New to Prepping? Start Here.

These days, your life can swing from wildfire warning to tornado watch pretty quick. It’s happened to us more than once.

Here’s something interesting:

Years ago, a tornado pitched an 8-year-old boy dozens of feet into the air.

He survived.

A simple baseball helmet with a faceguard saved his life. After immense public pressure, the CDC finally started to make explicit recommendations about helmets during severe weather. You can use a motorcycle helmet or a full-contact football helmet, even a bicycle helmet. They work. Throw in a neckguard for good measure (a lot of sporting goods stores sell them.)

It’s good to know these things. It’s good to know that getting pitched clear into the air doesn’t have to kill you. It’s good to know that most tornado deaths occur from a blow to the head or neck. So, you don’t have to spend thousands of dollars on a full shelter. Just protect your vital organs.

Every prepper has an origin story.

Mine begins in 2020.

Since then, we’ve dealt with more than pandemics. We’ve dealt with thunderstorms. We’ve dealt with tornadoes. We’ve dealt with arctic blasts and water line breaks. We’ve dealt with droughts and heat domes. We’ve dealt with toxic plumes and spills. We’ve dealt with hurricanes and wildfires. And now we’re living through the engineered collapse of our government and its core systems. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court just made it easier to dump raw sewage into our drinking water sources. These threats are multiplying.

They’re becoming pervasive.

There’s no going back.

For someone who’s been prepping for years, it’s still a lot to take in. For someone who just started, it’s more than overwhelming.

It’s paralyzing.

As I’ve learned, prepping goes far beyond the generic articles flying around now, the ones that tell you to start a garden and build a community. Prepping means actually sitting down and making a plan, taking stock of yourself, and developing an understanding of what you can do and what you can’t. The can’t part matters just as much. We all need to know our limits.

I’m going to share my plan with you.

And you can share yours.