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Welcome to the Behind the Shield podcast as always my name is James Gearing and this week
it is my absolute honor to welcome on the show veteran law enforcement officer and the
man behind blue grit wellness Eric Tung.
So in this conversation we discuss a host of topics from his family's powerful immigration
story, his journey into the world of policing, his own officer involved shooting, the recruitment
crisis, creating a culture of peer support, social media, school safety and so much more.
Now before we get to this incredibly powerful conversation as I say every week please just
take a moment go to whichever app you listen to this on, subscribe to the show, leave feedback
and leave a rating.
Every single five star rating truly does elevate this podcast therefore making it easier for
others to find and this is a free library of almost one episode away almost 900 episodes
now so all I ask in return is that you help share these incredible men and women stories
so I can get them to every single person on planet earth who needs to hear them.
So with that being said I introduce to you Eric Tung.
Enjoy.
Well Eric I want to start by saying thank you so much for taking the time and coming
on the Behind the Shield podcast today.
Yeah man thanks so much for having me James, appreciate it.
So where on planet earth will be finding you your morning my afternoon?
Yeah you're finding me in the Seattle area but not Seattle proper so but yeah not too
far from there where I work is kind of between Seattle and Tacoma and yeah this is what I've
called home for the greater part of my life you know since kind of halfway through childhood.
I just recently interviewed Kevin Heffernan who's one of the broken lesser guys that did
the Tacoma FD have you had any sort of conversations about that show with any of the Tacoma area
firefighters?
Not a whole lot you know my initial awareness was that you know obviously those guys are
parody geniuses but as far as you know having a fire station in one of the most wet areas
in the country might be a good ground for comedy and no I haven't really but I think
my awareness to the fire culture is only increasing and increasing as I continue on in life you
know we we collaborate really well with our local fire department but then again you know
I have a couple of my best buddies that have switched and made the transition from police
work over to fireside in the recent years so I believe I'll just learn more and more
as we go.
Well we'll get to there you know when we get to that point but I'm kind of jumping ahead
now just while we're on this topic there are parts of the country maybe other places in
the world I'm not so sure but um that I'm fully aware of where police and fire don't
even talk to each other and that becomes super detrimental I don't know if that was a factor
in for example Ivaldi but you know that kind of ego and that lack of communication can
be so detrimental for the people we serve.
What is it about your agency that when you kind of look back now has forged that alliance
between the two professions?
Yeah I wonder what it is but I mean I think like most things things that go well in your
organization or things that don't go well you can attribute towards historic tradition
and culture and from the time I came on you know I've been a police officer for almost
17 years from the time I came on it was very partnering right it was it felt like same
team and so you know we have our jabs right like we like to make fun of them when we call
them out in the middle of the night and all that but then they throw it right back and
so it's always been that kind of collaborative culture where we even verbalize at times hey
like we have each other's backs like something happens to us we want them there ASAP right
for for medical and then all the time as people in the fire industry know or just first responders
know you might be trying to perform aid or care but the situations are oftentimes so
volatile that it's becoming more and more routine for cops to get dispatched alongside
you rather than you know separately.
Yeah absolutely well I would love to start the very beginning of your timeline obviously
then we'll walk through into the profession of law enforcement so tell me where you were
born and tell me a little bit about your family dynamic what your parents did how many siblings.
Yeah for sure so I was actually born in Memphis and there's not a whole lot of Asian Americans
there but you know my folks immigrated from Taiwan and China and you know they came to
the US for opportunity just like so many other other folks from around the world and so I
grew up in Memphis it was largely I think it's at the time it was like 48 or 49% white
48 49% black and then everyone else was kind of you know sharing that couple of percentage
points but I think like most people they think that your upbringing is pretty normal until
you realize it's not the most average or not the most common but all to say I had what
I visualize as a pretty average childhood right just kind of grown up middle class it
wasn't until I moved when I was eight or nine you know to the Pacific Northwest but I think
like so many people and we talked about this a little bit before we hit the record but
I think so many people that join a life of service or a career of service whether it's
the military or first responder work they had something not so ideal right in their
lives something not so ideal in the lives of those close to them maybe something happened
to them or someone close to them and for me it was a collection of things but looking
back you know we started childhood for sure a little bit of that was the rocky home situation
you know my parents they had their share of issues and it became more and more routine
that you know there was there's chaos in the household right there was a lot of disputing
and dissension where I don't think when I reflect back it's necessarily that that led
me to police work I do think it was that sense of wanting to be an example for myself and
others right I wanted to be a figure in the community I wanted to have the literal boots
on the ground to affect a situation when things do get a little chaotic or think people do
get a little scared and I became more and more recognition for me as I progressed into
adulthood and then was in college and I really had to do that soul search of like okay now
that now that we're wrapping things up in the academic side like what are we really
going to be doing with our lives so going back a generation I'm always intrigued of
people's immigration stories whether they're first or second generation obviously I'm first
generation over here my son is you know first generation American but you know there's there's
some beautiful elements of some stories there's some obviously you know less than beautiful
elements what was your parents you know immigration story from what you heard through their mouths
yeah I mean man where do I start I think to start it's impactful to talk about my great
or sorry my grandparents and you know my grandparents were all in China and the communists took
over in the 50s and so that informed a lot of my family's trajectory as far as like my
ancestry but also a lot of how I look at the world a lot of how I reflect and how grateful
I feel to be born in the USA you know despite all the the media and the sense that we are
so polarized and I think a lot of that is really we're less so than a lot of fear mongers
and business folk would like us to think right I think we're a lot more similar than we often
give credit to you but not to deviate too much you know they all basically fled a life
of affluence and they had nothing and because freedom and ability to live your life the
way you want and not be jailed or worse is really important when you when it all comes
down to it the crux of it and so then formed a lot of how I grew up and how I look at the
world but yeah as far as my parents you know they met in Taiwan and they immigrated over
and you know without going too much down the rabbit hole you know my mom you know she was
pressured by traditional values to not get married too late in life and I think that
there's a lot that could be said about how I was raised you know with really traditional
values kind of the the second generation Asian American you know just hard work hit the books
and not a whole lot else right be obedient and do as you're told and and I was a pretty
good kid right I did stay within the lanes most of the time I did what I was told and
didn't cause too much heartache or too much trouble so that was a lot of you know my life
and growing up just the shy kid that just hit the books hard and did kind of what was
expected of me which is very uncommon for people of my culture to get into law enforcement
or first responder work.
What are the pros and cons of that kind of traditional culture that you were raised in
and the reason I asked that you know you could immediately look at a lot of our Asian professionals
now you know in medicine and some of these other areas and academically they've absolutely
crushed it you know and they've become incredible you know neurosurgeons or whatever it is but
you let's compare that for a second with you know sports these these parents that live
vicariously through their children and they you know might end up becoming a professional
sports person and then you know I'm assuming that a lot of these people hit a point in
their life where they're like oh this isn't everything I wanted to do and you so you're
being kind of driven down that path and you excel in that path but that path is very narrow
and that sense of play and childhood may have been kind of skipped as you navigated this
this career you know trailblazing that you were on so you know I've kind of totally loaded
that question but what were the pros and what were the cons of that that kind of the parenting
parameters that you found yourself within?
Yeah I love a lot of that question and it is there are a lot of parts to dissect so
I suppose to start the pros of that traditional upbringing my situation is not unique and
a lot of people speak very well and have written very well about it but it taught grind right
it taught hard work and I do think that there's an aspect of community and family that's important
when you realize it's not just you right there is a degree of living to uphold respect and
expectations of others which can be good to an extent however you you hit on it there
right whether it's parents really living vicariously for their kid to be a doctor or to be a you
know major league baseball player if the dream isn't yours it's an empty dream and the likelihood
to hit it or hit it in the way that you ought to to serve you and others in your life the
best way I think is going to be pretty shallow and it's going to be built upon a fragile
foundation so a little bit of that I you know so many times I've seen you know I think we
all have friends that are maybe pushed a little too hard in the dreams that weren't theirs
and they oftentimes it's within grasp and they could take it if they wanted to but they
don't and they pivot and they do something else and so I think that that that notion
for kids to play is so crucial I love that you hit on that because that's a frequent
reflection point for me I try not to be a rigid parent but oftentimes I find that I
am and you know I I can verbalize at the same time and interactions with my daughter where
I truly don't try to put anything on her as far as what she's going to do in life but
I try to support her and whatever is fun for her and and I get so excited whenever I see
these little aspects or skills or or passions starting to bloom what about from an emotional
point of view when I think and I got I love Chinese Asian culture so much when I was younger
I kind of found myself diving headfirst into the world of martial arts and then that was
it it was a massive rabbit hole but again you think of that and stoic is the wrong word
because I know stoic is you know is a positive thing but the impression I think you're right
you're right yeah so so was there was there space to emote because I mean so many of us
were raised with you know suck it up rub some dirt and all that stuff what was that through
a Chinese lens for you yeah there's a lot of that I think you're right on the money
in that stoicism like the philosophy is huge and positive I love that right that's a huge
tenet of how I try to live my life how I lead how I perform in a team is recognizing your
emotions and not letting them overburden you right and focusing on the locus control that
you have that's how I view stoicism like the philosophy whereas stoic to hide your emotions
I think that's what you're hitting on and there was a lot of that right I was a pretty
emotional kid you know looking back as I said I was I was shy but I was always in touch
with my feelings you know I'd watch a I remember watching like all dogs go to heaven when I
was four and I was just bawling at the end I was like why do you have to die and my mom
had no like she did not recognize that I have such a reaction to you know this cartoon but
that was always me right I was always in my thoughts I was pretty introverted but I and
I was very in tune with certain things that would trigger certain feelings and yeah growing
up that was definitely not it wasn't supported it wasn't fostered and while my mom was pretty
sensitive to me it was definitely something that I had to grapple with as I was coming
into adolescence right because I had big feelings you know I'd be called a sissy and you know
that was something that would only exacerbate as I felt this divide and this lack of relationship
with my dad growing up in general you know to the point where that became pretty catabolic
relationship that in adulthood you know I went about eight years without speaking to
him just because I didn't want to give him the satisfaction I was truly angry you know
from things as a younger kid.
