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Practical Prepping Podcast
Mental Fortitude: Staying Calm & Thinking Straight When Disaster Strikes
00:24:51
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- [00:01]
A
We all love the gear talk. Bullets, beans, band aids and bugout bags. But here's something we don't talk about. Enough mental preparedness. You can have the best gear money can buy, but if you freeze up or panic at the wrong time, none of that helps. So today's episode is all about prepping your mindset. Staying calm, focused and decisive, no matter what curveball life throws at you.
- [00:38]
B
Welcome to practical prepping. Today is October 27, 2025. And this is episode 530. You know, this is the prepping podcast with no bunkers, no zombies, and no alien invasions. Just practical prepping where we teach everyday people how to prepare for life's emergencies. And we're here to help you get prepared. I'm Krista.
- [01:07]
A
And I'm Mark. And if you'd like the expanded notes of this episode, go to practicalprepping.info 530. We're talking about mental fortitude here today. As preppers, we do love to focus on the physical aspects, the things you can hold in your hand.
- [01:24]
B
Oh, absolutely. I mean, the preps, the food, the water, the.
- [01:28]
A
And even the sexy stuff like the gear and all of those kinds of things. But there's an equal importance, and that is mental preparedness.
- [01:37]
B
Well, you've said this before, that your mind is your most important survival tool.
- [01:41]
A
Absolutely. Now, the goal here today is to provide some strategies for managing stress and anxiety during a disaster.
- [01:50]
B
You know, it's completely normal to feel overwhelmed or anxious or scared. That is not a sign of weakness when you're facing a crisis, a disaster, an emergency.
- [02:01]
A
Some of the common reactions to, let's just say, disasters or various events. One is emotional. That can be fear, anxiety, sadness, irritability. You can have cognitive reactions, difficulty concentrating, memory problems or confusion.
- [02:20]
B
Sure.
- [02:21]
A
After the April 27, 2011, tornadoes in Alabama, in the county that I was in, we had 12 killed in that. And this recovery went on several days. We put a communicator with all of the key people, the heads of the different agencies, and. And there was one of the employees of the EMA that was with one of our communicators and there was a message passed to her through the communicator. And she listened and she nodded as she was understanding. And when it was over with, she turned to the communicator and she said, what did they say? Yeah, she was that overwhelmed.
- [03:04]
B
Your mind can be fried. I've known of times when people have faced something very sudden and cataclysmic. They can't tell you their phone number. They can't tell you the house number or their street because your mind does go a little blank when you're in the middle of an emotional reaction and a cognitive reaction. You feel completely ridiculous afterward because it's like, that's something. I know. But at that critical moment, there was a panic and there was a paralysis that seemed to overtake.
- [03:33]
A
Well, I shared the story a few weeks back about my first wife, Carla, that was working one of the FEMA centers and she had a lady that asked her the date and she gave her the date. And then she looked at her and said, honey, what year? Yeah, she was just totally fried is a good word. Part of the EMA employee situation was she was tired, she was exhausted.
- [03:59]
B
Oh, I'm certain.
- [04:00]
A
I don't have any idea how many hours she had been up. But you can also have physical reactions to this fatigue, which is common and normal. Headaches, changes in sleep or appetite. And this is, if you're going on a more extended period of time, is that those changes can be seen in that sleep or appetite.
- [04:24]
B
Right. And some vulnerability factors. You have to keep this in mind. If this applies to you, you may have pre existing mental health issues. That's a common thing. And you have to be aware of what your mental health issues may be. Some people are a little more prone to anxiety. Others, some are a little more prone to disassociate, which can also be not helpful at times when you need to engage or when you need to make a decision. And it kind of depends on the severity of the disaster. You know, a tree falling down in your backyard is certainly serious, but it's not necessarily life changing serious. But the aftermath of a devastating EF5 tornado or a hurricane, flood or fire or whatever the case may be, it's a much more graphic and a much more intense experience to have. And you can expect that you would be responding to that in kind.
- [05:16]
A
Yeah, and some past trauma. Our grandson, who's now 16 and intends to be a meteorologist, now when he was three, they went through a tornado and it devastated his neighborhood. Now, their house was not badly damaged. In fact, they lost two shingles on the roof. But seven houses down from them was total destruction. And you could see all the way through the house and in the front of the subdivision there was a lady kill there. There was a lot of destruction. There was no way to get to their house without driving through that. And so he experienced going through that daily as they would go and come.
- [06:01]
B
Yeah.
