Making it through a survival crisis is a process of managing stress, equipping yourself and seizing opportunities as they arise.

These myths affect all three aspects of survival; avoid them at all costs!

It’s just like camping.

It’s nothing like camping.  When you go camping, if you can’t take a shower for a couple of days. No problem, you’ll take one when you get home.  This will be your home, and you’ll have to figure out how to keep your body (and clothing) clean all year long,  in the cold, snow or wind.

On a camping trip, you can live without anything for a couple of days, even weeks, and you can always jump back in the car and go to the nearest grocery store to pick up what you need.  What if there were no grocery store available?  How will you feel when your daily habits are interrupted, not just for a few days trip, but for the foreseeable future?

You can buy enough food and supplies for forever.

No, someday what you have will run out.  You’ll have to learn to grow and/or gather new food supplies and to learn to use what you have, even if that means pancakes without baking powder.  Someday you will have to wipe your butt with a washable rag instead of disposable toilet paper.  Someday there could be no gas to get to the store and the store won’t have anything on the shelves anyway.

Your neighbors will gather around and help each other.

Think about your neighbors who haven’t got a clue, or can’t bear the thought, of their comfy suburban lives changing when the reality of where society is going hits them, “upside the head”.  What if your neighbors can’t get their daily supply of cigarettes, beer, Prozac, soda pop, etc., etc., etc.?  Are they going to be the kind of people you can depend on?  For how long?

If I buy enough gadgets (mini washing machine, generator, solar tracker) I’ll be OK.

If you truly believe that society is in for a big shake up, you’ll realize that this is not a time to spend money unnecessarily, but to put every penny you can into what is practical.  Gadgets are going to break down and then you will have to learn to live without them anyway.  Why not learn now?

I can get to my survival location when TSHTF.

This is the most flawed and perhaps the most popular plan, thinking that when all hell breaks loose, you will know far enough in advance to travel the hundreds of miles to your survival location.  When the door slams shut, the highways will be blocked, the urban and suburban streets will be blocked and patrolled and no one will be going anywhere!  Even if your survival location is only a few miles away, you probably won’t be able to get there.  If you truly understand the need for being “survival-minded”, why not begin living the self-sufficient lifestyle NOW?  Learn what it really means to live off-the-grid NOW, not when there is chaos all around you.  You may find that it’s a much better lifestyle than the one you are living now.

I can convince my “significant other” that this is the right move.

No, you can’t, and you shouldn’t. All you can do is give them information and allow them to do with it what they do.  People either get this or they don’t.  It’s not for everyone.  This goes for all family members.  If all members of your family are not on the same page, you’ll have to determine what to do.  Staying where you are may be your choice.  Just do it as an informed decision.

Additional survival myths include that you will be successful hunting for food in a long-term survival crisis, you can take on the authorities and win and everyone who is prepared will make it out alive.

There are more myths that surround the survival movement, but these are some of the most prevalent and basic.

To learn even more myths about surviving a survival situation, please check out The Survival Mom.