Moving through moral injury

While doing research for my Hackworth Fellowship into improving health outcomes for unhoused veterans, I came across the term “moral injury” in Nancy Sherman’s book "Afterwar.” It was an entirely new concept to me, but it completely changed how I think about ways to help people who've experienced profound traumas.

Rather than physical or psychological injuries, moral injury occurs when you're forced to act against your deeply held morals or beliefs, or from the distress of witnessing others do so. Think of healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic who had to ban grieving family members from the hospital rooms of their dying loved ones. Or soldiers made to carry out orders that may harm innocent civilians. It’s the idea of split loyalties. You're loyal to your own deeply held moral convictions, but you're also loyal to the law, for example. And if tension arises between the two, that can create a spiritual wound or moral injury, which can lead to a deep sense of isolation.

I wanted to explore ways to address moral injury within the veteran population. I come from a family of veterans. My grandparents served in the Vietnam War and my great-grandparents served in World War II. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, where I'm originally from, there's a large veteran homeless population. It always upset me because I believe part of the social contract of this country calls on us to care for those who have been wounded while protecting us. It is also one of my deepest held convictions that no one should bear these kinds of wounds on their own. My family who served came home to a great support system, but so many others aren't so lucky.

The Department of Veterans Affairs is one of the country's largest integrated health care systems. While it offers traditional therapies and evidence based treatments, there are fewer non traditional therapies available to veterans. Things like therapy dogs, equine therapy, and yoga. When we started looking into the Strauss Scholarship, my co-applicant, Gabriella Gegel ’27, and I initially wanted to do something with therapy dogs. But once we learned just how expensive it was to train one dog, we knew we had to pivot. So we decided to pursue something with yoga instead, and hopefully reach a larger group of veterans.

Gabriella and I are using our Strauss funds to bring the Veterans Yoga Project to the South Bay. We are working with an instructor certified in trauma-informed yoga to, hopefully, offer classes every other week. And we're working with Uber and Lyft to provide free transportation to the classes for veterans, so barriers like transportation do not stand in the way.

Why yoga? Personally, I'd fallen in love with yoga when I started at Santa Clara. Coming from a place so far away and feeling homesick, yoga became an anchor for me. It was a great way for me to relieve stress, clear my mind, and find a sense of community. I love that it’s a tool that you can learn and take with you wherever you go. 

For veterans, yoga can offer those same benefits—community-building most of all. The transition of living within the structure and built-in community of the military to navigating civilian life on their own can be extremely disorienting. Having a welcoming, calm space where veterans can move, connect, and support one another can help ease that transition and reduce the isolation many experience. Moreover, it's a tool that can help rebuild trust. A trust that may have been injured during their time in service. With yoga, they can start to regain their confidence and repair their ability to trust in themselves, in their instinct, and in their gut.

Annie Schloss ’27 is double majoring in public health and biology and minoring in religious studies with plans to attend medical school. She was a 2025-2026 Hackworth Fellow with the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics and this spring was awarded a Strauss Scholarship, which funds year-long public service projects proposed by California college sophomores and juniors.