Recently I’ve found myself logging into my computer in the morning and checking out the Business Section on CNN and MSNBC to see if the economy has crashed yet. Then I cruise over to the BBC to see if Europe is still with us. After I’m done with the economic news I have to check out the riots in England, the several wars we’re involved in, and various crime stories of people doing horrible things to each other – some because of the economy apparently. Let’s not forget the famine in Africa and thousands of refugees trying to find food and water by walking hundreds of miles to get out of their current no food zone.
Man. After all that it’s a wonder I don’t put a little cyanide in my overpriced coffee (up because of inflation and a lack of the coffee bean.) Then again, I probably couldn’t afford the cyanide.
Everywhere you look there are conflicting news stories. One headline will tell you that gas is going up because of a lack of offshore drilling and the article directly beneath it might say that gas is going down because we’re getting better at conserving gas in the US.
To quote Colonel Potter from the old MASH series, “Horse puckey.”
That’s right. Whatever happened to the day that news agencies reported news instead of trying to make it? I understand that they need to come up with headlines to keep people reading, but when they start writing conflicting viewpoints and posting them literally side-by-side I think it’s time to slow down a little.
Oh, we’ve got serious issues in this world of ours, no question about that. My problem is that when I log into these sites I tend to wallow in them like a pig in mud. After a week of doing that my morale is in the toilet, I’ve gone over my preps for the tenth time, and I’m on Amazon trying to see what else I can buy to make my family’s life easier in the post apocalyptic world after it burns down from the economic crash or comes to a halt because we’ve run out of fuel due to our huge gas guzzling SUVs and pickup trucks. (Guilty!) Then I jump on the blogs and pretty soon I’ve got guns sticking out my windows listening for the claymores on the perimeter to go off so I’ll know when and where to start shooting. Damn those hordes who think they’re going to get my stuff. I’ll fight to the end!!
Ok, for those of you who haven’t picked it up yet I’m using the tongue-in-cheek font today. The point is this: yes, we have problems in the world, but we’ve always had problems in the world. As long as you’ve done some kind of prepping I suspect you’ll be ready for most anything that comes down the line. Don’t worry if you don’t have a retreat in the White Mountains, there’s a good chance you won’t need it.
You might! Don’t get me wrong – I’m no prophet. I do expect a crash of some sort, but wallowing in the details isn’t going to prevent it or make it any better. With another baby due any minute now I’ve decided to be as ready as I can for anything and not worry about the things I can’t do anything about in the meantime.
I’ll still read the news, but there’s a difference between wallowing and reading. Maybe I’ll finish that fiction book I started awhile back with all the extra time that will give me.
Play with your kids. Go for a hike. Play chess with a friend. Whatever! Be ready, but enjoy your life! This is the only shot you get at it folks, so make it count.
-Jarhead Survivor
BTW:
Don’t be a Debbie Downer!
saturday-night-live-debbie-downer
Caution – Prepping Can Lead to a Gloomy Outlook On Life
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25 comments
Nah, We’re all going to die.
Just kidding, Jar. I’m with you 100% .
If I spend more time living, at an opportunity cost of a few survival preparations, I’ll call it a wash. What’s survival about, but living anyhow?
It’s really the same question that we all deal with every day. The more time we spend working, the less time we have to live,and we’re ostensibly working so that we can live better. Balance, Grasshopper.
i prefer to think of it as “sober realism” as opposed to “gloom”.
going to the “Clinton News Network” and “More Silly Nonsense By Chicks” is half the problem. (and don’t get me started about those Brits…)
get as much neat stuff and food as you possibly can, while they’re still exchanging it for “federal reserve notes”.
This is about where I sit.
The media is indeed half the problem – I daresay it is more than half of it. Every night, you have tales of woe, murder, destruction, mayhem… with the occasional ‘human interest’ and happy story thrown in, like it were some token item.
Personally, if you look you will find that there is a lot more good news than bad out there. OTOH, the reason you don’t see it is because good news doesn’t attract the eyeballs and ratings as much, methinks.
The funny part is, I find that the day goes better when I avoid crap like drudgereport.com and CNN.
This past weekend, my missus and I went wandering out in the countryside. Found quite a few neat small towns that I could definitely consider living in or near. Sure, it seems like “OAMG he’s preparing for the worst!”, but in reality, the SHTF aspects were minor, and never left my skull. The major and most enjoyable part was the friendliness of the local folk, the beauty of the countryside, and my missus (finally!) saying “you know? I’d love to have something with a garden and a root cellar, and the people here are real nice. I think we could really live out here.”
now is the time. (if the down-payment is low enough)
we’re looking too. you are no worse off buying something now, rather than continuing to rent. (if you can truely afford the payment) sometime in my mid-eighties i may be my own landlord…
… and it’s probably your outlook on life, that lead you to become a “prepper”.
