Comfortable, sunny, breezy, and nice. That’s what I’m hoping for, we’ll see what we get. We had all the kinds of weather yesterday. Overcast, thunderstorms, drizzle, sunshine, wind and rain. We even had a few minutes of ‘very nice.’ Today, the national forecast has Houston in the clear.
Didn’t get a whole heck of a lot done yesterday, that couldn’t have been done more efficiently and more quickly by someone who was motivated. Keeping my motivation up, and keeping moving forward is harder some days than others. But Summer is Coming, and with it the most common threat around these parts- hurricanes. Also on the way are un- somethingly hot and humid days. I’ve got a limited time to do a bunch of stuff that is SO MUCH easier when it’s not in the 90s for both heat and humidity.
I feel a bit like I’m going through one of those periods like RBT did when he kept posting that he probably wouldn’t be posting much, but then he posted more. I keep saying the same thing every day- “I’ve got so much to do” but then I don’t do it…. grrrr. External deadlines… I need them.
I built three or four careers around meeting externally imposed deadlines. It’s in my blood. Internally imposed? Not so much. I’ve never been good at that. My 10 year plan took me 15 years. I did eventually accomplish it all, but it was both simple and complicated. Get my finances in order. Find a good woman and marry her. Buy a house. Start a family. Simple right? 15 years to get there from where I started.
Live through whatever is coming and get my family through it, doesn’t have the same concreteness, and yet it’s an arguably simpler goal. After all, it’s mostly just “continue living”. And how hard can that be? Weeeeelllllll, that depends, doesn’t it? And it strikes right to the heart of a preparedness lifestyle.
“Live through” – but implied is not just survive, but do it with style, without drama, with simplicity and grace. Succeed, not just endure. Coming out the other end as a starving refugee is better than not coming out, but far from the ideal of being in a position to thrive when things get better.
“Whatever is coming”- bad things are ALWAYS coming. Good things too and sometimes people forget to prep for them, but mostly we prep for the bad things and figure the good things will work themselves out. Hurricanes and floods are the most likely natural disasters here. But personal bad things- job loss, accidents, illnesses, death of a loved one- are the most common disasters everyone faces and if you aren’t prepping for them, you should be.
What other bad things are coming?
–Global pandemic was on the list but not top ten. Ebola convinced me to take the possibility seriously and to prep for it ‘for realz’. H/T to Aesop for that. And HEY LOOKIE! Global pandemic is here. I’m in restocking mode, but I could still be comfortably pulling TP from stock after a year, and that’s with three females in the household. How much is too much vs now you have none? You will have to find your own balance, but I’m usually on the side of ‘more’.
–Slow economic collapse, worldwide depression. RBT changed my mind about this, and changed my planning horizon. Now I think we’re already started on this one. It’s harder to prep for because the length of time involved is so great, and because the number one prep – piles of money – doesn’t work so well with the most likely cause, ie. hyperinflation. There are steps you can take and preps you can make though. Unless you like the taste of domestic animals and the local fauna, food is your best prep. Putting your stored up life energy (ie. the product of your work) in something that will survive a currency collapse is a good idea too. If you can’t get your stored up life (money) somewhere safe , or if you haven’t managed to store much up, you need to look for ways to use what remains to continue working through a collapse. Rental income streams were my go-to plan for that, but I didn’t factor in a government that would steal from the landlords. I’m busy rethinking and looking for additional streams. Skills involving making and repairing are looking pretty good.
–War. Internal or external. Both are bad. Both involve hardship and privation. Internal would also include economic collapse. External might involve a currency collapse, or might be triggered by more monetary trickery, or it could pull the economy up out of the dumps. So many flavors are possible, with contradictory effects. Very little of it is likely to be good on an individual level though. Internal war is looking more and more likely every day, with Balkanization being the most likely outcome. Where you are is going to be VERY important if that happens and your number one prep.
There are other bad things that could be coming, some far more unlikely than others, but not impossible. First contact with aliens would be a game changer, for example. It’s also unlikely to go well for us, but most of the things that would be likely to happen get covered by preps for the other biggies. Room temperature superconductors, fusion energy, radical life extension, those might fall into the ‘good thing’ column but would also be disruptive as heII. True AI, self aware machines, grey goo, killer plagues, all somewhere on the list of things to consider, and then usually discount. CME, EMP, space debris impacts, other ‘hand of God’ events, well, we’ll do what we can if something that big happens. Having preps won’t hurt.
And then there is that last part of my goal- get my family through. The everyday part of this is just to raise my girls to be competent human beings, and to make sure they have a good foundation for their lives on their own. The prepping part is a bit more specific, but mainly for me it comes down to skills, attitude, and foundational beliefs. What I think those should be would fill another few thousand words, and maybe I’ll spend the time to write those words down, but that will have to wait. Right now, getting my family through means the physical stuff- preps in the traditional sense. It means making sure we have the basics to survive and thrive in the most likely scenarios, and even some of the much less likely ones. It means resilience and flexibility and adaptability. It means stockpiles of stuff, and collections of skills and reference materials. It means paying attention to possible threats, local and national and global. It means engaging in the world around us with our minds and eyes open. And it means planning for what comes next and putting resources in place to support those plans.
And of course it means STACKING. Start stacking. Keep stacking. If you can’t stack stuff, stack knowledge and skills. Stack people, relationships, networks. Do it as a hobby. Do it as a social activity. Do it with passion, or with calculation and focus. But Do It.
It’s never too late to start, it’s always too early to quit.
nick
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