Modern Survival Tenant #2: Debt is Financial Cancer – Kill It.

“Gold is the money of kings; silver is the money of gentlemen; barter is the money of peasants; but DEBT IS THE MONEY OF SLAVES.” -- Norm Franz

I have covered this topic of considering Debt as Cancer in previous posts and I have adopted this tenant of Modern Survival into my life even before I ever heard of other folks that were planning for having a positive financial future.  Most of my readers know that I have been a fan of Dave Ramsey and his down to earth methods of getting out of debt and living a better life.  He developed the Snowball method of debt reduction.  I may not agree eye to eye with Dave on everything but I can personally endorse his Snowball Method as I see my snowball growing and gaining speed every month that goes by.

In my last blog post I wrote of those that only prepare for failure are just as foolish as those that do not even plan for success.  The financial portion of our lives is but one area where we can measure success or failure.  Finances are easier to quantify because we are dealing with numbers.  One of the first steps to planning our financial lives to determine how much we should save in case of failure and how much we should spend in reaching for our successes is to have at least a simple budget.  The world is made up of both successes and failures, we should plan for both.  Often time’s people see a budget as some elusive mathematical computation that only a CPA can understand.  In reality a budget is just a simple list of how much we expect to earn based on our current paychecks and how much we plan on spending.  It may not be as fun as just sliding the plastic card through the checkout reader and not being concerned when “Later” actually comes, but having at least a simple budget goes a long way towards taking personal responsibility with our money.  How can you plan for the future if you don’t even know how much you have, or how much you can save, or even how much you can spend today without going further in debt.

Debt is a cancer that can eat away at your life.  You have to kill it.  The bottom line is that if you are in debt, or you are getting deeper in debt you are doing yourself and your family a disservice.  STOP IT NOW!  You are just screwing yourself and your family over if you do not dig yourself out of this toxic hole.  By reducing your debt today you can have financial independence and a better life tomorrow.  You are the only one in charge of your life including the financial portion of your life.  No one will do this for you.  The revolution is you.  Now is the time for you to start building a better, more secure, self sufficient life.

Make your own way, others will follow.  Everything you do today to prepare for tomorrow should improve your life today.   

Modern Survival Tenant #1: Don’t bet on failure.

Prepare for Everything Including Nothing Going Wrong

“Yet although history never quite repeats itself, and just because no development is inevitable, we can in a measure learn from the past to avoid a repetition of the same process.  One need not be a prophet to be aware of impending dangers.  An accidental combination of experience and interest will often reveal events to one man under aspects which few yet see.”  (Friedrich Hayek – “Road to Serfdom”)

Looking back at history as I know it and seeing how some people responded to potential crisis I have seen people move into panic mode as they prepared for a disaster that never materialized.  During the Cuban Missile Crisis a lot of people dug out root cellars and installed personal bomb shelters.  While they might have survived a nuclear blast they were probably not really prepared to survive the long term after effects of that type of disaster.  I imagine most of those shelters have either been removed, or maybe dug out to be used as a pool.  What about those folks that stocked up on pallets of military MRE rations prior to Y2K?   Did anyone really eat all of that food or did it most of it all go to waste?  If you ever tried one of those MRE meals you can probably take a good guess at what happened to them and realize a lot of those cardboard meals went in the city dump sometime around 2002 after they all went bad.

The main commonality and point of failure that most people encounter when they jump on the old school survival bandwagon is that they are BETTING ON FAILURE.  They are betting on getting bombed.  They are betting the world will fall apart when (not if) the U.S. Dollar fails.  They are betting that society will collapse when…(fill in the blank).  By betting on failure and preparing for it, they lose sight of being prepared for realistic problems such as temporary water shut offs to the neighborhood, kids needing to have a college fund, the transmission failing on their car, losing their job, etc.  

