Scythe13's Prioritised Prepping

[Scythe13]

Okay, this could end up being a big post, kind of an article, but also borderlining a philosophical perspective on prepping.

Prepping is all about survival and sur-thrive-al, right?

Yes (haha, I bet you thought I was going to say otherwise). Well the blunt of the matter is that prepping is to allow you to survive a crappy situation. Whether that situation is loss of family, loss of job, loss of car, or loss of civilisation. Prepping is survival.

Although prepping is survival, survival is not prepping. Survival is the desired outcome of our actions.

Let's look at how things should be prioritised.

Most people start off prepping by buying a big knife/machete, and a hell of a lot of beans (unless you hate beans.....isn't that right Terry?). But if you look at that logically, it's kind of an obscene idea. Just because someone owns a knife, it doesn't mean they can use it effectively, correctly, or safely. Furthermore it doesn't mean they can maintain the knife and keep it in a useable condition. Okay, what about the beans. It's a meal. A meal is not a long term survival plan. It's a meal. ONE meal. So beans is not the logical thing to start prepping with.

Okay, pretend you've just started prepping today, and by the weekend, SPLAT!!! The poop hit the fan! Odds are pretty good that, as a new prepper, you're going to be up poo-creek without a paddle.

So let's look at another perspective. What will let me survive on a longer term basis than beans and a knife? Well what do you need to survive? Food, Water, Shelter, Warmth, and that's the basics of it. But not all people know even those basic things. So it would stand to reason that correct knowledge is a fair basis on which to start prepping, right? Again, the answer is yes.

Having correct knowledge and understanding of what your body needs to continue to exist is vital to knowing what to provide. So how do you get knowledge? Books, training courses, DVD's and things like that.

If you are new to prepping and you don't know how much time you have available before the poo hit the fan, then the main thing you need to focus on is gaining knowledge of what to do.

The second most important thing, after knowing what to do, is knowing how to do it...well!!! Knowing how to do something is not enough. You need to know how to do it well! That means practice, practice, and more practice. Granted you will need tools to make some things happen, but you'll need to get the knowledge of what to do, and how to do it, first.

The best way to do these things is a wilderness survival course buffed out with a load of reading and practical trial and error. For fire, a lighter will run out, matches will run out, but sticks....they grow on trees! haha. How does it feel to know you have the ability to make fire at any time, instead of being able to make fire as long as you have fuel in your lighter? The same goes for shelter.

Once you have that, if something happens, you have a damn good chance of survival. However, gaining those kinds of skills does take time. But knowing what to do and how to do it will be a much better platform than a few tins of food.

If something were to happen, your long term survival would be dependant on your ability to implement the survival skills you've learned. Tins of food will run out, water purification tablet will run out. The main thing is that those skills you have will give you what you need. Your short term survival can also cover the same criteria, however can be made more 'comfortable' via certain things.

After you have those basic skills sorted, you are able to survive at a moments notice.

After that, the situation of making life more comfortable comes into play. This is where food storage and all that comes in.

[Timelord]

Very True & a useful article. Some people seem to do it in the reverse order.

I suppose that someone who just gets in a tonne of tins in case food supply is interrupted etc, is also prepping, but they are prepping for the short term only. They may not realise this and by reading the forums and following the myriad of well meaning "how to's" out there, it may well seem that some of the common systems are the way to go. ie. a preset system like a supply of storable food will be seen on the forums to be highly recommended and therefore may seem to a new prepper to be a major priority above things like knowing how to light fires or obtain drinking water.

Maybe an itemised/prioritised list could be put on the site for new preppers to enable them to weigh up what their best most efficient course of prep action would be for them. It would be a core reference as such that priority of prep actions could be judged against.

As a new prepper, many may not have the wider view of knowledge that would enable them to make the best prioritising decisions on their own and so a little guidance & help may be beneficial.

We could of course just leave it to people to figre it all out themselves.. TL.

[Scythe13]

Item 1: Skills + Ability
Item 2: Everything else