Outdoor Survival Skills

The Law of the Jungle…Survival of the Fittest…everyone has heard these expressions, but have you ever taken the time to examine what they really mean?

With all of our technological advances and creature comforts, we have been lulled into a false sense of security, thinking we will never have to deal with struggling to survive.

Seriously, when was the last time you prepared an entire meal from scratch, without using the microwave?

Better yet, when was the last time you spent some time with your family, or even just by yourself, without watching television?

If we think that we will always be safe, we really do need to snap out of it! Just look at some of the horrendous storms and “natural” disasters that have occurred just this past decade.

Remember the tsunami that caused such devastation and loss in Thailand back in 2004? Or how about Hurricane Katrina and what happened down in New Orleans, Louisiana?

If you were there, would you know what you would need to do to survive?


Even more importantly, could you actually do what you would have to in order to come through such an ordeal? Why should we be bothered to learn how to build a fire without matches, or how to obtain safe water to drink when all we have to do is get up and go into the kitchen for either?

The answer is simple: natural disasters can strike at any time and deprive people of electricity and everything else they take for granted and assume will always be around to get them through each day.

Even less predictable than hurricanes are other natural disasters, such as earthquakes that strike without warning and tornadoes that can materialize in minutes; each of these can cause such total and devastating loss of lives and property in even less time than it took for them to appear. But there are also other types of disasters we need to gear up for.

Many experts have been saying that we are seriously at risk for a worldwide disease pandemic, like the Spanish flu that decimated populations across the globe in the first quarter of the 20th century.

It is highly possible that a similarly wide reaching and horribly contagious disease epidemic of today’s bird flu could put such a strain on community emergency services, such as hospitals, police, fire departments and ambulances that they could not be depended on and people would be forced to fend for themselves.

If that doesn’t scare you, then look at the ever present risk of a terrorist attack: look at what happened to NYC back in 2001. What if these cowardly assassins targeted and destroyed area power stations, water reservoirs or even succeeded in an attack on our government?

This is why you need to invest at least a few hours to learn as many primary survival skills as you can: fire making, finding water, making shelter, finding food and preparing meals with just the most basic of tools would get you off to a good start. Look at this to be the penultimate in all those self help courses you keep taking: not only will you become more self-sufficient, if disaster strikes, these skills may very well prove to be more valuable than any insurance policy…they just may save your life, as well as your families.

The typical survival kit includes not only supplies like water reconstitution gear; fire-starting tools like a flint (or better yet, also some matches!) and stone, first aid accessories, a hunting knife, eating implements and a shovel. It will also include instructions on how and what to do during a disaster. Even if your kit contains an inflatable mattress, there is one tool that is often overlooked, yet it is the single, solitary, most important item you will need to use to survive…your brain!

We have become so inundated with surrounding ourselves with our creature comforts, we forget that our species actually has the natural, and possibly inborn, capacity to survive at all costs.

This is what helped us become the supposedly superior species here on this planet: the ability to think and to create is what set us apart and above all other members of the animal kingdom.

As with any tool, before you can start using it, you should know how it operates so that you can work it to its fullest capacity. Let’s say that you need to do something, but you’re not sure if you can. Here is how we, as humans, analyze things:
We see a problem and start examining it.

Once you realize that you cannot do something all on your own, you know that you need to find another means of accomplishing the task at hand.

You conceptualize as to the best way to resolve the problem and what tools you will need to use.

If you don’t already have it at hand, you design whatever tool is necessary to help you to fix your problem.