Prepping – a short-term for “being prepared” – is recognizing that the “normalcy bias” is potentially dangerous.  The “normalcy bias” tells you that everything is OK, because everything has been OK for a long time, and it will continue.  Nothing significant will change.  And, if there are signs that are telling you something is getting ready to happen, you want to suppress that, ignore it, pretend it is not happening.  This is also referred to as “rearview mirror forecasting.”  In other words, looking back at recent history tells you how the future is going to be.  This is actually “most of the time” true – until it isn’t.

This bias is what gets investors every time there is a bear market.  It seems to always be a surprise.  It should not be, but it is.  In the same way, when things fall apart at a company, and it falls into bankruptcy, many employees are surprised.  The same effect happens in every aspect in life.  Recently, I was reading an article about the absolute mayhem and loss of law and order in Sweden, brought on by the massive immigration of uncivilized men from Africa and the Middle East.  And the politicians are surprised by the mayhem.  But they shouldn’t be.

Normalcy bias is a very powerful force.  Most of the time, it protects us from doing stupid things.  However, it cannot ever prepare you for a historic turning, such as a massive stock market crash, such as 1929, or 2001.  Such events we would much rather pretend can never happen in our lives.  If you grew up in the 80’s and 90’s, you believed the stock market always went up – anyone could make money in the market.  Until 2000.  2000 was a historic turning in the stock market, catching most by surprise, and losing trillions of dollars for investors.

Historic turning events – catastrophe events, are many and varied.  Here are a few:

• Massive eruption of a super volcano, such as in Yellowstone, or in Long Valley, California
• Currency collapse due to excessive debt (now over $20 Trillion)
• Loss of the electric power grid via X-class CME (solar mass ejection)
• Loss of electric grid due to high altitude nuclear explosion from North Korea or terrorist attack
• Pacific tectonic plate shift, destroying cities and infrastructure along the northwest coast and setting off many west coast volcanos
• San Andreas fault slip, causing massive damage in California
• Pandemic from all of the deadly diseases brought into our country by the massive, uncontrolled immigration
• Riots and revolution in the large cities, spreading outward

I am sure you could add a few to this list.  Gee, asteroid strike?  Nuclear war between Pakistan and India?  So many things could go wrong.  Fortunately, most of the above will not happen in our lifetimes.  But all it takes is ‘just one” that affects us.  Or brings our country to its knees.

Here is a storm surge they were not prepared for…

Prepping is “getting ready” so that – if you have any time at all – you have an immediate plan to put into action.  And, if you don’t have any time at all (such as a massive earthquake, or nuclear attack) you have a plan and a “go-bag” in your car which – hopefully – is not too far away from where you are.  And, you have a plan for your entire family, so everyone knows what to do if the unthinkable happens.  Where to meet.  What to expect.  How to deal with trouble.

That is really what prepping is all about.  The amount of time and money you spend “prepping” will be proportional to how concerned you are that one or more of these unthinkable events is a real possibility in your lifetime.  Many people do not have enough imagination to imagine the unthinkable happening.  Others have an over-active imagination.  The best place is to be somewhere in the middle:  knowing something WILL happen – maybe not in your lifetime, but maybe in your lifetime, and that you don’t want to be one of the ones that goes down the drain right off the bat because you were totally unprepared.  Rome DID fall.  Every civilization rises and falls.  Things were great in Pompeii – until the eruption.  Heck, things were great in Houston, until the hurricane.

We will be writing a series of articles on the various aspects of being prepared, and getting prepared.  This article is just to get you past the “normalcy bias” or “it can’t happen here.” syndrome.  Hopefully, to get you to stop pretending these things can never happen to YOU.

Yes, one or more of these things WILL happen.  When?  Where? We do not know.  But what we do know is, no civilization is forever.  If you are paying attention, you can already see the death spiral of Western Civilization – well advanced in Europe, less advanced here in the USA.  How will it end?  I can’t answer that question, but what I can say is this:  being prepared for an emergency, for the unthinkable, for a sudden dramatic change in circumstance, is much better than not being prepared.  Join the millions already on their way:  become a prepper!  Avoid the rush down the tubes when the unthinkable happens!