In one of my early roles as a newly minted Australian helper, I worked as a counsellor with people in law enforcement. On my first day in the job, I set the room up with lights garnered from the store of unused furnishings on the witness-protection floor and waited to see who might come through the door. The biggest part of my job turned out to be talking about such things as: it isn’t dangerous to cry; and accepting death doesn’t mean being happy about it. The people I spoke to were generally receptive to these ideas, they valued knowledge highly, and they knew that when it came to death, there was quite a bit they didn’t know. But it was hard for them to put this learning into practice, because when they took these ideas outside the counselling room, almost no-one else believed in them.

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