Top 90 Gavin de Becker Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Denial is a save now, pay later scheme.”

— Gavin de Becker

2. “I encourage people to remember that “no” is a complete sentence.”

— Gavin de Becker

3. “You have the gift of a brilliant internal guardian that stands ready to warn you of hazards and guide you through risky situations.”

— Gavin de Becker

4. “Every day people engaged in the clever defiance of their own intuition become, in midthought, victims of violence and accidents. So when we wonder why we are victims so often, the answer is clear: It is because we are so good at it.”

— Gavin de Becker

5. “Only human beings can look directly at something, have all the information they need to make an accurate prediction, perhaps even momentarily make the accurate prediction, and then say that it isn’t so.”

— Gavin de Becker

6. “We must learn and then teach our children that niceness does not equal goodness. Niceness is a decision, a strategy of social interaction; it is not a character trait. People seeking to control others almost always present the image of a nice person in the beginning.”

— Gavin de Becker

7. “Niceness is a decision, a strategy of social interaction; it is not a character trait.”

— Gavin de Becker

8. “No matter how famous the victim, no matter how powerful the advocates, it simply isn’t always possible to control the conduct of other people.”

— Gavin de Becker

9. “Most human predators, however, seek power, not food. To destroy or damage something is to take its power.”

— Gavin de Becker

10. “Throughout history, fairly arbitrary lines drawn on maps have determined who prospers and who needs, who eats and who starves, who attacks and who is attacked, who lives long and who dies young. Oh, we have been slaves to those lines for so long...”

— Gavin de Becker

11. “Persistence only proves persistence-it does not prove love. The fact that a romantic pursuer is relentless doesn’t mean you are special-it means he is troubled.”

— Gavin de Becker

12. “There’s a lesson in real-life stalking cases that young women can benefit from learning: persistence only proves persistence – it does not prove love. The fact that a romantic pursuer is relentless doesn’t mean you are special – it means he is troubled.”

— Gavin de Becker

13. “The unsolicited promise is one of the most reliable signals because it is nearly always of questionable motive. Promises are used to convince us of an intention, but they are not guarantees. A.”

— Gavin de Becker

14. “No” is a word that must never be negotiated, because the person who chooses not to hear it is trying to control you.”

— Gavin de Becker

15. “TIME syndrome, which is the introduction of threats, intimidations, manipulations, and escalation.”

— Gavin de Becker

16. “The Scriptwriter is the type of person who asks you a question, answers it himself, then walks away angry at what you said.”

— Gavin de Becker

17. “When a person requires something unattainable, such as total submission to an unreasonable demand, it is time to stop negotiating, because it’s clear the person cannot be satisfied.”

— Gavin de Becker

18. “The solution to violence in America is the acceptance of reality.”

— Gavin de Becker

19. “I’ve successfully lobbied and testified for stalking laws in several states, but I would trade them all for a high school class that would teach young men how to hear “no,” and teach young women that it’s all right to explicitly reject.”

— Gavin de Becker

20. “People who refuse to let go often make small requests that appear reasonable, like Tommy’s letter of reference, though the real purpose of such requests is to cement attachment or gain new reasons for contact.”

— Gavin de Becker

21. “A woman alone who needs assistance is actually far better off choosing someone and asking for help, as opposed to waiting for an unsolicited approach. The person you choose is nowhere near as likely to bring you hazard as is the person who chooses you.”

— Gavin de Becker

22. “Declining to hear “no” is a signal that someone is either seeking control or refusing to relinquish it. With strangers, even those with the best intentions, never, ever relent on the issue of “no,” because it sets the stage for more efforts to control. If you let someone talk you out of the word “no,” you might as well wear a sign that reads, “You are in charge.”

— Gavin de Becker

23. “Typecasting always involves a slight insult, and usually one that is easy to refute. But since it is the response itself that the typecaster seeks, the defense is silence, acting as if the words weren’t even spoken.”

— Gavin de Becker

24. “The hijacking of an American jet in Athens looms larger in our concern than the parent who kills a child, even though the one happens rarely, and the other happens daily.”

— Gavin de Becker

25. “Men who will not harm you needn’t persuade you to trust them; they simply act appropriately from the moment you meet them and for as long as you know them. They.”

— Gavin de Becker

26. “People should learn to see and so avoid all danger. Just as a wise man keeps away from mad dogs, so one should not make friends with evil men.” – Buddha.”

— Gavin de Becker

27. “In ourselves our safety must be sought. By our own right hand it must be wrought.” – William Wordsworth All.”

— Gavin de Becker

28. “Just as some things must be seen to be believed, some must be believed to be seen.”

