As a law enforcement professional you spend all day looking for people doing something wrong. You are continually looking for people violating traffic laws, state or provincial laws, by-laws, statutes, and criminal laws. People call you when someone else has done something wrong and assaulted them, robbed them, or broken into their home. You launch an investigation and set out on a path to find the wrong doer. When you do find them you are looking for signs of deception, clues that they are lying to you. Finding and dealing with people doing something wrong is a big part of your profession.
The problem is that you often become so accustomed to looking for people doing something wrong that you also get in the habit of looking for what your peers and co-workers are doing wrong and at the end of your shift and on your days off you look for things your spouse and children are doing wrong.
As a trainer you watch videos of events involving officers and look for what they did wrong and where they screwed up. In your training scenarios and training classes you tend to look for what officers are doing wrong and mistakes they are making.
When you get a written test back the first thing you do is look for the questions you got wrong.
After teaching a course you often focus on what went wrong and the problems you encountered.
It can become a habit to always look for what people are doing wrong. When that is what you are always looking for, that is what you will find.
Start looking for the good. Start looking for the good in your peers. Start looking for the things your officers are doing well. Start looking for the good in your spouse and your children. Start looking at all the questions you answered correctly. Start watching those videos and making a list of things the officers did well.
You might be surprised to find that you find what you are looking for so spend more time looking for the good. Once you create the new habit teach your officers to start looking for the good as well.
Brian Willis
Winning Mind Training – Dedicated to helping the men and women of law enforcement Embrace the Suck, focus on What’s Important Now and Dare to Be Great.
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