TO PREP OR NOT

One factor in prepping vs non-prepping has to do with differed gradification vs immediate gradification. As a prepper, i place needs above wants. I may want a new dvd player, but i may need extra blankets in case the electricity goes out. If the electricity goes out, i can't watch the dvd and it won't keep me warm. Prepping has to do with what level of comfort i wish to enjoy in the future. Electricity isn't a given, it can go out, tempatures dropping is almost certain.

hypothetically,

If something did create an environment that needed you to be prepared, you cannot have a settlement.

So few prep, and so many will be fighting to survive.

If you have supplies, it will be sought by all.

So I would say prep only what you can walk into the shadows of the wilderness with.

Maybe just me, but I only prep what I can carry in a hurry! The skills needed to survive in the wilderness!

The most important thing to prepare is your self. Get in shape, get informed.

Know where resources can be had and how to make things for yourself.

And always have a towel.

You do know when the SHTF, the ones that didn't prep are gonna come looking for you.

Yes, and i suspect it won't be to congradulate me on how well prepared i am, lol. They will want my gear.

That would be most unfortunate.

How much prepping is reasonable? Somewhere between these two questions should be where most people should fit.

Are you as self sufficient as your grandparents were at your age? If not, you should work on attaining more freedom and security for your future well being.

Are you able to outfit, feed, and arm a small army? Perhaps you should take a vacation... close to home in range of your groups shortwave radio feed of coarse

Last Edited by Resister on 02/20/2013 01:25 PM

The biggest problem I see is people are prepping for long term. That's a bad bad habit. Some people call us preppers but we really aren't. Ever since I was a kid my family always stored a few months at least worth of food due to living through natural disasters and riots.

I also see a lot of these TV preppers acting like they are going to hold up in their apartments for weeks. This is a horrible move.

If you live in the city, you should be mobile as much as possible and learn survival skills, not prepping skills.

If you are like me and live out in the country, it's useful to plan on holding up for a while, but not relying on having luxury.

Either way, don't store too much crap. Learning to hunt, forage, fish, and build natural forms of cover and warmth are just as important. NO matter what, at some point all of that stored food will be gone.

Also, unless you plan on being a front line soldier in the civil war or zombie apocalypse. Don't hoard too much ammo that you can't carry it all. In a firefight one of 3 things happens. 1. You get away or they do. 2. They are dead and you can loot their ammo/weapons. 3. You are dead and don't need more ammo anyways.

How much of what depends really on where you are and what your long term plan is, not the short term. And don't put all of your eggs in one basket. Ammo especially can be heavy. If you have to dump it off don't keep it all together or you'll wind up with none.

I just hit a sale at Nitro-Pak. 15% off and free shipping. I finally got a deluxe dental repair kit. been wanting one for years. also got another pack of water purification tablets and another box of self contained waste disposal bags. Along with a shortwave radio. the radio might be fluff but what the hell. I couldn't beat the price.

Events happen. Either manmade,natural,or other.
Being prepared seems like a reasonable approuch.
Use your intellect and intuition,as guidence.

I'm a working single mom whose pension disappeared in 2008. That scared the hell out of me. I realized I need to set aside the basic necessities for my family.

I'm not a die hard Prepper, just in case I lose my job or the economy crashes we will have a little bit to live on for a while.

I'm a prepper...

At the side of a pool, drinking some caipirinhas...

That's how I prep!

Great post. Years of food and thousands of rounds of ammo are great and all, but if you don't know how to replace it then you are still living on the blessings of the past instead of paving the way for your future.

Someone may kill you for your sleeping bag, your water bottle or the change in you pocket, it happens all the time, but that doesn't mean you should not have a sleeping bag, water bottle and some chump change.

True. And what happens if a person has to leave his preps to get to a safer location? I see people putting their lives in danger for all the stuff they have saved up. Instead of their preps helping them it would endanger their lives.