I listened to you on the enduring the badge podcast let me get that right and I got a
sense of empathy and compassion which I would like I hope that the people that were around
me saw this you know that was something that I carried on was it was it flawless no I had
good days and bad days in uniform of course but that managed to stay I never really you
know totally succumbed to the compassion fatigue for example you have this kind of environment
where you're not as encouraged to show emotion I didn't you know I was definitely allowed
to show emotion in my upbringing when you look back now what was it you think that fostered
and nurtured that compassion that you cat you was able to hang on to you know 17 years
later in uniform.
Yeah I'd say I wasn't able to really hang on to it too well it's kind of ebbed and flowed
through my career and that's something I do like to reflect upon and share with others
in that you know as a kid it's not it wasn't valued as far as what I was taught and how
I was raised and I know that's common with a lot of men regardless of you know cultural
upbringing is that you know there's these traditional senses of what it takes to be
manly or have masculinity which is generally to be strong whatever that means right and
it's comforting for me in my late 30s as I raise a daughter and I interact with kids
and I interact with other parents and friends and co-workers to feel very comfortable publicly
saying that you know my compassion my ability to feel for others and deeply care you know
like really truly give a damn makes me a better man right it makes me a stronger man it makes
me more dynamic it really took some time to come into my own with that as far as the compassion
fatigue for sure it hit me right the cynicism hit me and all these things hit me at different
times in my career even as early like as one to two years on where I felt so negative and
I felt so cynical and looking back you know cynicism really only can exist when resilience
is super low when you're not when you're not well and you're so impressionable to this
negative influence but for me and a lot of what I do through social media and my podcast
is really to enhance and and support this notion that we need to take care of ourselves
so that we can take care of other people and with that is it's resilience it's wellness
it's being positive and sometimes you have to fake it till you make it like you sometimes
you have to force that positivity because it is so overwhelming at times if you don't
if you don't conscientiously intentionally have that now back to your early life what
were you playing as far as sports well to fulfill stereotypes I was not playing sports
I was playing piano right and especially before the move like it was very locked down to you
know the traditional I say you know but really don't so like the traditional Asian upbringing
it's like very common to go to Saturday school so I went to Chinese school on Saturdays and
so you know when all your weekdays are already tied up with normal school and you're expected
to go above and beyond and have straight A's like A minus is a is a hit like that is you
have failed and there's going to be consequences with that but then Saturdays like you'd be
going just to learn Mandarin you know I'd be learning to read and write and so your
weekends kind of evaporating music was culturally acceptable I did have a couple friends that
they could play some sport like tennis or what have you but it's really come up a lot
more more recently you know as far as Asian American culture but at the time there was
no emphasis or support for for sports it wasn't until I was 10 or 11 that I joined you know
a local club soccer team and man how deficient I was you know from not having all the reps
that that muscle memory and hand eye or hand foot or foot eye coordination you know just
really wasn't there it's funny you said about the A minus I literally just saw a kind of
funny video on Instagram the other day and it was a said what it's like and you know
in an Asian family and it was a little boy and he got in from school and he showed his
mother the the the work you know his exam and it said A plus and she's like looking
all disapproving and shaking her head and then he pulls his thumb back and it was double
plus and she was like oh good so but it's funny as well you mentioned about the the
music my wife is half Filipina and you know she kind of fumbled around earlier in her
life and again kind of low self-esteem not really believing that she you know her own
self-worth to a point as far as the career ladder and she found herself in the optical
world so she got into kind of retail initially and then became an optician and as we speak
she's actually finishing up her doctorate so she'll be a doctor of optometry and so
I told her this is obviously a recessive Asian gene that just wasn't expressed until later
in life so I bore a violin yeah I'm like all right that's the next thing we're gonna do
yeah well it's so cool that she you know in adulthood right is finding that and building
that whereas you know I getting straight A's through most of my childhood and then getting
to college where I could make my own decisions like the the fire wasn't there and I think
something I was exposed to recently is this thought of three P's and their purpose passion
and performance and so the performance was pushed upon me but I didn't feel the purpose
and I certainly didn't have the passion you know that was just kind of put upon me and
so it just doesn't gel or it didn't gel for me and you know you frequently see that amongst
a lot of people well those are interrelated as well and this is my own personal example
I was a straight C student in school and it was kind of ironic I'd wanted to be a doctor
academically I definitely didn't have that burning desire and then I'd wanted to be a
firefighter and then early when I was about 11 they told me that my color vision wasn't
good I was supposedly colorblind which is the blanket statement they use for failing
one or two pages in those books and it took me a long time to circle around I finally
had an aha moment literally in my late 20s went to fire school and then went to medic
school and became a straight A student the only thing that had changed is like you said
the passion now I wanted to learn about this thing I was driven to be a firefighter a paramedic
and so there's a definitely an interrelation between grades and passion and purpose so
if you've got a kid who's struggling maybe that's the wrong environment for them maybe
trade school rather than college or you know who knows but but I think there's a real that's
I love the way you put the three Ps because that is something I think a lot of us are
missing initially as parents as we get so sucked into academia we forget about the big
picture yeah and I love that I love that for kids today because there are so many alternative
schools there's running start there's just more availability to these trade schools and
other paths which are I mean so crucial and you know you talk about industries that are
going to be in dire need and hands-on hand skills and trade schools is very much a big
piece of that you know but your story kind of reminded me of a kid that I grew up with
and he was kind of the the B minus C kind of kid and he's a doctor now right because
he hit his stride towards the latter part of high school and then he started taking
more seriously it's something he wanted whereas he was picking up momentum as far as academia
and when he got into college he took it super seriously because it was his choice right
his parents were pushing him his parents were engineers and he came from a good educated
background but it was his choice and then he's doing well right now right at the same
time you know I look at that parallel to me because we're all hanging out back when and
just saw him at the 20-year reunion but it was very different whereas I was you know
I was pushed so hard and then once once the training wheels came off it's almost like
I just set the bike down rather than continue to pedal yeah my wife has blown me away she's
a straight a student in med school and she's just that's phenomenal yeah that's so cool
all these sororities now and you know fraternities that she's in one's called Pi Kappa Pi I mean
that sounds more like a bakery than a you know organization but whatever but no but
it is it's again it's just finding that that thing and she's so driven that you know she's
kind of slipped into that you know the mentality that you were talking about so I think it
absolutely has a place when you're driven and you want to be the best artist or dancer
or whatever it is but that has to come ahead that has to become first and then the grades
will follow not the other way around yeah and I try to be grateful and I think it's
worth recognizing you know you asked earlier on about the the good characteristics that
were instilled from my upbringing for sure hard work and grit and character those were
tenants that were undeniable and it certainly helped me in my career I when I did get into
law enforcement I dove in and I tried to approach it with a studious mind from every angle from
book work to what I could get exposed to online content to picking brains and seeking mentorship
I think that that tenacity is what's helped me and what I try to encourage others to do
not just be a bystander to their life or career it's hey you can take this by the horns and
you can you can craft it the way you want you can think creatively about that especially
as it aligns your talents and skills so while you were in school were you already thinking
of law enforcement or was there something else no it was it was something else there
was a lot of continuing to pivot so traditional paths that were put in front of me that you
know I had extended family doing that was late in high school computer science so I
took an AP as it's called kind of a college level computer science class utterly hated
it could not resonate with it and so when I started college University of Washington
my thought was to do pre-med and it's a pretty no joke kind of school for pre-med so they
have a very robust weed out class entry to chemistry and I took it and I was robustly
weeded out and so right away I was like yeah okay medicine is not the thing the same time
I was doing college painting there was there were a different number of kind of franchise
companies where not like you're just painting houses during the summers but you're actually
actively marketing and doing the hiring and project management through the school year
so you can gear up for production and so I did build a lot of confidence in doing that
right running a small business we were it was a sole proprietor where truly it was my
business to run I just had to pay royalties to the company and got a lot of confidence
with that right interacting in the real world and seeing what my earning potential could
be based on how hard I worked and how successful I was in these interactions and operations
what I found in initially you know kind of going back to your question about college
I thought that maybe I would finish out with a generic undergrad degree and maybe go back
to business school again because that would be a certain level of success and maybe more
more acceptable or prestigious if you would and but then I found that those things didn't
motivate me right there are there are times I worked harder and I got more money and my
lifestyle changed zero I just filed it away which is great at the same time I just didn't
see how whether it was painting or any other enterprise how sales or marketing or project
management would really resonate with me and so I really went down the rabbit hole as far
as soul searching and I always had an affinity towards service and even military service
I remember being in high school and the ROTC or junior ROTC program really excited me but
it wasn't something that was supported with my family so I kind of just let it go and
thought about it here and there but when I was in college and I was really at this this
crux of man what am I gonna do when I actually graduate and go into quote unquote the real
world I really had this affinity to look into public service and that was law enforcement
and firefighting so I did what my nature would do and I started just looking up everything
I could online I bought a firefighting manual you know as far as prepping for the test and
I started just trying to soak up every information bit I could I knew one guy that was older
that had become a police officer but he didn't succeed in that career so he wasn't the best
resource and I also knew a firefighter that was pretty new but he was a couple years older
and so he wasn't as accessible to kind of interact with but I just kind of threw myself
at it and I tested in the springtime before I graduated and a lot of doors open with police
testing my 93% on the written test for fire got me zero interviews and my 81 or 82 with
law enforcement got me just about every interview I could want and so then it was yeah for sure
we can just end the interview here we're done yeah yeah so you win it's harder it's more
desirable job although man everyone's having struggles these days which is mind-boggling
to me as far as police and fire and just every every bit of public service which is a bit
sad but not to go on a tangent yeah so I just ended up testing and interviewing and refining
my interview skills and I got hired the summer after I graduated from UW Kent Police where
I'm still working today let's go on that tangent now because obviously we're in the law enforcement
world now but it's I think it's an interesting perspective and I just had a few conversations
with people recently because I I entered the fire service in 2004 and then less than a
year later I was in the way the East Coast in Miami area then I went to California so
your side of the country and this is I think what a lot of people have forgotten when it
comes to the recruitment conversation we're just talking about trying to fill seats but
just like you underlined and then to be very fair there are more police vacancies in our
our fire firefighter vacancies that factors into but for example if anaheim I tested against
a thousand certified firefighter EMT or paramedics with experience in wildland firefighting volunteer
firefighting explorer programs I mean their resumes were fat and that's what the entire
