Offering practical mindfulness instruction, tips, and resources to help take your legal mind from burdened to brilliant.
Author Archives: Claire E. Parsons
Claire E. Parsons is Of Counsel at Bricker Graydon Wyatt LLP in Cincinnati, Ohio. She has practiced for the last fifteen years in the areas of litigation, employment, local government law.
Claire is an active leader in her community and in the legal profession. She has led innovative charitable programs in her community, statewide legal organizations, committees relating to the promotion of women professionals. Claire is also a frequent writer and speaker for these and other organizations. She has published and spoken about numerous topics, ranging from complex legal issues, to law practice, networking and marketing, as well as mindfulness and wellness for lawyers and other professionals. She writes regularly on LinkedIn and even co-authored a book this year with 19 other women lawyers about how they used the platform to network and pursue career goals during the pandemic.
In 2013, Claire began a mindfulness practice early in her law career and as she was learning to be a new mom to her eldest daughter, Sophie. When Claire began the practice, she saw it gradually transform her life for the better by helping her to reduce overthinking, manage stress, and infuse compassion practices into her daily life. Over the next few years, she continued to study mindfulness practices and attend retreats.
In 2018, Claire began speaking and writing on these topics and she quickly became regarded as a resource for professionals as someone who can explain meditation practices in an approachable and practical way. She has completed more than 1000 hours of training to teach mindfulness and compassion, including meditation and a variety of other mind-body practices, including yoga, pranayama, and somatic healing. Claire has also authored two books, How to Be a Badass Lawyer and Mommy Needs a Minute. You can learn more and connect with her through the blog or on LinkedIn.
Founder’s Note: I wrote this book review years ago on a different blog, but I thought about it recently because I am in the process of finalizing my own fable on mindfulness. After reading this book, I reached out to Laura Vanderkam via email and her response and encouragement stayed with me for many years. I am sharing this post here because Laura’s work is essential for busy lawyers and we all sometimes need a good story to help us see the possibilities for change. I hope you enjoy it.
If I suggested that you read a “time management fable”, you’d probably think I was losing my mind. A phrase like “time management fable” calls to mind a litany of business-speak phrases or the holier-than-thou preaching of someone offering “hacks” offered to help you achieve more in a day than you have time to do.
Though it is indeed a fable intended to offer insights as to time management, Juliet’s School of Possiblities by Laura Vanderkam avoids those issues. Rather, it is just a story about a young professional who, like many of us, needs a mentor to help her figure out how to manage her time.
An Expert on Time Management
I’ve liked Laura Vanderkam since I read I Know How She Does It years ago, when I was an overwhelmed new working mom. Her approach, in this most recent fable and in the wider variety of content she offers, is practical and based on facts. She isn’t holier-than-thou. She doesn’t pretend time management is easy. But, she also refuses to fall into the trap of throwing up her hands in disgust at how daunting it can be to manage a professional and personal life in today’s world.
In all honesty, when I read Vanderkam I am reminded more of the ancient Greek philosophers I studied in college than the business self-help gurus available now. Just like Aristotle offered ideas about how to find “the good” in life, Vanderkam offers practical solutions that one can use to live a good life. Her suggestions tend to be good ones because, like many of the ancient Greek philosophers, she is a scientist as much as she is a theorist.
Time Management Is Seeing All Possibilities for Life
Vanderkam does not merely think about time; rather she has studied the use of it for several years. As she’ll tell you in her books, articles and podcasts, she has tracked her own time in 30-minute increments and has studied the time logs for thousands of professionals, including busy lawyers. In other words, her philosophy on time management is rooted in a painstaking study of countless uses of it in a variety of contexts.
That view comes through in Juliet’s School of Possibilities where the smart, ambitious, but overworked protagonist, Riley Jenkins, meets a mentor, Juliet, who shows her the divergent possibilities created by each decision she makes as to the use of her time.
It is by seeing this divergent path that Jenkins learns she needs to think more about expectations, setting good personal boundaries, and rethink priorities. She sees the divergent path on a beach (rather than a yellow wood), but still you’ll see it makes all the difference.
Why This Fable Is Ideal for Lawyers
I’m sure there are lots of books out there competing for your time. This fable from Laura Vanderkam is a quick, charming read with a good message and more heart than you’d expect. In fact, the book at times is deeply spiritual since it forces the protagonist, and in turn the reader, to examine the merits in how we spend our waking moments.
This theme comes through when mentor Juliet offers readers the following prayer: “Expectations are infinite. Time is finite. You are always choosing. Choose well.” Though new book choices seem to be infinite and time certainly is finite, Juliet’s School of Possibilities is a good choice for lawyers or any busy person looking for practical and worthwhile insights about time management.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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When I speak to lawyers about mindfulness, I’m sometimes asked about guided meditations. I’m not sure why, but some people have the idea that using guided meditation is somehow not “real” meditation. Allow me to set the record straight: that’s not true.
