Embrace the Mental Health Warrior Creed of "Bend Not Break": Triumph with Mental Health Flexibility

Ever feel like life’s challenges are too much to handle? I’ve been there. Join me, Bruce Schutter, on the Mental Health Warrior Program podcast, where I share my personal battles with bipolar disorder, alcoholism, anxiety, and PTSD, and how adopting the Mental Health warrior Creed of "Bend, Not Break" turned my life around. This episode is all about equipping you with the mental tools to face life's adversities without giving up your power. Through practical strategies and relatable anecdotes, we discuss the importance of responding thoughtfully instead of reacting impulsively, drawing inspiration from a sports analogy to emphasize flexibility over rigidity.

Discover how simple morning affirmations can set a positive tone for your entire day and learn actionable steps to integrate the "Bend, Not Break" Warrior Creed into your daily routine. Whether you're stuck in traffic or grappling with mental health complexities, this episode provides you with the insights to embrace all emotions and live life fully. Unlock your inner mental health warrior and take the first step towards a resilient and triumphant life. 

Tune in today and start building your Mental Health Warrior strength, so you can triumph over any challenge life throws your way! 

Chapters

• 0:00 Building Mental Health Warrior Foundation
• 6:52 Bend Not Break
• 14:24 Unlock Your Inner Mental Health Warrior

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hi everybody, bruce Shutter here with the Mental Health Warrior Program podcast no Surrender. Now, today, in order to help you build some of this foundation, we're going to do a couple of these episodes, including today's, on some of those foundation elements of being a warrior that will help you in not surrendering. Now, we talked a little bit about it in a previous episode, about the power you get when you don't surrender, but there's also something right alongside that that will help you achieve that, and that is the mental health warrior creed, and the creed is bend not break, and today we're going to talk about how to apply that, how it boosts your power and how that approach is sustainable, which is important because, remember, we are going after lifelong results where we are mental health warriors and we control the direction of our life and triumph over any challenge life throws our way. So, having said all that, let's jump right into this, because this is a big subject and the funny thing is it is centered on just three words. So the Mental Health Warrior Creed, as I mentioned, is bend not break, and this is important because it is a mindset, much like the mindset I'd mentioned in a previous episode about no surrender. It's an approach we're taking. That is basically setting how we're going to live our life Now. We'll go on to later into setting the actual direction for our life and how important that is, but right now we are starting out with how we're going to live each and every day as mental health warriors, and that is the first step in building a solid foundation and the first step in unlocking and building our power as warriors so that we can triumph over any challenge we face. Again, we're not going to surrender, but we're also not going to break. We're going to bend, not break. That's why I wanted to dedicate this episode to the creed and the numerous ways you can use it throughout the day. So one of the first things I like to do is the creed is so important.

Speaker 1: 2:10

I actually like to repeat this to myself as a great tool each and every morning. It sets the tone. Now, you can do this. I do this while I'm brushing my teeth. It is just a little bit of basically an affirmation, if you want, or you could call it a mantra, but we are setting the tone for each and every day Now. I like to do this because, again, mornings can start to get hectic. You got that cell phone beeping. You're probably getting ready to go to work. You got the trip or the drive to it. You got to make sure you have everything you need. Again, we need to have a solid starting place.

Speaker 1: 2:47

So what I do is I just repeat to myself remember, bruce, you are a mental health warrior and today we're going to bend, not break, when challenges come up, because I can guarantee you there will always be challenges. Now, personally and you've heard me talk about this my challenges of bipolar disorder, alcoholism, anxiety disorders, ptsd from my time as an EMT. Now personally and you've heard me talk about this my challenges of bipolar disorder, alcoholism, anxiety disorders, ptsd from my time as an EMT all of those challenges. They're present each and every day. So the creed helps me remember that I'm going to face those challenges throughout the day, but I'm going to bend, not break, meaning not give up, and I will find my ways, using warrior tools and solutions, to go around those problems and triumph over them and solve those problems too. So we're going to say both. All that equals triumph, but it all begins with that important how we're going to approach the day, which, in this case, has been not break.