I forget which one the conference centers in anaheim was full and so this is how far
we've come it's not like oh why can't we fill seats we used to have to compete and I think
the big thing that's missing from this conversation is then you know you and I and this is again
not saying wow we're amazing it's not it's just that we clearly were taken from the upper
percentile of that large group of people which then in turn you're getting the fitter people
the more driven people the more resilient people ultimately and you're kind of filtering
out just like with intro to chem which is what happened to me in my med school journey
by the way I hit academics and I'm like oh okay I'm not supposed to be a doctor so that's
my you know my failures but everything happens for a reason absolutely but so it's not that
you're just looking for a person in a seat we're looking for the best person we can possibly
find for that seat and obviously we'll get into all those conversations too so talk to
me about the contrast with what you experienced testing in 2007 and what you're seeing now
in 2024 yeah man there's a lot to unpack there so it was a lot of I guess to summarize some
of these points because I do have a very intimate relationship with both in that my most recent
assignment that I came out of prior to promotion was being the sergeant of our recruiting and
hiring unit right totally revamped because of the challenge that we've seen in the last
few years that is going to make sense to everyone listening whether they're a cop or not but
to summarize and simplify I suppose the biggest difference was what most people remember for
those that are in the service for more than a few years is that there was this this vying
and this testing for a very selective process for the candidate whereas now today it's essentially
free agency for your capable competent people your candidates that maybe have no experience
they have no firefighting or EMT experience or volunteer work but if they're sharp and
they have good character and they present well they're probably going to get a decent
shot at a decent agency same for police right you had people that really had to show up
well right it to stand out you needed to be college educated or have legitimate work experience
or life experience or have military service and then you had to pass the rigorous background
in all these things whereas now because I keep such such an eye on all these things
and headlines you have a lot of agencies that are really sacrificing quality and that's
not subjective quality that's that's a lot of physical standards that's a lot of written
standards that is that are actual background component issues as far as how much criminal
history and what type of criminal history you allow I do want to caveat that there is
subjective nature to that but some of these headlines and some of the candidates I even
seen hired in my region are a little concerning because I've looked at some of these people's
background packets and we've made an assessment for my agency to say hey I'm there's some
integrity issues I'm a little concerned the stories aren't driving and then I see them
at the academy in the state and that's a little concerning right and I know that it's a it's
pretty dire at some places but we can't we can't sacrifice that quality as far as what
we're going to depend on these folks for I have worked for arguably one of what I would
consider the best fire departments in America I would I have also worked for what I would
consider one of the worst fire departments for America and I say that because they had
an incredibly large budget and yet complacency was you know a cancer through the whole thing
and there's I always say there's some incredible people in that department but it's despite
it not because of it but with that I got to see a very glaring commonality the best one
had an incredibly high standard the bar was set and they would happily get rid of 25%
through attrition of every single probationary class by the end of that first year so you
know if everyone met the bar they weren't going to just cut them for no reason but usually
about the top you know quarter or you know a quarter would would would kind of not make
it through that year what you ended up then after that crucible was not only incredibly
motivated firefighters who became engineers who became captains etc etc but also even
this kind of um the knowledge in other areas like I tested when I came back to the east
coast with just at a c pat one of the guys said I've never met anyone that's left and
it was anaheim left anaheim fire department before and that's the one I had to test against
all those people conversely and it wasn't that much longer we're talking when I left
anaheim now I'm only five years later I work for orange county and then the last place
better better benefits than where I was working before you know better pay um a kelly day
so a little bit more time off they weren't um you know understaffed horrifically but
my class and before when we got hired there was no physical you know training whatsoever
in their orientation there was no real training at all you did hr paperwork you went around
and rode theme park rides and and that was it and I saw the complete opposite so to me
this lower the standards to get more people in is completely backwards in my opinion if
you want to get good firefighters and police officers you have to keep those standards
up and let people know about that and the candidates will rise up they will look for
places to prepare so what are your thoughts on that um concept yeah absolutely I think
there's a degree of simple economics right we look at the last few years and police have
come under a lot of scrutiny and some of it was deserved right I think there's a lot of
opportunity to say hey yeah we're not perfect and we have work to do and we want you aka
all of us the community to do that work together I think there's a lot of value in that and
I think that it's not helpful to get super defensive we have an opportunity if we want
to prove our worth with that it is one of the most complicated jobs I think even a lot
of police antagonists or um I said just I guess haters or critics would say that yeah
it is a difficult job to do right the way we want it all the time or most of the time
even and so with that if we're going to expect a lot we have to compensate a lot and that's
not all monetary but I think that's a piece I also think that's support where you've
lacked support is where you've had the biggest attrition issues and the biggest cultural
and morale issues is people leave those agencies because it is free agency right and so it's
not even like a state like red state blue state thing but it's just hey I'm gonna go
five miles that way to where the administration and the city leadership is much more supportive
in us doing the job with the way we need to and that's with training that's with funding
that's all these things community support is a piece right but I think absolutely when
you talk about lowering standards and you're opening it up and you're opening up risk and
I think that again even if you're a critic to public service or how much money it costs
you have to recognize the huge risk when you're taking in people haphazardly to that degree
100 percent the reason why I went to the last one was the one I worked before before was
a 56 hour work week so there's a big kind of misunderstanding of how many hours the
firefighters actually work and it's the biggest fairy tale we tell is that we have this incredible
schedule because we don't it's smoker mirrors it's bullshit but then you add in mandatory
overtime I'm going through a divorce I'm a single father and I'm being told after 56
hours that week that I got to stay another 24 and can't go and see my son so this is
the other thing I think that is not really being discussed about the the recruitment
crisis we have in 2024 a young man or woman that's looking to join our profession is going
to google what's it like being a cop what's it like being a firefighter and they're going
to see all these things too and then they're going to go to ups or amazon or whatever their
alternative was and go well I could be home in my bed every night actually make the same
if not more you know and not have to deal with all these other issues that I'm seeing
about so I think this is and you said it perfectly like the environment if we're going to ask
our men and women to leave their families and go and protect a community of complete
strangers you know arguably then we've got to give them the environment financially you
know emotionally and then the rest and recovery because a lot of these people are going to
be up through the night whether they're you know night shift in the police or any shift
in in the fire service that requires more rest and recovery than the person who bags
your groceries and no disrespect to that person but they sleep every night and they work 40
hours a week so that is another thing that I'm seeing now is that we now we're at a point
where we have to fix it there's so you know such incredible access to knowledge now that
a young person can learn exactly what it's like to be a firefighter or a police officer
and now that's out for everyone to see we're having a recruitment process because we refuse
to fix those things when we fix those that's the good news if we just have the actual balls
to step up and address some of these issues that have been killing our first responders
for decades we will see people line up out the door again but until we do that in my
opinion it's the whole insanity is doing the same thing expecting different results
yeah it's such a big deal and I love that you went there and we look at the younger
generation right let's let's say the Z's where they are wise beyond their years is recognizing
the personal agency and the importance of their own personal health and well-being and
how that will manifest into things like their relationships and their quality of life and
their families and all these things right you have the 40 sorry the the 24 25 year old
and a lot of them might say hey that does not sound fun my neighbor down the street
or my uncle is a first responder and he talks about how prevalent divorce is he talks about
how he has insomnia he talks about all these things on while I respect the crud out of
him I don't want that for me right and then you have the the young somethings whether
it's 20s 30s whatever even for you all right that is saying hey no I want to do this job
and because some of these notions and these trends are so prevalent they may be accepting
this degree of yeah it's gonna really suck and I hope my marriage can sustain it but
we're gonna roll the dice because I want to do this really important thing they might
not verbalize in that way but I think as some some of the culture recognizes that risk and
that's a super sad thing too where we need to have these conversations and support the
first responders being the type of healthy individuals they need to be you know I work
graves and I my body never responded well to it even in my early 20s and when I went
back electively to try to lead from the front with a group of you know my officers that
were going back to graves I seriously regretted it when I was in my mid 30s and the new dad
that couldn't end quickly enough but I say all that to say I have extreme respect for
the fire industry when I was coming in as a young cop I was alongside all the jokes
and I'll still make the jokes here and there right about oh you get to sleep at work and
I got a buddy in a quiet agency he gets to sleep at work and he'll he'll own that right
but my partners my you know my brothers and sisters in red in my agency they wake up all
the dang time for shootings for you know mental health subjects that are on substance use
disorder all that right like they're always awake and I I'm a curmudgeon with my sleep
and I get thrown off just working swings to cover my night my night crews as watch commander
now and I cannot relate to like I you couldn't give me that job now to be working 24 48 72
hours and woken up however many times that we know is taking years off the end of their
lives and so I I fully respect it and I did want to take a moment just to say that because
I think there's a lot of cops that will keep throwing shade and they might actually believe
that that's a better that's a better gig for health and I'm gonna say hey like it's not
that simple absolutely and it's the same because people will have the conversation the fire
like oh you know should we should go to to 12 so I'm like no I mean this is why law enforcement
struggles go look at your er physicians and nurses like a lot of them are you know in
terrible shape so it to me it's about we've got to fight to give them more time off between
shifts if I'm gonna ask a police officer to be awake while I asleep while I'm asleep that
maybe will you know stop my teenage son from being attacked or you know whatever they're
gonna you know whatever potential there is I want that person to be the fittest most
well trained and most well rested before that incident the same way as I always say with
the gray areas and no one ever talks about sleep deprivation in some of these gray area
police videos that we stay but when my son is pulled over and he reaches for his insurance
and the officer thinks he's going for a gun because of everything that's happened and
we have someone murdered almost every day in blue at the moment you know that conversation
too so the rest and recovery I think is absolutely imperative yeah absolutely I mean you look
at high stakes jobs and airline pilots right that's one where the standards man I know
an airline pilot and just the amount of consequence if they have any degree of substance in their
bodies because the stakes are high right and but we have to recognize that lives are on
the line with first responders whether you wear blue or red or you're a medic like these
these things are crucial you know you have medics driving around the country or sorry
the county and it's it's gonna be life or death and that second save lives and they're
cruising and they're gonna be fatigued right and they're they're driving at 80 90 100
miles an hour trying to get there to save someone's life like these things are extremely
crucial and I don't know I'm curious is a is dr.
