Prepping isn’t for everybody; it takes a lot of time and investment to pull off. However, preparing for emergencies and disasters is a necessary undertaking if you want to make it out alive. If prepping isn’t your cup of tea, there are ways for you to get into the mindset of a prepper. These can help you get into the prepping lifestyle and even actually enjoy it. Here are four ways to make prepping a part of your daily routine. (h/t to SurvivalSullivan.com)

Make a checklist for everything

Checklists are a great way to start getting into the prepping mindset. Preppers and survivalists alike use checklists to make sure they don’t forget anything essential. For example, if you’re packing up your bug-out bag, a checklist ensures that you won’t leave anything out. Prepping guides for beginners provide checklists of the essentials. What’s great about making a checklist is that it helps make tasks easier to accomplish. You can start by making a checklist for the things you have to do at work or for your chores on the weekends. Soon, you’ll get accustomed to doing your tasks step by step, just like a checklist.

Consider a different point of view

Prepping requires a lot of hard work, so you must find a way to look at it with a different perspective, otherwise you’ll get tired easily. Prepping tasks aren’t exactly regular chores that are tempting to put off till later; they’re avenues for you to upgrade your knowledge and improve your skills. Focusing on the fact that you are growing and improving can make you feel a lot better about the journey toward learning a cool new skill or taking a full inventory of your supplies. Don’t focus on the long road ahead to your goal, focus on the fact that you’re taking it one step at a time. (Related: Prepping 101: Three important lessons for beginners.)

Do new and fun things every day

A lot of the things that preppers do are actually enjoyable. You get to practice bugging out, which means riding your bike, going on a long drive or challenging yourself to go on a weekend hike. You get to do physical conditioning and defensive training, which will push your body to become stronger and more resilient. Route assessments and physical training can be a great time for you to enjoy some solitude as well. Listen to a podcast or an audio book about prepping while working out and you’ll find that you can exercise your body and mind at the same time. Furthermore, if you want to meet new people who can help you out on the road to becoming a better prepper, there are a lot of mutual aid groups that can help you out. You can even make new friends along the way.

Feel the sense of adventure

A commitment to the prepping lifestyle means signing up to becoming a better version of yourself every day. This means you’ll constantly be seeking to improve different parts of your life and your abilities. You’ll learn how to organize things properly; you’ll learn how to cut costs when buying supplies; and you’ll learn new abilities that will make your life generally easier. The way you think about this road to self-improvement will matter greatly. If you approach a task thinking right from the start that it’s impossible to do, you are less likely to finish it. However, by changing your mindset and thinking of this task as a new adventure, you’ll end up enjoying yourself more than you expected.

Prepping can be challenging, but it’s not impossible. With these four new ways of approaching prepping and making it a part of your everyday life, you’ll be well on your way to becoming a better version of yourself.

Sources include:

SurvivalSullivan.com

ThePrepared.com

ThePrepperJournal.com