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< | "To Be a Lawyer in My Own Estimation is the Key to Happiness" | >
> | “To Be a Lawyer in My Own Estimation is the Key to Happiness” | | | | |
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< | I Want to be a Happy Lawyer
Aristotle said, "Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence." I agree with Aristotle, and my biggest fear in life is not being happy. Yet, I chose to be a lawyer. According to a Johns Hopkins University study of more than 100 occupations, lawyers lead the nation with the highest incidentincidence of depression. An ABA survey indicated that 41% of female lawyers are unhappy with their jobs. The ABA also estimates that 15-20% of all U.S. lawyers suffer from alcoholism or drug abuse. Moreover, in 1996, lawyers surpassed dentists as the profession with the highest rate of suicide. Although these statistics are grim, I believe that it is possible to become a happy lawyer. In fact, when people ask me what type of lawyer I want to become, I do not say, "a prosecutor," or "a bankruptcy attorney." I say, "a happy lawyer." | >
> | I Want to be a Happy Lawyer | | | | |
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< | I am a Control Freak and a Pessimist
My goal in law school is to learn how to become a happy lawyer. But first, it is important to learn why many lawyers are generally unhappy. | >
> | Aristotle said, “Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.” I agree with Aristotle, and my biggest fear in life is not being happy. Yet, I chose to be a lawyer. According to a Johns Hopkins University study of more than 100 occupations, lawyers lead the nation with the highest incidence of depression. An ABA survey indicated that 41 % of female lawyers are unhappy with their jobs. The ABA also estimates that 15-20 % of all U.S. lawyers suffer from alcoholism or drug abuse. Moreover, in 1996, lawyers surpassed dentists as the profession with the highest rate of suicide. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/therapy-matters/201105/the-depressed-lawyer.
Although these statistics are grim, I believe that it is possible to become a happy lawyer. In fact, when people ask me what type of lawyer I want to become, I do not say, “a prosecutor,” or “a bankruptcy attorney.” I say, “a happy lawyer.” | | | | |
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> | I am a Control Freak and a Pessimist | | | | |
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Why? Because being happy consists of avoiding what generally makes other people unhappy?
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> | My goal in law school is to learn how to become a happy lawyer. But first, it is important to learn why many lawyers are generally unhappy. In doing so, I will gain a deeper understanding of who I am, and what I need to accept about myself. Once I am confident in myself, I can figure out what it is that makes me truly happy. Psychologist Lynn Johnson attributes depression in the legal profession to two personality traits many lawyers have: perfectionism and pessimism. http://www.legalunderground.com/2005/03/lawyer_depressi.html. | | | | |
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> | The legal world attracts perfectionists because the legal world rewards perfectionism. We learn this very early on. In undergrad, we strive for a near perfect GPA and perfect LSAT score to get into the best law school. Then, we strive for perfect grades at the best law school in order to get into a law firm on the Vault 100 list. Unfortunately, the majority of lawyers do not succeed in getting into the best law school or succeed in working for a top law firm, compounding the feeling of failure. Then, as lawyers, we are criticized for small writing errors, and praised for billing 14 hours in one day just to have a perfect answer for our client. And as much as we strive for perfection, we never feel like anything is good enough. As a result, our level of stress rises and our happiness diminishes. | | | | |
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< | Psychologist Lynn Johnson attributes depression in the legal profession to two personality traits many lawyers have: perfectionism and pessimism. The legal world attracts perfectionists because the legal world rewards perfectionism. We learn this very early on. In undergrad, we need to have a near perfect GPA and perfect LSAT score to get into the best law school.
But were all the lawyers who later wind up perfectionist and pessimistic trying to get into the best law schools with near perfect scores?
Then, we need to have perfect grades at the best law school in order to get into the best law firm.
Aren't we talking now about a rather small fraction of all the lawyers in American society? I don't know how you define "best" law firms, but might we say that not more than 1% of the lawyers work there? Surely all these perfectionist and pessimistic, hence depressed, lawyers cannot mostly be drawn from this 1% of the lawyer population?
As lawyers, we are ostracized for small writing errors, and praised for billing 14 hours in one day just to have a perfect answer for our client.
I must tell you that if lawyers were being widely ostracized for small writing errors, there would be no one left in the city to practice law.
And as much as we strive for perfection, we never feel like anything is good enough. As a result, our level of stress rises and our happiness diminishes.
Many lawyers are also pessimists. We are always planning for the worst, never taking risks, and constantly worrying about the future. Not surprisingly, a Johns Hopkins study in 1990 showed "that in all graduate-school programs in all professional fields except one, optimists outperform pessimists. The one exception: law school." Why? Because "pessimism helps us excel: it makes us skeptical of what our clients, our witnesses, opposing counsel, and judges tell us. It helps us anticipate the worst, and thus prepare for it." | >
> | Many lawyers are also pessimists. We are always planning for the worst, never taking risks, and constantly worrying about the future. Not surprisingly, a Johns Hopkins study in 1990 showed “that in all graduate-school programs in all professional fields except one, optimists outperform pessimists. The one exception: law school.” Why? Because “pessimism helps us excel: it makes us skeptical of what our clients, our witnesses, opposing counsel, and judges tell us. It helps us anticipate the worst, and thus prepare for it.” http://www.legalunderground.com/2005/03/lawyer_depressi.html. | | | It is no surprise that lawyers are unhappy. Put a control freak and a pessimist in an unpredictable, hyper-competitive, and very often extremely demanding environment, and you get depression, suicide, and substance abuse. | |
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< | To Be a Lawyer in My Own Estimation
If lawyers are unhappy because many of them are perfectionists and pessimists, the question then becomes: am I a perfectionist and pessimist? You bet I am. How can I be a happy lawyer if I am a control freak and a pessimist? I will not find the answer to this question by choosing to work at a law firm that I like the most. I will not even find the answer to this question by choosing to work for a public interest organization helping people. I will not find an answer to this question by starting my own practice, finding my own clients, and making my own hours.
