the psychology of surviving

[trax]

The most advanced organisms in survival technics are viruses. If you want to learn about survival, you must enter their world, they do not consider anything but the duplication of themselves, and will probably be what puts an end to humanity, if humans do not do it first..

Yeah ok. I think the key words there are "they do not consider" I'm just trying to guage people's thoughts on survival situations and what makes them think the way they think...or react the way they do, etc. You're way too educated and smart for me, dude, the only thing I need to know about how many species of anything there is in the world is "can I eat that one?" I think we're getting a bit trippier here than I meant to be. I sure do appreciate the amount of information you provide though

[trax]

I'm sure I will bro, I'm just wondering what people's thoughts are on the same subject. Thanks

[Fog_Harbor]

volwest

I hope you can remember all these semantics and circular points of hubris next time you're faced with the sudden desire to live instead of die.

If there is no will to live, try this - stop eating. Get back to me in a month or so and tell me whether or not you had the desire to eat because of internal or external stimuli. Let me know whether it was instinct or will.

I will agree with you on most of your definitions, if you will agree that English is a fluid language in which the majority usage usually wins. The word 'will' as most of us use it is simply desire or determination.

With that, I bid you farewell

[trax]

Don't eat the cornflakes, apparently someone's pi##ing in them! Unless of course you're Bear Grylls in which case, bon appetite...

[DEET]

Being...crushed....by....thread.....gotten....too. ....heavy....aaahhhhh

[owl_girl]

Being...crushed....by....thread.....gotten....too. ....heavy....aaahhhhh

Lol DEET that’s hilarious

[FVR]

Wow, heavy thread. Sounds like alot of bs to me.

Instinct, yeh right. Instinct can get you killed in some situations. You have to know when to go against your instinct.

Will to survive, balogne. You can have the will to survive and still die. Nobody wants to die, I do think that some will fight harder to live than others. The comment on "family" is right on. Family will give you that little extra that you "may" need to survive.

Training, you can have all the training in the world, one mistake, you're dead.

Pyschology of survival = heart and luck.

When the Indianapolis went down, instinct led them to drink the salt water, training taught them not to drink the water. The will to survive slowly deteriorates as time goes on. Those that survived had luck and heart.

The luck came in as they were not injured on the ship, and the sharks did not get them. The heart came in to play when they fought their desires and instinct to consume that which they knew would eventually kill them.

I've known many who have had the trianing, but did not have the heart.

Yeh, I'll stick with heart.

[nell67]

Volwest,

I love reading your posts,you give tons of insightful info and have changed the way I think about lots of different aspects of survival,sometimes I have to reread it to grasp exactly what you are saying,and other times it takes the brain picking comments and questions from the fellow pack members for it sink in (kinda thick headed,hubby says thats because I am woman LOL) but it definately makes me think harder about what I would do.

Keep up the good posts all of you ,beacause in the end you just never know what little bit of information and the discussion that follows will someday help one or more of us who find ourselves in a true survival situation to come out of that situation a survivor!

[trax]

That I got lifting this thread off DEET's chest....sorry about that DEET, I'll try to lighten up a bit

[DEET]

That I got lifting this thread off DEET's chest....sorry about that DEET, I'll try to lighten up a bit

WHEW!!! thanks trax I thought I would be stuck under that thing forever and be forced to eat scorpions and elephant turds while drinking my pee like Bear

[Dynanim]

I know this thread's old, but I think it'll live with a bit of CPR... Let's look at it from a slightly different point of view: as going into a crisis.

Anatomy of a crisis
When we are faced with a crisis, we usually go through a few phases. If we understand the phases we may be able to function better and get through it relatively unscathed.

Phase 1: the triggering event
Before the triggering event, we’re in control of ourselves and behave the way we do in everyday life. When the triggering event impacts us, we recognise it as a crisis. The best strategy for handling this stage is to avoid the trigger entirely. This calls for planning, trying to anticipate stressors and what could go wrong, and doing your best to develop strategies that will negate or minimise those possibilities.

Phase 2: escalation
If, despite our careful planning and gazing into our crystal ball, something goes wrong and we’re precipitated into a crisis, we enter the escalation phase. This is when we recognise that we’re in a stressful situation and we react with some or all of the following:
• Shock
• Disbelief
• Confusion
• Difficulty in deciding
• Forgetfulness
• Worry
• Fear
• Anger
• Time slowing down
• Numbness
• Helplessness
• Feeling that we should be doing more

These feelings often escalate in intensity until we enter the crisis phase. To increase your chances of survival, it would be ideal to recognise that you’ve entered the escalation phase and that it could lead to you entering crisis phase. How? Knowing this sequence, i.e., that escalation will follow a triggering event, should help you recognise that your reactions will escalate to a crisis point. So once a triggering event occurs, keep a lookout for escalating reactions and focus on calming yourself. The best way to do this is to engage one or more of your senses.

Do your best to stop the cycle here. If you enter the crisis phase, you won’t be of much use to yourself or anyone else. It will most likely worsen the situation. Working out your most viable options will happen when you are in control of yourself and don’t enter the crisis phase.

Phase 3: crisis
In this phase our stress increases. Our hearts beat faster. Our motor skills and our perceptual abilities diminish. We can’t respond until the threat is identified, but because we lose the ability to process information, we begin to lose control of ourselves, reacting irrationally. Each of our selves is affected: the extent to which each is affected depends on the severity and duration of the event.