At least, I don’t think it’s true. Don’t get me wrong. There are advantages to meditating without guiding. I have written about that before. But the fact that unguided meditation offers benefits does not imply that guided meditation is somehow not enough.
If you are giving yourself a hard time about this, keep reading. Here are five reasons why guided meditation is a valid way for lawyers to practice meditation.
1. Guided Meditations Can Help You Explore and Learn Various Practices
I don’t rely on guiding too much in my personal practice anymore, but as a beginner I used them as much as I could. The reason for this was that I did not have very much experience with different practices. And even when I found practices that I loved, like loving-kindness, I hadn’t memorized all of the steps.
After a few years, that changed but only because I had used been practicing so much in recorded mindfulness sessions. That’s my point here.
Guided meditations can help lawyers explore and learn various meditation practices. While I do recommend a simple approach to meditation in general, exploration is great for lawyers too.
Mindfulness is a trait and a tool for life. The best way to figure out what styles and practices support you the most is to experience them. Guided meditations offer this to lawyers and other professionals who want to learn.
2. They Can Help You Keep Your Session on Schedule
One of the biggest issues that prevent lawyers from meditating more is time. A great thing about most guided meditations is that they have built-in timers. Most recorded practices cue you when you are done, so you don’t overstay your session.
This is a real issue with meditation because it is a practice that can encourage spacing out or falling asleep. Because most lawyers access guiding in the form of audio recordings, the end of the practice will usually wake you up.
Some apps, including Peloton, also allow you to put your practice on your calendar. You can select your practices for the week and schedule them so you don’t miss a sit. This is huge for lawyers, who are often motivated by our calendars.
3. Guided Meditations Can Make Practice More Enjoyable
The best kind of meditation is the one that you will do consistently. Based on this, it makes sense to enjoy your time meditating at least a little bit.
Guided meditations can do this in several ways. They may offer background music or soundscapes that can block out distracting sounds. This is important if you live in a noisy part of town or with people or pets who don’t always keep quiet.
The voice of another person guiding you make make practice feel less lonely. Along the same lines, the voice of another person may be soothing and help you relax. If you use meditations from someone you know and trust, following their guiding may help you feel more confident in your practice.
This may help you rest in your practice instead of feeling like you are working too hard. Meditation is hard enough on its own. Using guiding to make it a bit easier is not a cop out. It can be a smart way for lawyers to sustain their practice.
4. Lawyers May Need Practice Accepting Support
If you don’t like the idea of guiding in meditation, it could be possible that you have some issues around accepting help. This is common for many lawyers and it was definitely an issue for me.
The good news, though, is that you can learn to work out of this mindset. Independence is a wonderful virtue. If you are exploring mindfulness, though, I bet you already have this trait. Meditation will not take it away, but it may help you see the various ways in which you do better when you have the right support.
A guided meditation is a tool to support mindfulness practice. It works just like a mat, block, and blanket support a yoga practice. If you use props for yoga or another physical fitness practice, you are likely to see that they don’t detract from practice. Instead, they often make practice better.
Trust me, learning this lesson in meditation is one that translates into life. This is yet another reason why lawyers can feel good about using guiding to support their mindfulness practice.
5. Trained Teachers Offer Guided Meditations for a Reason
As a final attempt to convince you that there is nothing wrong with supporting your practice with guiding, I will appeal to authority. If you take a meditation course or attend a retreat, you are very unlikely to practice in silence on your own the entire time. Instead, most teachers offer some sort of guided meditation.
If you search the internet, you will easily find guided meditations from some of the best meditation teachers in the world. This includes people like Sharon Salzberg, Tara Brach, Jack Kornfield, Thich Nhat Hahn, Pema Chodron, Ethan Nichtern, and more.
Trained teachers offer these practices because they encourage students to practice and learn. Implicit in this is the idea that using guided meditations is still meditation.
Bottom Line: There Is Nothing Wrong with Using a Guided Meditation
If you are taking the time to practice mindfulness, please do not be hard on yourself. Be wary against listing all the reasons why your practice is not good enough. Practice is hard enough, especially for busy people like lawyers.
As long as the guiding is helping you practice, there’s nothing wrong with it. Just keep practicing and doing what works for you. You can always explore other styles of practice over time if needed, but you shouldn’t feel pressure to do so. Using guided meditations is a legitimate way for lawyers and everyone else to practice mindfulness.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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It’s been a while since I recorded a new guided meditation for lawyers, but I just recorded a new body scan practice. I like doing them. It’s just been busy with other projects lately, including editing my upcoming book.
This week, though, I am pleased to be offering an introduction to mindfulness course for my law firm. This course will track the practices taught in my first book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer. Week 2 of the course for lawyers and legal professionals will be about body scan meditation.
