How A Retired FBI Agent Stays Human In A Hard Job

He walked away from the pulpit because the stress would not let his body rest, then spent the next two decades staring straight at humanity’s darkest corners. I’m joined by Eric Robinson, newly retired after 24 years in the FBI, to talk about resilience that’s earned, not posted. Eric shares how carrying other people’s pain as a solo pastor led to daily headaches, and why choosing a new path was a mental health decision as much as a career move.

From there, we trace his unusual transition into federal law enforcement, including how the post 9-11 environment and his background shaped the Bureau’s interest. We also get real about maturity and judgment in high-stakes work: what experience gives you, why authenticity matters with first responders, and how a “mask” culture can quietly grind people down.

Then we go deeper into the cases that leave a mark: sex trafficking, exploitation, gangs, and the challenge of staying compassionate without being naive. Eric explains why justice can’t depend on a “perfect victim,” and he tells a moment from Chicago that re-centered him fast when a kid he judged as a nuisance asked for help getting home. We close with a look at how he approaches interviews and interrogations by building connection and psychological safety to get the truth, not to perform anger.

If you care about first responder mental health, trauma-informed leadership, and real-world resilience skills, hit play, then subscribe, share this with a teammate, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

Please reach Eric through his website at http://www.preachertobreacher.com

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Transcript

Welcome And Mission

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to Resilience Development in Action with Steve Bisson. This is the podcast dedicated to first responder mental health, helping police, fire, EMS, dispatchers, and paramedics create better growth environments for themselves and their teams. Let's get started.

Meeting Eric Robinson

SPEAKER_01 0:29

Well, hi everyone, and welcome to Resilience Development in Action. I'm so happy to meet Eric Robinson. You know, we meet people differently. I've said this many times on my podcast. And I met Eric through a pod match. Yes, it's not like a dating site. We were joking around about that earlier, because our wiveslash girlfriends will not be happy about these things. So anyway, it was great to read his story and then we exchanged, and I thought that that was a great, you'd be a great guest. But Eric Robinson, welcome to Resilience Development in Action.

SPEAKER_02 0:59

Thanks, Steve. Also a pleasure on my end, too.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

You know, I looked at your book and I'm like, darn, I should have read that book. I didn't get a chance to look at it yet because the story's fascinating, but I don't want to take away from you telling your story. But for me, going from, you know, a specific job to another like yours and then retiring and being to where you're at in your spiritual life, your mental health life, your physical life is just fascinating to me. But because I read a lot more than probably most of my audience at this point about you, Eric, I probably should ask you to introduce yourself.

From Pulpit To FBI Career

SPEAKER_02 1:33

Sure. I am a few months retired from 24 years in the FBI, joined in 2002, and during the years, I'll go through it real fast. I worked drug cartels, gangs, public corruption, and civil rights, organized crime, crimes against children, financial crimes, national security, and human intelligence. Along the way, did 15 years as a SWOT operator, and that was very fulfilling. Firearms and tactical instructor. Got to see quite a few things. And prior to that, I was a Baptist pastor. So I preached my last sermon in the church on Easter of 2002, just happened to be. The next Sunday, I was in Quantico, Virginia for the FBI Academy. And the Sunday after that, as they're easing me into my law enforcement career, I was preaching in the chapel in the FBI Academy because they didn't have a chaplain and asked me to fill in.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

Well, there's so many things that you just said that seems to me that are very important. You know, I never know where to really start because this is always people's stories and I love their story. The first thing that came to mind is the 2002 decided to go to the FBI. I'm like, all right, sorry, 9-11 kicks in right away for me. Is that what kind of like made you decide to go into a more law enforcement type of job or something else?

SPEAKER_02 2:55

Or it it was something else.

Burnout, Headaches, And Boundaries

SPEAKER_02 2:57

And as you get into mental health and resiliency, it was for my mental health. And it might seem odd to you, but I uh pastoring the church, there were a number of factors. The shorthand answer for me is that I was incapable of separating myself from the people's problems. So they're I'm doing normal pastor stuff. People are coming to me saying, hey, I've got this issue, and I'm working through with them, but then I would carry it on from there. So better men have been able to figure out how to not hold on to that. That wasn't me. And the result of that was the stress gave me headaches every single day for the final two years. And I mean every day. And while I enjoyed what I was doing and it was fulfilling, and we were successful, we're doing well. There just came to a point where I couldn't do it anymore. Yeah, I had to decide like either I was going to choose to make a move, or inevitably my body would make that choice for me, and I didn't want to see that happen. And so I looked at a few jobs, say, well, let's just start out and see what's there. And I I applied for one job that I was overqualified for, and they turned me down, and then I applied for one that I was underqualified for, and they said, Yeah, sure.

