Criminal Justice

Law enforcement officers may be apprehensive to try yoga because they think they need to be flexible and don't know how to fit it into their schedules, but yoga can actually increase flexibility and mobility and help them stay mentally healthy. It doesn't take a lot of time to practice and can be easily incorporated into daily rhythms.
 
Transcript: "Hi, Susanna here. The question posed to me today was, why do you think so many in the law enforcement first responder community are apprehensive to get into yoga? Well, I think there's a few reasons, but the two that stand out for me are this. One is flexibility. There's a thought out there that one must be flexible in order to even begin to practice yoga. And I believe that comes from YouTube videos and articles where it shows a lot of bendy people. But it's not true. I'm here to tell you it's not true. Yoga does indeed increase flexibility, increase mobility, which is only a benefit to us, and especially as we age. And then when you look at the law enforcement profession where you may be sitting for long periods of time, either in a car, behind a desk, behind a computer, and at the same time, we still have to have the ability to physically, quickly react to the situations in front of us with a healthy mental response. Yoga is really primed to help enhance all those aspects of a law enforcement professional's role. And number two is how do we incorporate 30 minutes, 45 minutes, 60 minutes of yoga into the daily rhythms of a law enforcement officer's life, especially if it incorporates shift work. It's not easy, but we can educate our officers to find those small nuggets, times for those small nuggets, those small bouts of yoga, five, 10, 15 minutes. We can do this. Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks."

To handle the emotional toll of working with victims and offenders, I recommend finding at least one good thing every day and being grateful for it. This is a life skill that can really pay dividends when you're struggling.
 
Transcript: "Hi, Susanna here. Question posed to me was, how do you handle the emotional toll that working with victims and offenders can take? You know, being in law enforcement for just a little over 20 years, I found that finding at least one good thing every single day was very helpful to move past difficult situations, difficult times, working with difficult people inside and outside the organization, and simply to see the good every single day. As corny as that may sound, there's research to back it up now, which is pretty amazing and pretty awesome. It validates this type of practice. So really being grateful and seeing the good every single day can transform your life. And so I would highly recommend that whether you're in law enforcement or not, it's a life skill that can really pay dividends when you're struggling. We all do. Thanks."

Transcript: "Hi, Susanna here. The question today is what is an underappreciated trend today that you think will have massive consequences in the future? Mindfulness practices, mindfulness practices in the law enforcement community especially, and we're just really tapping the surface of the training right now, but it's really beginning to take root. Not quite as far along as I would like to see it, but mindfulness is training the mind and we spend so much time and energy in the areas of tactical training and firearms, investigative techniques and all those areas that we need to emphasize. So don't get me wrong, we need to emphasize that, but why are we solely focusing on those aspects of a law enforcement officer's role and not training the mind? There's a mind behind everything we do, obviously. So focusing on equalizing the training between mental, physical, emotional and spiritual training is, in my opinion, is going to have massive positive impact on the future of law enforcement. Thanks."

Transcript: "Hi, Susanna here. The question is, what characterized the period of your life where you experienced the most personal growth? About 15 years ago, I was going through some personal and professional struggles, deep struggles more than I had ever been through in my life. And I always thought I was a very resilient person. And I found that, you know, that resilience ebbs and flows and I wasn't doing so hot back then. And it really took that time to compel me to draw me into really taking a deep look at myself and just really discovering who I was, what was there, embracing the suck, leaning into the suck of what I was experiencing at that time. And I guess I equated to, you have to, you know, go through a lot of mud to become a flower, right? And we can do this, but it does take adversity and moving through life and seeing things for what they really are in order to really experience the joy and all the good things in life. Thanks."

I hope that the Tactical Breakdown podcast benefits law enforcement and public safety through providing relevant, useful, and actionable content. The purpose of the podcast is to go behind the curtain and show officers what goes into building out the training they receive, including understanding the why behind it. This includes discussing the deeper context of policies, procedures, and how to evolve and improve them.
 
Transcript: "Thanks Liv for the question about what I've gained from my podcast that would benefit the law enforcement community. And the short answer is I hope the podcast in general benefits law enforcement and public safety just through the content that we provide. I'm very, very fortunate in the fact that I get to interview and sit across from some of the top experts in the world and ask them questions that a lot of people don't have that direct connection to. And so hopefully we're putting out content that's relevant and useful to them, actionable and defensible. But I would also say that the purpose of the tactical breakdown when I created it was to really go behind the curtain and show the officer what it is that goes into building out the training that they receive and giving them the why. I don't know if you're a fan of Simon Sinek, but I am. And so explaining and understanding the why behind training. So when we do that five minute drill on the range and you really feel like you got a lot out of it, I want to go back and I want to talk about the 80 hours that went into building the five minutes. That's really the foundation of what the podcast is. And hopefully when people listen to tactical breakdown, what they get out of it is that the deeper context of what it is that we do, why we do it, the training, the policies, the procedures, everything that exists, the way it does, why is it there? And is there a way that we can change it? We can evolve it, we can improve it. Should we do away with it? And all of the concepts around those discussions. And so thank you for your question and looking forward to answering more."

In escalating tense situations, it is important to treat it like a game and not take it personally. This can help you get the resolution or result that you are looking for, such as de-escalation or control.
 
Transcript: "So the question is, what techniques have I found useful in deescalating tense situations? I would have to say that there's nothing that's gonna beat experience. If you've never been yelled at, sworn at, or threatened or intimidated before, then you really kind of just have to get those reps under your belt to really understand how human beings in that state function and what it presents like to you and for you. But I would also say that for me, I like to treat it like a game. So I go into it and it really is a switch you have to turn off in your brain and say, hey, this isn't personal. Kind of, I in some way take some enjoyment out of it and treating it like a game and finding a way to work around to get the resolution and get the result that I'm looking for at the end, whether that's a deescalation, whether that's a control and arrest. But the concept is treat it like a game, don't take it personally and you'll get through it just fine."