dipping a toe

DIPPING A TOE

You know I’m not a fan of incremental preps, past a certain point.  No one can usually just buy everything they need in one swoop, and I think the best strategy is to just buy the Better Than Nothing supplies in a state of panic.  Panic, spend your $500-$700 ( $800 if you throw a hundred on a piece of junk land as a down payment, to avoid the coming rush ), and THEN start to take your time and build up your preps.  You MUST act as if the ending is tomorrow and be prepped yesterday.

*

So, you can’t JUST say that “slow and steady wins the race”.  It isn’t a good idea to completely panic, either.  It is a mix and match strategy.  Don’t take your sweet ass time, because no one can time the collapse.  And don’t panic and do stupid crap, because no one can time the collapse.  Do both.  The one area I think incremental steps fits well is in skills and habits.  Since it is that time of year when we are supposed to do “New Year’s Resolutions” ( not that you should, but it is traditional ), let’s cover fast and slow change.

*

Changing fast is saying, hey, I’m a fat slob and I’m hitting the gym, cutting out Quarter Pounders and Little Debbies, quitting smoking and beer, all starting tomorrow.  We all know that is NOT going to work.  Too much, too soon.  As long as you don’t drag out the process too long, slow and steady improvements are better.  As a teenager, I had braces ( why?  Because my father had medical insurance. Not necessarily because I needed them ).  That dingus breath had me in braces for a good two or three years, claiming slow and incremental was best.

*

He went TOO slow.  Many a night I missed out on homemade taco’s ( OMG-my mom’s best meal.  Shells fried up from tortilla’s, chorizo in the hamburger.  A rare treat ).  To this day, I hate the dentist JUST for that.  All those visits and micro adjustments, teeth constantly sore.  Just clamp those bitches down and be done with it.  But nooooooo!  We had to put his little spawn through college.  And the doctors were worse!  Anyway, I just had to get that off my chest, again.  Even though I’m cooking, I cannot eat that kind of grease and perfect tacos will never again be realized.

*

So too fast doesn’t always work and too slow is worse.  But I have found that as long as we aren’t taking about pain and suffering eliminating luxuries ( what?  You don’t think sloth and deliberately poor diets aren’t luxuries? ), “dipping your toe” works rather well.  What do I mean?  I mean starting a new skill or habit and using positive reinforcement to motivate you.  Stopping one bad habit after another is no fun, but it is a lot easier just by starting.  GOOD habits are much easier and faster.

*

Let’s say you are a slob.  Just cleaning one room in the house, that motivates you to start cleaning other areas.  And if your whole house is clean, you don’t let one area get dirty or other rooms decide to join in on the fun.  It is a behavior contamination process.  You don’t shave five minutes off of your exercise today, because then you’ll do it again tomorrow.  But again, that is a discipline issue, and no fun at all.  But LEARNING, as opposed to painful discipline, that is a more positive feedback loop.

*

Say you want to start gardening.  Don’t do a butt ton of research, invest a ton of money and then dedicate most of your waking hours to it.  Too much, too fast.  Just take the simplest crop, the most forgiving, and plant one flower pot.  Whether you know what you are doing or not.  You are dipping your toe in an unknown area.  Let that success wet your appetite for more.  “Okay, that wasn’t so bad, I’m going to dig up one corner of the back yard and plant a single square foot garden with a couple of different seeds”.

*

Or, just start a compost pile.  You’ll be motivated to put that to use once it is completed.  That was all you had to do.  Just throw kitchen scraps in a pile, after reading the basics on Wikipedia.  Then walk away and let the progress motivate you later.  Don’t rush things.  I did NOTHING about reloading components past my initial primers purchase ( close out at the hardware store-I think I got them for two cents each or less ).  Not for years.  But they were calling to me ( “more!” “I’m lonely!” ).  I started picking up lead wheel weights.

*

That was free and fit my budget at the time.  But the more weights I found, the higher the fire underneath my butt burned, motivating me to buy more components.  More back-up Lee Loaders.  Covering rifle, carbine and pistol loads.  More loading manuals.  Haven’t we all been guilty of this Mission Creep?  I view it as a good thing.  It isn’t about buying more shoes, it is about eventually becoming an amateur cobbler with the tools and materials.  When I became interested in anthropology, I had zero clue what I was doing.  Textbooks were worthless, the field seemed the birthplace of feminism.

*

But you read one “popular market” book and get the references from that book and then the books listed from those new ones and before you know it, you’ve started finding books that just reference each other and you know you have all the information you need.  It was exciting chasing down the knowledge, and it all started with just a throw-away remark of “anthropology can be distilled down to food forms all behavior” ( not an exact quote, obviously ) I randomly ran across.  Just find one simple thing to get your journey started.

*

What about finding a dandelion?  They aren’t very shy and easy to spot.  Try something edible they are famous for.  That was easy and fun, and it might get you motivated to move on to other plants.  Opening a book and studying wild edibles?  Most likely, it ends there. But once you do a simple hands-on, you wake up your curiosity.  You have a positive feedback.  JUST reading and forcing yourself to learn a new skill, because it is Prepper Approved?  That won’t work.  It is another chore.  Make it fun and hands-on.  Tactile reinforcement.  And do it super simple to start.

*

That avoids being overwhelmed or having too high of expectations.  You start out with a cover over the front steps, you don’t try to learn carpentry by building a barn first.  You don’t start by shooting at five hundred yards, but at twenty-five.  Just zeroing the weapon wets your appetite for more.  Just because it is necessary doesn’t mean you can’t use it positively.  This was an elementary level discussion, but I think we do tend to overthink and over plan and lose sight of how simple and easy we can start new things, like when we were kids.

( .Y. )

( today's related Amazon link click here )

*
note: free books.  Zombies here.  Another here.  Dystopia here.  
*
note: the January issue of "Survivalist Advertiser Monthly" is available.  If you are poor, or already donate, these are free in weekly installments by subscribing to my e-mail newsletter.  The monthly version is a form of donation.  It is $2.09, giving me a dollar profit ( the folks at Lulu have cats they have to feed, I'm sure ).  47 pages, 12.5k words.  Kindly consider buying click here.
*

Please support Bison by buying through the Amazon links here ( or from http://bisonprepper.com/2.html or www.bisonbulk.blogspot.com ). Or PayPal www.paypal.me/jimd303 

*** Unless you are in extreme poverty, spend a buck a month here, by the above donation methods ( I get 4% of the Amazon sale, so you need to buy $25 worth for me to get my $1 ) or mail me some cash/check/money order or buy a book ( web site for free books, Amazon to pay just as a donation vehicle ).
*** My e-mail is: jimd303@reagan.com  My address is: James M Dakin, 181 W Bullion Rd #12, Elko NV 89801-4184 ***E-Mail me if you want your name added to the weekly e-newsletter subscriber list.

*** Pay your author-no one works for free.  I’m nice enough to publish for barely above Mere Book Money, so do your part.*** junk land under a grand *  Lord Bison* my bio & biblio*   my web site is www.bisonprepper.com *** Wal-Mart wheat***Amazon Author Page
* By the by, all my writing is copyrighted. For the obtuse out there