Readiness and Survival in an Uncertain World: Why You Should Care To Prepare

By Kevin Baum

I recently stayed at a high-end hotel, for business, and was struck by how empty the place was. No matter where I went I was alone, wandering the halls of a seemingly empty facility. It was unsettling and strange, like a plot out of a B-grade movie where suddenly one person finds that he is all alone in the world.

One evening, while eating dinner in the hotel’s restaurant, I mentioned my observation to the waitress. “You’re right,” she said. “I think with one exception, you are the only person staying here. In fact, we just had to lay off a lot of our employees. Some had been here for years.” I replied that I was sorry to hear that the economic crisis has hit them so hard.

“It’s more than just the economy,” she continued as she stared up at the ceiling; “Something just doesn’t seem right. It’s as if the world is off course or something. Just watch T.V., it’s all doom and gloom. It reminds me of the months just after September 11, when the world went into a holding pattern while everybody waited anxiously for who-knows-what to happen. I’m nervous. All my friends are nervous.” She paused and looked back down at me as she finished her musings, “Anyway, one thing is certain: We live in interesting times . . . ”

I think that short story is the perfect place to begin this article on family readiness and survival in an uncertain world. Why?Because my waitress was right, we do live in interesting times; times that will likely present significant challenges to all of us. Please understand, this is not mere opinion, nor is it gloom-mongering. Scholars from many diverse disciplines agree that we live in an epochal time, an age where trends and events appear to be taking on a life of their own, some good and many bad. Even President Obama in his recent inaugural address prophetically noted that there are ‘gathering clouds and rising storms’ on the horizon.

So what exactly is going on, and what should a reasonable person do about it? Those are the two central questions that I would like to explore in this article. First, I want to examine some significant trends that appear to be shaping our world and our future, and then I will offer some suggestions on what you and your family can do to meet the potential challenges that we may have to face, individually and collectively, as we live through these interesting times. Let’s start with five trends that will likely raise your eyebrows.

1. Global Population & Resource Scarcity
Are you aware that global population has doubled in the past 40 years, going from 3.3 billion to just under 7 billion today? Think about that for a minute. Forty years is an insignificant number in the global scale of time, and yet, in the past 40 years alone, we have doubled the number of people living on this planet. And while much of this growth has occurred in rapidly-developing countries such as China and India, it should still concern you. Because, according to the Worldwatch Institute, in the very near future, food demand from China and India alone will likely exceed the current global agricultural production capacity, driving global food prices higher as countries compete for ever-dwindling agricultural resources. In fact, you are likely seeing evidence of this trend in your grocery prices right now. What’s more, water tables on every continent are declining as we pump out water at greater rates than rainwater can replenish it, (and human waste continues to foul what water we have left). Right now, more than 400 million people suffer from water scarcity, and the Population Media Center predicts that number will hit the 2 billion mark soon – 25% of the entire planet’s population. Two commodities that we all take for granted, food and water, will within your lifetime, very likely become as precious as gold.

2. Global Warming & Climate Change
Perhaps more than any other trend in recent history, the issue of global warming has spawned tremendous and often contentious debate. This debate has left many observers confused and bewildered, and has regrettably muddied up what is an agreed-upon fact. Here is the fact that has been lost: Global warming is real. What is being debated is the causative agent of this warming – is the current level of warming the result of human activity or a natural planetary cycle? And while this debate is interesting, it is a red herring because it distracts attention from what is really happening, which is that the world’s increasing temperatures are causing the weather to act in weird, and frequently hostile ways. So what can you expect from a warming planet? Most scholars agree that warming will generate severe amplifications of normal weather patterns, resulting in significant infrastructure disruptions and power outages, changes to agricultural production, outbreaks of heretofore contained diseases, and the dislocation of entire populations of people as they run from harm’s way. Thomas Friedman, in his seminal work Hot, Flat and Crowded, coined the term “Global Weirding” for the effects of our warming planet. Bottom line: Expect to see weird and wild things from Mother Nature as our planet continues to warm up. (In fact, the Hazards Research Center in Boulder, Colorado, recently reported that 2008 disaster-related deaths were three times the yearly average!)

