Bulletproof Spirit

If you are a police officer, firefighter, EMT, ER nurse, or soldier, or you love one . . . This book can save your life Suicide, depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance abuse, and many more emotional and stress-related problems plague the first-responder community. Hundreds of thousands of these brave public servants have unwittingly become victims of the professions they once loved. However, the suffering that results from a professional life of sacrifice and service can be prevented and mitigated. As a law-enforcement veteran, police captain Dan Willis has witnessed the damage of emotional trauma and has made it his personal mission to safeguard and enhance the wellness and wholeness of police officers, firefighters, EMTs, emergency-room personnel, and soldiers. Bulletproof Spirit offers field-tested expertise designed to be used by all first responders — and their families — to heal themselves and continue serving with compassion and strength.

When life deals you a particularly difficult blow or a staggering loss, how do you handle it? If you’re like most, you might think Why me?, struggle to find your way, or lash out at those around you. But there are a select few who seem emotionally hardier, who are able to face life’s physical, emotional, and financial hits undeterred and perhaps even forge ahead, empowered in the face of adversity. These people aren’t more deserving or luckier than the rest of us; they simply think differently–they are connected with their steady inner self and find strength where others might see meaninglessness; they make life-affirming choices instead of defeatist ones. In short, they are spiritually bulletproof. They face as many of life’s slings and arrows as the rest of us, but they don’t succumb to hardship or misfortune. And you can be one of them. In The Secrets of the Bulletproof Spirit, renowned peace activist Azim Khamisa and inspirational speaker Jillian Quinn reveal the thirty essential keys to emotional and spiritual resiliency. Based upon their own experiences with heart-wrenching loss, the strategies they present may seem simple, but their advice can open up a whole new way of thinking. Khamisa and Quinn will help you discover • that your thoughts help to create your reality, and that you can use them to take control of your life • the potentially damaging mental routines you’re running on autopilot • the vital connections between your upbringing and your “resiliency quotient” • spiritually affirming thoughts that may help you make more spiritually empowering choices “What lies within you really is more powerful than any hit you may take physically, emotionally, or materially,” the authors write. With their help, readers will find themselves more confident and secure in a volatile and uncertain world. When you learn to identify most strongly with that invincible core–your bulletproof spirit–you tap into the truest source of security available to you. And while there’s no foolproof way to stay out of the proverbial line of fire, the information, inspiration, and tools in this book will provide you with an emotional bulletproof vest, a way to take hits and come out on top. From the Hardcover edition.

Suicide, depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance abuse, and many more emotional and stress-related problems plague the first-responder community. Hundreds of thousands of these brave public servants have unwittingly become victims of the professions they once loved. However, the suffering that results from a professional life of sacrifice and service can be prevented and mitigated. As a thirty-year law-enforcement veteran, retired police captain, and police academy instructor, Dan Willis has witnessed the damage of emotional trauma and has made it his personal mission to safeguard and enhance the wellness and wholeness of police officers, firefighters, EMTs, emergency-room personnel, and soldiers. Bulletproof Spirit offers field-tested expertise designed to be used by all first responders — and their families — to heal themselves and continue serving with compassion and strength.

Suicide, depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance abuse, and many more emotional and stress-related problems plague the first-responder community. Hundreds of thousands of these brave public servants have unwittingly become victims of the professions they once loved. However, the suffering that results from a professional life of sacrifice and service can be prevented and mitigated. As a thirty-year law-enforcement veteran, retired police captain, and police academy instructor, Dan Willis has witnessed the damage of emotional trauma and has made it his personal mission to safeguard and enhance the wellness and wholeness of police officers, firefighters, EMTs, emergency-room personnel, and soldiers. Bulletproof Spirit offers field-tested expertise designed to be used by all first responders — and their families — to heal themselves and continue serving with compassion and strength.

If you are a police officer, firefighter, EMT, ER nurse, or soldier, or you love one . . . This book can save your life Suicide, depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance abuse, and many more emotional and stress-related problems plague the first-responder community. Hundreds of thousands of these brave public servants have unwittingly become victims of the professions they once loved. However, the suffering that results from a professional life of sacrifice and service can be prevented and mitigated. As a law-enforcement veteran, police captain Dan Willis has witnessed the damage of emotional trauma and has made it his personal mission to safeguard and enhance the wellness and wholeness of police officers, firefighters, EMTs, emergency-room personnel, and soldiers. Bulletproof Spirit offers field-tested expertise designed to be used by all first responders — and their families — to heal themselves and continue serving with compassion and strength.

The author of the gold-standard essential reading for many law-enforcement agencies and for first responders of every kind now speaks specifically to new recruits called to “protect and serve” in ever more challenging times If you’re a peace officer (whether in policing, corrections, probation, border patrol, or another public safety field) this book could save your life. Inspired by the author’s award-winning wellness text Bulletproof Spirit (required reading at the FBI National Academy), Police Resilience is a comprehensive and effective guide to protecting yourself and healing from trauma. Written specifically for training academies, students, and new peace officers, it provides evidence-based, field-tested resilience and wellness strategies as well as firsthand accounts from experienced officers. Includes QR codes to access informative videos featuring veteran officers’ solutions to the real-world challenges of policing

This thoughtful, practical guide shows readers a way through the minefield of condemnation and persecution faced by gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender Christians and helps foster a faith that is bulletproof—impervious to attacks, yet loving and savvy in its approach. Bulletproof Faith is filled with useful insights and proven spiritual practices that deflect attacks and enhance and strengthen faith by turning attacks into opportunities for spiritual growth. Praise for Bulletproof Faith "Gay and lesbian Christians are constantly demoralized and told they are not children of God. In Bulletproof Faith, Chellew-Hodge reassures gays and lesbians that God loves them just as they were created and teaches them how to stand strong, with compassion and gentleness, against those who condemn them." —Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu "It is an amazing truth that gay and lesbian Christians need to develop a bulletproof faith in order to survive the attack of other Christians. That, however, is the experience of many homosexual persons. Candace Chellew-Hodge has in this book committed herself to the task of making that survival a reality. I salute her and her work." —John Shelby Spong, author, Jesus for the Non-Religious "We know the Religious Right is wrong about same-sex relationships and it's time to move on. But how to withstand their relentless attacks and find lasting peace of soul? Candace Chellew-Hodge offers a practical guide. It met me right where I am. It will touch and help heal many others, too." —Daniel A. Helminiak, professor of psychology, University of West Georgia, and author, What the Bible Really Says About Homosexuality

How the rise of the West was a temporary exception to the predominant world order What accounts for the rise of the state, the creation of the first global system, and the dominance of the West? The conventional answer asserts that superior technology, tactics, and institutions forged by Darwinian military competition gave Europeans a decisive advantage in war over other civilizations from 1500 onward. In contrast, Empires of the Weak argues that Europeans actually had no general military superiority in the early modern era. J. C. Sharman shows instead that European expansion from the late fifteenth to the late eighteenth centuries is better explained by deference to strong Asian and African polities, disease in the Americas, and maritime supremacy earned by default because local land-oriented polities were largely indifferent to war and trade at sea. Europeans were overawed by the mighty Eastern empires of the day, which pioneered key military innovations and were the greatest early modern conquerors. Against the view that the Europeans won for all time, Sharman contends that the imperialism of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was a relatively transient and anomalous development in world politics that concluded with Western losses in various insurgencies. If the twenty-first century is to be dominated by non-Western powers like China, this represents a return to the norm for the modern era. Bringing a revisionist perspective to the idea that Europe ruled the world due to military dominance, Empires of the Weak demonstrates that the rise of the West was an exception in the prevailing world order.