Bug In vs. Bug Out: Which Survival Strategy Actually Works?

Bug In vs. Bug Out: Which Survival Strategy Actually Works?

Should you stay home during a crisis or grab your bug-out bag and leave? The answer isn’t as simple as most people think.

In this episode of The Prepping Academy Podcast, Forrest Garvin cuts through the myths surrounding bugging in and bugging out. You’ll learn why Hollywood and social media have given many people unrealistic expectations and how to develop a practical preparedness plan that works in the real world.

Discover the advantages and disadvantages of both strategies, the biggest mistakes preppers make when planning to bug out, and a simple decision framework that helps you know when it’s safer to stay and when it’s time to leave.Whether you’re preparing for natural disasters, civil unrest, long-term power outages, or other emergencies, having both a bug-in plan and a bug-out plan can make all the difference.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• The truth about bugging in vs. bugging out
• Why do most bug-out plans fail before they begin
• When staying home is the smartest survival strategy
• What every bug-out plan must include
• How to evaluate threats before making a decision
• Why planning ahead beats reacting under pressure
• The hybrid preparedness approach that offers the greatest flexibility

If you’re serious about emergency preparedness, self-reliance, survival planning, and protecting your family during uncertain times, this episode provides practical, real-world guidance you can put into action today.

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Civilization Is Only Nine Meals Away From Anarchy

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Podcast Tags:

bug in, bug out, bugging out, emergency preparedness, prepper, prepping, survival, survival planning, self-reliance, bug out bag, disaster preparedness, SHTF, grid down, emergency planning, homesteading, civil unrest, natural disasters, family preparedness, preparedness strategy, The Prepping Academy Podcast

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Transcript

Announcer 0:54

Survive, thrive, stay alive. It's time to get repair with the Prepping Academy podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:10

