"The Gift"

A few months ago I took a self-defense class which I loved and which got me interested in learning more. The teacher recommended The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals that Protect Us from Violence by Gavin de Becker, and so a few weeks ago I finally checked it out from the library. I loved it! Then last week I read Protecting the Gift: Keeping Children and Teenagers Safe (and Parents Sane) by the same author, which is basically the same stuff (several repeated stories, actually) but geared toward parents.

They cover some very tough topics, namely violence in general, domestic abuse, and sexual assault. But I still really recommend that all women read The Gift of Fear and all parents read Protecting the Gift. I feel like I learned a lot, and I actually do feel less afraid or at least less worried/anxious than I have in the past. The main points I took away from the books were these:

1-If an instinct comes to me, I should explore it. Where did it come from? It's there for a reason. (De Becker posits with some amusement that women are generally more likely to accept their intuition as valid than men are. In the cases that men do favor intuition over logic, they call it a "gut feeling.")

2-I never have to do anything that makes me or Matt feel uneasy, and Matt and I will trust each other if only one of us feels uneasy. That especially includes choices we make for or about our kids. I will do anything to keep them safe and that may sometimes include choices that seem illogical or embarrassing but are in line with intuition. It's more than OK to face a few awkward moments in exchange for the possibility of wishing in the future that I had made a different choice. My kids are entitled to those same rights, and if they seem uneasy about something I will find out why. Societal and peer pressure are not real forces that we are physically compelled to obey.

3- "I am capable of what every other human is capable of. This is one of the great lessons of war and life." - Maya Angelou (The Gift of Fear, 42) In the context of this topic, it's helpful to think this way about violence because I'm less likely to be a victim of a crime I can imagine happening, than something I don't expect or think I need to prepare for. Every "bad deed," even the worst ones, starts with a "bad thought," and everyone has those. I'm not as different from criminals as I wish I were. We're all humans, and many criminals don't really look like criminals.

I'm impressed by de Becker's writing skills. He is a very good storyteller and makes excellent use of figurative language and imagery. (My favorite use of imagery, while my least favorite story, was a very effective metaphor about the principal of an elementary school hypothetically presiding over an imaginary school assembly in the chapter about school violence in The Gift of Fear.)

I don't mind that he repeated some of his stories in the second book--I expected that and skimmed as needed.

Some quotes from the books with my intro in italics:

I love this: Each person has his own perspective, his own reality, no matter how much it may differ from ours. As historian James Burke explains: 'All that can accurately be said about a man who thinks he is a poached egg is that he is in the minority.' (The Gift of Fear, 96-97)

A metaphor for the lasting effects of child abuse on children: When young, [circus elephants] are attached by heavy chains to large stakes driven deep into the ground. They pull and yank and strain and struggle, but the chain is too strong, the stake too rooted. One day they give up, having learned that they cannot pull free, and from that day forward they can be "chained" with a slender rope. When this enormous animal feels any resistance, though it has the strength to pull the whole circus tent over, it stops trying. Because it believes it cannot, it cannot. (TGoF, 228)

Here the author is talking about social programs for needy children, but I have to remind myself of this even in my own family--that my kids aren't just an extension of me: We [need to] take an entirely different view of children, not as temporary visitors who will someday grow into citizens, but as full-fledged, fully contributing, fully entitled members of our society just as they are right now. (TGoF, 229)

Why we worry: Daniel Goleman concludes that worrying is a sort of "magical amulet" that some people feel wards off danger. They believe that worrying about something will stop it from happening. He also correctly notes that most of what people worry about has a low probability of occurring, because we tend to take action about those things we feel are likely to occur. This means that very often the mere fact that you are worrying about something is a predictor that it isn't likely to happen!
The relationship between real fear and worry is analogous to the relationship between pain and suffering. Pain and fear are necessary and valuable components of life. Suffering and worry are destructive and unnecessary components of life. ...
When worrying, ask yourself, "How does this serve me?" and you may well find that the cost of worrying is greater than the cost of changing. To be freer of fear and yet still get its gift, there are three goals to strive for. They aren't easy to reach, but it's worth trying:
1) When you feel fear, listen.
2) When you don't feel fear, don't manufacture it.
3) If you find yourself creating worry, explore and discover why. (TGoF, 287)

Examining and exploring worries as they come: Is worry an intuitive signal? In a roundabout way, it can be. That's because what we choose to worry about, however bad, is usually easier to look at than some other less palatable issue. For this reason, a good exercise when worrying is to ask yourself, What am I choosing not to see right now? Worry may well be distracting you from something important. (Protecting the Gift, 55)

Explore every intuitive signal, but briefly and not repetitively. When faced with some worry or uncertain fear, ask yourself: Am I responding to something in my environment or to something in my imagination? Is this feeling based on something I perceive in my circumstance, or merely something in my memory? (PtG, 56)

A silly but effective exercise: Each time you have a worry, define when you expect the dreaded outcome to occur, and mark it down on a calendar. Imagine you are worried that your daughter will be harmed while attending college in the big city. When? In a year, a month, a week, later today? Imagine you choose a week. Write it down, and when that milestone passes without incident, make note of that too. Record these failed predictions for a year, or until you are too embarrassed to keep doing it, whichever comes first. (PtG, 56)

Have you read these? I'd love to chat about them if you have. Lots of food for thought.