Lessons About Survivalism, Media And Problem Solving
Let’s talk about Survivalism, and how the survival market is both a guide of how not to live your life, how you can tell the difference between consumer and corporate interests, and most importantly… how to go about fixing issues in your life without being overwhelmed by massive issues.
(Warning; flow-of-thought coming here.)
The Survival Market
I’ve written a lot of sales pages for survivalist publishers over the years. It’s a great study if you’re looking for an industry to learn copywriting and marketing for.
- It amplifies peoples’ fears and primal instincts
- Survival is an evergreen topic
- It’s politically neutral*
- There is a ton of money to be made (you wouldn’t believe some of the unreal figures that launches make in the survival market)
- It’s a perfect example of how people try and buy their way out of fear and trouble
I’ll move on shortly, but let’s address the asterisk above.
Is survival politically neutral?
It doesn’t seem to be, because all the adverts and landing pages point out “TRUMP IS EVIL” and “THE FEDS ARE WORSE NOW THAN EVER” and the like.
To a guy in the funnel, it looks like that landing page is designed specifically to your political interests. So how can it be neutral?
Because you’re being sold to through a funnel. This updates based on the steps you take.
If you’re a liberal, you’re going to get the “TRUMP IS EVIL” sales page. If you’re a conservative, you’ll get the “LIBERALS ARE TRYING TO END DEMOCRACY” page.
As always, you’ll have to buy gold or set up a trust to protect your pension before it is too late.
Survivalism Dorks And Why Survivalism Is Simpler Than You Think
I mention the survival market because it’s so easy to see the divide between salesman and customer… and the customer’s aspirational-self versus their actual-self.
The average survivalist big-spender (aka perfect customer and one the companies target) is nothing like they think they are. To see them on their favourite sites, hear them talk or see the products they’d buy, you’d think they were some 80’s action figure made real-life.
They buy backpacks that are too big to carry, have ten million rounds of ammunition and literally think that massive corporations send helicopters to spy on them while they post online.
These guys spend thousands a year on products, subscriptions and all kinds of stuff. Meanwhile, a lot of them never use the equipment they buy and a worrying amount of them are insulin dependent diabetics who are also obese.
In other words, not all that high on the survival list.
Why Are You Talking About This, Jamie?
Survivalism isn’t exactly one of the mainstays on this site, but (for those reading in the future) Hurricane Harvey is doing its best to make Texas really wet at the moment, and it reminded me of a site I read a long time ago.
I’ll introduce it and then get to the point.
Here’s a great site that I read years ago. It’s stuck with me:
The design is dated, it’s on a weird subdomain and there’s no fancy, “Here’s a link to my Special Report on how Obama is coming to steal your gold and guns.”
It’s a storyline/workbook about how one guy got his family out of danger in Hurricane Katrina. It details what went wrong, what went right and what you can do to ensure you do a better job than he did.
Now, to get to the point.
Most solutions are simple. Most problems are also simple when you dispassionately look at them. And, to top it off, most of the media/corporate/political/societal systems are never going to impact you on a personal level to the extent that your own actions will.
In the past year, we’ve seen people rioting because they disagree with electoral results. We’ve seen failures in authoritative structures that have led to preventable deaths. Then there’s the ever-present threat of natural disasters.
It’s all fed to us through a 24/7 news cycle that’s been honed over generations to tirelessly mess up your amygdala.
Add to that the fact that our social and close relationships take part on media where this stuff can also get you (read: social media) and you’ve got the recipe for people who can’t help themselves and are constantly afraid of everything.
The Problem And Solution
To watch the news, you’d think that at every second there’s imminent death and destruction coming your way. There probably isn’t. So allowing all that noise to overwhelm you is absolutely counterproductive to everything.
Read the linked site about Katrina and apply the course of action to every part of your life.
There are a limited amount of problems you face and limited solutions.
If you’re in a hurricane zone, you need to worry about hurricanes. If you live in a place that can flood, then you need to worry about that.
None of these things might apply, but you might be out of a job. Or you might have no friends, or you caught your girlfriend sleeping with the milkman.
Whatever your problems in life, concentrate on the problem and how to fix it.
Otherwise, you’re acting like the obese guy who is preparing for Helter Skelter and the inevitable NWO takeover which you’re going to have to wage guerrilla war against.
Once you’ve determined the problem, work out the sensible solution. If you’re in the path of a hurricane, you have a tree of decisions to make, and they’ll lead consequentially to the next one:
- Do you leave? If yes, then…
- Where do you go? Once decided…
- How do you get there?
- What do you take?
Your decision tree provides the solutions and gives you the best way to spend your time, money and mental energy.
There’s no point in researching the fall of the stock market if you’re broke.
There’s no point in buying a 150 litre bug out bag if you’re too out of shape to carry the damn thing.
Don’t prepare for the end of the world (low likelihood) when you can’t pay the rent (high likelihood disaster.)
Final Thoughts
Preparedness is something that’s fallen by the wayside as life has gotten more comfortable. However, unlike most prepper gurus, I’m not going to resort to “learn to live off the land” or “they’re coming for you” rhetoric.
The problem with a lack of self-sufficiency is deeper and more fundamental than that. At the root of it are poor problem-solving and diagnostic issues.
You can’t prepare for a disaster if you don’t know what to prepare for. If you try and prepare for everything, then you’ll prepare for nothing.
Narrow your issues down. If you have no money, fix that. If you have a house that’s susceptible to flooding, then fix that.
In the world of constant information overflow, you need to unplug. Then you need to get to work.