The Walking Dead, Survival Rule Of The Week: War at your door

Living people are deadlier than zombies, more often than not. But, The Walking Dead’s season finale raises a question: What do you do when war hits home?

As bad as zombies will be in a zombie apocalypse, living people will be worse. I detailed why living people will be worse last week, but, suffice to say: We can make war, where the dead cannot.

Something else I alluded to last week was that how we respond to war will determine whether or not we survive it. This week, I intend to focus on what do once that war hits us.

But, before we do that, something I felt I didn’t elaborate on enough last week was the need for proper planning and the mentality that goes into it.

First of all, when you’ve encountered hostiles and are preparing to go into conflict with them, you need to plan as if any attacks you make will fail.

I don’t mean that people should doubt themselves into submission, but, you DO need to be realistic: As bad as doubting oneself can be, overconfidence is just as big a contributor in failure. If you simply assume that everything will go as planned, you won’t be taking into account things about the hostiles you don’t know, or things you simply can’t control. A perfectly laid plan can crumble because of something as simple as bad weather.

You need to accept the possibility of things going south on you and have plans in place for the various ways it can go south on you. If you allow yourself the vice of pride, it could easily drag you to Hell.

With that in mind, something any such contingency plans should include is an escape route from your base.

If hostiles attack, you need to have a plan in place so you don’t just run out the front gate and get slaughtered. You need to know all the ways you can escape, not simply in case of hostiles, but, any emergency that may arise. By knowing your escape routes, you can keep a much of your group alive in case the worst happens.

And, that is the thing you need to most prepare for: The worst.

What do I mean by the worst? Well, last week, I mentioned being the last member of your group to survive. That sounds terrible, let’s go with that!

What you need to do is prepare yourself mentally for that possibility or, at the very least, that you will lose someone important to you in the fight. In war, there are casualties. That’s just the nature of it.

You need to accept that this can (If not will) happen. Tricking yourself into thinking you won’t lose people is setting yourself up for heartbreak.

It’s important that you be ready to weather the losses you’ll take. You can’t let the deaths of loved ones cripple you, whether it’s from zombies or people, because either one will capitalize…and kill you, too.

As important as battle strategies and defenses are, should you be faced with war, preparing yourself for losses is far more important. Much like with overconfidence, tragedy can derail even the best of plans if you become too distraught or broken to execute them.

You need to know, not think, know that you will suffer losses, maybe even of people you love when you go into battle. You cannot assume that you won’t. It’s imperative, as difficult as it will be, that you prepare yourself emotionally and psychologically for those losses, so you can carry on and defeat your enemies. You can mourn after the war is won.

If you come into conflict with hostiles, war will come to your doorstep. You not only need to prepare to win it, you need to prepare in case you lose it, too. The first step to survival is preparation.

Next: The Walking Dead, Survival Rule Of The Week: War is never easy

And that’s our survival rule of the week!! Hopefully, it will help you should you ever need it and give you that mental edge that will prove so crucial once the dead start eating everyone.

If you like this and want to find out more rules to survive the zombie apocalypse, why not pick up a copy of my book, The Rules: A Guide To Surviving The Zombie Apocalypse! You can get it on Kindle here and on iTunes here!