To what extent do I want to be prepared?

How prepared should I be? The opposite question would be: how much risk am I willing to accept? One's risk tolerance determines one's level of preparedness. In what areas one is able, or unable, to allow risk, determines what one prepares. Some preparations will give such a disproportionate risk-to-reward advantage, that however unlikely the event, they should be considered anyway. In this second segment, I'll try to answer those questions and outline the areas I focus my efforts on, and the areas I avoid.

Read part 1: Why I want to be prepared.

Priority preparations in any situation

The most urgent preparation providing the most disproportional returns is to have water on hand, and lots of it. Without it, all else is futile. Most preparations will adhere to the same hierarchical priority structure; we adhere to Maslow's pyramid, in the sense that we start with the items that enable the need of further preparations. In other words, we start by preparing the items we'll need across scenarios to be able to continue living, which will enable the need for other resources. There's no need in preparing long-term food storage if there's not enough water on hand to survive more than three days in the first place. The first criterion is urgency.

The second criterion we wish to focus on is usefulness. We want items that are useful in all scenarios, or a range of scenarios specific to your location; which events we prepare for varies from person to person, simply because the threats or disasters we face differ based on location and situation. Families have different priorities from individuals — need different quantities; coastal residents need flood preparations, whereas mountain residents might need earthquake preparations. We live in an area that is particularly prone to flooding, which means I'll need to have inflatables on hand, since all other preparations are meaningless if I can't keep my head above water.

In all scenarios, it is a good idea to have the ability to stay inside for days or even weeks on end — to sit it out so to speak —which means one must think of having the necessary basics on hand to not have to leave his home. Some items people tend to overlook beside the obvious food and water are soap, garbage bags, a shuffle (or some other way to dispose of human waste when lacking a garden), light (candles and lighters), a propane camping stove and flashlights and batteries. One also wants to have a basic toolkit and some supplies to do repairs and alterations to the house; things like duct tape, cloth, wooden panels (for boarding up entries), and so on. Some emergency items to consider are an emergency radio, plenty of emergency blankets, hand warmers, and basic medical supplies.

Those are some basic items to consider in any scenario. Now let's consider specific scenarios that are important for me because of either their likelihood, or their disproportionate devastation and avoidability.

Situations I wish to be prepared for

Regardless of the situation, I wish to be able to stay indoors for long periods of time, but also be able to move quickly when necessary, so I make sure to have a packed bag on hand which will provide me with 72 hours of supplies. Also, I make sure to always keep my car's gas tank at least half full, and to have the tools and supplies in the car to move long distances quickly at all times, which include good maps of a 1,000-mile radius, water, fire, medical supplies, and light. Creating this optionality of either staying put or moving quickly is in my opinion the most important preparation.

Five likely scenarios

The first scenario I prepare for is fire. I wish to be able to extinguish fire both at home and in the car. Fire prevention is good practice, even when one doesn't feel any further desire to prepare. Fires are easily started and easily mitigated with the right tools. They grow in devastation exponentially and become uncontrollable quickly, so it is good practice to have some means of extinguishing fires on hand, like blankets, extinguishers (ideally a minimum of one at each floor and exit), and also a kitchen extinguisher for putting out oil fires (class F for Fat).

The second scenario to prepare for is financial downturn. Ways to prevent its immediate consequences are:

• keeping a stocked pantry, to immediately reduce grocery costs;
• having a financial buffer;
• minimizing the amount of recurring supply needs or dependencies, for example by keeping any necessities on hand in larger quantities or having the ability to reduce the need for using utilities;
• keeping financial buffers for likely emergencies, such as car repairs, in order to prevent financial death spirals;
• and also, more importantly, making sure to keep up with the maintenance of important items, such as your main car or appliances.

The third scenario I wish to be prepared for are any medical emergencies, by keeping a decent amount of medical supplies on hand, like bandages, gaas, band-aids, alcohol wipes, and other basic first aid needs. I also keep decent amounts of common medicine on hand, such as paracetamol, ibuprofen, Norit, laxatives, anti-reflux medications, and basic supplements such as vitamine C, D, B2, magnesium, zinc-selenium, iron, which can be used to fortify one's immune system if needed.

An important fourth scenario I wish to be prepared for are supply chain problems. We've never had any problems before —that is until recently, when there were several issues due to the pandemic. These issues continued for several months in some Western countries, partially due to backward policies, which were ushered in using the pandemic's tailwind for ulterior goals, like reducing climate change. Other problems occurred due to irrational consumer behavior (in one case, the BBC explicitly stated that 'there are no fuel shortages', which people interpreted as meaning the exact opposite, leading to panic, which, in turn, led to fuel shortages). Before these events I never bothered thinking about being prepared: our just-in-time supply chain logistics seemed to work just fine, — but as I've shown, there are many reasons to have your own inventory of basic items, either to take any hits without having to jump into action immediately, or to prevent feeling the urge to compete in desperation with others for at-the-moment scarce resources, or reducing the need of going outside whenever it's dangerous to do so.