I believe I will find the answer through the advice a law professor once gave me: to be a lawyer in your own estimation. What does it mean "to be a lawyer in my own estimation?" According to the dictionary, the word "own" means, "of or belonging to oneself or itself." The word "estimation" means, "the process of finding an estimate, or approximation which is a value that is usable for some purpose even if input data may be incomplete, uncertain, or unstable." So, technically, I need to find the answer through the process (the process belonging to myself) of finding an approximation that is usable for some purpose even if data may be incomplete. Breaking this down, a "process belonging to myself" can simply mean my own thought process. So, "finding an approximation usable" would simply mean to guess. "Some purpose" would be the purpose of finding happiness as a lawyer. "Even if data may be uncertain" would mean even if the information I used to arrive at my question were incomplete. So, using my own interpretation, the key to being a happy lawyer is to use my own thought process to guess the answer, even if the information I used to arrive at my question is uncertain. In other words, to be a lawyer in my own estimation means to be a lawyer who accepts who they
are, and trusts oneself despite having uncertain answers.
This seems rather awkwardly mechanical as a form of textual interpretation. Maybe we could find a more philosophically resonant way to put the argument. Polonius has the franchise, has he not? "This above all: to thine own self be true."
Learning to Control My Own Happiness
If I can accept that I am a control freak and a pessimist, I may be able to use those qualities to my own advantage. Neville Goddard said that in order to get what you want in life, "[w]hat you must acquire [is] control of your ideas and feelings."
What a quaint reference. Christian New Thought rarely turns up in law student essays. This particular quote is actually, it seems to me, part of the generic language of American self-improvement literature. We are to perfect ourselves, or achieve worldly success, or whatever, by acquiring self-control. As stout a secularist as Ben Franklin can be found at that tabernacle. And what are we to control in ourselves? Our ideas and our feelings: otherwise known, to pretty much every cultural and intellectual historian of the American 19th century as "the Head and the Heart." One could get in from Horatio Alger as well as from Neville Goddard.
Hardly matters that it isn't even vaguely true. To get what we want in life—it would be substantially truer to say—we have to stop believing in our conscious control of our ideas and feelings altogether.
Ironically, many lawyers don't realize that their own happiness is in their control despite being absolute control freaks. Thus, if I channel my energy of perfectionism into controlling my own state of mind—into controlling my own happiness, despite being pessimistic, I believe I can become a happy lawyer. I just need to accept who I am, and trust that my weaknesses will eventually become my strengths. I believe that I can do this in the three years I am in law school.
References:
Why are these "references," rather than links in the text, that we could click through if we wanted to? They're not more useful here, are they?
http://www.legalunderground.com/2005/03/lawyer_depressi.html
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/therapy-matters/201105/the-depressed-lawyer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimation
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> | To Be a Lawyer in My Own Estimation | | | | |
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> | If lawyers are unhappy because many of them are perfectionists and pessimists, the question then becomes: am I a perfectionist and pessimist? You bet I am. Will I be able to avoid being a perfectionist and a pessimist? No, I will not. So then how can I be a happy lawyer? I will not find the answer to this question by choosing to work at a law firm that I like the most. I will not find an answer to this question by starting my own practice, finding my own clients, and making my own hours. | | | | |
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< | -- AlexandriaSchumacher - 25 Feb 2013 | >
> | I believe I will find the answer through the advice a professor once gave me: to be a lawyer in your own estimation. To me, the words “my own estimation” remind me of two moments in my life when I experienced overwhelming clarity. The first moment was when my stepdad took his own life, and the second moment was when my dad died unexpectedly. The death of a loved one is devastating. Yet, when I lost my stepdad and dad I felt so centered, so in touch with reality, so connected with nature and to other people. Life became very simple. I walked around for weeks with a sense of clarity about what mattered to me—love, relationships, kindness, and peace. I became all of these things despite the pain I felt. I believed this is who all of us are, and who I am at the core. We are all the same and connected in this way. | | | | |
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> | As I am reminded of these moments, “my own estimation” means to be true to myself. When I am my true self, I am operating not by superficial wants and needs but through love, kindness and peace. I let go of believing I can consciously control my ideas and feelings, and operate at this simple state of existence. This is when I am truly happy. When I am in this state, I am reminded of the issues I am most passionate about. I am reminded of other people who are deprived of love, kindness and peace. I am reminded that I am privileged despite my losses, and I am reminded that I am in a position to help people less fortunate than me acquire what matters to them. | | | | |
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< | I have some trouble
believing that happiness consists in conquering one's tendency to be
unhappy. So I don't think a happy lawyer is one whose self-respect
is preventing her from drinking too much or committing suicide. I
think she's someone who loves her work and believes deeply in its
value, who has a way of life that suits and sustains her, and who
faces the future with confidence and interest rather than with fear.
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> | I agree that lawyers are pessimists and perfectionists. But lawyers are also lacking a sense of clarity to help them realize what truly matters to them. | | | | |
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> | I believe that I can find happiness as a lawyer by staying true to myself, by finding passion in my work and believing deeply in its value, and by facing the future with confidence and clarity. I am hoping that law school will help me maintain this clarity, and not take it away from me. |
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