Category: Plan Your Life

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What Is YOUR Tactical Action Plan for 2012?

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Editors Note: Please join me in welcoming our newest contributor Sgt. Mark St. Hilaire as he leads us off for a Happy, Healthy and Safe New Year!

The New Year’s Resolution: What Is YOUR Action Plan for 2012?

As I reflect back on 2011, I am a little overwhelmed thinking about the things that occurred over the past year in my life.  I have experienced many changes in my agency, new commitments within my family and my community service, illnesses and the deaths of loved ones and friends, some physical changes as I approach the golden anniversary of my birth and most of all, observing and reading about law enforcement officers who self-destruct in their careers through their unusual behavior and actions on and off the job.   It has been an emotionally exhausting time and I am grateful for the many training opportunities, the maintenance of my fitness-eating plan and especially my peers who helped prepare me to meet these challenges.

As this New Year begins, many people participate in the ritual of a New Year’s Resolution.  Many people accept the challenge and yes, many of our resolutions succumb to an early death.  I stopped making resolutions on the annual basis because I felt discouraged when I could not keep my resolutions.

In the New Year of 1996, I had been a police officer about 10 years. I weighed about 350 lbs.; I had a distorted view of my career, working nights, an adult beverage problem.   I had come to the point that I was so frustrated and I was miserable… Continue reading

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The Way of the Blue Warrior

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As police officers, we talk a lot about being warriors.  We’ve all heard members of the military talk about being warriors, but even other people describe themselves as “road warriors” or “weekend warriors”.  Everyone from nurses to stock brokers describe themselves as “warriors” and you can even find a warrior diet, and a website where they list warrior names for baby’s.

There are warrior books, warrior companies, warrior games, warrior trucks and even warrior cats.  I guess if you are a warrior, you know what you are.

Maybe the word is a little over used, or maybe we need to define ourselves as warriors, in the context of law enforcement.

As law enforcement officers, we certainly can describe ourselves as warriors because at times we may have to enter into a fight to the death, and many times our lives are threatened during the normal course of a day, but is that the whole picture?

I don’t think so.  I think we define ourselves as warriors because of what the word symbolizes about our approach to life, work and the world around us.  Does it mean that we are always at war?  No, it means that we are always prepared to deal with violence if it comes to us, or the communities we protect.  More importantly… Continue reading

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A Manifesto for The Perfect Life

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Editors Note: Chuck Rylant, a police officer from California who is also a Certified Financial Planner and a regular contributor on CopsAlive.com, gives us all a New Year’s Manifesto for a Perfect Life and shows us the process it takes to get there.

THE PERFECT LIFE MANIFESTO
By
Chuck J. Rylant
How you can achieve more this year than in the past 10 years combined

This report is free. I encourage you to share it or post it on your web site. My only request is that you do not edit it and keep it in it’s entirety. You are welcome to publish excerpts as long as you identify Chuck J. Rylant as the author. And a link it www.chuckrylant.com is always appreciated.
© 2010 Chuck Rylant

THE MAGIC FORMULA

Every year around January 1st a lot of people will begin new years resolutions or do some sort of goal setting, but only about 3% of those people will actually achieve those new goals. Previously I wrote about goal setting from a different perspective, but in that article Brian Tracy found that only 3% of the population writes their goals down. And according to research, those 3% are 1000 time more likely to accomplish their goals.
But this isn’t just another story about writing your goals. There’s plenty of that advice out there already. Traditional goal setting usually involves a written list of the things you want to accomplish. This step alone, as mentioned above, has incredible power at helping you get things accomplished. But there is a better way.

“Most people aren’t really happy, but they aren’t unhappy enough to do any thing about it. That’s a dangerous place to be.”
Tony Robbins

I’ve always been somewhat of a goal setter and usually do fairly well at accomplishing my goals. But when working with private clients, I’ve learned that it’s very hard for most people to accomplish their goals. So this led me to really study the subject of getting things done through goal setting. In researching and working with others, I realized that my informal goal setting wasn’t working as well as it could.

It wasn’t until 2008 that I took those goals that were bouncing around in my head and put them in some logical order on paper. As part of a leadership retreat, we were sent for two hours to sit overlooking the ocean and write our goals. With nothing to do for two hours but think, I figured out some amazing things about myself.

