Recalibrated

Weeks after September 11, 2001 Nelson Smith was ordered to prepare for combat and soon found himself in a remote corner of the world few had even heard about months before. He had just finished the Special Forces Qualification course and was a new Green Beret. Nelson was attached to a team tasked with bringing Hamid Karzai safely back to Afghanistan. Intense fighting rose at every turn as the Special Forces team and their Afghan counterparts pushed into Kandahar in 2001. These men were leading the charge in the south, fighting the Taliban all the way to Mullah Omar’s headquarters in Kandahar. Nelson had been in Afghanistan a few weeks and experienced heavy fighting and heavy losses when fresh reinforcements arrived for the final push into Kandahar. The new support guys were unproven in gun battle. Smith, in the lead vehicle of the convoy, drove an old British-style, four cylinder Toyota with the gear shifter on the left, driving wheel on the right. The line of trucks, laden with guns, ammunition, supplies, Afghans and Americans, entered a big mountain pass when all of a sudden the ta-ta-ta of bullets and machine gun fire opened in front of them. The lead passenger in Nelson’s truck was a major, the highest ranking officer in the vehicle and therefore the one responsible for calling the shots. “Sir! What do you want to do now?” Nelson yelled over the zip zip zip of bullets. But there was neither a response, nor any direction given. The commander was curled on the floorboard in the fetal position with his feet flailing in the air, kicking the windshield wipers on and off and the gear shifter into neutral. This well trained officer lost his composure. One of the seasoned Special Forces guys hollered loudly over the booms of RPG and machine gun fire, “keep driving, keep driving!” So Nelson just kept driving towards the gun fire, towards the valley. Keep Calm, Carry on Through twenty years in the service, Nelson grew to be really good at what he did and it became instinctual to drive towards the sound of gunfire. He was trained and bred to be a warrior, to hunt, to survive, to evade and to use deep internal sensors to read situations and people. It takes immense courage to stay calm under fire, to control the impulse to seize up, start yelling, and respond in a frantic way. Throughout his combat tours, Nelson would coach young soldiers through a firefight to help them maintain composure. “Most start yelling frantically and become incoherent on the radio,” Nelson remembers shaking his head, “guys would be screaming over the radio and I would say “Calm down! Stop, get your composure, catch your breath and say it again one time, slowly and clearly, because if I have to ask your to repeat we are wasting time!” It’s easy to watch war movies and think “oh yeah, I’d be brave like that too” but no one ever knows how they will react when the real thing happens, and zip zip zip go the bullets. There is a big difference between training for battle and finding yourself in the middle of a firefight. Even the toughest men can end up yelling, freezing, and even wetting themselves. Before the realities of marriage presented themselves, I sensationalized love, wore rose colored glasses, and assumed I could handle any challenge thrown at the relationship. But when the the bullets of anger and accusation flew I lost my composure and desperately wanted to run away, to throw the towel in and jump ship. Nothing I endured was what I signed up for or expected, in stark contrast to a field of wildflowers, it felt like I was walking through Mordor. Crawling through my days and clinging to anything that could offer hope, I decided to go outside my comfort zone and attend the church’s women’s retreat. As providence would have it, the subject of the conference was Fear Not- Trust in God. I felt like a battered woman going to this conference, grasping for hope and a wind of change. Still feeling new and unknown, I took my seat at a round table towards the middle of the room. The speaker got up, adjusted her glasses and began. “Fear kills joy,” she pronounced definitively. “Ladies, the number one most repeated exhortation in scripture is Do Not Fear! Free-floating fear permeates your heart, your thoughts, your attitudes and your outlook on life, and prevents you from walking in the promises of our God, because His kingdom is righteousness, joy and peace.” My heart stopped, it was like she was talking directly to me. I had so much fear floating around, consuming me, dividing my attention, steeling my joy. During the hardest days, fear, angst, trepidation crept in like a rolling fog: fear of episodes, fear my life wouldn’t change, fear of judgement by others, fear I wouldn’t know what to say or do, fear of not being known or significant. These fears made me feel less valued, unrecognized, overly self-critical, anxious to please, confrontational, explosive toward Nelson, unsure of myself, and full of self-doubt. I had written just days before attending the conference: Lord, there is a raging sea inside of me. I can’t control my fear, hurt and the painful realization of the situation. The raging sea pulls me in. Lord, I need help to walk on the raging sea by not taking my eyes off you, following you. I need help, Lord. I don’t know what to think or how to be. How can I say “when sorrows like sea billows roar— It is well with my soul”? Sitting glued to my seat, I absorbed every word like a dry sponge under a faucet. The speaker continued, “Fear is not from God, therefore must no be allowed to remain. The spirit of fear is directly opposed to the Spirit of God, the Kingdom of God, and must be battled with the weapons of God.