My client was sitting at her desk, drafting a complicated, rushed memo. The topic was an obscure derivative. She’d worked all weekend, then come in again early. Her head hurt. It was due at 5 pm. She could barely focus and was feeling panicked. It was 4 pm.
The phone rang. Not thinking, she picked up and barked her last name, sharply, the way the partner she worked for did.
“Jones.”
It was her ninety-two-year-old grandmother.
“How are you, Sweetheart?”
My client couldn’t stop crying.
“All she did was ask how I was,” she told me. “That’s all it took. I fell apart.”
When you enter the world of biglaw, you pass through a ritual of initiation – LSAT, law school, bar exam, interviews.
Then you enter the bubble.
On the inside, propositions that seem insane in the outside world are taken for granted:
- Two hundred thousand dollars in student loans is within the normal range.
- You have to earn six figures or you are a failure.
- You can’t take a vacation just because you “have” a vacation. It must be “convenient.”
- Leaving the office at 5 pm shows a serious failure of commitment.
- Taking a weekend off shows a serious failure of commitment.
- Working night and day and doing your best shows a serious failure of commitment.
Last week, another client’s mother was rushed to the hospital. He got a call from the emergency room, then sprinted to the train station to buy a ticket home. It was serious – a perforated appendix that could have killed her. He spent the weekend by her side. Once she was back in her own bedroom, recovering, he found himself tucking her plastic hospital id bracelet into his briefcase.
“I know, it sounds crazy, but I didn’t think they’d believe me.”
“They’d think you were lying about your mother being rushed to the hospital?”
He rolled his eyes. “I know. I know. But they’re like that. No one trusts anyone. An excuse to leave for a long weekend? Someone might try it.”
The rules are different in the bubble. The worst distortion? Money becomes more important than people.
When my client’s ninety-two-year-old grandmother called to ask how she was, it reminded her this old woman is a precious treasure – and she’s elderly, and frail. She won’t be here forever.
When you work at a law firm, things keep coming up. My client hasn’t seen her grandmother in more than a year. That’s part of the reason she was crying. The rules inside the bubble take over. You forget who you are. Then an old woman calls and reminds you.
As the author of this column, I’m asked the same question all the time – how do I survive this?
The answer might be: by not forgetting who you are.
That starts with remembering what every child knows: people are more important than money.
My client knew she could concoct some way to take a day off and visit her grandmom. If she had to make up a story, then fine, she’d make one up. Her grandmother was more important than an assignment – or a job, if that’s what it came to.
A partner could tell her it’s not convenient and she has to cancel.
She could tell the partner sorry, that’s not possible.
To keep people more important than money inside the bubble, you have to enforce boundaries. That might be risky, but it’s worth it.
The first person worth more than money is you.
I used to take the elevator down from Sullivan & Cromwell once in a while. To the ground level. Then I’d go outside.
I looked at trees. That’s it. To remind myself they exist.
It’s just a job.
Trees matter. Nature matters. Art matters. Friends matter.
If things get that bad at a firm, you can leave. To hell with loans and “career” and all that. If this place is killing you, you can depart. You are more important than any other consideration. If this environment is toxic for you, you need to get out.
People matter. You matter.
If you’re going to enter the world of biglaw, remember what it is, a bubble.
Don’t forget to visit your grandmother.
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This piece is part of a series of columns presented by The People’s Therapist in cooperation with AboveTheLaw.com. My thanks to ATL for their help with the creation of this series.
If you enjoy these columns, please check out The People’s Therapist’s new book.
All of this is well and good, but what do you do if you are stuck in a toxic environment and looking for a job, but can’t simply leave because (i) you have loans to pay and (ii) any potential future employer’s going to be suspicious you were forced out (which is actually on the brink of happening)?
What coping mechanisms do you recommend for an environment that has truly turned rancid, from which it is incredibly difficult for the employer to fire you for various reasons, but where it’s clear you’re no longer wanted (for reasons that have nothing to do with your actual work product)?
