to
assist the next partner or employer that may get tangled in this
person's behavior. I think
that's reasonable given the focus of the book, but it does raise some
interesting ethical and sociological questions which go unanswered.
One area that I wish the book had explored more concretely was
the actions people should or shouldn't take in preparation for violence. Becker leaves hints
throughout the book on his perspective on this, but I wish he'd been
more direct.
For example, Becker claims that
armed guards
at your company's entrance can reduce safety by giving the
false impression that security is "handled" and that employees can
ignore their fear signals.
At the same time, he praises security infrastructure like key cards,
and procedures like deactivating key cards when an employee is
fired. Why is one action considered a step back, and the other a
step forward?
He also laughs off the notion of a couple that gets concealed carry
permits to protect themselves and others during a mass shooting. He
explains that they are more likely to shoot themselves then the bad
guy. On the topic of mass shootings, would Becker consider the
Until
Help Arrives training to deal with mass
casuality incidents as feeding anxiety
and wasting time focusing on an unlikely scenario? Or, would he praise it for
arming citizens with critical skills that educate and thereby
reduce worry?
And what about shelter in place drills for children? Are they an
important and useful safety precaution like fire drills?
Or, do they just fill kids with anxiety which will leave them less
safe?
My reading of Becker is that actions that reduce worry and provide
concrete skills are a good thing. Actions that serve to amp up
concern should be avoided. But that still leaves a lot of gray
areas. For example, could key carded doors not give the same "security is
handled" impression that armed guards do?
When I casually looked at the book's description, I saw that it was
released in 2017. So I was more than a bit surprised when I got to
the end of the epilogue and it was signed, 'Gavin De Becker,
1998'. The epilogue starts with the statement that the book had been
out for a year. So The Gift of Fear is now 26 years old. I have to
say, it's aged well.
One clue to its age was the opening chapter, which seemed to be a
mishmash of political dog whistles. Becker explains that
everyone is impacted by violence and that the world is a dangerous
place; that's the kind of messaging I'd expect to hear from
gun-toting conservative neighbor. In the same chapter, he also calls
out the ridiculous availability of hand guns; a talking point I'd
expect to hear from my liberal neighbor. He includes
statements like "the government isn't going to save you," a message
straight out of the libertarian handbook. And yet, Becker proudly
explains that he has worked with top federal agencies to help
institute polices; these are the kind of claims I'd expect to hear
from someone who believes Government can and should be a force for
good.
It was refreshing to these opinions spilled out together, and I wonder
how much push back Becker would have received if he'd tried to start
a best seller today with such a collection of statements.
Another sign that the book was written in the late 90's is the lack
of discussion on school and other mass shootings.
The Columbine
High School Shooting, widely considered to be the first of its
kind, happened in 1998. Though, Becker's prediction that one
horrific event is often advertisement for future events does indeed
hold true.
There's also no discussion of terrorism, a topic that would be hard
to ignore after 9/11/2001.
I had to smile as Becker mentioned the absurd fear that Americans
have for 'foreign viruses.' Yeah, not so absurd now is it?
For most Americans, violence remains a sort of contradiction. In
many respects, we are safer now than ever. Yet at the same time,
countless Americans are impacted by violence on a daily
basis. There's no silver bullet for navigating this paradox, yet
The Gift of Fear appears to be a useful addition to our
safety toolbox. That's because its core premise is
that you already have its invaluable tools at your disposal, you
just need to give
yourself permission to use them.
