normal is a trap
I once talked to a firefighter who told me he’d learned to think of his reactions as “normal responses to abnormal situations.” He repeated it a few times, saying it came from a therapist. It got me thinking… is that a helpful message? Despite my huge respect for the person saying it, that idea didn’t sit well.
Firefighters are not average.
Firefighting is consistently ranked among the most stressful jobs in America. And stress, at its core, is just a fancy word for high variability. Anything can and will happen on the fireground, on the way to a call, or after an incident. No matter how much training we receive or whether we follow SOPs down to the letter, emergencies are an environment of chaos.
Chaos.
So, surprises are guaranteed.
The mere idea that you’re just an average bro or gal is a dangerous mindset. This way of thinking is counterproductive, especially in a profession designed to confront the unimaginable. Your job isn’t about being normal—it’s about taming the extreme.
But society? Society wants you to be normal. Everywhere you look, it’s pushing the idea of average. There’s this magnetic pull to blend in and settle for a normal life because it seems like that’s what everyone else does. But let’s be honest here—your neighbor (the accountant) didn’t just lose a colleague to lung cancer. The cashier at your local store isn’t gifted with flashbacks of a drowned toddler in a hot tub. These folks lack experience on the edge, where you work.
When you accept an average identity like these others have, you set the bar in an unreasonable place and expect experiences that are typical. Anything that falls outside that line creates trauma. Trauma is essentially your brain’s way of alerting you that something doesn’t compute. How could your mind possibly make sense of the weird shit when it’s expecting normalcy?
Big egos in the fire service get a bad rap these days. Some consider them a sign of arrogance. I believe the opposite. They’re a useful filter that encourages you to act in a way an average person wouldn’t even consider. I’d rather overestimate my abilities and fail a few times than believe for a second that firefighting is on par with a 9-to-5 office job.
Expertise is expected of us. High levels of endurance and resilience are expected of us. Extreme adaptability is expected of us. These are not traits of the average person. Average folks don’t go out of their way to develop them.
You deserve better. The fire service deserves better. Average, normal, mediocre, half-assed, and okay don’t cut it here. The coping mechanisms you need to thrive cannot be average. They need to be WELL ABOVE average.
Only then can you meet those abnormal situations with an abnormal level of grit.