Some of us have no choice but to keep going and pray that our partners can bear with us until we get out.
At very least, you can remember who you are, and what truly matters. If you can keep your head together, you can survive anything. If you break down and fall apart, then whatever else happens, things will be a lot worse. Remind yourself that you are allowed to leave. Okay, sure, you have loans and future employers might have to be “spun” to a bit – but you CAN leave. If you’re losing your mind, you can leave. If this is killing you, you can leave. When it comes down to it, your welfare is the over-riding consideration. That’s the truth.
I don’t think you understand the concept of “CAN leave”. If he has loans, how can he leave? What will he do? How will he pay his loans?
If you don’t pay your loans…you don’t pay your loans. The banks can’t put you in prison anymore. They’ll have to wait. When you’re back in some sort of job, you’ll start paying them again. Your life is more important than money.
You really have a way of knowing what I’m thinking, having recently told my 89 year old grandfather that I can’t visit him in Florida because “I can never take a vacation”.
I suspect a lot of lawyers haven’t seen their grandparents in a long time.
I’m not buying it! I work in biglaw and I don’t know ONE attorney who can’t take one long weekend off. Give me a break. It doesn’t exist. I know hundreds of biglaw lawyers, and they all go on vacations. Some might have to do some work while on vacation, but I don’t know of anyone who doesn’t take vacations. Stop with the pity fest, really.
I work in regional BigLaw and very few take vacations – your experience does not negate all other experiences.
I had a Biglaw partner tell me I couldn’t take one day off to go see my grandmother on her deathbed (literally), in a month where I billed 350+ hours. I told him to go f**k himself and went anyway, but don’t think it doesn’t happen.
It happens. The issues isn’t whether you can or cannot take a weekend off, it is that you can never predict if your plans will be canceled. So you stop making them.
I got told to bring my billables up the month I watched my grandmother die, and my divorce was finalized. And they prefaced it with “we know your life has been difficult, but” nothing less than 200 was acceptable.
This is a different Jadzia — a Biglaw alum. My experience at a big firm (rhymes with “Fladden”) was completely different than the Jadzia upthread. I saw people called back from their honeymoons at that firm. At another firm a friend (who for some reason stayed and eventually made partner) collapsed at his desk, and came back to work the next day. Six months into my Biglaw tenure, I was the victim of a serious, violent crime on a Saturday — and was back at my desk on Monday. After finally having an internal meltdown after same, I scheduled a 4 day vacation. Which was canceled (by an of-counsel) the night before it happened because a response to interrogatories was due the next week. Everybody here probably can guess how this story ends.
You stabbed the Of Counsel with his Mont Blanc, pled insanity and were out in 90 days after explaining to the folks in the asylum what the firm was like? 😉
Look at what you just wrote. Let me summarize: (1) attorneys can take a long weekend off; (2) lawyers sometimes go on vacation, but usually take work with them.
That’s a tough lifestyle. A long weekend four times a year doesn’t cut it for a good quality of life when your normal life is a 60-70 hour week at odd, unpredictable hours. And every biglaw attorney I know, including me while I worked in biglaw, and definitely including every partner in biglaw, works on most if not all vacations. Billing 20 hours in a week is not a vacation, particularly if you’re stressing about all the extra resulting work that’s piling up back at the office and about the fact that you have to deflect and disappoint other attorneys who want your time and who don’t care enough about your vacation to even remember that you’re on one.
As for setting limits, I’m sorry, but in biglaw it does not work, mostly because at every level you answer to people who either don’t set limits themselves or who don’t care. Junior associates answer to mid-level associates (on the verge of sacrificing their lives to the firm), who answer to senior associates (flat-out crazy on the quest for partnership), who answer to junior partners (after senior associateship have already sacrificed any outside life and are generally used to it), who answer to senior partners (obsessed with answering to clients who don’t care about their lawyers’ lives and way past the point of recalling what a real outside life was like).