The fifth scenario I wish to be prepared for is a blackout. Blackouts are highly likely to occur over the next decade in Europe, due to an aged energy infrastructure that doesn't cope well with our hasty transition to green wind and solar energy, which are inherently unstable. I've already experienced many short cutoffs here over the last year, and I expect more to come. Experts warn for brownouts across Western Europe, due to its interdependent energy network. In case of a blackout, power will likely be restored within one to two weeks, which is a long gap to bridge without basic preparations. Luckily, preparing for blackouts is straightforward by having the basics on hand, combined with lots of light and heat sources, and an alternative cooking method.

Then there's one last scenario I want to touch on, which is the usefulness of a bartering kit. I want to be able to trade with people. I've read the account of one civil-war survivor (Bosnia) who managed to survive with his family for three years. Many died. He was very clear on his current preparation priorities: 'I would rather have 1,000 BIC-lighters than 1 ounce of gold'. Money became useless: it were the barter and skills that really mattered. Being able to repair things, provide medical aid, brew lamp oil or alcohol, or his particular trade: refilling BIC-lighters from a butane camping bottle, are the real currency in really disastrous situations. Having bartering items on hand will greatly improve your chances of survival, since they will account for any items you might need and not have. Basic bartering items that are valuable and don't take up a lot of space or large investments, are lighters, flints, duct tape, flashlights, batteries, (consumable) alcohol, medical supplies, pocket knives, soap, garbage bags, candles, coffee, chocolate, water filters, and ammunition and weapons.

These basics serve as a buffer between the external world and ours; it will ensure any setbacks will be delayed, instead of immediately noticeable in our daily live. I have no illusions about the sustainability of any long-term disaster scenario; instead, I tend to prepare just enough to take any momentum out of dire situations, in order to deflect the impact from my family to our buffers instead. It will delay any implications, buying us valuable time to think, consider the situation, and explore any alternative options, before we have to take action. In my opinion, this is the most beneficial way to prepare: it will greatly reduce any tendency to panic, delay any immediate consequences of the crisis, making it by definition no longer a crisis, giving us time to first see the unforeseeable before having to make definitive decisions.

Unlikely but worthwhile scenarios

Then there are some highly unlikely, but very significant scenarios I wish to be prepared for. The most obvious to our family are floodings. Items to consider are inflatables, survival blankets, hand warmers, a pump, and canned food (will float and won't spoil). Another, more serious scenario is nuclear fallout. This might be an irrelevant, or even controversial threat, although it has recently become a more likely possibility due to conflict in Ukraine. What's important to understand is that those who are prepared for nuclear fallout, by having a simple protocol in place, actually stand a decent chance of surviving, granted they have a basic food and water supply on hand. The most important part of nuclear fallout is to not get directly exposed during the first 24 hours, and ideally the first 2-3 days. If one would carry potassium iodide pills at all times, and one would take these pills immediately in order to saturate the thyroid with stable iodine, then make a point of sealing one's home and hunkering down for at least 2-3 days, or even better, the first two to three weeks, one could prevent the worst radiation sickness, or even prevent it altogether, again buying precious time to consider one's options.

You can find my practical nuclear protocol here.

Scenarios I don't wish to prepare for

Then there are scenarios I avoid, since they are either covered well enough by my basic preparations, or they are very unlikely, or they are impossible to prepare for in any meaningful way.

The most significant one is war. I don't think war is an impossibility in Western Europe, but I do think it is highly unlikely. The second reason is that preparing in any meaningful way, besides my basic supplies, is difficult, or perhaps even impossible. The most important preparation, namely carrying or owning firearms, is illegal here. One could arm oneself in other ways, but if we are realistic, most melee weapons will be useless in any real conflict. The third reason is that all war scenarios will require different approaches, with the most obvious remedy being to flee in time, which I have covered with my mobility protocol. The second most obvious is to lay low and use up any barter and supplies, which I've also already covered. The only real significant preparations would be to arm oneself, and to build a shelter, both of which I currently do not aspire to do.

The second scenario I do not wish to prepare for are droughts, since they are highly unlikely in our particular area, and I have plenty of water sources on hand.

The third scenario I do not wish to prepare for is an entire category of apocalyptic scenarios, meaning the end of civilization, requiring decades-lasting food storages, weaponry, stone-age survival techniques, and so on. While the likelihood of such an event isn't zero, the chance of such an event occuring, combined with my incidental survival, is so unlikely, and so hard to grasp and prepare for, and so costly — and to be honest, tedious — that I do not wish to spend my time on it. Who knows, one day I might regret it; although if I live to regret it, I will probably have more serious problems to worry about.

Conclusion

I want to be prepared to the extent that I will not need to participate in collective hysteria under any circumstance; to the extent that I can delay most crises for at least 1-2 weeks, thus reducing it from a crisis to a logistical problem, by taking the emergency out of it; to the extent that I do not have to leave my house for substantial periods of time, allowing me to withdraw from any conflict instead of competing with others in time of need, and so avoiding conflict altogether — conflict which is, in light of my reasoning above, by definition unnecessary, since it will be conflict between the unprepared, and there's no reason to be so.