Last year we passed around the book Deep Survival, It's still available for anyone who wants to read it: Deep Survival The book deals with "who lives, who dies and why". These themes are still on my mind 14 months later and I have figured out how to personally train myself to deal with situations. Crisis Management This sounds like a buzz word for a corporate team. Maybe we need to look at ourselves, or more accurately our minds, as a corporate team then. We need to seize the reigns of our first reaction to the trouble. They say that when it rains it pours. In my daily life, I rarely face just one problem... they usually come in a torrent and my first reaction is to toss up my hands and walk away. That is the mindset that will hinder my survival. I have to force myself to stop and reassess the situation. It's hard but if I can't do it now, I will surely fail when it really counts. When 4 or 5 or 10 things crop up all at once, I have begun forcing myself to smile and look at the items on this mental checklist that I CAN fix easily and quickly. Half of the problem can vanish in minutes. That leaves me confident and able to attack the remaining, more challenging issues. Try it next time you are frustrated over something. Look at it as a challenge and start training your mind now to react under fire. It just may save your life someday. If you don't train, you'll perform exactly how you trained later. Another thing that I work on in the 'down time' between crisis' is something that Bear helped me articulate. Look at the very worst case scenario now. If the very worst thing that can happen to you over a blunder at work is that you lose your job and have to find another, and you realize that now, you will have a new perspective the next time a blunder does happen. Working through these difficult thought process' is much easier while you are warm, fat and happy than trying to learn it on the run. This survival business is 99% mental IMHO. If you don't have the proper mindset, a few years of stored food may not help you much.
Book looks interesting and he had a good page titled "The 12 Rules of Survival" http://home.comcast.net/~laurencegonzales/ds/rules.html
But Mousie, thou art no thy lane, In proving foresight may be vain: The best laid schemes o' mice an' men Gang aft agley, An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, For promis'd joy!