I’m not saying biglaw is bad; it’s great for some people. You’ll be hypersuccessful, practice law at the highest level (arguably), and make lots of money (certainly less than the big finance cats or ceos, but honestly if a mill or so a year doesn’t cut it for you, I doubt a bill would). Just realize that if you want to stay and make it and thrive in biglaw, you have to not see your grandmother who lives in Florida more than once a year, for the remaining two years that she’s alive.
Finally, to add to the point that this is all a bubble, I can tell you that I know plenty of people in other industries who make more money that biglaw attorneys and are just as objectively successful but who don’t have to give up so much of their outside lives. Most of them just shake their heads when they see or hear about how biglaw attorneys work. Ironically, your comment—that every attorney can take “one long weekend off” and go on work-filled vacations—which you made to show that biglaw isn’t that bad, actually nicely illustrates the author’s point about the bubble.
Great article. I have felt this way in the past (though things have slowed down a bit recently) and it was terrible. There is always a way out–it might just not fit in with your plan. If you’re truly miserable, you can find something else to do–even if it means teaching English in Nicaragua, or starting a taco stand. I know people will laugh that off, but it’s true. It’s never to late to start over.
All true. I will say this, however, by way of reminder. It’s not just big law. It’s all law.
Never forget: you chose this.
Yeah, but a choice made by a young person working on inadequate information isn’t much of a choice, is it? Madoff’s victims “chose” too.
Yes – query the definition of “choice” when you were young and naive and had to find something that would lead to a paying job ASAP (as law did in my time). Free choice requires free will and some level of knowledge.
What you do actually “choose” is to do this forever, or to change.
What do you mean? So if you signed up for a particular job when you got out of law school, that means you still have to be there 10 years later? Besides, people who went to school in 2005-2006 did not go in on inadequate information, it was just a different market. The fact that they graduated just as the world was collapsing on them… well, that’s really not up to them.
Inadequate information — do you ever think adults, albeit young, can be help responsible for their actions? I didn’t trust the law schools, after all, the law schools told me nothing about attorney happiness. I contacted attorneys, did internet research, etc. Further, I did not have assumptions of grandeur. I knew people who went to Catholic and assumed they’d transfer to Georgetown after 1L year. I knew people who went to TTT saying they wanted to get into “International Law”. Others, who currently blame law schools for the ‘scam’ perpetrated against them, went into law because they didn’t know what to do with their philosophy degree — as if the law schools forced them to do philosophy rather than finance! I know folks who wanted to do BigLaw because they thought it’d finally get them laid. Sorry, but these idiotic, fanciful notions are not the fault of law schools, the ABA, or BigLaw monsters, the rot lies with individual students and new attorneys.
Maybe some straight talk and tough love from the therapist is in order?
It’s slightly more complicated than that. I think of my decision to go to law school as an impulsive early marriage. I was 22, and I didn’t really have a good sense of what I was getting into. It was a mistake, and I think I knew it by the end of first semester. But like a lot of newlyweds, I chose to believe that I was just having trouble adjusting and that my fears and frustrations were the result of immaturity and inexperience. I stuck it out… for a while.
By the time I knew I wanted out, I had invested a lot in my legal career. I had eighty grand in loans. I had taken the bar (twice) and given up months to studying. I had several years of experience in the field.
You can’t just erase a marriage, and I can’t just pretend my law degree didn’t happen either. I still work in corporate law nearly 10 years after making the decision to go to law school, though I don’t practice, which frees me from some of the worst aspects of the lifestyle. I still get frustrated by the way my J.D. and debt limits my options. I’m working on the side to build experience outside of my field, but that’s stressful too — sort of like learning how to date again after a six-year marriage you thought would be your last.
So yes, I chose this. But the other thing I have to never forget is that everyone fucks up. Making a bad decision at 22, be it law school or a bad marriage, doesn’t mean you have to live with it for the rest of your life. You can make different, better decisions with the benefit of having learned some important lessons about who you are and what you want out of life. It’s not easy, but it beats crying at my desk twice a week.
