Absolutely Unqualified: From close calls to real-world safety skills

Excellent writing. Elegant craftsmanship. Crisp. Clear. Powerful. Essential reading for those who would be safe, and would keep others safe. This is about safety… and SO much more!

Lt. Col. Dave Grossman

A retired US Army Ranger and former West Point psychology professor, Lt. Col. Grossman is the author of seventeen books, including On Killing — required reading at the FBI Academy and on the US Marine Corps Commandant's reading list, with more than half a million copies sold worldwide — and On Combat. He has co-authored a New York Times bestseller with Glenn Beck. His research has been cited by US presidents in national addresses, and he has testified before the US Senate and Congress. GrossmanOnTruth.com

Chapter 1: When Safety Shattered

My daughter asked for a snack.

That is all it took. We were not in a dark alley or bad neighborhood. This was not some decision I could look back on and call reckless. My daughter wanted something from the concession stand at her cousin’s hockey game, so I said yes, and I stood up. It was a thirty-second walk.

It was supposed to be a simple afternoon. I had taken my two oldest daughters to watch my niece’s hockey game. My sister and I were catching up in the stands, laughing, enjoying the game. Everything felt completely normal.

I squeezed my daughter’s hand and told her I would be right back.

Halfway to the concession stand, something shifted in the air around me. A feeling I could not name. Not quite fear. Just a sudden wrongness that made me feel like someone was watching me.

I turned around, and that is when I saw him.

He was in his mid-twenties. He was muscular and covered in tattoos. He had appeared directly behind me, out of nowhere, close enough that it could not have been an accident. He was not looking past me or around me. He was looking directly at me, with a fixed, cold glare that did not waver when I caught his eye. His fists were closed tight.

Most people look away when you catch them staring. He did not move a muscle.

My body knew before my mind did. I abandoned the snack without another thought and walked straight back to the stands. I thought he was going to hurt me.

I leaned into my sister and told her quietly. She did not hesitate, and she said she had already noticed him, that there had been a man up in the stands staring at me.

I turned to look, and my stomach dropped. It was the same man, with the same glare, and same stillness. He was watching me like I was something he had already decided about.

I told myself I was being paranoid, or that it was nothing. But for some reason, I could not shake it.

When the final buzzer sounded, I made a decision that seemed logical in the moment. We would wait in the hallway for my niece to come out of the locker room, to congratulate her.

Then the same man walked over and stopped at the wall directly across from us. The hallway was narrow. He was not scanning the room or waiting for anyone. He was fixed on me, and I understood exactly what his body was telling me.

This man wanted to harm me.

Every cell in my body was screaming the same word, run, and I did the worst possible thing.

I froze.

I grabbed my girls’ hands. I put my head down. And I stood there, completely motionless, while my mind went white, blank, and useless. I actually believed that if I looked away, if I pretended that I did not see him, he would leave me alone.

The training I did not have left me with nothing. No plan, no voice, no movement.

My brother walked into the hallway, completely unaware. The moment he appeared at my side, the man’s entire demeanor shifted. And just like that, he was gone.

I told my brother everything in a rush of shaking words. He did not ask questions, and he walked us out. He checked the parking lot, walked us directly to our car, and I immediately locked the doors.

I sat in the driver’s seat for a long time before I could start the engine.

I did not act. That was the part that hit hardest. Not the fear, but what I had done with it, which was nothing at all.

I called my husband from the road. Through tears, I told him I could not live another day without knowing how to protect myself and my girls. He could have hurt any one of us, and all I did was stand there with my head down.

He signed us up for a Krav Maga class the next week.

Why did he pick me? What did he want from me? How could I be so weak?

But that is not where this starts. Sitting in that car with my hands shaking on the wheel, the thing I could not stop thinking about was that I already knew. Fear had been following me my whole life.

I had known since I was nine years old.

Chapter 2 begins: "I was nine years old when I stood in my best friend's house, one street behind my own, and looked at the bullet holes in the glass."