“Goals allow you to control the direction of change in your favor.”
Brian Tracy

The following two years I continued this process and expanded it by taking a couple of days each year and devoting them strictly to goal setting. Last year I went to a beach resort and while there, created the beginnings of the process I’m about to share. But it wasn’t until I read Leo Babauta’s blog post titled “the best goal is no goal” that I really put this whole thing together. My approach is very different than Leo’s, but what he said got me thinking.

The reason people don’t usually accomplish their goals is partially because… Continue reading

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Successful Cop: Lt. Christopher A. Manos, CPP

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Check out this weeks newest teleseminar and live web training with a continuation our our Successful Cop Series. This week’s guest is Lt. Chris Manos, CPP a 27 year veteran of the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office in Colorado.

Currently Chris is the Administrative Lieutenant in the Detention Facility but he has worked as a patrol deputy, Crime Prevention Deputy, Investigator and Sergeant. Prior to his law enforcement career he served in the United States Air Force as a Law Enforcement Specialist. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice and a Masters Degree in Management. In his free time he works as a professional magician… Continue reading

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New Year’s Resolutions for Cops

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As a police officer, sheriff’s deputy or corrections officer do you have a list of New Year’s Resolutions?

It seems that some resolutions that would be appropriate for peace officers or those in law enforcement would include a list that started with these questions: Continue reading

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Cops and Superstitions

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Today’s date 08/08/08 apparently has so much power as a lucky number that the Chinese Olympic Committee actually picked today as the date of the opening ceremonies for the Summer Olympic Games with a starting time of 8:08:08 PM!

Are you superstitious? Continue reading

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Plan Your Life List

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I first read about John Goddard when I read the original edition of Chicken Soup for the Soul several years ago.  At age 15 John set 127 goals he wanted to accomplish during his lifetime.  He wanted to accomplish great things and he wanted do lots of amazing stuff during his lifetime.  Now many years later he has done most of them and shares his experiences with others.  His list included things like exploring all the major rivers of the world and climbing the Matterhorn.  He rode elephants and camels, flew in jet fighters and lit a match with a .22 rifle.  He wanted to read the complete works of Shakespeare, Plato, Aristotle, Dickens, Thoreau to name a few and he was able to publish an article of his own in National Geographic.  He retraced the route of Marco Polo through all of the Middle East, Asia and China, and dove in a submarine.  Business World News called him the Real Indiana Jones CLICK HERE to read more.  I loved the story so much that I used to read it to my scout troop when I was a Scoutmaster and I would challenge all of them to write their own life list.  Do you have a Life List?  is it in writing? Continue reading

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Stress: Cause or Symptom

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When you really examine the side-effects of a law enforcement career on the men and women who take the oath and don the badge it’s kind of scary.

First examine the rate 100 to 200 police officers who are killed in the line of duty in the U.S. alone each year.  Then if you dig deeper, the statistics show that things like suicide, cancer and other side effects of the police career that kill thousands more cops each year. Continue reading

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Fun, Fun, Fun!

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That sure describes our policing profession doesn’t it? How many of you really got into law enforcement just for the fun of it? I know, I know, you told the interview panel that all you really wanted to do was to “help people”, and when you became a cop, you did but admit it, you were looking for fun.

The big question might be “Is it still fun?” Did all the fun and excitement that got you into police work linger or has it passed? Are the thrills still there or are you having to create then now? Most importantly, what do you do for fun and relaxation off the job?

With stress probably being the culprit behind most police officer deaths, certainly after retirement, what are you doing to minimize that stress now and how are you relaxing? Also of importance is how healthy is your means of having fun? Continue reading

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What Will You Do With Your Life?

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Welcome to CopsAlive.com. CopsAlive works in cooperation with The Law Enforcement Survival Institute to bring useful tools, ideas and strategies to police professionals who want to plan happy, healthy and successful lives and careers.

What will you do with your life? Will you become one of the best cops in the world or will the job take it’s toll on you? CopsAlive will ask questions of you and of the experts on your behalf. We will consider the true threats to your life and ask you to conduct threat assessments for your life, health and career. Continue reading