What is "survival" to you?

  • BushMoot: Come along to the amazing Summer Moot 31st July - 5th August (extended Moot : 27th July - 8th August), a festival of bushcrafting and camping in a beautiful woodland PLEASE CLICK HERE for more information.

What does "survival" mean to you?

  • Being able to stay alive in the wild until rescue if the aircraft you are on crashes

    Votes: 9 56.3%
  • Coping with unexpected curveballs such as the transport system leaving you stranded away from home

    Votes: 3 18.8%
  • Riding out powercuts and storms at home with a level of comfort

    Votes: 2 12.5%
  • Holding on until rescued during bad weather after getting lost/injured in the hills

    Votes: 8 50.0%
  • Live OK as a familiy unit for a couple of weeks if we lost easy access to modern infrastructure

    Votes: 2 12.5%
  • Going on a trip to a wild place and managing on your own with minimal kit/food carried in

    Votes: 4 25.0%
  • Live and thrive in a situation where we lost all supply chains and modern equipment/power

    Votes: 7 43.8%

  • Total voters
    16

GreyCat

Full Member
Nov 1, 2023
534
676
53
South Wales, UK
OK so another thread got my autistic brain fizzing a bit, a word set it off..... You know, the way that lots of people use the same word, but the context indicates that they don't necessarily mean the same thing....

Todays fizzy word is "survival."

What does it mean to you?

I am curious as to what people mean by the word. All of the options I have listed could be regarded as "survival" however they would all require different responses. Timescale is important I think, as at some point survival becomes community building/living differently, and the skills change from (say) immediate needs for water/food/security/shelter to things like securing food for longer term, managing health conditions, delivering new babies, making clothes and tools......

GC
 
  • Like
Reactions: Wildgoose
Surviving = Taking actions specifically aimed at staying alive after circumstances make that challenging, and making it out of said set of circumstances alive and (relatively) well.

Thriving is great, but that's on a different scale in my opinion. That's about how comfortably you survive, rather than the binary of Survive vs Not Survive.

Edited to add: I think what you've listed are survival scenarios or a list of situations, rather than what a definition of 'survival' is.
 
We used to (semi) joke,
Bushcraft is chill the hell out asap
Survival is get the hell out asap.

I think Stuart's thread on the Cup of Tea kind of says it for me :)

 
The various scenario/options Greycat has offered seems to run a spectrum from a multitude of potential difficult situations from the extreme wild - to rural - to urban disturbance - to near societal breakdown , so I guess what the aim is it more understand when a person says they are wanting to learn skills to " survive " if they are talking more about wilderness survival skills/quasi bushcraft to more urban/prepping type eventualities.

Or maybe a person isn't seeing it as a fixed spectrum.
 
  • Like
Reactions: GreyCat
Survival, by definition, is staying alive under circumstances that have the potential to kill you (One could say one survives every day - until you don't). You can't always train and gather skills to help you survive an event but you can train to plan for and deal with potential events or cope after events. For example, you can't train to survive a car accident, but you can train to drive in a manner that reduces risk and/or to drive defensively. You can't train to survive an air crash, but you can train to develop skills that enable you to survive the aftermath.

So, for me, the only one that comes close is the first if it has the potential to kill me. The fourth (injured in bad weather) may also just cover it. All the others aren't survival, they're just 'getting through'.
 
  • Like
Reactions: oldtimer
The various scenario/options Greycat has offered seems to run a spectrum from a multitude of potential difficult situations from the extreme wild - to rural - to urban disturbance - to near societal breakdown , so I guess what the aim is it more understand when a person says they are wanting to learn skills to " survive " if they are talking more about wilderness survival skills/quasi bushcraft to more urban/prepping type eventualities.

Or maybe a person isn't seeing it as a fixed spectrum.

Yes, pretty much.

GC
 
  • Like
Reactions: TeeDee
After a series of events that ended with me being fitted with a pacemaker the factory Industrial nurse asked me how I was doing. I opened my mouth to reply when he said: “You’re upright. What more do you want?”

That has been my mantra for the twenty years since.

In my early family days “survival” meant hanging on to my job, earning everything that I could and keeping a roof over us. Survival was a synonym for (peace time) living.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Falstaff and Toddy
OK so another thread got my autistic brain fizzing a bit, a word set it off..... You know, the way that lots of people use the same word, but the context indicates that they don't necessarily mean the same thing....

Todays fizzy word is "survival."

Could be a lot of things - and could change from where ever one is on life journey.

If one is looking at it from a skills perspective - maybe one is studying bushcraft and wilderness skills for reasons that one wants to learn those skills to know and reassure yourself you could fare better if in the highly improbable case you're forced to survive from what you know and can do if thrust into an improbable scenario where you need those skills as a civilian.

If you were doing the same learning but as a Military pilot - it would have more relevance , more likelihood ( still slim ) and would be learning for a purpose of E&E /SERE type scenarios

So both of those learnings phases would be to provide one with a higher level of knowledge and reassurance that one is well prepared IF that situation ever comes to pass.

Or maybe one is learning those skills simply for the pleasure of learning and self discovery - , no implied self pressure , just learning for learnings sake - its the same skills set but more as a hobby of learning -- How did my ancestors survive? can I replicate it ? Yes I can. Fulfillment.


These skills I tend to think of as Primary - Primitive - the needs to cover off Food/Water/Fire/Shelter with very little - learning to source and find things from the natural world and use/apply them. Limited equipment / limited access to anything from our present time.


Some of the scenarios definitely feel/read ( at least to me ) as more concern over a possible future event so seem to put it into a more prepper perspective of survival - which can be more focused on some of the more improbable worse possible futures and how one is going to take action against that.

Learning some skills that are more Tertiary based - so that would be looking to learn skills to effect survival -more longer term - if the current status quo of existence is upset or interrupted or possibly comes to an end.
A more dystopian view creating a need to learn to be more removed and connected to the current grid of society..
Again some may do this study and skill learning just for the 'fun' of learning whilst others may make the move to be more off grid and self sufficient in the here-and-now - and there is nothing wrong with that if it improves ones quality of life and happiness.

I guess there could be a question of a Survivalist ( if such a term is still relevant ) wanting to cover all bases -from the Primary skills to the Tertiary . A bushcrafter maybe drawn more to the Primary aspects and the Prepper to the more Tertiary elements and concerns.




More likely survival could be , coping with hardship in the here and now - whatever that looks like?

Bad relationship / Violent relationship

Medical diagnosis and treatment - going from week to week , day to day, hour to hour

Homelessness -living hand to mouth with little light ahead in terms of hope.

Dark thoughts - surviving in our own heads when we have to much internal negative chatter making us think of and dwell on permanent solutions for what will be temporary situations.
 
  • Like
Reactions: GreyCat
Surviving is what I do every day, and I don't believe I'm only one having to exist this way.

To say what I learn from imagining the **** survival situations causes me to gain knowledge and skills to continue to survive
 
Survival is what the army taught me when I did E&E training, before I visited woodlore and learned it was just another branch of the bushcraft tree!!

Or put another way survival is bushcraft but without taking the kitchen sink!
 
I tend to put things in a couple of boxes. Are other people the solution or the problem?

1) first scenario: Survival - hang on until other people arrive to help. Skills and knowledge.

2) middle sceanrios: Preparation - having basic resources available to deal with the problem with minimal assistance.
That may just be a mobile phone and cash. Or maybe be extra warm clothes and food.

3) last scenario: Evasion - hang on until the other people are not a problem. Skills and knowledge.
 
Last edited:

BCUK Shop

We have a a number of knives, T-Shirts and other items for sale.

SHOP HERE