Speaker 1: 3:42

So once we've established that, we're also preparing ourselves for any life challenges. Now I classify those as they still have emotions attached with them, but they could be your challenges of driving in traffic, which is a pet peeve of mine. I get frustrated quickly, but I'm working on it as a mental health warrior and today I'm much calmer because I remember the creed. We're not going to break, we're just going to bend when we have challenges. And again, that is all important because once we break, we give up power and we do not want to do that, whether it's a life challenge, a mental health challenge or even our mental health disorders. So all the challenges we can face or do face, it's super important personally, because what I have found and I did this before is I relinquished that power each and every day and it took me down a dark path, and that is not something you want to go down, and each day there's less joy in living life and and instead we're just trying to get through the day, and that is not what warriors do. We are going to learn to live life fully, embracing all the emotions out there yes, even the tough ones and, of course, embracing the good ones, to really enjoy what we achieve or what we experience each and every day. So we have that fantastic goal.

Speaker 1: 5:05

The question is, how do we make it happen each day? And that's where I developed the Warrior Creed to remind myself, to remind you guys, it's important that we learn to bend, not break. Now a great analogy I like to always talk about on this, because people say what does that really mean? And we could go into the philosophical we could go into. If you have ever watched an old show, there was a Kung Fu show and the guy would walk through towns and nothing would bother him. He handled every challenge. And it's kind of like they teach in some of the martial arts. People could learn to walk on rice paper without breaking it, which is a huge skill. Now, of course, that doesn't have a lot of practical applications walking on rice paper and I certainly don't think I could do that.

Speaker 1: 5:50

So let's go back to what can we do as mental health warriors. Well, we can learn to bend, not break, and that gives ourselves, it gives us a chance to again respond, not react to life's challenges, one of those mindset rules we have as a warrior weapon which supports this path. And when we don't break, we stay in control, and that really is the key when we're dealing with emotions, because if we start to relinquish control to our emotions and those challenges, we lose on both fronts. We one become vulnerable, forced to just try to get through the day or look for short-term solutions, which will not benefit, as I mentioned, because we are going after a lifelong change. But, most importantly, it did not give me and it won't give you a good position to handle the challenges you're facing now and the next ones that will come up maybe another hour from now, maybe five minutes from now, because life is always filled with challenges.

Speaker 1: 6:52

But we have this secret weapon and it starts with something very straightforward three words that you can repeat and you can remind yourself. You can write them on a scrap of paper or we'll do a little shameless plug at this point. If you're watching the video, I'm going to hold up my Mental Health Warrior Challenge coin and it was so important to me to actually remember to bend not break. I will turn it around. If you have the video, you can see on the back it says bend not break. This coin is a way to carry the program with you. It carries that motivation and support and some warrior wisdom.

Speaker 1: 7:29

Now, I didn't bring this up just to be marketing it. What I wanted to show you was how important it is, as a warrior, that we adopt that approach to living our day and I can tell you personally I have found this to work in any situation that has come up in the last 17 years as I've been a warrior. Now I'm not perfect and I won't sit here and claim that I have handled everything perfectly now because I'm a mental health warrior. But I will tell you I have not relinquished control. I have not gone back to drinking and given up that power to drinking where I don't want to deal with my emotions and given up the power of controlling my day to alcohol. I have also not let my bipolar take over. It may still send me into depression or a little bit into everything's perfect and there's no worries, but I can manage those today so that I don't engage in bad, self-destructive behaviors, just trying to extricate myself from those challenges.

Speaker 1: 8:28

And on my anxiety, it has helped because anxiety really can control you and it controlled every action I did. I was so filled with anxiety. Going to meetings, meeting people, going to big groups, small groups, all those things were filled with anxiety. That's not even to mention what if I took on a new challenge. Well, that was just filled with a huge amount of anxiety coming down the road that I didn't know how to handle, which meant I either bailed out or I probably didn't do as good a job as I could have because I just wanted to escape the situation. That's not how I approach it today.

Speaker 1: 9:03

With the tools I've learned as a warrior, I have learned to bend and work around the anxiety that comes up and to manage it, minimize it and move forward. Where today I am not skipping out on anything in life because of anxiety, now it still pops up again, but with the warrior creed we have a solid path that we bend, not break, anytime that comes up, and that has seen me through my challenges and allowed me, and can allow you, to triumph over them each and every day. Because, again, it is those three words that have simple solution but powerful results, and that's what being a warrior is all about. The whole warrior program is built on things we can use each and every day, build that foundation and build lifelong results. And that is fantastic because, again, as I mentioned in another episode, we're not going to surrender anymore to life's challenges and this path of the Warrior Creed is how we're going to make that happen.