Hey, welcome everyone to the Prepping Academy. I am forced. Oh, this is going to be a tough subject. People have opinions like crazy. This is bug in or bug out. What actually makes sense for you and your family? And you know, we've watched movies, we've read books, and everyone has their opinions. And we're gonna discuss it today, and hopefully, maybe we can help you decide what is maybe best for you and your family. I'll give you my opinions on several things, but hey, just want to let you guys know that we are grooving, we're just moving and grooving. We got, you know, Patrick's been putting out podcasts, I've been putting out podcasts, we've been pretty steady. Prepper Net is growing. We have more city meetings than any other organization in the world when it comes to the preparedness. We have been just absolutely tearing it up. We're we got a lot of things, I mean, we're working on as well. We've done redone the prepernet site, we've redone what else have we done? We've done, we've done a lot of work. We've done the prepping academy site, we've redone the prepper shows USA. I've done my personal page, forescarvin.com. We've I've redone all the websites and got some pretty, I mean, I'm I'm posting blogs on a lot of these. So go check them out and just go to prepernet.com. You'll see all the links there, all the partners that we have. And hopefully, yeah, you can get. I mean, I'm I'm I'm posting some great links with some some AI photos. It's okay. AI is not all totally evil, but yeah, go check that out. Everybody's like, we we don't use Facebook a lot because literally Facebook turned on us, and it's hard to forgive them. So we have our own social media site. If you go to prepper net.com, you will see and and and read about that and and see we're talking about. Oh, and I got some I do. I have a uh one post I posted about America's birthday. So anyway, preppernet.com, and you'll see the blogs there. You'll see I got a free ebook you can go and get on PACE, on you know, planning your your PACE. If you guys don't know what PACE is, you know, PACE is an acronym for primary, alternative, contingency, and emergency, and you can comply that to communications with meetup with with your family, with just about everything. You can go put your email address, your and your first name, and you can download the book. And not only is there a book, I put together a workbook to go with it as well to help you in your planning. And that's all you need. I mean, that literally gets you started, and it's it's absolutely free. And you can go to prepernet.com and download that. So today's topic is a tough one. I have met and consulted with almost a hundred, well, over a hundred groups really. And most of the groups are bugging out, and it's always like, do we need to bug out? Do we not need to bug out? Do we need to have bug out property? So I would consider myself one of humbly, I consider myself one of three experts in the field in the United States. And I'll I'll name the other two. One of them is Jonathan Hollerman, and one of them is Charlie Hogwood. Jonathan Hollerman does wrote a book called Survival Theory, and it's one of the best preparedness books I've ever read. And Jonathan is a good friend of mine. I'm actually on one of his sites as a like a I don't know, expert counsel or something or whatever. He's on mine as well. And then Charlie Hogwood as well. He wrote the book called Survival Groups, and he's been a friend, he's helped me teach classes, and yeah, and so I I would say between the three of us, they're they're yeah, we've consulted for probably over 500 groups, and I don't know anyone that consults as as much as we do, actually. I'm not I'm not tuning my horn, I'm tuning theirs. They've been doing it longer than I have. I've been doing it for 10 years, and both of them have been in the business longer than me. But we've worked on projects together, groups together. So, anyway, this is a subject everyone we we it always comes up. But do I bug in or do I bug out? So everyone loves the idea of bugging out. I mean, they've seen movies, they've read books, and yeah, it's just so glorious and glamorous to bug out. Grabbing your bag, heading into the woods, starting fresh in a safer place. This is gonna be great. I'm in charge now. And you know, but the reality is that most people will fail absolutely on their face in a short amount of time. And I do we have facts on this? Yes, we do. I've interviewed many people, people that let's say for Selko that was in Bosnia. Oh, yeah, he had his bug out bag. He says the I mean, terrible. Just you go, you can go and listen to the the interviews that I've done with him. I've interviewed people from Argentina when they were running from the government, Venezuela when they were hiding from the government. And uh these have been on past podcasts, and they're like, Yeah, yeah, I should have stayed home or I should have got out. Everyone, it for every person is a different, different decision. Today we're going to break down the bugging in and bugging out theory because yeah, you haven't done it yet. And what actually makes sense for you today, and why most people are getting this completely wrong. A lot of people, they just do. They just, you know, you got the man in the house that's all tactical. He's like, let's get out of here. It's not safe, which that's true for a lot of people. For me, it's true where I live. I've got 5,000 people that live within a mile and a half of my house. That's a lot of people. I'm not gonna stay and fight them. So, but hey, again, thanks for joining the prepping academy. We're gonna get right into this, but uh just to let you know, I do have over 20 years experience in the prepping and consulting. Well, consulting is about 13 years. So, but it's been it's been a minute, and so I'm not saying I'm an expert, I'm saying I'm one possibly an expert, maybe. If you don't like what I say, then that's fine. It's totally fine. So most people get it wrong. Why do they get it wrong? Because they read books, they watch movies, they think they have all the experience and knowledge that they need, and they can just, I mean, if you want to test it, go out for three weeks in the wilderness and see how you can live. No, now if you have a retreat, that's different. You have a place to go, that's different. You think you can go like commandeer a building and take it over? You know, that's a lot of ifs, because what if the janitor shows up? What if the owner shows up? A lot of people