I love this very short book because it is eminently practical and relevant to anyone, anywhere, at any time. While not a “Christian” book, it is based on Biblical principles of righteous shrewdness and wise discernment. A favorite quote is “You can never fight what you can’t see coming.” Too often, Christians say, “trust God.” We ignore best practices in security to our arrogant spiritualization. "A live dog is better than a dead lion" (Ecclesiastes 9:4).
When Quesenberry describes the “art” of situational awareness, he implies that there isn’t a clear wrong or right—we need to use our minds, senses, and hearts. With the pressure off to “get it right,” I was fully able to engage with the material and apply it in my daily life and travels.
Spotting danger before it happens is a skill that can be developed and may even save your life.
Understand the threat
Build situational awareness
Develop personal defenses
A mother dropping her teenager off at the mall, a young man leaving home for college, a family about to head out on their first trip overseas. What do all of these people have in common? They all have a vested interest in their personal security and the wellbeing of those they love. According to the FBI's Uniform Crime Report, there were an estimated 1.25 million violent crimes committed in the United States…
I think of Aviya as a book friend. Reading her made me laugh aloud, and I want to meet her over coffee. I could relate to her shock that most families don’t discuss ancient Hebrew grammar at home—I can’t imagine not discussing theology on a daily basis, and my own children had to learn that our home life isn’t common, either.
I appreciated her intellectual honesty and enjoyed seeing the Bible through her eyes and life experience, as a Jew who had only ever read it in Hebrew before starting graduate school. She made me appreciate the Bible in new ways and long to finish mastering ancient Hebrew (if that is possible). At the same time, I gained a more nuanced picture of the God of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures.
Aviya Kushner grew up in a Hebrew-speaking family, reading the Bible in the original Hebrew and debating its meaning over the dinner table. She knew much of it by heart - and was therefore surprised when, while getting her MFA at the University of Iowa, she took the novelist Marilynne Robinson's class on the Old Testament and discovered she barely recognized the text she thought she knew so well. Kushner began discussing the experience with Robinson, who became a mentor, and her interest in the differences between the ancient language and the modern one gradually became an obsession. In this…
This book on emotionally immature parents was life-changing. I learned to name parts of my emotional loneliness in childhood and understand more of the why. As a child of a refugee (my dad) who had fled to America from the trauma of World War II, I began to re-see my experiences with an emotionally distant father in light of his unprocessed trauma.
I was riveted by her discussion of emotionally immature parents. It seemed she could peer into my soul. A key quote is, “Understanding their emotional immaturity frees us from emotional loneliness as we realize their [emotional] neglect wasn’t about us, but about them.” I feel free to live life from my own deeper (and sensitive) nature, knowing there is nothing wrong or bad about having my own opinions and feelings.
Are you one of the countless people who grew up with emotionally immature parents? If you suffer from this troubling parent/child dynamic, you may still recall painful moments from your childhood when your emotional needs were not met, when your feelings were dismissed, or when you took on adult levels of maturity in an effort to "compensate" for your parents' behavior. And while you likely cultivated strengths such as self-reliance and independence along the way- strengths that have served you well as an adult-having to be the emotionally mature person in your relationship with your parent is confusing and even…
In a world where danger and uncertainty loom large, imagine having a comprehensive guide to aid you in discerning, reshaping, and skillfully handling the risks that come your way. My book provides practical tools and profound insights to help you thrive in an increasingly hazardous world.
With deep spiritual contemplation and meticulous research, it offers risk assessment and management training, a hermeneutical methodology, sixteen risk myths, and even a trauma recovery recipe. This equips you to create a systematic action plan to faithfully traverse dangerous landscapes and become empowered to deftly decipher and handle risk with wisdom and hope.
For those yearning to embrace a life of unyielding faith, this book will become an indispensable resource.
