Being Prepared

BEING PREPARED

          As I saw people getting ready for camping trips and traveling for the Memorial Holiday weekend, I had a chilling flashback to an ill-fated scouting trip of my own, from yonder years of my youth.

          I was probably about 13 years old when this unfortunate escapade occurred.  First off, however, you should probably know that my family has quite a scouting reputation!  And by reputation, I don’t mean the “Eagle Scout” kind!

          No, in fact it all started with my Dad many years ago when he was a young whippersnapper.  I don’t know all of the "Dennis the Menace" moments that transpired from his younger scouting years, but the culminating event of his scouting experience occurred when he threw a can of pork and beans in a raging campfire one night, which resulted in a piece of exploding-hot-tin-can-shrapnel embedding itself in the scoutmasters dairy-aire as he lectured them by the fireside.  He wasn’t actually kicked out of scouts… just strongly encouraged not to ever come back again!

          So, the prestigious scouting legacy in my family began, which my brother’s and I carried on in all our genetic glory.  Don’t get me wrong – I loved the camp outs and most of the activities.  It was just all the uniforms, silly cheers, and leaders who treated it like a religion which rubbed me the wrong way.  I guess I didn’t like feeling like my worth as a person was based on whether I met a certain dress code or had a certain number of patches in my possession.  For many kids, scouting is a wonderful and very important part of their life and development, and I fully support anyone who wants to be involved.  But it just didn’t fit my mold.

          The particular camp-out I will reminisce about today was one of the most dreaded memories – A WINTER CAMPOUT!!!

          It began on a Friday afternoon, when I got home from school and my mom reminded me I had a scout trip that weekend.  I had totally forgotten, and in a mad rush to make it to the church on time before everybody left, I threw in a flimsy, thin, little, almost-see-through nylon sleeping bag, my little tin camp-cook kit, and an extra pair of socks.  It was only as I was walking out the door that I realized this was one of the outings where we were responsible for bringing out own food.

          In a rush I grabbed a kid’s favorite – a box of Kraft macaroni and cheese for dinner, along with some eggs wrapped up in a towel for breakfast the next morning and shoved them in my back-pack, and away I went.

          Only later, after a tiring and bone-chilling snowshoe hike for several miles through the mountains, did I realize that instant macaroni and cheese also required milk and butter to complete the recipe.

          Struggling to melt enough snow in my little pot to boil the noodles, as everyone else was preparing to go to bed, I suffered through choking down cold, crunchy, cheese-powder-caked noodles and then nearly freezing to death through the long winter night in my flimsy sleeping bag!  To top it all off, the eggs I had hastily wrapped in a dish towel were crushed in my back pack when I retrieved them the next morning.

          It’s not that the other scouts weren’t willing to share and help me in my plight; they most certainly were – for the right price.  $5 for a hot dog, $2 for a hot dog bun, and so on.  Of course I didn’t have any money way up there in the wild, so I suffered.  My scout leaders chuckled and extolled the lesson I was learning about “Being Prepared”.  I didn’t appreciate their advice and being the source of their object lesson at the time, but looking back now, I guess I should thank them for the lesson I learned – The Hard Way.

          Life is tough!  It has a way of throwing some pretty unexpected things at us without any warning at all.  Loss of a job, illness, financial collapse, natural disasters, accidents, warfare, and an endless list of possible calamities can befall us when we are least expecting them.  So what can we do to be better prepared for the uncertainty of the future ahead of us?

          Please humor me as I share a few thoughts on the subject… and do it with the help of some squirrels. (My wife thinks squirrels are cute, so I often send her text messages with pictures of dogs or squirrels to brighten her day.  That’s another lesson in treating your wife right guys, but for today, we’ll stick to preparedness).

1. Food and water supply.  If disaster strikes or your income stops, you won’t be able to just go to the store and get more supplies.  You may have to make do with what you have on hand. Having a few basic emergency provisions in your car or in a portable back pack is also a good idea, because you never know where you will be when an emergency happens.

2. Have an alternative cooking or heating source.  If there is no electricity or you run out of gas for your grill, what are you going to do?  There are a variety of portable cooking stoves or rocket stoves that will allow you to use twigs and branches to cook or heat a space, so that you can simply use things all around you as a fuel source.

