Taking My Own Advice To Get More Ready
Fierce Community is planning Zooms for the rest of the summer to do exactly this: to help us all get more ready. They’ll be announced later this week.
I’M ACTUALLY DOING THE THINGS I SUGGESTED
📋 I did a Facebook post last week on how we all need to get more ready (posted to Fierce Community today) for this era... and then surprised myself doing exactly that THE ENTIRE DAY that day instead of several things I had planned for Fierce Community and for bringing in necessary cashola. THAT WAS NOT MY PLAN THAT DAY.
🤷🏼♀️ Eh? What're you gonna do? Apparently I listen to my own advice! 🤣
But this is the stuff. ✔️
We have GOT to change our lives for this new era we're living in. Okay we don't have to. But it would help if we do, for real.
So I started making a pivot. 🔺⤴️
I made a huge pile of things to donate or give to people I know. I'm going to check with friends to see if their kids can fit into some clothes I've outgrown but love.
With the cleared-out space, I put most of my meager but real supply chain interruption stash in one main place and in a few (but now less) other spaces.
Like rice, lentils, beans and a few bottles of meds are all together, and the bottles of water I've been filling from empty food containers are in the other locations where I had things all mixed up before. I put a few other larger things boxes of face masks with the water.
That process alone was super helpful in pivoting to get into being ready for this moment. 🔺
📋 I have a better sense now of what is on hand and what isn't that I might actually need in an emergency.
✔️ That will help me prioritize what else to try and get to have around.
It was also kind of entertaining because as I was moving stuff around and thought I had it all... I found another stash and would have totally forgotten about it otherwise. 🙈 So my hidey-hole stashing things where they fit concept was not super efficient.
So far that all sounds like prepper stuff. Which is good stuff. And for me even though it's pretty minimal it's more than nothing.
👀 I was also able to see that my tiny efforts over several months have actually led to an increase in preparedness. For sure.
🍶 Like there were lots more bottles of water from fruit juice containers than I thought.
And I overbought on some things so now I can switch limited funds to a few other key areas for different little things. 🦷🪥 Like I totally forgot toothpaste, for example.
NOW I WANT TO DO MORE
Anyway. My point here is that the moving around of things and spontaneous assessing of my own situation led me to want to do this for my entire place.
Because here's the thing.
⭐⭐ I don't need all the stuff that I have for this new era. ⭐⭐
I have been expecting huge disruption for years. I've studied system science. Now I've also studied more about societies. Climate change is real and happening fast.
Yadda yadda yadda. Okay we all know disruption is coming but it's here and we're in a fast-escalating part of it.
So I've had different things around just in case I might need them or move somewhere else or develop some other kind of a life. Or you know in case I had a life in which we did not have major disruption.
But that's not what we're doing.
We're doing disruption.
So there's an opportunity to clear out lots of things that I won't need during this era. 🛒🧺
So now my question in looking at my stuff has been...
❓ "Is this something I need while I'm living in a country whose Congress just shifted the entire federal government to an unprecedented level of law enforcement while also dismantling rural health systems and removing healthcare for millions?" ❓
Nope. I don't need this <random object> for that.
I will keep lots of keepsakes, photos, and decorative crap for now... but my stuff is going to shift.
🎪🍳 While I was looking around to see what I had, I found an inordinate amount of camping gear stashed in surprising locations. I kind of forget I have so much because I keep it pretty well squirreled away. This is what happens when you live in the city in tight spaces, or just in condos or apartments.
Anyway I will keep most of that stuff but I might try and rearrange it to be more findable in the case of needing it.
🧰🪛🛠️ Along the same lines... I have more tools than the average person because my dad is a carpenter and I worked construction my first year out of college. And I owned a condo for a while. The power tools have already migrated to relatives' places, but the other stuff is surprisingly handy to have around so I will definitely be keeping it. 🪚🔦
🌱 I found a few stashes of seeds and some gardening notes.
🧷🧵🪡 I found a sewing kit from when I was a kid with the basics.
I put all of that small stuff with the rest of the prepper stash.
MY UNIQUE SYSTEMS DOCUMENTS ARCHIVE
📂🗄️ Unique to me... I've also had notes, documents, and publications from my time in the federal government... in case those were ever needed due to major disruption or catastrophes.
I have had a very unique path through the federal spaces, and some very unique insight into programs and systems most others have never seen. 👣
That stuff is important. I have some records of it that help to understand the bigger picture pieces. 🗂️🗃️
Some of that stuff we're just not going to need... because things are already so far from the kind of government that was.
Some things I will keep in the short-term, and then we'll see how funky this gets and if they seem like they are worth keeping for archives for the other side of all this mess and whatever we choose to build on the other side.
OTHER CITIZEN ARCHIVISTS ARE GETTING READY TOO
Lots of people are doing stuff like this with pieces and parts of what the federal government was before, and even state governments, universities, and other institutions.
📜📚📓 There are thousands of citizen archivists.
People are pulling data offline and saving things in various places.
🔭 Anyway so as a society, we'll see who makes it through and who's got what when it comes time to do new things.
For now I'll keep some of the paperwork and documents I've got, but some is already irrelevant.
GOOD LUCK WITH WHAT YOU’RE DOING TO GET READY
✔️ Anyway. I accidentally got more ready for this era even though I said that's exactly what we should be doing. Gold star for me! ⭐🤣
It was only an accident because I was trying to get more ready in different ways. But hey! Progress is progress.
Good luck to you and yours as you get more ready. 🍀
For me, most of my getting-ready focus will be more on the community and connection parts of getting ready, on the bringing in cashola parts, and on putting things in place so I can help other people through this new era.
But rearranging my place to support that work is helpful, too. Humans need logistics and materials that help us do what we need to do.
Onward and forward. Try not to get dead. Keep your head above water. And all of that.
Humanity survives. We find ways through together.
🧭🗺️🔦
Fierce Community will be announcing Zooms to help talk through some of this and make actual plans. Those Zooms will be scheduled out through the rest of summer. They’ll be announced both here and on the Fierce Community page this week.
Vanessa Burnett is the director at Fierce Community. This nonprofit work promotes connection, community, coordination, creativity, engagement, empowerment, leadership, and resilience in an era of rising instability and societal disruption. Email fiercecommunityteam@gmail.com to set up a conversation.
Vanessa is a social entrepreneur, advisor, and empower-er for doing fierce community in a time of disruption and disaster. Ms. Burnett has a rare systems-level understanding of the pieces and parts that modern society needs in order to survive that can help people and groups navigate this era of fast change and unprecedented challenges. More about the author in this bio and on this page.