Sybil Dunlop, The Daily Record Newswire
Like many lawyers I know, anxiety is a long-term companion of mine. It's not usually crippling or debilitating anxiety - the kind that prevents you from accomplishing your goals. Mine is generally more of a nervous-energy anxiety - an omnipresent background buzz that inspires me to jump out of bed early each morning, ensures that I double-check my work, and also means that my hands can get sweaty on turbulent flights. I generally think of my anxiety as a motivating friend as opposed to a vampire.
I first remember experiencing anxiety in middle school. I played saxophone in the symphonic band. Every Monday, the band director would call on each saxophonist to play an excerpt from our band program. If you made fewer mistakes than the person sitting to your right, you could switch seats with them, moving up in the world of saxophonists. I eventually achieved first-chair status, but worried over my ability to maintain the position. Anxiety drove me to pick up my horn each night to practice. Once I picked up the sax, however, I found the pure joy of playing it sustaining in and of itself. Although I could not have articulated this conclusion at the time, my anxiety was complementing my goals, not undermining them. This balance worked for me through both high school and college.
Things took a darker turn after I graduated from college. I moved to Washington, D.C., where I accepted a position in politics. Although I loved both my job and my colleagues, there wasn't enough work to fill my day. I completed my assigned tasks by 10 a.m. most mornings, leaving me with seven hours of Internet surfing. I spent my time reading old (public domain) books online. While my Edith Wharton and Arthur Conan Doyle repertoire grew, my anxiety levels also rose. My worries became irrational. I fretted that my office elevator would crash to the ground; I worried my metro would smash into another on the way home; I agonized over whether the mole on my arm was skin cancer. Without any medical confirmation, I came to believe that, lacking a more intense intellectual challenge, my mind was spinning up worries. I left D.C. for law school.
Right away, the intense anxiety subsided. While it continued to get me out of bed early to read my coursework, it didn't prevent me from falling asleep at night. I felt a similar peace during my two-year clerkship. Indeed, intense anxiety stayed at bay until my first year of practice.
On my first day in practice, I heard the line from "Poltergeist" play in my head: "they're baaack." I immediately grasped how much room for error there is in our profession. People were turning to me (me!) for advice with their most difficult problems. As a baby lawyer, I especially worried about the unknown unknowables - the Rule of General Practice that I didn't know existed or the strange exception to the case law that I didn't think to search for. I gripped my phone throughout the evenings to stay constantly apprised of my cases (and ensure I hadn't made any horrible mistakes). For one year, I felt like I was skiing precariously down a slope that was beyond my skill level.
But only one year later, however, everything seemed to click. My anxieties receded, and I began to practice with confidence and, yes, joy. Our profession, of course, cannot be worry-free, but my anxieties again complement my goals. These days, I worry about getting a nettlesome case settled, providing excellent client service, and whether I can become a successful business generator. I am delighted to show up each day and attack these problems with energy, organization, and a marketing plan. I have chosen these worries to occupy my mind, and I am voluntarily dedicating my professional career to addressing them.
I share my story at graduation time because a new class of lawyers are entering our profession and starting their own first year of practice. With all my heart, I hope each new graduate can avoid the unhelpful types of anxiety. But I also want to reassure you that if you feel as though you are careening too fast down a mountain, you are not alone. It gets easier. The second time I drafted an Answer, it was better than the first. The second time I took a deposition, I knew how to improve over my first attempt. And by my fourth or fifth brief, I stole ideas from my second brief and built on them.
Building a skill set takes time. In the meantime, however, there are coping strategies. I identified a buddy a year or two older than myself who could answer my entry-level questions. I found a peer group with whom I could share stories of triumph as well as failures. And then slowly, without realizing it was happening, I became the older advice buddy and my peer group turning into a networking club. For this reason, the best coping strategy may be to simply remember-in moments of intense anxiety-that this too shall pass.
Published: Mon, Jun 08, 2015
