Prepping Frustration

     I have noticed from several blogs and forums the frustrations of new preppers to the art of preparedness, it happens. Prepping to many people can be a bug that bites many people pretty hard and fast and therefore it can be discouraging when they try and compare themselves to others who have been in it longer. For myself I would rather use the analogy of a marathon because it can be a very long race to getting prepared with the difference of there really never being a finish line so you need to work it in a steady pace and try to not overwhelm yourself, it takes time for some things to come to fruition especially if it is skills that you are working on. Speaking of skills versus gear I have my own process on those, Gear is sometimes the easiest to procure because it is mostly a mouse click away and it is a pretty good way to get your foot into the door. Skills though can sometimes take years to master but unlike gear they are always with you and you generally never loose them. Now one wonders why a person would not just stock up on some gear and call it good? That requires another explanation.

      In the grand scheme of things I generally put a person with gear as able to survive smaller, shorter less intense scenarios, typically these would be events lasting from a few days to no more than a week or two, Think of how long your BOB would last you here.  Now  lets look at an event lasting several weeks to maybe several years, is your gear going to last and provide for you for that time frame? most likely some items will but not all and that's where good skills will come in such as medical training, gardening or even basic hunting skills, do you see the differences?  

     Keep in mind that I believe a person or group that has a mix of both gear and skills will be better off in the long run but it is a balancing act for sure and again it can be very overwhelming so If you find yourself getting frustrated than one thing I found that has helped me is to temporarily move to another thing on the list such as a different skill or the research of another item or even take a break altogether, bear in mind that this can be very consuming but try to no let it consume you completely. Another thing to try is to divide and conquer ( You should be anyway ) This really is something that is very hard to do by yourself, is your spouse on board? Are your closest friends involved?     

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