Slaying the Three-Headed Dragon – Part 2 of Armored Knight Psychological Strength Building

“Psychological strength is the measure of our ability to manage situations through the power of our mental preparation. It involves cognitive, behavioral, emotional, and spiritual aspects, all acting in concert to address the challenges we face. These elements all rest on a bedrock of purpose, our fundamental reason for living.”

—Tony Kern, The Armored Knight, 2022 (forthcoming)

What this "Knight" stuff all about?”

Dr. Kern chose to use the metaphor of the Armored Knight because it helps explain the key relationships between the person inside (the Knight) and the various elements of protection he or she must become comfortable wearing (the Armor) to stay safe and effective on the field of battle (our increasingly crazy everyday world). Becoming an Armored Knight is the first of a three-part, robust, science-based “mental strength for all” lifestyle program developed over the past five years to help anyone—and everyone—build and continuously grow their psychological strength. The overall program is called Armored Knight: Psychological Strength Building, and it currently has three components, all offered as separate courses but meant to be taken sequentially:

1. Becoming an Armored Knight – Preventative and restorative psychological strength building across five specific areas: Purpose, Cognitive Strength, Behavioral Strength, Emotional Strength, and Spiritual Strength.
2. Slaying the Three-Headed Dragon – Identifies and confronts the threat of psychological disengagement caused by apathy, frustration, and cynicism - the Three-Headed Dragon who stalks the unsuspecting, leading to isolation in life and disengagement at work.
3. Fighting the Infinite Battle – Builds the positive and proactive lifestyle of continuous readiness, personal growth, mental power, and stability through a mindset-driven code for living.

This course covers the second and continues your knightly adventure, this time through the dangerous lands of a dragon that you learn to defeat through new knowledge, encouragement, skills, and other activities to continue improving your psychological strength and wellbeing.

Objectives for Slaying the Three-Headed Dragon:

• Learn of KODAP3, a three-headed dragon whose bites inject apathy, frustration, and cynicism into our veins, why this combination of toxins is so deadly, and how this relates to our mental wellness within the broader Armored Knight program.
• Recognize and fight the signs of apathy, no matter if you’re still in the initial stages or if you’ve already advance to full-blown apathy. An exercise will help you discover the weak spots in your armor where apathy gets through, and how to stop it from happening to your current passions.
• Fight frustration or use it to your advantage—the choice is yours. Use short-term frustrations as an emotion to fuel your plan of action to avoid future frustrations. Review and eliminate long-term frustrations, or learn to accept them.
• Combating cynicism within ourselves is the last step in ridding ourselves of this nefarious dragon. An effective countermeasure is practicing thankfulness and gratitude, another way this lesson ties into the overall Armored Knight curriculum.

.A note for HR and mental health professionals. This program is not designed to replace any existing mental health approaches or employee assistance programs but is intentionally designed to complement them.