This is a continuation of my last post where I looked into some of the talented professionals who have left the legal profession, some of the reasons why we might be thinking of leaving the profession, and what the profession and its members can do to try and encourage us to stay.
You can read this here - "It's not you, it's me!" - a mass breakup from the legal profession. But why?
With the news of so many talented and capable professionals leaving the profession that I have worked so hard to enter and qualify into, it begs the question:
Have I thought about leaving the profession too?
It seems slightly ironic that I'm asking myself that question not long after the 2nd birthday of the creation of The Neurodivergent Lawyer where, on 4th April 2020, I came forward as my real self, took the mask off, and made the conscious choice to be fully open and truthful about myself to the online legal community.
But perhaps my gift to myself here is that I am becoming much more aware of what I feel is important to me in my life and in my career, and that what I do for work fulfils me professionally and personally.
It is fair to say that there is so much more out there than just legal practice. Sure its a big enough industry with some highly reputable names and people to work with, but its certainly not the only profession in the world, far from it!
Now, go with me on this. Right now what I'm doing is taking a deep dive into not only the last 2 years, but the rest of my career also and what I've learned from years spent in legal practice.
This doesn't mean to say that a decision has been made as it's a big one to suddenly change career paths and its not something that should be done lightly, especially as careers tend to be considered lifelong once you've qualified into or become senior in a profession or industry.
But I don't want this to be overly negative. Sure there are some parts over the last 2 years that I haven't liked or that haven't sat well with me, but I want to look at this from a positive and constructive perspective because this could be a new chapter of the story of Phil Steventon, or it could be a remaster of the current route I'm on. Who knows!
At the time of writing this, I'm unemployed after having quit my last job ......... long story!!
So this time away from work and this time with my own thoughts has been useful. It has given me a chance to think about who I am, what I want to accomplish in my life, the things that I want to do in my life, and ultimately think about what makes me happy and fulfilled.
I'm not going to lie, I have given some thought to whether my vision of the kind of life and career I want for myself lies outside of law. And there are a few reasons for that:
Because of who I am
My identity is a result of a number of things about me and how I go through life and experience the world. Some have been with me since birth (ie my divergence and the personality and character traits that come with it, along with the skills and abilities but also challenges of being divergent), and some are a result of life experiences and things I have picked up as I go along.
I am not just an aspiring lawyer; I'm also an advocate for my communities (the legal, autistic and neurodivergent communities), and I'm the result of a number of my hobbies and interests too. This means that I'm a cook, baker, gamer, writer, traveller, and I'll be a number of other things at lots of different points in my life moving forward.
And this has changed at different points in my life as I have grown. I'm a different person now at 32 years old than I was when I was 28, or 25 or 22. At each point, I also had different goals and things I wanted to achieve. I grew into new goals and new values, as we all do when we go through life.
Because of what I want to accomplish in my life
Remember in my last post around purpose, and phrasing the question to "what do I want to do with my life that is meaningful and that helps people?"
Through the actualisation of who I am based on everything about me, it has opened up avenues that, before the start of 2022, I didn't realise were potential options for me where I could fulfil what I feel is what I want to do with my life that is meaningful. Possibilities are opening up every day where I can identify areas and projects and ventures where I can use my skills, expertise and abilities, whether this is solely within the profession, or still servicing the profession, or outside of it altogether. And so there is nothing stopping me from exploring these now that I have the chance to do it! Would I have been able to do this had I still been in full-time practice? Or would I be able to do this if I do return to full-time practice long-term? Maybe. Maybe not.
Because there are a number of cool things that I want to do/try
We only get one life, so it is right that we seek out things that fulfil us and that we enjoy. And there are a lot of cool things that I might want to get involved in, whether long term or short term. Different projects, paid roles, voluntary roles, opportunities to support my communities, other hobbies, turning hobbies into paid ventures, other fun fundraising projects, I could go on all day! Now I have the time to think about them, I can think about the steps needed in order to go ahead with them, whilst also being able to manage my time well enough, and see if I feel they could fulfil me!
Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful for every experience I've had, whether they've been good or bad. I've gained a lot of expertise, training, skills, development, and self-awareness as to what I'm good at and what I struggle with, along with what makes me happy whether its work or people. Every experience has led me to become the person I am today, and I wouldn't be who I am today had I not gone through the good, the bad, and the downright messed up!
But despite all of the above, the idea of leaving the profession does scare me.
I'll be perfectly honest with you. Part of that is to do with my own sense of pride.
Law is a highly desirable profession to service/work in, and the experiences you can have from a career in law are very valuable. Being able to say that I'm an aspiring lawyer is a very nice thing to be able to say to anyone as, typically, lawyers do carry a great deal of respect and admiration from them just being lawyers, and that's regardless of if the person you are speaking to truly understands the training journey we go on. So the idea of leaving means I might go down in the eyes of people in my network or community (yes I know, seeking out external validation rather than our own personal fulfilment is a killer, but this is a genuine worry I've been having!)
