HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Christopher Slavens, an Army combat veteran who served during Operation Iraqi Freedom, is now helping others work through mental adversity.<\/p>\n
Slavens joined Jonathan Masaki on \u201cThe Rally Point\u201d for an in-depth discussion about how his time in uniform informs the way he supports people facing challenges in their lives.<\/p>\n
After his military career, the retired Army major earned a degree in social work and is now a licensed clinical social worker.<\/p>\n
He has also served as a graduate-level lecturer at the University of Hawai\u02bbi at M\u0101noa\u2019s School of Social Work.<\/p>\n
As a combat behavioral health counselor, Slavens said his experience helps him understand what others may experience when dealing with trauma, grief and major life transitions.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the ways that I try to help for instance military service members, or even people that have been through trauma, is to understand that there are certain aspects of how you had to adjust,\u201d Slavens said. <\/p>\n
\u201cFor instance, in theater, in combat environments, that were a strength while you were there. The idea is to recognize it, to adjust it, to transition, not to cut it off and pretend it doesn\u2019t exist,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
His journey from the battlefield to the therapy room is a powerful story about resilience, purpose, and service.<\/p>\n
Join HNN\u2019s Jonathan Masaki, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, every other Wednesday at 12:30 p.m. as he highlights different aspects of the U.S. Military, military civilians, contractors and others who play a role in Hawaii\u2019s armed forces.<\/p>\n
Watch \u201cThe Rally Point\u201d on all of HNN\u2019s streaming apps.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 Hawaii News Now. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Christopher Slavens, an Army combat veteran who served during Operation Iraqi Freedom, is now helping…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":669985,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[97,259,260],"class_list":["post-669984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=669984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/669985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=669984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=669984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=669984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}