A person can have a month or so of things saved up for the unexpected but if you are not ready to leave your preps then it will become a death trap. Better to know how to live in your surroundings. Then you will never be afraid of leaving home.

Prepping seems to foster fear of the unknown. And fear attracts even more fear and more troubles to the person.

That's not prepping. That is having some necessities that can be easily replaced. I have some food in my house but I don't have years stored up. I have what I need and I replace it when needed. I have no fears of being without or being unable to replace things I actually need.

I have "extra" but my goal is to live like my great grandparents did.
Plant my own beans, can them, eat them, clean the jar, plant more beans, can them, eat them, clean the jar....see my point.
I'd like to be as close as I can to a self sustaining system.
Keep in mind I'm not even close, but I'm working towards that goal.

For that type of event, just buy a little extra canned food each week. Just the stuff that you might normally eat. Put it away and check on it to make sure that it is not getting out of date. Usually last 2 years or more.

You will be surprised how easy it is to do and how good you will feel knowing that you can feed your family if something goes wrong.

Under adverse conditions (think homelessness) not easily replaced.

Well, having thought about this a lot... Those who have stockpiled what they need to survive long term are only guaranteed to survive if everyone else vanishes. Not a very probable senario.

The problem is just the very point of survival; with all those preps you might be torn if the situation is one where evacuation is the only way to survive - will you evacuate and leave most of your preps behind or, will you make the wrong choice which kills you?

Best be ready for both.

If you are in a city, your best chance at survival is to move out as quickly as possible.


If you are in the country, you can hunker down for awhile but may still have to take the show on the road. Be prepared to take what you need most and to defend it.

Once again... the most important thing to prepare is yourself. It takes a certain mindset to survive when thing go wrong.

One thing people never mention is that it won't be all bad guys and evil people running around. Many places will build communities and many people won't have jobs and will help enforce law. Mostly small towns like mine will probably do this.

Think Jericho. Big cities will become breeding grounds of crime and disease, small towns will band as communities and militias. Then you'll have pockets of outlanders and raiders.

We won't all be running around alone forever.

Excellent points. ideally, prepping and survivelism need to go hand in hand. Fight,flight, hunker down,hide or signal to be rescued are options to survive. As one poster wrote earlier, don't put all your eggs in one basket. What you need to survive a firestorm, may not be what you need to survive a flood.

Everything in moderation? Perhaps the best prep is the ability to think through as many possibilities as you can, then have action plans for all of them. The quickest route to death is miscalculation of the danger you are presented with.

Everyone is a prepper.

Everyone who keeps a few extra batteries or candles on hand in case the lights go out. Everyone who has a couple of extra blankets around in case it gets cold. Everyone who keeps band aids around, or a first aid kit in case of an accident.

Some people just take it to higher levels, and are more prepared for a wider range of incidents.

I think you should prep just in case of an economic collapse not necessarily for an apocalypse or whatever lol

These are all good points, but if most people are like me, they really cannot make long term plans to bug out to a far away destination. That seems dangerous,to me as well, as I fear there will be checkpoints, carjackers, NO GAS, etc. to prevent one from getting too far.

Also, I cannot AFFORD to go far. So my plan is to hunker down where I am. I will survive on what I have managed to put away, barter with my nearby friends for water, (deer or other) meat, etc. I live in the country - a small town where everyone knows each other, and helps each other - so I feel relatively safe here.....although I have NOT shared that I am "semi-prepping" with anyone! Through casual conversation, however, I have learned there are a whole lot of other people in our town prepping, so I feel somewhat secure that there will not be bands of marauders coming for my food stuffs.

That said, I have SOME food, SOME water, and SOME weapons and ammo....not tons of it, like on the prepper shows. But - I would have to agree - that it is unlikely that anyone can survive hunkered down inside an underground bunker for years. Reminds me of the old Cold War days!

I am still a little unclear on how long we would be thinking we may need to be self-sufficient. If it's just a few months, I think I would be OK. If it goes to 8-10 months or a YEAR or more, I'm f'cked.