3. Some form of shelter.  If you are away from your home or on the road, do you have a basic way of making an emergency shelter to stay out of the rain and elements?  Emergency blankets, tarps, blankets, etc.. are all possible ways to stay warm or make a temporary portable shelter in an emergency.

4. Have knowledge of basic first aid, CPR or other simple medical skills and supplies.  These skills might not only be important for your own personal injuries, but can help those around you in need.

5. Have a means of personal protection.  You hope you never have to use force to protect yourself, but being prepared will often keep you out of trouble if a situation went bad.

This may also include knowing some personal self-defense skills.

6. Stay in shape.  Even if it’s just walking or some other basic way of keeping your fitness levels up.  This will come in handy if you had to walk a longer distance to find loved ones, as well as the fact that improved fitness levels will help your body cope better with the stresses of an emergency situation.

7. If possible, have an alternative source of communication.  If the phones and cellular systems all shut down, do you have a plan or way to communicate with your family or loved ones, or at least have a designated meeting place in an emergency? 

Even just some paper and pencil could be vital if you had to leave a note for someone.

8. Group together with friends and family if possible.  Having a reliable support system and team effort would be crucial to any type of moderate to long term survival.  In a real emergency, it would be tough to make it on your own for an extended period of time. 

Also, having someone else to love and care about is a great support and motivation to make it through the tough times.

9. If possible, have some extra clothing in your emergency bag, or a way to dress in layers, so that you can adapt to changes in hot or cold temperatures.

10. Find a simple way to keep yourself entertained.  It might be a simple deck of cards, singing, or even a journal to help keep you mentally relaxed at times.

11. Stay calm!  Even though things might get crazy in an emergency, panic rarely does any good.  Being able to keep your wits about you can make all the difference in getting out of a situation or being able to help others.

12. Learn how to pace yourself.  There may be times when you will have to go for extended periods to keep safe, but learning how to be aware of when you need rest and recovery is also important to avoid overexertion, dehydration, etc…

13. Learn self-confidence!  When things get tough, it’s often hard to cope if you don’t have a belief in what you are capable of.  The truth is, all of us have hidden reservoirs of courage and capacity that we should learn to tap into.

14. Don’t count out the importance of religion.  I don’t care what your personal beliefs are, having a sense of what is morally right and wrong is what makes us human.  When things get crazy in an emergency or natural disaster, having a belief and understanding of the truth that there is a higher power we can draw on for support is invaluable!

15. Don’t hesitate to pray!  Sometimes desperate situations drive us to our knees and being able to reach out to a God who loves us, is a reservoir of power just waiting to be tapped into. 

But it is my personal belief that prayer and gratitude to God in times of peace and plenty is an important trait to develop, Not just when things get tough.  It would seem pretty selfish of us to only call upon God in our emergencies and expect Him to deliver, if we haven’t ever learned to thank and trust in Him when things are going good.

16. If ye are prepared, ye shall not fear. 

Taking the time to make some basic plans and preparation now, can and will make all the difference later.  When things get tough, the time or preparation has already passed.  If everyone is expecting others around them to take care of them, then nobody will be prepared and we will all suffer.

          But if we all do our part to be prepared individually and as families, then we can weather the storms of life together all the easier!

          Take my word for it.  It's no fun freezing your keester off and eating crunchy macaroni noodles in dried cheese power! Learn a lesson from a former bad boy scout and  BE PREPARED!!!

Plugging into the Power Source

Plugging into the Power Source

         Several years ago I was preparing to leave work one evening after a long day at an In-patient rehab center.  As I was walking down the hall toward the exit, I waved to one of the residents who was lying in his bed and bid him a good evening.

          “Hey, can you help me for a second?” He called out as I passed.  I returned to his room to see what he needed. “I can’t get my remote to work so I can watch some TV this evening.”

          Knowing that he was quite disabled at the time and unable to get out of bed without a lot of help, I realized that the remote for the television was his only link to the outside world for the rest of the night.  Rather than leaving him stuck with only one channel or having to ring his call light and have the nurse come down every time he wanted to switch the station, I set down my bag and agreed to help.

