Things I’ve Learned So Far in Law School

The first three semesters of law school have been quite a roller coaster to say the least. Here are the main things I’ve learned along the way:

• They weren’t kidding about all of the reading. You might be reading this thinking, “How bad can it be?” but its bad. I spend a couple of hours every day just reading cases in thick textbooks, which are never entertaining. Being stuck in my room all day with remote learning makes me loathe it even more. And you can’t ever skip it like you did in undergrad because you’re going to get cold called in class to answer questions about it! Overall, very unbearable. I try to block out time in my schedule each day to chop up the readings and also read ahead when I can.
• Unplugging is possible. When I started law school I thought I needed to be constantly studying or reading something (even on weekends) in order to do well academically, and I have come to learn that it’s just not true. There is a point where no amount of studying, outlining, or reading is going to aid your understanding of a subject. I personally try not to do any law school work on the weekends. It absolutely requires some determination and hard work on the weekdays, but if you can get your work done, you can certainly take the weekends off. I have found relaxing and recharging to be essential to my mental health and motivation and have been actively implementing it during this 2L spring!
• Cold calls aren’t as bad as you think they are. I personally don’t ~hate~ cold calls that much. Other students despise cold calls and want nothing to do with them. I don’t really mind having to answer questions in class. In some classes this semester, I even volunteer (gasp) and answer questions about readings or hypotheticals! You just have to remember that literally no one is going to remember anything you say and the professor isn’t looking for a perfect answer. They just want to walk you through the analysis of an issue and teach you something.
• Imposter syndrome in law school is 100% valid, and everyone feels it at some point. I’ve poured my heart out on this subject in a separate blog post, but I’ll give the TL;DR here. With law school being such a competitive and high pressure environment, everyone is bound to feel inferior and not good enough at some point during the process. I try to be super open on this subject because law school makes me feel like I’m trash quite a bit. From the grading curve, to not falling into a certain top percentage of the class, to thinking that I needed to be on the law review journal to get a “good” private firm job, it’s tiring to keep up with every aspect of law school bringing me down. The thing is, I need to stop comparing my behind-the-scenes struggle to everyone else’s highlight reel. I’ve learned to acknowledge the feeling of imposter syndrome in myself (as I feel it constantly) and have been able to manage it to an extent by reminding myself I am doing my best.
• I have to be my own biggest supporter and motivator. Going along with the last point on imposter syndrome, I have found that I need to be my own biggest supporter in order to get through this. Law school is a tough journey, and I have been hit quite hard by the weight of it all (even physically shedding weight, 14 pounds in the past year, just from stress and forgetting to eat). I have felt quite alone, especially during my 2L year. Remote learning absolutely does not help the situation. Even with family, friends, and my partner there when I need them, I feel isolated most of the time. Even outside of law school, I know this might be the case in the legal field as well. I spent some time talking with an attorney recently who, reflecting on his time at a big law firm, detailed how “no one at work was there to cheer [him] on or motivate [him].” Being my own biggest support system is something I’m actively working on, and I’m attempting to implement more self care and positive affirmations into my daily routine.