Gill Martin's work socialized in the fire industry as far as the hypervigilance curve
I am aware of it because of this podcast and though it's funny I've known his name comes
up all the time I still haven't reached out to him to get him on the show yet but I don't
think it's very well known certainly in your community in the wellness and mental health
side but I haven't heard his name mentioned a huge amount on the fire side yeah but just
for you know some of the listeners that might not be familiar he talks about the amount
of time it takes for our sympathetic systems to come out and you know back to parasympathetic
which is rest and recovery and usually you're not really it don't quote me but usually by
the time you finish your days off you really barely got there right and then you're going
back into the fray and so you're operating at this completely constantly hypervigilance
state which is just wrecking wrecking your body as far as stress hormones and and all
that and even interacting with these other restorative factors of your life which is
you know your physical health absolutely on the enduring the badge podcast I heard you
just touch on the officer involved shooting and I'd obviously love to hear kind of your
perspective of that but I think what was even more interesting is you mentioned that it
was the near shootings that actually bothered you more so I don't know if there's a kind
of chronological pattern to those you know near and the one that you actually got involved
with but kind of walk me through that because again you know it gets so politicized again
more often than not depending on the ethnicity of the person that was shot and the ethnicity
of the officer that was involved blah blah blah but the reality is and I've said this
on here there's no one I mean there might be one sociopath out the what two million
cops but no one is waking up in the morning hoping that they're going to shoot someone
that day so talk to me about that kind of combination of the the near shooting and shooting
that you had in your career so far yeah and just you know for my officer involved shooting
the the quick dirty the quick and dirty is that I was called in I was off I was working
as a canine officer and there was a subject that an officer tried to stop for suspected
drug deal like a hand-to-hand and then he started playing the name game as it were right
his names all spelled weird and it's coming back no record which is a telltale sign that
he's lying about his name because he's got warrants and all these things and so he actually
tries to swing on the officer and assault him luckily the officer dodges him and he
takes off and it's a foot chase he and another officer try to engage them on the foot chase
and the guy starts reaching his waistband which fortunately created a reaction for the
officers to kind of peel off and as the suspects passing some bystanders they are able to verify
yeah he is pulling a gun out of his waistband so they locked down the area you know Sunday
midday bunch of shoppers everything in the area and we got called in to to track for
this guy and in the in the dead of the summer and after a couple hours past we basically
honed down to one area which was a closed landscaping business so there was this outdoor
yard and essentially when my dog got in descent he got super animated and then we realized
that the guy might be near or he had just been there my dog Kato found the guy's jacket
under like a riding mower and then that just sent shills down all of our spines because
we're like okay he was definitely here he dropped his jacket or he's still here and
what happened essentially was one of the officers I was with tried to move like this barrel
out of the way for Kato to get back to access where the guy probably was and at that time
the guy popped up we saw his head and he ducked and he actually took a shot at one of the
officers so that became a reaction of just a barrage of gunfire towards that guy and
talking about that it never really bothered me I got to the point where I was telling
the story so frequently and it was you know quote unquote righteous I suppose anything
I say can be inflammatory but the guy popped out and tried to kill a cop after trying to
assault a cop and these things for the fabric society you can't do however luckily he didn't
hit the officer and he was hit multiple times he was actually hiding behind this like cabinet
that in my head was like oh it's just like sheet metal I should shoot through this because
I can't see him and that's what our training would say to do is like hey just recognize
what a bullet can pass through you have lethal force all these things what happened was the
cabinets held all these propane tanks and contrary to mythbusters gunfire can actually
rupture propane tanks and cause this leak and while as mythbusters has pointed out
and a fire investigator later verified propane is extremely hard to ignite from something
like gunfire however at this this landscaping business there was kind of this enclosed quonset
hut so it's like a tarpaulin structure closed on the back and the sides and the roof and
then the front was open what happened in the gunfight was that enough propane leaked out
that it created just the right density where someone's muzzle flash or a bullet or some
sort of spark ignited that and this these flames just you know passed over me and us
and I remember just being so intensely hot and thinking like this is it like this is
the end and I go into that degree of the story because I think that's what helped me recognize
how grateful I was for everything you know we came out of that situation I thought I
was done and then once the moment passed and some of the pain had passed I realized we
weren't done and we got we had to get out of here and everything's on fire and there's
all this popping and hissing of all the unknown chemicals and accelerants and all the things
around us and we start kind of evacing out but one of the officers you know I'm seeing
is crawling out and we think he'd got hit so we pull him out of there and we start stripping
his uniform and checking under his vest and I remember it went from me saying hey man
are you okay are you okay are you okay frantically to you're okay you're okay it'll be okay and
just doing you know our combat first aid just raking his body trying to see if he has any
bullet wounds you know right around that time someone asked me hey where's your dog and
I didn't even give it a thought I just I assumed he was gone I assumed he was just in the gunfire
and in the blaze and I kind of haphazardly called for him but I felt like there was no
point in doing so but as we continued to evac out the suspect actually got up out of the
fire and he starts coming out towards us and trying to flee and so a couple of us engaged
him in gunfire and then he was he was I suppose neutralized I'm not trying to sound cold
I'm just trying to say it as it is but I say all that to say that when I look at that situation
and my dog's okay so for all the dog people out there like you can breathe a breath of
refreshing air we all made it out of there except for the suspect right a handful of
officers even my canine like he had some burnt hair I had second-degree burns of both my
forearms it's pretty gnarly it's pretty gross but all in all like I came out of that feeling
like I was I had a second lease at life right I came out feeling so euphoric which is a
very common response but I wasn't the you know that wasn't the case for everyone and
that was the beginning of the end for someone else's career as far as post-traumatic stress
and I won't get into the details of that but I think it is important to illustrate for
everybody listening like there is such a range of response I thought so frequently about
why I responded the way I did and the best I can come up with was just that my brain
went that way and I think there's a lot of things that we can and can't control and oftentimes
our outlook is one thing that we might not be able to control in the moment but we can
do our best and we can do what we can prior to these these situations of intense stress
so that's my not so short version of the shooting where I reflected so much and yes there's
a lot of stress and there's potential litigation and are you going to get charged and all these
things for doing the right thing and saving your life and your buddy's life but really
I never felt like that was an extreme risk I felt you know I was I was not alone I felt
supported by my agency all these things whereas fast forward a couple years after I promoted
as sergeant and I retired my my police dog there was a situation that is probably the
most significant not the only one where I almost shot someone but the most clear and
the farthest I'd got to you know putting my finger on the trigger but essentially this
was a domestic order violation subject where another agency's canine was tracking and I
was there on what you call containment or perimeter right I was in my marked car trying
to help the help contain the area and hope that the guy beds down it doesn't escape
where we've kind of cordoned off and it just so happened that the dog located the guy really
close to me so when I got out of my car I actually grabbed my rifle and I ran over towards
where they were and this guy was doing everything to try to get shot and he was put put you
know putting his hand in his pocket he was making threats towards us and he was pulling
it out so violently and punching it out and this is one of those I feel like it was like
a Jesus take the wheel moment where I was like everything in my training and gut is
telling me I need to shoot him to save my buddy's life because he was punching out
his fist directly towards my buddy who was off in the distance but for whatever reason
in that fraction of a second which felt like an eternity I was you know putting the aim
of the rifle up and I was pulling slack out of the trigger but I was like that guy's closer
and he has more lighting in this you know in this dark parking area I have to trust
that he knows what he's doing and he's not shooting and so I shouldn't and and he didn't
what he what the suspect was doing was he was creating this finger gun right and he
was reaching his pocket again he started doing it to all of us and increasingly I was like
man is he building up his resolve does he actually have a gun is he just goading us
the first time so then the third time or the fourth time he can take pop shots but in the
end the canine was released and he helped arrest the guy but I had so much consternation
I had so much stress over not just the fact that I didn't shoot but I felt like I had
to but also the continued times that he did that that I questioned man was I irresponsible
was I poorly trained to not do what I should have done categorically at the same time
there is this element where I realized that if I had shot him he was an unarmed man of
color at the end of the day and I was like man everything including the threats and we
didn't have body cam at the time but everything would have supported my shooting him but would
I be getting charged would I be getting arrested and this is the type of complicated feelings
that non-shooters frequently interact with and more than ever it introduces these different
intersections between moral injury should I have shouldn't I have and then you feel
guilty for feeling guilty all these layers that are pretty complicated to unpack but
yeah those are some dynamics of the non-shooting that was really close for me and yeah it's
definitely kept me up in subsequent years less so now I can't think about the last time
it's really caused this strain in me but I know that's a very real concern for officers
out there you know today more than ever where a lot of times officers are doing as they
should as they're trained as their policies and laws allow but we recognize we're in this
perception is reality type of world where that can be a super scary thing.
With that particular call was that ultimately an attempted suicide by cop?
Yeah, yeah he was a he didn't have anything in his pockets but like a cell phone but he
just kept doing it over and over and he he didn't want to go to jail and that was the
thing he kept violating this order he had gotten to the point of a felony and robbery
like he took her purse with force and all that that night but but yeah it was it was
definitely a thing where that was what he was trying to generate out of our interaction
that night.
