Unhappy Catholic Lawyers

[Yeoman]

Getting back to looking at these, I’d heartily endorse this comment:

Good stuff. We should send some of the lawyers out to pasture, I reckon. But the point of this thread is that as a lawyer I am profoundly unhappy with ‘what I do well.’ And I know a bunch of talented lawyers who are also very unhappy and feel trapped. Just because I am good at cross-examining a witness or victim or police officer, and good at arguing my client’s cause to a judge or jury, it doesn’t follow that it makes me happy. But I do appreciate your sentiments.

 

[Yeoman]

For me, it was simply my childhood dream. I was good at debate/speeches and always told people I was going to be a lawyer. So I became a lawyer. I wish I had put more actual thought into it … or had the benefit of a mentor to tell me “no, don’t do it!”

I really feel badly for you.

I didn’t have the slightest thought of becoming a lawyer as a child, and I am thankful that I did not. The thought did not really occur to me until I was in college, and a professor suggested it as a possible career as in his opinion I demonstrated “analytical thought”. He was a lawyer who had worked, for a very long time, as a history professor.

It seems strange looking back that this would have caused this career turn, I was majoring in one of the sciences as an undergrad, but I wasn’t doing as well I as hoped I would in that pursuit (while not doing poorly) and the idea of practicing law, based upon my complete misunderstanding of what solo practitioners did (the only lawyer I knew) began to seed the thought. When there were no jobs in my field when I graduated I took the LSAT and headed off to law school.

In retrospect, the things I always really liked doing were always very outdoor oriented and I fooled myself that having a career would allow me to do those things and to be happy in the career. I certainly fooled myself regarding what the profession of the law was like.

But I’m glad it wasn’t my childhood dream. I’d feel crushed if it was.

 

[Yeoman]

Wow, Yeoman and LionsDen, talk about coincidence! I’m not one but I do want to enter the profession. I’ve had a knack in the political field and people always assumed I’d go for law. My Bachelor’s is in Political Science and Theology from a university in Hawaii.

I would have gone to law school right after college, but if had years of misfortune that followed. I was I’ll with Myalgic Encephalitis, my dad died, my mom’s business had to relocate and the adjustment wasn’t easy. Many more bad things came my way and prevented me from doing what I want.

Now I’m 29 and haven’t done squat. I still am considering law school and have been asking where do I go with my life now. I was thinking it today when I saw this thread. So add yet another person thinking this is Divine Providence and not a coincidence.

Let me ask you this. What is your experience of law school? Was it a good experience? I want to attend a certain prominent school in the Philippines, where the law grads frequently go to Harvard and other prominent schools for their LLM. One of the reasons I want to go there is for the connections. Without getting into it too deeply, I basically lost my family and what I had in the Philippines and have to start all over.

Your experiences as professional lawyers clearly suck. But what of your time studying? As for me, I’d like to be dealing with nonprofits and nationbuilding, the more philanthropic side of things. I’d hope it wouldn’t suck as much as having to scream and argue with hostile jerks. I’m hoping making the lives of people better could be my inspiration and keep me happy. After all, Saint Thomas More, Saint Josemaria Escriva, Blessed Bartolo Longo and Cardinal Dulles were all lawyers too. Was law school miserable?

Glad I get to pick your minds. I’d love for us to talk about this more. Perhaps God is speaking to me through you. Perhaps God may speak to you through me as well.

I loved law school. It was very intellectual and involved a lot of reading, which I have always enjoyed. Frankly, I didn’t think it was particularly difficult either, but perhaps that’s because I enjoyed it.

I don’t think law school did anything to prepare me for the practice of law, and over time I’ve acquired a certain degree of contempt for academic lawyers as a partial result. But I’ll abstain from commenting on the specifics of your situation, as you are contemplating law school in a foreign country, and presumably practicing there as well, and I don’t really know anything about that, at all. I will note that at least in the US, the only reason to go to law school is to practice law, and a person going to it should regard that as the most likely employment result, no matter what else they may dream of regarding it.