As I will explain in this post, there are numerous ways to do body scan meditation. I prepared a new guided meditation to offer a different option: one that starts in the bottom of the body and moves up. This post will share the new practice, as well as explain its advantages and potential risks for some populations.
What Is Body Scan?
As I have written before, body scan meditation is the practice of systematically scanning through the body to feel sensations. This is not a practice of thinking about the body or its parts. Instead, the practice is to intentionally direct your attention to sense the body.
To many, it may seem only natural to start a body scan from the top of the body and work your way down. After all, many lawyers live in our heads so that is often a great place to start.
The point of doing this practice is to build awareness of and familiarity with sensations in the body. This is essential for several reasons. One is that our emotions often register as sensations in our bodies. Another is that body awareness can help us to remember that there is life outside of the thoughts in our head.
Finally, learning to linger in sensations in the body, is an important way to cultivate mindfulness as a trait. Bodily sensations offer us a direct and tangible link to our present moment reality.
Options for Practice
Because body scan meditation is about feeling sensations in the body, there are multiple ways to do the practice. This can include but is not limited to:
Sides of the body: left and then right or vice versa;
Categories of body parts: limbs, torso, head, etc.:
Cycling approach: jumping from one part of the body to another; or
Varieties of sensation in the body: examples include temperature, pressure, space, relaxation.
In addition, these practices can be further modified and customized by adding different techniques. Some body scan practices might be quick, including a simple check in with body sensations. Other body scans might be lengthy and lingering, including deep exploration of bodily sensations.
Finally, it is also possible to add movement or pressure to body scan to foster awareness of sensation or relaxation. Progressive muscle relaxation is commonly paired with body scan. With this strategy, you may tense and relax muscles as you move through each body part. As another option, some people move their hands to rest on the bodily areas to help themselves feel sensations more strongly.
Advantages of Bottom Up Body Scan for Lawyers
Many lawyers would hear these options for body scan and ask which meditation style is the best. My answer, as always, is that the real question is which one is best for you. The only way to truly know this is to explore different practice styles and learn which one supports you most.
This is why I recorded a bottom up body scan guided meditation to allow for another option to try. The reason to explore this practice is that it can provide a faster route to relaxation. Many lawyers, myself included, are often stuck in our heads. We think a lot and habitually live in our thoughts as a result.
Starting a body scan at your toes or feet may help you feel relaxed and grounded more quickly. It also may help draw your mind out of your thoughts and into your body faster.
In my normal sitting practice, I tend to use a top down approach to body scan as a matter of habit. However, if I struggle with sleeplessness, I more often start a body scan in my toes. It often helps me relax, remember how good it feels just to lie down, and avoid thinking so I can get back to sleep.
Warnings and Potential Risks
Importantly, though, there are some potential risks for any mindfulness practices that draw you quickly into your body. Because emotions register in the body, a faster connection to the body can imply the potential for overwhelm. For this reason, some people may struggle with starting a body scan meditation at their toes and may do better with a top down approach.
This includes people who are very new to meditation, people who have severe anxiety, or anyone with a history of trauma. If that is you, it does not mean that meditation or body scan is off limits. Instead, it may mean that a top down approach may be preferred or that you should consult a healthcare provider or trained teacher first.
The real question with any mindfulness practice is whether you can feel safe, supported, and alert so that you can do the practice. If this is true for you, then bottom up body scan meditation is one to try.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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I have always been a big fan of stand-up comedy and recently this world has collided with my love of mindfulness. It’s now becoming common for comics to talk about meditation in their sets. Most of the time, I can turn my meditation teacher brain off for long enough to get a good laugh out of them.
But when one of my favorite comics, Josh Johnson, took on meditation I couldn’t resist writing about it. I’m a huge fan of Josh Johnson. I’ve seen his tour, watched his comedy special on HBO, and love his appearances on the Daily Show. Johnson is an excellent storyteller and can make you laugh at the tiniest things.
Recently, my husband sent me one of Johnson’s short clips where he talks about trying meditation. It’s quick and hilarious. You should watch it just to laugh. The other good news is that Johnson’s bit points to several very real struggles in meditation practice.
For those of you who want to laugh and learn, this post walks through Josh Johnson’s two-minute clip on meditation. Then it offers teachings to address the problems he mentions.
Don’t Beat Yourself Up When Your Mind Wanders in Meditation
Johnson starts off his bit by correctly mentioning the teaching that you should avoid beating yourself up when your mind wanders from the breath. Of course, he exaggerates the teaching for comic effect. He says that “you should not, you cannot” beat yourself up when your mind wanders.
