Beginning With The End In Mind

A career in law enforcement is a marathon, not a sprint. I don’t know about you, but as for me, I want to finish in the upright position. I don’t want to get to the end and collapse in a grasping, gasping, crumpled, depleted heap. I want to run the course, finish strong, and still be able to walk the next day. I want to have gas left in the tank for my family, to enjoy life after the badge, and to have a successful encore career.

But to do that, I must begin with the end in mind.

Jammed Up And Burnt Out

Too many guys get jammed up or burnt out because they are only thinking about right now or this weekend. They make short term decisions with long term consequences, sacrificing their future selves on the altar of their present whims. They start their career hard and fast, hammering overtime and details, spending money like a politician, partying like it’s 1999, drinking like a fish, eating whatever they feel like, and by mid-career they are a burnt out shell of their former selves.

They sprinted the first half of their marathon and have nothing left to give, holding onto hope that they’ll be able to crawl across the finish line and pray that they don’t die before they can cash their first pension check. Meanwhile, their families watch from the sidelines, forgotten and afraid, picking up the pieces of the life they once had.

The Long Game

Your career in law enforcement shouldn’t be this way. It’s not good for you, your family, or for the community you serve, and it’s just not sustainable. Law enforcement has enough trouble with recruitment and retention as it is, let’s not kill ourselves because we never took the time to know any better. Let’s turn it around before it’s too late.

In order to make it in this job you’ve got to play the long game. You’ve got to make decisions based on a ten, twenty, or thirty year time horizon. In order to finish strong in work and in life you’ve got to begin with the end in mind, thinking in terms of film strips, not snapshots, marathons, not sprints. Part of that process involves viewing yourself as a whole, and then intentionally focusing on developing each aspect of your life that makes you, you.

Slicing The Pie

When I first learned how to clear a room or a house I was taught to slice the pie. Slicing the pie is just clearing a room from the doorway or clearing around a corner piece by piece, step by step, in sort of an arc. When I finished the sweep, I had “sliced the pie.” I couldn’t skip over a slice, because if I did, I exposed myself to an uncleared area which would put me in a dangerous spot. To successfully clear an area, there’s no skipping slices. Brace yourself because I’m going to keep running with this pie analogy.

Think of you — your whole entire self — as a pie, a pie divided into seven equal slices. You might be thinking that this a dumb analogy, or you might be starting to get hungry, or just the mere mention of a pie transports you back to your childhood when pieces of pie or cake were being passed out and as the plate plopped down in front of you the first thing you did was look to your left and right at your brother’s and sister’s slices to see if theirs was bigger than yours or not. And if you got the smaller slice, you might be feeling angry right now. For that, I apologize. But that’s not the point here, so there’s no need to be angry. In this scenario, you get all the slices — the whole pie — because the pie represents your whole self. Without one piece, or even a part of a piece, you are incomplete.

Seven Slices, Seven Disciplines

The seven slices of pie are the seven disciplines for a successful, balanced, holistic life. I know, I know, that’s some pretty fancy talk for a 40-something-year-old bald guy sporting a mediocre dad-bod who’s throwing out ten-dollar words like ‘holistic’ like some vegan, capri-wearing yoga bro. I get it, but bear with me.

What we’re about to do is mash these two pie analogies together in a sort of tactical amalgamation (Please note: amalgamation is a fifty-dollar word) and lay out a framework to follow. First, we’re going to view ourselves as one whole pie sliced seven ways. Then, we’re going to look at each piece as representing a particular discipline and then ask some tactical, practical questions in an effort to identify where you’re at and to hopefully turn some light bulbs on in your head. Here we go.

Slice Number 1: Spiritual Growth
Know what you believe, why you believe it, and then live it out

In order to grow spiritually you first must know what it is that you, in fact, believe and why. It’s the ultimate existential question that you must answer. I don’t know if there is anything more unsettling than unanswered spiritual questions about life, death, and what comes next. Don’t believe anything? Well, even if you consider yourself an atheist and believe in nothing, that is still a belief. If you’re not sure what you believe, there’s no shame in that, it just means it’s time to get about the business of figuring it out. Then, what you believe should inform how you live, otherwise your belief is pretty much useless — nothing more than a quippy bumper sticker on your car or a trite saying that hangs in your kitchen. Who you are and how you act flows from your beliefs, which is why this is where you need to start.

• Do you believe in God?
• What is He like? How do you know?
• Where will you go when you die?
• How do you define right and wrong?
• What are you teaching your children about faith?
• What tenets govern your life?
• Does what you believe actually affect the way you live your life?

Slice Number 2: Family Relationships
Lead and strengthen your family

Family relationships are the most important relationships, and yet can be the most challenging. Marriage is hard work and the foundation of your home. Raising kids is hard work and your highest calling. How you arrange your calendar and your bank account will tell you if your family is as important as you say it is. In order to foster your relationship with your family, you need to be around (surprise!). You need to do what’s best for the long term, not what’s convenient at the moment. That means being fully present when you’re with your family and having the courage to do what’s right and confront problems head-on. Be faithful to your spouse, be firm and compassionate with your kids, and lead them by example. Set aside family time and then guard it with a vengeance. I heard someone once say that poor people buy things, but wealthy people buy experiences. I don’t know if that’s true but the idea is that experiences create memories that last, while things like iPhones and Playstations will just end up in the trash. Spend the majority of your time and money on experiences with your family, not on things for your family.

• Are you giving your family the time they need and deserve?
• Are you putting your spouse first, ahead of your kids?
• Is your goal to raise good children or functional, responsible adults?
• What will your family look like 20 years from now?
• How will they remember their time spent with you?
• What traditions will they carry on and which ones might they leave behind?

