Fear The Walking Dead, Survival Rule Of The Week: Have a code

It may not be necessary to survive the dead, but, as Morgan showed in this week’s Fear The Walking Dead, if you want to live with yourself, you need a code.

Surviving a zombie apocalypse is tough. It becomes tougher when you can’t live with yourself. When you become disgusted with the choices you’ve made, the person you are, or the person you’ve become in the zombie apocalypse, it makes survival a whole lot more difficult than it needs to be.

In this week’s episode of Fear The Walking Dead, we met a new pair of survivors, Wendell and Sarah, who were going out of their way to help strangers because it was part of their code. Granted, they were lying, but, the point is: Having a code, a set of behaviors to live by, is important if you want to be able to look yourself in the mirror.

You know what, actually? Let’s start with Wendell and Sarah. When Morgan met them, they passed themselves off as kindly truckers, leaving  supplies for any weary survivor to use as they needed.

However, they were, in actuality, thieves, who stole the truck from the very person who was leaving supplies, and trying to steal them all back for themselves.

Don’t be like that. I could probably give you a bunch of elaborate reasons why, but, I be simple: When you make things about only yourself, and you’re selfish and greedy, it will come back to bite you, sooner or later. When you’re selfish and greedy, you’re a “that guy”. Bad things happen to “that guy”s.

Along with Sarah and Wendell being less than what they seemed, we saw Morgan, after committing himself to finding the rest of the group, decide to give up before he even started. Why? …Fear.

Now, it’s one thing to be afraid of walking into a dangerous situation, but, that wasn’t what Morgan was afraid of. No, Morgan was afraid that he wouldn’t be able to help the group, and so, he chose to not even bother trying.

This, maybe more than anything else, can be the toughest thing to live down. When we chose to not to act (When we have the ability to help) out of cowardice, it eats away at us. Maybe not all at once, but, eventually, it will get to us. We can often be our harshest judges, and when we (For lack of a better term) “chicken out”, over time, we give ourselves our harshest sentences, ones that we may never live down.

This bothered Morgan because it was, to some degree, turning his back on his ideals. To him, all life is precious, and, by abandoning the group, especially after a hurricane, for he knew, he was leaving them to die.

You see, if you set down a code for yourself, you have to stick to it. You can’t just bail on it whenever it becomes inconvenient. If you do that, you’re little more than a liar, even if the only person you’re lying to is yourself.

Principles can prove expensive, but, if you don’t adhere to them, eventually, the guilt and shame you carry for it, can prove even more costly, as you discover you may not be able to live with what you’ve done, or failed to do.

Finally, if you’re going to have a code, have it be real.

There’s plenty of people who convince themselves they’re good by default, and, therefore, anything they do is for a greater good, no matter how repugnant their actions actually are.

You can’t do that.

Don’t sit there and convince yourself that you are good, go out and strive to be good. Anyone can say they’re good, but the true test is being good.

This is why you follow…The Rules.

And that’s our survival rule of the week!! Hopefully, it’ll help you 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!