This morning I was thinking about how a goal of law enforcement should also be a common goal of all men.
This isn’t a statement about police officers. As in all people groups, there are positive and negative expressions of law enforcement, helpful and hurtful.
I was thinking about the famous and well-known phrase: To Protect And Serve.
Today it felt like I had never really heard it before. It seemed new, heavy with meaning and importance.
A universal need.
Often when I want to understand a concept or idea, I go back to the basic definitions. Here’s what I found in my dictionary:
Protect: to defend or guard from attack, invasion, loss, insult, etc.: cover, shield.
Serve: to render assistance; be of use; help.
All too often the competitive nature of men, in professional or personal life, abandons these principles. It becomes an Us vs. Them scenario, necessitating attack and invasion, winning being defined by the other losing. We, in our own pain and need, put ourselves first, wanting to be served rather than to serve.
Instead, we can focus on the other. We can watch out for our brothers and sisters, avoiding insult and attack. We can be of service and helpful. Our actions in the world can make it a better place.
Let’s take that famous saying and give it a spin.
Serve and Protect.
This is a needed reminder to reexamine what we’re doing, personally and professionally, in the world.