I recall that when I started in the law 10+ years ago I spent several nights struggling to sleep because I wasn’t sure whether or not I had understood and correctly completed some (what I now realize were pathetically) minor aspects of a filing. I also recall the despair I felt after I spent a weekend preparing a beautiful markup for a partner and then received a rant on the Monday about what an idiot I was for spending so much time on a document when the client “had clearly wanted the bare minimum of changes” (would have been nice to know earlier).
Yes, the law is a tough profession. But, some of our troubles are self-inflicted – if I had achieved a better sense of perspective I wouldn’t have been sweating the small stuff – and unfortunately, the fact is that to be a success as a lawyer, one does need to harden up. Clients don’t want pushovers representing them. So, adversity can be a necessary evil.
None of us have been conscripted for a defined tour of duty. A certain degree of discomfort is to be expected but the author is right – family and personal health have to come first.
My question to AnonymousAssociate is, leaving pride and your desire to meet parental/friends’ expectations aside, what do you really need to earn in order to manage your loans and live a life that makes you happier? I suspect the answer might lead you to broaden your job search.
I took a week off to stay with my grandmother (who raised me) when she was really sick. She seemed to get better. The partners were unhappy. I went back to work on the other side of the country. She died two days later. Don’t be me.
I worked at a biglaw machine for four years and while the work was satisfying, the pace was relentless. Typical 12-15 hour days, 6 days a week, lots of travel. I felt like I could never go on vacation or plan anything because I always felt that the firm came first.
Then, I left . . . and went to another relatively big firm in a mid-sized market. The workload was less, but it was also less interesting — and the feeling that my priorities were other people’s priorities (partners, clients, etc.) was still there. And a big reason that I stayed was because I thought that I needed the six figure salary to be happy.
So, I left again. For good. I had coffee with my wife one morning and I just broke down. I took a $50K haircut and moved to government work. And I am happier for it. Obviously we are on a much stricter budget, and I am thankful that I never had time to spend the money that I earned working at biglaw so that I have it as a cushion now, but, the most important thing is that I am happy.
Unfortunately, in the current economy, many people are, or feel, utterly trapped in their legal jobs.
I myself was a successful engineering manager before turning to law, hoping to leverage my technical and business-side dealmaking experience into a great combination. Oh, that I could go back in time…
What I didn’t know before going back to law school was that I would be expected to work night and day as a lawyer, not just in the days leading up to a new product like an engineer, but 24x7x365, and that anything less would be the subject of harsh and constant derision.
What I didn’t know was that often, on top of my clients’ outrageous expectations, they would not even appreciate my advice – what they more often want is immediate turnaround on whatever they’re asking with a simple rubber stamp on what they propose to do, whether compliant with the law or company policy or not.
What I didn’t know was that most legal jobs are filled with politics, of the back-stabbing, always-fearing-for-your-job-and-future kind, and that legal or technical merit often has little to do with success or reward.
What I didn’t know could fill a book, and would deter most prospective lawyers from even trying it, if only it could be conveyed somehow. Telling them how miserable a profession it is, even with lots of bad examples, somehow just doesn’t do it in the face of night after night of TV falsely casting the profession as interesting and glamorous.
In some long ago introductory economics class, I remember reading that a rational decision maker should generally disregard sunk costs, but many people find that hard to do. No kidding! I’m not too happy working as a lawyer, but can’t seem to convince myself that I really could walk away from everything I’ve invested in this career over the past 15 years.
I want to forward your post to my dad, who still can’t understand why I hated being a lawyer enough to give it up entirely. I was on the verge of getting fired because I dared to be at a sporting event on a Friday night when a partner was looking for a draft (he could have asked for several hours earlier of course, but no, that would make too much sense), and the weekend before I had dared to say I could only work on a brief on Sunday because I had relatives coming in to visit Saturday. I took ONE vacation in three years. And I didn’t even work in the kind of sweatshop most Biglaw associates face! I know there are people out there who seem to thrive living this way, but for the rest, it makes me sad that it takes them so long to realize that it is a screwed up way to live, and even longer to find a way out (if they can at all). I got lucky.
