The Challenges we Face
Below you will find many challenges we need to know in order to help guide you on your way. The challenging tools to be aware of are: The Primal State, The Fog, The Monkey Mind and Spokes in the Wheel.
The Primal State
In the primal state, the basic five senses are used to navigate through a problem. We depend on this primal state. We see, hear, taste, feel and smell things on this basic level to survive. In the primal state, we are hypervigilant and on alert. We are surrounded by anger like we are surrounded by oxygen. The easiest emotion to have. Always there and readily available. We use anger to keep people distant, to protect ourselves from further injury. We were taught to attack our problems. Sadly, attacking anger is only adding fuel to the fire. These events are now a road block. We cannot move forward nor can we find happiness. We were trained how to fight and survive, but we were never taught how to live after the traumatic event. Tools are available. You can learn how to move forward and live.
The Fog
The Fog occurs when you cannot concentrate or focus on things that you know need attention. The ‘Fog’ is real and comes in many forms. Veterans experience it at different degrees. The main point is you are not alone.
The Monkey Mind
The Monkey Mind is when our minds hop from subject to subject. We feel there is no “off” switch. Monkey Mind consumed my days; I was not happy on any one topic, yet I would hop to everything under the sun. This was one of my biggest challenges, I felt like a passenger on a nonstop flight.
Spokes in the Wheel
When we were kids, we would put baseball cards into the spokes of our bike tires. When we would ride, the cards would make clicking sounds. Fast forward to now. Our mind is the wheel and the events of our past are the cards. Every time our mind starts to spin, the events go clicking by.
