About Me

I spend a lot of my time thinking about the future.  I'm just a normal guy...I have a wife and kids...I'm a guy with a regular 9-5 job...I wish I could say that I have lots of money and I am prepared for whatever it is that life throws my way.  Unfortunately, that's not the case and it always seems there is more month at the end of my money.  So what do I do?  That's the golden question. 

What DO I do?

I have so many responsibilities.  There are many people counting on me to have answers!  I don't have all the answers, in fact, I don't have many answers at all.  BUT – I AM LEARNING.

I have spent a lot of time over the last couple of years researching on Family Preparedness and Self-Reliance.  There isn't just one place that you can get this information.  My goal was to build a website that is a place that people can visit for a "One Stop Shop" for information.  I have been running www.prepyourfamily.com for a few years now.  I'm not preparing for the end of the world, and I don't think that you should either.  I believe that we should be preparing for the "What-ifs" that are undoubtedly coming our way.

1 - What if I lose my job?

2 - What if a family member gets sick?

3 - What do I do if there is an earthquake and my house destroyed?

4 - I have a mentally handicapped child.   If our daily routine gets messed up or he doesn't get his meds, our situation will spiral out of control very quickly.  What do I do?

5 - What do I do if the power goes out for a couple hours?  A couple of days?  How do I cook food?  How do I keep food cold?

The above "What-ifs" are just a few of the questions that I have been thinking about for a while now...I would guess that at one point or another these same questions have gone through your minds as well. 

I am a huge believer in Self-Reliance.  A big part of being Self-Reliant is having food stored, just in case… When I was twelve years old, my parents divorced.  In the blink of an eye, my family was literally split in half.  My Brother and I lived with my Dad, and my Sisters went to live with my Mom.  Without any warning at all, I had the “opportunity” to learn first-hand what it meant to be Self-Reliant.  For the first twelve years of my life, I lived fat and happy.  My Mom was an amazing cook.  As far as I was concerned, she was a genius in the kitchen!  She was always whipping up masterpieces.  When my Mom wasn't cooking, my Sisters were.  My Mom had taught them well.  There was no reason for me to learn to cook. My Mom and Sisters had it all covered! 

For a few years after the divorce, there wasn't much money to go around.  A lot of the time, we had an empty fridge.  However, there was plenty of food to eat!  Our basement was chock full of food storage.  My Brother and I quickly learned that we had two options…learn to cook or go hungry.  For a while, our food creations tasted like crap, but eventually we became pretty good cooks.  As bad as our situation was, without that basement full of food storage, it would have been much, much worse. 

Now, 25+ years later, it is my responsibility to fill the basement chock full of food storage.  To be honest with you, I didn't want to fill my basement full of the same kind of food storage that I had as a kid.  What was it Mick Dundee said?  “It tastes like…Crap, but you can live off it”.  Food storage is expensive!  I don’t want to invest in food that I will only eat if “I absolutely have to”!  I don’t have that kind of money.  With the economy the way it is right now, I am lucky to have enough money to put food on the table each day, let alone to buy extra food to store - just in case.  My Wife and I have tried over and over to create a good food store, but we failed each time.  We have tried the case-lot sales that our local grocery stores have once a year.  We thought that was our answer.  We would save up a bunch of money and then fill the basement up with case after case of canned food.  That’s great food storage, right?  Not-so-much.  Time goes by, we go to the basement and realize that our entire room full of food storage is expired!  Just like that, hundreds of dollars are wasted.  After a lot of trial and error, we have chosen Thrive Life as our go to source for food storage.  Thrive is different than all the other Food Storage.  The food actually tastes good!  In my opinion, Thrive beats all other brands, hands down.   Thrive sells high quality every day foods.  We no longer strive to have a basement full of food storage, we are working towards having a basement full of food that we eat every day.  We want to have our own personal food store.  No more late night or last minute trips to the grocery store.  The food we need is just a few steps away.  Because of the huge assortment of every day food that Thrive makes, we are able to save money by eating what we store.

Our jobs as Parents, Grandparents, Neighbors, and most importantly Citizens of the World, is to take responsibility for ourselves.  It is up to us to be Self-Reliant.  When something goes wrong, we can't assume that others will be willing and able to take care of us.  If we are not prepared, we cannot help anyone!  I like to think of it this way...We have all heard the spiel many times...You get on a commercial flight and the Flight Attendant goes through a few scenarios that COULD happen during that flight, you can use your seat as a flotation device, Yada, Yada, Yada.  One thing that always stands out to me is when they are explaining how to use the oxygen mask.  They ALWAYS tell you to put the mask on yourself FIRST, before helping others.  You're no good to anyone if you are already dead.

Prepare your family now, so don’t have to worry so much about the “What-ifs”.  Prepare now so you and your loved ones can not only survive, but THRIVE with whatever may come your way.