One of the most irresponsible elements of the way a lot of these incidents are reported
is it's always on the police should have done better and we're never asking the question
why are the streets of America so dangerous when for example the streets of Reykjavik
or Lisbon aren't you know what are we doing to our population that's creating gangs and
homelessness and sex work and all the things that you and I saw you know over and over
and over and over again you know I worked in an area where there's lots of theme parks
where people had no idea what was going on in the darker sides of Orlando for example
but you know you're talking about this one you know near suicide by cop you're talking
about you know the gang members you're talking about all the violence that has devolved our
law enforcement I use that term deliberately because devolved to the point where we look
like we're in Fallujah or you guys look like you're in Fallujah when you're out which then
adds more kind of fuel to the fire as far as trying to interact with the population
that you serve so I this is my personal perspective I think for example the prohibition of drugs
has been an epic failure and what I mean by that is not that we should have it now available
in all the grocery stores but the arrest and incarceration of addicts specifically found
within the addicts users amount of drugs I mean it was alcohol prohibition was an epic
failure in the 30s and then drug prohibition began right after that based on racism and
job justification so as a firefighter paramedic who's pulled yellow blankets over you know
numerous people that have died all from the ripple effect of this this is my personal
perspective talk to me about the mental health element of a lot of the problems that you
see through a police officer's eyes.
There's lots of impact there.
I suppose it's where my mind goes is that it's so complicated to you know dissect I
ended up majoring in political science in college and whereas I wanted to learn so much
about the government it ended up making me feel so dejected and so disillusioned with
how politics work and with that you know I think I'm not alone and there's so many police
officers I personally know that they don't really have a strong opinion with drugs they
just know that extreme enforcement to incarcerate everybody is not the answer and you know opening
up everything also is not the answer.
We see that in our region now as far as the the de-policing or the lack of enforcement
of drugs and the fentanyl epidemic is just off the charts right.
When you started kind of doing this intro leading into the question in all societies
ills and gang culture and violence and trafficking and drugs where I was supposing it would go
is kind of a discussion on like community and how fatherhood is is an absolute lack
thereof is an absolute social ill that's contributing to all these things in my humble
opinion and so how is my experience as a police officer shaped a lot of that I think something
I've said before is that first responder work is an accelerant to a lot of things right
it's an accelerant for you to look at the human condition and you're going to experience
life at this much rapid much more rapid pace you're going to be exposed to so many significant
events and so many traumatic experiences either primary, secondarily or tertiary through being
a first responder and it's going to it's going to allow your condition to be heightened
whether it's positive or negative and so in a lot of ways it's done both you know it made
me like I said really jaded and cynical about the systems or system as far as like criminal
justice but also other systems that we interact with like child protective services like it
is so heartbreaking to see and be interacting with kids that are pulled out of you know
drug-afflicted homes and they're exposed to drugs and the inhalation of some of these
opiates and similar and the you know CPS isn't taking these kids and it just boggles your
mind and I don't presume to know everything about what CPS does or doesn't do but I know
that this is not the answer right and again I'm not trying to point fingers at like one
agency but it's just to say it's made me and so many officers so dejected at times but
again kind of going back to stoicism is like hey we got to just do what we can and recognize
that when we're here in this moment there are so many forces and so many organizations
and so many people that have to be involved in creating the solution and it's just not
sustainable to take that on.
Take that on yourself in the moment right you can be interacting with this kid and you
can think hey for the next six hours I'm going to try to be the best thing that happened
to this kid and you might be the best thing that's happened to that kid that day that
year his or her whole life which is absolutely just saddening to even fathom but you know
I don't even know if I answered your question man.
No you did and it's funny because in actually that is the answer that I was talking about
even though you know the legality of addiction is a big part of it and where I think for
example the Pacific Northwest has dropped the ball is like you said you know reducing
the level of policing in that area which I think is part of it but if you look at for
example Portugal and I had the guy that spearheaded this in Portugal on the show twice now and
they took the money from the quote unquote war on drugs and they slid it over to that
preventative element so they created you know addiction counseling they created mental health
counseling they created job creation so they took someone and okay well if I'm looking
at this as a medical patient who is suffering what's the equal and opposite version of that
where does the money need to go that's what we haven't done so people say oh we tried
that it didn't work well we didn't try that we decriminalized or you know legalized a
couple of things that was it so all your meth heads and you know heroin addicts you can
you know you're still going to prison but if you like cannabis you're fine you know
what I mean it's it's what is filling that void and we see it in the uniform it's the
same exact thing behind closed doors with alcohol and opiates and all this stuff in
fire and police as well so community is the answer but people point at broken homes why
are these homes broken it's this multi-generational trauma if let's pick on dad for a second if
dad isn't around maybe he's an alcoholic maybe he's in prison maybe he didn't have
was wasn't raised with that nurturing environment where he felt an understanding the loyalty
to be with a child and raise him even if the partner was not the right person then you
co-parent as a divorced couple whatever it is so this still circles around to healing
broken people and I mean that you know compassionately this is the part of the conversation that
we don't have when he talks about politics for the last eight years I haven't seen a
fucking ounce of compassion and community from either of the two last shitbags that
we've had supposedly running this country nothing to pull people together bring us together
talk about healing talk about community so that's what we're missing and it's glaring
you know should we throw addicts in prison no but should we just ignore them then also
no these are people that are hurting and they're you know that lack of mentorship then leads
to gang membership and all the other things that we see and then the the fact that our
we have drug prohibition empowers the underworld to make a shitload of money off addicts you
put those addicts in the hands of the medical community like Portugal does you cut the head
off the snake now our law enforcement can focus on the sellers and the smugglers and
the judicial system will be opened up so the real criminals of the world can feel the full
effect of the law so I it's interesting having these conversations and it's just the answer
is yes community can you know replay you know building these homes again but how do we do
that if we don't address the underlying mental health issues that are multi-generational
in our country yeah and that's where I like about you know my region a lot of the west
coast and the pacific northwest is recognizing these other tools right if if law enforcement
is the hammer then yeah sometimes you have screws you don't it's not just nails you're
you're dealing with right so you might need a screwdriver you might need these other tools
at the same time I think that where a lot of agencies or regions or departments cities
have flopped is that thinking that's either or and I love how you said and right and is
like one of my new favorite words in the last couple years because I like to say and rather
than but because defund where that went wrong is just trying to shutting down this one machine
and trying to rebuild something totally different but kind of the same but also right like essentially
we just need more and I know that it's not it might sound too simplistic to say yeah
just not more money yep I know that things cost money but we can't shut down something
like the criminal justice system because there's just still so much violence and there are
people that need to be arrested right but not everyone needs to go to jail right there
are diversion programs I like seeing things like that there are a lot of successes I'm
aware of that co-responder units whether they're built through the local fire department
or ancillary thereof with mental health professionals responding alongside or being able to get
called out by law enforcement I think those are a lot of the right answers or diversifying
some of your law enforcement to do some of those types of roles because again it's not
either or some people say police aren't social workers okay all first responders have a degree
of the social worker heart and service you you can't reconcile that we're in the people
business right I always say it's people taking care of people so if you want to be a first
responder and that just that that's you have an aversion to that then you're in the wrong
line of work but yeah going back to these complicated issues they're going to take complicated
solutions and that's to be adaptable and that's to think creatively and just really look at
the problem from multiple angles when we talk about community involvement I think that's
another great solution is and you know how do we for example increase diversity in uniform
and rebrand ourselves we brand ourselves better it's funny you obviously get pulled through
the meat grinder depending on you know if it's a horrific event like the George Floyd
or whether it's a as we said a gray area event that actually you know it's you could argue
either way and this this person was doing the best at that moment but you know the fire
service has done a terrible job of branding because no one knows what the hell we do like
no one and then you know you could watch Chicago fire or to come where FD you know you're not
going to really see what fire firefighters do and even someone made a point very good
point recently like if you watch even the reality shows on the fire service they're
always saves you know I've worked 14 years I never had a code save my whole career that's
the reality of cardiac arrest most of them don't come back I was a black cloud so none
of mine came back but you know so we're painting this false story but we're also kind of painting
this you know firehouse jovial nature they sleep all night kind of thing and of course
there are elements of truth in all of those but the reality is very different where I
think there's so much value and power is mentorship programs and one of my friends started one
here that's phenomenal because you're basically removing the barriers to entry you're immersing
yourself in cultures that are underserved communities and you're telling these young
boys and girls hey all you've got to do is show up to this fire station we will give
you the equipment we will give you the training in this this area there are scholarships of
fire academy there are departments they're looking to hire you on the other end now you're
exposing these young people to this profession some of them will be drawn and absolutely
excel some of them will enter and go oh like my stepson actually it's not what I want to
do beautiful now you've figured out you know one thing that you don't want to do anymore
but that to me is also how you really kind of extend into the community because now you're
educating young people not in the show and tell look at my swap vehicle type way but
actually given an experience and and really understanding what it is you do and empowering
them that that is one of the options that they could choose to serve their community
as well yeah I think that's a huge opportunity and you hit them from different generations
different stages of life we have community academies where a lot of adults come in they
learn about the police right and sometimes they are some people that are a little bit
critical of the police they get invited in right members of the community and generally
I have I've not heard otherwise but people leave as advocates because they see how strapped
we are they learn so many dynamics of the the police department that even our new officers
don't know right they get to meet different units and hear about civilian roles and all
these competing interests and at the end of the day you have something like that you have
coffee with the chief you have community meetings but then you hit it from younger generations
right so you have things like explorers one of the successes that we had in recruiting
was recognizing that community engagement recruiting were the same thing and so whereas
throughout the nation a lot of community engagement units were dismantled because staffing was
so poor we took it on our own role as far as recruiters to say hey we're just going
to be everywhere in the community that we can be and if we're talking to 10 year old
kids and helping them be less scared of the police that's fantastic maybe we don't get
any names on the clipboard that I want to test next month that's okay just because by
virtuous being out there and engaging that is the same goal and we're going to put it
on social media and we're going to show people that we're out here and people should come
to us if they have questions I've had people come to me in a recruiting type of booth and
ask some pretty critical poignant questions about law enforcement and to give them a pretty
candid honest answer as a human being rather than I'm a representative of blah blah blah
and this is the kind of note card that I'm supposed to read off of people get that like
that authenticity is so important and essentially humanizing the experience is the biggest thing
that we can do just to build some connection with the community and I'd be remiss if I
didn't mention cops in schools programs where we used to be a lot better about it I'd love
to see a return to that and sometimes it is a two-way street where public schools aren't
very accepting or inviting to police officers we see that in the area in the region in recent
years but for years I was on day shift and I was loosely assigned to one elementary school
and every week at least once or twice I would swing by at lunchtime although I worked at
a busy agency like I made it a priority but I'd swing by during lunchtime or recess I
would just hang out I would kick you know kick the ball I would you know swing from
the monkey bars I'd be sitting down with kids as they're having lunch asking them what they're
eating and just having those organic interactions where we're not taking someone to jail I mean
that's so critical just to build that build that relationship with them at a different
age.
