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 4 May 2008 @ 02:25, by jerryvest. Medicine, Healthcare
Because breathing charts the life rhythms, the way we breathe signals the disposition of our energies. Agitation or excitement causes the breath to be uneven and rapid; but when we are calm and balanced, our breathing is even, slow, and soft. We can also change our mental and physical states by the way we breathe. Even when very upset, we can calm and balance ourselves by breathing slowly and evenly.
When you are aware of your breath, your whole life becomes balanced. Even when you find yourself in situations which arouse great anger, frustration, or pain, you can dissolve the disturbance by just being aware of your breathing, slightly paying attention and making the breath calm, slow, and rhythmical.” Tarthang Tulku, Kum Nye Relaxation, pp. 40-41
Warrior R & R Center - A Prototype for Soldiers-
This announcement is very good for our soldiers who are suffering and great opportunities for them to receive care and treatment. I am very proud to be part of this health care work with our Wounded Warriors. We are currently engaged in research to validate what we do with soldiers every day. Our Warrior Restoration & Resilience Center is one of a kind as Gates describes and we are all hopeful that our prototype becomes available to every soldier returning from war throughout the world. I have posted a couple of logs describing some of my experiences with the soldiers. [link]
Jerry Vest, ACSW/LISW
US Army Social Worker & Professor Emeritus
Warrior Restoration & Resilience Center
Wm. Beaumont Army Medical Center, Ft. Bliss
[link]
[link]
************************************************************************
Gates Works to Reduce Mental Health Stigma
by Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service
FORT BLISS, Texas, May 1, 2008 – Seeking mental-health care due to post-traumatic stress will no longer be seen as an obstacle to getting a government security clearance, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates announced here today. Video
Gates announced the new policy after touring the Restoration and Resilience Center that opened in July to treat combat veterans diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. The center, part of Fort Bliss’ Beaumont Army Medical Center, uses treatments ranging from group and individual therapy to yoga, acupuncture, massage, chiropractic and hot-stone therapy.
Its goal, officials at the experimental facility explained, is to help troops recover so they can stay in the Army.
Gates told reporters he had an “extraordinary experience” visiting the new center and seeing work under way to help soldiers deal with combat stress.
“They are doing some amazing things here in terms of helping soldiers who want to remain soldiers but who have been wounded with post-traumatic stress disorder,” he said. “It is a multi-month effort by a lot of caring people, and they are showing some real success in restoring these soldiers.”
Gates said he’ll take the idea of possibly replicating Fort Bliss’ prototype program to other posts.
He also noted other techniques being developed in the combat theater to give troops additional tools to deal with the circumstances they face. “These are clearly worth additional attention as well,” he told reporters.
Gates called additional resources and capabilities to treat troops dealing with PTSD just one aspect of a two-part effort.
“The second, and in some ways equally challenging, is to remove the stigma that is associated with PTSD and to encourage soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen who encounter these problems to seek help,” he said.
But he acknowledged that not every soldier returning from Iraq and Afghanistan is getting the treatment they need. He cited an Army inspector general report’s findings that troops often forgo mental-health care because they’re concerned it could prevent them from getting a security clearance and potentially could damage their careers.
Gates cited “Question 21” on Standard Form 86, the government security-clearance form that specifically asks applicants whether they have ever received treatment for mental-health issues.
The question asks if the person has consulted with a mental-health professional or other health-care provider during the past seven years about a mental-health related condition.
Respondents who answer “yes” must provide dates of treatment and the provider’s name and address.
“For far too long and for far too many, this question has been an obstacle to care,” the secretary said.
The Defense Department has been working with other agencies for eight months to strike a balance that enables troops to get the treatment they need and the intelligence community to get the information it needs, he said.
“It took longer than I would have hoped, but it is done,” Gates said. “Now it is clear to people who answer that question that they can answer ‘no’ if they have sought help to deal with their combat stress in general times.”
New language for “Question 21” asks if the person consulted with a health-care professional during the past seven years regarding an emotional or mental health condition. It specifies, however, that the answer should be “no” if the care was “strictly related to adjustments from service in a military combat environment.”
Gates directed in a policy letter dated April 18 that the revised language be used by anyone completing the SF 86 form.
A letter being distributed throughout the military explains the new policy and its rationale.
“Seeking professional care for these mental health issues should not be perceived to jeopardize an individual’s security clearance,” states the memo, co-signed by Undersecretary for Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. and Undersecretary for Personnel and Readiness David S.C. Chu.
“On the contrary,” they wrote, “failure to seek care actually increases the likelihood that psychological stress could escalate to a more serious mental condition, which could preclude an individual from performing sensitive duties.”
The letter urges men and women in uniform who are exhibiting symptoms of PTSD to seek help and makes clear that this is not going to put their security clearances or their careers in jeopardy, he said.