— Gavin de Becker

29. “Remember, the nicest guy, the guy with no self-serving agenda whatsoever, the one who wants nothing from you, won’t approach you at all. You are not comparing the man who approaches you to all men, the vast majority of whom have no sinister intent. Instead, you are comparing him to other men who make unsolicited approaches to women alone, or to other men who don’t listen when you say no. In.”

— Gavin de Becker

30. “That’s what happens when you’re angry at people. You make them part of your life.” – Garrison Keillor In.”

— Gavin de Becker

31. “You have more brain cells than there are grains of sand on your favorite beach, and you have cleverness, dexterity, and creativity – all of which powerfully combine when you are at risk – if you listen to your intuition.”

— Gavin de Becker

32. “A strategy of watch and wait is usually the wisest first step, but people frequently apply another management plan: engage and enrage.”

— Gavin de Becker

33. “Predatory animals usually devour prey in order to convert flesh into fuel. Most human predators, however, seek power, not food. To destroy or damage something is to take its power. This applies equally to a political movement, a government, a campaign, a career, a marriage, a performance, a fortune, or a religion. To push a pie into the face of the world’s richest man is to take his power, if only for a moment.”

— Gavin de Becker

34. “Worry, wariness, anxiety and concern all have a purpose, but they are not fear. So any time your dreaded outcome cannot be reasonably linked to pain or death and it isn’t a signal in the presence of danger, then it really shouldn’t be confused with fear. It may well be something worth trying to understand and manage, but worry will not bring solutions. It will more likely distract you from finding solutions.”

— Gavin de Becker

35. “Threats betray the speaker by proving that he has failed to influence events in any other way. Most often they represent desperation, not intention.”

— Gavin de Becker

36. “Persistent, Mike thought. Mark of those who succeed. Indeed, it was the mark of something, but not success. It was refusing to hear “no,” a clear signal of trouble in any context. Forty.”

— Gavin de Becker

37. “This is the violence that captures our fear and attention, even though only 20 percent of all homicides are committed by strangers. The other 80 percent are committed by people we know, so I’ll focus on those we hire, those we work with, those we fire, those we date, those we marry, those we divorce.”

— Gavin de Becker

38. “The unsolicited promise is one of the most reliable signals because it is nearly always of questionable motive.”

— Gavin de Becker

39. “Charm is another overrated ability. Note that I called it an ability, not an inherent feature of one’s personality. Charm is almost always a directed instrument, which, like rapport-building, has motive. To charm is to compel, to control by allure or attraction. Think of charm as a verb, not a trait. If you consciously tell yourself, “This person is trying to charm me” as opposed to, “This person is charming,” you’ll be able to see around it.”

— Gavin de Becker

40. “Usually, they have to attach a tentacle to someone else before detaching all the tentacles from their current object.”

— Gavin de Becker

41. “When Kelly refused her attacker’s assistance, he said, “There’s such thing as being too proud, you know,” and she resisted the label by accepting his help. Typecasting always involves a slight insult, and usually one that is easy to refute. But since it is the response itself that the typecaster seeks, the defense is silence, acting as if the words weren’t even spoken.”

— Gavin de Becker

42. “Perhaps the most admirable reason to seek rapport would be to put someone at ease, but if that is a stranger’s entire intent, a far simpler way is to just leave the woman alone. Charm.”

— Gavin de Becker

43. “Though we live in space-age times, we still have stone-age minds. We are competitive and territorial and violent, just like our simian ancestors. There are people who insist this isn’t so, who insist that they could never kill anyone, but they invariably add a telling caveat: “Unless, of course, a person tried to harm someone I love.” So the resource of violence is in everyone; all that changes is our view of the justification.”

— Gavin de Becker

44. “Believing that others will react as we would is the single most dangerous myth of intervention.”

— Gavin de Becker

45. “Zen master, Shunryu Suzuki said, “The mind of the beginner is empty, free of the habits of the expert, ready to accept, to doubt, and open to all the possibilities.”

— Gavin de Becker

46. “In America, a woman is killed by a spouse every two hours.”

— Gavin de Becker

47. “I don’t believe in such a thing as the criminal mind. Everyone’s mind is criminal; we’re all capable of criminal fantasies and thoughts.”

— Gavin de Becker

48. “We think conscious thought is somehow better, when in fact, intuition is soaring flight compared to the plodding of logic. Nature’s greatest accomplishment, the human brain, is never more efficient or invested than when its host is at risk. Then, intuition is catapulted to another level entirely, a height at which it can accurately be called graceful, even miraculous. Intuition is the journey from A to Z without stopping at any other letter along the way. It is knowing without knowing why.”

— Gavin de Becker

49. “Avoid being in the presence of someone who might do you harm.”

— Gavin de Becker

50. “Rock climbers and long-distance ocean swimmers will tell you it isn’t the mountain or the water that kills – it is panic.”

— Gavin de Becker