I explain being a lawyer to my non-law friends this way: “Remember how it felt to be cramming for finals in college, when you had no time to focus on anything else in your life, barely slept or showered, and felt a constant slight panic? Well it is like that, except there is no light at the end of the tunnel”
Making the decision to quit was not an easy one and required a well-respected counselor (former lawyer herself) telling me I had no business being a lawyer, but leaving was the happiest day of my life.
Great post. When my great aunt died last year, a lawyer I worked for said that he did not think it was necessary to go to funerals much beyond immediate family. (This was at an in house position, so I think that the issues may reach beyond large firms.)
When he said this, I looked at him strangely. I was shocked he said it out loud. There is no doubt in my mind, he was going through the life events he had missed and judging them against the end of my great aunt’s life. Then, I just felt bad for him, thinking how bad do you have to be beaten to think this way? I went to the funeral.
I learned that lawyers’ opinions cannot be a barometer for the other obligations in my life. Many lawyers are maladjusted from years of inhumane treatment. They are not the best source for life advice.
Going to a funeral or spending time with a dying relative is not giving your boss the finger. It is participating in life. I also think that the advice from Risky Business can apply well at law firms: “sometimes you have to say ‘what the f&*!.'”
I’m a 26 year old student in my first year, going through the motions and trying to figure out prescriptive easements and covenants and all of that fun stuff.
I’m also a 4-year military veteran, still on Active Duty, and basically contracted for the better part of my career to serve in as a JAG when I finish law school.
All I can say is this: suck it up, or make a change. You chose to take the path you took, just like I chose a path that would see me removed from my family twice in the last four years and sent to a desert wasteland to work 18 hour days trying to accomplish the mission and not get killed at the same time. Oh by the way, making peanuts on the dollar.
Money is not the end all, be all. I’ll probably make the least amount of money out of all of my classmates when we graduate (it won’t be six figures, not for a long time), and I couldn’t possibly care less as long as I’m happy.
You have the power to change your path – every minute you spend wallowing in your own self-pity is a minute wasted that you could have spent figuring out a plan for a better you. As Michael Jackson famously sang – start with the (wo)man in the mirror, and make a change.
You are also making officer pay (probably O-3?) while attending school and not paying tuition. That’s a pretty sweet setup, it’s also a very comfortable setup. People that fund their education through loans graduate with a lot of pressure when they see six figures of debt. They need to find a job, and when they get there and realize it sucks they’re afraid to get out. And no offense, but you’re only in your first year of school. What happens if you find out you hate it? Now you’re stuck in JAG for another six years after you finish the miserable three years of school. And then, when you’re finished with the commitment to JAG, you’re just that much closer to a nice retirement check from Uncle Sam — why not just tought it out? But, are you really choosing your own path, or are you just stuck in a choice you made a long time ago? I’m just saying, have a little more empathy for people who are in a different boat than you.
My last grandparent died a year ago this week. I didn’t go across country to the funeral and instead stayed to work all weekend. I’m still upset with myself for that. Don’t be me.
[from EX Biglaw Jadzia]: I want to second what Jane Doe and Mark said — better to piss off a partner than live with the guilt and regret, which will certainly stay with you long after you have left the firm. But it is a REALLY hard “choice” to have to make if you still have debt. Frankly, I no longer want to be in a profession where being human and loving your family is seen as laziness.
YES. 10+ year firm veteran here – when you have a choice between doing the right thing, and pissing off a partner – piss off the partner. Someone is always going to be pissed anyway – that’s the professional personality. And if they are really pissed off that you are human and you have to leave? I’m not aware that bankruptcy (at the worst case) has actually killed anyone.
There’s a little bit of freedom in the realization that, no matter what you do, they’ll still be unhappy.
Grow a pair of testicles or ovaries or both. I don’t care. The advice that you can leave anytime is just wrong and shortsighted.