Slice Number 3: Health & Fitness Routines
Take care of your physical body and your mental fitness

You get one mind and one body. Count ‘em — one! You can get away with a lot when you’re young, dumb, flexible, and heal quickly, but when you get older, not so much. Health and fitness is one of the easiest cans to kick down the road because there is always a reason to put it off and the consequences are rarely immediately apparent. Your physical health shouldn’t be trendy, follow a fad, or be a roller coaster ride. It should become a rhythm of life, something repeatable and sustainable. The same goes for your mental fitness. Just like one workout doesn’t make you fit and one salad doesn’t make you skinny, maintaining your mental fitness should be done on the regular — journaling, solitude, counseling, or meeting with a therapist. If you wait until it’s broken, it’s too late. If you do it once a year, you’re not actually doing anything at all.

• What are your fitness goals?
• How often do you work out?
• Will your fitness routine translate to ten, twenty, or thirty years from now?
• Are you working out smart or are you just an injury waiting to happen?
• How’s your mental fitness?
• Do you have an outlet for the stresses and strains of work and life?
• What condition will your mind and body be in when you’re 65 if you continue on your current path?

Slice Number 4: Personal Relationships
Foster your personal and professional relationships

Humans were not meant to go it alone. We were designed and built for relationship, community, and interdependence. Some of us may have been stabbed in the back at one time or another, and as a result, swore off relying on anyone, ever. Some of us are moochers who just take and take, alienating ourselves in the process. Others are introverts who get cold sweats just thinking about being in the same room with people, never mind talking to them. And then there are those who can’t get enough attention, regardless of how shallow, abusive, or negative it may be. Relationships, when done well, move us all forward, but must be intentionally started, fostered, and protected. As a card-carrying introvert, this is a tough one for me. But I have found that getting out of my comfort zone and investing in my personal relationships has been super beneficial.

• Are you a giver or a taker?
• Are your relationships disposable or sustainable?
• Do you let people walk all over you?
• Do you view negative attention better than none at all?
• Do you see relationships in terms of winners and losers?
• What are you contributing to your relationships?
• Who will be at your funeral and why?

Slice Number 5: Financial Discipline
Be a better steward of your resources

God is the owner and we are the managers. What money we have been entrusted with is a responsibility, not a right. We can squander it on things that don’t matter or we can invest it in things, in people, and in purposes that do. Most of the mistakes we make with money often arise out of fear or greed; fear of missing out so we overspend to get what we want right here, right now; greed for more money which causes us to try to get rich quickly, to take uncalculated risks, to cut corners or to violate our ethics. We live in a buy-now-pay-later get-what-you-want society that promises a life of leisure devoid of consequences. Money is a great servant but a terrible master. We must be disciplined with our finances so that we can provide for our family, retire with dignity, give generously, and leave a legacy.

• Do you operate your household on a budget?
• Are you straddled and stressed by debt?
• Is money the number one argument in your home?
• What is your plan for retirement?
• What ministries, charities, or outreaches would you love to fund?
• What kind of legacy will you leave behind?

Slice Number 6: Intellectual Growth
Grow your brain, broaden your knowledge base

Education shouldn’t stop at graduation. If you’re not growing, you’re dying. You need to be reading, taking a class, meeting with someone that’s ahead of you in life and asking questions, and trying new things. Broadening your knowledge base increases your capacity to enjoy the world around you, helps you make better decisions, and adds value to your relationships. Pour into yourself so that you have something to pour into others while you work toward becoming a better version of yourself in the process. Leaders are readers. They never stop learning and neither should you, because, surprise! you’re a leader, whether you like it or not. The only thing necessary to be a leader is to have followers, and I can guarantee that someone is following you, whether it be a little brother or sister, niece or nephew, son or daughter, husband or wife. It doesn’t have to be a formal or professional relationship, and in fact, it often isn’t.

• What kind of things do you want to learn more about?
• Twenty years from now, what would you wish you had begun to learn today?
• How many books do you read in a year?
• When was the last time you took a class to learn something?
• Are you stuck being comfortable in the familiar?
• Who can you sit under and learn from?

Slice Number 7: Professional Development
Further your career and hone your craft

Professionals get paid to do what they do. Football players, actors, doctors, assassins, whatever — the best get paid the most because they are in the highest demand. Why? It’s simple, really. They are good at what they do because they are constantly perfecting their craft, sharpening their skills, learning and trying new things. They view their work as an evolutionary process, constantly iterating and updating to keep an edge on the competition and deliver the best product to the customer. Our profession is no different, so we can’t just mail it in, do the bare minimum, and expect to end on a high note. What got us where we are will not get us where we want to go.

• Are you a student in and of your field?
• Are you willing to risk failing so that you can learn something new?
• Are you a practitioner or merely a preacher?
• Twenty years from now, will you have the same skill set you do now?
• Do you stay on the cutting edge?
• Are you content with the way things have always been done?
• What professionals should you surround yourself with?

Twenty Years From Now

This may seem overwhelming, like you have to do everything all at once at a thousand miles per hour otherwise you’re a complete loser. That’s not what I’m saying at all. No one can do that. Look, some of these things will come easy to you and will happen naturally, almost effortlessly, while others will be hard and you’ll have to be super intentional about them. But if you take these seven disciplines and use them as a framework for your goal-setting, the likelihood of your success will increase exponentially simply because you paid attention and did it on purpose.

Lay it out, write it down, work on it a little each day and each week so that twenty years from now you can look back at how far you’ve come and be glad that you started when you did.

Check out our FREE one-page goal tracking sheet to help you get started.

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