Law is boring. Am I being delusional and do I have a future in the profession?

[Anonymous]

Dear all,

I have an articling position with [top downtown firm] in Toronto. I previously worked a summer at a large company in-house. 

To the extent you do “real work” during a summer, I found it terribly boring even when I was busy. Stress is not the problem. I also found the “fun”, “partner level” tasks such as strategizing, client consulting, etc. quite boring and underwhelming. When I worked in-house and found it much of the same except I was able to leave early often.   

This isn’t really surprising–I was a little apathetic about going to law school in the first place. In law school, I’ve performed fairly well but I found the material mind numbingly boring. I took courses across the spectrum. Prior to law school, I had a job that involved life or death situations. Blades and bullets occasionally almost met skin. There was often boredom, but it was balanced out by moments of exhilarating danger.

I feel like I am supposed to be entering an exciting period of learning. Instead, I dread returning to (starting) a life of boredom. I am inclined to believe (1) the firm probably is not for me and (2) the profession might not be for me.

I’ve considered joining the army as a JAG, the idea of some legal work AND the prospect of real danger is appealing. Are there other options or is what I am looking for totally non-law / law-adjacent? Have you experienced a similar feeling to mine? Am I experiencing Peter-Pan syndrome?

I may be wrong, but I feel like a lot of people compromise because they would like to raise a prosperous family. I do not. So, I am not concerned about money so long as it pays $75k+, home ownership, raising children, retirement, partnership, or city of residence.

All comments welcome, including those that are critical. Thank you.

 

[Ohshmagoda]

7 minutes ago, Guest Anonymous said:

the prospect of real danger is appealing

Curious choice to go to law school if literal danger is/was what you’re looking for. Mental/intellectual challenge is typically the appealing part of the profession.

[Jaggers]

It sounds like an office job is maybe not for you? Getting into litigation where you are out making court appearances could give you the adrenaline rush you seem to want, but there aren’t many legal positions where you are in danger day to day. 

[Phaedrus]

3 hours ago, Guest Anonymous said:

Am I experiencing Peter-Pan syndrome?

Maybe. Not wanting to pry (meaning, this doesn't demand an answer), but how have you felt the last year or two? Do you feel regulated and optimistic, or is everything a little grey? Maybe not bad, but empty? Have you had much of a non-work/non-law school life? Do you wake generally dreading have to go to work? 

It could absolutely be the case that office and paper work are not for you (despite obviously being good at it). Doing work you genuinely have no interest in is soul sucking and I'm of the opinion that it's not worth sacrificing the little time you have on this earth doing something that makes you unhappy (and, by extension, will hurt your other meaningful relationships). That said, I'm also cautious about telling someone to abandon the field at a very early opportunity. I mean, law school wasn't cheap and the work gets better when you're the one making significant decisions. 

Some of what you described sounds like burn out. Law school is a pressure cooker and students often hop right into a summer position undertaking another kind of grueling gauntlet. I was miserable for a lot of law school and I struggled to find passion and curiosity in anything, even those courses I would otherwise have an interest in. I felt much of what you described above and worse. I questioned why I went to law school because I didn't like the people, the curriculum, much of [what I thought was] the work I'd be doing, and I lacked a clear path or end goal. I was a K-JD'er and went to law school because I excelled in undergrad, someone suggested I write the LSAT, and I was accepted (which comes with a lot of praise and encouragement from family) and not because I ever aspired to be a defense lawyer. Now that I'm in practice (criminal and family, mostly) and have discretion to make major decision, it's rekindled my interest and passion despite still being a gauntlet. 

So, yeah, part of it could be a Peter Pan Syndrome issue paired with burn out. The K-JD path is linear and, even if you live on your own for a back portion of it, you still don't confront the same kind of existential questions and "what do I truly want to do with my life" as you do when you have gap years or had another career. It's a well-beaten path that's intuitive to follow if you're able to. Another part of your experience could be unidentified burn out and/or depression. It took me a long time to be able to identify the symptoms in myself (for example, I'd lose weeks at a time going through the motions, lost in a fog and hardly able to distinguish days and weeks from each other). Or, I could be wrong and you're just coming to realize that this path isn't the right one for you (and, btw, that's perfectly okay and is absolutely nothing you should feel bad or ashamed out. In fact, I commended my peers that left law early when they realized they wanted to follow paths that better enrich their lives). 

Just some things to consider. 

