Legal Commentary

We have all seen the reports about how unhappy many lawyers are, how many people drop out of the profession, describe themselves as "recovering lawyers," and so on. And we know that lots of law students are unhappy, stressed, and confused about what law school is supposed to be doing. It seems that wherever you find someone who hates what she is doing, you also hear, "I thought this was what I wanted, but I didn't want this." So in line with a recurrent theme here at Prawfs, what role should law schools play in teaching students to know what they want and exposing them to what the real world is going to be like?

Personally, I think we play a big role in both, which is why I often require my students to do some kind of reflection exercise, sometimes the same exercise, at least once during the semester. My favorite is also a good icebreaker for seminars or other meetings. I ask the students, "If time, money, and skill level were no object (in other words, you have enough of all of that), what would you be doing with your life and why?" Not surprisingly, almost no one says, "going to law school," but the answers can tell the students a lot about what they need out of a career. And knowing what they need out of a career can help them tailor their law school experience towards those attributes, which will make the law school piece (and hopefully the career) much more fun or at least easier to tolerate. And this question can create a lot of productive internal dissonance for people not used to reflecting. For example, recently one woman I asked got very agitated when I told her that she could not consider obligations or other people's expectations in her answer. But the point was, how do you know what you want or need if you're always doing things based on what others want or need?

So, if time, money and skill level were no object, I think I'd be working at a specialty cake bakery like the one featured on Food Network's Ace of Cakes. Each cake is a single project with a beginning and an end, the environment is full of of really creative people, the work is very tactile, you can see your progress, and the end product is so beautiful and often visually calming, with smooth curves and symmetrical patterns. Plus, who doesn't like cake?

What about you?