Great topic, and one that is certainly under-addressed.

IMO practicing your skills is extremely important. True, your life is not on the line during practice. But if you can't do it in practice under low-pressure, how do you expect yourself to do it for real under high-pressure? Matt's analogy with EMS training is exactly right. Before placing my first ET tube on a live patient, I had only done the procedure on manequins. But if I hadn't done the "classroom" training I sure couldn't have done it right when it was for real.

Some think that they will magically do great when the shiite hits the fan. But I urge those people to remember a proven adage from the world of combat: "you will not rise to the occasion, you will default to your level of ingrained training".

Note that we are talking skills here, not the proverbial mom-becomes-superman and lifts the car off of her baby. No amount of "oh God this is for real" + adrenaline will enable you to build a fire or construct a shelter with skills you never knew.

Please understand I am not discounting improvisation and the ability to make-do with what you've got in an admittedly unpredictable crisis situation. But I believe we need to apply a concept used by explorers, soldiers & others who venture into the unknown: be really good at what you CAN control and it will free you up to better deal with what you CAN'T control.