Category: Survival Mindset

Letter Re: Self-Reliance Versus Governmental Reliance Mindsets

JWR: Stories like these only help to illustrate the wide range of problems that come to the surface when the thin veneer of society is striped off due to an event like Superstorm Sandy.  The compression of people in high density population centers like metropolitan New York etc, is just asking for chaos and confusion when their normally well organized and managed structure of life is quickly changed for the worse. Our world is now comprised of what is known as the inverted technology pyramid.  When one side is  weakened in can quickly topple over and leave the entire structure …


Four Letters Re: Hurricane Sandy After Action Reports

Good day, Mr Rawles… Here in West Virginia, we have experienced a wide variety of weather from Hurricane/Superstorm Sandy.  Last Friday, it began raining well ahead of storm making landfall. Rains continued off and on thru the weekend, gradually increasing in steady rains all day Sunday and well into Monday. Around 7 pm our local time, that rain turned to snow and that’s when things began to get interesting.  I tend to be a light sleeper so it was the ‘sound’ of power going off at 2:34 am on Saturday morning that awakened me for the day.  I got coffee …


Family Continuity Planning, by John from Virginia

It’s 2:36PM; you and your spouse are at work.  Your son is at day care and your daughter is at school.  The Schumer hits the fan. What is your Family Continuity Plan? The scenario above is very real and indeed plausible.  Many families have and will one day experience something very similar to this.  To prepare you and your family from natural or man-made disasters it is recommended to design, develop, and incorporate a Family Continuity Plan (FCP); it may one day save all of your lives. As any prepper, for a natural disaster or a TEOTWAWKI event (or both), …


Six Letters Re: Hurricane Sandy After Action Reports

James, I’m located in central New Jersey not far from the Delaware River. In the days prior to the hurricane hitting, everyone packed the supermarkets, warehouse clubs and home improvement stores to stock up. At the home improvement stores, the people who had best luck getting generators were those who purchased them online and selected in-store pickup. There were lines of people 100+ deep from the front of the store to the back waiting for new shipments of generators to arrive. The only people who were guaranteed anything were those who had already purchased and paid online. For those lucky …


Attitude Adjustment, by Dena M.

As a single mother of two I know and live the word budget all to well. My income is limited and I have wasted a lot of time and money because I was too focused on getting ‘only the best.’ I quickly realized that the path I was on was getting me nowhere. I began to look at past purchases and realized that a lot of my purchases were unnecessary and quite frankly irresponsible. If I wanted to better guarantee the safety and sanity of myself and my young children, I needed to take a different path to self-sufficiency and …


Survivor Mindset: One Man’s Trash Is Another Man’s Treasure, by J.A.P. in New Mexico

We have all heard the old idiom: “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” This basically means that something that one person considers worthless may be considered valuable by someone else. This could not be further from the truth in the mind of any survivor. You could branch out into every aspect and area of survival with this mindset at your core. Water, food, fire, shelter, and security can all be obtained with this in mind.   I believe that in a survival situation and in everyday life that everything around you is valuable and has multiple uses. I also …


Guarding Your Mental and Emotional Health, by C.T.M.

One aspect of our lives that can take us out and render even the most prepared of preppers useless is our mental health. Very few people have ever experienced a long duration high stress environment to test their mental strength. The incredible men and women of the military may be among the elite few who can attest to how their mental health might survive in a post TEOTWAWKI environment. Police, first responders, EMS personnel, and firefighters may have a glimpse into what it takes to survive mentally in high stress environments; however, those stressful events, even the most complicated are …


Why Firefighters are Some of the Best Preppers, by Shawn

I started prepping a few years back when I was in paramedic school.  I had no educated goal when prepping initially.  Then I met a good friend of mine that changed the way I look at prepping, and helped me make my prepping intentional.  I read Patriots and I started prepping all the more; now with motivation and intelligence.  When my friend reads this he will probably view this is as some form of Narcissism even though he falls into this category.  But I digress. I have been a full time firefighter for 5-1/2 years  I am currently a Paramedic, …


