Preppers Personal Security Tips

A lot of people watch shows like Doomsday Preppers or T.V. series such as The Walking Dead and reach the inevitable conclusion that preppers are crazy and that emergencies and disasters are things that never happen in real life, not to them at least.

The fact of the matter is, preparedness goes well beyond Doomsday scenarios. In fact, “little things” such as getting ready for burglaries, having a well-equipped car and taking care of personal security are common sense, and they have nothing to do with asteroids, zombies or World War III.

In what follows I want to tackle the issue of personal security. If your spouse isn’t interested in preparedness, this is one of the issues you could mention without making yourself look crazy. Good people are victims of bad people each and every day… and this happens in first, second and third world countries alike.

Personal Security Tips for Preppers:

Step #1: Taking Care of the Little Things

I’m not going to bore you with stats about assaults, rape and street fights. You can find those online if you’re looking for a good scare, or if you need them to convince your spouse to listen to you. We all know that people are attacked every day and they don’t have to go to Afghanistan for it.

Everyone should have at least one self-defense item on them at all times. Now, I don’t know the laws where you live, so I’m just going to give you a list of things to choose from. I trust you will do your due diligence on what you can and cannot get:

• a handgun
• a folding knife
• a stun gun
• pepper/wasp spray
• a tactical pen
• a slingshot
• a credit card knife

In Australia and Europe you’ll even have a hard time with pepper spray… but don’t let this discourage you from finding alternatives.

Step #2: Taking it To the Next Level. Your Car

Once you have at least one item with you at all times, it’s time you consider your transportation vehicle. Even if you don’t use it that often, what will you do if you’re going someplace out of town and you’re suddenly ambushed by a group of people. It happened to me onceand luckily they were kids who started hitting the car with their fists, so driving off fast was enough.

Keeping the law in mind, let’s see what some of the things you could fit in your car’s trunk are:

• a rifle or a shotgun
• a snow shovel (hint: this is practically mandatory for emergency situations, no one can accuse you that it’s a weapon)
• a large knife
• an axe
• a machete
• baseball bats
• walking sticks

One of the things I bought for my car was a snow shovel. It can’t be considered a self-defense weapon because its purpose is to use it to get your vehicle out of snow and mud… but it can make a good back-up self-defense weapon in case I get attacked.

Step #3: Get a Dog

I’ve had dogs for the past 15 years and loved each and every one of them. All very loyal, though they didn’t get many chances to show it by defending me. There are plenty of breeds to choose from: German Shepherds, Dobermans, Rottweilers and even smaller ones such as beagles.

Step #4: Take Self-Defense Lessons

I should have put this at the top of the list but I realize a lot of people are lazy, and self-defense lessons take time, effort, patience and focus. Now, I’m no martial arts instructor but one thing I know is that if you don’t practice, you’re not going to get any results just by watching YouTube videos.

If you don’t have the time, consider ditching the gym for a month to try them. You’re going to get one heck of a cardio workout every time. Finding a self-defense class in your area is something that requires research, such as:

• talking to people who’ve already taken one
• watching YouTube videos with demos of each martial art to see what they look like and researching which ones are best for you
• not assuming that a more expensive class has a better instructor
• keeping in mind any medical issues you may have such as a bad back or bad knees
• and, last but not least, finding an instructor who’s passionate about what he does

Step #5: Convincing Your Family to Do It

If your family isn’t receptive to prepping or their own personal security and well-being, if you feel they might be reluctant to the above suggestions, you should probably think and plan beforehand what to say.

Let me help you out by giving you some suggestions on how you can approach them:

• Dig up old news of people being attacked in your town or city. This is very powerful proof that they can’t argue about.
• Read the stats I was talking about in the beginning of the article and let them know that, even if the odds are small, it’s still important to be prepared.
• Think what they are going to say and have comebacks. Some of their objections might be: “Oh, this will never happen to me!” or “Don’t worry, we live in a safe neighborhood!” or “I’m not going alone in unknown places at night so I don’t need this”.
• Lead and they might follow. If they see you taking action, they might be inspired and follow your lead.

Stay safe,

Dan F. Sullivan