In reality, this teaching is offered because it is common for people to berate themselves when their minds wander in meditation. It happens to all of us. For this reason, the teaching is not a prohibition like Johnson implies. Rather, it is a guidepost and an invitation to learn self-compassion.
Stated in a more precise way, the teaching really is that meditation is much easier and more effective when you have a kind inner attitude. If you notice yourself getting upset or engaging self-criticism, that’s okay. There is no need to feel like a failure or criticize that. Instead, the answer is just to recognize that you are doing something hard and go back to the breath.
Don’t Expect to Have a “Calm Mind”
About 25 seconds into the clip, Johnson correctly describes the practice of bringing one’s attention back to the breath repeatedly during meditation. But he ends it by saying that the goal or the expected end result is a “calm mind.”
Johnson is doing comedy here, so he doesn’t explain what he means by a “calm mind.” If you watch on, though, you can tell that he is equating a calm mind to a clear mind. Stated more directly, this means a non-thinking mind.
Some traditions may make this the goal and some teachers even talk about “clear minds” on occasion. For many teachers and traditions (myself included), though, meditation is not about removing thoughts. It does not make thoughts magically disappear and they are not off limits during practice.
With this foundation laid, Johnson dramatically declares that he’s “Going to try to meditate.” He closes his eyes and assumes a stern posture to show how serious he is about it.
Again, this is clearly for comic effect. Even so, it raises a really important point. Johnson is suggesting that good meditation is about being super serious. He’s suggesting that it’s fundamentally about discipline.
If you watch, pause the clip at about 37 seconds and take a look at it. You can see Johnson sitting with his eyes closed tight, appearing like he is trying to force himself to concentrate. Aside from the comic value, this is how a lot of lawyers think meditation is supposed to look.
As I have written before, relaxation, play, and even joy are better approaches. Why? Because you will focus best and learn the most when you are relaxed instead of trying too hard. Discipline matters insofar as you do the practice. But, once you do, ease up, relax, and crack a smile.
Lotus Pose Is Not Required in Meditation
Next, Johnson attempts the hilarious and impressive feat of demonstrating getting himself into lotus pose while sitting on a stool. This is for laughs and to show how awkward he felt forcing himself this pose for meditation.
Johnson quickly notes, though, that he struggles because he’s not as flexible as he used to be. Then he says his leg fell asleep. Anyone who has meditated for even a few minutes has had these same struggles.
Here’s the truth: meditation can happen in almost any posture. Using a cushion or sitting with legs crossed can be great, but they aren’t required. You can meditate in a chair or you can do so standing or lying down or even walking. Any posture works as long as you feel safe, relaxed, supported, and can stay alert.
Focusing on the Breath Is Not Thinking about the Breath
Johnson next hilariously showcases a subtle misunderstanding of the directions for breath focus practice. Once he gets himself into position, he says that the object is to “just think about your breath.” He exaggerates this by saying you should “hold onto the ideas of your breath; that’s how you stay present!”
Some teachers and traditions may differ on this, but meditation is not thinking about the breath. Instead, breath focus meditation is about keeping one’s attention with the breath. I teach this to mean feeling the physical sensations of the breath. Other ways of practice also include noting the cycles or parts of the breath.
Thinking about the breath is different than feeling the breath and observing its aspects. When you think about the breath, your awareness is principally in the mind. But when you feel sensations of the breath, your awareness is in the body.
As Johnson comically demonstrates, this distinction matters a lot. All of his thinking about the breath leads inevitably to a long train of thoughts about everything but his breath. This is why it makes a difference to know what your anchor is in meditation. If you know the anchor very precisely, it is easier to stay with and return to your anchor.
What to Do When You See that Your Mind Wandered
Perhaps the funniest part of the clip is when Johnson demonstrates his wandering mind. He goes off on a tangent for about a minute sharing his anxiety about world events. As you can hear, the audience immediately gets it. This is a very relatable thing.
Mind wandering is exactly what you can expect to experience if you try meditation. When you start to notice it, it can be just as hilarious as the mental rant Johnson shared in his clip.
And he announces in dramatic form at the two-minute mark of the clip, “I wandered.” Of course, this is a comedic reckoning. Johnson uses it to show that his pursuit of a calm mind was futile all along and to laugh at himself.
Here’s the thing: the moment where you notice the mind wandering is not a failure. It doesn’t mean you are doing the practice wrong. It means you are doing the practice right because you have seen that your mind is wandering.
In that moment, Johnson woke up from his anxious mental rant. He stopped it. That’s a good thing and a powerful thing once it becomes a trait. The problem was, he didn’t stay with the practice and return to his breath. He judged (in hilarious fashion) the mental pattern. The teaching, of course, is just being kind and going back to the breath.
You Probably Aren’t Doing Meditation Wrong
Of course, Johnson doesn’t do that, at least not in the clip. Instead, he says that “I went ahead and I stopped meditating.” Over the laughter of the audience, he explains that he at least stopped for the time being “Because I was doing it wrong.”
