Tactical Living

There are some people after looking at my life, roll their eyes and exclaim, ‘paranoid’ ‘psychopath’ Not that what they think ever bothers me. Not at all.

As these people regularly get robbed, car jacked and since they take zero ownership over their personal protection and only seem to outsource it to the police all the time – these are also the same people who are very often constrained by fear. Real or imagined. Fear consistently holds them back. Fear keeps them poor.

In many cases it even stops them dead in their tracks from doing business in the world’s fastest growth regions. No I am not talking about New York, Paris or London….but rather places where folk regularly point guns at people. These are incidentally the best places to make your fortune abroad. As since the polite air conditioned addicted crowd considers them basket cases – land is usually dead cheap. Rental is non existent (even comes with a sky view, if a bomb renovated it). Labor is plentiful. As everyone wants to get out of refugee camps and as far as the laws are concerned, you can just make it up as you go along.

These are of course nuggets of wisdom – they never ever teach you in Harvard Business School. As they since tactical living is not a module that is usually taught there. They have no choice but to go in high. While those who are skilled in managing risk can go where angels fear to tread and pick up goodies for free.

I kid u not! I happen to know bus loads of people who regularly read my blog and they’re all prospering and very happy doing what they do all over the world – as we all share the common philosophy of living a tactical life.

To me cultivating a Tactical Mindset is not paranoia. It’s good business IQ. If you happen to believe that it is of no value…then you are stupid and ignorant. The end!

It is wisdom. As since I work in a dangerous environment. I makes perfect sense to have a complimentary thoughtware. I don’t ever have to live in the shadow of fear. As since I spend a lot of my time training, training and training….I have every confidence in being able to defend myself and those around me.

Tactical living to me is attitude where one makes a conscious decision to declare war against complacency and to be prepared to maintain the status quo thru the knowledge of Warcraft.

It is preparing constantly for the unthinkable. It is living in a state of heightened awareness where one is conscious of everything. Nothing is ever what it seems when I am in this heighten state of consciousness – I take nothing for granted. Not even simple everyday acts like driving up to my gate*

There is so much more that could be written on this one subject. But since I don’t want to overload your brain till it explodes like a hand grenade. I hope this short piece will provoke you to consider taking ownership of your security seriously.

*When you drive a car into a house head first. You literally lose every strategic advantage. You’re a duck! If there is an ambush. You can’t step on the gas and make a lightning getaway. You can’t even weaponize your car to ram the baddies or take off their knee caps either. And since all ambushed contain within them the element of surprise. They all invariably take advantage of the blind side and when your back is turned to a possible threat. You are literally a sitting duck. That’s why the right and only way to drive a car into a house is by reversing in.

————————————————————————–

‘The greatest solvent that militates against 100% preparedness has to be complacency – to me that’s really just a zombie attitude when everyone goes thru the motions without having the goal firmly superglued in their heads. It’s just aerobics. Usually with roughly the same processing power as tying their shoelaces. They’re not situationally attuned. They’re not covering the bases tightly with the right attitude. It’s sloppy and worst of all they don’t bother to train realistically and everything is just dumbed down to a routine. Wonder no more when the shit hits the fan like little India everyone is twiddling their thumbs, mumbling and waiting for someone else to make the decision.

In that case. They did not lack the equipment. Rather the one factor that undermined their capacity to annul the threat rapidly had to be complacency. That’s to say they had the wrong attitude.

That attitude is well and fine in Singapore. I bet you could even live up to the ripe old age of eighty with all your hands and feet intact. As all one has to do is pick up the phone and outsource the whole idea of personal security to the police. But over here in the frontier. There is no law. Not after you cross the first two rows of the palms as you drive into a plantation.

It’s only you and them. So to me there will always be an understanding of sorts that differentiates me from all other men whenever the subject of life is raised. This will always be the attitude of those who turn the wheel of life in the frontier – nothing is ever what it seems. Nothing can be taken for granted. If no one is trying to kill you. That’s because you put in the effort to make those basic living conditions possible with the sweat from your brow. It never came for free. As for the idea of government, it might as well be on written on some rock on the moon.

The frontier man can step right into the field and put it on like a jumpsuit and just as well be the invisible man. With the certainty, there will always be 12 ways to walk in plantation in the dry season without ever making a sound. If the other side has FLIR. On a moonless night there are at least six ways to confuse him. You can’t defeat it, but you make him pull out his hair! If it’s thermal, there are at least seven in the dry season and only two in the wet with a possible three with the intelligent use of kerosene. In the wet season, there are four shades of camouflage. In the dry three when the sun is high and seven more when the arch of the sun sinks below the 3rd azimuth. Three methods to turn a lorry turtle on the flats with just three sticks. Six on the slopes with only two and one when it’s crossing a bridge in a plantation. Four to make a lorry stuck in the mud during the dry season. By falling just two mature palms, it’s even possible to bring an entire column of lorries to a halt. Two methods to bring down a bridge. Four to make it sweep away in a heavy storm and only one to slowly bring it down crashing….yes, there will always be an understanding of sorts I reckon whenever the subject of life is raised…but that is only to be expected don’t you think so. After all it’s hardly as if we live the same, but rather separate lives.’