          Of course, the first brilliant thing I did was to point the remote at the black screen and punch the buttons repeatedly, somehow thinking that my thumb might be more magic than his to activate the TV.  Nothing.

          Next I flipped open the back of the remote and spun the batteries around a bit in the holders and tried punching the buttons… again Nothing.

          So I left the remote and offered to go get some new batteries from the maintenance room on the other side of the building.  Finding the maintenance staff gone for the evening and the door locked, I then had to go on a search for the evening supervisory nurse who would have the key to the door to get the batteries.

          After several minutes, I finally located her and she handed me a ring of keys.  Returning to the maintenance room, I began to shuffle through the 15 or so keys, trying each one in the lock…. None of them fit.

          Searching again for the charge nurse, I explained the dilemma, to which she chuckled and handed me another set of keys, stating that she had handed me the wrong set of keys the first time.  Returning to the storage room, I again shuffled through a dozen keys before finding the correct one. After searching through several drawers, I finally found some new batteries, returned the keys to the nurse, and then made my way back to the patient’s room.

          It had taken so long, that I was sure the poor fellow had assumed I had left and ditched him for the night.  After laughing and explaining why I had had been delayed, I triumphantly placed the new batteries in the remote and punched the power button…. Nothing!

          Figuring the entire remote was faulty, I apologized and again left to track down the nurse with the keys, again returned to the maintenance room, and located another new remote control, returned the keys to the nurse and once again went back to the patient’s room, put the new batteries in the new remote and punched the programming button…. Again Nothing!!!

          Exasperated, I just about chucked the remote out the window!  At that moment, I happened to glance down by the garbage can and something caught my eye.

          The power cord for the television was unplugged!  At some point, when a housekeeper or nurse was changing the garbage, the cord must have been bumped and jarred loose from the socket.

          Humbled, and quite embarrassed, I reached down and plugged the set into the outlet.

The patient, who was holding the old original remote on his bed, pushed the button and the TV fired to life!

          We both shared and laugh and he thanked me and apologized for all the time and trouble he had caused.  But as I walked to my car, I couldn’t help but realize the profound lesson I had just been taught.

          In all my efforts, despite trying to be helpful and productive, I had wasted a lot of time and effort because I had failed to do the most obvious thing first – Plug into the source of power.

          How often do we all do this in life?  We go about our daily grind and struggle, thinking, planning, working and trying to accomplish things, but are we taking time to plug ourselves into the real source of power which provides light and insight and pure direction?

          Of course I’m talking NOT about books, or the internet, but instead I’m referring to the Ultimate source of all power, light, knowledge and direction, God.

          I have found that I can plug into that source of power better in my own life, by three prongs on my spiritual power cord:

Prayer -

Study of the Scriptures -

And Temple attendance and worship.

          These three prongs, if we use the force to apply them, truly allow a higher source of energy to flow into our lives.

          That doesn’t mean that we won’t have to do a little footwork (or sometimes a lot) to bring the needed pieces of our lives together, but taking the time to plug into the source of power in the first place, will often save us a lot of wasted time and heartache running down the wrong paths and trying the wrong keys to the doorways of life.


         "Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." - John 8:12

          "Behold, I am Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I am the same that came unto mine own, and mine own received me not. I am the light which shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not." - D&C 6:21

          So, if you find yourself spinning your wheels and exhausting your efforts to no avail, take a closer look and make sure the trials of your life haven’t knocked the cord out of outlet.  Make sure you are firmly plugged into the Power Source!  Experience has taught me that going back to the basics is generally the best place to start!

NEW BLUE SHOES

NEW BLUE SHOES

          Many years ago, when I was still in graduate school studying Physical Therapy, I happened to be doing an internship in a small community hospital which had nursing home attached to it on one end.  One day the nurses called and said that they wanted me to assess an elderly Alzheimer’s gentleman to see if some therapy would help him get moving around better, so they could care for him more easily.

