I firmly believe these two crucial moments in The Walking Dead shaped Rick's survivalist mindset

The Walking Dead has been one of the most popular zombie-apocalyptic franchises and has since expanded into several other shows. It began with Sheriff’s Deputy Rick Grimes’s (Andrew Lincoln) awakening from a coma and finding people from the whole world gone, replaced by zombies. He went on to look for his family, whom he found with a group of survivors, and became the leader of that group.

Becoming a leader was a lot of responsibility in a world where every minute is a fight for survival, and it ended up affecting him in many ways. It began with the early years of him taking the lead and fighting with his own best friend, who had his own idea of leadership during the process. Over the years in The Walking Dead has changed Rick’s mindset of survival. Some events have affected him more than others.

Here are two reasons that I think had a huge impact on Rick’s mindset to survive in The Walking Dead.

Two crucial moments in The Walking Dead shaped Rick's survivalist mindset

1) The group’s isolated life on Hershel’s farm

After not finding any help from the CDC, the group left to find help and traveled further. In season 2 of The Walking Dead, while looking for Carol’s daughter, Carl got shot, and they had to stay at Hershel’s farm for a while. The group gradually became accustomed to the safe environment of the farm, isolated from any harm for the time being.

Shane even tried to stay there without Hershel’s consent. This safety, coupled with Carl getting hurt, affected Rick’s mental stability for the first time. With the information Dr. Jenner had shared with him about everyone being infected, and then his own best friend trying to kill him, for Rick, the farm was not one of the safest places as he knew he had to change himself to keep his family safe, (even from threats closer to him than he imagined).

The fight in the bar, deciding on Randall’s fate, losing Dale, and later killing Shane had a huge impact on him and changed his mindset, making him think about keeping his family and his group safe from any threat, be it zombies or human beings.

2) Hershel's death

One of the only good things that happened to Rick on the farm was Hershel’s friendship. He put all of his trust in Rick to lead the way and keep his daughters safe in the apocalyptic world. Rick also relied on Hershel’s wisdom several times. After Lori died in the prison in season 3 of The Walking Dead, Hershel tried to bring Rick back to reality. He even helped in taking care of Judith, and was also a huge help when the residents of the prison suffered from a deadly flu, which resulted in many deaths.

But Hershel’s days came to an end when the Governor came back in season 4 of The Walking Dead and killed Hershel by beheading him with Michonne’s Katana. After Dale, Hershel had become the voice of reason when Rick found himself lost on many occasions, and losing him was a huge loss for not just Rick but the whole group.

The prison was destroyed, and all of the groups were scattered until they met in Terminus. From tearing the throat apart of the leader of the Claimers to slaughtering the people of Terminus in a Church, we saw one of the most ruthless versions of Rick ever in The Walking Dead franchise.

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He did suffer numerous challenges in later seasons as well, but these early years of the zombie apocalypse prepared him and shaped him for the dangerous life that the group and Rick, as a leader, had to go through in The Walking Dead.

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