As mentioned above, I think Johnson should give himself more credit. For one thing, his joke make me and lots of other people laugh. In addition, I think he was doing meditation just fine. I don’t think he was truly doing the practice wrong. Instead, as mentioned above, he may have had some expectations about practice that made him think he was doing it wrong.
In addition, the truth is that meditation is not an easy practice to sustain. It’s a simple practice to learn, but it can be hard to sustain. This is because it forces us to confront uncomfortable thoughts and sensations for extended periods of time. For these reasons, struggles in meditation don’t mean you are doing it wrong or it doesn’t work. Struggles can sometimes indicate the opposite.
You Can Always Try Again Later
Johnson says he may try meditation again in the future. Of course, trying again is the only way to learn the practice and see what works best for you.
Because all the struggles Johnson pointed to are common issues, here are a few tips that may make meditation practice a bit easier if you ever decide to start or start again:
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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You can’t ignore a book with a title like Laziness Does Not Exist. It’s bold. Many lawyers might argue that it’s controversial. As soon as I heard it, I knew I had to read it.
Most of you probably aren’t surprised that a mindfulness teacher was interested in a book about laziness. After all, I encourage other lawyers to spend more time doing nothing in this blog on a weekly basis.
Keep reading to learn more about why I liked the book so much and what it may offer to you.
The Book Offers Deep Insights for Lawyers who May Fear Laziness.
Despite it’s seemingly simple title, LDNE is more than an argument about the nonexistence of laziness. Instead, it’s more of a conversation about our cultural and individual feelings about work and effort. It posits that a collection of values around work and productivity have congealed into “the laziness lie.”
Even so, as I read LDNE, I was repeatedly impressed by how much Price offered deep insights on these subjects. He didn’t skim the surface by making a generic plea for us to appreciate the importance of self-care. Instead, he went deep in explaining how laziness got such a bad rap in our culture. Then he invites each of us to explore how our own fear of being regarded as lazy causes each of us to overwork, whether at work, with our personal habits, or even in our relationships.
In various ways, the book is full of insights. It reframes fundamental issues that will change your mind, whether you start off believing in laziness or not.
It Also Shares Useful Tips to Help Lawyers to Set Boundaries.
More significantly, the insights in LDNE weren’t offered just to produce “aha” moments. Instead, they are intended to help each of us give ourselves a break. LDNE does this by offering a variety of useful strategies and practices to get oneself out of the grind created by the laziness lie.
Most relevant to lawyers, these include tips and strategies for managing one’s work day and work life. For instance, it explained that small breaks at work can actually boost productivity.Th
This can cause us to track and document on social media every activity in our lives to the point where we leave ourselves no place to rest. It was helpful that the chapters both offered permission and practical strategies to gradually find more ease with these life activities.
Encourages compassion and understanding for yourself and others
Price encourages us all to stop reflexively calling ourselves or others lazy when we struggle. Instead, he asks us to look more closely to understand what may be causing the problem. In many situations doing so may help us identify a very logical reason why effort, work, and motivation are a challenge.
Laziness Does Not Exist Is a Good Read for Lawyers
Overall, Laziness Does Not Exist by Devon Price is an easy to read, insightful, and well-structured book that will change your mind. It will help you identify the ways that worries about laziness come up in your own life and work. It may help you develop strategies to work a little less in ways that aren’t consistent with your values. But the end goal isn’t lazy at all. It is courage to look more clearly at the world, yourself, and other people so that you can act with greater kindness and compassion.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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I’m relaxing on family vacation this week, but I realized I have two great events coming up next week. Lawyers interested in mindfulness and attorney well-being may like to hear about them. In fact, both events are raising money for good causes so I hope you will check them out.
This post will share details about each of the events and provide the details for how lawyers can register and participate.
Will Work for Food
The first event coming up next week ticks all the boxes. It covers an interesting topic, it’s aimed lawyers, and it is for a good cause. Will Work for Food – the New Possibilities Hour is an initiative of my friend, Jean Lawler and other dispute resolution professionals. Jean is a great lawyer but she spends much of her time mediating cases now.
She started Will Work for Food with friends to educate people about the mediation process and raise money for charity in the process. To do this, she brings in experts from various fields to talk and teach about an issue that comes up in mediation.
The Topic: Anger in Conflict Resolution
Jean and her friends saw my past working and writing on anger management and asked me to talk about that. Anger is definitely something that can get in the way at mediation. For that reason, Jean and I will talk about how mindfulness can help us manage it and even harness the energy of anger for good.
This session will be an interview about anger, and how it shows up in law practice and conflict resolution. We’ll also discuss what mindfulness offers in terms of anger management and why it’s a whole lot more than a few breathing strategies. Instead, you might be surprised to learn that anger may have some hidden benefits.