9-11, Hiring, And Starting Late

SPEAKER_02 4:16

So to nine to 9-11, I had studied Islam in the past. I was trained to be a missionary to Muslim cultures. That course changed a bit, and I stayed safe-side and just went through pastoring. But my application was in process when 9-11 hit, and I'm presuming that my background in working with Muslims was a factor in being hired because we had an al-Qaeda problem. And hey, this guy knows how to contact Muslims, reach out to him. So I think the Bureau took a chance on me for that. And then, of course, once I got on board, they stuck me on a drug squad.

SPEAKER_01 4:55

Yeah, that's why it's funny because when you started talking, I'm like, and then he ended up being on SWAT.

SPEAKER_02 5:00

Yeah, never handled a gun before.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

Oh, really? Yeah. So when you know, without being too pushy, what how old were you when you decided all this?

SPEAKER_02 5:09

I was that's not pushy.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

I was well, I know you're only 35, so that's my gosh.

SPEAKER_02 5:15

My shoulder is 85.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

That's I'm shooting the fucking gun. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:21

Oh my gosh. I and and I love having the headphones on because obviously all those days at the range, like I I have found that even on podcasts when people talk, I do this because you know the hearing starts to go. I was 32, 33 when I got on, and then didn't join SWAT until I was 42. So it's a young man's game, but I started pretty pretty ripe running around with the younger guys.

SPEAKER_01 5:50

Well, it's funny because the I want to go back to a couple of things, but the one thing I would say to you is that if anything, I want my FBI people to be a little more experienced than a 22-year-old kid.

SPEAKER_02 6:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:00

But that's just me.

SPEAKER_02 6:02

Oh, yeah. It's the same here. And so the Bureau, if you're gonna be an agent, you have to be you have to have a bachelor's degree and then at least three years real world experience. And even then, I mean, you know, kids who are 24, 25 say, oh, I think I'm going to try. I'm like, nah, man, you you you gotta get at least hit 27. Get a little bit of time in there where like you're you're you're on the the front edge edge of adult.

SPEAKER_01 6:29

Right. I mean, you know, I go back to there's so many things I would say to that. I believe that we shouldn't make be able to make we we can I don't mind voting, but like making any decisions about your body or anything else shouldn't be done till at least 25. Because that's when your your frontal prefrontal cortex gets fully developed. So that's where I think being in the FBI, being 25 should be a minimal requirement. Oh, yeah, because I think that I I I remember how I was at 23, and you shouldn't give me a gun or intel for any shit. Um that's me.

SPEAKER_02 7:03

Right. And the FBI shouldn't be teaching you how to be an adult. And so it's funny, when I came in, folks were older, and then they went through a period of younger, and then they went through a period of you know, guys were at least 30, and now they're skewing younger again, trying to get more agents in.

SPEAKER_01 7:22

Yeah, I think that we're the there's a difference in generation now. People think about careers a little differently, and I don't know if it's better or worse. I don't want to judge that. I just think it's different.

Staying Authentic Without Going Cynical

SPEAKER_01 7:33

Uh, one of the things you talked about that, you know, being a pastor, sorry, this cement the hall podcast too, so gotta be making, you know, you talked about separating yourself from people's problems. It's interesting because I always thought that being a pastor, being a reverend, being a type of person that will be in charge of a congregation or whatever you want to call it, a a temple or anything else like that. I thought that they would talk about you know the whole boundary thing in the sense that how to like leave it at the fucking door. In mental health, they do that to us, and you learn how to do it because you know, we just I don't want to compare pastors to mental health counselors because I think they're apples to oranges, the same type of area, but not similar. Yeah, we got you know, it's funny that they never taught you guys how to kind of like leave it at the door, so to speak.

SPEAKER_02 8:19

Yeah, in the church, they didn't to teach us how to leave it at the fucking door. The it uh part of it too is I I was the sole pastor, so I didn't have you know others to interact with. That was my fault. I was fairly young and didn't realize what I needed. So, you know, here I am gutting it out, you know, with the headaches, trying to get through. Running was the only thing that helped. That if I ran, then no headache, and then I'd have a bit of an afterglow of like, oh, okay, I'm still at peace, and then it would hit. I know it was self-imposed, but obviously there was some truth to this that as a pastor, I had to wear a mask, I had to be this person, and so that was part of why I wasn't sharing things with other people. And again, I know that was self-imposed, but it's not out of whole cloth. Like clearly there was that, you know, at least a notion of, yeah, yeah, yeah, we need our pastor to always be right, doesn't like to smoke cigars, doesn't like to drink bourbon, doesn't like to watch rated R movies. Okay, so now I gotta hide myself. So that added to it as well.

