Evaluating Happiness: Rejecting Cognitive Dissonance in Law School

The Set-Up

Most of us want to say that we’re happy in law school and that we made the right decision in coming. That’s because before we started, we all had our reasons. We want to become a lawyer, perhaps, or make money, help people, change the world, figure out what to do with the rest of our lives, or even keep learning about how society functions. Whatever the reason, and whether or not it was a good reason, we committed (unless we drop out) close to $270,000 and 3 years of our lives.

So then we find ourselves here. But, there can be an overwhelming amount of work. There is nearly no practical learning at all. The curve is undoubtedly a terrible method for encouraging learning through collaboration. There are court opinions that are tedious. Classmates’ opinions sometimes lack substance or significance. Time spent with friends and family shrinks.

But we’re still happy. We have to be, or it wouldn’t be worth it.

The Rationalization

Over the past few months, I’ve constantly been asked, “Do you like law school?” And every time, I have answered affirmatively – that I like it and I’m happy. I’m enjoying the readings and the new historical perspectives I’ve gained, my peers are intelligent and I like a good number of them, and I’ve been challenging myself to become a better speaker and writer. I’ve been asked so many times, that it’s practically rehearsed by now. I like the internal consistency, as people often do.

The Rejection

But then came one day, “I hope that’s the case, but I’m not sure I believe you.”

I’m not often accused of lying, although, when that sentence was uttered to me, I also don’t think it was meant as an accusation of a lie. It did force me to consider the set up that law school puts us in. We pay a lot of money and spend a lot of time in law school, so we must be happy doing all of the readings, attending the firm lunch receptions, and meeting overworked attorneys who come to invite us to join them.

It made me consider that I need to seriously evaluate if I’m happy in law school by simply following the steps that Columbia has so nicely laid out for us, or if there are other steps that I could be taking instead.

The Happiness?

Still, even now, I’m not sure where happiness, for me, really lies. But, recognizing that the dream that society has pushed us to pursue leads us to sometimes conflicting goals is a start.

In terms of pursuing happiness in law school, there are two different types of happiness that are at stake. First, there’s the kind of instantaneous, literal happiness that we can feel. The other happiness is a more long-term happiness of accomplishing things that we believe will contribute to our future happiness. The uncertainty in evaluating our future happiness results in a conflict between immediate gratification and possible future fulfillment. The result is that we might not pursue what we enjoy now because it conflicts with what we believe we will enjoy in the future.

I don’t have a be all and end all solution for that conflict. But, there are steps that we can take to ensuring our happiness. For example, social psychology has suggested that there is at least one thing that has been proven to make us happier: giving to others. In relation to while we’re at law school, even though we might have no money to give to others, we can certainly give our time to those who need it.

Another step we can take is to evaluate what has made us feel the best in the past. Looking back to the list of things that has made me enjoy law school, I’ve noticed that for the most part, the list was all about myself. But if the question were changed to, “What have you done in the past few months that have made you feel the most accomplished?”, then I would have a significantly different answer about when I was actually able to help someone else instead of myself. That answer might be different for other people, but I think that the answer is worth exploring before any of us commit ourselves to the firms and institutions that we’re directed towards.

Being at a world-class legal institution means that we should have confident optimism about our futures, but only if we are truly pursuing things that we actively reflect on as making us happy. Undoubtedly, we don’t want to start reflecting on ourselves 20 years from now, only to realize that we never took the moment and asked ourselves what we truly enjoyed.

So, am I happy? I’m still not sure, but I’m certainly not going to fall prey to an internal need for consistency, or anyone else's definition of happiness.