3. Predictions, Prophecies, & Portents
Every generation has its Doom’s Day scenario. Human history is replete with end-of-the-world predictions; whether religious or secular in motivation, we humans seem to be fascinated with our doom, and this current age is no different. However, what does appear to be different is that today there exists a strange and sobering confluence of multiple and varied predictions about the end of the world as we know it, all converging on or around the year 2012, (in fact, even Hollywood is jumping on the band wagon with a Summer 2009 blockbuster release titled “2012!”). Apparently, the year 2012 is when the ancient Mayans predicted the end of their ‘Long Count’, a calendar period of 5200 years, each of which was supposed to have ended in cataclysm. Interestingly, the current Long Count is considered to be the 5th and final ‘Great Year’, as the Mayans called it. Five Great Years equal 26,000 years, almost exactly the amount of time it takes the earth to complete one precessional revolution, which in astronomy is referred to as the “Precession of the Equinoxes”. That numerical coincidence is just one of the many strange synchronicities that seem to link mythology with science as it relates to the year 2012, and why this date has so many people of various traditions alarmed and excited. But here is the real point of this short 2012 narrative: Millions of people truly believe that 2012 will reveal some grand, global-scale event – either religious or worldly – that will change the world. In fact, many of them want it to. This should concern you because millions of people that want something to happen can actually make that thing happen if they want it badly enough.

4. Technology & Interdependence
Like population, technology grows exponentially, with each new generation building upon the one that came before it. Look around you right now; it is likely that you are looking at technologies that are fundamental to your current lifestyle (perhaps even your ability to make a living), that just 30 years ago didn’t even exist. Society’s technological advancements are truly mind-boggling, and they have made our lives easier and arguably more interesting. But there is a catch. As our technologies become more advanced and pervasive, so does our dependence upon them, both individually and collectively. Now, more than ever before, we are dependent upon a webbed network of technologies, institutions and infrastructures that provide for us those things that just 100 years ago we had to provide for ourselves, such as heat, water, light, transportation, food and more. We have become an interdependent and dependent society, increasingly relying on outside technologies and institutions to survive. This is potentially dangerous because our technological dependence has created a form of collective complacency that has robbed us of vital coping and survival skills that used to be commonplace. Imagine a major urban center of 5 million people suddenly robbed of their technologies, having to live off the grid for 30 days or more; what do you think that picture would look like?

5. Economic Crisis
There is an old saying: anybody that tries to tell you what the financial markets are going to do is lying or trying to sell you something. Nobody knows for certain when the current financial crises will end, nor what our lives will look like just 12 months from now, much less five years from now. But one message does seem to thread throughout all of the predictions about the economy: It’s going to get much worse before it gets better. In fact, Gerald Celente, founder of the Trends Research Institute and a highly-respected futurist, with an impressive track record for forecasting global trends, predicts that unemployment will skyrocket between now and 2012, and even goes so far as to suggest that people will be living in tent cities all across America. He refers to our upcoming economic challenge as the Greatest Depression, and expects a near-total collapse of the banking industry and financial markets, with ripple effects felt around the world.

A Recipe for Disaster?
So, here is the question that I would like you to consider: What will be the synergistic effect of these five trends as they begin to collide? Imagine an overpopulated planet suffering from dramatic and unpredictable weather, fighting for scarce resources in what is likely to be the worst economic crisis in history, with millions of people looking around the corner expectantly for the apocalypse, all the while depending on outside technologies and institutions for personal survival . . . sound like a crisis in the making?

Perhaps, or it could be an opportunity. General Honroe, the commander in charge of the post-Katrina recovery, suggested that the most important lesson we should have taken from the Katrina disaster is that we have, as a population, lost our ‘survival’ instincts. In a pre-world war II society, argues Honroe, Americans maintained a ‘culture of survival’ where independence, self-sufficiency and rainy-day preparation were simply a way of life. Long-term food and water storage and collection, along with essential survival tools and skills were commonplace in those days; people were realistic enough to know that in a severe emergency, they would have to rely upon themselves, not FEMA. In fact, FEMA didn’t exist, at least not in the form or function as it does today. Our complacency toward personal survival today, argues General Honroe, has crippled us.

This is particularly unsettling given the trends discussed above, since many of us are woefully ill-equipped to meet the challenges of our increasingly uncertain world. So, what can we do to re-acquire General Honroe’s culture of survival? At SurvivalOutpost.com, we recommend two things to our customers and clients: First, you should begin to think differently. By this I mean that you need to acknowledge that we live in extraordinary times and that these times can present extraordinary challenges. You should also recognize that in a severe disruption or emergency (say, for example, four Katrina-scale events hitting in a two-month span of time, or a profound financial depression), that you will need to be able to rely upon yourself for personal survival. And last, you need to face up to the possibility that it can happen to you, whatever ‘it’ is. In my more than 25 years working in public safety, I have learned that this is where people struggle the most. Why? Because we always assume that ‘it’ will happen to somebody else. Only by changing the way we think can we then begin to change how we act, which takes me to my second recommendation.