What is your perspective on school safety?
I you know had all kinds of guests on here and there's been some incredibly brilliant
ideas you know put there but it seems like one of the again if you got a Venn diagram
where they all intersect is having an officer in the school now we do here I want to preface
that that's the right officer in the school I had a really horrendous experience with
my son in middle school with an SRO and the principal and I discovered tripped over a
fact that this would be going on for a while and it's actually been remedied and laws have
changed here and if that officer did the same thing now she would be in prison for it so
you know again so I when I'm very supportive of obviously my brothers and sisters in blue
I have some police horror stories myself you know and it's despite that because I know
that that was that individual not the profession but so talk to me about your perspective of
school safety in general and then if you are behind having SROs in schools what kind of
person needs to be in that role?
Yeah I love I love the idea and I love that you added on it has to be the right person
I think that that is a great theme for everything but it needs ultimately I love the the friendly
interaction I love the lack of rigidity I love an approachable officer but as a parent myself
and seeing the world today I want someone that's tactically proficient and able to
handle the ultimate threat which is the ultimate priority in our society everyone needs to
be united in this is the safety of our children like they are the literal future if not for
them what is this all for and so whether it's this conversation or whether it's us going
to work every day that is the point that is why we put our lives on the line now with
that said I love the idea of like an officer friendly like I love the idea of separating
the discipline aspect a lot of schools handle that on their own or they have school security
to have the officer be an extension of the boogeyman archetype is not helpful for our
developing kids it's not helpful for relationships with police as they grow into adolescence
as they have these trivial issues whether it's drinking or truancy all these things
and it's not helpful to their adulthood either so I think that the best benefit is where
you have someone that is approachable they are like a staff member and a mentor for those
that might be interested in the job but moreover just because everyone is going to be interacting
with the police officer at some point and that's where the dare officers a lot of people
have personal anecdotes contrary to the quote unquote perceived failure or the documented
failure of the dare program with drug enforcement or drug awareness is that so many people can
cite their dare officer and their dare officers name and recognize that it was a positive
influence just as this teacher kind of coach mentorship.
I love that don't make the cop the boogeyman that's again another layer that you've just
added to this beautiful tapestry that I've got now when it comes to school security and
I think 100% some of the things I've heard is yes you need to have exactly that you need
to have someone that can interact with the kids that maybe inspire them to put a uniform
on themselves but if nothing else humanize the world of policing and be there you know
maybe a kid will open up to them so be that yin yang and going back to Asian culture and
my love of it I've talked about this a lot the problem is men quote unquote have kind
of found themselves as a white circle and forget that we're soft and hard you know and
the police officer in credit to Ocala here we had a shooting I was actually in a code
red and it ended up being a false alarm they'd never had a code red before in elementary
school with my son I was dropping him off on a medical after a medical appointment and
I got to see firsthand from the inside the school how vulnerable how you know how disconnected
these children and teachers are when this is going on now Parkland you know we had an
avaldee we have one side forest high school the teacher actually talked the kid down and
then the SRO ran towards the danger and ended up detaining the kid and it was a slightly
different scenario I think he shot once and I think it shook him out of it and then he
but regardless it's irrelevant so having that yin and yang having that police officer that
people feel comfortable going to maybe might prevent them ever going down the world of
addiction because they're that kind compassionate big brother or sister but at the same time
as you said now you've got you know someone with extreme psychosis walking towards the
school with automatic weapons now they're able to switch in a completely different mode
yeah and I'll inject I think that it's very relevant to say hey when you when you select
people for these roles it shouldn't be seniority based it should be merit based it should be
tenacity based right you might presume that a school resource officer is kind of like
a past out to pasture retirement gig and it shouldn't be it should be a tiring job it
should be a hard job it should be a job where that officer is learning everything they can
they should probably go to the SWAT trainings you know so they are up to date on tactics
they should probably be extremely physically prepared they should probably be going to
all these after hours meetings with teachers with staff with parents right it's it's this
community engagement aspect they should be intertwined and interacting with criminal
intelligence units in your department because there are those kids and I'm not saying they
need to be like hunted but no like a lot of times the SRO will be engaged and know what's
going on and know who kids are hanging out with if a kid shoots another kid that SRO
should be the first and most prolific resource to access in those times of need and so it's
not a it should not be a chill relaxed job it should be an engaging probably exhausting
job because the stakes are high and the opportunities are so huge if someone does that job right
I couldn't agree more I want to hit one more area can operation side and then we'll go
to peer support I had numerous people now that are canine handlers on the show Mike
Goosby was on one of the canine kind of gurus from LA I had Billy Cushing on and when you
hear again the way that canines are projected to the public you know used as a kind of political
tool versus the reality of the canine world and how infrequently they even bite it seems
insanity to fight to remove a tool that ultimately is going to save lives not only of the people
you know that are committing the crime but also our officers and civilians so talk to
me about the canine program through your lens yeah it's just a very unique tool and when
I was in canine one thing I used to describe it was that the community meetings or what
have you is that as technology is growing and growing and advancing and doing all these
things that we wouldn't have been able to recognize them doing there's still no tech
that can do what a canine can do that can that dog those dogs can actually exercise
judgment right they they can read a situation but beyond that because some people might
think that that's a little you know I'm over my skis right now but they're not robots right
they and there's no robot that can program right now to detect individualized scent and
so when a canine is tracking a suspect they're tracking nuances of that person's unique
fingerprint of odor which is everything from their their their family background to what
they eat what they bathe with what they're wearing you know how stressed they are and
this apocrine scent that comes out like all these super specific nuances and there's no
tech that can do that right so if you have someone that is a bad bad dude or bad bad
gal that's committed a very violent thing and very determined to escape law enforcement
that's who you're using utilizing a canine for to seek them out to find them whether
they're in an attic or whether they're in the woods somewhere these are the people that
would otherwise have gotten away because they avoided detection and just a drone just a
chopper sometimes that's enough not enough sometimes it is a collaboration of so many
things and then ultimately yes there is that degree of these dogs are gonna be out there
and they might catch a knife like mine did instead of an officer and you know he recovered
from that so he's kind of we would joke that he had nine lives and I think he spent them
all when I recounted them back and the different incidents he was involved in but yeah he might
catch a knife she might catch a bullet and that's part of the gig right to protect someone
else and I like how you even pointed out sometimes because protecting the suspect because catching
a dog bite is a lot better than catching a bullet and that's use of force continuum our
prerogative is always to use the lowest level of force that we need to use to affect the
situation to affect the arrest well I know in Billy Cushing's story his dog I think it
was Kit I believe was killed but he discovered a guy hiding behind a kind of rain barrel
if memory serves me right and that allowed you know the other officers to see him in
time and shoot him and we just lost a canine I think it was canine Leo here in Marion
County that was killed it was a beautiful story actually tragic the way it ended but
our local paramedics in Marion County had just gone through a canine first aid class
so after the canine was shot the actual the other the human paramedics worked on the dog
and from what I understand Gainesville Marion and Alachua counties all cleared the roads
while this you know ambulance took the canine all the way up to the the UF Shands here in
Gainesville and sadly he passed away but he was given every single chance you know they
were able to at least stabilize him up to that point but this you know these are the
incredible you know dogs that serve in law enforcement and obviously in our military
as well and you know to disband them because of you know comparing them to kind of Nazi
Germany when when it's the opposite when you actually understand what they do they've saved
so many you know criminals lives that given them a chance to you know to rehabilitate
and hopefully have a full life versus as you said you know they just end up shooting because
that's the only tool they've got yeah and I'd like to add to there it is the one use
the force here to date that you can recall you know you can't you can't shoot a taser
in midair the barbs you just retract them back because someone's hands go up in the
air and so that is a unique factor of something where you can evaluate that is that is a good
thing people should be able to surrender and they do all the time.