SPEAKER_01 9:27

Well, I think that that's a good point, right? Being yourself is key. You know, one of the things that I talk about in my field is that some therapists learn that whole detachment and all that. That's what they still teach us in school. I don't know. I haven't been in school in like 20 years, maybe they don't. But for me, I because of the work I do, if anything, if I am not authentic or I'm not being myself, or I kind of hide who I am, I am screwed with this population because first responders can smell a fake from a mile away. Yeah. And I think that that's where I like tell people like the worst thing that could happen is people saw who I was. And I think if that's the worst thing you could ever say, I guess I'm okay.

SPEAKER_02 10:04

Yeah. And what was good for me is when I got into the FBI, obviously there's stressors there, but it didn't affect me the same. All I had to do was be a good FBI agent, do the job, and you know, the results happened one way or the other. Disappointed maybe, but not disappointed in the same way that I'm struggling with it because that's a family breaking up, like and it's still gonna be broken up. This is you know, bad guy gets away and he's in the wind. Okay, somebody'll catch him. Guy's not getting indicted when he should be. Yeah, disappointing. Society will get him, he'll get caught somewhere. So it just didn't affect me as personally.

SPEAKER_01 10:45

Well, you know, that's interesting because I hear you say that. And having worked in the jail for a couple of years, worked at parole, worked at probation myself, again, mental health only. I will not steal any valor. People know that on my podcast. It's just I've always been a mental health guy. I never worked per se in the law enforcement or first responder world. You gotta deal with criminals in the undervalued society. I'll be perfectly honest with you. When I worked in those fields, sometimes it affected me mentally. You talk about, oh, family's really affecting me, FBI not so much. So yeah, what's it like to be with like these guys? And then you go, like, ah, okay, let's go home and have a cigar in a bourbon.

SPEAKER_02 11:24

Yeah, so I I I I think of it this way like there had to be some reflection. Because if you have this notion of, oh my gosh, there's so many criminals or so much crime out in the world, it's it's like somebody who's a bird watcher saying, Man, there's so many birds out here. Well, every day when I check in, like I'm on the computer looking for bad guys, I'm staring at at bad guys. Well, I have to be aware and then realize that's work, that's what I'm doing for real. I have to be interacting with other people to show, oh, right. You know, I don't I'm not gonna get so cynical to think everyone's like this that, yeah, Steve, you seem like a nice guy, but I know there's dirt on you, and so I don't trust you. There is, but there is, but it's it's it's it's the kind of dirt that's okay. It's fine. But yeah, uh I mean my dad used to tell me, and we get in some discussions, and he'd say, you know, you're you're very you're in a bubble in the church, like you don't realize what the real world is. And he was a truck driver, so he wasn't talking about criminal stuff, it's just like, hey, you're talking to people who are homogeneous, they're like you, they're from your town, you know, they're similar ages, similar socioeconomic backgrounds. And you know, we would discuss that or argue, and then I get in the FBI and like like always, my dad was right. You know, I'm seeing you so much different. I'm in Chicago talking to gang members who are completely different than how I grew up. I'm talking to teen prostitutes who are not like me. And you know, I'm talking with guys who are business managers stealing money, millionaires, but stealing more money, and they're not like me. So it was it was eye-opening to get into a new world and see different types of people, but then also see the commonalities of hey, we're still human too.

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SPEAKER_01 13:33

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Sex Trafficking Cases And Victims

SPEAKER_01 14:34

Well, you you talk about interacting with those individuals on, you know, and how they're different than us. You can't tell me you didn't hear like some stories that were also heartbreaking. I mean, when you hear about you talk about teen prostitution, I know we use the name human trafficking now. Um it's pretty similar, if you ask me. Um I know people will say it's slightly different. Okay, whatever. How do you deal with that? Because that to me, like that's the that was the hard part is hearing like the victims, particularly. Yep. Because you know, people will be, oh, she's a prostitute. Yeah, but when you're forced into it, are you a prostitute?

