The Realities of Urban Survival Post SHTF

Among people considering the subject of survival in a future world where society has broken down, there seems to be some who delight in a chaotic scenario featuring all kinds of violent conflicts between warring groups, using their guns to bring back the wild game for the evening’s feast, as in a science fiction adventure movie now playing.

Survival in a Post Collapse Urban Environment

These notions of supporting oneself in the survival situation by only hunting wild game are totally unrealistic. In America, there is no longer enough wild game roaming around to feed a crowd for an extended period, Even if your “crowd” were the only ones hoping to live by shooting its supper, and of course in the chaotic situation that might very well come, there will be great numbers of people out there competing for the same food resources. Even if you’re lucky enough to find and shoot an animal, there would be the problem of preserving it. Even if you find yourself near a body of water and there are fish in it, there will be plenty of other people grabbing the fish.

There are other problems that must be taken into account if you want to escape into the wilderness in order to survive. Consider the necessities that you have become used to in civilization, and you will begin to realize the enormity of the problem. You may not even reach any wilderness because you might be stuck in traffic with others trying to get out, or you might not be able to get out of the city and wind up thrown into FEMA like camp instead, along with everyone else that was on the road.

After careful consideration of these possibilities, the conclusion is clear: the locus of your plan for survival should be your own home. If you haven’t yet done so, be advised that you should create a survival haven in your home. If your current home isn’t in a satisfactory location, make plans to acquire one that is suitably situated. It doesn’t have to be a stand-alone building; even a condo can be adapted with careful planning and hard work. The most important criteria in considering whether a location is suitable are whether 1) it has room for storage and 2) lends itself to concealment. To learn about survival, take an example from the animal world, as they are experts at survival. One technique of survival that almost all animals have in common is their ability to employ camouflage as their major defensive measure. The lesson to be learned from this specifically by a survivalist is to avoid attracting any attention to oneself.

There are people who enthusiastically take up the survival challenge, stocking up on all kinds of foods and buying hundreds of dollars’ worth of equipment, and yet fail to understand the true meaning of being a survivalist – that it involves a commitment to lifestyle change.

Stocking up on goods is all very well, but you must also look to building up your personal energy reserve by maintaining your body in top physical condition. Likewise, it obviously doesn’t make any sense to buy the finest guns you can afford, if you don’t know how to use them – but how many people realize it is just as important to maintain one’s ability to shoot accurately through continual practice? The survival lifestyle also includes awareness that all of the things one has bought and stored will eventually be used up, and consequently, a survivalist is constantly seeking knowledge of how to create and acquire meals and clothing when left to subsist on their own.

As mentioned earlier, the treasured notion of happily surviving by going off into the wild is not realistic unless you have an ideal location already well-prepared in all ways. So you make the decision to make your home your survival haven; now fast-forward – not to the crisis, but to the time when you have reached the point where you begin to take pride in your well-stocked home. There will be the temptation to show off your pantry, but you must resist – you should be extremely selective about who is allowed to come to your home; once you reveal the existence of your food supplies, you can expect people to show up at your door asking for a handout when the crisis hits. This does not mean you must isolate yourself; one can be friendly with neighbors without insisting on entering their homes, and demand the same respectful attitude from them in return. Your aim should be to find like-minded survivalists and eventually build a network of dedicated people who can count on each other for support.