Agriculture is in crisis. Grain harvests have been steadily getting worse, as have potato harvests. Everything is NOT ok and people know it. The zeitgeist is that preparedness is something a lot more people want to know about, without the tinfoil-hat connotations, Reform voting, and far-right politics. People recognize that they need to work together.

Solidarity Prepping is Mutual Aid Survivalism

I have been in communication with a number of groups who are preparing and laying the groundwork for community preparedness, which is not necessarily land-based.

• Resilience & Preparedness are pro-social, not individualistic endeavors
• Skilled, coordinated groups are more resilient, and there is safety in numbers
• Preparedness of individual households is as important as collective preparedness
• Long-term resilience is a team process: it requires higher levels of skill, collective preparedness, and the building of trust and shared capacities in essential areas.
• Participation in a group that focuses on collective preparedness & learning concrete skills creates cohesion
• Fundamental Basic Needs: such as food, Water & waste management are central to adaptation
• Mutual Aid Based: We need to operate in a kind and reciprocal way

Solidarity Prepping supports groups to learn skills in a prosocial environment. The prosocial learning in nature philosophy is central to the ethos of building community bonds through mutual learning and support. Solidarity prepping is a science-based approach to adaptation and survival in the event of ecological collapse.

I choose not to reference concepts such as Thrutopia, Transformative Adaptation, and Deep Adaptation. However, my work in the area of adaptation is based on 40 years of practicing survival skills in nature for pleasure, to learn more and be close to wildlife.

I have seen the power of nature to heal! I led a pilot project at a large psychiatric hospital, designing walking routes and developing a horticultural program for detained patients. Digging can be better than medication for Generalized Anxiety, one of the most common mental health disorders in the UK. Yet I haven’t heard any Shamanic Practitioner healers talking about the healing power of Nature.

1.5°C is Gone

Anyone who reads this blog will be familiar with my use of the term “Goldilocks climate niche” for agriculture. We have just lost that. Above 1.5°C, arable agriculture begins to decline and eventually collapse.

Preparedness for the Climate Emergency & Ecological Collapse

Preparedness for the climate emergency & ecological collapse requires extraordinary skill, resilience, and cooperation. “Developing a mindset that can move through the ecological grief process towards acceptance quickly, in order to move to an activated state may perhaps be the most essential skill for navigating a world where environmental shocks can arrive with little warning.[1]

Preparing for psychological challenges

The psychological impact of collapse will be immense, especially in a world where familiar landmarks and ways of life are disappearing. Emotional resilience will need to go beyond maintaining hope; it will involve developing a deep connection to nature, finding purpose in community service, and embracing new identities as protectors of the environment and each other/ Collective mourning practices can help communities cope with the loss of their environments and ways of life, turning grief into a source of solidarity.”[1]

A Deep Connection to Nature

A deep connection does not come through visualization-led meditations. This is why I am resistant to attempts to introduce new-age spirituality into survival skills and preparedness, because learning survival skills is about being in nature and the relationships we build with plants and animals.

Survival skills are wide-ranging and always get better with practice. They constitute a meaningful activity and a distraction. These activities are perfect for reducing anxiety and stress. For example, manufacturing rope for later use.

Research using EEG and other measures to study brain activities during nature exposure find that rhythmic brain activity indicates better attention, higher functional connectivity and altered sensory processing. These findings correspond with increased focus, cognitive flexibility, and creativity.”[2]

Survival in the Anthropocene will also mean embracing uncertainty as a constant companion, since cascading climate disasters are likely to cause ongoing psychological trauma even in the calm between events. [1]

“Are you someone others will want on their team?“[3]

Even if I were willing, I would expect people to learn skills; Dr. Gail Bradbrook wants to hear from people who want to organize around collapse. I am not convinced: “We need the Guys who know how to build stuff”[4]

“Go to the Green Gathering folks, and there are people there who know all about each one of those things: experts, the permaculture guys, the people who rig up the tech...”[4]

“We need” and “Are you someone others will want on their team?” This is not the Solidarity Prepping way. I teach skills, so you all know what you are doing.

“What Are We Going To Do When Supermarket Shelves Are Empty? & People are Rioting in the Streets,” Asks Dr. Gail Bradbrook.

If ever there was a case for having a small stockpile of food, now is it. If you are forming a preparedness community, then collective preparedness and collective storage of additional food ahead of bread riots, and, of course, learning how to process and planting unfamiliar paleo-foraged staples in plain sight. While Gail Bradbrook might be right about wanting to talk to people who know stuff. Growing crops will become increasingly difficult. Foraging to survive will become increasingly difficult, and people will eat the wrong things, especially wild carrot and certain fungi. Many Preppers still fantasize about bugging out to the woods—this is a death sentence unless you are ultra-skilled.

As for the case for making preparedness more spiritual, I would suggest to the author of Rainbow Prepping: perhaps go find out what prepping and solidarity prepping actually are, rather than writing some unresearched rubbish that looks like AI-generated slop, even though it isn’t.

References

[1] How we could survive in a post-collapse world. Corresponding author: Stephanie Rost, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s44282-025-00160-1-1

{2]Your brain on nature: how exposure to natural environments heals, calms and cures. https://www.unr.edu/nevada-today/news/2023/atp-nature-and-the-brain

[3] Rainbow Prepping Prof. Jem Bendell https://jembendell.com/2026/08/04/rainbow-prepping-a-brighter-way-to-get-ready-for-collapse/

[4] Dr Gail Bradbrook. https://youtu.be/5o8qKdr4eQc?si=qnn-Bkcge8tS03Jq&t=761