have these ideas. I'll go to the campground down the street and just kind of take. Yeah, other people have that same thought. And they might not be in, it might not be in your best interest to be around them. But, you know, and also fantasy, oh, how you know, you know, all these different shows and you know, how everyone just survives easily, even alone. The guys go out and they spend 60, 70, 80 days, but it is oh, just that's they could not spend any longer. I remember Alan Kay, friend, friend of the show, friend of PrepperNet. He won the first series, and he was probably made it the easiest than some of the other ones. And he was he has many times said how difficult it is, and then you know, parts of it were easy for him because he was very, very experienced. Yeah, they they um I think Chris Weatherman was in that one too, and he he kind of got knocked out really soon. But the reality is most people aren't trained for the wilderness. Now, if you go to a house, that's different. Like you go to, you know, a mountain house or a house out in you know, farmland, that's different, but it still brings up some of the same issues. They don't understand the logistics of getting all their stuff there. You better have your stuff wherever you're going before you have to bug out. You would hate to have to carry everything you need there on your back, even in your car, because you put it at risk of people stopping you. I do, I do make this statement, and I've made this statement for years, that those that know, and we and that's people listening to this podcast right now, we have an advantage. People don't know that when things, events happen, that they don't even think bug out. They think, huh, this is gonna be kind of interesting. Let's see how this plays out. But as preppers, we would go, wow, this is gonna turn out bad, which gives us a little bit more time than everyone else. I would say 12 to 24 hours. I really believe that. People just think, well, it's not gonna be that bad. This is America, we can get through this. Well, I'm gonna miss a few days of work, and they just don't really think it through. They've never thought it through like we have. This is our advantage. We need to take advantage of that. Go and get what you need at the stores if you can, you know, get your gas, everything topped up, buy wherever you can, get a U-Haul, and get then get out of Dodge. The great thing is, most of the things you buy, you can take back. Let's just be real there. So, so you know, most people also do not bug out if you don't have a place to go, just don't do it. I I you know, I I told this one lady and she's like, Where do we bug out to? I'm like, if you ma'am, if you don't have a place to go, you know, your best choice is stay home, defend it, die at home. She looked at me all bugged out, you know, bug-eyed, and I'm like, listen, that's the truth. So just just stay home. And she goes, So I need a place. I'm like, you need a place. Yeah. Bugging out with the without a plan is just disaster. It really is. You don't want to again listen to my podcast I did on when I interviewed Selko. I've interviewed him several times and different parts. So listen to them all, and he will tell you the true nature of bugging out and not having a place to go. So bugging out is not the people aren't prepared. Are you prepared to take your entire family, feed them, protect them from wild animals, people wherever you're going, even if that is, you know, a house, a mountain house, or you know, a farmhouse or something, it's it's it's difficult. I'm not saying staying at home is not difficult because it can be. But bugging in is a little different. You have an advantage because you feel at home, you know the area, you know the supplies, you know you have shelter, you're you're your lower risk to the environment, to animals, your major risk is people. Which where your house is, there's probably a lot of people. The people there's a there's a good there's a good YouTube video, and I believe this is it, and I hope it's still on the on YouTube. It's called 72 hours to anarchy. You need to watch that. It goes back in history when people absolutely lose their mind, and after 72 hours, they literally start attacking their neighbors for food. That's and you're like, well, we're in America. That's never that's happened in every society throughout history. When people believe there's no more food coming, all heck breaks loose. Watch the video. I think it's and you know, I will try to find that and link that in the show notes because it's that important. And it's called I think it's called 72 hours to anarchy. And it's an old, it's been out there for five, six years, but it's a good video. It really makes you think a lot. So bug it in, but so you you you you don't have to relocate, all your goods are there, you can store your goods at home. It is much, it's just much easier. You know, if the grid's down, there's no power. So, what do you do? You could have some backup power because you're at your home. Again, the biggest problem staying at home is people. Number one issue. Now, if you're out in suburbia and there's no, you know, there's only you know a few hundred people around you, hey, that might be a good alternative. If you could partner with some other people in your neighborhood or your cul-de-sac or along your street, that could be that might be the best choice for a lot of people where the kids can sleep in their own bedrooms or at least their own house. And so, yeah, I I do like that scenario for a lot of people. If you don't have a retreat or a place to go, grandma's house or Aunt Jenny's house or something like that. If there's not a lot of people, I would always try to stay at home. If there's a lot of people, I mean, but you still have to partner up with other groups, you have to build a tribe, and you have to talk to other people and kind of plan this beforehand. Don't wait. Cell Co would tell you don't wait on any of the planning, no matter what you do, bugging in or bugging out. Do it before the event happens. But you know, but so yeah, I'm I'm a big fan of bugging in. Again, if there's not a lot of people. If you're if you got a thousand people within a mile, I'm just saying, if the power doesn't come back on, you you're screwed. You can't, you, you're, you, you're just you just are. You've got to be you got to be planning to get out. What that magic number is, I don't know that, but I know like there's a town, I don't know, an hour and a half from