Your top ten essential skills.
brianlux
Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 43,122
What do you consider to be the ten most important skills you know or want to know how to perform? These can be survival skill, interpersonal skills, household skills, any others you find are important and any combination... but just your top ten!
Here's my list:
1. Knowing where to find potable water.
2. Building a fire with only a knife, wet wood and a match.
3. Know how to perform basic first aid (CPR, Heimlich maneuver, stopping bleeding, making a splint, and treating shock).
4. Be able to construct an emergency shelter in the outdoors.
5. Be able to swim.
6. Change a car tire and make basic repairs to an automobile.
7. Know how to procure and prepare food including identifying edible wild plants.
8. Know how to navigate with map and compass.
9. Be able to defuse an argument and if necessary, practice self-defense.
10. Know how to care for vinyl records and operate a record player.
I can do all of these but admittedly am a bit weak in a few (but no problem with #10!)
Here's my list:
1. Knowing where to find potable water.
2. Building a fire with only a knife, wet wood and a match.
3. Know how to perform basic first aid (CPR, Heimlich maneuver, stopping bleeding, making a splint, and treating shock).
4. Be able to construct an emergency shelter in the outdoors.
5. Be able to swim.
6. Change a car tire and make basic repairs to an automobile.
7. Know how to procure and prepare food including identifying edible wild plants.
8. Know how to navigate with map and compass.
9. Be able to defuse an argument and if necessary, practice self-defense.
10. Know how to care for vinyl records and operate a record player.
I can do all of these but admittedly am a bit weak in a few (but no problem with #10!)
"It's a sad and beautiful world"
-Roberto Benigni
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Know how to be a good Scout...
Boy Scouts taught me all of that and much more by the age of 12 or 13. I was fortunate to have my own superb father as our Scoutmaster, so we had a top notch Troop in every way. We didn't waste our time making key fobs, we were camping and working on survival skills all year long. He kept ot super low key on the Christianity, emphasising Native American culture instead, and there was no worry of hanky panky trouble, he was always there to make sure everyone was safe. Great times. Don't know if I will Scout with my boy, I'd like to do all the same stuff without joining an organisation, but having plenty of other kids around is important to keeping a 10 year old engaged in a pursuit which features no-fun chores like clearing brush, digging ditches, and hiking for hours in the heat and cold.
My list:
1. Know how to Scout. This includes all survival skills, first aid, and emergency preparedness.
2. Know how to farm. Basic knowledge on growing seasons, plant habits, animal husbandry, and preserving foods.
3. Engine repair and mechanical skills.
I have none, I am woefully under skilled in this area.
4. Know how to cook. Well.
5. Know blank verse when you see it.
6. Learn an instrument good enough to pass the time.
7. Know when to shut your mouth. That one is a constant battle.
8. Learn how to cope with negative emotions and practice actually doing so.
9. Learn how to find your limits, and then how to push past them.
10. "Be able to defuse an argument and if necessary, practice self-defense.". Couldn't have said it better Brian.
- to get the god's serenity prayer (even if not one of faith; the principles apply)
- apologize when I'm in the wrong
- forgive
- and, perhaps ironically, release anger when needed
- excel in a "vocation" - as gambo said, farming. Also become skillful in carpentry, metalwork, plumbing
- listen
- find time every fucking day to have "me" time; to reflect
- demonstrate love for those precious in our lives - and say it, too
- recognize and deal accordingly with poisonous snakes...and people
Shitload more!
No doubt! That's why I cheated and rolled a bunch into one lol
I'm a real carpenter and a bit of a plumber, but I'm not sure how "essential" those skills are.
Vegas 93, Vegas 98, Vegas 00 (10 year show), Vegas 03, Vegas 06
VIC 07
EV LA1 08
Seattle1 09, Seattle2 09, Salt Lake 09, LA4 09
Columbus 10
EV LA 11
Vancouver 11
Missoula 12
Portland 13, Spokane 13
St. Paul 14, Denver 14
10. Peace.
9. The ability to change for the better when given the opportunity in life to do so.
8. A confidence in what you believe in in
life, but always maintaining an open heart, and mind to new things.
7. Hope that is unexplainable; resonates, in and touches other people's lives.
6. Humility in all things.
5. A healthy understanding of how things work, and how to use that knowledge effectively.
4. A respect and generosity than spans species.
3. The ability to communicate effectively and in a way that offers, AND deserves respect.
2. A working knowledge of how to manage your life in a manner that creates a feeling of self worth.
1. Being aware of your surroundings, and knowing a general emergency plan at all times, to the best of knowledge.
I believe that if you do these things, starting with 10. And working your way to 1... you will have a successful life. Yes.. I am still working on them.. as are we all hopefully.
keep em' coming.