Get Prepared! Take a weekend morning, schedule a family meeting and walk through a typical ‘day-in-the-life-of-our-family’, with one exception – you have no power, no infrastructure, and no assistance. You can’t go to the store, can’t use your car, no power in the house, no plumbing, and definitely no iPod. Everything that you will need for personal survival has to come from what you already have around you. Think this through carefully. You will quickly discover that you are trapped almost from the very moment you wake up. If you are like most people, you will get up, brush your teeth, use the toilet, brew some coffee, and read the news on-line. However, if you don’t have stored water, you can’t brush your teeth, use the toilet or brew coffee. You obviously can’t get on line! You can’t call FEMA or 911. You can’t get cash because the ATM’s have no power. You have no idea what is going on around you because you have no means to get news.Your refrigerated food is rapidly souring and your pantry is half-empty because you intended to get groceries tomorrow. If you are up north, you are likely cold; down south, hot. And so on . . . now, multiply that one ‘day in the life of our family’ by 30. How did you do? Will you survive?

This is a great exercise and one that tends to get people’s attention quickly. By walking through a typical day, you quickly realize that you need to stock up on supplies in three main categories: Food & Water; Medical & Hygiene; Protection & Self Sufficiency. These three categories should constitute your family’s Disaster Survival Kit, and if adequately stocked, will give you the necessary supplies and equipment to weather almost any disruption. Let’s take a brief look at each.

Food & Water
We recommend that families keep at a minimum seven days of non-perishable food and water storage on hand, preferably a 30-day supply. You should look for food products that have extended life-spans, such as Meals Ready to Eat (MRE’s), dehydrated foods, beans, rice, wheat, nuts, and so on. There are a number of reputable businesses that offer these types of prepackaged meals and non-perishable foods, including SurvivalOutpost.com. You should also consider power bars or energy bars, foods high in caloric and protein content and rich in nutrients. These bars store well and go a long way in an infrastructure disruption. For water, you should plan on 2 gallons a day for each person; this includes water both for drinking, cooking and cleaning. Don’t’ forget that you will need to purify your stored water, either through filtration or other purification techniques. Many people use 15-55 gallon drums for long-term water storage and collection. Others, such as me, use large-capacity vessels for rainwater collection and water storage. You decide what works best for you and your household, and prepare accordingly.

Medical & Hygiene
Both personal and medical hygiene refer to practices that ensure good health and cleanliness, such as bathing and washing your hands, maintaining good sanitation and waste management practices, keeping perishable foods refrigerated and free of contamination, proper management and treatment of injuries and the like. Cleanliness is easy in this modern age, thanks to running water, soap, dishwashers, toilets, and sewers. But the minute we remove these conveniences, we are instantly transported back into a day where poor personal hygiene was a leading cause of disease, infection, and even death.
Your family’s Disaster Survival Kit needs to include medications for multiple illnesses including antibiotics and pain/fever medications, a complete first aid kit for managing injuries, and hygiene products such as anti-bacterial wipes, toilet paper, bleach, soap, portable toilet, blankets, towels, and more. (Don’t forget infant formula and diapers if you have little ones around.)

Protection & Self-Sufficiency
To survive on your own, without all the modern conveniences offered by today's infrastructure, you need to ask yourself a simple question, "What tools, equipment, materials, and skills do I need to live productively and safely through at least 30 days without support?" As you go through this exercise, you will quickly realize that your Disaster Survival Kit needs to include products for light, shelter, heat, power, water purification, and emergency communication. Your Disaster Survival Kit will need battery-operated radios, cooking stoves and fuel, fans, knives, can-openers, utensils, waterproof matches, duct tape and more; you will need ropes, hand tools, saws, and skills to improvise your own repairs to your home and survival equipment.

What you include in your Disaster Survival Kit depends on your individual needs as it relates to personal protection and survival. These include where you live, the hazards you may face, your current level of survival skills and experience, and your long-term cache of supplies and equipment. For more information on disaster preparation lists, see the department of Homeland Security’s site, Ready.gov.

Creating a Culture of Survival in Your Home
Always remember the following maxim: When the time for action is upon you, the time for preparation is gone. In these extraordinary times that we live in, it simply makes sense to equip your family with the tools, knowledge and supplies to weather the coming storms. Consider it an insurance policy, because President Obama was right, there are gathering clouds and rising storms on the horizon. The question is, are you ready? KB
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Kevin Baum is co-owner of SurvivalOutpost.com, an on-line business specializing in disaster preparation and survival products and resources to individuals, families and businesses. The SurvivalOutpost.com philosophy is to balance reason with readiness, and to encourage knowledge, self-sufficiency, and independence, as tools to survive in an increasingly unpredictable and interdependent world. Kevin is the former Assistant Fire Chief with the Austin, Texas, Fire Department, and has spent more than 20 years in risk reduction and disaster preparation. Kevin has a Master’s in Public Policy, and completed doctoral work in Hazards Research. Kevin can be reached at Kevin@SurvivalOutpost.com.