When I stopped off to get fuel yesterday before work, a fight broke out between some members of our community.

I know both families who were fighting. I understand, to some extent, the trauma that both families have experienced. I don't judge. I tried to break up the fight, mainly because there were children present, and I didn't want anyone to get badly hurt.

After the fight had settled down, I drove to pick up one of our young Traditional Owner trainees from his house in Roebourne to take him to work. I stopped outside his house and he came out and said he couldn't come in today. His only pair of shoes had fallen apart. I told him no worries, not to stress - we'd take care of it. We bought him a pair of shoes that day. But the look on his face was heart breaking.

I realised that he's putting most of his trainee wages towards his family, to help his mother pay rent and look after his little brother. He hadn't thought to use the wages to buy himself shoes, like most teenagers would. This is all before 9am. Before I've got to my desk to respond to emails and engage with the strategic matters.

I can't tell you how hard it is to switch gears. Then, throughout the day, my team and I supported three families to organise funerals for their loved ones. Each family seeking help to pay for the funeral, asking for shade and chairs for the burial. Help to get some food to feed all the family that will be travelling for the funerals. Each family just wanting someone to listen to them. Three families in one day. In one small community. All dealing with grief and sorry business.

As the CEO, I know my team experience ten times what I do. And sadly this is a pretty normal day. I only write this because I realise after Reconciliation Week, that so few people truly understand what working in the community really takes. What it means.

For non-Indigenous people, like me, it can be a heavy load. But everyone needs to understand the responsibility, pressure and load for First Nations people working in this space. I can see on the faces of my colleagues what it takes for them to come to work every day.

Don't misunderstand. There are powerful and beautiful moments every day too. The stuff that keeps you going. But the load can be so heavy.

I ask my non-Indigenous network to imagine for a moment the experience of the many First Nations people who work in this space; those who could go and get a job with a major resource company or in government, but instead choose to show up every day in community.

For many of my First Nations colleagues and team, it's not a choice, it's a responsibility. Unlike non-community members who can often just walk away.

Australia would be far worse off without the thousands of people, like those who make up the Ngarluma Yindjibarndi Foundation Ltd (NYFL) team, who chose to work in this space.

Sean-Paul Stephens is the chief executive of the Ngarluma Yindjibarndi Foundation Ltd