letting the cat out of the bag

I have a really great story about a cat and a "baaaag" (with a Wisconsin accent)... but my friends tell me that I have a tendency to repeat my "really great" stories... so I might save that one for another time.  Besides, because the hilarity of the story really depends on its execution in a Wisconsin accent, I'm sure it probably loses something over the Internet.

Alright, I will cut to the very exciting chase:  I am leaving law to go work for Cafe Well, a social media company focused on health and wellness.  And I am SO freaking excited!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I've struggled with how best to package this news in order to convey the appropriate amount of gratitude to the law firm that employed me in a terrible job market, while also being honest about how I felt about myself as a lawyer.  After days (ok, weeks) of hemming, hawing and trying to spare feelings, I decided that honesty is always the best policy.  To the extent (do you think that now that I'm done being a lawyer the phrase "to the extent" will drift out of my vocabulary as magically as it entered?  I hope so).  Anyway, to the extent any lawyer is insulted by my decision to leave the law, please consider this my formal apology.  It's not you.  It's me.  It's me and the industry.  It's me and the nature of law.  It's me.  It's me.  And I was miserable.

I would have to say that I knew early on law might not be for me.  There's a certain desperation that goes along with that.  A certain "oh shit, what have I done?" that sits in the pit of your stomach and rears its ugly head just about the time you start thinking "maybe I could make this work."  Thanks to the blog Leaving the Law, I learned that my Meyers Briggs personality type is ESFJ - Extrovert, Sensing, Feeling, Judging.  Interestingly, I also learned that only 2.7% of lawyers are ESFJ.  And here is what that apparently means: ESFJ results.  A majority of lawyers, according to the writer of Leaving the Law, are ISTJ - Introvert, Sensing, Thinking, Judging, and it struck me as I read this, that not one of my friends from law school could be considered an Introvert.  Weird.  Then again, most of my friends from law school are going through their own struggles with being lawyers.  Ha, sorry guys, I guess you're just not introverted enough for the law.  Weird. 

Anyway, I didn't quit law over some personality test online that told me maybe a legal career was not the best fit.  I quit law because every piece of me and who I am told me every single day that a legal career was most definitely not the best fit. It's hard to admit defeat.  Ask anyone.  In most cases, I would rather die trying with a smile on my face, than admit defeat.  Strangely though, accepting that the law wasn't for me was the most freeing, liberating feeling in the world.

Once I accepted this... the next questions became, WHEN??  HOW??  SERIOUSLY???  When in the world am I supposed to make this transition?  How long do you have to give it before you can justify throwing in the towel?  And... to a certain extent... what would people think?? 

Here's what I know:  (1) I have $260,000 in debt.  That is constant.  That is not going anywhere.  I will have that debt whether I make $30,000 a year or $400,000 a year.  (2) I could never, EVER go BigLaw.  I was working at the, relatively speaking, coolest, most modern, most laid back, while still being a respectable 17th Street law firm.  And I couldn't hack it.  While there are of course politics in every firm, I loved the people at my firm... and I knew enough to know that they were damn good lawyers.  In other words, if I wanted to become a great lawyer, while also being able to train for marathons... this firm was the place for me.  (3) If I don't go BigLaw (like really, really BigLaw... like sell-your-soul and your first born BigLaw), I will not make the kind of kind of money I need to make to pay off my loans in that 5-year period I so unrealistically set for myself when I decided to go to law school.  (4) There is a thing called the Income Based Repayment program, and it's saving lives everywhere.

Once I let go of the loan piece... and those who know me, know what a task that was... I could focus the reality of not practicing law.  I could get to the place where I could admit to myself and other that, like the People's Therapist said, I suck at law.  Not in the way you're thinking.  I'm sure I was on the path to being a really good lawyer some day.  That's not what I mean.  I mean I suck at being adversarial.  I suck at conforming.  And while the competition piece is certainly ingrained in me, I lacked the ownership over my work to really consider practicing law as a competition. 

Also, like the PT said, I'm good at school  (yes friends, I was/am "Nicki from Wisconsin"... I know), and law school is school.  As any attorney will tell you, law school doesn't make you a lawyer.  Spending countless hours (and actually... they're not "countless" - you better be counting every single one of them in tenth of an hour increments and charging exorbitant rates) behind a desk, constantly feeling like you're not doing enough and someone is always mad at you (the partner, the client, opposing counsel...), the guilt, the anxiety, the constant fear that you missed something, contentious conference calls day after day... THAT makes you a lawyer.  And I knew I couldn't do those things for the rest of my life.  Even if it means I  "wasted" $130,000 per letter (J and D) after my name.  It's a sunk cost.  And when I think about all the non-legal benefits I got from law school, and how much I enjoyed the actual school part of it, I can say, even right now (even while my loans are accruing interest at a higher rate than what I'm paying on them), that it was worth it.  It was worth it for the people I met.  It was worth it for the place it brought me to.  It was worth it for the experiences abroad.  If it's what I needed to go through to bring me here... then it was worth it.

There's so much more that I want to write on this topic.  I want to tell you all about people's reactions (because it was not at all what I expected).  I want to tell you how my new job came to be.  I want to tell you how supportive my family has been.  And I will... in future blog posts.  Because while I think I can finally consider myself officially in "recovery," this blog will survive my legal career, and I have every plan to keep writing and let The Recovering Lawyer become whatever it's going to become.

A huge HUGE thank you to everyone for all of your support and words of encouragement along the way.  As most of you know... I am more than happy to talk further with any of you about this topic.  And it's fitting to me, that I finally have a minute to sit down and finish this blog post (which I started over 2 weeks ago) on Easter Sunday.  I think it's also appropriate to quote Leaving the Law one more time before I sign off, because her words ring true for me... The Meyers Briggs Personality Test is not going to substitute for the voice of God, mind you, but it might help you sort out some of the competing voices in your head. Well, the ones you can discuss in polite company, anyway.  I am grateful for the Meyers Briggs results, AND the voice of God, AND the people who have walked me through this... the ones I would consider NOT as "polite company" but as rather real, honest company - the ones who told me that if I'm miserable now, I'll be miserable in 5 years.  That if law isn't a good fit, it doesn't magically become a better fit just because I have debt.  The ones who've discussed all of this with me ad nauseum and stood next to me while I publicly embarrassed myself on this topic.  To all of you, THANK YOU.

And so begins the long (amazing, fun, exhilarating, inspiring, reason-to-get-up-in-the-morning) path of recovery.  Amen.