A Warrior's Reflection

A Warrior’s Reflection

[Editor's Note: I posted a number of articles from 2004 - 2007 warning people who are considering joining the military to think twice because the U.S. military in the 21st century is no longer the U.S. military of the World War II era. The U.S. military is no longer functioning as the "good guys" on the world's geopolitical stage. Far from it. The U.S. military is controlled by a satanic hierarchy who are waging war on innocent people in the Middle East and Africa for corporate sponsors who profit from war, and for the Greater Israel expansionist strategy being waged in the Middle East (Syria is the current victim on the chopping block). Killing people, especially innocent people, is going to severely damage your soul and your psyche for the remainder of your life (and for a time in the afterlife). Even those who fought in the "justified" battles of World War II, whether in Europe or the Pacific, were plagued with nightmares and flashbacks for the rest of their lives. Today, there is no excuse for joining the U.S. military. The evidence is abundant, plain, and obvious - who and what the U.S. military has become. Those who go down that road will continue to pay the heavy price that veterans of the Middle East are facing today. Do yourself and your loved ones a favor: Don't join and avoid becoming another suicide statistic - that the Illuminated/corporate U.S. government, its satanic military leadership, and the badly mismanaged Veterans administration couldn't care less about.]

By Michael Harshbarger

http://educate-yourself.org/cn/reflaction08dec14.shtml#top

|December 8, 2014

A Warrior’s Reflection from Michael Harshbarger (Dec. 19, 2014)

When I took the job working with veterans, my intuition told me it would not be easy. There’s been too much pain and suffering for young Americans. Last week it hit home. One of my co-workers, another vet, handed me an article that he wanted to share with me. It was about an Army captain, Peter Linnerooth. He was a psychologist who did his very best to treat PTSD during the worst year of the Iraq war, experiencing a great deal of the horror first hand. He was also critical of the Army’s neglect in treating the trauma related to the horrors of war, sharing a Chaplain’s belief that “the army is criminally negligent in its mental-health care of soldiers.”

When Linnerooth had enough, he went home and attempted to help as many as he could, yet spiralled into deeper and deeper PTSD himself. In an article in TIME he said:

http://nation.time.com/2013/01/11/dr-peter-j-n-linnerooth-1970-2013/

“The Army is focused on the short term- ‘I need a warm body manning a gun in a Humvee,’” adding: “That’s great – until that warm body is crazy and eats his gun.”

“In the early morning hours of the second day of the new year, alone in his apartment, that’s just what Linnerooth did; after mixing Jack Daniels with Diet Coke with a telephone argument with his wife.”

He left behind a four month old daughter. This hit me hard. I’m thinking: ‘how can you be so irresponsible to kill yourself and leave your children behind?’ And yet a part of me, the vet, knows that there comes a time when you just know that you can’t go another inch.

Another vet wrote the following: “Sometimes I feel pathetic. My hands shake when under pressure, and I wonder if everyone sees it.” You wonder why an old man trying to cross the street before the walk sign expires (or he does, whichever come first) looks so very vulnerable, so very fragile; and then it starts to happen to you, the sense that your’re not what you used to be

I wonder sometimes if I have PTSD. If I do, I have had it since I was twelve if not longer. It is not caused by my military experience, though that exacerbated it. The shaking, the anxiety, the default desire to end this experience when pressured or in pain. I never dwell on it, but it is always there like an invisible friend.

And no one really understands. Maybe another vet, but they are usually lost in their own swirling mist of existence. What would I say? ‘I feel pathetic.’ No one has time for that. We have to get on with our material lives, after all, the I-phone 787A Plus surely is coming out today, or at the latest the New Year. I’ve got to get in line at Walmart.

Here is their Warrior’s Reflection:

“He said I would be changed in my body.
I would move through the physical world in a different manner.
I would hold myself in a different posture.
I would have pain where there was no blood.
I would react to sights, sounds, movement and touch in a crazy way, as though I were back in war.
He said I would be wounded in my thoughts.
I would forget how to trust, and I would think that others were trying to hurt me. I would see dangers in the kindness, and concern of my relatives and others.
Most of all, I would not be able to think in a reasonable manner, and it would seem that everyone else was crazy
He told me that it would appear to me that I was alone even in the midst of the people, and that there was no one else like me.
He warned me that it would be as though my emotions were locked up, and I would be cold in my heart and not remember the ways of caring for others.
While I might give meat and blankets to the elders, or food to the children, I would not be able to feel the goodness of these actions. That I would do these things out of habit, and not from caring. He predicted that I might do harm to others without plan or intention.
He knew that my spirit would be wounded.
He said I would be lonely and that I would find no comfort in family, friends, elders, or spirits. I would be cut off from both beauty and pain. My dreams would be dark and frightening. My days would be filled with searching and not finding. I would not be able to find conections between myself and the rest of creation. I would look forward to an early death.
And I would need cleansing in all these things.”

So let the cleansing begin. The Mindfulness group lives, next at 3pm Thursday at the Lindholm Center on Highway 99.

[ St. Vincent de Paul Programs Directory
www.freshgrok.com/satarah/SVdP/programs-directory.php5
Directions: Eugene Service Station – Go There; Richard W. Lindholm Center; 450 Highway 99 North; Eugene OR 97402; Phone: 541-461-8688; Fax: 541-607-5477 ]

Michael Harshbarger

Related

Dr. Peter J. N. Linnerooth, 1970–2013

http://nation.time.com/2013/01/11/dr-peter-j-n-linnerooth-1970-2013/

The closing of one door….by Michael Harshbarger (September 24, 2014)

http://www.cycling-mindfulness.com/#!The-closing-of-one-door%E2%80%A6/clfr/1

Michael Harshbarger’s blog

http://www.cycling-mindfulness.com/#!blog/c9hn

About Michael

http://www.cycling-mindfulness.com/#!about2/c1975

Discovering Your Core Values

http://www.cycling-mindfulness.com/#!testimonials/c1viv

Mindfulness, Core Values, Groups, and Tools

http://www.cycling-mindfulness.com/#!repairs/cuy0

Ken Adachi note: Mike sent me this article without identifying himself by name. I wrote back and asked him to tell me who wrote the article and whether he had been in the military himself. Here’s his reply:

On 12/17/2014, Michael Harshbarger wrote:

My name is Mike Harshbarger. I have talked with you twice in the past, once about Don Croft, and the second time about Agenda 21, which is prevalent in Eugene where we live. This article was posted on my website Cycling-Mindfulness.com on My blog. I wrote most of it, except the first part in quotes, which comes from an article (copied) that was given to me by another vet (apparently appearing in Battleland (Time.com) by Mark Thompson, and the Nez Perce warriors reflection which I found on the internet, not sure where, and only God knows who wrote it.

Yes, I am a Viet Nam vet, 1st Air Cav 1967-68. I am working with a Veterans in Progress Program in Eugene, with 25 years in mental health, and a strong background in Mindfulness based therapy (not a therapist). I have done a Mindfulness group for over four years, and have seen amazing healing in a few people. One of the tools that I use is what is called an Inner Wisdom Journey, taught to me by a therapist here named Dean Schlecht. It is designed to put one in contact with their Inner Self Helper, or Observer Self. You can find information on much of this on the website. I also have a Facebook (Cycling-Mindfulness) page to promote the website. I am not a fan of Facebook, but use it, I hope, for a purpose. One of the things, probably the primary thing I was taught by Dean was: “I want my truth, and accept it’s cost.” I have read and trusted your site for close to twenty years. I hope that my site, in a different way, speaks my truth. Here is a link: harshbarger9990.wix.com/cycling-mindfulness.

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