A prepper motto

Prepper Motto

“If you don’t prepare, you could lose everything. If you prepare for the worst and nothing happens, you’ve lost nothing.” You might say that this is a prepper motto. An expression of the guiding principle, or the spirit of prepping and preparedness.

Given the uncertainties, dangers and risks in the world today, it just makes sense to prepare. It is common sense.

The prepper / preparedness movement has gained a-lot of traction over the years, and it has been happening for a reason. More people are ‘getting it’. They are becoming more aware of the many systemic problems and risks as an indebted, dependent, and densely populated society. Not to mention the national and global ‘political’ problems to muck it all up (putting it mildly).

“…if nothing happens, you’ve lost nothing.”

You might compare preparedness to an insurance policy, although with an important exception… Unlike conventional insurance policies where you pay cash into the plan, and then if nothing happens (e.g. you didn’t need it) you have nothing to show for it. However with prepping and preparedness, even if nothing happens, you will have lost nothing. How’s that? Well, you have procured tangible supplies and hard assets (and skills) which are yours, in your possession. Tangible. You can still use them…

It’s an insurance policy where you are paying premiums – to yourself!

The prepper, (the preparedness-minded) will not go blindly through their future as most sheeple being led by the nose, so to speak. Instead they will lead themselves. They will think for themselves, discovering the risks (some being systemic), and adapt solutions for them. Building a lifestyle that incorporates principles of the prepper motto.

The prepper, (the preparedness-minded), will take charge of their own future while preparing for its uncertain outcome. Committing the time to acquire extra food and supplies. The practical skills and common sense knowledge to be more self-reliant and self-sufficient to the extent possible or the extent desired.

Being prepared not only sets you up to survive, it provides tremendous peace of mind. For example I look at our food storage and feel safe and secure. I look at it all of the things I’ve done and learned which have helped me towards a degree of self-sufficiency and self-reliance. You can take it as far as you want to. Or anywhere in-between.

Just remember this:
By not preparing, you are preparing to fail.

[ Read: Preparedness is Peace of Mind ]

21 Comments

  1. Yes this has been my philosophy for many years .
    At the worst my family gets to rummage through the Junk I have accumulated and have a good laugh .

  2. Insurance plain and simple. I know it is hard for some to afford it.

  3. Also a hedge against inflation and especially now with hyperinflation kicking in, in accounting it’s called “present value of money” or “cost averaging”.

  4. After more than 25 years living in the Rocky Mountains we just called our preps the “Winter Pantry.”

  5. people in my area have called it a way of life for a hundred years, it’s just what we do. most here live very simply and it works out good. no problems.

  6. ges of being middle-class
    “He told me it was men of desperate fortunes on one hand, or of aspiring, superior fortunes on the other, who went abroad upon adventures, to rise by enterprise, and make themselves famous in undertakings of a nature out of the common road; that these things were all either too far above me or too far below me; that mine was the middle state, or what might be called the upper station of low life, which he had found, by long experience, was the best state in the world, the most suited to human happiness, not exposed to the miseries and hardships, the labour and sufferings of the mechanic part of mankind [i.e, the working poor], and not embarrassed with the pride, luxury, ambition, and envy of the upper part of mankind. He told me I might judge of the happiness of this state by this one thing—viz., that this was the state of life which all other people envied; that kings have frequently lamented the miserable consequence of being born to great things, and wished they had been placed in the middle of the two extremes, between the mean and the great; that the wise man gave his testimony to this, as the standard of felicity, when he prayed to have neither poverty nor riches.. Robinson Crusoe

  7. “He bade me observe it, and I should always find that the calamities of life were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind, but that the middle station had the fewest disasters, and was not exposed to so many vicissitudes as the higher or lower part of mankind; nay, they were not subjected to so many distempers and uneasinesses, either of body or mind, as those were who, by vicious living, luxury, and extravagances on the one hand, or by hard labour, want of necessaries, and mean or insufficient diet on the other hand, bring distemper upon themselves by the natural consequences of their way of living; that the middle station of life was calculated for all kind of virtue and all kind of enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the handmaids of a middle fortune; that temperance, moderation, quietness, health, society, all agreeable diversions, and all desirable pleasures, were the blessings attending the middle station of life; that this way men went silently and smoothly through the world, and comfortably out of it, not embarrassed with the labours of the hands or of the head, not sold to a life of slavery for daily bread, nor harassed with perplexed circumstances, which rob the soul of peace and the body of rest, nor enraged with the passion of envy, or the secret burning lust of ambition for great things; but, in easy circumstances, sliding gently through the world, and sensibly tasting the sweets of living, without the bitter; feeling that they are happy, and learning by every day’s experience to know it more sensibly.”