I must disagree. In fact, it reassures me that I am GOING TO survive what ever comes. The peace of mind that comes with my gear, guns , food and basis of knowledge gives me a great outlook and confidence. The only gloom is feeling sorry for the idiots that sit around and wait for someone else to rescue them.
I have been prepping for over four decades and Ithink I’ve developed a fairly good attitude with regard to the bad news we hear from the media. I will say, however, that over those forty-so-years that the news has become more ominous. It used to be that the threats were “out there” somewhere (the “Cold War”, for example) and were less defined. Today, the worries are closer to where we live and we clearly see it in unemployment, energy costs, terrorism, the economy, bad governmental leadership and other issues. In addition, events such as major earthquakes, Hurricane Katrina and Fukushima have made us more aware of the other dangers we face.
I suspect my view is very close to those of Spook45.
I live, I love, and I prep. I stock up to be ready for something to happen, and I stock up just to save some $, because it’s cheaper in the long run. I watch the news to see what is going on and I take the majority of what is said with a grain of salt.
That is why I stopped listening to the news on the TV, they only seem to highlight the negative (yes there is a lot to be negative about), but after awhile the gloom and doom get old.
I prefer to have fun when possible, enjoy the time that I have left and do the best by those who do well by me. Being ready for the unexpected is just part of living right.
That is why Fox, CNN and all the other news are not watched very often in my house. I keep up with the news in other ways that are less biased and probably more accurate.
I prefer my sunny outlook to the Debbie Downers of the world. The glass is half full until you drink from it.
Semper Paratus ;-P
Harold
“How much pain they have cost us, the evils which have never happened.”
Thomas Jefferson
“I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.”
Thomas Jefferson
Besides those words of wisdom from a very wise man , you cant believe half of what you hear in the media , do you really think they are telling you the truth ? Perhaps to some degree , but its so suspect its not worth your time to listen . They are all Jerry Springer as far as I’m concerned .
Its things like this that give me grief when trying to get the wife on side. I suppose it depends on your point of view, almost all of my preps have practical, everyday value and use. A deep larder is good for stocking up on bargains, offgrid toys and things are good for camping trips, etc.
If you’re doing light prepping(which I guess I have to say I fall into) then all well and good. But how do you maintain 40 years of prepping interest? What opportunities have been lost by expecting the worst for 40 years? Not to say Presager has been thinking this, but you know there are people out there that are expecting it all to vaporise ‘any day now’ and lives their lives like that all the time. There was one guy describing his bugout bag plans and how his choice of shoe that he wears every day is directly related to the speed that he can get home, grab his bug out bag, and beat the mystical traffic panic by a few minutes that will be so well defined as TSHingTF.
For now, i just accept that I’m far from prepared for everything, but I have the right mindset to adapt quickly should the worlds situation change.
I forgot to quote:-
Presager Buddy -“I have been prepping for over four decades and…”
in my immediate family, it’s closer to five decades. (50th anniversary of the “Berlin Wall” this week. “Cuban Missile Crisis”, the ice storm of ’58, hurricanes Hazel, Donna, Agnes…) it isn’t an “all consuming” passsion with us, just something to keep in the “back” of the mind.
the “irish” part of my psyche arrived here as a result of the “famine”. (talk about yer “bugouts”!)
I can’t answer for him, but I can pitch in my own $0.02…
I’ve had the odd idea of prepping off and on ever since my 20’s. It’s literally saved my butt once (a flood had wiped out the apartment I was living at – if I didn’t notice the river and loaded a quickly borrowed pickup truck with my stuff, I’d have been in with all the other building survivors who lost their stuff, thinking that they had plenty of time still..)
It has also given me actual peace of mind in many other instances…
– knowing that I have the food/basics covered and a bit of extra cash put by makes sudden unemployment more of a situation that I can just deal with, and less of a cause for heart attack and palpable fear of just-as-sudden homelessness.
– It gives me something to fall back on, which in turn gives me less to worry about should I decide to do something bold and new with my career/hobbies/etc.
– I got laughed at when I put in a no-sh!t storm shelter next to the very first house I bought back in the 1990’s… until a tornado hit town. Fortunately the neighborhood didn’t suffer any major damage or catastrophic loss, but it was enough to stop the neighbors once and for all from pointing and laughing. After that, I started getting serious questions on how they themselves could put them in…
Oh, and who says you have to always expect the worst? Hell’s Bells, if it happens, it happens, and if it doesn’t no skin offa mine. Prepping doesn’t eat any more than maybe an hour or two a week, more if I go out to the gun range or the woods, and have some fun that coincides with SHTF/survival skills (e.g. marksmanship, hiking, orientation, fishing, hunting, a bit of botany, etc).
As for missed opportunities? I disagree. As noted above, sometimes prepping puts me in a better position to take certain risks than if I did not. Much better than living eyeball-deep in self-generated debt, going from paycheck-to-paycheck in some McMansion with a big boat parked in the garage and a family who likes to ‘live the dream’, such as it is. In my case, I prefer to live far more simply nowadays, and be sure that no matter what hits, I stand a reasonable chance of surviving it, and perhaps even overcoming it to be stronger than before.