The Importance of Healthy Eating and a Readiness Lifestyle

Lately I have begun speaking, teaching, and writing on topics such as How To Eat An Acorn; Ancient Food Preservation Methods Today; Permaculture, How and Why; and Edible Common Landscape Plants. I have also been writing on Christian Culture, and various things concerning our time, from first-hand experience. In 1999, we suddenly became aware of Y2K.  We had a two-year old child, and were horrified [at the prospect of a power grid collapse.] I borrowed from my Dad to get out of bank debt, and sold antiques in order to stock up on foods and other items that made me …


Letter Re: You Don’t Need To Be A Conservative To Be Prepared

Sir: Anyone who spends any amount of time on survivalist and preparedness oriented forums knows that a certain political worldview is the most commonly encountered perspective, particularly with respect to economic concerns. Particularly in the literary niche that is survivalist/preparedness fiction, the protagonist is often identified as a conservative critic of Keynesian economic thought and favors the gold standard. Very often the plot presupposes a very right-wing political orientation. Matthew Bracken (Enemies Foreign and Domestic), Thomas Sherry (Deep Winter, Shatter), Glen Tate (299 Days), and even James Wesley Rawles (Patriots) all share to some degree this worldview. Some authors even …


Are You Sure That You Are Ready To Defend Yourself?, by Brett S.

You stocked supplies with plenty of beans, bullets, and Band-Aids.  You have backup plans to your backup plans and know your family can survive months without any contact from the outside world.  You are ready for just about any cataclysmic event, should one happen.  But are you really ready for the most important decision of your life and the life of your family members?  How far would you go to protect your life and the life of a family member?  Preparing for disaster doesn’t necessarily mean you prepare for armed combat, but practically, disasters create an environment where the aggressor …


Great Grandmother, The Prepper, by C.J.

I got a call from my mother the other day. She is the mother of six, grandmother to twelve and great-grandmother of three children.  She had just returned from a visit to one of my sibling’s homes.  She said, “You are right!  They are serious about this prepping stuff.  Tell me what to do.”  My mother’s revelation has been a long time in coming.  She is a devout Christian and a Bible teacher.  She believes that Jesus will return and scoop us all up to heaven, hopefully before the tribulation.  She is what she calls a “pre-trib” [rapture] believer.  I …


Letter Re: Lessons Learned From My Elders

James: As a five year old I lived with my grandparents in a small isolated village in the foothills of the Austrian Alps.  This was about 1953 until 1958.  Rural life had its own rhythm which now seemed more akin to the 19th century.  Small family fields were plowed with the milk cow which was also used to bring in the hay and the harvest.  Everything planted had a use.  Each tree on these small family farms bore fruits or nuts.  Ornamentals were for the well to do- perhaps the village doctor who had a more secure source of income.  …


Letter Re: Mental Preparation for Lethal Force

Hi Jim, That was a well written and informative article by Mark B. on preparing yourself to use deadly force. As a retired police officer and firearms instructor I can tell you that Mark gives solid advice. We can also look at history for lessons on what’s important in prevailing in a gunfight. I’ve been involved in a few myself and I’ve spent a lot of years figuring out what works and what doesn’t. I’ve studied the old west, taken many courses, read countless books and analyzed my own experiences and how I survived. It can be distilled down to …


Practical Defense Skills When Left with Little or Nothing, by Suburban 10

TEOTWAWKI may leave you alone with nothing. Nothing but your knowledge of what is available to you as a means of survival and defending yourself. Hopeful you have enough skills to find essential items required to survive. Time is limited and for an active person foraging for food, protecting themselves and seeking safe shelter. Without these life essentials, this is (on average) how much time you have to survive: Air -3 minutes, Shelter at O degrees Celsius – 3 hours, water – 3 days, food – 30 days. Take care of these and half your battle of survival is won! …