The Walking Dead, Survival Rule of the Week: The worst of times

The Walking Dead season 11

Never assume things will go right for you. 

If we look back at the group’s plan to launch an incursion into the Commonwealth to overthrow Pamela, we realize that a lot had to go right for their plan to go off properly. Then, if we think back to how things went, clearly, not everything did.

As the group made their way into Union Station, they were ambushed, with Pamela’s minions holding the high ground in the station and locking the doors to prevent escape, enabling them to slaughter several of the civilians the group had brought back with them from the forced labor camp Pamela had converted Alexandria into, with no effort.

This is why, in a zombie apocalypse, you can not assume that everything is going to go according to plan for you because, if you do, the moment things don’t fall into place, you’re left at the mercy of your enemies, be they living or dead.

Your best bet is, firstly, to try to have plans that don’t rely on a specific thing or person being at a specific time and/or place or a specific event occurring in order to work. Whatever that specification immediately becomes the weak link in your plan, which, at best, can be thrown off by things you couldn’t anticipate and, at worst, be exploited and used against you.

Secondly, have contingency plans in place so that, if you have to rely on specific circumstances (Sometimes, it’s unavoidable), make sure that you have some means of duplicating or mitigating those circumstances so that, should things not fall into place — Locked doors, more enemies than you expected, ambush, etc. — you have the means of getting control of the situation and not be hoping things just work out.