- [06:02]
A
And it brought him to a point where if it thundered he just started screaming. He just lost it.
- [06:09]
B
Of course, he's a child and it's understandable, but it took him several years to really get past that.
- [06:15]
A
Yes, it did. And it really took sitting down with him and showing him the radar. Now this rain is going to get here and it's going to have some thunder and lightning in it, and it's going to be about 15 minutes from now.
- [06:28]
B
Yeah. Papo actually sat him down in front of the GR Level 3 weather program and kind of explained things in a very matter of fact way, not to try to induce fear, but to try to show him, although we don't control the weather, we can see what it is, how large it might be or how small it might be, and that we don't have to fear. If we have knowledge, we can take steps.
- [06:51]
A
Right. And I even showed him, kind of hate to say it this way, but thankfully we had a tornado warning during that and I showed him that, hey, we've got a tornado warning. Our tornado warning radio had just gone off. No need to be afraid because see, here is the. Where the suspected tornado is and see where it's going. It cannot affect us from where it's going. And so he began to see that. And over a period of time, he worked through that. But in his earlier years, that past trauma was a real problem for him with handling those situations.
- [07:30]
B
And that might be the case with a adults who've been through. You've met several people who've been through a storm disaster of some type or a weather disaster, and they're just looking back over. Maybe they were not a prepper, maybe they were not in a prepper mindset in those days. But becoming more prepared actually has helped heal a lot of that trauma as well, because that's what we have always said. This podcast is not about peddling fear. We are about dismissing or at least downgrading the level of panic that one would naturally feel if you're in the middle of something catastrophic like that. I mean, things happen. We just have to stay prepared, like.
- [08:13]
A
The tagline says we do. And we have to recognize that stress in ourself and it's good to be able to recognize it in others as well. We need to pay attention to our own thoughts, our feelings, our behaviors, our. Are we more irritable? Are we having trouble sleeping?
- [08:32]
B
Yeah.
- [08:32]
A
Are we having trouble remembering?
- [08:34]
B
Are we having a nervous stomach situation? You know, what's the deal?
- [08:38]
A
And one of the things that I've noticed about me, me personally, when I get stressed in these kinds of situations, I become more irritable. I do. I've been working these situations, and then here's something that's just not going right and I get a little bit more irritable, and I have to be careful with me. But I've also learned to observe others because they may be struggling silently. And with those folks, we can offer encouragement, we can offer to listen. And this is where one of those situations where we need to realize that God gave us two ears and one mouth. We need to listen more than we talk.
- [09:23]
B
Right.
- [09:23]
A
But we need to watch out for that stress, recognize it in ourselves and recognize it in others.
- [09:30]
B
Now, we're going to come back in a minute, discuss some more practical coping strategies. But first, we want to tell you that today's cup of coffee comes from James. James, we really do enjoy that coffee. We've been enjoying it during the show so far. We appreciate your support of the show, and we're going to tell you, listeners and friends, ways that you can buy us a coffee and help support the show as well.
- [09:52]
A
Now, let's get back to the show. Practical coping strategies. Some of the things that we can do and need to do. Now, one of the immediate actions that we need to take is to prioritize safety. Of course, safety is first, no matter what. Keep ourselves safe, keep others safe. Now, we can seek information, but limit that amount of information. I'm one of these that's guilty. Something happens and I want to read everything there is about it. I want to know everything about it, and. And then I want to speculate about it. So we need to stay informed from credible sources but avoid being overwhelmed by that news.
- [10:33]
B
Yeah, it's called information overload. And that can also, in a way, pin you down Instead of helping you to take action. You can become a bit. I call it analysis paralysis. You know, where you're just like, it's too much.
- [10:48]
A
It's paralysis by analysis. We're overthinking. But the other thing with that information overload, which goes back to what I was talking about, the young lady that was with Ema, is there was too much information given to her at one point in time.
- [11:06]
B
She just didn't need.
- [11:07]
A
She could have handled one decision or one piece of information, but when she got five pieces of information, she lost that.
- [11:17]
B
You just shut down.
- [11:19]
A
It starts running out the other side. And so be careful with that, with the information overload, that we're not able to make the single decision that we need to make and make those decisions one at a time.
- [11:33]
B
Also think about connecting with others, you might have to do a debrief after the action and after the crisis has been averted so that you can look back and go through the what worked, what didn't work, what worked for you, what worked for this one, what didn't work and how was it handled? Because sharing that information can certainly open a lot of doors for the next time that it might happen. I mean, I wish disasters and emergencies wouldn't happen, but we know they do. So talk with others and it's okay to even share your feelings and it's okay to say, hey, you know what? I was absolutely scared to death, but I knew that my fear, I can handle that fear. But I still needed to take action. So share those feelings and listen intently and with compassion to other people who said I didn't make a decision when I should have. I made some mistakes. You know, be vulnerable and be compassionate to people that are sharing with you.
