Submitted by Jeffrey S. Katz, an instructor in the Leadership Education Unit at the FBI Academy and a graduate of FBI National Academy Session 264.

A career in policing is rife with trauma. We frequently witness tragedy firsthand and routinely experience the worst samplings of human behavior. When we think we have seen it all, someone raises the bar to an entirely new level of deviance. As the years pass, so does our innocence, and innocence lost is irrecoverable.

We operate within an imperfect system made up of imperfect people, serving a society with evolving and opaque expectations of those who protect them. There seems to be a sense of increasing intolerance for poor outcomes — and things have certainly already gone sideways in many situations before someone gets the idea “Hey! Maybe I should call the police.”

This is not meant to cause a sense of regret or malaise but rather to underscore the reality that the work we and our folks have signed up to do is hard — very hard. We know this, but it deserves public acknowledgment, especially after the past few years.

Police work can certainly take a hefty toll on us as people. It can harden our hearts; contribute to isolation, depression, and self-protecting cynicism; and even lead to self-destructive mechanisms ranging from substance abuse to suicide. The nature of our work makes it easy for our sense of humanity to erode significantly during this otherwise noble journey. That is not good for our people, profession, or community.

Historically, we have done poorly in acknowledging our work’s human toll. We can recognize the difficulties endemic to our work without being “soft” or “weak.” Intentional recognition of the rigors of policing can help prepare veterans and new trainees alike by stressing the importance of self-care, fitness, and mindfulness practices as lifestyle features that expand the scope of traditional officer safety techniques. Doing so will not just help produce better police officers; it will help promote healthier, happier, and more centered human beings.

Many of us entered this arena with the genuine desire to make the world a better place. Perhaps it is time to start by making the world a better place for those who share our desire to do good for others. Think compounding human interest.

We need to emphasize our humanity, lean into the challenges of our work, and encourage our personnel to report for duty centered, supported, well-rested, and open to the reality that the world is not such a bad place after all — our exposure is just wildly skewed. Together, we can acknowledge this, rebalance our focus, realign our officer safety practices, and marshal the future of policing toward a better tomorrow that emphasizes the common humanity we all share.

The world can be scary, but we can do scary together in new ways and succeed. Time to get after it!