I happened to be poking around in my blogging dashboard today and noticed that people have been leaving comments on this blog! Somehow in setting it up I forgot to have Blogger notify me when people leave comments. My other blogs are set up this way, and so I am used to not having to look. Well, I’ve been getting comments! I apologize for not responding, though obviously not all comments require response.

I’ve turned on the notifications now, so hopefully I won’t ignore you again.

To quote Maxwell Smart, “Sorry about that, Chief!”

My parents’ home was built in the early twentieth century and included an unfinished half basement. I remember being somewhat frightened of it as a child; the concrete floor and walls, the bare floor joists instead of ceiling, the single bare bulb in the center of the room that required you to walk into the darkness to find the pull chain before you could turn it on. Perhaps even scarier was leaving the room, when you had to turn out the light, turn your back to the big, open, dark room and make your way out again.

Today I would give anything for a basement like that. Newer houses, at least in my state, do not have basements. At least not like that. We have a split level home, with the lower floor partly below ground level, but not a storage basement like my parents had. I never really appreciated all that space they had until I started trying to build up food storage of my own.

We’ve had to get more creative. There is room in the garage, but it’s not the most ideal facility. It gets far too hot in the summer, and is difficult to get around in when we park both cars inside. We converted the closet under the stairs to food storage, but it is cramped, dark, and attracts mice too easily. We have storage under our beds and on top of cupboards. We even put storage cabinets in our master bedroom. And it’s not enough.

A basement would make all of it so much easier. I’ve heard of a company in town that builds basements underneath existing houses. I imagine it’s possible to add a storage basement underneath the ground level of our house. I also imagine it’s fairly expensive. With the current state of the economy it may well be a long time before we see that kind of money again.

So for now I suppose we have little choice but to get creative in finding ways to overcome the lack of storage space in our home’s design. Hmmm… What if we placed our bed up on top of a large cabinet? Weren’t beds you need a stool to climb into all the rage a few years ago?

I went to a business seminar today. While we were waiting to get started we were introducing ourselves around and discussing what we did. One gentleman I was speaking with pressed far enough to find out I am launching a website centered around self-reliance. From the expression on his face I couldn’t quite tell if he had no idea what I was talking about or he merely found the topic about as interesting as he would a doctoral thesis on differentiation in lichens of the American Northwest.

Some people are perhaps fortunate enough to have never been faced with a situation where self-reliance comes in handy. In the training room of a company where I used to work was a poster that said something along the lines of, “A system backup is an activity religiously practiced only by those who have previously experienced a system crash.” However true, the implication is that people don’t appreciate the need for something until they experience a situation in which that something would have helped had they done it.

Those of us who have already seen the benefits of self-reliance tend to view people like that as “whistling past the graveyard,” or perhaps being like children who believe they are invisible if they close their eyes. But then they probably view people like me as paranoid, tin foil beanie-wearing survivalist nut-jobs. I guess it goes both ways.

Just for the record, I did not rush out and buy duct tape and plastic wrap during the anthrax scares after 9/11. I did not buy surgical masks or refuse to go out in public during the various super-flu scares of the last decade. I am not a reactionary. I merely believe in risk management. Having been through three periods of unemployment in the past eleven years, I see the need to mitigate the risk of extended unemployment through financial planning, food storage, and learning to do some of the things I would rather not have to pay someone else for during low-income periods.

So let me just reiterate. This is not a site for conspiracy theorists, apocalyptic harbingers, or survivalist loners. If those people find something of value on this site, great. They’re certainly welcome if they behave themselves, but they’re not my audience. This is a site for people who, whether or not they choose to live a self-reliant lifestyle during good times, want to be prepared for the inevitable hard times and be able to do for themselves as much as possible. It’s for people who see that there are certain risks in life worth preparing against.

It’s for people who have found that certain things work well for them and want to share what they have found with others who might find it useful also. Welcome! Come on in, pull up a chair, and tell us what you’ve found. Or feel free to pull up a chair and just listen. That’s fine, too.

Whatever I may think of Thoreau’s ideas in Walden (and for the most part I think rather highly of them), there is no disputing that he is convincing me to fall in love with Walden Pond itself. Other than himself, it is the only other character of consequence in the book. And who can blame him for going on and on about it, really? I mean, take a look at this:

Photos by Ian Britton (via Freefoto.com)

I suspect in a place like this I’d get rather introspective and philosophical, too. There is an aerial photo of the pond and the surrounding area that can be seen here. I am uncertain about the copyright status, so I’ll just send you there if you wish to see more beautiful New England scenery. I would if I were you. “Thoreau’s Cove”, where he built his cabin, can be seen to the lower left. The straight cut through the woods across the lower right corner is, I believe, the train tracks that Thoreau mentions frequently–often in connection with dismissing modern development and travel.

If ever I travel in New England, Walden Pond is on my list of place to see.