here called Pagelin. There's probably 600 people in the town, and it's spread out. I would I would stay home there. If I live in Raleigh, Kerry, New York, you know, Philadelphia, you've got to get out of Dodge. You've got to get away from people. You need to be in a place where there is only 15, 30 people per mile. That's it. I mean, you've got the bet the less people, the better. So bugging out though is it's just it's dangerous. Just getting to your location. Have they got roadblocks? Have people already taken over your location? Is it really a better position? If it's away from people, yes. If you can get there, go. I teach people a lot of the time most of the time when I actually consult with people, it's about getting them out of their current location. That's the number one thing. Uh again, from people from California to Canada to throughout the United States, is getting them to a safer area where they have the potential to survive. You don't have the potential to survive, you don't have the skills with your family and protecting your family to survive in a community where there's a thousand people less than a mile. The herd always wins. Zombie World will happen. Again, don't want to be the dead horse. Go listen to the Cell Co interview. And zombie herd zombie herds always win. And but if you do have a bug outlocation, it requires planning. It reply requires you going there, setting things up, setting supplies up, having backups, having everything you need there. Matter of fact, in my group, which we've had my group since Y2K, we've had a retreat since 2001. So we've had a retreat for literally 25 years. You find another one in the world that's done that, and I'll give you money. There hasn't been. There's not one. They don't survive. But we've had a retreat for 25 years. We're planned there. We got so the idea for the families is every family has enough to stay at your house for three months. That's it. We want you to risk your life to get to the retreat because we need you there. So you don't have a lot of stuff at your home. Matter of fact, 95% of your supplies are at the bug out location. Because we want you to risk your life to get there. Because we know if you stay there, you're probably not going to make it. And so, and we need you at the retreat. But it takes planning, you gotta have a destination, logistics. I got some good examples. Let me throw one at you for 20 seconds, let you just ponder on this. Well, I don't have a retreat, I don't have a place to go. Well, find an Airbnb out in the middle of nowhere, rent a shed, you know, like a storage unit, and put all your stuff in there, and then go and take care of that property when the grid goes down and people are killing each other in the city. You go take care of it for the owner. Just the thought. I don't want to get any more information of that. So one of the biggest mistakes is not having a destination for sure. No route planning. You gotta have a route. You just don't want to hit on the interstate and go. And it needs to be close. When I say close, I'm saying three to four hours because, again, I believe we have a head start. I believe we have a head start. We will see always bug out. I mean, always my my group, we bug out, something small happens. And then we get there, we have a good party, hang out, then we all leave if nothing, if it's no big deal. That's the type mindset you need to be in. Always, always leaving. Just in if you have a place to go. Don't decide at the moment, well, let's go to grandma's house real quick. Yeah, you should have already planned that. That's that's bad on you. That's shame on you. You you should love your family a little bit more to think about it than in the last second. Let's go to Ant's house and and not have it all set up and all planned. That's just that's just wrong. You will pay for that decision. Is so some of the questions this, you know, when you're as you're pondering what to do and where to go, is is your safe, is your you know, current location safe? Have it short-term, long-term? I mean, long term, did people from the city finally get to your location? Do I have enough resources here to stay? I mean, if you you say, yeah, I got enough food for a year, but do you really, if people come and break into your house because you can't stop them? Do I have a safe destination to go to? Grandma's house, Aunt Jen's house? Okay, it is three hours away. Can we get there? Well, would they let me go and maybe build a barn, put a little structure on there to put some of our our you know, food? Can I talk to them? Will they think we're crazy? Should I just go down to the you know a little town down the street from their house and start packing all the food and supplies there instead of storing it at grandma's house where she thinks you guys are crazy, you know, and then just show up and say, hey, we got all the supplies, we just have to go get it. Can you get there safely? I mean, yeah, don't don't be going through the city or the hood to get to your place. So the question is the bit the I mean, the number one question am I better off staying or am I better off going? Bugging in, better off bugging in or hitting the road, bugging out. These are the questions and things you need to determine now. Like literally last week, but now then you need to start planning this. I will tell you. I am writing a book on this. It's not gonna be to it's it's been it's it's called the complete guide for survival groups, and it is it's taken me a long time because in the middle of writing this book, I started writing another one on privacy and AI and you know facial identity, all this kind of stuff, facial rec, you know, recognition, all this kind of. I'm like, I gotta get this out. This is you know, so I'm but I I am coming out with a book. It's I it we're months and months away. So don't don't be waiting for it yet. You need to start planning now. So, but real real world scenario. I mean, let's say if the power goes out. Our power went out the other night for 12 hours. Makes me so mad. That's the only time I want to cuss is when power goes out. I'm like, why is my dang power out? I would say if your power goes out, you just stay there. I mean, because you can see on the map these days, you still got internet, you know, with your phone. Well, it's just you know, 400 homes. We were we had 2,000 homes out, or two, yeah, 2,000 people were affected. I don't know if that's homes or whatever, but since 2,000 people, we stayed. I cranked up the