 

[Yeoman]

This does seem providential. I am happy to share my experiences and thoughts with you, my friend. I enjoyed the novelty of being in law school and learning the Socratic method of analysis. But it wore off pretty quickly and the egos and arrogance of those in the profession became apparent to me early on. I had always been a good student and law school was no different from that standpoint. Just more learning/memorizing and adjusting to the styles of the teachers. When test time came around, I just did what I always did – read/memorized and tested well. What’s important for you to understand is that law school resembles the practice of law as much as a dog resembles pasta. Don’t conflate enjoyment of the one with enjoyment of the other. Also, the myth of going to law school “just because you can” or because “you can do anything with a law degree” is truly a myth. You can “do anything” with an accounting degree or a philosophy degree too – that doesn’t mean you should spend 3/4 years and a boatload of money getting one. I’m happy to answer any other specific questions you might have. Please don’t adopt my cynicism without doing your own searching. Go online and read blogs/sites from lawyers who have left the practice or are struggling to enjoy the practice. It would be time well-spent for you. I pray that God reveals His will for you and that you let go of the reigns. Peace brother! (I am assuming you’re a brother and not a sister because I’ve never heard a woman say “squat” like you did)

Another excellent post I’d endorse.

 

[Yeoman]

Y

Again, I reiterate that lawyers who have poured years of time and thousands of dollars into their education, still have options other than law. That is what the whole field of career development is about–helping you figure out how to use those very skills that made you succeed in law school and practice. There are trade-offs and that is very hard for someone who is used to a high income and prestige. But again, I see that in many people who have high-powered careers, and decide they have to make a change.

Perhaps this is the case, and we can’t see it, but that’s not the experience of many lawyers who seem to try to abandon the field.

Merely having a law degree is a deterrent to some employers. I’ve twice had people outright ignore an attempt for me to apply to a job outside the field. I know that as in one case I called them due to a lack of response and was told “you’re a lawyer. . . you wouldn’t like this” and in another case the hiring individual (ironically a disbarred lawyer) told me nearly the same thing, with “this isn’t what you think, you wouldn’t like it. . . it’s not a law job.” I’ve had numerous other occasions where I never get a call back.

Perhaps ironically, the few times I have, the potential jobs came out paying so little that they could not have supported a family.

 

[LionsDen66]

I really feel badly for you.

I didn’t have the slightest thought of becoming a lawyer as a child, and I am thankful that I did not. The thought did not really occur to me until I was in college, and a professor suggested it as a possible career as in his opinion I demonstrated “analytical thought”. He was a lawyer who had worked, for a very long time, as a history professor.

It seems strange looking back that this would have caused this career turn, I was majoring in one of the sciences as an undergrad, but I wasn’t doing as well I as hoped I would in that pursuit (while not doing poorly) and the idea of practicing law, based upon my complete misunderstanding of what solo practitioners did (the only lawyer I knew) began to seed the thought. When there were no jobs in my field when I graduated I took the LSAT and headed off to law school.

In retrospect, the things I always really liked doing were always very outdoor oriented and I fooled myself that having a career would allow me to do those things and to be happy in the career. I certainly fooled myself regarding what the profession of the law was like.

But I’m glad it wasn’t my childhood dream. I’d feel crushed if it was.

Thanks for your compassion and your insight. I wouldn’t say that I’m “crushed”, because as a child of God and believer in the promises of eternal salvation, I recognize that we’re only in Act One of a “Bazillion” Act play, but it has been challenging to be in this mid-life career crisis. I keep feeling (can I trust my feelings?) that God is leading me in another direction and I’m open to His will over and above my own. As for your plight, have you considered “downsizing” your life in a way which would allow you to simply leave the profession and start your own business?

 

[LionsDen66]

Another excellent post I’d endorse.

“Great minds think alike, and fools seldom differ.”

 

[Yeoman]

It’s never too late to resurrect a thread- we do it all the time here!

Thank goodness! I’d hate to be a burden on the forum, but I do find this thread to be helpful and extremely interesting.

 

[Yeoman]

Thanks for your compassion and your insight. I wouldn’t say that I’m “crushed”, because as a child of God and believer in the promises of eternal salvation, I recognize that we’re only in Act One of a “Bazillion” Act play, but it has been challenging to be in this mid-life career crisis. I keep feeling (can I trust my feelings?) that God is leading me in another direction and I’m open to His will over and above my own. As for your plight, have you considered “downsizing” your life in a way which would allow you to simply leave the profession and start your own business?

I’m pretty downsized already, which is an aspect of my personality, I suppose. Or perhaps it reflects that I come from a very Catholic family and had in particular a father that was very humble. We never bought off on that “we must have this” and “we must have that” type of thinking, and as an adult I never have either.

That’s actually one of the odd reasons that law has been a burden. In the civil practice, as you know, the members of the profession exhibit a high degree of keeping up with the Jones type of mentality. Not all, to be sure. I’ve known a couple of very wealthy lawyers who were very humble and had their own minds, so they never acted as if they must have this or that.