When we prepare for smaller more realistic failure events, we are actually much better prepared to handle those major disasters and maybe being able to ride out the aftermath of a larger situation without a tremendous amount of discomfort.  That’s right, we prepare for problems in a way that makes our life better TODAY!  Modern Survivalists are folks that are betting on a positive outcome in the face of problems while they are preparing themselves and their families for a better life even if things fall apart.  Having less debt means having more money to spend on things they want.  Growing some their own food means they are eating healthier and spending less.  Storing some food means that they will spend less now on food they would have to buy later and they will have something to eat if their world does fall apart for a while.

Being a Modern Survivalist does not mean hunkering down in a bunker full of guns, ammo, rice, and beans waiting for the Big One to hit.  It just means that we are getting prepared to live a better, more self sufficient and more secure life than those around us who are just not paying attention.  Don't bet on failure, just prepare for success whether failures happen or not.

The Twelve Tenants of Survival in the Modern World.

It seems that when a group of people that are like minded get together they form a list of their core beliefs or philosophies.  Christians will immediately refer to the Ten Commandments as their guidance or list of the way they should live their lives and how they should treat others.  We the People of the United States of America look towards our Constitution as the guiding principle in how we allow our elected leaders run our government, even if it seems none of them have read it lately or follow it as they should.  What about a list of tenants or guiding principles for Modern Survivalists or Preppers.  No, not a checklist of what to buy, what to store away, or which skill-sets to learn, but a foundation of how and why we prepare for life’s emergencies as a foundational guide to fall back on as we attempt to do the right things for the right reasons.

Several folks have put together a list of these core beliefs or tenants that describe the philosophy of Modern Survivalists.  The best one that I have found lately is from Jack Spirko the host of "The Survival Podcast".

• Prepare for Everything Including Nothing Going Wrong
• Debt Is Cancer Kill It
• Grow and Produce Some of Your Own Food
• Tax Is Theft Pay Only What You Must
• Stored Food is a Safe Investment
• Understand Disaster Probability and Commonality
• Green Energy Is For Independence Not Saving Polar Bears
• Own Land and Make It Produce
• Utilize Pragmatic Preparations
• Have a Means of Defense
• Have Full Documentation for Any Disaster Need
• Develop Your Own Plan

I am planning on looking into each of these concepts in my next few posts to share some of this philosophy with you.  I would like to encourage you to start taking control of your life and start preparing yourself and your family to enjoy life in a way that is happier, more self sufficient, and more secure than ever before.

Getting Back to the Basics

I haven't written down any thoughts about Preparedness for the last few months.  It seems that life gets in the way sometimes and you need to focus your efforts towards other goals that are the most prevalent in your life at any given moment.  But in a nutshell that is what being prepared is all about.  Being prepared means being able to face life's curve balls when they are thrown at you, and living a better life if things are going good. 

Our family faced an emergency six months ago with my wife having another brain surgery that she has valiantly recovered from.  In looking back over the last several months and remembering that she was out of work for three months we relied on some of our preparations such as food storage to get us through.  In fact I didn't really realize how much those preparations helped us until I took a look at our food storage the other day and realized that we had used about thirty percent of it and needed to get back on track with restocking.  I guess we were supported by those preparations and because of them we didn't have to struggle to make ends meet quite as much as we would have if we hadn't prepared.

With that little wake up call for me, I thought it might be important for me to share more information with my friends and family so that they might take a step back and look at where they are in their preparations to be able to live a better, more secure, and more self sufficient life.  We all need to "Get back to the basics" once in a while to make sure our lives have a solid foundation.  I would encourage all of my readers to take a look at their ability to face life's challenges within their ability to do so.  Have you stored a couple of days/weeks/months worth of food?  Have you put away a little extra cash in a safe spot in case you can't get to the bank or your Debit card gets lost or stolen?  Have you taken steps to reduce your Debt to cut that cancer out of your financial life?  Are you planning on planting a small garden to raise some of your own food to eat healthier and spend less?  Being prepared is not a new concept nor is it hard to do.  It just takes a single step to get started and it is never too late.