Why Lawyers Should Watch
It is free to watch and participate in this session, but Will Work for Food encourages everyone watching to donate to food banks. As a big fan of cooking myself, I elected to support the humanitarian work of renowned Chef, Jose Andres, at World Central Kitchen.
Of course, my episode will only be a drop in the bucket in addressing hunger on a worldwide basis. But Will Work for Food has already raised over $1 Million since it started in 2020. Join us to be a part of that impact.
When and How Lawyers Can Join or Watch
The live event is online on June 25th at 8 AM PST / 11 PM EST. You can find register for the event on Zoom or watch live on LinkedIn. If you join live, you can engage and ask questions in the comments or chat.
If you wish to catch the interview later, you can find the recording on LinkedIn or view it on the Will Work for Food website.
Thriving in Law Summit
This Summit is organized by lawyer and coach, Gina Steele. It is a 4-day Virtual Online Event designed specifically for legal professionals looking to transform their practice and their lives. Have you ever looked at a conference schedule that looked great but you didn’t have the time to attend?
This event is different. It boasts an array of wonderful speakers on a range of topics relating to lawyer well-being. But it gives you the flexibility to decide when and how to watch. Topics include mindfulness, compasion, communication, time management, and more.
The Topic: Compassion for Lawyers
My session is entitled “Becoming a Badass Lawyer: How Self-Compassion and Compassion Towards Others Helps Lawyers Succeed and Thrive.” In this one-hour interview, Gina asks me to break down how and why lawyers should cultivate compassion for self and others.
Like the event above, the Thriving in Law Sumit is also supporting a good cause. Our society faces a critical gap in access to justice. For many underserved and marginalized communities, competent legal representation is out of reach. Lincoln Law School is working to close this gap by transforming determined, hardworking adults into practice-ready, ethical advocates. Those who donate to Lincoln Law School will have access to the Summit videos for a year.
When and How Lawyers Can Watch
The Summit runs from June 25-28, 2026. Each day, all scheduled interviews will be available at 9:00 am PDT/12:00 pm EDT and will remain available until the end of day June 30, 2026. You can register through Gina’s website here and get access to all the videos next week.
This means that you can watch the videos on your own time in a way that fits your schedule.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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I teach and write about the importance of celebration for lawyers, all the time. But I’ll be honest, it can sometimes be hard to do. Last week, I finished a critical case and I was fortunate to have the chance to celebrate right away. It made a huge difference in my outlook and energy levels.
This experience reminded me how simple but essential celebration can be for lawyers. As a result, I decided to share my experience to show that celebration doesn’t have to be something that is time-consuming, expensive, or difficult. Instead, it can be a simple sharing of experience with colleagues.
If, like me, you struggle to celebrate all your achievements, to keep yourself motivated in your law practice. This post will identify why celebration is essential for lawyers and the key ingredients of a good celebration.
Why Is Celebration Important for Lawyers?
The reason that celebration is important for lawyers is the same reason that it is hard for us to do. Lawyers are busy people who deal with difficult things. Our work involves risky situations, stressful cases with clients, and a lot of time in the office. We may also feel pressure because so many other people depend on us.
So when a case ends or a deal is done, lawyers can forget to take the time to feel good about it. We may move on to the next case or just go home and rest, but we don’t look back. Instead, lawyers often keep looking forward.
Over time, this can mean that lawyers experience a lot of negative things without much balance. We devote our attention and energy to things that stress us out. But we may miss many of the good things that come along the way.
Celebration is essential to remind us that there are also good parts of law practice. We may have clients that we care about, people in our law firms that we enjoy, and staff and the team members who impress us. If we don’t take the time to celebrate, we don’t reap the rewards of all these beneficial aspects of work. Due to the negativity bias in the brain, lawyers need explicit reminders of good things like these.
What Was My Big Celebration?
You may be wondering what my big celebration was. In reality, it wasn’t that big at all. My practice group has weekly conference calls, where we all meet on Teams to discuss our cases and workload. Because it was the end of our busy season, one of the practice group leaders decided that we should all share a drink. Some of us chose to drink mocktails, and some of us actually had a cocktail.
Fortunately, the day of the event, the leaders sent out an email reminding us of the special occasion for this call. A few hours before it happened, I resolved a major case that had caused problems and stress for my practice and client. So of course, I decided to rush out and buy some champagne to celebrate with my colleagues on the call. And let me just say, it was a lot of fun. It made me feel good about my practice and close to my team. It made me realize that the struggles we go through as lawyers are worth it. It really made a difference to my energy levels and outlook.
The Key Ingredients of the Celebration
You may be wondering what made this simple celebration so great? The key ingredients I have identified are as follows:
first, it was planned in advance,
second, it involved a shared experience, and
third, it included an element of fun
fourth, it did not require extra work.
