Mindset! What Mindset?

According to several dictionaries a mindset is:

Mindset:  a fixed frame of reference, the minds orientation or perspective. The mental grid a person uses to filter data from their environment.

Noun: a set of beliefs or a way of thinking that determines one's behavior, outlook and mental attitude.

Mentality:  a habitual or characteristic mental attitude that determines how you will interpret and respond to situations.

There are all kinds of ‘mindsets’ that we develop over the course of our lives and all of them are important in determining just how we act, react and move through our world during our daily lives.  As always, there are degrees to any mindset and some requirements – personal, mental and physical.

For instance, at the root of a self-reliant mindset is a conscious effort of replacing an "I need help" attitude with an "I can do it myself" attitude.  Therein lies the silver-lining of self-reliance; when you achieve even a modicum of it, you feel really good about yourself.

I found this fancy psychological study done on mindsets to determine what traits or attributes hinder or help a person with any particular mindset.  What the long, wordy study said was that basically all mindsets are either of the Fixed or Growth type. 

The more ‘growth’ mindsets you have, the more adaptive and resilient you are – the better capable you are to not only survive adverse situations, but thrive.

While a Lifestyle is:

Lifestyle:  A way of living of individuals, families (households), and societies, which they manifest in coping with their physical, psychological, social, and economic environments on a day-to-day basis.  Lifestyle is expressed in both work and leisure behavior patterns and (on an individual basis) in activities, attitudes, interests, opinions, values, and allocation of income. It also reflects people's self image or self concept; the way they see themselves and believe they are seen by the others. Lifestyle is a composite of motivations, needs, and wants and is influenced by factors such as culture, family, reference groups, and social class. The analysis of consumer life styles (called psychographics) is an important factor in determining how consumers make their purchase decisions.

Noun: the habits, attitudes, tastes, moral standards, economic level, etc., that together constitute the mode of living of an individual or group.

Adjective: pertaining to or catering to a certain lifestyle: unhealthy lifestyle choices; lifestyle advertising; a luxury lifestyle hotel; suggestive of a fashionable or desirable lifestyle a lifestyle café

A mindset and a life style are similar in that the mindset is how we view or ‘filter’ what we see around us and how we react to it.  While a life style is what we do to meet our fuzzy wuzzy side of wellness and how we want others to see us while doing it.

Over the years I have worked with seniors that needed to downsize because of health and or the economy.  Just about all of them felt that they were somehow losing their status in society by downsizing.   Now some of these people felt that anything under 3,000 sq ft was just right or small.  Granted that might be true if there are 6 or more of you in a home, or a household member is claustrophobic, but the reality is that that is a huge home for the majority of US households of 4 or less and in most cases that much space is not being utilized.

Up until the late 1800’s to early 1900’s closets in homes were small as most people only had a few articles of clothing and rooms were much smaller or cozy.  In the 1980’s large master bedrooms with walk-in closets and master baths was all the rage.  Remember the sales pitches or the marketing and advertizing; “Have your own master suite”, “Relax in luxury in your own private spa-like bath” and the like?   Yet just how often do these people utilize all the clothes in their closets or relax in their master bedrooms and baths?  Yet they are paying for it with their mortgages, time to clean and maintain and money to heat and cool these underutilized rooms.

Then there is the old stand-by of “Look good, feel good”, which is great for depression riddled people but has absolutely no value to people who accept life as it really is.  Reality lifestyles are people that know that how we feel and perceive ourselves to be, is rooted in our own minds and not our outward appearances.

That is not to say that the people living in reality are not happy and content with life, because I can assure you most of us are and then some!  The real difference is how we perceive ourselves and civilization.  We have become a society driven by stuff and convenience.  We have been lead to believe that the more stuff, the flashier the stuff, the more expensive the stuff we surround ourselves with equates to success, wealth and beauty.  The reality is that this is just stuff and success, wealth and beauty are not attributes that can be readily displayed.  We can project the illusion of them, but display it to achieve it – NO.  Studies around the globe have proven that people that are truly content and happy in life usually don’t have tons of stuff around them and that people who are striving to reach this state of mind do.  The realist knows the difference and still strives to fulfill their dreams in the face of it – without any illusions.

What does all this have to do with preparedness? 

In many ways being prepared, having the preparedness mindset, is a lifestyle change, however in a very real sense it is not.  Instead it is merely an extension of frugality, positive thinking, readiness, faith and common sense used to control some of the many factors in our environment.  This means that the changes to our lifestyles for preparedness are rather superficial and not bone deep.  True you have to live it to have it; however it does not require much in outward changes to our lifestyles.

When thinking of preparedness or survival in a worst case scenario, most people focus on storing food, water, medicine, fire starters and other survival gear.  We prepare ourselves in every way imaginable.  But how many of us stop long enough to prepare ourselves mentally?  To prepare our mindset to survive and thrive?

So, what is the preparedness mindset? 

It is a mental attitude you take on that breaks you from your normalcy bias, or the mentality that nothing bad can happen to a person.

With Preparedness this means having more than insurance policies, first Aid kits, bug-out bags and meeting places for our families.  It means being ready, spiritually, economically, intellectually and physically.

There really is nothing to be afraid of because we are already more capable than we can imagine.  If we are prepared spiritually, economically, intellectually and physically; then when the time comes, we will be able to tap into our inner survivor and stay focused and strong - no matter what is thrown at us in a SHTF world.

This will be much easier for us, if we prepare ourselves ahead of time.  And the sooner we start training our mind and body the better they will respond when the time comes.

Remember that 99.99% of the disasters we will encounter will NOT involve a widespread, government/world altering event.  Instead they will take the form of lost jobs, accidents, medical issues, fire, crime, etc., followed by the usual severe weather and natural planetary issues. 

Key points from the Pro’s on Preparedness/Survival Mindsets:

In all my research on a Preparedness Mindset, a few things stood out as being the most important.  Now granted these are those relatively intangible, fuzzy wuzzy things, and no matter how hard they are to describe and implement - they are vital to a healthy preparedness mindset!

• A Positive Mental Attitude – Can Do, Will Do rather than Can’t or Won’t

•  A Firm Grasp of Reality – Fact oriented rather than conjecture or perception, allowing calm informed action vs panic-like uninformed reaction.

These two factors appeared in article after article, book after book, study after study.  Since they were repeated so frequently this places them at the top of the Preparedness Mindset requirement list.

Read on to find out what else makes up a Preparedness Mindset @ http://www.scribd.com/doc/104447717/Mindset-What-Mindset


"Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference."
Winston Churchill

TNT