Patriot Express News Letter Edition #20
Fellow Patriots,
Good morning to all. Thank you for your continued support and time to read, email, text, and visit our website. The motivation is the belief we are helping one person at a time. We never know when the clock will strike zero. If you are not convinced people are not prepared, just watch the video clips and news streaming live from south Florida. Empty stores and folks lined up to buy last minute supplies....because? They are not prepared. Remember 5% vs 95%.
We made it!!! Woo-hoo. Twenty straight weeks. That voice in my head keeps singing "Keep Charging..."
Please continue keeping our fellow Patriot brothers and sisters in your prayers. We have several folks who are battling health issues or dealing with a spouse with major health issues. Prayers are powerful and I know these folks would appreciate them much. Thanks!!!
I would like to welcome our new Patriot readers from Dandridge, TN, Eastern N.C., and North Alabama. Welcome aboard.
With that said... Let's get moving...
Hurricane Dorian
Florida plans for 7 days without power. The shelves are already empty of basics. I stand by my statement: Five percent are prepared and ninety-five percent are never prepared.
Which group are you with?
Be safe.
(Reader advisory - This site, the author/owner and the contents of this site are for reading pleasure only. We are NOT responsible for your feelings, happy or sad.
As always, avoid fear porn, take what you want, throw away the rest and apply to your own preparedness as you see fit. Keep one foot grounded always. Earthly speaking, the only thing we know for certain is how prepared we are or not.)
Thoughts for the Week -
In the world we live today, it is hard to not feel down and bombarded with negative news. Story after story put before us is negative and insulting. It is easy to point fingers and become angry at what we see and hear. Decisions and changes that impact our way of life today and tomorrow. We may even ask "what is real or fake?" I can't speak for you, but for me, I find my solid ground and resolve through my faith. I'm not perfect (ask Ms. Lucy) and I get disgruntled like anyone else. But at some point I step back and remind myself of my beliefs and the understanding that He is in control every second. As humans we like to be in control and know what is next. When will it happen? What is going to happen? We like to surmise and analyze events and what we think will come next. I, like you, wish we had all the answers, but we just don't. This is why I often say "keep a foot grounded, throw out the fear porn, learn, educate, share and prepare. In my book and often in writing I add how important it is to first prepare spiritually, psychologically, and physically. Simply put, don't jump on the cruise to the unknown. Be yourself and keep the faith. A positive attitude can overcome most things in life.
Why am I saying this? I get emails from readers often and I read them all. Every word. And I take to heart what is shared with me. Last evening I received an email from a Patriot sister. I do believe it was the first time she had emailed. She thanked me for newsletter and so forth. Then she told me she had attended a few of my classes at Heritage Life Skills and she shared how she held on to points I made about my strength through faith and how this plays in to the strength of my mind. Controlling my mind to what I take in, keep, file away, throw away, and process now or hold for later. We have to know and understand who we are. She stated how this was the thing she has been working on since the classes in April. I'm truly humbled by her words, but, lifted to know something I said about how I handle things and what I believe may help someone else. I say to you weekly to learn, educate, communicate, and help others. We will not survive these earthly challenges alone. We must have a group or team. But the strength of a group or team starts with how solid each brick is in our wall. That is the goal in the news letters, articles, the book, website and teaching classes. The intent is to help others. One person at a time. One team at a time.
Next...
I think I may have figured out the problem. I was focused on the website and the number of visits vs number of reads. The number of reads dropped 2/3 in a single week for two weeks in a row. Then I emailed everyone and asked folks to email be back to let me know if they had read the newsletter in the past two weeks. I heard back from about 1/3. Last evening I got a message from one of our very supportive Patriot sisters who said she" liked the new format and she even found the website on her own." That didn't make sense to me because I email out notifications to two groups with each posting. She said she had not received emails since Aug 10th Newsletter. So it appears the problem is with the email side and not the website side. Through further conversation she discovered about a two week period where all emails from me landed in her SPAM folder. Thanks to my Patriot sister for her time to investigate this issue. I will investigate same this evening when I get home from my day job. Keeping it simple, unless something drastic happens, I will post a Patriot Express News Letter every Saturday morning. If you don't receive the link from me, simply go to the website and the blog page and you will find it posted.
Next...
A common trend I'm continuing to find amongst like-minded Preparedness parents is the fact they are concerned and worried about their young adult children who choose to not per take in their preparedness wishes. Many refuse, some per take a little bit, maybe to pacify their parents. I don't know. I hear stories of grown children making fun of their parents for being responsible and preparing. I understand the frustration. Then I have to remind myself, long ago I was a long haired know-it-all musician who dreamed of making it on MTV and conquering the world. My liberal father tried to stress the importance of education to me but I knew it all. What did he know, right? It took me a while to understand his point and realize education was important. My point is, if you are in this boat as a parent, don't feel like the lone ranger, because many feel it. Other than buying them a round trip vacation to Haiti or Venezuela, you can only be patient and hope for the best. Don't give up. Leaves crumbs in the hope they follow at some point. Don't give up and keep the faith. Did you know, a recent article in Yahoo Finance by Sible Marcellus, https://finance.yahoo.com/news/these-people-are-most-likely-to-lose-their-jobs-first-in-a-recession-160247635.html, offers that young people, specifically recent college grads will be the hardest hit during a recession because they are most likely the ones to lose their job. This is another reason to prepare and may be an opening to get the door to the mind thinking. Stocking food and water isn't just about EMPs and hurricanes. It's about "anytime" one is hungry and can't put food on the table. When one is hungry they don't care what caused it, they just want food. Another example of the "cause and effect" I speak about often. The pain comes in the effect of the event, which is the cause. A bit of good news is that probably 40% of our readers are probably under the age of 40.
Next...
I recently started and will be continuing more random emails to a select group of individuals with a subject, story, and requesting their input on the topic. Each time I will randomly select roughly ten to fifteen folks on the email list to contact via email and request input. I will then consolidate inputs I receive back and share with the group who provided the inputs and to the overall group. I won't include names of who submitted what response to protect the privacy of the individuals. The topics will range from civil collapse to economic turbulence, EMPs to grid-down, disease outbreaks to immunizations, preparedness priorities to bugging-in vs bugging-out... There are no wrong answers. I try to spread the ten choices out between states and regions, age groups, professions (best I know) and experience in preparedness (based on what I know of the individuals). I will try to do at least one of these per mon