Having Your Sh*t Together

No, this is not going to be a post about the metaphorical meaning of "having your sh*t together," like we say about a person, he or she "has their sh*t together" as in... they have their life generally sorted out and functioning properly, they are in control, etc. I don't know whether I've ever had or ever will have my "metaphorical" sh*t together, and I don't really care. This post is about something far, far more interesting to me, that is, two of my favorite leisure-time pursuits: camping and fishing.

Camping and fishing each require a lot of equipment. For camping, you essentially need light, packable versions of everything you already have at home. That would be some sort of shelter (tent), a bed (sleeping bag, cot, etc.), some way to cook food (camp stove and fuel), some way to get water (water jugs, water purifier), eating utensils, food, somewhere to sit around the fire, appropriate clothing (a whole other story), etc. etc. For fishing, you need an entire different category of equipment which I will not get into here, lest this post become about nothing but fishing. But, suffice it to say, in order to fish, you need a lot of sh*t.

Not only do you have to buy and own all of this stuff it also has to all work, meaning you have to have used it once or twice to make sure you like using it and it's not garbage. You have to make sure you have everything you need for all the situations you might run into in the various seasons you'll be camping, or fishing, or whatever: rain, cold, emergencies, etc. Now you also have to store all of this stuff in your house and be able to find it and assemble it all in a timely manner so that you don't end up having to buy more stuff you already own and just can't find.

All of this may sound really simple. Trust me, it is not.

It takes many, many trips in order to get your gear all sorted out so that, when it comes time to pack up for your next trip, you can pack up within a couple hours, rather than a couple days or weeks. Because I'm at a point in my life where I go camping and fishing very frequently, I'm finally at a point where I can, within maybe an hour, be fully packed and ready to go camping. When it comes to fishing, I've gotten it down to maybe 20 minutes.

This is important because not only does having your sh*t together mean your actual trip can be better -- you have everything you need, you know how to use it, and it works -- but you can also spend much less time preparing and stressing out about preparing for the trip. In fact, a fraction of the amount of time. Thus eliminating one of the greatest annoyances of taking camping/fishing trips: packing and unpacking. Once you've got your sh*t together, you can spend more time and energy enjoying the thing. 

There were years in my life (too many) when I only went fishing or camping a handful of times a year, if at all. Therefore each trip was like having to re-acquaint myself with all my gear. First I had to find all of it. Then assemble it. Then figure out what still worked, what exactly I would need and how much to bring. Inevitably, because I was out of practice, I would forget something, bring the wrong thing, have to buy something I knew I already had but couldn't find, or bring too much, whatever.

But like with anything in life, the more you do something the better you get at it. Period. Sounds trite. Sounds basic. But it's something we forget too often when blaming ourselves for why we're not better at XYZ, or why we haven't achieved success at [insert activity here]. Very seldom are there mystical, unfathomable, or mysterious reasons why we are not proficient at whatever it is, or why we waste too much time doing some activity or other: we just haven't done it enough. Granted, this is not a uniform code that applies to every activity in life. But I bet if you looked at something you want to be better at -- some skill or activity -- or something you want to get done in life, there's a way you can "get your sh*t together" so you can at least approach it properly, and the act of getting ready to do it is not a barrier in and of itself.