Before You Call It God’s Plan — Remember 1979

History shows the same tactic has been used for decades—from Operation Cyclone in Afghanistan to today’s rhetoric about Iran and biblical prophecy.

by Julie Telgenhoff

A recent report has circulated widely online after a watchdog complaint alleged that U.S. troops were told their potential role in conflict with Iran was “part of God’s divine plan.” According to the account, a commander reportedly referenced passages from the Book of Revelation and described the conflict in apocalyptic terms, telling soldiers that events unfolding in Iran could signal Armageddon and the return of Jesus Christ. The claims were highlighted in a report by The Guardian, citing concerns raised by a non-commissioned officer who said troops were encouraged to see the conflict not simply as geopolitical policy, but as prophecy unfolding.

Whether the allegation ultimately proves accurate or exaggerated, the deeper issue it raises is not new. Throughout history, political leaders and military institutions have often wrapped wars in religious language. When framed as divine destiny rather than policy, war becomes morally simplified. Instead of a strategic decision made by governments, it becomes a sacred duty.

That rhetorical strategy has appeared repeatedly across cultures and religions.

Source: Wikipedia

One of the clearest examples emerged during the Cold War. In 1979, the United States launched Operation Cyclone, a covert CIA program that funded and armed Afghan resistance fighters battling Soviet influence in Afghanistan. The program would run for more than a decade and become one of the largest covert operations in CIA history.

During that period, U.S. officials openly appealed to religious motivation to strengthen the Afghan resistance. National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski famously visited fighters near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border and told them their struggle was righteous, declaring that “God is on your side.” The message framed the war not only as a geopolitical struggle against Soviet communism, but as a sacred fight aligned with divine will.

In other words, the same pattern that now appears controversial in American Christian rhetoric was used decades earlier by U.S. officials appealing to Islamic fighters.

Different religion. Same tactic.

Operation Cyclone itself illustrates the scale of the strategy. What began as modest funding in 1979 grew into hundreds of millions of dollars annually by the late 1980s. Weapons, training, and intelligence flowed to Afghan fighters through Pakistan, many of whom belonged to strongly ideological militant groups favored by regional power brokers. Religion provided a powerful unifying narrative. Fighting the Soviets was framed not only as a political struggle but as a religious obligation.

Looking back, it becomes difficult to argue that those messages were genuine expressions of prophecy or divine revelation. They were tools of persuasion designed to mobilize people to fight.

This historical pattern complicates modern claims that current geopolitical events represent biblical prophecy unfolding in real time. When leaders tell soldiers that war fulfills divine destiny, the message may resonate deeply with believers—but history shows that such language has often served strategic purposes.

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Religion is one of the most powerful motivators available to political authority. It can create cohesion among soldiers, justify sacrifice, and transform ordinary conflict into moral crusade. When violence is framed as sanctioned by God, resistance becomes difficult. Doubt can feel like disobedience not only to government, but to faith itself.

Because of that power, religious rhetoric has long been used to rally armies—from medieval crusades to modern ideological conflicts.

The controversy surrounding the alleged remarks about Iran may therefore be less surprising than it first appears. If the claims are accurate, they would not represent a new phenomenon, but rather the continuation of a familiar strategy: invoking faith to give war a sacred narrative.

History suggests that whenever governments speak the language of prophecy, it is worth asking whether the message comes from heaven—or from the machinery of politics.

What Happens After You Wake Up?

 

by Julie Telgenhoff

There’s something no one really prepares you for when you “wake up.”

The moment you realize you’ve been misled — about a system, a narrative, a belief — it doesn’t feel empowering at first.

It feels destabilizing.

At first, you feel sharper.
Then you feel scared.

Because if what you once trusted isn’t solid… what else isn’t?

Fear turns into urgency.

You want the people you love to see what you now see. Not to argue — but because you don’t want to feel alone in the new frame.

So you share.
You send links.
You bring it up at dinner.
You try to explain.

Not because you want to dominate conversations — but because you want safety in numbers.

But something begins to happen.

People get uncomfortable.
They pull back.
They change the subject.
You feel distance growing.

Now fear shifts into anger.

Anger feels stronger than fear. It feels clearer. It feels powerful. But underneath it is grief.

Grief that you can’t unsee what you’ve seen.
Grief that others don’t want to see it.
Grief that connection now feels strained.

This stage is real. And it’s rarely talked about.

Awakening often mirrors grief:

• Shock
• Urgency
• Anger
• Isolation

If you stay in that stage too long, something else happens.

Your nervous system never powers down.

• You’re constantly scanning
• Constantly analyzing
• Constantly bracing

It feels like awareness — but it’s actually hypervigilance.

You may start to notice:

You don’t sleep deeply.
You feel responsible for informing others.
You struggle to relax in ordinary conversations.
You feel alone even in company.

And at some point, a quieter question emerges:

Is this freedom… or is this another kind of captivity?