Look, if you really made it into biglaw you probably care about your career as an attorney. In this regard my advice if you don’t like your job is to start immediately planning to leave it in a way that preserves your career. A lot of you whine and cry and wait until you almost bust before you start really looking. Don’t wait, start now and then you might be lucky enough to get out before you are fired.
Also, if you worked for more than 2 years in Biglaw and still have over 100k of debt, then it’s your own fault. Stop blaming others and realize that you are prolonging your golden handcuffs by your spending.
Once when I was in biglaw I was facing down my second working weekend in a row after two weeks of long hours. The senior associate knew I had a family obligation Saturday afternoon and said if I came in early Saturday morning she’d let me leave by 4pm to make it. I did, finished my work, and was still waiting for her to come into the office to revise my work by noon. She came in at 2pm and re-arranged her desk for an hour while telling me about the great time she’d had with her own family the night before. At 4pm I was just starting to input her changes. At 6pm she let me go, but only after she’d made me thank her for allowing me to leave.
No amount of money is worth forgetting for even a minute that that kind of behavior is unacceptable. I left that job, and even though I’m dirt poor now I’ve never regretted it.
I left a very successful, high-paying, dysfunctional firm for a lot of reasons (valued my life and sanity and stomach lining) but one of the last straws was the review cycle when about 3 of us in my PG heard that we “weren’t working enough nights and weekends.” Not because work needed to be done then, just because being there 24/7 gave the right impression.
Sorry, the 13th Amendment abolished slavery. Snap.
Thank you for this post. I am currently in New Zealand (was actually in Christchurch during the earthquake), and yesterday, the NZ Prime Minister said something that we should all remember, “[These deaths] remind us that buildings are just buildings, roads just roads, but our people are irreplaceable.” Buildings and roads are what we get from BigLaw, but people are our lifeline. We should always remember that.
This is no joke. My first year in Biglaw our entire incoming class was informed that there would be no vacation during the entire month of December. So, I informed my highly religious Roman Catholic family that I would not be spending Christmas with them for the first time in my life. Because my employer said so. My father asked me if I was a slave. I laughed at the time thinking that they just “didn’t understand”. My family ended up spending money they did not have to come to me during the holidays. I did not laugh years later when I was still working on Christmas. I laughed heartily when I left for an in-house position where vacations are respected (although we all still are connected by the ever-present internet and email, it’s a choice and if you put up a boundary and say you are not available, then that choice is respected). Get out of Biglaw while you still can. It’s toxic. My wake up call was having a baby. What will your wake up call be?
“When my client’s ninety-two-year-old grandmother called to ask how she was, it reminded her this old woman is a precious treasure – and she’s elderly, and frail. She won’t be here forever.”
At the risk of playing armchair psychologist, on some level it probably also reminded her that she, too, won’t be here forever, and that being chained to a desk on weekends and nights is a dubious way to spend the “best” years of one’s life.
I survived for 2 years in biglaw working insane and abusive hours as a corporate securities attorney. I even received a 2-month “sabbatical” when I left a resignation letter on the managing partner’s desk over the weekend. I went in-house part-time, but the hours grew as the company grew and I ended up going crazy…literally. Was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder but managed to hide it from the company for another couple years. Quit that job to go back to biglaw. We had to list on a schedule the weekends we were NOT available to work and routinely were called in to work on the weekends when bodies were needed.
I had a baby who now has Stage 4 cancer and all of my priorities have changed. Life is too precious and short to do something you hate just for the money. I lost my house in a short sale and declared bankruptcy, but still had $100k in student loans. Found a loophole, and now that I am permanently disabled due to my Bipolar Disorder, the student loans are being written off. It’s a shame I had to lose my mind to get here, but now I am FREE to do whatever I want as an attorney (they even waive my California bar fee of $500 due to my disability).
I can also tell you that I NEVER had a problem deferring the payments on my student loans when I couldn’t afford them. I financed them over 30 years and am glad that I deferred payment as long as possible. I don’t regret my Harvard Law School education, and I know that I will find a way to use my law degree to advocate for the mentally ill after my little girl beats cancer.
