I went to law school – quite a long time ago now. After seeing Harry Hamlin in LA Law (yes, I said it was a while ago…) I decided that the life of a lawyer was definitely for me. Then I saw the bluestone 19th century law school quadrangle at the university that I ultimately ended up attending, and I was smitten. Sold – sign me up! It never occurred to me at the age of 15 that perhaps I couldn’t handle law school or its disciplines. All I would have to do was study hard enough to get the marks to get in. I’d always excelled academically – I assumed that this would be just another box to tick in my inevitable path towards lawyerdom.
I worked hard and got into the bluestone law school. It was at that point that I became a small fish in a big pond of extremely bright law students. I was studying concepts that were completely foreign to me and that required a degree of intellectual rigour that none of us had encountered before. Suddenly, I wasn’t the brightest kid in the class and I was struggling to rank somewhere in the middle of that class. I took solace in my history and politics studies, and told myself that perhaps I wasn’t cut out for the law – a form of academic cop out to disguise my deep fear that I would fail my law subjects. I got to a point when my fear of failure became so crippling that I was weeks away from chucking it all in and dropping out of law school.
When I was in my fourth year of university, I finally sought treatment for my depression. It was only after I’d been on medication for some time and had regularly been seeing a clinical psychologist that I realised that a lot of my fear of failing had been precipitated by my depression. I had pretty much decided that I was never going to practice law because I couldn’t see how any law firm could possibly want to employ me. Actually dealing with my depression and taking back control over my emotions and my life enabled me to think more clearly about what I was capable of achieving, even though I was still scared.
The following year I received the best marks of my law degree. I obtained a graduate job at the end of my degree. I graduated from university and started practising law and discovered – to my surprise – that I was actually pretty good at it. I even enjoyed it. I’m lucky enough that I’m still enjoying it.
I often think back to that time in my university career when I was convinced that I would never make it as a lawyer. I never thought that I would get past the fear that I experienced – fear of failure, fear of embarrassment at failing, fear of pretty much everything. It can be painful to look back at that period even now. However, remembering those days reminds me that even at the lowest point in my life I still managed to find enough strength to tumble over the finish line.
When in doubt, just keep tumbling …
Phew. Well done you. You nearly didn’t become a brilliant lawyer, colleague and mentor?! #LuckyForUs
How gorgeous are you?? #luckyforme
Brilliant! Well done. I understand how tough that time must have been.
Not easy, but we all have challenges that we get through eventually!