whole house generator and we we made it through it. Oh, but in the whole house generator, there there is no air conditioner still, it just takes too much, but we had everything else. Civil unrest, you know. So sometimes I'm I'm kind of out in the country. You may, and I'm still bugging out, but you may be out in the country, and civil unrest downtown doesn't really bother you. They're not gonna come out, you know, the farmland or the suburbs and and do that. I do know in Chicago when they were rioting in Chicago, I was out in because Elburn, which is Aurora, which is way outside Chicago, you know, 30 miles. And oh yeah, they burned down North Aurora. You can look that up. Yeah, it was and you're like, gosh, this little small, but it wasn't small because there's you know, you got 12 million people right down the road from you. That uh you need to get further out than than I was at the time. But but is it you know, to say natural disaster, you know, most of that time a natural disaster is limited to a geographical region. Help is on the way, not good help, and not help all the time, but most people after the actual disaster and they're safe from the disaster, there's always people don't really die after that. If you if you make it through, you you you usually can figure everything out, especially because it's so localized in an area. Long term, gosh, you got to get away, way, way far from people. So, long-term scenario, you've got to bug out. I yeah, you gotta bug out, and you gotta get away from people. You got to be in farmland, mountains, wherever that is for you, you got to get there. And you gotta be ready. You gotta have the skills, and you got to have the supplies, you got to have the mindset. It's all together. A good, you know, a good book, I'll just tell you, is called the preparedness roadmap. It is a book that I wrote for preppers and what to buy, what to learn, your mindset, how to start thinking the right way. It's called again, it's called the preparedness roadmap. You can get on Amazon. It's a great book. I'm telling you, it's one of the best books I've seen out there. And I'm not just saying that. I am just saying that, but I am not just saying that. So the real answer is both. Because sometimes you need to bug in, but other times you do absolutely the worst it is, you need to go. You just need to go. I'm just saying, I'm a bug out kind of guy. You've got time, you've got ways to plan, you can go get storage units for a hundred bucks a month where you can start putting your stuff. You can find Aunt Jenny, you know, Tom, whoever you have to get out of the city. Just know if you don't get out of the city, I think you're just you're doing it, you're doing a wrong service to your family. I'm just, you got to protect them. That's your number one goal. Women, too. You got to protect your family. And being in the city, being around people when all the poop breaks, you don't want to be there at all. So, but I think you got to plan on both staying in for three months or so, gotta have enough supplies, and then having a place to go. I'm a big bug out guy. So I will say this: I I didn't plan on doing this, but I have a website you guys can go to. And you you may not want to go there, but it's called preppersconsulting.com. You'll see my big ugly mug there. It's called preppers with a sconsulting.com. And you can go in there, you can contact me if you have questions, you can schedule calls with me. I literally every month I I I usually limit my calls to no more than 15 a month because that's like 15 hours of time. And you usually, yeah, matter of fact, this month I had so many we had the we started scheduling some for next month, and then and then Cody started calling people saying, hey, forest, he he's gonna make time for you. So I am going to do more than 15 this month, but it's called again preppers with an S, preppersconsulting.com. You can go and check that out. And what you know, what I do is try to help people with their scenario, their location, look at their the maps, help them determine if Stan is even an option, and then maybe even helping them find a place where they can go. So if you're interested in that, go to the website, send me a shoot me a message, book a call. Yeah, I don't do it for free. Sorry. I mean, I will answer some of the question, basic questions, because I am here to help people. That's kind of what I do. But but yeah, shoot me an email, and I'd love to help you guys. I mean, I've literally helped hundreds of families determine we'll do an assessment, we'll do where's it, what areas would be best for you. We'll look what's around you, supplies around you, where you would go, what it looks like there. I would ask, you know, questions about your skill level, all that. So anyway, guys, I just wanted everyone to kind of think about this. Is something that should be on your mind all the time. I'm I'm it's it's important enough to always be on your time. And as I tell I told, I tell my brother, so if I tell my brother, I tell you, he's like, force it out. What's planning? I'm like, listen, if you don't plan to do something, you're literally just telling your family you don't care. He's like, Far, stop saying that. I do care. And I'm like, well, you need to plan something then. Hey, okay, okay, and that's kind of how our conversations go, but he's already got some plans now, and he's been working on it. That's my own brother. So don't you don't think I would tell you that? I'm pretty so anyway, guys. Thank you for listening to the Prepping Academy. And we hope to bring, I mean, we're bringing you good content. We think we this is to make you think. This wasn't a sales pitch, didn't mean to do a sales pitch, but they make you think and start planning. Because what's the saying? If you if you don't plan, if you if you don't plan to succeed, you plan to fail. No plan is fail. It's not gonna turn out good. So, anyway, guys, thank you for joining me on the prepping academy, and we will see you guys next. Oh, we got some good announcements coming up. Oh, big ones, maybe about a movie and a book that by Wim Fortune One Second Ether and some things, how we're involved in it. Hey, we'll get that next podcast. We'll share more about it. So there's some great things going on, and we're excited. So, guys, God bless, and you guys take care. See you on the Prepping Academy next week. Goodbye.

Announcer 32:12

Thanks for listening to the Prepping Academy Podcast. Preppers United at www.preppingacademy.com.