Life is precious…don’t waste yours!
ML says:
” I don’t regret my Harvard Law School education, and I know that I will find a way to use my law degree to advocate for the mentally ill after my little girl beats cancer.”
Well, you can always do Medicaid and SSD hearings if you feel like helping individuals.
These days Social Security is giving durational denials (meaning you will get better in 12 months) to schizophrenics.
You can also always try to figure out how to reconstruct and fund the various state mental health “systems” that are imploding.
Waa, waa, waa. Try having no job ITE. I graduated in ’09, after going to law school much later in life – an opportunity I did not have when I was younger. I spent 20+ years before law school working dead-end jobs. I would do anything at this time to work in biglaw. I currently have 6 figures in student loans and no retirement savings. If you hate your biglaw job that much, then leave. There are plenty of people, like myself, who would gladly fill that open position. You sound indulged and spoilt. Many people spend their whole lives working in dull, mechanical dead-end jobs making very little money and still have to work long hours – or even work two or three jobs to make ends meet. Get some perspective and realize just how lucky you are. Waa, waa, waa.
Agreed. Associates in the first few years of BigLaw who complain have no concept of how this system works: BigLaw is simply a means to an end, and is the LEAST of all evils.
The profession of law is inherently miserable, stressful, and grinding, regardless of what area/context you practice in. Thus, BigLaw offers the most appealing situation, as it 1) pays you the most money to endure this misery, and 2) provides you with the most liberty/exit options as far as career opportunities go.
Getting your first job out of law school in BigLaw will enable you to make an incredibly lucrative living while also enabling you to CHOOSE your path (to a degree, anyway) as to where you want to go after BigLaw and what you want to do (assuming you don’t make partner at your firm). After a few years in BigLaw, you will have good $, and prestige and experience which will be leveraged into something else more aligned with what you want. But BigLaw is the hazing which enables you to get to this point.
For everyone else who misses such a path at law school graduation, it is utter misery, as beggars can’t be choosers.
I have been unemployed for months. Any career I try to make in law at this point will be one of unending toil, low pay, and underemployment. My friends in BigLaw, after a few years, have good money saved, a great name on their resume, and headhunters calling them left and right.
You whiners don’t know how good you have it.
Biglaw is a toxic wasteland and the (few) people I know who still drink the Kool-Aide suffer from severe Stockholm sydnrome. Yes, the money is good, and money serves an important purpose, but most people don’t go to law school to make money — they go to law school to have a meaningful career/life. Associates at biglaw are not lawyers, they are merely adjuncts. The partners are the “lawyers” on the case, and they have the clients. We don’t have clients; some of use delude ourselves into thinking we do, but we are glorified, highly intellectual paralegals/secretaries, who get paid alot to put our heads down, shutup and conform. If you spend enough time in BigLaw, it becomes truly toxic, because BigLaw manages to (in subtle, and sometimes not so subtle ways) erode your confidence entirely, which subconsciously prevents you from seeking out more meaningful, challenging paths.
Part of the problem with life is that you have to basically create a positive ongoing cash flow in order to have the security to have a “meaningful” life. It’s a feature of the modern economic system.
As it turns out, BigLaw is not generally a good way to fill the “meaningful career/life slot” and some firms are quite toxic to certain people.
Agreed re: cash flow, but it does not have to be at the level of a BigLaw salary. Plenty of people make less than a BigLaw salary and find their lives incredibly meaningful. One might argue even moreso than those with much more than a BigLaw salary! Also, unfortunately, it’s difficult to understand the toxicity of BigLaw when you haven’t gone through it, especially when you are young, fresh out of law school, facing law school debt and swarmed with all kinds of BigLaw wooing and promises of grandeur and “important” work. It’s not so clear at that point what a soul-sucking enterprise it all is, and how unimportant your role will be in whatever work you can convince yourself is important. I think it’s reasonable to expect as a young new lawyer that if you go to a respected law firm, you will be respected, have a mentor or two, and find your work interesting. Unfortunately, that is usually not the case.