Awareness is powerful.

But awareness without regulation becomes exhausting.

You don’t have to deny what you’ve learned.

You don’t have to go back to sleep.

But you can choose the next stage.

The world may still be chaotic.

But your nervous system does not have to live in permanent alarm.

There is a way to hold discernment without living in hypervigilance.

It begins with small shifts.

Less constant reacting to what appears on your screen.
More choosing what truly deserves your attention.
Conversations chosen carefully instead of constantly.
Time in your own body instead of only in your head.

If you’re in that heightened state right now — you’re not crazy.

You’re processing.

Your system is trying to recalibrate after a rupture in trust.

But processing doesn’t have to become permanent activation.

You can step back without going back to sleep.

You can stay aware without staying inflamed.

You can strengthen your body, your routines, your finances, your relationships — quietly — without fighting every narrative that crosses your screen.

There is a way through this that doesn’t require you to abandon your clarity.

It only asks that you anchor it.

Anchor it in your body — through breath, movement, sleep, strength.

Anchor it in your daily life — through routines that build stability instead of urgency.

Anchor it in relationships that allow dialogue instead of division.

Anchor it in tangible progress — learning skills, building savings, improving your health — things that strengthen you regardless of the system around you.

Discernment is powerful.

But discernment paired with regulation is sustainable and powerful.

You don’t have to carry the weight of everything you now see.

You only have to carry yourself well inside it.

If this resonates with you, these may too:

10 Questions to Ask Yourself When Everything Feels Off

The Ancient Breathing Technique That Tells Your Body It’s Safe to Heal

10 Questions to Ask Yourself When Everything Feels Off

 

by Julie Telgenhoff

Have you noticed that nothing catastrophic has happened, yet you feel scattered, unmotivated, slightly anxious, and strangely alone?

Your thoughts don’t line up.
Your ambition feels muted.
You scroll but don’t feel connected.
You’re tired, but not from doing too much.

Before you label yourself lazy, depressed, or behind, pause with me for a second.

Ask yourself these questions.

1. Do I feel tired or unsettled?

Tired means you need rest.
Unsettled means you need grounding.

Those are not the same thing.

2. When I say “I have no motivation,” what am I actually lacking?

Could it actually be that you're lacking clarity, structure, connection or safety?

Motivation is often the last thing to return when those four things are unstable.

3. Am I overwhelmed by my own life or by the constant exposure to everyone else’s?

We were not designed to process global chaos daily. Reality is, your nervous system absorbs more than you consciously realize.

Feeling “off” may be overload, not failure.

4. Do I feel lonely or unseen?

Loneliness is lack of presence.
Feeling unseen is lack of being understood.

Social media gives us contact without connection. That gap creates a quiet ache.

5. When I imagine my future, do I see possibility... or fog?

If it’s fog, that doesn’t mean you lack potential. It may mean you’re living in extended uncertainty. And uncertainty dulls long-range imagination.

6. Am I comparing my internal state to other people’s curated highlights?

Your behind-the-scenes will always look messier than someone else’s edited narrative. 

Comparison distorts baseline reality.

7. Is my body calm right now?

Before you answer emotionally, check physically.

Is your breath shallow?
Are your shoulders lifted?
Is your jaw tight?

A dysregulated body will generate dysregulated thoughts.

8. Do I feel personally unstable or collectively unsettled?

There is a difference.

Many people are carrying ambient anxiety right now because of economic tension, global instability, and information overload. The nervous system does not separate “mine” from “ours” very cleanly.

9. If I turned off external input for 24 hours, what would remain?

No news and instead, just focusing on yourself.
No scrolling and looking at other people's lives different from yours.
No commentary of other's experiences or approval.

Would your internal state improve? Or stay the same?

That tells you where the "off" signal is coming from.

10. What is one stabilizing action I can take today?

This isn't anything complex like reinventing yourself or putting together a five-year plan. Rather, it could be:

• That one phone call you've been putting off.
• A short walk around your neiborhood.
• Taking 5 minutes and clearing off one surface.
• Or... just one slow inhale and exhale repeated five times.

Because stability is built in small, repeatable steps that will eventually create a signal of safety.

So... if everything feels off, it doesn’t automatically mean you are broken. Instead, it may mean:

• You are overstimulated by constant social media scrolling or listening to all the news going on outside your environment.
• You are feeling underconnected because you've been feeling down and therefore, isolating yourself.
• Maybe you are living in temporary uncertainty, not knowing which direction to take next.
• Or constantly comparing yourself to others who you think have it all together, but that's just the image they project to the world.
• And it could be that you're creating tention and anxiety within your body because you're unintentionally holding your breath.

The best remedy for all of this is to not judge yourself and instead, focus on regulating your nervous system by doing deliberate mindfulness moments throughout the day. Clarity, calmness and a better mood will return after the body settles.

And if you’ve been feeling alone in this, just know you’re not.

