It's been a little while since I did an entry in the Building Tangible Margin series. Before I continue in that thread, I want to take a moment to address preparedness thinking. Many people have unfortunate notions about preparedness that cause them to avoid taking needed action. Let me just clarify where I'm coming from and where I'm not coming from.
I have yet to find a perspective on preparedness that strikes the right balance. This has become a subject of great interest to me, but I have had to cobble together many sources to address the issue to my satisfaction. Allowing my faith to inform my preparedness makes it all the more difficult, though ultimately more purposeful.
There are two extremes when it comes to thinking about preparedness—blind optimism and paranoid pessimism.
On the blind optimism end you have folks who don’t believe anything bad will ever happen to them or if it does they will be taken care of. Don’t bother asking them to jump your car; they won’t have jumper cables.
The paranoid pessimists, on the other hand, give preparedness a bad name. Their survival-of-the-fittest, world-be-damned perspective may be well-equipped and thoroughly thought out, but they’re not going to jump your car either. They’re running from the black helicopters, headed for the hills.
My approach to preparedness is an attempt to heed the call of Scripture to be both prudent and charitable. My preparations are acts of love toward family, friends and, potentially, strangers. Preparedness also happens to make for an interesting hobby to the perpetually curious and imaginative. It is a middle ground between the extremes. Hoping for the best, preparing for the worst...within reason.
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