These items are easy to comprehend but I will explain why each was so essential me and why it may matter to other lawyers.
1. Lawyers May Need to Plan to Celebrate
The first element, planning, matters because it shows it was a priority. Planning is also a practical necessity, so we could make a point to be there and participate. In addition, we were reminded of the event the day of, so we didn’t forget to do something special. This reminded everyone that celebration and connection with each other were important.
I know sometimes it feels odd to plan out a celebration or even a small time to connect with colleagues. While impromptu gatherings can be nice, it is not something that busy lawyers can rely on. Instead, people with busy calendars need a plan. If you prioritize celebration, show you value it by planning it out.
2. Celebration Requires a Shared Experience
The second element, the shared experience, is of course the most essential. Even though it is non-billable time, most of my team make the time to come to our practice group meetings. This is in part because we like to talk to each other and hear from each other. We work in separate offices across a few states and don’t always get to see each other face-to-face.
For this reason, any chance to bring lawyers together for real community is a good thing. This is why a shared experience is essential to celebration.
3. Celebration Should Be Fun
The third element, fun, should also not be overlooked. Fun had to be added in this situation, because if it wasn’t, it would just be another practice group call. If we didn’t add something fun, it wouldn’t be special. It would be another work meeting and not a celebration. In this case, the drink made the call more fun and took it in the realm of celebration.
Regardless of whether their drink contained alcohol, everyone had fun with their drinks. Some even came up with creative names for their drinks or used a special glass. I decided to add a personal charcuterie board to my champagne. Everyone had a good time explaining whatever they chose to drink.
The point here is that celebration needs to be fun. Do something a little different or special to note the occasion and lighten the mood and it can turn a meeting into a celebration.
4. Lawyers Don’t Have Time for Extra Work
The fourth element: it did not require extra work. No one had to prepare anything or make time for an extra meeting on their calendar. Instead, we used the time already available and just decided to dedicate some of it to celebration. This increased the chances that we could all participate and really celebrate the occasion.
Sometimes law firms and companies get into trouble because they try to do celebratory events, which require a lot of work from their employees. Sometimes this effort is worth it, and sometimes it is not. When you’re planning celebrations at your office, be sure that it isn’t forced fun. Make it real fun that doesn’t require too much work or force participation at the detriment of the people who will enjoy it.
Celebration Should Be a Habit for Lawyers Instead of a Rarity
Here is my big point with this post. I shared this simple experience about a celebration for at work to show how simple it can be. Sometimes lawyers don’t celebrate because we think we’re too busy, and we think we don’t have the energy. This post shares an example of a way to celebrate with other lawyers in the office that doesn’t take extra time or extra work.
Of course, lawyers may not be able to celebrate every tiny thing or do it every day. But if we keep these tips in mind, we can make celebration a regular occurrence in our places of work and lives. And the more we make connection, happiness, joy a priority, the happier and healthier we may become.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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Sometimes I have to remind myself that big projects come down to completing a million tiny steps. As I have shared before, I am working on a new book. It’s my first novel. My update is that I have finally settled on a title.
I will share that at the end to keep you in suspense. But for now, I am taking a moment to celebrate the milestone. The writing of this book has been much slower, and in some ways harder, than my first book. I keep finding that I need ways to motivate myself.
A Novel Is Written in a Series of Small Steps
So, today I am sharing a post about the importance of small steps. This is something that you would expect a mindfulness teacher to say. A meditation practice starts with a single breath. If you get off track, I teach that you just need to bring yourself back.
This same approach has been serving me well with this book. It took me over two years to write it and I had to keep letting the story come out, paragraph by paragraph.
I finally decided to publish the book earlier this year at a time when my law practice did not feel so busy. By the time that plan was up and running, so were all my cases. This means that I have had to literally find some stolen moments to do a Zoom call with my coach, read the feedback from beta readers, or fill out the form for my book cover.
Life Gets in the Way but I Keep on Writing
The good news is that this is very much like meditation. I keep getting distracted by other things in life and having to drag my attention back, even if only for a few moments.
Of course, this is hard and frustrating. Even though I love writing and enjoy learning about writing fiction, I’d be lying if I pretended there wasn’t a little voice of doubt that asked “what if you just quit? Would anyone care?”
Instead, I use it as an opportunity to recommit by answering the questions that doubt asks me. What if I just quit? Well, of course, the world would not end. Most other people would not notice or would be too polite to say anything. But I would know. I would care. I would be sad that I didn’t finish the project.
And so I keep looking for an extra few minutes here and there. I have committed myself again to finalizing the editing this summer so I can publish by the end of the year. It is sometimes hard to make myself take each of the tiny steps.
