Letting Go of the Toxic Warrior Spirit

On Veterans Day, I give gratitude to our warriors for going off to far away lands, living in inhospitable conditions, and sacrificing their lives for our safety and freedom. If you cherish your freedom, lifestyle, and credit them for attaining and sustaining that, please do the same today and always.

Many of us either have no relationship with the warrior spirit or an unhealthy one.

In the best case scenario, soldiers are forgotten. When off the military base, they are invisible. We pay their salary and wipe our hands of what they do. It's "out of sight, out of mind." Perhaps this is why the suicide rate for soldiers is through the roof.

In the worst case scenario, we equate "warrior" with "warmonger," which is the shadow side of the warrior spirit. It's the toxic expression of the warrior that kills without restraint, annihilates, and is aggressive instead of assertive. 

When we promote this vision and see our warriors through this lens, we devalue them and the people with whom we disagree. We're all humans. Let's retain our humanity as we fight.

The debt we owe our soldiers cannot be discharged with money. We ask them to go into the deepest pits of Hell for us where they risk their lives, sanity, and souls for us.

They are our brothers, sisters, fathers, and mothers. Let's remember them today and always.