The Futility of Preparation

[ArmaGoof]

Psychological preps are probably as important as physical ones??

In the final analysis, I believe being pschologically prepared is the key to accomplishing or enduring just about anything.  Does anyone here remember "Pschocybernetics"?  I believe the author was Maxwell Maltz (??)  ANyway, the concept was to try to imagine as vividly as possible that which one is contemplating performing.  Applied to sports, job interviews, finding a connection in a strange airport - anything.  While your imagination may well be off target significantly, if you spend enough time mentally rehearsing, it makes things somehow easier.  As an INFJ I tend to do this naturally, nearly obsessively.  Sometimes I'm way off target once the real situation presents, but usually in a good way, as things rarely go as bad as I imagine.   OTOH, they almost always don't go as WELL as I imagine either. Reality is usually somewhere in the middle.  At any rate, I'm rarely totally surprised and unprepared.

[BenjaminTheDonkey]

Perhaps the other value of preps is to give a person some sense of empowerment in the face of overwhelming disaster?  I know that my cancer patients often engage in this kind of behaviour after getting a bad diagnosis.  That's why I am pretty lenient with letting them do alternative medicine, acupuncture, massage therapy, etc, in parallel with their conventional treatment.  It may help, I don't think it hurts, and it gives the patient and their family a sense of having some control over events.

Psychological preps are probably as important as physical ones??

Hope,
Can you please say a bit more about this? E.g., what percent of patients show this behavior, how much of their lives does it consume, maybe even some specifics, etc.? Plus, of course, please apply this to us and PO as much as you think is valid. TIA!

[Hope@ZeroKelvin]

 

Psychological preps are probably as important as physical ones??

Hope,
Can you please say a bit more about this? E.g., what percent of patients show this behavior, how much of their lives does it consume, maybe even some specifics, etc.? Plus, of course, please apply this to us and PO as much as you think is valid. TIA!
[/quote]

I would say about 25% of my patients admit to trying some alternative stuff.  Probably more, they are too embarrassed or afraid I will get mad if they mention it.

It seems to cut across all demographics and economic classes, sometimes the strongest advocates are some of my poorest and least educated patients, who have a fair amount of mistrust of the medical system and society in general.

Don't know how much of their lives it consumes, can't give you a handle there.  Probably as much or more than the conventional mainstream stuff.  They do pay out of their pockets as insurance doesn't cover it.

The difference between preps and alternative med is that at least with preps you know what you are doing and getting.

Oh, oh, now I've done it.  We'll be hearing from Lua pretty soon!

[EWHM]

I've heard it said that if the doctor tells me I have less than 6 months to live, send me a quack :-)  That is, if your prognosis is bad enough, you might as well try some exotic treatments if they're not overly unpleasant or expensive.  What, after all, do you have to lose?  My personal favorite on this is the trip to Hawaii for a very bad cancer...to raise blood vitamin D levels, of course :-)  If nothing else, its a very pretty place to die.  Will raising your blood vitamin D levels improve your chances?  Maybe, maybe not, but it should at least lift your spirits.

[Broil]

They have some very nice, inexpensive laetrile and coffee enema cancer clinics down in Mexico.  That could be a decent way to go, sitting in a veranda in Acapulco, munching nachos and sipping margaritas.

[terra-ist]

I can relate to feeling futile about preps. I just can't see being able to hang on to stuff or protect crops in the face of starving hoards. I travelled through Zimbabwe and Zambia during a drought and saw the razor wire, electric fences and armed guards it took to keep the starving people out of fields. And I can't say that I'm looking forward to living in a world where billions are starving and anything that moves or grows gets wiped out. People's places are regularly broken into here now and people aren't desperate yet. So why bother.

But... I'll probably prep anyway, if I can find somewhere I think has a snowball's chance in hell of being survivable and worth surviving in. What else can you do? But I seriously don't want to do this alone. I don't have a family, and haven't found a community that's onto it.

By the way, about changing the way things are going instead, I think I've given that my best shot and it's hopeless. But I had to try.

[DoomandGloom]

I've heard it said that if the doctor tells me I have less than 6 months to live, send me a quack :-)  That is, if your prognosis is bad enough, you might as well try some exotic treatments if they're not overly unpleasant or expensive.  What, after all, do you have to lose?  My personal favorite on this is the trip to Hawaii for a very bad cancer...to raise blood vitamin D levels, of course :-)  If nothing else, its a very pretty place to die.  Will raising your blood vitamin D levels improve your chances?  Maybe, maybe not, but it should at least lift your spirits.

Or you could enjoy your last days and not worry about spending them trying DESPERATELY to over come something that that is NOT overcome-able. I would do the unthinkable and enjoy myself - so that's what I try to do now...

[ArmaGoof]

Or you could enjoy your last days and not worry about spending them trying DESPERATELY to over come something that that is NOT overcome-able. I would do the unthinkable and enjoy myself - so that's what I try to do now...

