Survival-Free to Choose

This picture and others similar are some my favorites. You know, this is home, our home, our home planet. It is our place in the universe, and to me it is beautiful, the sight of Earth from space is truly breathtaking.

One of the great blessings of the space race, and mankind’s eventual landing on the moon, is to finally break the bonds of Earth and to see it from a new perspective, in a whole new way, to see it as it really is. Earth defies all imagination.

When I see these pictures, always one the the first words to come to my mind is “LIFE,” signifying to me that through the expanse of space, our Earth is about life, a special kind of life, not just organisms, but living, breathing, thinking life. We have an amazing diverse experience on this planet we call home. It is a water planet with a friendly, protective atmosphere, and just the right temperatures to sustain our life systems.

To me an interesting thing to contemplate is that all life; fish, birds, horses, deer, corn, potatoes, wheat, trees, seems to be programmed in some way to survive. They all follow particular predictable life cycles that assure not only their general survival, but their ongoing futures as well. All life, all life except mankind. You see mankind seems to have some sort of freedom granted, some right or agency, a choice if you will in all things. Now with this choice comes two opposites, success and failure, happiness and sadness, indeed also life and death.

As I stated in a previous blog, ” a man sitting on a couch with everything he needs to live, can die just as easily as a man in the wilderness with nothing.” The man on the couch with everything can choose at any time to die, by not eating, or by more drastic means to cut his life short, while the man in the wilderness with nothing, may cleverly come to utilize whatever resources there may be around him and survive, that is retain or extend his life. Many times it is just that, a choice.

We enhance our ability to live and survive, by what we learn, by the skills we master, and by developing the courage beat all that is against us. At Wilderness Innovation we teach the Six Elements of Survival: Shelter, Fire, Water, Medical, Food and Social. Since man began these have always been the essentials. At the Core level our needs are basic and somewhat crude, but as we move up to the Efficiency and Comfort levels, things are more refined, easier going.

As part of mankind’s peculiar existence, unlike all the other creatures and life forms, we are truly able to alter our world, to build and to improve, like no other. We are seemingly unlimited in our abilities. However, no matter how far we progress, the Six Elements are still there and cannot be lost without us cutting our own lives short. When man went into space he did not evolve into some space creature that no longer needed water or food, but had to take that with him. A man stranded in the wilderness, must somehow provide these things too, if he is to live. We teach how to do it, in a simple, systematic way. Watch for our new training launch, coming soon.

This is Perry Peacock for Wilderness Innovation, where we “Simplify Survival,” until next time, have a great day!!