That is what everyone is thinking... but we still have some time left over here. The hardest part of combat, is defintely not the combat... It is the nothingness in between... and even harder, the nothingness at the end of a deployment. The longer we stick around here, the edge keeps wearing away... leaders have to work twice as hard to keep soldiers in line and I find that I have to keep tabs on myself as well...
I missed a meeting the other day... simple mistake, but just made me realize that it is extremely important to insure that I am straight before I start setting a bad example... It is hard to focus when there is not much to focus on. That is where i need to step it up as a leader- create a focus, create something to keep moving forward too- and at the same time, I must ensure that my soldiers believe in this focus...
The easiest and most often used answer is training. Nothing keeps a soldier more occupied than that. Now, making your soldiers and leaders believe in that training and put forth a decent amount of effort is the hardest part. This is where i realized that I need some more work as a leader and here in Iraq, on a FOB, close to the end of deployment is probably the best place to learn because it is probably one of the toughest situations (soldier mentality wise) to try to put together good training. (maybe I'm wrong, haven't seen the other side yet)
I've been thinking too much...
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