          He was a skinny, smiling old chap who couldn’t have weighed more than 90 pounds, who just looked completely content to be lying on the bed.  His dementia was advanced enough that he couldn’t really understand things too well or follow directions for what we wanted him to do.  I suggested the nurse and I try to get him up, but I didn’t want his feet to slip on the tile floor, so we placed some of those extremely attractive hospital socks on his feet.

          As I helped to spin him around to sit up on the edge of the bed, his body went rigid like a board (I’m not kidding at all – he was stiff just like he was strapped to a plank), and we couldn’t get him to bend and the waist and sit up.

          Using my very young therapist intuition, I placed a transfer belt around his waist, and suggested to the nurse who was on the other side of the patient, that if we tilted him forward and lifted on the belt, that perhaps once we got him up onto his feet, his instincts would kick in and his standing reactions would take over and then we could see how he could move around.

          I put my foot in front of his on the floor as a brace, and we gave a 1, 2, 3 count and lifted on the belt to tip him up onto his feet, but the old guy surprised us. As we lifted, he deftly and nimbly stepped over my foot, took a flurry of skittering little stiff-legged strides across the floor and right up the drawers of the dresser which was next to the bed!

          For a moment the nurse and I were in complete shock and astonishment as we both held on to the belt around his waist and behind his back and the little old man levitated completely stiff in the air with us holding his trunk and his feet now sitting on top of the dresser!  Talk about planking – this guy was the Master!

          In the midst of this shocking moment, the old man looked down at his feet, with those blue hospital socks, then turned and smiled at me as we held him in the air and proud as could be asked me, “Have you seen my new blue shoes?”

          We couldn’t help but burst into laughter of the hilarity of the situation, and I was afraid we might drop him, so I finally simply scooped him up in both of my arms and laid his plank-stiff body back on the bed.

          I’ve thought back on this situation some over the years, and it still brings a smile to my face, but has also taught me a few lessons as well, about how often times as we go through life, we can easily get distracted about the reality of what is going on around us.  We can so easily get caught up in the less important things in life that we fail to notice what is most important.  In essence, we get so focused on our “new blue shoes” that we don’t see what life is trying to teach us in order for us to improve.

          For some, their distracting “new blue shoes” might be their job and they become so focused on this that they mistakenly think that is who they are and what defines them.

          For others, the “new blue shoes” may be a greed for money and acquisition of more material “things” that they think will buy them happiness, but which are often hollow, unfulfilling, and only bring temporary false-joy.

          For others, the “new blue shoes” may be excessive, time-sapping video games, television or social media which dull the senses and waste away potential productivity.

          In reality, the potential list of “new blue shoes” we focus on is vast and endless.  But if we could take a minute, loosen up our perspective and shift our focus away from those “new blue shoes” and look at the larger reality around us, we would see that there are forces in our lives which are trying to help us actually become something better than what we are in our current state of rigidity.  The purpose of life isn’t to get “new blue shoes” but to experience growth, change and improvement that we can carry over into the eternities beyond this mortal realm.

          A loving God and Savior have provided many sources of help and guidance along the way to achieve this change… if we aren’t too rigid to let them.  Some of these helping sources come in the form of family members, sibling, parents, grandparents who care about us and are filled with wisdom and experience to help us through our struggles.

          Another source of strength may come from religious leaders, life counselors, or caring friends.

          Other inspired sources of guidance beyond our own understanding come in the wonderful power of prayer and meditation.

          Or the Holy Scriptures.

          And even in looking beyond ourselves to provide meaningful service to others.

          If all we are focused on in this life are the “new blue shoes” (trivial things of no lasting importance), we will miss out on the true sources of peace, love, joy and fulfillment which are found in devoted caring relationships with our spouse.

          The “new blue shoes” can also, if we are not careful, rob us of the precious moments and years with our family and children, which all too quickly grow up and move on with their own lives.

          We would all do better to shift our focus from whatever our “new blue shoes” are in our lives, (which we might think are cool but are really just cheap hospital socks of worth that will wear out and fall apart rather quickly when put under stress) and instead focus more on others around us, we will find that life is a wonderful learning and growing experience with plenty of help along the way to raise us up, allow us to stand and become something better than what we are today.

          As the good Master said, “Lay not up for yourselves treasure upon the earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven… For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” – Matthew 6:19-20