About six months ago a friend and I bought a training program to get us started as online retailers. To date we have made one sale (Thanks, Mom!). We technically got what we paid for. I don’t believe the training was at all bad. We did get a website, and we did get the traffic they promised us. There are numerous reasons I can think of why we haven’t converted any sales yet. Only a few lay all the blame on the people who sold us the program, and they’re unlikely. I’m dissatisfied with my experience, to be sure, but I don’t feel like I was conned.

But evidently others do. They feel they should somehow be shielded from the consequences of their choices. And guess what. That opens the doors for the real con artists. I’ve received numerous calls over the past few months from some company who claims to help you get your money back from companies like the one we worked with. To be sure, our vendor has its problems. Their marketing techniques used to be less than honest a few years ago, and they have paid out some money and made changes to their marketing materials as a result of government action. But from what I can tell, none of those situations apply to my case.

But this new company is willing to help people like me. For $500 they will send you forms to fill out and mail in. You become one of their clients! It’s never quite clear what it is they do for you beyond send you the forms. In fact, if you check the Better Business Bureau’s file on this company (they have an F rating), it seems that all they do is send you forms–forms you could get for free if you know where to look.

Oh, they’ll go on at length (until I get tired and hang up on them) about how unscrupulous this other company is and how you really need to go after them. They’ll tell you that 13 states have filed actions against them (in which case, if yours is one, you should contact your Attorney General–he will get you money, too, and for no cost on your part). They’ll tell you about clients who got most or all of their money back. But they won’t promise you anything.

They are feeding off the human notion that we should never have to suffer negative consequences. If something you tried didn’t work–even if the vendor never promised it would–you have a right to get your money back. You deserve a “do-over”. Failure should never be a permanent option.

It’s a nice idea, but as I said, it leaves you prone to scammers. Or, as Westley tells Buttercup in The Princess Bride, “Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who tells you differently is selling something.” Do I like failure? No. Do I like the feeling of having perhaps fallen victim to a scam? No. But I have two choices at this point. I can waste a lot of time, money, and emotional well-being exacting revenge, or I can move on, learn from my mistakes, and focus on the future.

The company that called me today wants to use the shame and embarrassment I feel at potentially having been scammed to scam me yet again. Shame, like hate, like lust, like greed, or many other emotions, is a tool others can use to get inside your head and take something from you.

The sad thing is that those people who somehow do manage to whine their way into avoiding their consequences have much less initiative to keep from getting scammed in the future. They don’t feel they have to learn from their failures because they manage to avoid any actual failure. Chances are they’ll get scammed again because they don’t feel they have much to lose.They’ll likely be convinced that the next time will be the time they hit it big. And if they don’t–well, they’ll figure out a way to avoid that one, too.

Don’t get me wrong. People who purposely take advantage of people do deserve their comeuppance. But people who essentially get what they pay for and still insist that they get their money back…well, that’s a bit more of a gray area. The company may share some of the blame if they set unrealistic expectations, but the buyer needs to bear some responsibility as well.

No, I’m not happy about my experience. But I intend to learn from it. I do not intend to spend even more money trying to get back money that is already gone and will only be recovered by browbeating someone into doing something they really shouldn’t have to do just to shut me up. I will be better served in the long run to learn what I can, and forget the rest.

The School of Hard Knocks is not anyone’s favorite educational institution, but lessons learned there are harder to forget.

I’ve been discussing this with some friends and found the variety of answers to this question interesting. I have been assuming that most people use the terms “self-reliance” and “self-sufficiency” more or less interchangeably. And some do! But not everyone does, and the differences are worth noting.

So I put it to you: What is self-reliance or self-sufficiency to you? Are they the same?

Also, what different areas do you think need to be addressed in order to become self-reliant or self-sufficient?

I await your comments!

I like to think of myself as a sensible, careful person. I don’t take unnecessary risks as a general rule. I appreciate dangerous tools. I don’t use them in foolish ways. Most of the time.

Today I experienced that 0.1% of the time. I was using a razor blade knife to cut some crumpled tape that had been wrapped around a cord. Cutting at the tape in a more careful manner was not yielding results, so I gripped it a bit more firmly and sliced at it again. A sudden sensation in my finger made me realize I had not only cut the tape.

When one cuts oneself there is always that moment of uncertainty when you cannot tell just how bad it is yet. Would there be a lot of blood or a little? In this case it was more than a little but less than a lot. I had managed to avoid a serious wound. I was, quite frankly, lucky. It could have–perhaps even should have–been much worse. I treated it and, other than realizing how much I require my left pinky in typing, went about my business.

I was a bit shaky the rest of my shift. There may have been some minor shock involved, but I suspect it was primarily from realizing how stupid I’d been and how close I’d come to a trip to the emergency room. I only let down my usual guard of carefulness for a moment, and that had been all it took.

