Eric Greitens Calls Everyone to Action in "The Heart and The Fist"

Before former Navy SEAL Eric Greitens was deployed to Afghanistan, Southeast Asia, the Horn of Africa, and Iraq during the War on Terror, he did humanitarian work in Bosnia, Rwanda, and Cambodia. Which basically means that Greitens, author of The Heart and The Fist, is really good at making other people feel like slackers.
 
His book, he told Imus today, is about what he has learned through his service on the front lines in these dangerous locations. “One of the things they teach you in the SEAL team training is not just tactical strength and physical strength, but also the mental and moral strength it takes to be a real warrior,” Greitens said. “You have to be indeed courageous, but you also have to be compassionate to the right people, and you have to, in their words, give everybody exactly what they deserve.”
 
As an example, Greitens recalled an operation in Ramadi, where he and his team blew through a door, behind which they believed there was an Al-Qaeda terrorist. “At the exact same moment we blew through that room and had to engage that terrorist, there was a sleeping Iraqi infant girl on the floor,” Greitens said. “To be a real warrior, you have to be able to both engage and be capable of great violence, but you also have to be able to protect people when they need protection.”
 
Greitens has also learned that not everybody is receptive to the help offered them. “A lot of times it’s built on personal relationships more than it is any relationship between governments,” he said. “It’s just whether or not the guy across the street actually trusts you.”
 
After a suicide truck bomb in Fallujah, Iraq, hit his unit, an incident that left Greitens with minor injuries but seriously wounded many of his friends, Greitens realized another front line he had yet to serve on.
 
During visits with friends and other recovering veterans at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, MD, Greitens learned that what his fellow servicemen and women wanted more than anything was to continue giving back. “I donated my combat pay, two friends put in money from their disability checks, and we used that to start The Mission Continues,” he said.
 
The Mission Continues is a non-profit organization that Greitens said strives to restore in wounded veterans perhaps the most devastating thing a person can lose. “What we’ve found is that the most serious injury is not if they’ve lost their eyesight, or their hearing, or they’ve been burned, but it really comes if they lose their sense of purpose,” he said. “We don’t give charity—we give them a challenge. The challenge is to find a way to continue to serve again, here in our community.”
 
Imus suggested a copy of The Heart and The Fist be distributed to every person coming home from the front lines of Iraq and Afghanistan. “Everybody has their own front line,” Greitens explained. “The front line is the place where your hopes for yourself and the hopes for the people you love come right up against the reality that the world presents to you.”
 
He continued, “In order to triumph on those front lines, it does take the heart and the fist. You have to be both courageous and compassionate.”
 
You also have to have incredible willpower, at least in Imus’s view. “You could have been getting babes or doing cocaine,” he observed of his impressive guest. “Instead of that, you’re out there helping people.”
 
Imagine that.
 
-Julie Kanfer

Comments

[Doug Petepiece]

What a brave and courageous young man.....going on Imus
Refreshing to see this man defending his country in a way tvv shows never show.
And his battle continues helping wounded Vets back home.
On that subject headline writers should hang their heads in SHAME after....Zeta-Jones heads to MENTAL hospital headlines blasted all over yesterday
This doesn't help our Troops that need help but are afraid to share their fears and worries....shame on AOL headline crew

Just hope the people, who help him overseas, end up being safe and have a better future after he leaves.
Still remember seeing Green Beret hero's crying because they promised people in Viet Nam they
would be looked after....but America had to pull out...and these mountain people paid the ultimate
price for supporting the US