Honored to have been asked to contribute to Military Officer (Nov 2025) on the importance of stigma‑free mental health support for U.S. service members and their families.

Resilience, mindfulness, and open communication are not signs of weakness — they are acts of strength and commitment to duty and loved ones.

Read the full article here: https://lnkd.in/ghuVRwSZ

Military Officer, Nov 2025

Mental Health Strategies

Lt. Col. (Dr.) Ivan Edwards

The article is part of the “Family Matters / Work‑Life” section and focuses on mental health strategies for military officers. It emphasizes that while officers are trained for endurance, crisis management, and high‑stakes decision‑making, they also face a hidden battle: maintaining mental resilience and work‑life balance outside of duty.

Key Points

• Constant pressure: Military officers operate under intense physical, mental, and emotional demands.
• Impact on families: Stress can spill into...

This piece is a soul-anchoring affirmation for those navigating grief, trauma, or emotional fatigue. It opens with a distilled truth—“Pain refines, but grace restores”—setting the tone for a journey through hardship toward healing.

Themes:

• Resilience: The poem honors the strength found in rising after being weighed down by the past.
• Healing: It reframes pain not as a destroyer, but as a sculptor of wisdom and grace.
• Hope: Each stanza builds toward a crescendo of empowerment, reminding the...

You Are What You Eat: The ABCs of Total Health

By Dr. Ivan Edwards

This article explores how simple, everyday nutrition choices can strengthen the heart, reduce inflammation, and...

I’m honored to share that Resonance of the Soul: Flowers and Harmonics received a deeply reflective review on Muwado, one of Africa’s leading storytelling platforms.

The reviewer...

The Uganda Poetry Society has announced the establishment of a new literary distinction — The Dr. Ivan Edwards Poetry Award.

This honor, named after Dr. Ivan Edwards, a...

You’ve already won because you understand what matters.

It is more than meets the eye.

It is in you because of Him.

You’ve lived long enough, lost enough, and achieved enough to see the truth: the real victory is becoming the kind of person who can look back without regret.

That’s rare. That’s precious. That’s earned.

Inspired by a random act of kindness from a stranger.

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The world is vast…

mountains that scrape the sky,

oceans that hum their ancient hymns…

yet somehow small enough

for a stranger’s smile

to feel like home.

Travel, and the world opens.

See it.

Hear it.

Let the wind of another land

whisper its stories into your bones.

We are one…

beyond color, beyond race,

beyond the borders we drew

before we knew better.

A mother is a mother

in every language.

A father is a father

wherever the sun rises.

...

A recent global review of my poem “Even the Jacaranda Know” revealed layers I never expected — a humbling reminder of how readers give a poem new life.

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A poem, Even the Jacaranda Know, from my book Resonance of the Soul: Flowers and Harmonics, was recently reviewed on a renowned global African literary platform. The reviewer described it as a sweeping human portrait that “speaks in many voices but breathes through one tree.”

You can read the full review here:

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