“The most important thing for us now is to get the word out as far as we can to every man and woman in uniform to let them know about the change, to let them know the efforts under way, to remove the stigma and to encourage them to seek help when they are in the theater or when they return from the theater,” Gates said. “So this is a very important issue for us.
“We have no higher priority in the Department of Defense, apart from the war itself, than taking care of our men and women in uniform who have been wounded -- who have both visible and unseen wounds,” he said.
Gates called the new Restoration and Resilience Center an example of new approaches the military is taking to provide that care. “This center here is illustrative of what can be done,” he said.
Thirty-six volunteers participating in the program, all diagnosed with PTSD after serving in Iraq or Afghanistan, receive care that combines group and individual therapy sessions with meditation, yoga, acupuncture, massage therapy, chiropractic and hot-stone therapy treatments.
“They are all volunteers,” Gates said. “They all come here because they want to.”
Biographies:
Robert M. Gates
Related Articles:
DoD Changes Security Clearance Question on Mental Health
More >
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4 May 2008 @ 01:08, by anandavala. Systems Thinking
Excerpts from brainstorming notes related to
SMNDesignView
For more information on SMN see SMN
on Anandavala.
I am exploring the idea of developing a Netbeans 6.0 module,
either as a plugin or as a rich-client application.
Things to consider:
I need a good vision of what I am building before I start
designing it.
What is it that the SMN functionality seeks to provide the
application user? What will people want the whole application or
plugin to do?
What sorts of things will people want to be able to do with the
GUI and with the model and with the simulation space itself via the
GUI? How best can the GUI facilitate this?
If developed as a plugin then how will the SMN functionality be
integrated into the rest of Netbeans?
If developed as a rich-client application then how will it come
together as a single whole application?
How best to implement the matrix itself? As some kind of table? It
needs to be programmatically controlled and not set in the code –
we may want more or less rows or columns, we may want different types
of elements altogether (e.g. instead of text fields they are buttons
perhaps).
The matrix-view is a small window that allows for detailed access,
but for large models we need a lower resolution but broader scope
view, we could have subsystem / supersystem viewing levels for the
matrix. One could view systems at the atomic scale, or as a single
whole system, or at many different levels between these. The designer
can click on systems (either by row, column, vector element or rowOp)
and choose to collapse all sibling subsystem and show only their
supersystem. Or they can drill into a supersystem and show all or
selected subsystems.
The state vector needs to be represented somehow in the
matrix-view so that the system designer can visualise the current
state of the model. The multiple system viewing levels apply to the
state vector as well.
Whether an SM or an SV element, at each level there is some screen
graphic to represent it to the designer. If the element is an atomic
system it shows a text field to display and edit the data. If it is a
conceptual system then there is an icon that displays the subsystems
as small squares within the element.
When the designer double-clicks on an element they drill into the
system and reveal all subsystems. There is also a right-click option
on elements that brings up a dialogue box for selecting which
subsystems to show. More >
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 2 May 2008 @ 10:10, by maxtobin. Extraterrestrials
Blessed Be the Mother Ship; (this one for Vaxen!! Keep lighting fires brother.)
I find the changes are now well in focus and it is impossible to deny the Divine impulsing through the One and the Many.
Truly exciting times as we consciously awaken (feel the paradox and allow the humor to shake you free) to the ever present holographic ONE ~ NESS.
This information came my way, my favorite oracle sensed my need to have an external confirmation of the inner knowing which is growing.
I find the messages that Tom brings through are always worthy of deep reflection. Take this one if you will and discern with your own heart the validity and immediacy of the communication. Here is the original article in full
The bulk of the message is below for your nourishment and to support the ongoing wake up calls. Can you hear the screaming yet or does the screen get in the way? More >
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1 May 2008 @ 23:57, by erlefrayne. Economics, Financing, Banking
[Writ 28 April 2008, Quezon City, MetroManila]
We’re having a production-related problem with rice today in the Philippines today, which looks more like an echo problem of a larger global phenomenon of food crisis. Riots have already been experienced in at least 33 countries, and we may expect the frequency to rise in the months ahead.
To single out production factors, and especially to pinpoint flawed land-use patterns as the cause of the crisis, tends to blur the real cause behind much of our peace and development problems in the world today. This crisis is one of the anarchic results of orchestrations done by financial speculators over a stretch of three (3) decades, followed through recently by food cartels’ machinations to heighten up their looting of the public’s resources via the food market.
Let us recall that as early as the 1980s, the move towards liberalizing the food markets and integrate this sector into the evolving ‘virtual economy’—by unleashing speculative practices on agricultural products via instrument of ‘commodities markets’—already crept into our national boundaries. Gradually did the pattern get integrated into a global mesh of transactions involving not only food but a long list of articles of trade and services being transacted via the secondary markets or hedge funds. More >
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 1 May 2008 @ 23:43, by solomoreno. Spirituality
The plot of these dreams was that there was two elements that could not be one. It was inside the reality of these dreams that impossibility, a seemingly wholly intellectual notion, became a feeling... More >
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 1 May 2008 @ 15:34, by joanaroma. Relationships
More >
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1 May 2008 @ 09:54, by isid. Spirituality
Réflexions autour des expériences extatiques.