BM,
I feel your going to be alright . You have it spot on about the mind set and adapting . There are those of us that own the ideal homestead property and do have the supplies and off grid set up to see them through , but the majority of us are not so fortunate . As you said , plan for the reasonable most likely happening within your scope of means and reality . If your doing that , your still ahead of most of the population . We talk a lot about survival , which duhhhhhhhhhhhhh , thats what these sites are about , but I wonder how many are planning for a life and not just survival ? There is a difference . In a post nuclear holocaust , I would rather be one of the vaporized in all honesty . No kind of life worth living in that situation .
I suppose, reading all these comments, that you’d have to say that people of like minds read like-minded blogs. Unless everyone is just going with the flow, most comments here indicate that prepping is something that is as much fun and a hobby as a life-or-death essential task.
Not to point fingers, but you look at some letters on Rawles site, and I feel genuinely sorry for people that drank his coolaid. People that write in to say they packed up the wife and kids from their city life and have moved out to a remote property, so far from civilisation that there is no grabage collection, they have to tend land where they’ve had no previous experience etc.
If you do things like that, I think you’ve taken it too far. You can feel free to laugh at me if it all does crash suddenly, but I think cases like that show people’s gloomy outlook taking over their lives to their detriment.
Agreed , finding a balance can be hard but its important . I knew a guy that was so scared and convinced of the Y2K thing ( you remember that horse shit dont you ? ) He ran out and blew his savings on jug water , dried food and propane . The day after Y2K didnt happen , he looked like he found his mother dead in the kitchen , he realized his mistake and was stuck with a bunch of crap no store would take back .
Doh, my message above totally left out
Presager Buddy – ” I have been prepping for over four decades…”
Makes more sense if I quoted that first.
I occasionally get gloomy. But, not often. Like others, I don’t watch tv, don’t even own one. I don’t read newspapers either. I get my information about the world through Facebook, blogs and regular old radio.
The few times I have been worried or bummed out, an hour in the garden with the 2 year old cures it right up. Or a night out dancing with friends. Or a phone call to talk to grandma. There are so many things that are unaffected by the slow unraveling, and I find it very therapeutic to focus on those when I start to get overwhelmed by the scope of the problems. I know I can’t solve all of them, I know some of them will affect my life and my son’s life for years to come, but I just have to learn to let those go, and focus on areas where I can do real and actual good.
Well said JS. Reading about doom and gloom day in day out does get into your head sometimes and causes a gloomy outlook. I know, I’ve had to take a break from all the bad news lately. It was making me too exhausted to write. Rather than focus on all the bad news, it’s more productive and uplifting to focus on the more positive aspects of prepping– for some, we get excited about gear, or learning some new skill and becoming proficient. Thanks for a timely reminder.
I used to get bummed out by the gloom, but there’s been so much of it that I’ve come to roll with it. Prepping has benefits beyond just SHTF prepping, simple living, self-reliant benefits that come through regardless of SHTF scenarios.
“Seek not that the things which happen should happen as you wish; but wish the things which happen to be as they are, and you will have a tranquil flow of life” – Epictetus
That’s the only thing I found worth remembering from my freshman philosophy class.
Yukon
Well l too look at news most days and sometimes to get a break from it l don’t. Some days l miss the blissfulness of not being aware of what’s going on around me. However I have learned to balance out right here right now life and maybe if shtf life. I do have to say this though, l don’t want to wake up and realize the water that’s been dripping on the rock has made a hole when l wasn’t looking. Like our rights slipping away, our economy going to crap, and the social unrest that seems to be getting more frequent, when do we definitively say now S has H T F? Go on with life but watch the river and make sure it doesn’t overflow when you weren’t looking.
Nice reminder, Jarhead. Sometimes we focus so much on the “prepare for the worst” that we tend to forget the “hope for the best” part.
Prepping offers us a nice piece of mind that IF things go pear-shaped, we are prepared as best we can.
I’m mostly at peace no matter what comes. Oh sure I still rant and whine about a lot of what I hear and see, but in a way I’m graetful. I don’t think I would have done a garden, canned, smoked meats, brew beer …. and all the other things I have learned and done without my own personal disater and the forcasted doom and gloom. Perhaps because I think the MSM is cheerleading and not as gloomy as I am in the situation might make a difference. Ironically I’m an optomist and a Realist. “I’ve prepared as best I can for the suckage. It’s not sucking all that bad right now. I’m almost ready for “Major suckage” and I still have time to prepare so more.”
But I’ll be going camping next month to get away from it all. No tv, cell phone service and the only chore I have to perform is walking the Dogs and picking up poo. I’ll try out my own canned bacon, bottled butter and beer I made myself. It’s going to be a blast, at least for me to use foods I’ve made or preserved.