How A Law Professor Gained Perspective On Law School Woes

Obsessing on a problem causes ripple effects. Stop dwelling on your problems.

Sad business woman with  personal organizer.I was pretty annoyed when I left for my vacation.  I had heard about some unpleasant things going on at LawProfBlawg School of Law, and I was concerned.  I wanted information.  I wanted to know why some key decisions were made.  I wanted to be happy.  Instead, my concerns felt dismissed.  I left in a bit of a huff.

I realized, after several daylong hikes, some fresh air, and unparalleled beauty, that I had lost perspective.  Yes, bad things happened.  But it wasn’t the end of the world.  Nor was it something that required me to get as upset as I did.  Being upset didn’t change the outcome.  It only made me feel horrible, caused me stress, caused me to lose focus, and, in the end, I gained nothing.  I allowed these obsessive thoughts to rob me of part of my vacation.  Anger about the past and worry about the future robbed me of my present, with my full consent.

What I had lost was perspective.  I equate perspective to distance.  As I have stated before, you are calmer in times of drama when you look at the situation as if you are in the audience (with balcony seats), watching a play.  If you’re in the midst of the drama, you can’t focus, you may become frustrated, do not think clearly, and make bad decisions.

The Dalai Lama is oft quoted as having said, “If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it’s not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever.”

For lawyers and law professors, this is easier said than done.  The problem for lawyers is twofold.  This is easier said than done, and it takes a lifetime to practice the patience necessary to achieve this clarity.  Also, we often overestimate how often we can fix something, and then dwell on iterations of how we might fix it.  We believe that worrying helps fix the problem, and that obsessing will help us come to a solution more readily.

There are many ways to cure the obsessive need to fix things so that the problem can be let go if it is truly not fixable.  First, and most important, is to assure that the problem is indeed YOUR problem.  Often times, others thrust problems upon us.  We can be empathetic to their plights, but we cannot take the problems of others on as our own.

Second, permit yourself some time before you give it ANY thought.  Our best reactions to a situation are not likely to be our first reactions.  The best managers don’t react instantly when angered.  Many bad e-mails have been sent in hostile and immediate reaction to some event.

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Third, if the problem is truly your problem, set a time limit.  If you can’t come up with a solution in X amount of hours, you probably aren’t going to.  Let the problem go.  Lawyers tend to be more on the obsessive side.  That’s great when wrestling with a client problem, but it can be devastating in your personal life or when dealing with your colleagues.

Fourth, once you let the problem go, do not think upon it again.  You are losing happiness and precious time obsessing about that which is probably unfixable.  It also suggests that your desperate desire to fix the problem may stem from something other than the problem itself (a need to be needed, a feeling that if you can’t fix the problem you aren’t smart, etc.)

Finally, ponder what you considered to be overwhelming problems from a month or a year ago.  You’ll find, as I have, that the problems of a year ago are not that which plague you today.  You’re over those issues, you’ve moved beyond them, and are now dealing with other hurdles.

What you gain from this exercise is that you’ve limited how much the problem has caused you additional issues.  Obsessing on a problem causes ripple effects.  You think about the problem, causing you to lose sleep, which causes you to think less clearly, so you spend more time on the problem… It is a bad cycle, if you let it be.

My flight is delayed.  Time for me to practice what I just preached.

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LawProfBlawg is an anonymous professor at a top 100 law school. You can see more of his musings here and on Twitter (@lawprofblawg). Email him atlawprofblawg@gmail.com.