- [12:29]
A
And speaking of connecting with others, we'd love to hear from you. You can leave comments and even questions@practicalprepping.info contact now. One of the things that I've actually noticed my daughter has gotten my grandsons into with handling stress and it's stressful to be a teenager today or even a young boy. Well, yeah, but I mean, there's a lot of stress there. There is, but one thing that we can do is we can stop and do some breathing exercises. We can practice deep, slow breathing. And I've started doing that again in my life and when I feel stressed, I just stop, I take a deep breath and I let it out real slowly. It really does help. But those are the immediate things that we can do. But there's some long term coping mechanisms that we can put into place.
- [13:25]
B
And one of those is to establish a routine. You want to create or maintain as much normalcy as possible for the situation. It just helps your mind reconnect to the things that, that are normal and the things that you're accustomed to because we need that kind of normalcy. Also think about some healthier habits like prioritizing your sleep during the response to a disaster. Think about a healthier form of eating if you can. Let's lay off some of the junk stuff and maybe get a little more nutrients going because we all know that during stress your body depletes its vitamins and mineral stores much quicker. So think about that as well. Also walking, running, lifting weights, doing some sort of exercise is a great way for your physical body to release a tremendous amount of stress. Because if you hold that in you'll find that you'll experience more joint pain, more headache, more backache. The types of things that just fatigue you and make you feel worse than you normally would.
- [14:27]
A
And this really comes into play if you are being quite sedentary during this disaster. For example, there are times that folks that are assisting with disasters, they sit in a chair a lot of the day. They're assisting other people. Getting more exercise doesn't necessarily apply to the guy that's out there running a chainsaw and pulling limbs.
- [14:50]
B
That's true.
- [14:51]
A
He's getting the exercise.
- [14:52]
B
They may be overdoing it.
- [14:54]
A
Yes. Carrie, Ben Gay in your deployment. But this is the folks that are not out doing that type of activity. Just being able to get up and move around. There have been times that I have set my timer for one hour and when the timer went off I had to get up. Working here at the desk, had to get up and walk around the house inside for two minutes. Just that two minutes of getting up and walking around really helped with the stress. Also engaging in relaxing activities. And this comes into a longer duration event where we're really spending weeks or whatever recovering. It's good to focus on a hobby. Some of you ladies knit, crochet. I've seen people working at disaster centers where they were crocheting in their downtime. Yeah.
- [15:55]
B
It just kind of helps pass the time and give your mind something positive to do.
- [16:00]
A
Exactly. Reading. I love to read and I could just devour a book sitting there when I have the opportunity. And practice mindfulness. Focus on the present. I'm working more at being where I am at the time that I am. Does that make sense?
- [16:19]
B
Instead of putting your mind on back stuff or future stuff. That or you can't really do a whole lot about either one. Especially the back stuff.
- [16:28]
A
Yeah, but being present means that I've put my telephone down and I'm listening to you.
- [16:33]
B
Yeah.
- [16:34]
A
That I'm not sitting there and just what some folks call doom scrolling. You know, just one.
- [16:40]
B
That's the perfect phrase.
- [16:41]
A
Yeah. And there's nothing really gained by it. We might see a few good memes, but what else can you do with that time that you were sitting there not being present with the family?
- [16:55]
B
And we do want to reiterate too that if. If you really do sense that you're maybe a little bit over your head in some of these types of things, that's okay and that's normal. I just want to reassure you and encourage you to understand that you're feeling human right now. Very human. Particularly when you have been victimized by a disaster. So definitely seek out professional help because it is there and it is provided and it is available. And sometimes you do need to be able to share with someone. And sometimes it's actually easier to open up to someone who maybe you don't know. Maybe you have to reach outside of your circle group and speak to a professional who can really guide you mentally and emotionally through a disaster. If you really sense that you're kind of drowning here emotionally, it's time to reach out. Nothing wrong with that. You would encourage someone that you know that's struggling, you would tell them that very same thing. So if you're experiencing that, give yourself your own advice.