Emotional: we may experience fear, grief, anger, despair, sadness, numbness, and generalised anxiety disorder.

Mental: we may experience impaired concentration & decision-making, impaired memory, disbelief, worry, denial, flashbacks, and tunnel vision.

Physical: we may experience fatigue, insomnia, cardiovascular strain, hyper-arousal, general health problems, headaches, decreased appetite, nonspecific distress, and Medically Unexplained Physical Symptoms (MUPS).

Spiritual: we may experience aggression, isolation, hopelessness, disassociation, panic, and a lack of confidence.

Familial and social: we may experience increased relational conflict, social withdrawal, impaired performance, over-protectiveness, abandonment, and rejection.

If you couldn’t stop yourself from entering this phase, do your best to recognise that you're in the crisis phase. Do whatever it takes to calm down, making sure that you're in a safe place. Don’t decide on a course of action at this stage; unless of course you don’t have the luxury of time.

Phase 4: recovery
Once the stressor is gone (or its immediacy lessens, or we manage to regain self-control), if we survive the crisis, we begin to calm down, regain control of ourselves and a semblance of our usual behaviour returns, but remain fragile. We become more rational and may experience forms of relief or anger, possibly even exhilaration.

This is another phase where we could try to work out our options. Be aware that your emotions may still be dominating your decisions in this phase.

Phase 5: crash
Once recovery is complete, we may move into a “crash” phase. We tend to display below-normal activity levels, requiring time to physically recover and mentally process the event. Long term effects could include Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), grief and anger.

[kyratshooter]

Do they have to be in that order or can I mix them up?

What happens when phase three is followed immediately by another phase three, phase 4 never happens and there is another phase three occurring after you moved immediately to the PTSD stage of phase 5?

anyone remember who's on first?

[TXyakr]

It is just a rough model of real life not a ridged mold to cram a person's experience into. If you realize what general phase of a cycle your are in you can slow down your otherwise non-voluntary responses and regain some control of your situation and possibly heal faster. Perhaps not be re-triggered by stressful events and start the cycle all over again or have multiple crisis phases, prolonged escalation get in a inner loop as kyrat mentioned, and not get to recovery as quickly as you could.

Difference is being blown by the wind with no keel or being able to steer your way through it.

THAT ^ was just a rough analogy not an exact science, don't take it too literally or be overly specific about it "KYratshooter".
Psychologists are just guides to point you in the general direction they DO NOT have all the answers!!!

My sister stressed out about some things that were out of her control, I think it is possible that it contributed to a sudden onset of Rheumatoid Arthritis. I know others that may have had a genetic predisposition toward mental illness like schizophrenia, and extreme stress that they did not deal effectively with appeared to suddenly trigger that. Knowing how to deal with stress is a good thing IMO. One of the biggest differences between a special forces officer and G.I.

[Stever60]

I loved baseball, but I never could guess at the plate what someone was going to pitch. I tried to watch the ball, if it was a fastball hit that, curveball hit that - more or less how I live. I can't guess the future. I can prepare myself to hit a fastball or a curve though. Granted - if I could guess it I likely would have a better swing - same with life - same with a survival situation (my opinion). I was taught - in general, that survival is doing those things everyday that improve your circumstances, prioritizing what is needed and extending to the next day. Then extending days into weeks and weeks into months . . . whatever it takes. Psychology is a grey area for me - not to say it does not have merit. I understand math where as the English language baffles me, psychology even more so. For me it is easy, I am hungry, I am cold, I am thirsty. What to do, and what to do first. I think the question is about the mindset of a crisis situation or survival situation and I think maybe I am way different perhaps than a lot of people, not sure - but my mind set is just matter of fact - hit the pitch. I may need to change my name to caveman if it is not taken.

[Rick]

Perhaps we should put together an Anatomy of Humor. It seems some miss the attempt.

[Dynanim]

The world needs to be reintroduced to Abbott and Costello. Humour is a perfect de-stresser. Really useful in a survival situation. That's not a joke!

Anatomy of Humor part 1... The knee bone's connected to the funny bone. There's enough ad-libbers here to go on from there.

Kyrat, mixing them up is where reality meets the neat theories that psychologists put together. It probably get their knickerbockers in a bunch! Nobody's the same. I personally had a midlife crisis in my late teens and am going through childhood now. Maybe I'm just advanced for my age or have Benjamin Button syndrome. Anyway, this isn't my model, it's what I've summarised from my research into crises and survival psychology. I've taken info from studies of the 911 tragedy and from studies of individuals. Basically, like TXyakr says, if you know what stage you (or people you're responsible for) are in, you're able to deal with it better.

If someone in your group is starting to freak out, breaking the process early might save your group a lot of grief. This aggro guy came running up to me on a deserted street one night, roaring wildly. He was obviously already upset about something. I decided to break the cycle to see what would happen. Just before he got to me I asked him if he was okay. He stopped in his tracks, stared at me and said "nobody's ever asked me that before" and he walked up to me and gave me a hug. Instead of escalating the situation, doing something that was unexpected turned it around. Suppose someone in your group is starting to panic, knocking them flat on their back would be unexpected, but you wouldn't want to change their direction from fear to anger (or unconsciousness) in a survival situation. Depends on who it is though

[crashdive123]

Depends on who it is though

Truer words have never been spoken.

[Rick]

Running out of Depends can make you freak out. You could literally wind up with a SHTF...never mind.

[crashdive123]

That's what they make commando briefs for.

[Rick]

This may be turning ugly. First the CCW hong and now this.