The Story of Your Alternative Legal Career

These “truths” about leaving law and finding an alternative legal career only work in the context of depressed, dysfunctional people. They’re a profession-wide form of group-think. They get reinforced constantly. That’s why they feel so deeply true.
But theses stories are not TRUTH written on high. They’re only stories you are choosing. And they’re sabotaging your efforts and making you miserable. Maybe it’s time to start re-writing your tired, dispiriting plot lines with some new truths that make it a helluva lot easier to get out of bed

You Can’t Buy the Career Ticket Before Knowing the Destination

Do you keep using lizard tools to find a new career? That’s what searching for jobs on legal job sites is. That’s what listening to legal recruiters is. That’s what worrying about what your salary might be is. Really, that’s what all your worry about lack is: lizard worry about logistics, about the plane ticket. Lizards don’t do hope and joy and meaning. But you can.

What Lawyers Can Learn from Dragonflies

Nascent unhappy lawyers chase accolades for grades and accomplishments. They please parents and teachers and then law firm partners, by squishing themselves into the success box rather than looking inside themselves for their truth.

The Conditions Are Never Ideal

You know what a lot of resistance to getting an alternative legal career boils down to? The conditions are not ideal. That’s it, really. And our perfectionist, either/or thinking tells us to throw up our hands and give up because the conditions are not ideal. That’s a dodge.

Workaholic Lawyers, Avoiding Life

Numbing out is our way of avoiding pain, but it has the unfortunate downside of numbing us to joy as well. When we numb out, we embrace less than our full humanity. We become less, sometimes far less, than our full selves. Wow, doesn’t that sound appealing.

If You’re Creative, You’re Screwed in Law

I’m in the middle of playing Connect 4 with the 7 year-old. He loves this game, and he’s pretty good at it. I, on the other hand, am bored out of my mind. Then I berate myself that I need to share his enthusiasm, to enter his world. So I try to understand the attraction

I’m not THAT Jennifer Alvey, Either

Well, she’s at it again. One of those other Jennifer Alveys. This one was the Indiana state finance director a couple years back, and allegedly had back-door communications with the operators of a proposed gasification plant about a pending contract; not cool under state sunshine laws. Another Jennifer Alvey, a few years back, was convicted

Career Goals That Actually Work

Before you go all goal-setting crazy, figure out what you truly value. Try doing some work around that value. If you still aren’t moving toward a life that beckons you, then it might be the time to set a goal.