JustAdvice

The One Thing I’ve Learned

I was once asked to describe, in a nut­shell, what I had learned from being a pro­ba­tion offi­cer.  I couldn’t, at the time, give a con­cise answer, but now I know what I would say.  After close to forty years of work­ing with offend­ers, try­ing to assist, coerce, rea­son and pun­ish them into reha­bil­i­ta­tion, I am con­vinced of one thing.  Peo­ple have free will.  Bar­ring a men­tal or phys­i­cal inabil­ity, they will do any num­ber of things for any num­ber of rea­sons, but they will, for the most part, do what they want.

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