Yep, we are now convinced, beyond any doubt, that our days of comfort are numbered, if not indeed our lives themselves.  Might as well scavenge what pleasure is left while it is still to be had.

[kathyprepper]

I have relied on my preps twice and neither was an event that had ever occurred to me. Once, I took a serious fall and ended up with two major surgeries and laid up for 5 months. Thanks to our preps, my DH was able to cook easy, tasty meals and not make arrangements for someone to care for me so he sould shop. We lived with the extra expenses and lack of income because we have no debt and cash on hand. The other was an ice storm that knowcked out our power for nearly 2 weeks. We were able to be a real community resource because we had gas for transport, water and food. We even delivered matches and kerosene lamps to the unprepared. We could cook, keep warm, even take hot showers. I anticipated the storm but not the lack of other's preps. (we live in New England for goodness sake!) Tosay I that it is futile to be prepared brecause I can't see the future is (no disrespect intended) dumb. Granted, if aliens land and steal all my soil, I'm screwed. An instant ice age like the Day After Tommorrow will probably do me in but let common sense prevail. I'll eat the food, drink the water, read the books, wear the clothes, burn the wood and love my neighbor, PO, ice age, aliens or not.

[metaforge]

The key to overcoming the hordes is probably to be way way out in the middle of nowhere, or to organize your community, or at least parts thereof.  Remember also when TSHTF, at least in the US, many who would normally become the hordes will instead voluntarily opt to punch their ticket into the Fedghetto to live under big brother's eye. [Just like the morons voluntarily submitting to the H1N1 vaccine - whatever big brother says must be true!].  So... there may not be as big of a starving horde running around to defend against, especially if one can form a mutual bond for defense along with like-minded neighbors.

[Grower]

I just found this thread and hooted all the way through it. But not at the well-considered and offered posts, of course.

I don't think I'm going to leave the house anymore. Thousands of things could happen. I could slip on mud and land on my head and crack my neck and die before Hub gets home and finds me. One of my chickens could fly up and poke out my eye. I could fall off the front stoop, lie comatose for hours, and die of exposure and shock because it's cold and rainy today. I could get hit pulling the car out of my drive way. I could get hit at the first intersection because cars come flying over the hills on both sides. Once I get up some speed, a deer could run out and crash into me, since it is rutting season. The steering could go out on my car. The brakes could go out. The transmission could break down when I was traveling at 65 on the interstate. A huge chunk of blue ice could fall from the sky and crush me. I could get some kind of soil fungus into my system while working in the gardens and die a slow painful death. I could rupture a disk in my lower back carrying 50 pound sacks of feed.

Oh, yes, this recliner is feeling mighty comfy.

Nope, no point in prepping for anything unless you can prep for everything. And you can't, so tra-la-la.

Funny -- d&g ignores posts about changing one's lifestyle and other ways that living = prepping = living. If he can't argue with somebody, he ignores them. Then when people give him reasonable specific scenarios and knowledge, he claims he just wants to address the point as "philosophy." Well, sweetie, philosophy means love of knowledge. You seem to be striving to justify the lack thereof, or at least putting it to any valuable use.

I live the way I do because I think it's a more sustainable way to live. I wish I could get even better at it, but at least I'm headed in that direction. To my mind, perfect prepping would be to have the world lose all access to cheap power and find out a few months later that it happened. But I don't expect to achieve perfect preparation. I'm not really living to "prep" anyhow. I'm trying to live better, according to what "better" means to me. I like what somebody said about being able to fashion a lot of new preps based on a wide variety of basic preps. I am prepared to live.

[Candy*Land]

My H has been arguing the futility argument for years. And due to that, well, it's largely been an excercise in futility on my part!!

Dig in and do what you can -- what gives you the best chance with all the know-how you've got.

That's all we've ever had and it's been enough for our predecessors. 

[DoomandGloom]

There is a tremendous difference between preparing for known events and preparing for unknown events. On the one had you wear a seat belt because accidents happen. On the other hand you wear a helmet at a restaurant. One is logical, the other is not. There is obviously some real line which can be crossed.

Instead of everyone being super-sensitive to the prospects of being illogical and unreasonable, can someone tell me what they think are necessary preps which don't defy the logic of not knowing what, when and where some DOOM will happen? No, of course not. 

[Candy*Land]

Well, you know that you breathe, eat, drink, wear clothes, buy things somehow, live somewhere, use a form/s of energy, take meds/use a doctor, do personal and household sanitation, transport yourself, entertain yourself, communicate with others, get information, etc, etc, etc -- EVERYDAY.

What if the *sources* of those items dried up for 3 days, a week, 2 weeks, a year, forever?

What would you do in a disaster like Katrina with the resources you have now?

What is something that you could do in the next hour and day and week and month to get yourself in a better position?

Buy something? Move? Fix something? Reach out? Get your teeth fixed? Sell things? What?

 

[pamplemousse]

I vote that we ignore DoomandGloom, let this thread die a natural death, and continue prepping as we each see fit.