Speaker 1: 10:07

Now, one of the interesting things I just want to share with you is this warrior path that we're taking. It is also actually very powerful and very effective on getting us out of situations, because we're going to try and kind of prevent them from happening with this approach. But, as I mentioned, there will still be challenges that come up. You may get stuck in the worst traffic ever. You may come home and find six bills you forgot about, or they just showed up all on the same day. I mean, these are regular life challenges we all run into. Again, we're already in the middle of the challenges.

Speaker 1: 10:41

What do we do now? Well, just like in the morning I mentioned I repeat it to set my day on the right path. You can repeat it as a way to get out of challenges. You're giving yourself permission to respond, not react one of the mindset rules by saying I'm going to bend not break. Now, I'm combining two things here at this point, but I'm giving you two amazing ones a tool mental health, warrior tool, mindset rule two but I'm pairing it with the mental health warrior creed of bend not break. So we are essentially allowing ourselves time to process the situation, process the emotions, even if it's just a couple seconds, and you will get better answers, you will find the right answers for you and that will lead you on the path of triumph. And I can guarantee you that will work because I have seen personally what has happened.

Speaker 1: 11:37

When I just went around and broke all the time Essentially as an analogy I would break at any challenge. I would give in, rush back to solutions I knew really didn't work and they would just add more problems. So I started this very negative cycle going on and on. Certainly, drinking does not put you in a good position to handle the next day, nor does bailing out of things because of anxiety put you in a good position for the next day. But with this new path and with the warrior creed, we are building a path forward each and every day, based on today of bending, not breaking.

Speaker 1: 12:18

Now, what I will do here is I just want to sum up a great analogy for the power of bend, not break. Now, if you've watched any sporting event so it could be football, it could be soccer, anything with a giant field where the one team gets the ball, where they get the football, the soccer ball, and they're at the far end of their territory. So you have to go the entire length of the field and that player grabs the ball and maneuvers it around all the other players to reach the other end zone and score a goal, even just to reach that end zone, even if they haven't scored the goal. We are probably at that point up with our hands raised saying wow, that was a fantastic performance. And we're saying wow, that was just so amazing to see. And I want to show you that because what you've just seen is somebody who bend, not break. They follow the warrior creed because they didn't just run straight down the field, they didn't get to run over all the other players. A lot of times it's even a smaller player facing the big linemen of a football team or other players that are just larger than them, and they maneuver around those challenges. They bend, not break. And think about how exciting it is to watch that on just a TV show or the sports. Think about how exciting it is to live that each and every day as a warrior, and you can do that. So I'm going to leave it that analogy to show you the power of the mental health warrior creed.

Speaker 1: 13:46

Now there is so much more to being a mental health warrior to build your strength so you can go over and triumph over challenges lifelong. You'll find that information out on our website. Go to BruceShootercom S-C-H-U-T-T-E-R, but you can always type in mental health warrior program, maybe put in Bruce at the end of a Google search. You'll find it and you'll see all the resources we have Get you started today. There's a free book. We've got a newsletter. We've got the Mental Health Warrior Challenge coin to help you each and every day. And then for your foundation to really build your skills.

Speaker 1: 14:24

There are nine books At this point. Each one of those has a unique solution, including the first book, the Triumph book, which gives you the blueprint for becoming a warrior, and part of that blueprint is the four components, of which we just unlocked one of them today, the Mental Health Warrior Creed. So think about all the power you can get once you start to explore all the other components. And it's all on that site. It'll get you going today. You start today. You'll see results today Because, just like listening to this video, you can walk away and start using that creed.

Speaker 1: 15:02

You can just say it to yourself, write it on a scrap of paper. Any way you do it, I will guarantee that is a powerful first step you've just taken, and you and I will be approaching challenges ready to triumph over. So I'm gonna leave you with that. Get excited and start to use the mental health warrior creed in your own life and each and every day as your new way of living. Hope to see you on the site, but I'm going to leave you with this powerful thought the power to change your life is within your grasp when you become a mental health warrior. The only question is are you going to take action today, now? I know you will, so I can't wait to see you there. Bruce, signing out, have a great day.