Life is precarious, really. We continue to live as much by accident as by design. Though I suppose a certain amount of safety can be reasonably assumed (if not, quite frankly, it would be most difficult to accomplish much in life), it doesn’t take much to remind oneself that living is as much a failure to die as anything else. It only takes one time of not thinking things through to lose the use of a finger. It only takes one time of trusting another driver too much to become a quadriplegic. It only takes one time of being in the wrong place at the wrong time to become an entry on the obituary page.

I do not intend to be morbid. My purpose is really to remind myself and anyone else who will listen that there is only so much we can do. We should take reasonable precautions. We should be prepared for unwanted outcomes. But ultimately there comes a point where further worry is counterproductive. We could be the most careful, most prepared person on the planet and still get struck by a falling piece of Skylab.

Self reliance includes preparing for unpleasant contingencies, but you simply cannot prepare for everything. There comes a point when all reasonable precautions have been taken and you must simply continue living, primarily on faith. Self reliance helps make that easier, in helping you know that you’ve done what you can. The rest is beyond your control.

“Society is commonly too cheap. We meet at very short intervals, not having had time to acquire any new value for each other. We meet at meals three times a day, and give each other a new taste of that old musty cheese that we are. We have had to agree on a certain set of rules, called etiquette and politeness, to make this frequent meeting tolerable and that we need not come to open war. We meet at the post-office, and at the sociable, and about the fireside every night; we live thick and are in each other’s way, and stumble over one another, and I think that we thus lose some respect for one another.” – Henry David Thoreau, “Walden”, section on “Solitude”

I’m not quite so cynical of human companionship as Thoreau, but there does seem to be some measure of truth in this. There are, after all, the old sayings “Familiarity breeds contempt,” and “That which we obtain too easily we esteem too lightly.” In the latter case, I think Thomas Paine was speaking of freedom, but I suspect it applies just as well to relationships.

I don’t see Thoreau’s take on things as “the way things must be”, but rather a warning that relationships require effort. There is something to be said for “acquir(ing) any new value for each other.” Certainly anyone can become too familiar with one another, but if this happens too easily or too quickly in the relationship it could be a warning sign. When you spend much of your time together there will often be very little new to talk about.

It is therefore good when you can choose companions (be it friends or spouses or what-have-you) that you find someone whose perspective and thought-processes you find intriguing so that even though you both experience many of the same events, even your individual reactions to and thoughts on those events will be different enough to provide value in the discussion of the same.

That’s why, though far too rare, I have often found great satisfaction in conversing with people whose ideas may differ significantly from my own, but who are not threatened by those differences. People who can calmly disagree with you and respect you just the same are wonderful people who should be treasured. Such relationships can be some of the most rewarding you will ever find.

In any case, while I agree with Thoreau to a point, even I, an introvert, find some human interaction beneficial throughout the day. While I don’t think I would go crazy in Thoreau’s Walden situation of near solitude for days on end, I do find that simply having someone else to bounce my thoughts off of from time to time helps me immensely. I suspect if I were to live like Thoreau for an extended period of time I would begin speaking to myself (at least more loudly and frequently than I already do). I would certainly start speaking to the various flora, fauna, and inanimate objects nearby.

This is one reason why I don’t believe that self-reliance really means complete independence. As it says in Genesis in the Bible, “And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone”. Or, to quote from more contemporary bards, “We all need…somebody…to leeeeaan on!”

My series on home document management continues over at The Knot in the Rope. Last installment was identifying potential records. This time I discuss different types of documents, as a prelude to exploring different ways of collecting and storing documents.

How far should one go toward self-reliance? I suppose that’s a question everyone must answer for themselves, but I’ve got a few ideas. For starters, I am not and never will advocate dropping everything and moving into the woods to live off the land. As tempting as that may sound sometimes, I believe you would lose more than you would gain.

But anywhere in between it really becomes a matter of risk management. How much risk can you tolerate? For me, one limit is “where a mistake could cost me life, liberty, or more money than I can afford to lose”. For example, a friend and I have been starting a business. While I’m more than happy to cut corners and do things ourselves whenever we can, when it comes to handling out taxes I don’t feel we know enough yet to tackle that one on our own. The cost of failure is too high.

We did, however, look over all the forms we would need to file and see how much of it we felt comfortable with. Research and practice runs cost you nothing except time. In this case we still didn’t feel comfortable enough to take the risk of doing it ourselves. We’re hiring a professional, at least this time.

On the other hand, we are still looking to do the bookkeeping ourselves. Even though we are a bit befuddled by the software we bought, we believe we can figure it out. The risk of failure there is lower because we are still keeping manual records in the mean time. Yes, it could end up costing us more next tax season if we still haven’t gotten a handle on the software, but it could also save us a fair bit of money as well. It’s a risk worth taking, at least for now. We will revisit this decision in a few months before the pile of records gets to be too high.

So while I will never be able to be 100% self-reliant, technically, I don’t believe that is really the goal. It’s certainly not a realistic goal, in my mind. As long as the tax code and legal code to which I am subject remains inscrutable to me there are risks I just will not take just to be able to say “I can do it ALL myself.” I’d be even less self-reliant in prison.