How Self-Reliance Skills Can Help Your Prepping Skills

We’ve said it again and again that skills beat any amount of equipment hands down – that latest reminder came on the 11^th of May when we talked about some of the skills any self-respecting prepper would need to master.

There are certainly going to be some fairly obvious – and essential – tools you’ll need in your skillset. But there are also likely to be some that you perhaps thought would never come in handy or that you might never need to learn.

Let’s help to put matters right on that score – with some suggestions about the lesser-known or least obvious skills you might want to acquire:

Sewing

• before you dismiss it out of hand as “women’s work” just think about the situations where being handy with a needle and thread is going to make prepper life easier – and could prove all the difference;

• it’s not only a question of being able to repair the few clothes you’re likely to be wearing or carrying in your grab bag but the ability to sew together sheets of material when building a shelter or making bespoke dressings for wounds;

• small, portable, hand sewing kits are numerous and by no means expensive – take a look at those suggested in an article in Good Housekeeping magazine on the 14^th of September 2020;

Cooking

• something of the same goes for cooking – it is an essential skill and one that any prepper needs to learn;

• it’s a skill that needs to be learned because when you are up against it, every meal needs to count – you can’t afford to waste mouthfuls of empty calories but need to know you are eating as healthily as possible;

• that means brushing up on your knowledge of nutrition and recipes that deliver the nourishment you are going to need;

Dehydrating food

• the Organic Prepper has published articles about preserving food by freezing, canning, or dehydrating;

• power failures during emergencies and crises mean that freezing can be unreliable and short-lived while canning and dehydrating will take some advance preparation of course;

• you might be surprised by the kind of foods you can preserve through the simple act of dehydration – drying out food by leaving it in your oven on a low setting;

• vegetables – especially if you’ve shredded them – are prime candidates for dehydration but you can also dehydrate leftover food such as chicken, turkey (including the stuffing!) or ham, and the mashed potatoes you had with it;

• fruit can be pureed and then dehydrated to preserve it;

Roofing, plumbing, and electrics

• your one place of refuge during any emergency or crisis may likely be the home you already live in;

• that is where you will have the psychological comfort of familiarity and the safety of knowing how everything works – together with the stores and supplies you have been steadily accumulating;

• just like every other home, though, the building and its amenities are going to need regular repairs and maintenance for wind and watertight shelter to continue;

• for the prepper prepared for any eventuality, therefore, you are going to have to take on those repair and maintenance jobs yourself – whether as a roofer, tiler, slater, plumber, or electrician, as the need demands;

• these are all pretty heavy-duty skills that you are unlikely to pick up at all quickly if you are starting from scratch – so, the sooner you begin, the safer you’ll be. Try out local courses to get some skills.

These are just some of the skills you might never imagine having to learn. Yet each of them is going to add to your overall self-reliance – a quality dear to the heart of any prepper.