The Gift of Fear Top 100 Self Help authors. The Gift of Fear was selected for the book, 50 Psychology Classics. By finding patterns in stories of violence and abuse, de Becker seeks to highlight the inherent predictability of violence. The book explores various settings where violence may be found—the workplace, the home, the school, dating—and describes what de Becker calls pre-incident indicators (PINS). By noticing PINS (events and behaviors that often precede violence), individuals can better predict violence before it occurs, and therefore, take the necessary precautions and actions to stay safe. "The Gift of Fear" also describes de Becker’s MOSAIC Threat Assessment
The Story of the Youth Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was attempts to learn fear, which eventually leads to his awareness of mortality. This tale type did not appear in any early literary collection but is heavily influenced by the medieval adventure of Sir Lancelot du Lac called "", where he spends a night in a haunted castle and undergoes almost the same ordeals as the youth. A father had two sons. The younger, when asked by his father what he would like to learn to support himself, said he would like to learn to shudder. A sexton told the father that he could teach the boy. After teaching him to