Wilderness Survival: Vital Psychological Factors

Jul 26, 2010

Wilderness survival is affected positively or negatively by psychological factors during three important situations: first, before ever entering the wilderness; next, while hiking or backpacking in the wilderness; and finally, during a wilderness survival situation itself.

Image via Wikipedia

COGNITIVE PREPARATION BEFORE VISITING THE WILDERNESS

One of the most important factors in survival is a positive mental attitude. We will look into this more closely further on in this post. But for now, it is important to remember that a major factor in having a positive mental attitude in a real survival situation is possessing survival knowledge that one has developed prior to the situation.

So, get in the habit of learning how to survive in the wilderness. Buy a book or two on wilderness survival, and study them. You can also study online. Learn how to build a fire with no matches, how to build a shelter, how to find water and food. Not only will learning these wilderness survival skills serve to increase your chances of survival if you ever get lost, but it can be just plain fun to do.

We all, of course, hope that we will never need to use these skills, but knowing them can give us confidence that we can survive if we are ever thrown into a survival mode.

Another thing that is important to learn before ever visiting the wilderness is how to avoid getting into a survival situation in the first place. Learn how to navigate. Learn how not to get lost. Learn sensible and responsible behaviors for staying safe in the wilderness.

PSYCHOLOGICAL PREPAREDNESS WHILE HIKING AND BACKPACKING
During your hiking or backpacking trip, maintain an awareness of potentially needing to survive. Make mental notes of topographical features like valleys, ridges, streams, rivers and lakes. Take special note of large and imposing geographical features like mountains, large valleys, cliffs, glaciers and patches of snow.

If you are hiking in a dense forest, it will not be so easy to identify such features. So, it is even more important to be mentally aware of rivers and streams that you cross and their directions. Also important to remember in the woods is directions and steepness of slopes.

When you keep such a tally of prominent features of the land, two things happen. The first thing is that it will be less likely that you will get lost in the first place. The second thing is that, if you do get lost, finding your way back to a major geographical feature and getting unlost will be much easier than if you fail to pay attention to your surroundings.

MENTAL ATTITUDE DURING A WILDERNESS SURVIVAL SITUATION

Developing a positive mental attitude is essential for survival in the wilderness.

Choose fight not flight. When our brain senses that we are in a threatening situation, it signals our adrenal glands to release adrenaline into our circulatory system. This, in turn, initiates a fight-flight response. When this happens, one is faced with this question: Should I flee, or should I stay put and fight?

When faced with the threat of being lost in the wilderness, one must choose staying put and fighting, not fleeing the scene. Fleeing most often entails a panicky and mindless attempt at getting back to familiar territory without the help of deliberate mental activity. It can result in getting even more lost and taking up precious time that is needed to start survival activities like creating a shelter or building a fire.

Now, let’s talk about what it means to stay put and fight. What I mean here is fighting for survival. And, such fighting involves deliberately assessing the current situation and making decisions on how best to survive.

Develop a positive mental attitude. One must fight against panic and start fighting for a positive mental attitude. This attitude basically says convincingly, “I can survive!”

Panic comes naturally, without any effort. But developing a positive attitude that can result in survival takes a strong and deliberate effort. You must fight to develop it.

It is easy to see, as I mentioned at the start of this post, that having prior survival skills would make the fight against panic and for a positive attitude much easier. So, making a habit of learning survival skills prior to even entering the wilderness is essential.

There are many wilderness survival skills that need to be learned. Some of the most important, as we have discussed here, are psychological. We have also seen in this post how psychological survival skills are intimately tied with most if not all other more practical wilderness survival skills.

Start developing your wilderness survival skills now – both practical and psychological.

By Richard Davidian PhD.

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