Are you ready for when it actually happens?

It seems easy when you read about it.

Reading about an event, listening to others talk about it, even knowing someone who did it are not the same as experiencing it for yourself.

It doesn’t matter how much you prepare if you never actually experience the real thing. How will you really react? When the pressure is on, will you fight or fly? Will your training kick in and you’ll feel confident or will your old (?) instincts come back into play and you’ll do what you trained not to do?

If you trained so little that you’re not even sure what you’re supposed to do when the time comes, are you better off than the person with no training and better instincts? When does training actually overcome instincts anyway? Is there a fine line that you can tell tell when you crossed?

I’m a certified NERT … something.

I took a NERT training course for 6 weeks (it might have been 8 weeks) and I pretty much couldn’t tell you anything. I have a yellow helmet, though, and if there’s an earthquake and I put it on, people are going to come to me for answers and I’m afraid I’m not going to have any.

I remember that there is a valve for, well, something, maybe gas, outside of people’s homes and that you should turn it just a quarter turn in a certain direction to turn it off. Guess that’s a 50/50 chance that I’m going to help you blow up your house or not. Sorry. I paid attention, I swear, but it was just once a week for 6 weeks (or 8) and I missed one. I took notes. I have a yellow helmet. It’s a little scary that I might be seen as someone who knows more than someone else.

We saw four bears today. We weren’t in the zoo. We weren’t in our car.

Let’s see. Make yourself look bigger. Group together. Make a lot of noise. Don’t turn around. Don’t run. I think that’s what you’re supposed to do. We definitely made a lot of noise.

How many things can you become expert in? What’s a good number? How do you choose what to focus on? How about not dying from a bear mauling?