There's also a sense of personal empowerment and responsibility that comes from a career in law also because I understand that there are not many neurodivergent lawyers, nor many autistic lawyers. So being able to go on this journey for myself and for my community means I can learn so much more about myself and what I can and can't do, I can play a small part in making the journey that bit more accessible for ND and autistic aspiring lawyers, but also being accepted by a profession that hasn't always been inviting of people like me would feel like an immense achievement, considering all the effort I've had to put in to actually get there. Things like having to work twice as hard as colleagues to be on their level, building up incredible resilience following numerous instances of direct and institutionalised discrimination or ignorance, busting myths about autistic people only being good when it comes to rules, maths, technology and coding etc, or because we're autistic we're written off as rude and unsociable, and so much more that we have to deal with.
Not to mention there was a little bit of "I want to prove people wrong" and giving the society we live in (that is still very exclusionary of people like me) a big middle finger!
Further, I think this fear is because of how much time and effort I've invested into my studies and career, my parents helping to keep me on track and accountable, as well as helping me with some university costs (honestly, thanks Mum and Dad, I love you millions!), and that the idea that I'm just going to walk away from a goal that I've been trying to reach for 18 years makes it seem like all that effort and all that money spent has been wasted, including my parents' efforts and money.
I've since learned this is called "sunk cost fallacy". (What does this mean?)
Its very hard for people to leave things (projects, business ventures, careers, relationships, whatever) when they have invested so much into them. We're so averse to loss and guided by what is comfortable and familiar that we reject opportunities for gains right in front of us just because they're unfamiliar.
Particularly with law because the route to the big goal of qualifying is very specialised as there are a lot of milestones we need to hit in order to reach that goal. These milestones I've needed to hit have afforded me a degree of familiarity and comfort as they are milestones that I've incorporated into my journey for years now, and so the idea of walking away after investing so much time and effort is really hard to fathom.
Then there's a further identity point that links in here - due to spending years and years studying and working towards this career, it is fair to say that law becomes your life and your identity! So leaving that behind after so many years is understandably scary because it feels like you're going to become someone that you're not.
But I remind myself that investment into anything, particularly where I can gain a great deal of knowledge and expertise and where I can gain and develop skills that will help me through life, will always be a win. There will always be opportunities to use what I have learned anywhere I go, and there will always be opportunities to continue learning new skills and mindsets.
And from these opportunities will be the chance to develop and learn skills that will help you not just where you are right now, but where you're going with the rest of your life and career!
Things like:
Time management
Creating boundaries
Freedom to think and explore and create
Teamworking
Leadership
Communicating effectively and clearly
Understanding people and their goals and intentions
How to create concise and polished pieces of work without fluff and irrelevant stuff
Creativity in approaching and dealing with problems and solutions
Challenging perceived norms and challenging those around me to take a different look
Persuasion and bringing people round to your point of view
All of these skills are transferrable to any role or any project in your life. You may very well have a particular flavour layer on these skills depending on the profession you find yourself in, but if you think about it that's equivalent to, say, the frosting on a cupcake.
The cupcake itself will contain the core flavours and ingredients (ie the skills), but the place where you're using the skills above will dictate the colour or flavour or aesthetics of the frosting on the top!
Eve Cornwell created a video talking about her leaving her NQ job at Linklaters to move to the firm's legal tech company. In that video is a quote from the musician and YouTuber Montell Fish (about him here) and its a good one to get you thinking.
"If you want to offer some of the best things you can offer to this world, you have to know who you are".
It is perfectly acceptable and should be absolutely encouraged that you ask questions of yourself about who you are and what you want to accomplish in your life that is meaningful, fulfilling and can help people, whether that is in this profession, or something or somewhere different. And what matters is that we are self-aware enough to ask those questions, have difficult conversations with ourselves and people who have our backs.
So who am I? Well, that's a question I'm still answering. I have some answers, but not all answers. Maybe I'll have more answers to that question in a couple of days, maybe it will take weeks, or possibly even years. But regularly questioning who you are and what you want to accomplish in your life is an excellent thing to do regardless of where you are in life. It gives you a chance to reflect on you, what you've done, and what you want to do.
I'm conscious of this post being an indictment of the profession that I have worked so hard to enter, qualify into, and serve. I promise that it isn't. This is a post about gaining a great deal more self-awareness of who I am and what is important to me in life and in my career to be able to question whether what I'm doing aligns with what I really want to do with my life that is meaningful.
It doesn't make what I've accomplished so far meaningless, or any more or less than what anyone else at my level has accomplished. Because remember, we're all on our own unique journey and we move to different stages of our journey with every single action we take.
And if even just one person reading this starts asking themself the same question, then that is super positive and I would be humbled by that act, not because its been done for me at all, but because the person is practising a great deal of self-care in being self-aware. So good on you!
Be safe and be well! :)
P
Further reading:
Credit: Cover image photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash