Most of us are now under some version of a lock-down or quarantine, whether forced or self-imposed. As homesteaders, off-gridders or preppers we should take this opportunity to hone our skills or learn new ones.
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Contents
- mindset matters
- decide and do
- learn new skills
- practice existing skills
Mindset Matters
In times like these when things are uncertain, there can be a lot of anxiety around what could happen. It can be hard not to worry about the what if’s.
There is a good way to combat these feelings. It just takes two steps
First, identify the things you can’t do anything about. Most of the anxiety we feel is based around things we have absolutely no control over. Giving our energy to these emotions has no effect on the outcomes of things we can’t control.
It’s impossible to not have thoughts about these things that worry us which are outside our control, but when we have them it is critical to acknowledge them as something we can’t control and move on to step two.
Step two is simply making a plan of action to do something we can control. Consciously making a plan of action helps to relieve stress around the uncontrollable things by giving us a sense of control and by occupying our mind with actionable exercise.
Decide and Do
Now that we’ve decided not to borrow worry from the future, it’s time to decide what to do and do it. Deciding what to do is obviously up to you but I’m writing this article to make a couple of suggestions. I think this is a great opportunity to either learn new skills or hone the ones we have.
I’m an off-grid homesteader and there are always things I want to learn or things I want to get better at but there never seems to be enough time to get around to those things. Well now most of us are stuck in a situation where we have more time than we’ve had in a long time.
We can use this time to focus on these new skills and as a bonus set aside, at least somewhat, those worries we’re all having about this pandemic.
Learn new skills
If you’ve been planning on going off the grid this is the perfect time to start learning and practicing those skills that are going to get you there. Who knows how long we have before we have to get back to the daily grind that takes so much of our time. Today is the time to choose something to learn and do it.
Read a book about the skills you want. There are books out there about anything you want to learn. The great thing is you can start reading a digital book today. You don’t have to go to the library or the bookstore and you don’t even have to wait for it to be delivered. Pick a subject and download a book today.
You can also get an audiobook to listen to while you do other things like clean out that attic. I know you’ve been looking forward to that.
The best part about this plan is Amazon is offering a free trial with there Kindle membership. It gives you unlimited access to millions of e-books you can read on any device and audiobooks you can listen to. All at no cost for a limited time. Here are some links that describe the program. https://amzn.to/2RgXvLo
Also, you can check out my recommended books page where I list some really great books about survival first aid, foraging, bushcraft, DIY solar, rainwater harvesting, the off-grid lifestyle and more.. https://offgridmaker.com/recommended-books/
Learn a new skill by watching YouTube videos or listening to podcasts. These approaches are safe in this time of social distancing and don’t require any money. So let’s get to it and learn something new while we have the time to do it.
Practice our skills
We all know that we can’t just read about skills or listen to someone teaching us skills and expect to know how to do the skill. We have to get out there and practice.
This reminds me of when I was in Boy Scouts as a kid. We earned merit badges and these were basically awards we earned when we learned a new skill and demonstrated to our Scout Master that we had learned the skill and were proficient at the skill. This took practice. We didn’t just read about it and get the merit badge. It required practice to learn it.
Learning new skills has value we can’t even quantify because we have no idea how many times that new skill is going to come in handy throughout our lives.
One of the greatest points to learning a new skill or perfecting an existing one at this particular time is that the process of doing it has taken our mind off these worrisome times, even if only for a little while.
I hope you have found value in this post and I would love to hear your comments and suggestions, so don’t be shy. Let’s see how many great ideas we can all come up with together.
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