Many people are quietly asking the same questions. 

If this helped you, consider sharing it with someone you care about. 

Also, if this resonates, you might like: 

* The Ancient Breathing Technique That Tells Your Body It’s Safe to Heal

* Freedom Begins in the Nervous System
* Growth is Not Optional - The Cyclone Comes Either Way

* You Are the Spark - Ignite Your Own Fire 🔥

* The Sound I Return To When My Energy Needs Reset

* The Quiet Path: Why Silencing the Mind Reveals Where Life Is Leading You

*  Caught in the Chaos? Take the Break You Forgot You Needed

Freedom Begins in the Nervous System

 

by Julie Telgenhoff

If you owned the world and needed to control a population vastly larger than yourself, brute force wouldn’t work. You would be outnumbered instantly. Armies are expensive. Rebellion is predictable. Suppression creates resistance.

So you would ask a different question. "What actually works on humans?

History and psychology have already answered that. The same tactics used to control prisoners of war, kidnapped victims, and individuals trapped in coercive relationships rely on a small set of levers: fear, exhaustion, trauma, dependency, and isolation. Over time, the nervous system adapts by complying; by seeking safety within the very structure that created the stress.

This isn’t speculation. It’s documented human behavior.

Fear imprints quickly, and repetition cements it. Chronic stress narrows perception and reduces critical thinking. When the body is in survival mode, gray areas feel threatening, and complex thought feels exhausting. The mind begins searching for authority, for relief, for someone to resolve the tension.

Now scale that model up.

Instead of a prison cell, you use saturation. Instead of a captor, you use familiar authority figures. Instead of physical chains, you use economic pressure, social reward and punishment, and constant cycles of urgency.

Control no longer needs to announce itself. It only needs constant attention.

People often say, “If something like that were happening, someone important would speak out.” But systems of power rarely rely on universal silence. They rely on leverage. The higher someone rises in visibility, the more they are bound by access, reputation, influence, dependency, and fear of loss. You don’t have to silence every voice. You only have to neutralize the ones with real influence.

Meanwhile, ordinary voices can speak freely because they do not disrupt the mechanism of control.

This isn’t about secret meetings in dark rooms. It’s about incentives and consolidation. When narratives narrow, when ownership concentrates, when the same faces repeat across screens, familiarity begins to feel like truth. Authority becomes visual, and repetition becomes persuasion.

And then something subtle happens.

When people live in constant background fear, they stop questioning the system and begin operating within it. They argue about issues inside the structure, but rarely question the structure itself. They focus on the details while the foundation goes unexamined. They assume that if something is constantly shown to them, it must matter. Over time, the system feels permanent. And what feels permanent feels unavoidable.

The delivery system worked.

But here is the part that matters. If trauma can be scaled, then so can awareness. And if fear is the lever, regulation is the counterweight.

Real freedom does not begin in politics. It begins in the nervous system.

A regulated nervous system can tolerate uncertainty. It can sit with discomfort without outsourcing responsibility. It can question without panicking. When the body feels safe, the mind becomes harder to steer, persuade and control.

Notice how your body reacts to fearmongering headlines. Is there contraction? A spike or subtle adrenaline? That reaction is the mechanism. Chronic activation keeps people reactive. Reactive people are easier to direct and control.

The quiet rebellion is not louder outrage. It is steadiness.

Turn off the stream of perpetual urgency. Diversify information sources, not to confirm fear, but to dissolve monopoly. Reclaim your attention. What you repeatedly consume becomes your perceived reality. Strengthen real-world community. If trauma isolates, then regulation reconnects.

Refuse to live in chronic outrage. Outrage feels powerful, but it is metabolically expensive. Systems that thrive on reaction depend on it.

This isn’t about paranoia. It’s about self-governance.

You don’t need to believe in hidden hands to recognize patterns of conditioning. You only need to observe how often fear is offered as the primary tool of persuasion and how quickly the body complies.

If you wanted to control a population larger than yourself, you would not start with weapons. You would start with the nervous system.

And if you wanted to be free, you would start there too.

A steady pulse. A clear mind. Attention that is chosen rather than captured. That is a form of freedom no system can easily manipulate.

So before you scroll, before you argue, before you react, please pause with me.

Close your eyes and through your nose, take two quick inhales followed by a long exhale. 

Repeat 2 more times.

Notice what shifts. Notice what softens. Notice how quickly the body responds when it feels safe. 

This technique is called the physiological sigh, and it works by reversing the accumulation of CO₂ in the lungs and activating the parasympathetic nervous system which is the body’s "rest and digest" system

If even a few cycles of that breath changed your state, imagine what consistent regulation could do over time.

You may also want to read “The Ancient Breathing Technique That Tells Your Body It’s Safe to Heal.” It explores a different breathing pattern, why it works, and how something this simple can recalibrate a nervous system that’s been running on alert for far too long.

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