- [17:50]
A
And there's some proactive steps that we can take even now to build that mental resilience. We've talked about visualization. We can do mental preparedness exercises. We can visualize those scenarios. We can develop those coping strategies. If we sit and we visualize what's going to happen, we can come up with those coping strategies to deal with that. We can build those social connections, strengthening our relationships with others, very important, especially those that may be in this with us. But we can develop problem solving skills as well. Practice decision making. This is one that can be as simple. I mean, for teaching your kids the problem solving skills, you can have them to decide what we're going to do. And I know one that was teaching his daughter budgeting and he used this kind of thing. Now it's your decision, are we going to do this and this, or are we going to save our money and go do this? Now you get to figure out which one we're going to do. So they had to work through that budgeting. We can do the very same thing with the decision making. You get to decide, here's the options I see. Do you see more options? And then let them be a part of that decision making.
- [19:23]
B
You can also cultivate optimism. And I can't think of a time that would be any more appropriate to develop some optimism than after a terrible and catastrophic disaster. It's still okay to find that optimistic viewpoint and focus on some of the positive things. First of all, if you're, if you've survived a terrible disaster, that is a positive.
- [19:48]
A
Yes.
- [19:48]
B
Now, you may be looking around your life and thinking it's all torn up and everything's horrible. But no, you're breathing, you're seeing, you're hearing, you're up on your legs, you're walking around. You've got a lot to be thankful for right there. So focus on the positive and find those other areas and help other people find their positive that they may not be seeing right away because it's there. And you also want to learn from those past experiences. You know, past experiences will either bury you or grow you. You decide, you know, is it going to keep me down? Am I going to stay traumatized forever? Or am I going to reflect on what happened and realize, hey, I can take a positive step, I can make a decision, I can get up and do something and it makes a positive difference. And then reflect on those coping skills. What got you through? What was your secret strength? Was it your faith? Was it your, your relationships? Was it help from a stranger reinforcing faith in humanity? What was it that you can reflect on that got you through and helped you cope? Because you may need to pack those in and open them again when the next disaster hits.
- [20:54]
A
Now, we've got some resources for you and we're going to put those into the show notes. But the disaster distress hotline, 1-800-985-5990, you can call or you can text that again, that number is 1-800-985-5990 and that's available for text or call. The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. Just simply dial 988 on your phone and hit send. It's just like dialing 911, but you dial 988. That's the suicide and crisis lifeline. And there's the crisis text, line, text. Talk to 741741 again, that's talk to 741741 and we'll put all of those into the show notes for you.
- [21:48]
B
And we just want to reiterate that mental health is just as important as your physical safety. People, it's okay to not be okay. No one is expecting anybody to jump out of a disaster like Superman. Like it hasn't affected you. If you're a human being and you have a heart and you have feelings and you have a mind, you're going to be affected. It's okay to not be okay. Those resources are available to help you and reach out for them. That is not weakness. That is a sure sign of strength and self respect. Now, we need your input, friends, so let's talk. We're looking for a few more of you to join us for a quick 15 to 20 minute Zoom call. And why are we asking you this? Because we want to hear directly from the people who matter most, our listeners. And here's what we're curious about who you are and what drives your interest in prepping and what are your biggest prepping challenges. In other words, prepare from a preparedness standpoint. What keeps you up at night and what topics or resources would help you the most as you build your preparedness plan? And don't worry, this is strictly for just us internal use. There will be no names, no locations, no personal details will be shared. We just want to better understand your needs so that we can create even more valuable content for you.
- [23:10]
A
And here's what's in it for you. You'll get a chance to ask us anything. Whether it's about prepping, survival strategies, our gear, our cats, whatever, you can ask us anything. And then you'll receive one on one coaching to help you level up your preparedness. So get your questions ready. You'll also get a better podcast based on your input. In fact, today's episode comes from a listener's input.
- [23:39]
B
Excellent.
- [23:40]
A
And as a token of our appreciation, we'll send you our popular Building first aid kits PDF at no cost. And that's normally a $12 value. And that's a 28 page PDF on building your first aid kits.
- [23:55]
B
Sweet. So if you're interested in that, it's so easy, just email us at inforacticalprepping.info and we will send you that scheduling link.
- [24:05]
A
Your insight will help us make this community even stronger. And we can't wait to hear from you. So don't wait. Email inforacticalprepping.info today and let's get that conversation started.
- [24:17]
B
And if you receive value from this podcast, would you help us by giving back just a little? You can go to practicalprepping.info support where you will find the ways, including buying us a cup of coffee, that you can support our show.
- [24:33]
A
And we want to thank you for being here today. And as Krista always says, stuff happens, stay prepared and we'll see you next time.