But many do, and its a bit of a burden to be around people whose focus is so acquisition oriented. And even when this is not the case, at the end of the day most civil law tends to be all about money, so you get used to working where everything is all about money.

That’s a digression, but in terms of down-scaling, I live in a rural area where the practice of law isn’t all that lucrative so I don’t make an enormous amount compared to some other areas, and at the same time we are pretty conservative in our expenditures, so maybe we’re sort of there.

But, having said that, I can’t imagine what business I’d open. That worries me as over the years I’ve seen a lot of lawyers grow old and reach the point where in their old age they toddle into a the office six days out of seven and I always wondered why they did that. Now that I’m in my 50s, I fear I know the reason. The law burned all of their hopes, desires and dreams out of them, and left only the law. So without it ,they weren’t. Or at least they couldn’t recognize themselves. At age 50, that’s a fear of mine.

If I could simply raise cattle I would. But in putting pen to paper in my locality, I’ve learned that simply starting up that way, even on all leased land, would be pretty difficult. And I’ve also learned that when rare opportunities come up (I’m related to people in the field), people don’t tell me about them because people in that line of work keep opportunities to themselves, probably by necessity, and like to think of people with law degrees as lawyers. I can’t imagine opening a store, or something, so I really feel quite lost.

 

[LionsDen66]

I’m pretty downsized already, which is an aspect of my personality, I suppose. Or perhaps it reflects that I come from a very Catholic family and had in particular a father that was very humble. We never bought off on that “we must have this” and “we must have that” type of thinking, and as an adult I never have either.

That’s actually one of the odd reasons that law has been a burden. In the civil practice, as you know, the members of the profession exhibit a high degree of keeping up with the Jones type of mentality. Not all, to be sure. I’ve known a couple of very wealthy lawyers who were very humble and had their own minds, so they never acted as if they must have this or that.

But many do, and its a bit of a burden to be around people whose focus is so acquisition oriented. And even when this is not the case, at the end of the day most civil law tends to be all about money, so you get used to working where everything is all about money.

That’s a digression, but in terms of down-scaling, I live in a rural area where the practice of law isn’t all that lucrative so I don’t make an enormous amount compared to some other areas, and at the same time we are pretty conservative in our expenditures, so maybe we’re sort of there.

But, having said that, I can’t imagine what business I’d open. That worries me as over the years I’ve seen a lot of lawyers grow old and reach the point where in their old age they toddle into a the office six days out of seven and I always wondered why they did that. Now that I’m in my 50s, I fear I know the reason. The law burned all of their hopes, desires and dreams out of them, and left only the law. So without it ,they weren’t. Or at least they couldn’t recognize themselves. At age 50, that’s a fear of mine.

If I could simply raise cattle I would. But in putting pen to paper in my locality, I’ve learned that simply starting up that way, even on all leased land, would be pretty difficult. And I’ve also learned that when rare opportunities come up (I’m related to people in the field), people don’t tell me about them because people in that line of work keep opportunities to themselves, probably by necessity, and like to think of people with law degrees as lawyers. I can’t imagine opening a store, or something, so I really feel quite lost.

Good insights, and I’m pleased that you’re living simply. It tells me that you’ve got your priorities in order – with God as the apex. Without knowing what kind of population numbers exist in your neck of the woods, I hesitate to suggest a business; but, as our population ages at a very fast rate, I have found that businesses which tailor to the elderly are thriving and are likely to thrive over the next 20 years. Have you explored a franchise which provides non-medical care to seniors? Or one which provides guidance to families who are looking to place a loved one or obtain services for dementia? I have looked into these and although they require capital to start, if you have the desire to help people (which I suspect you do), you might find a calling in this arena. Not the same as tending sheep – but tending to the Lord’s sheep in another fashion. Just an idea for you to consider. Don’t feel lost – you’re only as limited as your own imagination to re-invent yourself with an eye towards working for God’s Kingdom. Pray for discernment and He will reveal things which might interest you. Then have courage to step out in faith. Finally, do as I say and not as I do – for I have not taken that step of faith yet either. Peace, brother!

 

[Yeoman]

I cannot help but note that as we’re discussing our hopes in getting out, some prospective law student is discussing her hopes, dreams and aspirations as to getting into to law school in the Family Life section:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?p=11890664#post11890664

So, ironically, here’s a person launching off, seemingly with little knowledge of where she might be headed, where so many of us had wished we had not gone. Well, God’s Will be with her.

