How To Start Prepping RIGHT NOW

This article will show you the basics of how to start prepping and prove that you can take action TODAY to make yourself more self reliant.  Although this article is a great starting point for new readers of The Bug Out Bag Guide it is also a great resource for anyone who is looking for ways to round out their survival skill set or just improve their preparedness.

Who Can Learn How To Start Prepping?

Mainstream media has recently stumbled onto the preparedness culture and has created some TV shows that have warped the public’s perception of our community.  The truth is that the overwhelming majority of people who prep are normal, everyday men and women who look to the modern world and want to make themselves and their families better equipped to deal with uncertainty.

What does this mean exactly?

Being prepared consists of 3 things:

1. Skills to make your self reliant and able to deal with a wide range of situations
2. A Plan to deal with likely problems, this should be flexible to deal with unknowable factors
3. Equipment and gear to help you enact your plan and leverage your skills.  Note that this is last on the list.  You can survive on your skills and plan alone but having the right gear (and knowing how to use it) makes life easier and increases your chances of success.

• You do not need any special training to learn how to start prepping
• You can prepare your family without breaking the bank
• You can learn skills that will improve your preparedness and self reliance at your own pace
• There is a welcoming community both online and in the real world to support you on your preparedness journey
• People of all ages can learn how to start prepping!  From seniors to kids, there are skills to learn and contributions to be made.

Prepping Myths Dispelled

• You do not need to hoard an arsenal of weapons and ammunition to prepare your family.  Some people choose to include weapons training in their prepping, some do not.  It is a personal choice.
• You do not need to think the world is going to end tomorrow to join the preparedness community, just wanting to be more self reliant is a great reason to get involved.
• Although individuals are welcome the preparedness community is not dominated by angry loners.  Once you get started you will find a nearly limitless group of motivated people that are excited to share knowledge and resources with anyone willing to learn.
• You do not need to go out and buy thousands of dollars worth of camping gear to start prepping.  Although survival gear will help you overcome obstacles it is of little help if you don’t have the skills to use it.  Having a bug out bag is a great idea but it is not the end of your prepping.
• There is no easy way to success.  Preparedness is a mindset and lifestyle that allows you to grow your skills, knowledge, and survival resources over time.  The more you put into getting prepared, the more you will get out of it if you ever need to call upon these skills.

When Should I Learn How To Start Prepping?

Bad news: The best time to start learning or building anything was 10 years ago.

Good News: The second best time to start anything is RIGHT NOW.

Never get discouraged that someone else may be further ahead of you or worry that it is too late.  Right now is an excellent time to start prepping and I am going to give you the tools to do so.  Prepping is something that you can do no matter how much spare time you have.

As I will show you below, you can learn the basics of many survival skills in the amount of time it takes you to read an article or watch a video, typically 10 minutes  or less. While it is true that mastering any skill or completing a larger project such as building a bug out bag will take longer, even these can be broken down into more manageable chunks.  Whenever you feel that you are in over your head remember that prepping is a personal journey that you can walk at your own pace.

Where Should I Start Learning How To Start Prepping?

There are a huge number of places to learn how to start prepping, both online and off.  Here at The Bug Out Bag Guide, we have a wide range of articles and resources to help you get started.

First off, I suggest you sign up to our newsletter. In addition to getting our new articles delivered straight to your inbox, you will get free access to tips and downloadable resources that are ONLY available to our members. Use the form below to sign up to our free exclusive newsletter.

What should I do first? There is so much out there!

Yes, there are a lot of resources out there with information on how to start prepping.  Someone new to the idea may be paralyzed by the number of choices available.  What I suggest is to start simple.  Choose a single, achievable goal and work towards it.  Seeing tangible progress towards becoming better prepared will give you the confidence to tackle tougher tasks down the line.  There are many choices for this initial goal, a good starting point, which can be done for FREE is to learn a basic survival skill.  Sure, it will cost you some time but think of this as an investment.

Your first skill can be anything from how to start a fire to learning how to read a map.  It is best to choose a basic skill such as “how to build a fire” instead of “how to build a fire in a rainstorm on a mountaintop” to keep it achievable in a reasonable amount of time.  The goal here isn’t to turn you into Survivorman, just to learn something practical and inspire you to learn more.

Here are some basic articles that cover these skills to get you started.  Click on the images to start learning:

We have a lot of great resources on The Bug Out Bag Guide but in addition to this, YouTube is the great equalizer.  If you have a skill you want to learn that I haven’t already covered there are probably a dozen videos out there showing you how to do it.

How To Start A Fire

How To Use A Compass:

Once you have gained some confidence by learning a few basic survival skills, move up to more challenging task.  You can either improve a skill that you already have (back to “how to build a fire in a rainstorm on a mountaintop”) or try another task such as making a Bug Out Plan or putting together a Bug Out Bag List.

How To Start Prepping: What’s Next?

You have taken an important first step by trying to figure out what you need to do to improve your preparedness.  However, the most important part of learning how to start prepping is to ACTUALLY TAKE ACTION!!!  It is easy to start something and quit at the first obstacle, people do it every day.

Don’t let your preparedness journey end with reading this article.  Follow the guidelines I have laid out above: start off easy with clear goals and work your way up from there.  I will support you along the way by providing more resources and information to help you grow.  Feel free to email me (Chris) directly using this contact form if you have any specific questions, I am always happy to chat.

Where you go as you learn how to start prepping is entirely up to you!  Prepping is a lifelong learning experience of constant improvement. It offers the very concrete benefit of improving your chances of living through a disaster.  The payoff for your investment of time literally could not be any higher.  Always remember, chance favors the well prepared.

Your Thoughts?

Is there anything else you want to learn about how to start prepping?  What is the first step you would take if you wanted to start your preparedness journey?  Is there anything that is holding you back?  Let us know in the Comments Section below, thanks!