One more tangent before we go to mental health what about fitness standards does your department
actually hold a fitness standard no it's one of the one of my struggles and kind of pet
peeves is I have a love hate relationship with unions and I while I would be terrified
of working in a right to work kind of state where there's no union protection because
of the things that those officers or firefighters may face is it allows this degree of protection
for people that can't do the job honestly the way that they ought to do it and this
is not to inject shame I know that there are those folks that kind of do put out shame
and guilt from a first responder perspective my goal would be to to elevate it and provide
all the resources to help people through that I love that my department has has pure fitness
program right there's a group of us that are basic strength and conditioning coaches where
we can meet with officers one on one we can meet them in small groups we can lead workouts
I think it's providing all the necessary resources to get people well but at the same time you
can look across the country and we know that there's a lot of people that are not ready
not fit for duty as it were from any first responder role and it's rolling the dice every
single day that they go out and that's not again to disparage them but that's just to
recognize like these are really high-stakes situations and we need to support our folks
to do that and peer support's a great segue into that I have the same relationship with
unions I was a union member of my whole career but 14 years I look back and when what's really
changed the workweek still absolutely blows we still don't have a nationwide fitness standard
you know the the mental health and the fire yes there are some people within our unions
that travel the country and do good things but as far as facilities we have one one facility
in the northeast of the country for a million firefighters so you know I I love the union
philosophy I do I think it makes perfect sense but I think there's a lot of self-serving
in unit unions and I have seen with my own eyes union you know leadership obviously opposing
fitness standards because they themselves couldn't fucking pass it you know in a year
from now if they train they're so fucking far from it so they've gone from serving the
people to serving themselves so that's where I have an issue with it the the crazy thing
is I've had numerous people from you know special forces special operations they clearly
have their own standards and you know once you fall below that you're off the team but
also ocean lifeguards you know and I was a lifeguard for a while not in the ocean but
in open water in pools and you know if you fail your swim test as a lifeguard that's
it you don't have your your certification anymore so it blows me away because they have
this all you're trying to take our jobs thing now I'm not saying about implementing a standard
tomorrow and everyone that can't cut it you just fire of course you have an on ramp of
fitness again but in a profession where lives are at stake in a profession where people
put punch three numbers on the telephone and whatever the hell it is we're going to show
up for them not to have fitness standards well I'm gonna have to strap a hundred pounds
of gear on me you know clothing and equipment and climb tens and tens of stairs before we
even go to work that I'm not held to a fitness standard is absolute insanity to me and then
in law enforcement these videos where you see these deconditioned officers you don't
have to be a genius to see how that then is a domino effect of mistakes that could be
fatal for themselves or someone they serve but also just layering this fitness conversation
the officers I've had on the show that are in great shape that you know are whatever
belt in jujitsu or you know whatever their thing is they're the ones that have the least
hand on hands-on interactions because there's also then that deterrent element to it as
well yeah yeah you keep your cool you're emotionally
regulated when you take care of things like exercise so yeah even beyond grappling and
these things that are so necessary and so beneficial if you just have some pretty decent
cardio you know you do a metcon every other week or you do some intervals or you lift
some weights casually right if it's social hour you will be more emotionally regulated
which is exactly the goal right for de-escalation talking people down and you're gonna have
a presence you're gonna have a confidence that you can handle yourself people won't
feel like they need to take a shot at the title which is a good thing and so yeah unions
are tough because yeah I agree like there's a way to maybe grandfather people in you have
this transitionary period but even at least for law enforcement there's a lot of roles
especially medium to large-sized departments where you shouldn't have to do like let's
say you're 45 and you have a bum knee I'm not saying that you can't be a cop you could
be an investigator you could be all these things there should be some level of fitness
right because you never know what your job may entail but there truly are some roles
especially the bigger the departments go where you might not have to do exactly what the
20 24 to 28 year old patrol officer is doing however in my experience even unions will
fight that notion yeah you could you could do so much hiring civilians to do some of
this back office work but no that's police officer work right but so often in the nation
we're having such a shortage of police officers and yet we're fighting ourselves to relinquish
that work that we truly don't want to do anyway or have the bandwidth to do yeah no exactly
and I always I always frame it this way there's a phrase that's got knocked around the the
fire service a lot would you want you rescuing you and I totally understand that concept
but that's that's me I'm less worried about me how would you feel if your family died
because the rescuer hadn't trained so your family you live in a 10-story apartment building
and the firefighter tapped out on the fifth floor and your child died well the medic tapped
out and your child choked that's what we're talking about it's not about oh you're trying
to take our job this fucking job requires an elite level of fitness you are tactical
athletes so if it's not the right job for you beautiful fire prevention investigation
whatever your thing is I agree with you a thousand percent but you've got no business
being a frontline personnel in a profession where you might need to do a foot chase you
couldn't you couldn't track down that person then they walked into a school and shot 20
children just because you didn't fucking take your job seriously that is where the line
is between you know oh they're trying to take our jobs and is this the right person for
the job in the first place and this circles fully around to the recruitment now we're
letting the wrong person in the front door which is terrifying yeah and I think that
there's ways to build a culture and yes it won't be overnight but you should have abilities
to work out on duty and whereas some firefighters able to do that easier not all right if you're
in a busy department that's going to be an issue so really truly carving that out where
in your day to day or your week to week you are working out you're not accountable for
the radio you're not accountable to grab a call and truly if it's talking about rest
and rehabilitation it's shorter shorter shift work and it's true protected sleep for firefighters
and it's and it's more training and it's wrapping up all these things are going to help people
actually function well and be able to do all these things that are are expected of the
job and they won't be unreasonable asks right because you're providing them the time and
the resource and the support to do them one of my friends said blah blah who's a Canadian
Royal Man at least and he was said yeah amazing guy yeah he was saying you know say you have
a five day cycle of you know of shifts in law enforcement day five should be a training
day I love that that should be completely woven in now you don't have to think about
your combatives or defensive tactics or your fitness because every week you're going to
be doing you know exercise a and then operational skill B and it's just completely infused and
then again if that's from day one it becomes a culture and I think that's amazing but again
that involves proactively investing in the department and then we're talking about the
funding for the addiction element well think about how much money this country bleeds because
of the problems with all the crimes that we see on the street what if we took some of
that money put it on the front end we would save money hand over fist if we address some
of the you know the issues that our population suffers from same with law enforcement take
some of that money proactively build you know one of those days training day obviously again
needing to hire a few more people and now every single week or every single 10 days
or whatever it is those officers are getting that and it's it's part of the work week it's
what you do every single you know cycle yeah I love it and shout out to Seb I'm going to
do a little plug because it's just as much about Seb and Marc Bouchard but my recent episode 68 on
blue grit radio but we talk about agency culture leadership and wellness and where they all
intersect and I it is one of the episodes I'm most proud of truly as far as listening to it back and
going through it and they agreed I think it was such a collaborative effort for the three of us
to talk through these issues and take the gloves off a little bit but I drew do truly think that
it'd be so helpful for people regardless of their organization really all these all these things
that intersect and we need to talk about them absolutely well I want to go to mental health
then so again on the on the enduring the badge podcast I'm giving a lot of shout out today
you talked about peer support but I loved again a phrase it's just something that you said in
passing you were talking more about building a peer culture now that I think is is again
sometimes absent from this conversation we assign eight firefighters as our peer support people
all right let's check that box now we can move on Dana Ali was one of the the firefighters I have
from North Carolina she said the goal of you know the mental health conversation is one day you know
we won't need a peer support team anymore that everyone will be that and I think that's the
beautiful goal and I agree with her a thousand percent so talk to me about your perspective of
the peer support element yeah it's exactly that you build a culture of peer support so it's not
just who has peer next to their name or they have a little extra training but when you know
it's happening right people are checking in and it becomes irrelevant and that is the goal right
where kind of like you said everyone is just doing it I think we're getting to the point where I see
some agencies doing it and I see this happening in my own agency where I read about something in
an email when I'm off and I'm like man that's a significant incident just for the leadership that
you know we're kind of brought in for awareness and then I reach out to the peer support contacts
on that crew or the sergeant I'm like hey how's everyone doing like oh we hashed it out we talked
about in the briefing it was really good like I don't need to know details but just the fact that
I know that there's a couple peer representatives in the room and they're talking about it at their
daily roll call and these officers are a little bit more tenured and there's a bunch of new people
in the room and they're simply unpacking it they're simply bringing awareness and acknowledgement to
this thing this call was really crappy that thing with the kid is super depressing and I'm kind of
messed up over it just saying that in a small group or individually or in a room it removes the
stigma right it's exactly what Mark Bouchard talks about in our episode right he just really
right he just released a book called setting my sights on stigma and he comes from an emergency
response team background right so it's like literally put it in your sniper sights to destroy
that stigma so the more we beat the drum and just we just socialize it we have more and more and more
conversations about it we have more and more and more conversations about how we need to have
conversations my goal is it for it to be redundant where I bring a peer support right just check in
they're like oh yeah thanks boss like eight people have already checked in on me and I got to talk to
my therapist this friday I'm like cool awesome right you know I'm wearing my hat and it says
Ken it has it's not really affiliated with my workplace but it is directly intertwined but it's
for my buddy who was killed in duty and Diego and so that that informed so much of my story
and why I look at peer support the way I do and I was a member of the team of my department for
years and I like to think that's because I'm an approachable guy I you know like I said earlier
I'm not I don't run from my feelings but the same time it wasn't until Diego's death that
I was really having to go under the microscope where I was such an advocate for mental health
awareness I was such an advocate for seeking resources but I never went to talk to a therapist
outside of getting hired on for my psych exam like a psychiatrist so really it was just over
and over you know I was revisiting this this process and losing a friend talking through it
daily with my wife and it was my close friends that said hey I think you should talk to somebody
and I'm like yeah I appreciate that I'm good they're like no no like you really need to talk
to somebody so I share that story because it might be the advocate that's saying all these things and
beating the drum but oftentimes we do see in the peer support circles a lot of folks aren't taking
care of themselves they're so focused on others which is exactly in line with the caretaker
caregiver culture in first responder work and so it is to say we all need it and we just need to
be having the conversation more and more. If you want to tell me who Diego was let's kind of share
his story a little bit. Yeah Diego is kind of a legend at this point he's he was larger than life
but he was he was the cop that when he was killed laying out spike strips in our city after
there was a group that was shooting at another group and they're trying to get that car but
he found himself in the road it wasn't clear traffic which is a very deadly thing. I hate
spike strips I was close to telling my guys I didn't want them to put them out when I was a
sergeant but that's not right either right but a lot of cops get killed laying out spike strips
in the road but essentially you know we were super close friends for years you know he was
