Survival Mentality: Quiz Question Reply

Answer: It is YOU! You are your greatest survival tool, both body and mind. It is yours and yours alone. What you do with it, how you feed it, take care of it, and teach it can possibly make the difference if you would make it out of a situation. How in shape is your body? Do you exercise, or do you lay on the couch all day (sorta guilty on that one...). Do you eat fruits and veggies? Or do you eat fast food? Do you teach yourself new skills, or was the last time you read a book back in high school? I think these are legitimate questions to ask yourself, and GET HONEST WITH YOURSELF! That is the best thing, getting honest.

I know I am guilty on not doing a lot of that stuff, like the exercising, and not eatin right, and I have only myself to blame on that one. But, I am going to fix that and start a small routine. I have some exercises that are pretty simple to do that will help me. As far as the food issue, I have been recently going to the farmers market on saturdays getting fresh stuff to eat, while supporting local farmers, and getting lots of exercise from the walking and lifting! The skills thing I am working on right now. I had bought several books that, while I am sitting on the couch, I am at least reading them, and gaining knowledge on what to do. So far I have Urban Survival Guide and Cody Lundin's book 'When All Hell Breaks Loose.' (Reviews are coming on those!) And soon I will be doing the lessons and ideas from those books. Also just recently I have been field testing a few items that I have bought and am actually working with. I bought a second small Sterno stove (Wow, say that five times fast) to use for just as a second stove here at home, or to have an extra for my vehicle bag. Also, keeping up this blog is a good thing too, because I am not only reminding myself what I have learned, but I am also helping you guys out there too. Practicing these things also helps to get the mindset, and helps not to let panic set in. I never knew the freedom of carrying a mini kitchen with me, and having the skills to make a meal whenever I wanted. It felt kind of nice. If you know what to do in hard situations, you are less likely to panic, and more likely to live. Even speaking is a good skill, as Bob mentioned in his comment on my last article, it might be able to get you out of trouble.

I am not sure what made me write this post. Maybe it was the show 'I shouldnt be alive'. Where a couple got lost in the jungle for several nights, and did what they could to survive, on hardly any water, an very little food. The sheer mentality got them through it. Or it maybe just a random thought or two.

To sum everything up... Your body and mind is the best survival tool you have, and everyone knows, if you neglect your tools, they wont work when you need them the most. So take care of it! Thanks to everyone who has responded, and sorry for the delay. Thanks again!

Survival Mentality: Quiz question!

Ok, I know that I have been doing a lot of product reviews and have not gone into the survival mentality too much since I started this blog. I thought I would just put a question out there that might get some folks gray matter going. I think most on here might get it right away, but here goes...

Question: What is your greatest survival tool?

Feel free to post your answers in the comments area.

(BTW, I will be posting the comments in a few days!)

Survival Gear: Cup and canteen

Water. Something we take for granted. For thousands of year the human populace has lived near sources of water. We need it, but for the longest time, we have been complacent about it. It used to be for some of us to take the bucket to the nearest water source daily, now it is just turn on the tap and hello WATER! Statistically we can live 3 weeks without food, but we cannot live three days without clean drinking water. It keeps us alive and healthy. Why am I talking about this? Well the situation in Massachusetts comes to mind. Seems that many would be willing to give their right or left (fill in body part here) for clean drinking water.

I am no expert on this, but boiling it does work. There are filters out there that do work too. M.D. Creekmore mentions of a water filter that you can make. There are commercial filters out there that you can purchase too. There are also ways of chemically treating it too. A combination of these methods is the best for removing impurities and bugs. Personally so far I have just bought bottled water for storage and rotate it when needed, will be working on my water skills when I can. I need to work on a lot of skills.

And of course, storing them in jugs and water specific containers is the best for storage. There are water specific conatiners out there, but my advice to you if you re-use containers... DO NOT USE MILK JUGS! Even the ones that you fill up at the store. I have known them to leak, and water leaks are no fun to clean up in a home. Get ones that are meant to hold water for long periods, and make sure that you clean them before putting clean water in them. Make sure you read up on how to store water, (I am doing that myself, I got Cody Lundin's book "When All Hell Breaks Loose". Might do a review on that in the future).

Also, get used to carrying some water with you, either in a backpack, vehicle, or purse. It is sometimes nice to have a drink of water on you, without having to pay too much for it. Since I travel a lot, I picked up a military G.I. metal cup, a 1 quart canteen and cover at Camping Survival. I want to add that, that online store is excellent! Speedy service. Two paws up! The whole canteen kit fits well on my backpack too. I wanted the metal cup so that way if I needed to boil water with it, I can (Yay for multipurpose!)

So, that is all that I can think of for now, sorry for the delay between posts, been doing a lot of stuff around here. If any of you want to add anything to this article, please put it in the comments area!