I’d also note that one of the classic myths about the study of law has been stated there, that being “you can do so much with a law degree” (not stated in those words). So commonly stated, and even sometimes by law schools, and so misleading in reality. It probably was true once, but is not so true now, at least in some localities.

 

[Yeoman]

Good insights, and I’m pleased that you’re living simply. It tells me that you’ve got your priorities in order – with God as the apex. Without knowing what kind of population numbers exist in your neck of the woods, I hesitate to suggest a business; but, as our population ages at a very fast rate, I have found that businesses which tailor to the elderly are thriving and are likely to thrive over the next 20 years. Have you explored a franchise which provides non-medical care to seniors? Or one which provides guidance to families who are looking to place a loved one or obtain services for dementia? I have looked into these and although they require capital to start, if you have the desire to help people (which I suspect you do), you might find a calling in this arena. Not the same as tending sheep – but tending to the Lord’s sheep in another fashion. Just an idea for you to consider. Don’t feel lost – you’re only as limited as your own imagination to re-invent yourself with an eye towards working for God’s Kingdom. Pray for discernment and He will reveal things which might interest you. Then have courage to step out in faith. Finally, do as I say and not as I do – for I have not taken that step of faith yet either. Peace, brother!

Thank you for your comments, which are helping me focus my mind.

You have mentioned this consideration of yours in this post, and I suspect this may be something that might work out for you, although I know the feelings of halting prior to acting on a decision of such magnitude. I pray that God will lead you in the right direction, and I know that you are praying on it.

For me, I know that particular option would not be for me, but I do appreciate your posting on your thoughts. It’s helped me to consider what I am doing, and where I am. For a long time I really hoped to get out of law and into agriculture, and I do have some cattle that we run with a family member. It’s not a large number, and we can’t really expand right now, but the family member does keep us in his thoughts.

I’ll be frank that over the past couple of years my hopes have faded, and I still think they’re unrealistic, but I’m still hoping and will resume praying on it. I also have tried from time to time to apply to outdoor professions and even just to things that it seemed like I might be qualified for, but without success. Once I was actually offered one of those positions, at much lower wages than I make now, but I pulled back at the end out of what I thought was fear. Soon thereafter the company closed, and I’ve thought since that was God intervening to save me from myself.

I’ve been sort of slogging on with a sense of despair for some time, thinking I have no options but that when I make 63, should God grant that I live that long, I’ll retire even if it means that it’s a pretty low key retirement (which would be fine with me). But reading this has given me a bit more hope. Maybe things will break so that I can just be in the fields, if God will it, or maybe I will have a job more in keeping with my personality. Clearly, I need to return to praying on it, which I had ceased doing about two years ago.

 

[PA2NCCatholic]

As a Catholic and a totally burned out attorney, visiting Catholic.com was the logical step. I was mildly surprised to find this thread on Catholic.com.

I plan on coming back to post my thoughts on this completely unsatisfying “profession”. I just wanted to let you all know in the meantime that there is indeed another unhappy lawyer out there frequenting this site!

 

[Yeoman]

As a Catholic and a totally burned out attorney, visiting Catholic.com was the logical step. I was mildly surprised to find this thread on Catholic.com.

I plan on coming back to post my thoughts on this completely unsatisfying “profession”. I just wanted to let you all know in the meantime that there is indeed another unhappy lawyer out there frequenting this site!

Welcome to the group! I’ll look forward to y our upcoming post.

I think this is another example of synchronicity at work. I hadn’t posted on this forum for a long time but was experiencing such frustration in my occupation that I logged on to start a thread like this. To my enormous surprise, the lawyer who started this thread had just in fact posted it.

Coincidences like that are too providential to be coincidences.

 

[LionsDen66]

As a Catholic and a totally burned out attorney, visiting Catholic.com was the logical step. I was mildly surprised to find this thread on Catholic.com.

I plan on coming back to post my thoughts on this completely unsatisfying “profession”. I just wanted to let you all know in the meantime that there is indeed another unhappy lawyer out there frequenting this site!

Looking forward to it, brother! Have an awesome Holy Week.

 

[LionsDen66]

Welcome to the group! I’ll look forward to y our upcoming post.

I think this is another example of synchronicity at work. I hadn’t posted on this forum for a long time but was experiencing such frustration in my occupation that I logged on to start a thread like this. To my enormous surprise, the lawyer who started this thread had just in fact posted it.

Coincidences like that are too providential to be coincidences.

… and Providence is just too Providential to be coincidence!