    —Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe (1719), Chapter 1

  8. Well, and any amount of preparedness is better than not being prepared for anything at all,
    Our life is pretty simple, we can make do on very little, thankfully, we just like having a little extra of this n that, never can tell whats coming

    1. Kulafarmer,
      yep, being as debt free as possible helps a lot also. it’s hard to do but not unobtainable. it comes with time and planning.
      can anyone ever be truly debt free? it’s always something here. electricity, water, house and truck insurance, property taxes. and things break down often at my house, plus the upkeep on the place. it’s always something.
      ugh. just when i think i’m getting ahead here comes DW with a report on the latest malfunction or catastrophe.: )

  9. The Prepper Motto should

    Better to have and not need than to need and not have

  10. Or the corollary to that which some seem to be on the path towards is, “If you got nothing, you got nothing left to lose”. ;-)

    And some just want to do it like Wade Wilson, with Maximum Effort.

  11. Maybe somebody who knows he Bible can help me out here: I remember the saying of: “Seven fat years followed by seven lean years.” I’ve gone through that cycle a few times in my life. Looks like we are coming upon 7 lean years coming our way right now. Fortunately, my tastes are simple (brewski budget, easily entertained). Hey, I’m 60 years old and I like to watch cartoons and cook for me and my wife. Lately, CNN has been almost as funny as Beavis and Butthead.

    1. 36 hours Calirefugee until the B&B series is relaunched. For this generation, instead of burning stupid music videos, the duo will be offering commentary on the Tik-Tok and other social media types. There is an entire new generation who is about to discover why I sign important email with an emphatic jpeg of cornholio. … butt munch!

    2. Calirefugee, re 7 fat years, see Genesis 41. Joseph interprets Pharaoh’s dreams. A couple years ago I thought we had 7 relatively fat years to prep for worst of GSM. Now that prepping will be taking place during a collapsing global economy with already deteriorating weather patterns. War on top of ‘vid disruptions with make harvests even leaner. Much hard work ahead to prep through these hard times for even harder times to come.

      1. Anony Mee,
        the parable of “the grasshopper and the ant” comes to my mind often.

      2. scout. Re ants and grasshoppers. Grasshoppers have no need to prep as they do not survive the autumn. They can afford to play. The species survives in egg form ready to hatch out in the spring. Perhaps the writer of Aesop’s fables was unaware of this. In any case, ants vs grasshopper story was part of an annual, observable cycle in the northern hemisphere. As the GSM is part of a 350-400 year cycle odds are the writer was unaware of the comprehensive devastation we lived through periodically. What will set the Modern Grand Solar Minimum apart from previous is that humanity was a small hunter/gatherer society or a somewhat larger pastoral society where 90% were farmers and/or lived on farms. Now the population is much larger and most of the world is urban/peri-urban. . .
        Here 1% of us are farmers and only 2% live on farms.

        1. Anony Mee,
          no offence friend, but have you ever read it? it’s a short Aesop fable about preparedness. a good story.
          Aesop’s fables had some good advice for everyone.
          best of luck

        2. scout, or is it cid, please don’t pretend you are friend of mine. I first heard this story from my mother when I was three or four. She used it to explain why we were working in the garden, or snapping beans for canning, or picking chickens for the freezer, on nice summer days when I would rather be playing. Later I saw that it fits nicely with Biblical admonitions regarding hard work. I especially like the verse in Micah about everyone sitting under their own fig tree. The picture book of Aesop’s fables I had as a child showed the grasshopper in a tail coat, playing the violin and dancing to his own tune. I was reminded of it again as a young adult studying economics and debating who establishes the value of cultural items like art and music. That came in handy later dealing with intellectual property rights and the downstream impact of personal property vs the good of society. We see that debate continuing today in issues like the commercial valuation of pharmaceutical products, and theft of defense secrets. In the prepper community the ant vs the grasshopper constantly grumbles around as an ethic having to do with perceived selfishness vs the misfortunes of others. Aesop’s fables have more layers of meaning than baklava has layers of phyllo. But if this one is all about preparedness for you, then rock on brother.

  12. Better to have it and not need it then to need it and not have it.

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