SPEAKER_02 15:12

Yeah, so what was often happening, and so if they're doing it on their own, then it's just them prostituting. When an adult gets involved, now it's sex trafficking. And the difference between you and me and the pimps we'd run into is here's a 16-year-old girl who's a runaway, parents are useless, drug addicts, absent, abusive. And so she's out on her own and she's been prostituting because she needs to survive. And unlike you or me, this adult male comes by and says, I would like to exploit that. You know, you and I would say, How can I help you? Let's get you out of this. But they would say, Here's a money-making opportunity. So most times, there's always differences, but most times these pimps were coming along, they're looking for the girls so they can add them to the stable, but they're now going to exploit them further. When we would prosecute these pimps, they would so often fight against the charges because this is their mindset. And this is again part of that fascinating seeing humans at work. She was already doing this. Like I was doing, like I didn't force her into this. She was already having sex with men. I I helped her earn more money. I drove her places, I took care of her, I gave her gifts, leaving out the manipulation, the abuse, the inherent evil of not caring for someone in trouble, but instead pushing them further into that. So we would have so many of these victims, and the prosecutors would say, Yeah, she's just not a good witness. I'm like, no, no, no, no. This isn't about the victim. This is about the adult carrying out the crime. Because she might just you know the prosecutors look at it and go, Yeah, but after you arrested him, she's back out on the street. I'm like, we're going after him. We're going after the evil. We got to find some way to get some foundations in to help her. But our job is justice, we're going after him.

SPEAKER_01 17:18

And going after them sometimes is very complex. Like you said, they they protect themselves in the well, I'm just helping here. Right. Um, omitting a lot of the other stuff.

SPEAKER_02 17:28

Well, and that's like that in court, that's not gonna fly. Like, you know, go ahead and try that one. You're gonna get hammered. But in their mind, hey, I I don't understand why you think I'm I'm not a trafficker, I'm not forcing it. There were some who did, but that's their mindset.

unknown 17:45

Right.

SPEAKER_02 17:46

And it wasn't necessarily like you and I might have that mindset in order to assuage our guilt and tamp it down for them. That's just that's just how they recollected what they're doing. Meanwhile, they were part of a group, a society, a micro-society, that praised this type of male behavior that said, This is how you are, more of a man, how you show your strength by taking on these women.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Well,

Gangs, Forced Choices, And Compassion

SPEAKER_01 18:15

I think that think about prostitution. I also, you said you're dealing with gang members, sometimes that gang-on-gang violence, you know. Some people, you know, I've heard many people like, well, if they kill each other, that's fine. But there's also got to be a compassionate side where, you know, they're still humans, and I know that that's not popular. And whoever's listening here is like mental health-wise, you got to understand that some people don't have a choice. Like, you know, that's what I think the hardest part is sometimes. Like, people will choose to be in gangs. Yeah, it's either that or worse. And if you think about it, that's not a hell a great choice to have.

SPEAKER_02 18:48

No, and they are making a choice, but their choices are forced, they're directed and limited too. And so getting to work with the gang members, you see, like there are reasons. And absolutely, I had to always see even the the worst criminals as human, not monsters, humans making monstrous decisions, maybe, but you see the gang members who they're poor, so this is a way to earn some money. They're threatened by the surroundings, so they need people with them. They're abandoned, so they need brotherhood. There's I mean, there's so many factors that play into it. It's and then there was glorification, so they're they're getting uh approval and finding identity and being in the gang, and and that's human that they would go after that. So, yeah, you know, here's an 18-year-old kid making poor choices, right? That's gonna happen, especially as those choices are directing them down a similar path of others.

SPEAKER_01 19:53

The need for affiliation is really underex uh people don't understand how important that is. That's why we do join, you know, anything. Basically, even our jobs are part of a group. Uh you know, sometimes we don't want to be there, but most of the time it's like, oh, well, I can bitch and moan with these people because they get it.

SPEAKER_02 20:11

Right. We have common complaints, and that that bonds us. And so living in Chicago, I was I was in an up-and-coming neighborhood, and I later learned that up and coming means it used to be worse. It's still bad, but it used to be worse. And there would always be, you know, kids outside like fighting, tagging stuff. And I went down once, it's like 10:30, windows are open because it's hot, and there are you know, kids are down there yelling. And I go down and I got my gun on me and badge just in case. But I go down and say, You guys gotta go home, you gotta shut up, you gotta leave. And like, here's this 13-year-old kid who's been causing havoc. He goes, you know, so I'm looking at him as like one more problem. And he says, What oh, what time is it? And I says, It's 10 30, man. He goes, Oh my gosh, my mom's gonna kill me. Would you walk me home? And that just splits from here's here's a gang kid, here, here's this nuisance, here's here's this object to oh, this is a 13-year-old kid whose mother's gonna be pissed, and he's scared of walking two blocks home. He sees me as a protector as an adult, that you know, now he went from gang guy to a 13-year-old child, and that helps then now to see this next guy who grew up in this hard land, like, yep, he probably went through similar stuff.