at my wedding we went to bachelor parties together we traveled we our families interacted we saw
movies we went to breweries we did all the things right and there was a really close group of us but
he was one of those guys that when he was lost like a bunch of people felt like they lost their
best friend because he was the guy that made everyone feel like they were his best friend
but a lot of what I look at Diego's legacy and how what it's meant for my career is
doing the things that I didn't feel comfortable with or competent in which were things like
community engagement which are things like public speaking which are things like spending time with
kids at schools like all these things that I talk about and I try to make so much about
how I want to do the job and how I want to be a member of the community and how I want to be a dad
are inspired by him they're inspired by his legacy and his inspiration and there are things that I
just truly recognized how significant they were how inspiring and how important they are how
crucial they are even though I wasn't that kind of cop you know when we lost him I was like man we
need more cops like that and the little I can do is try to measure up to a little piece of that
and it's directly related with you know me doing what I'm doing on social media like that wasn't me
I didn't interact with cops on social media and now it's become such a rewarding thing to be
connecting with people like yourself that are in this but for him he loved to network and he knew
so many cops outside the region whereas I was just kind of in my little bubble so to speak a little
bit more personally about about him yeah it was such a it was such a surreal thing but you know I
actually posted a picture of selfie with the two of us just yesterday and I got a couple messages
which were very very warming and very supportive but people like oh praying for you thinking about
you I was like now I think about him it's it's all positive right it's when I post a picture I'm not
in a sad place I'm in a very happy place in a very grateful place well thank you for sharing that I
mean this is this is a great opportunity when we we have conversations like this is to just you know
story tell about who someone was and then carry on that legacy a little bit talk to me about
your social media just talked about instagram a second ago because obviously we've pulled some
issues out of the shadows into the light but this show is all about solutions it's not about just
talking shit and then walking away and you've managed to curate your social media in a very
positive way and I think this is the issue when people say oh it's so negative that well you're
you know you're looking in the wrong places you're putting the wrong things in the funnel
in the beginning you know so when I scroll through mine you know it's obviously a lot of
first responder stories but it's you know kind of stories and you know charitable things and it's
beautiful you know and it's not an echo chamber I'm just choosing to to look at the good things
in the world that are that are human beings so what was your introduction to create in
initially the page and then I think it's interesting as well we talked a while ago
talk to me about the support from your department because a lot of departments will shut down
social media which again branding the fire service now you know a lot of our voices are
are not able to get out there and show the good that we do in uniform yeah so my social media
really took off you know Diego died in 2018 and it made me a little bit more comfortable posting on
my own social media so that was my own personal page my facebook and in 2020 the type of adversity
we faced I just found myself using it as an outlet and a sharing of my own anecdote and
speaking from the place where a lot of cops felt which was equally frustrated with the state of
the nation and equally hurting and wanting to say hey the majority of us are here for you we're here
for each other and we're just trying to do the best we can and I found a lot of comfort in sharing
that in a public way and I got a lot of positive response right I had really positive response from
people that I grew up with people that I went to college with that either didn't know I was a cop
or just kind of wrote me off because they didn't like cops and they're like man like you're you're
a good dude I've known you for so many years and I knew what you're about I remember you from you
know back when you're scrawny little shy eric and like we need more cops like you and that felt like
nice for a second but then it really just got me more frustrated because I was like if you only knew
if you only knew what most police officers were like because I'm just me like I'm I'm good at a
couple things but I'm pretty mediocre cop but there are some of these people that would never
be on social media because they're too busy working overtime cracking cases trying to get justice for
family with a murdered loved one like I'm not that guy that's that guy or that gal and so then I felt
emboldened to explore a little bit more on social media I started a blog blue grit wellness.com
which is pretty inactive now because the instagram is where I'm at most of the time but yeah just
blue grit wellness and it started from a place of just wanting to put positive content out and where
I felt that it can make the most difference was just trying to inspire first responders and non
just to adopt slightly healthier lifestyles you know where I reflect on my own career my points
of cynicism or loneliness were when my health practices weren't great and so learning about so
much of that in the grind learning about sleep issues or sleep habits that are helpful because
of my sleep issues was a thing and so I try to share that out and fitness and nutrition these
are all things that I learned from being a cop and having to learn them or else I would not be
functioning well I would not be optimized and I feel like I'm pretty close to that
in the last handful of years although I do have my dips right and sometimes that's stress sometimes
that interacts with different facets of my life you know I've been a dad for going on five years
now and so fatherhood and being a parent and showing up and not being distracted like that's
that's part of the things I'm constantly reflecting on working on so I share that out
and also intersections with my job so being in hiring recruiting for almost two years until the
last few months like that's what I was posting about all the time right hiring standards lowering
I post about it seeing people doing things the right way like hosting classes essentially that
mentorship we talked about earlier I talk about it and I post about it at the same time just
sharing a little bit about what that perspective is like for a cop and then starting the podcast
a little bit more than a year ago a blue grit radio which is just to have these types of quality
conversations right so long form you can really dive into these things that we just need more of
which is wellness but it leads directly into leadership and culture and first responder work
and then without right so there's industry professionals from the healthcare space or just
from mindset or from self-care what have you because it's all important it's all some stuff
that we need a lot more of absolutely no it's that's just it I mean there are so many people
that are needing help and I've talked about this in the past a couple of times people have said
they wanted to start podcasts and they say to me I don't want to tread on your toes and you know I
tell them oh firstly I didn't invent the podcast so that in itself is ridiculous but secondly
the more there are out there the more people are going to find the right fit they might want to you
know they might want to hear someone with this background or you know small agency a large agency
or this ethnicity or whatever it is you know the fact that there's more and more and more podcasts
and documentaries and you know knowledge sharing without any kind of ulterior motive I think is
incredible and so I commend you on starting the podcast too because I mean Seb Lavoie for example
an amazing human being but you are then able to disseminate all this information and it's not just
your area I mean people around the world can listen to your podcast and access it.
No I appreciate that and I did have that degree of I think it was one part imposter syndrome and
then another part because I am in the space so I'm like man there's so many people I admire the
crap out of that are doing this work such as yourself right but going back to Mark he was
working on his book that's not finished when we initially connected and chatted a couple years ago
but he was like man it doesn't matter whether it's your blog or my book or your Instagram or
your podcast like someone might read my words and have like nothing to do with it and someone might
hear you and be all about it and conversely the same right I like to think that maybe I can help
distill down what Seb says into like more normal brain because half the stuff he says I gotta listen
to it again because I was like you're blowing my mind with the level of the level of genius I just
called him that and he's of course so humble to kind of swat it away but I'm like no literally
like what you say is like truth bombs and I'm just trying to catch up in this conversation so
yeah we just need more and again if we can help this goal to be redundant then we'll succeed but
we got a long way to go. Absolutely well speaking of books you mentioned about Mark's book is there
a book or are there books that you love to recommend it can be related to our discussion
today or completely unrelated? Yeah there is one of the ones that I'm revisiting a lot is
the daily stoic and I just got the dad version of that right so Ryan Holliday and it just focuses
again on stoic philosophy because I think that those are some of the most tangible things where
you could read a line or passage you know whether it's a day or every couple days or you read a
couple but it's such a tangible low-hanging fruit to focus on and I love reading you know truly I
love reading things outside of our industry too. I'm trying to get more into fiction because I'm
typically the type that's like no I gotta I gotta learn something right now but whether it's
consuming podcasts across industries learning from leadership in the private sector has been
really helpful for me to adopt into police culture because we just see things differently
but at the end of the day it's just people right we're just we're just learning to work better and
communicate better with people so that's what I try to do as far as what I write about in Police
One and try to put out for those that are wanting to kind of take take things in from a different
angle. Brilliant what about movies and documentaries any of those that you love?
So many so many you know I really love movies with you know that sense of sacrifice right
brotherhood I was just talking about this recently with somebody Luke Goodish so shout out to him but
you know Banda Brothers, Saving Private Ryan I think that they just have this call to
service and being about something bigger than yourself and sacrifice and brotherhood.
I have a soft spot for any any story with some family adversity you know of course there's so
many because so many people have experienced that. As far as documentaries I didn't grow up playing
sports but I'm so fascinated with sports psychology and looking at the difference between winners and
those that don't win right like in what it takes to build a team through coaching and so that it's
such a great time as supposed to be alive and have access to documentaries about athleticism
because you really see how mindset informs that and how communication makes the difference or the
team right behind the team behind the cyclists like it's not just the guy on the bike it's
everyone else around them. Absolutely what about great people is there a person that you'd recommend
to come on this podcast as a guest to speak to the first responders military and associated
professions of the world? That's good that's a good question you got Seb. Oh you have you've had
Sean Taylors too right? Yes. Yeah I just I found that with Satch and oh man like that introduced
such a different angle to two gentlemen that I've I've heard and I've spoken to and I've
interviewed myself and you're putting me on the spot because people are like why are you saying me?
Why are you saying me? You can get back to me down the road a lot of people do. I will I will.
All right then last question before we make sure everyone knows where to find all the platforms
that you have what do you do to decompress? That's great what I've been doing to decompress
is going out in nature I think that's one of the sometimes someone like myself it's hard
especially building social media and all these platforms right where it feels like another job
and it's directly related to the job so taking my dog out and leaving the phone if I'm not going
super far that's that's kind of a struggle but having some boundaries or limits saying say hey
I'm not I don't need to be anywhere right now so I'm having this phone literally for emergency but
also the new challenge is not listening to something right because there's so many awesome
podcasts and so much to learn or even music but just to be is the new challenge. I'm gonna do one
more shout out Joey 9mm Musashi but his challenge was to throw in journaling right and even use a
fountain pen because it forces you to slow down and focus on calligraphy and I'm like a chicken
scratch guy like so if I have thoughts and I can't I can't even read my notes so just to slow down
slow down in whatever way you can hang out with my family my wife and my daughter that's that's the
stuff. Brilliant what about places to find you so where can people find the Instagram page where
can they find the podcasts and are there any other areas? Yeah the big thing is blue grit wellness
one word on Instagram blue grit radio that's on all your major players YouTube's just the audio
but if you can subscribe subscribe that's fantastic blue grit radio sorry blue grit wellness.com is the
blog and it has links to the other things how you can get in contact with me and my emails on there
brilliant well Eric I want to say thank you so much we've been all over the place like when I
listened to you in the in the podcast that I did listen to I could see yeah the compassion and the
empathy in there and it was interesting because you know you were very adamant on the fact that
you had highs and lows when it came to that area too but going from the mental health to you know
addiction and the physical standards in our professions it's been an incredible conversation
so I want to thank you so much for being so generous with your time and coming on the podcast
today. No thank you man I really appreciate it I love the work you're doing and I'm I'm
very grateful that we're able to connect.