A Brand New World

Law school really messes with your mind.

I am a disciplined, organized person. You’d think I’d be all over this law school thing. I put in 12-14 hours a day Monday through Thursday, and a short 10-hour day on Friday. I lighten up on the weekends: anywhere from 5-10 hours of study is all.

And I feel like I don’t study nearly enough.

Yesterday was my section’s hard day (four classes). In between Class 3 and Class 4, I caught half of an interesting panel on religious asylum. You can read about the new clincal program HERE. It’s really interesting stuff. And yet I just caught half of it – too much to do to sit and appreciate it all.

Here’s the funny thing: most of us think the work load is preparing us for our impending career. In other words, no, it doesn’t get better. This overwhelmed, inadequate feeling is part of what it means to be a lawyer. Too much in the “to do” box and not enough hours in the day.

Teaching was challenging in its own way. I found preaching to be substantially easier on the “work load” front, though it possessed unique challenges all its own. With my penchant for discipline and organization, I always felt as if I went over and above the call to duty in terms of hours worked, etcetera. But my path to being a lawyer is way different. WAY different. There is much more expected of lawyers than anyone can actually give.

But my two favorite words in the world are peace and justice.

Peace = breaking down barriers between people.

Justice = making things “right” when things have gone wrong.

And in spite of all the bad feelings people have toward the career field, it turns out to be the one career I know centered equally on my two favorite words.