“Life is often compared to a marathon, but I think it is more like being a sprinter; long stretches of hard work punctuated by brief moments in which we are given the opportunity to perform at our best.”
Michael Johnson
Take out the word ‘life’ in Michael Johnson’s quote and replace it with ‘The law enforcement profession’. There lies your challenge as a trainer – train your officers to be sprinters.
Think about the life of a sprinter. They train for hundreds, or thousands of hours in order to compete in an event that lasts less than a minute. In fact it may only last seconds. Those races, or competitions the sprinter trainers for take place very rarely. The vast majority of their time is spent in training, not competing. Hence, the life of a law enforcement professional. Train for hundreds or thousands of hours to be able to prevail in a violent confrontation that will likely only last seconds and that in reality happens very rarely.
The sprinter will likely be disappointed if he or she fails to perform at their best during the race, but life goes on. For the law enforcement professional failing to perform at their best may mean we attend another funeral, get another update from www.odmp.org and add another name to the walls of our memorials.
As a trainer you need to continually seek ways to inspire officers to acknowledge this profession is a sprint and to train and prepare accordingly.
Excellence in Training is a philosophy committed to helping good trainers become great trainers, and great trainers deliver awesome training. Check out our website at www.winningmindtraining.com for a list of upcoming dates and locations for the Excellence in Training Course.
Take care.
Brian Willis
Thought Leader, Catalyst for Change, Speaker, Author and a Man With Many Questions
Winning Mind Training – Leading the fight against mediocrity through Life’s Most Powerful Question – What’s Important Now?
To book Brian to speak at your event or to your officers contact him at winningmind@mac.com.
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