 

[Ridgerunner]

If I could simply raise cattle I would. But in putting pen to paper in my locality, I’ve learned that simply starting up that way, even on all leased land, would be pretty difficult.

Given the cost of land nowadays, it’s terribly difficult to make it work if one doesn’t already own the land, and now that cattle are so astonishly expensive, it’s essentially impossible if one also has to buy the stock. It has taken me years to get it to where it pays, but it did provide some tax deductions in the process.

However, I know of some people who have what amounts to a “birthing facility”. Not much land, but they have a good well, shelter and feed bunkers. For hire, they will take on peoples’ pregnant late-term cows, deliver them if need be, vaccinate the calves and get the pair up and going. Undoubtedly they have a “come quick” arrangement with a vet for the more difficult births. For a cow, difficult births are very rare, though.

I know of another who has a similar setup, but it’s for short-term “storage” of cattle. His customers are people whose ranches are a long way from the point of sale, and he takes care of them while the purchaser arranges for long-distance transit. It’s amazing how far some cattle are transported. Sometimes the cattle he stores are not exactly in transit immediately, but are “speculative cattle”. Some rancher buys a group cheaply at a stockyard or online, then advertises them online to resell. Meanwhile, he keeps them in a facility like this. Undoubtedly, some of those people never do take delivery on their own places, but are simply traders.

Those places are also used by bankers who round up foreclosed cattle and have to put them somewhere temporarily until they can get them to market on the right days. Sometimes they have to “feed them up” to make them more saleable. As a lawyer, you probably know that sometimes bankers seize cattle and then get hit with a restraining order before they get them sold, while the judge sorts out the merits of it all. Seized cattle are sometimes stored in places like this while the litigation is going on.

Anything like that would have to be investigated, of course. It would just about have to be in a place where there a lot of cattle and where there are really good stockyards, particularly those that do online trading.

 

[Yeoman]

Given the cost of land nowadays, it’s terribly difficult to make it work if one doesn’t already own the land, and now that cattle are so astonishly expensive, it’s essentially impossible if one also has to buy the stock. It has taken me years to get it to where it pays, but it did provide some tax deductions in the process.

That’s a fact. Its frustrating in the extreme.

Anything like that would have to be investigated, of course. It would just about have to be in a place where there a lot of cattle and where there are really good stockyards, particularly those that do online trading.

Here, lots of cattle, but almost no stockyards.

One of the things that’s really frustrating for me is that I know that I made a career error in becoming a lawyer. That’s nobody’s fault but my own, but my basic thinking was that I wouldn’t be able, or probably wouldn’t be able, to find employment in an outdoor career and there was no way that I would be able to enter agriculture. Law seemed like a good bet as I didn’t know anything about it, and from what little I knew it seemed like a professional job a guy could work 9 to 5, Monday through Friday, and then go out and enjoy the outdoors. Man, was I wrong. Those hours were far below those which I actually work, and I work six days out of seven normally.

But beyond that, I didn’t appreciate that my strong desire to be and work outdoors couldn’t be sublimated to anything else.

From time to time I’ve wondered why Divine Provenance would cause me to have such a strong desire to just work in agriculture and not give me a way to do it, but in reality, I probably just didn’t see the way to do it when I was young. Now I’m so far out in the swamp that getting back in is almost impossible. A cautionary tale, to say the very least.

 

[Yeoman]

This is an entry that appears up in the thread in Family LIfe about the LSAT, in response to a cautionary post that a person should look for a Tier 1 school, and with warnings about career dissatisfaction. It relates to what we’re discussing here:

Good stuff here. Old Captain America was accepted at a Tier 1. . . but kept running into lawyers who wanted to run from the law. He set up meetings with about a half dozen lawyers and a couple of judges to discuss law as a career. . .and found only ONE who actually enjoyed it!

To me that spoke volumes.

You really have to make sure about it, before you pull the trigger. It could be a costly mistake. I think to do law, you need to set the “I love the schoolwork” stuff or the “wow, constitutional law is SO fascinating!” and “I want to help make justice in the world” fantasies aside. . . along with the old, unstable idea that “law will let me do anything.”

Go to law school if you want to be doing law work.

I’m pretty convinced America has plenty of lawyers.

 

[Ridgerunner]

This is an entry that appears up in the thread in Family LIfe about the LSAT, in response to a cautionary post that a person should look for a Tier 1 school, and with warnings about career dissatisfaction. It relates to what we’re discussing here:

I don’t much doubt there are places where it is important to have attended a Tier 1 school. There are also lots of places where it doesn’t matter at all, and might even be a negative.