Vegas 93, Vegas 98, Vegas 00 (10 year show), Vegas 03, Vegas 06
VIC 07
EV LA1 08
Seattle1 09, Seattle2 09, Salt Lake 09, LA4 09
Columbus 10
EV LA 11
Vancouver 11
Missoula 12
Portland 13, Spokane 13
St. Paul 14, Denver 14
These are both wonderful and go beyond the pragmatic to the heart and soul of things. Thanks for inspiration, both of you.
1. How to express myself (with words)in a way that people can understand and respect.
2. Art/Writing...because if I can't express myself creatively, I'd explode.
3. How to grocery shop for healthy foods and cook what I buy...even though I don't like cooking.
4. Listening skills, because sometimes people just need someone to listen.
5. People skills, I'm good at communicating with people and helping them, I think this is important for everyone.
6. Technical Skills(as in technology)...the more you know makes it easier for you to get a job...
7. Managing money...I admit I struggle with this one.
8. How to drive...because sometimes you just need an open road and some air.
9. The ability to take the hits and keep on rolling.(sometimes I struggle here too, especially being Bipolar).
10. To recognize when a relationship is toxic for me and get out...
Tattooed Dissident!
1- The ability to lead and to be lead if needed.
2- How to fall a tree. How to chop one down without killing someone or having the tree destroy something, lol.
3- How to build things/construction and engineering(mechanicaly inclined) like a house, shelter, fortress, irrigation. Read schematics.
4- Marksmanship in firearms
5- Gardening/farming and animal husbandry, fishing.
6- Operating machinery
7- Reading and comprehension
8- Navigation/map reading. I see this as a dying art now that everyone google maps directions.
9- Organization skills.
10- Story telling.
Things I need to learn-
1- Preserving meat.
2- Navigate by the stars.
3- Learn what foliage you can eat in the wilderness.
4- Reloading bullets
5- Get better at skinning/cleaning game and tanning hides.
6- The Rubix cube.
Relpading your own ammo is an art. I have tried for years.. but I have nerve damage, that causes shaking in certain hand/arm positions.. it spills and wastes much too much black poweder and so I have been cut off from the reloading process
#7 Reading and comprehension. Were I to revise my list, that would be a must!
1. Know how to drive a manual transmission.
2. Perform basic vehicle maintenance (check/change fluids, filters, belts, flat tire, etc).
3. Understand and use proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation - even if it's "just the internet." And especially understand that it's should/could/would/might HAVE (or the abbreviated 've), not OF. Fuck, that drives me up a god damned wall!
4. Understand when someone corrects your grammar that they're not being a Nazi, they're trying to help.
5. Know the phone numbers of your local public safety offices. At the very least, have them programmed in your phone.
6. Admit your faults and learn from them.
7. Understand the strengths and weaknesses of the people closest to you.
8. Learn to use the word "no," especially in situations unfavorable to you.
9. Men: learn how to tie a double-windsor knot. It's not that difficult.
10. Communication is a two-way street. Don't just wait for the other person to stop talking so you can talk, listen to what they're saying.
We had a kid in the store a few years back who could do a Rubx Cube behind his back. He asked me to mix it up as best I could then took a good look at it, placed it behind his back and in very short order- voila!- had it nailed just like that. Blew my mind.
Knowing how to please the ladies.
Awe...yeah...
(Note to self: This means keep your wife happy!)
Tattooed Dissident!
Tattooed Dissident!
Hell knows I have been and continue to be judged.
It's never too late to acquire skills, especially those paramount to keeping yourself (oneself) in check so you can truly parent.
As to being a mess, who isn't, in some way
I tend to think my approach is the correct one, and everyone else is a fool lol
Fortunately, my nature allows me to give ZERO fucks if other people feel the same way about me!
And then there's the near hopeless cases. When I worked in human services, the prof I worked with referred to clients who are hard core addicts or people who have almost zero chance of getting emotionally healthy as "bottomless pits". She once said, "If you give up most of your free time, your money, your own family and your job you might, might, make a dent in someone who is a bottomless pit." Those seemed like harsh words to me because at the time that's basically what I was trying to do for a friend who admitted she wanted to drink herself to death. I did everything I could for her and yet she did, indeed, drink herself to death. Boundaries are a tough one, but I think an important part of knowing how far you can go in helping others who are greatly lacking in basic emotional and/or survival skills.