[BlockedQuebecois]

Why don't you just take up some dangerous hobbies, like the rest of us? 

[2easy]

I had talked to a user on here that was going through the exact same problem as you. They had mentioned that they had applied to government agencies within Canada that would still have a high amount of action. Maybe this is something you could look into?

[Cool_name]

Litigation might be better, but will still likely not involve bullets. 
 

If you really have no interest in making more than $75k though, I see no reason to stay as a lawyer. There are surely more fulfilling jobs out there if they only need to pay 75k

[CleanHands]

3 hours ago, Jaggers said:

Getting into litigation where you are out making court appearances could give you the adrenaline rush you seem to want, but there aren’t many legal positions where you are in danger day to day. 

I'm duking it out arguing in court all the time, with peoples' liberty at stake, and it's a far cry from when I was getting OC sprayed, doing knife disarm training, and wrestling around with people in the dirt.

I frankly don't think law is for the OP and would have advised cutting losses earlier if they weren't already articling.

I'm sure any police service would view a law degree, and especially being called to the bar, as a significant asset in a candidate. If one can stomach working for and with total fucking reprehensible pricks.

[Jaggers]

3 minutes ago, CleanHands said:

I'm sure any police service would view a law degree, and especially being called to the bar, as a significant asset in a candidate. If one can stomach working for and with total fucking reprehensible pricks.

I thought of this, but didn't say anything as I know nothing about how cops operate. I would have thought that even cop jobs where having a law degree as an asset are probably mostly desk type jobs?

[CleanHands]

10 minutes ago, Jaggers said:

I thought of this, but didn't say anything as I know nothing about how cops operate. I would have thought that even cop jobs where having a law degree as an asset are probably mostly desk type jobs?

In every Canadian police agency I'm familiar with, every single police officer starts in patrol and can expect to be there for at least 3 years, regardless of one's educational background. This is barring some exceptional circumstances--for example, a friend of mine who is a cop is Muslim, and although he did start in patrol like everyone else, his agency wanted to move him into a public relations-type position very early on (which he refused because no other cop would respect him if he became a PR guy immediately with very little street experience, especially when he was offered the position due to being a member of a minority group).

If you're a qualified lawyer they will very likely want to push you into a legal role pretty early, but you can resist that and a law degree would also be an asset being a detective on complex investigations or whatever.

Edited January 5 by CleanHands

[beachhouse]

On 1/5/2024 at 3:55 AM, Guest Anonymous said:

I’ve considered joining the army as a JAG, the idea of some legal work AND the prospect of real danger is appealing. Are there other options or is what I am looking for totally non-law / law-adjacent? Have you experienced a similar feeling to mine? Am I experiencing Peter-Pan syndrome?

I may be wrong, but I feel like a lot of people compromise because they would like to raise a prosperous family. I do not. So, I am not concerned about money so long as it pays $75k+, home ownership, raising children, retirement, partnership, or city of residence.

All comments welcome, including those that are critical. Thank you.

 

Not that I'm a JAG, but there's not that much danger anymore since Afghanistan ended. There are JAGs that deploy on operations and to the Middle-East to provide military justice training to partner countries, which can be exciting, but not very life-threatening.

Regular Army is a bureaucratic machine, which can be very draining if you can't tolerate menial tasks. I have friends who work as special forces officers, which is the most exciting you can get, where the majority of their day to day is intensely administrative in nature. 

If you want excitement, aside from being police, perhaps make it a long-term goal of joining a national security agency e.g. CSIS. I indirectly work for one on the military side (CFINTCOM) and you'll be working on things with gravity to it. The reason I state long-term is that its quite selective to get in, with no real guarantee of success but its worth trying if you have your heart set on it. 

[Apple]

Have you considered the UFC? 

[PzabbytheLawyer]

Astronaut. Especially when Trump starts the first international space war.*

*Asterisk because this unfortunately isn't actually out of the realm of possibility.

[SNAILS]

To the OP:

You have worked for a top downtown firm in Toronto and a large company in house.

If I did that, I'd probably be bored to death too. It's sounds like what I very indiscriminately call "corporate law."

Maybe try to expand your horizons by working for a criminal or family law firm. Day-to-day interaction with real clients, learning the details of real life situations, and getting into nuances of legal arguments in a respectful adversarial setting is something I find exciting. 

[Case]

Become a solo practitioner.

You can bring your hunting knife to work and get in shouting matches with whoever you want, whenever you want.