Normalement nos travaux en et de méditation nous conduisent à ces expériences.
Mais il faut être conscient que nous ne pouvons pas échanger avec nos contemporains sur ce sujet.
Il faut être conscient que ce que nous appelons « expérience extatique » sont des expériences d’un état de conscience différent... More >
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 30 Apr 2008 @ 09:54, by jazzolog. Music
Knowledge comes but wisdom lingers.
---Alfred, Lord Tennyson
What is beyond, is that which is also here.
---Ancient Indian aphorism
The Emperor's chief carpenter, Ch'ing, once made a music stand so perfect that all who saw it marveled. When Lu asked him to reveal the mystery of his art, Ch'ing demurred, saying: "No mystery, your Highness, though there is something. When I am about to make such a stand, I first reduce my mind to absolute quiet. Three days in this condition and I am oblivious to any reward to be gained. Five days, and I am oblivious to any fame to be acquired. Seven days, and I become unconscious of my four limbs and body. Then, with no thought of the Court in mind, all my skill concentrated and all disturbing elements gone, I go into the forest to search for a suitable tree. It contains the stand in my mind's eye, and then I set to work."
---Chuang-Tzu
If you've ever been in a choir, particularly the church variety, you may appreciate Dave Walker's cartoon, from the UK's Church Times. [link]
On Saturday, in San Rafael, California, there will be a national competition you may not be aware of. It's the 24th Annual Harmony Sweepstakes A Cappella Festival. Actually this is the final contest, as there already have been 8 elimination contests held in cities all over the country. Now the winning groups there are being flown to Marin Veterans' Auditorium for this big deal over the weekend. It's interesting there are hundreds of these groups involved, and probably not too many are of the barbershop variety anymore. As you can see from these photos and group descriptions, the music is all over the place [link] , but you can be sure of one thing: most of these participants have heard of Phil Mattson and The Foothill Fanfairs.
A couple years ago I stumbled into the best argument I know for writing personal stuff on the Internet. I merely related the coincidental sighting of a name of a musician on a CD set a friend generously gave me, with an LP I had bought years earlier. The name Michele Weir connected me to somebody name Phil Mattson, then I began to find out things about him, and finally I thought somebody somewhere might be interested in this so I wrote about it. [link] What followed here, elsewhere I post, and in emails has been a continuous flow of messages from people who studied and performed with this great teacher. Most recently I heard from someone named Roy Turpin, who happens to be a therapist now out in California (isn't everybody?) and he has provided me a rare opportunity.
A month ago Gene Puerling died. His passing went largely unnoticed in the media, but those of us who love acapella singing know he formed The Hi-Lo's in the early 1950s, and then Singers Unlimited a decade later, and we mourned appropriately. Phil Mattson appreciated the Puerling genius, which was a style and technique completely original, and had the brilliance himself to begin teaching it to young people. Well, I suppose some folks must have thought he was crazy to attempt it...because certainly those of us who also loved Puerling thought such singing clearly was impossible---even where there it was on records. It really was impossible, because Gene began to experiment with multi-tracking and eventually had 4 singers sound like 8, then 12, or a whole choir. Phil's challenge may have been tougher, because he used real people...and they were kids. More >
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30 Apr 2008 @ 07:44, by democritus. Economics, Financing, Banking
The idea is audacious, laughable, even blasphemous in today’s globalized, branded and capitalized culture; in a strange sense, however, we are in a moneyless society today. More >
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28 Apr 2008 @ 10:33, by vector8. Spirituality
"Mother," I asked, "why don't you teach others the method of living without food?"
My ambitious hopes for the world's starving millions were nipped in the bud.
"No." She shook her head. "I was strictly commanded by my guru not to divulge the secret. It is not his wish to tamper with God's drama of creation. The farmers would not thank me if I taught many people to live without eating! The luscious fruits would lie uselessly on the ground. It appears that misery, starvation, and disease are whips of our karma which ultimately drive us to seek the true meaning of life."
"Mother," I said slowly, "what is the use of your having been singled out to live without eating?"
"To prove that man is Spirit." Her face lit with wisdom. "To demonstrate that by divine advancement he can gradually learn to live by the Eternal Light and not by food." --- Autobiography of a Yogi
*******************************************
So my mother noticed that one of her many clocks had stopped working. Presumably, the battery had run out. She said she was going to check if she had any spares. The next morning I noticed she hadn't changed the batteries so I figured, why not charge the batteries?
I channelled energy to the batteries and the clock started ticking away. I then corrected the clock. When I showed mum her clock was working she asked me what I'd done.
"I charged the batteries," I said.
Mum gave me that "my daughter is mad" stare that' I've become accustomed to. At least the clock is now working. More >
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