Protecting the Gift: Keeping Children and Teenagers Safe (And Parents Sane)
By Gavin de Becker ( edits by TJ Cooper )
Gavin de Becker is acclaimed as America's leading expert on predicting violent behavior. He believes that when it comes to predicting violence and protecting children, we have the wisdom of the species.This natural ability is deep,brilliant, powerful. The human brain,nature's greatest accomplishment, and stunningly effective when its host is at risk, moves to a whole new level, one we can call miraculous, when one's child is at risk.
the brain built for protecting our children, the brain which was field tested for millions of years in the wild, is the wild brain. In contrast to the logic brain which is burdened with judgement, slow to accept reality, spends valuable energy thinking about how things ought to be, used to be, or could be, and abides within strict boundaries and laws, The wild brain obeys nothing, conforms to nothing, answers to nobody It is unfettered by emotion, politics, politeness, and as illogical as it may sometimes seem, it is, in the natural order of things, completely logical. Experience has convinced those of us that understand to tap into this resource, to reinvest in our intuition, to know how to avoid danger, whom, for example, to keep out children away from, we must listen to internal warnings while they are still whispers: our hesitation when the other parent insists there's no problem, the babysitter seems great to everyone else, when we're assured the school bus driver is a good guy. That hesitation stands there for a reason, and we won't always find the reason with logic. As children grow up, our longing for certainty grows stronger wanting to be sure that the park is safe, the beach is safe, the boy will drive carefully. we can't be sure. Yet we can be certain we've educated ourselves, made the best choice possible with the time and resources available, and not denied or discounted our intuition. This means being willing to hesitate even when it's inconvenient, unpopular, or downright rude, such as canceling a sleepover at the very last minute because of a feeling something's wrong.

De Becker finds that among all the possible risks to our children, perhaps nothing is more frightening to us than the danger posed by people, "danger that's by design, danger that's conscious." It may reside with the 14-year old neighborhood boy who makes us uncomfortable, or the delivery man who stops by during his lunch hour to give our child an unsolicited gift. The author believes that though many people act as if it's invisible, the danger that is conscious s usually in plain view. Some of the behaviors that precede this kind of danger are destined to distract, confuse, or reassure us, but those behaviors are
themselves signals. De Becker claims that there is a universal code of violence, and like every parent, you already know that code. Safety starts with knowing
your intuition about people is a brilliant safeguard.
To protect a child, you will have to take the fact that violence is part of humanity, deep into yourself.
While many parents are afraid of considering the details of how someone might hurt their children, ignorance, denial, or worry is not an effective strategy. Worry enhances risk because as you worry about imagined dangers, you are
distracted from what's actually happening. Perception, not worry, serves safety.Dispelling the Myths"Well, there's nothing you can do about it anyway," becomes fatal for children. Similarly, "Kids are resilient. They bounce back." Oh, I am so thankful de Becker challenges this one with "They don't." They adjust, conceal, repress, and
sometimes they accept and move on, but they don't bounce back. He sees the solution to violence in America lying not with more laws, guns, police, prisons,but rather with the acceptance of reality. This allows you to hear the voices of intuition, evaluate the risk, and organize defenses.
De Becker recognizes risk is part of our experience as humans. If we do all we can to protect our children and invest them with a deep belief that they are safe, they will be less afraid, and thus less likely to be violent toward others. All creatures are more violent when afraid. Domination is sometimes the only way for people to give themselves what society did not--a feeling of safety. Ultimately, the goal is not merely that children survive, but that they thrive. "You are much more than a guard. And I want nothing to do with caution if the price is your child's freedom to grow."The root of the word intuition, tueri, means to guard and protect.

Intuition communicates with us in many ways, from nagging feelings and hunches, to anxiety and fear. Signals of denial are rationalization, justification, minimization,
excuse-making, and refusal. When detecting one of these cues at work in yourself, ask "What am I choosing not to see here?"We successfully predict behavior everyday. For example, driving in city traffic,we predict the behavior of literally thousands of people. The majority of our
predictions are so automatic, subconscious, and accurate we aren't aware of them. They are handled by intuition. Because our society glorifies rational,left brain thinking, we discount other forms of knowing as primitive or ignorant.
A whole industry of how-to books on child rearing disourages parents from trusting their intuition.
Parents could offer no greater cooperation to a predator than to spend time thinking "but he seems like such a nice man." The elevator doors open, a mother sees a man inside and immediately feels apprehensive, then fearful. She
suppresses it, telling herself not to be silly, and enters the elevator with her child. Which is sillier; waiting for the next elevator, or placing herself and her child into a soundproof steel chamber with a stranger she's afraid of?
No other animal on earth would even consider the question, but we choose to ignore survival signals. This is what makes us victims of violence and harm.
While we may not want to think about or imagine the most serious risks our children face, if we don't, we cannot predict it, nor protect against it.De Becker finds that stranger kidnapping (as when a child is gone overnight,
transported a distance of 50 miles or more, ransomed, killed, or the perpetrator intended to keep the child permanently) is the thing parents most fear yet, it
is very, very rare. True, every year, there are thousands of kids missing. Most are runaways, and thousands of others are taken by divorced parents. Usually the perpetrator is the boyfriend of the child's mother, or someone else known to the family. Of nearly seventy million American children, fewer than 100 are provably kidnapped by strangers each year. A child is vastly more likely to have a heart
attack or be shot with a gun. De Becker knows well that the human imagination can conjure up a load of terrors
that might befall our children. Anytime you ask "Could this happen to my child?"
the answer will be "yes." But, he reminds us, there are better questions, such as "Will this happen?" Or "Is this happening?" In parenting, as in physics, everything we give energy to takes energy from something else. Worrying delays
and discourages constructive action. And:Children raised by chronic worriers may or may not become victims of violence,
but it is certain they will become victims of worry. And, it will slowly strangle their joy of life.De Becker distinguishes between true fears and unwarranted fears. True fear is a gift that signals us in the presence of danger; it is based upon something you perceive in your environment or circumstance. Unwarranted fear or worry is based upon something in your imagination or memory. He urges that we explore every intuitive signal, but briefly and not repetitively. Faced with a worry or uncertain fear, ask: Am I responding to something in my environment or in my imagination? Is this something I perceive in my circumstance or in my memory? Is the fear my son will have a car accident tonight based on some actual perception
he is unfit to drive tonight, or on that frightening news footage I saw? Few worries survive a cross examination of highly specific facts (which you can ask of yourself). The best antidote to worry is any action that will lessen the
likelihood of a dreaded outcome occurring.