W
hen Army surgeon
Rhonda Cornum
regained conscious-
ness after her heli-
copter crashed, she
looked up to see five Iraqi soldiers
pointing rifles at her. It was 1991,
and her Black Hawk had been shot
down over the Iraqi desert. Dazed
from blood loss, with a busted knee,
two broken arms, and a bullet in her
shoulder, the then-36-year-old medic
was subjected to a mock execution by
her captors, sexually assaulted, and
held prisoner for a week.
Her crisis included textbook causes
for post-traumatic stress: a near-death
experience, sexual assault, utter help-
lessness. And yet, after her release and
medical rehabilitation, she surprised
psychiatrists by focusing on ways she’d
improved. “I became a better doctor,
a better parent, a better commander,
probably a better person,” she says.
Cornum’s experience is far from
unique. The term post-traumatic
growth, coined by psychologists Rich-
ard Tedeschi and Lawrence Calhoun
of the University of North Carolina
at Charlotte, describes the surpris-
ing benefits many survivors discover
in the process of healing from a trau-
matic event. After counseling cancer
survivors, the bereaved, the severely
injured, veterans, and prisoners, the
researchers found growth in five main
areas: personal strength, relationships
with others, perspective on life, ap-
preciation of life, and spirituality.Tedeschi doesn’t believe trauma
is a good thing. But, he says, “in the
wake of trauma, people become more
aware of the fragility in life, and that
unsettles some while it focuses others.
This is the paradox: People become
more vulnerable yet stronger.”
Cornum is convinced that resil-
ience is like a muscle; it strengthens
when exercised and atrophies when
neglected. In 2009, she became the
director of the Comprehensive Sol-
dier Fitness program, a training
regimen that now falls under the um-
brella of the Army’s Ready and Resil-
ient (R2) initiative.
Today, every U.S. Army soldier takes
part in resilience training, which has
been shown to significantly decrease
substance abuse and increase good
coping skills, adaptability, and char-
acter strength. The training is so suc-
cessful that psychologists believe it
can help people from all walks of life.
The program is something of a
dichotomy. The military thrives
on teamwork, yet during resilience
training, soldiers concentrate on self-
awareness. They learn how to focus
on the present moment.
Practicing a rhythmic breathing ex-
ercise, participants inhale deeply and
exhale fully in a slow cadence. Focus-
ing on their breathing helps them
unlock muscle tension. Harvard Uni-
versity neurobiologist Sara Lazar has
shown that “meditation can literally
change your brain.” It can actually
shrink the amygdala, the “fear center”Photograph by Shannon Taggart rd.com 119Reader’s Digest