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LCLMAdmin

This author has written 205 articles

Argument: Law School Changed Me

Law students and lawyers often tell me that law school changed them. This realization usually occurs after numerous friends and family members tell them that they have changed. “You’re more argumentative” is often heard. Typically, the law student does not feel like they have become a different person, but instead they have been learning new skills. One of the most prevalent experiences about law school is the way that it changes the way you think about everything. Whether you are thinking about an argument to make or about the intention behind a law, law school teaches you that there are no right and wrong answers. It is all about the argument you can make. This is why the Socratic Method is used in almost every law class that you take. The Socratic Method uses a series of questions to help explore potential answers or avenues of thought. The point of the method is to ask questions and engage in the process of exploration. It is not about determining the one and only right answer.

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The Secret to Winning – Often not what you think it is: Competition vs. Cooperation

Recently, as I was listening to the TED Radio Hour on NPR, I was intrigued by a TEDWomen 2015 talk by Margaret Heffernan about how our traditional ideas of competition and pecking orders based on individual achievement are causing much more harm than good. In her talk, Heffernan talks about “The Superchicken Model” which was derived from the work of an evolutionary biologist from Purdue University named William Muir who studied chickens. Muir found that a flock of chickens made up of only the high producers (i.e., the “superchickens”) eventually failed over time due to the fact that all but three of them died as they pecked each other to death. In essence, the heightened competition literally killed most of them.

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The Cost of Depression

The statistics are, well, depressing when it comes to the rates of depression among law students and attorneys. While law students do not differ from the general population in terms of depression prior to starting law school (about 7%), approximately 32% of law students experience depression by the end of their first year in law school. This trend continues through law school to the point of 40% of students experiencing depression by the end of the third year. After law school and the bar exam, rates of depression go down a bit but generally stay at over twice the rate of the general population. Lawyers in all areas of law are faced with various stressors (financial, pressure, long hours, unemployment, etc.) that contribute to their impaired well-being.

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Increase your pain tolerance in order to get the tough stuff done

One of the most stressful situations that a person can be in is when they feel they have no control. Feeling a lack of control increases stress. Lists of the most stressful jobs are often topped by jobs in which the employee feels little control over their time and workload. A CEO who is responsible for the operations of a company and the jobs of all of its employees will most often report a lower amount of stress than a middle manager who feels like he or she is stuck in between the rules of upper management and the complaints of the ground level workers. The biggest difference between those two jobs (aside from the paycheck) is the amount of control that each person feels they have within their job.

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Tips on winning the fight against anxiety – Tip #3: Pretend you’re a surfer

One of the biggest ways to increase anxiety and stress is trying to control something that we have no control over. This is the definition of futile. Yet we do this quite often when we are anxious or worried about a potential future event. Our intentions are good (we want to prevent the bad thing from happening) but our attempts at controlling the world around us will actually increase our anxiety. The more we spend our energy on things outside of our control, the more our frustration grows, and frustration in the midst of anxiety can lead to panic. Not a good outcome generally.

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Tips on winning the fight against anxiety – Tip #2: Just wait

In a previous post I recommended that cheating was a great way to fight against anxiety. My second tip in the fight against anxiety is equally as counterintuitive. Another effective technique to fight anxiety is to do nothing and wait it out. This is easier said than done. Just to set the stage, by definition anxiety works through our natural warning system that tells us when a threat is present. The presence of a threat activates our “Fight or Flight” response which charges us up and gets us ready to attack or run away in order to protect ourselves. It almost demands a response. At least, it can certainly feel that way.

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Resilience: Internal Resources (Part 2)

In a previous post I talked about the importance of resilience in our day to day lives. One contributor to resilience is our experience of external supports (perceived and enacted). Another source of resources is within us. The more resilient we are, the more quickly we are able to rebound from challenging circumstances. This is true of major life events (adjusting to losing a job) as well as everyday sources of stress (unexpected work that gets dropped in your lap). The more resilient a person feels, the more confidence they have in their ability to withstand the turmoil that comes their way each day.

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Love Languages: So many opportunities for miscommunication

It should come as no surprise to anyone that all people want to be loved. It’s one of our deepest needs. Even within our professional relationships, we want to be loved. Now most people would not identify that need as love per se when it comes to coworkers and supervisors. But the basic elements are there. We want to know that our colleagues and bosses care about us, support us, and think well of us. So call it what you will, the same need exists within our professional relationships the same way it does in our personal ones.

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Stress and Time Management Group

Got Stress? Want to learn ways of handling it better?

LCL and LOMAP are offering a free Stress and Time Management series starting this Friday (August 28, 2015) and running for three weeks. We will cover topics related to recognizing stressors and your response to them, ways of dealing with stress so that the stress does not wear you down, and practical time management skills that can make a significant impact on your stress levels.

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