This book is a primer on how to keep yourself safe by listening to your own intuition and following your instincts. Violence is seldom random - we almost always have warning signals long before the boyfriend refuses to be broken up with or the employee with the gun climbs the clock tower.

I'll relate my own Gavin de Becker-esqe story here, by way of example.

Several years ago I had a well-liked roommate who needed to break the lease and move to another city. We both interviewed roommates from the local paper to replace her. I really liked J., but J. couldn't move in for 2 months. My roommate strongly encouraged me to choose M., who could move in immediately.

M. pursued the housing situation very aggressively, wanted to move in right away, offering money up front. She had nothing good to say about the situation she was leaving - she was leaving because of roommate problems. (Red Flag #1)

I had to be out of town the first week she lived there. I came back to find that she had cleaned and rearranged my room.(Red Flag #2)

Early on she told a story about how a boyfriend asked her to move out and she destroyed many of his things in revenge (Red Flag #3)

She cooked me dinner and pulled out an album of photos of her engaging in her fairly extreme BDSM lifestyle. (Live and let live, but at least a "pink" flag that she would show those things to me).

Later red flags:

-Felt free to comment on what I ate and offered to become my personal trainer and nutritional coach, which would involve following her instructions on food and exercise every day and reporting back to her.
-Monopolized the television and VCR -even when she wasn't home, set the TV to record her shows or left instructions about it, so she was always in control of the TV.
-Her stuff (mail, photos, sporting equipment) could be in the common areas of the house, but she could complain if mine was and/or move it into my room.
-When she was upset about something she would leave me a long note on the counter threatening to move out. Eventually, I started circling those words and writing "how soon?" on the notes, and she would apologize and cook me dinner or buy flowers or a gift. Meanwhile she would paint her room or buy a piece of furniture or do something to make it clear that she was never leaving.
-Mentioned a gun she owned in her storage unit.

And the big one:
-When I said that maybe living together wasn't working out and that she should start looking for a new place, my indoor cat suddenly "escaped" in freezing weather and "couldn't be found, even though I looked everywhere." Out the back door I found clear footprints in the snow leading to a spot under the porch where the poor thing was curled up (fortunately unharmed) - so the cat could be found in about 2 minutes. Danger!

At the time I didn't have the financial resources to make a quick move, so I saved my money and started retreating from the house in small stages and avoiding conflicts with her. I signed a lease on a new place without telling her, and when she went away on a 3-week trip out of the country, I moved out. I never gave a forwarding address or a phone number. She sent me many emails, mostly accusing me of stealing things from her and threatening "consequences" if I didn't bring them back. I ignored her and stopped engaging, and eventually she went away.

If I had read The Gift of Fear at the time, I might have been able weed her out much earlier and not lost the apartment that had been my home for 2 years to a psycho. At the time I kept trying to see her behavior through the lens of what a "normal" person would do and I questioned myself too much.


In closing, Gavin de Becker does not want you to be fearful or carry worry or anxiety about what could happen to you. Anxiety is paralyzing. Fear-real fear-is useful. When someone makes your hackles rise, listen to your instincts.