SPEAKER_01 21:40

Well, you you know, and I think that that's important to see people for people. I think that that's one of the things that sometimes, you know, part of what I just said earlier about when I worked in that world. I dehumanized humans a lot because I had to feel comfortable with sometimes, you know, sending him back to jail or what. Have you and I didn't do that, make that decision, obviously. But you know, sometimes I had to have that armor. How do you separate that from you know, because I, you know, the FBI agent came in and I'm gonna fucking set the law straight, and then this 13-year-old kid is scared, and now you gotta switch the the script, so to speak, in order to be there for that kid.

SPEAKER_02 22:20

Well, for me, that's that was my base, that was my default setting as a as a person, as a pastor, and I think most people have this to just look at people as as trustworthy, as good, and then you respond to what you're seeing. You you respond to how they're acting, you know, past attitudes. And then that kid brought me back to, oh, yeah, if I'm in church and there's a 13-year-old kid, it doesn't matter if he's black, white, whatever, and he says, Hey, my mom's upset. Can you help me? Like now I'm going to act kindly. Here I was being influenced by my surroundings, coming down with anger and judgment, and that kid's simple thing brings me back to, oh, that's right. I'm a nice person who wants to do kind things to others and not, you know, look at him with disdain. And so anytime that I was getting ready to arrest or interact with a criminal, I had to find, I had to go back and find what connects me to them.

Interviewing Offenders Without Judgment

SPEAKER_02 23:31

And so, I mean, these guys might be pedophiles, which people just look at and say, kill them. And I go, Oh, no, I'm here to bring justice, so I want a confession. I don't need to tell them they're disgusting because they already believe that. Right. I don't need to bring shame, they're full of shame, they're just driven by forces, by pleasures that they either are unwilling or unable to control. And so now I'm coming to them. It's like, okay, one guy I'm interviewing, he's telling me how he loved the little kid that he was with and had assaulted. And I I have to think, I know what that's like. Not in his context, but I know what that's like. I have kids, I love them. I have had girlfriends, I know what that's like. And so I have to now take away the judgment of yes, but you're talking about a child half your age and doesn't, you know, you harmed him for his life. I have to take that out.

unknown 24:32

Right.

SPEAKER_02 24:32

That'll be in that'll be in trial, but just now keep connecting and building with him so that we're just having a conversation, and the mind if I'm not damning him and slamming the table and cursing him, I think the mind brings him to a place where this is a con this is just talking. This isn't an interrogation, this is a safe place where you're not being judged.

SPEAKER_01 24:57

Uh I think that going back to what you said, you know, it really is about reminding yourself of where a person comes from. And even though we don't come sometimes from that different point of view as nicely as I can say it, it made sense in their brain. And that that's like that's the detachment sometimes that's really hard for people because people take it so personally.

SPEAKER_02 25:23

Yes, and and so there has to be an awareness and reflection. So I'm going in angry and disgusted because I've already been talking to the kid and the family, and I want vengeance, but that should be coming in the form of justice, which is me doing my job. Okay, let's set this right, and now I'm going to be, I'm gonna use my energy to be that person that I am otherwise. Let's let's not make this a separate context. Let's make this a conversation I'm having in the break room, let's make this this conversation, right? Just talking, let you know, making it safe in that moment. What's crazy is when you do those post-arrest interrogations, I have found that the criminals are set in this moment. So there's a calculus that what I say has future implications, but they're most often caught in this moment. So if this moment is I'm not judging you, but what you tell me is going to get judged by a jury, they don't see that. And so make this safe, and that makes my hammer so much bigger. Now that's how I punch you in the mouth by making you confess.

Part Two Teaser And Closing

SPEAKER_01 26:44

Well, you know, in case you want to punch me in the mouth, maybe we should go to if you're okay with standing for another half hour, I'd love to do a second part with you because I'd love to talk about irreverent, your book. Yeah. And I will need a copy, by the way. I have not read it. So for my audience who knows I'm always honest, I haven't read it, but I can't wait to read it. But can you stay for another half hour? I think we can talk more about the FBI, talk about your book. Uh, there's plenty of things to talk about here.

SPEAKER_02 27:09

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 27:10

All right. So for those of you, this is the end of this first episode, but please join us next week for the second part of this episode, which is going to be fantastic. And I hope to see you then.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Please like, subscribe, and follow this podcast on your favorite platform. A glowing review is always helpful. And as a reminder, this podcast is for informational, educational, and entertainment purposes only. If you're struggling with a mental health or substance abuse issue, please reach out to a professional counselor for consultation. If you are in a mental health crisis, call 988 for assistance. This number is available in the United States and Canada.