Milestones Build Momentum for Writing Success
Even so, the milestones are racking up. I am starting to see a clearer vision of how this book will come together. Now I have a title, a foreword, the beginnings of a cover, and some good feedback to guide my editing. Even more significantly, I also have some friends, a coach, and an editor to cheer me on and answer my questions when I am stuck.
By the end of this year, you will be able to read my second book called A New Year’s Present. It is a mindfulness fable for lawyers inspired by A Christmas Carol. I can’t wait to to see how it turns out and I hope you can’t wait to read it.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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Keeping things simple is not always easy for lawyers to do. We often like to learn all the things and know all the tricks. When it comes to meditation, I had this problem at first too.
I was so astounded that meditation helped me manage overthinking and anxiety that I had to figure out why. Part of that meant learning about all the mindfulness practices I could to try to put the puzzle pieces together.
This kind of exploration is not bad, but at the end of the day it did not change my daily meditation practice much. After more than a decade, my daily mindfulness routine looks a lot like it did at the beginning.
As I have learned, this is a good thing. Keeping your practice simple is one of the best ways to make it last and to get benefits from meditation. Here are few reasons why.
A Simple Meditation Practice Reduces Decision Fatigue
As I have written before, my practice is truly very simple because I usually sit in silence. At first, I used guided meditations, so I am not shaming it if you do. The reason I quit, though, was that I got sick of trying to find a meditation for practice every day.
This blog illustrates that there are tons of modalities to use to make up a mindfulness practice. But, if you had to pick a practice every day, actual practice might get derailed by decision fatigue.
This is a real concern for lawyers. We rely on discernment every day to help clients make decisions. Delayed gratification is built in our jobs. If our rest time also requires the use of the same mental faculties, it may not really feel like rest.
This is why keeping things simple is essential for mindfulness practice. Once we adopt a single practice or a set regimen, we don’t have to decide. All we have to do is the mindfulness practice itself.
Keeping Mindfulness Simple Supports Relaxation without Effort
Another advantage of a simple approach to meditation is that it makes relaxation much easier. If you do the same practice most days, you will more quickly come to associate the practice with calm.
For example, if you do breath focus practice every day, your mind and body will eventually adjust. You may notice that you quickly, and nearly automatically, relax. This may help you enter the meditative state with more ease.
Most lawyers try meditation to manage stress and build happier lives. To that end, it makes sense to build a practice that supports as much relaxation and rest time as possible. This is why keeping your practice siple is important. It lets you spend more time in relaxation and spend less time trying to relax.
While there are many ways to practice mindfulness, most of us know that different practices may lead to different results. In this way, spreading your time thin across many different practices may result in a shallow understanding of any one practice.
Picking one or just a few practices when you meditate gives you the chance to go deep. It allows you to build mastery in skills in a way that a more eclectic practice does not. This is because you get more time and more practice repetitions to build experience and wisdom.
You Can Explore Other Mindfulness Practices as Needed Over Time
Now, if your mind is screaming that monogamy in meditation practice is boring or leaves too little room for exploration, calm down. Keeping your meditation practice simple does not mean that it can never change.
Remember that meditation is a practice for life. Ideally this means that you will practice mindfulness for many years, including up to the rest of your life. Having meditated for over a decade, I can say that exploration and shifts in practice are essential.
You can keep your mindfulness practice fresh by trying new things. This is why I have used and teach everything from body scan to loving-kindness to open awareness on this blog. In addition, new challenges in life often emerge that may affect our practice. For instance, if health reasons cause sitting meditation to be a struggle, we might want to try walking meditation or yoga instead.
Even after shifting my practices many times over the years to account for changes in myself or my life, simplicity has been the one constant for me. I have tried and will keep trying all the practices out there. But at the end of the day, I know I can always come back to my simple practice of focusing on my breath or just sitting and letting things arise and fade away.
Exploration is a wonderful way to learn about mindfulness but it is also wonderful to have a stable and consistent practice that feels like home.
Conclusion: Keep Meditation Simple
In short, if you want a strong meditation practice, it is not necessary to have an elaborate one. It is not necessary to know every mindfulness practice there is. It is not even necessary to find the “best” possible style of meditation.
Instead, what works best for lawyers with busy schedules and too many decisions to make at work, is to find the best practice for you. That means the practice that you want to return to day after day. In general, that means a simple practice which includes one or a select few mindfulness practices built into a daily or near daily routine.
Keeping your meditation practice simple won’t make it boring. It will invite relaxation with less effort, build true mastery, and let you spend your time cultivating mindfulness instead of debating what practice to use.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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I have had a few encounters with feedback recently. Most lawyers (and most people for that matter) have a love-hate relationship with feedback. We know we need it to learn and grow, but actually hearing it can be a double-edge sword.
When an appraisal is positive, we may feel proud and feel validated. But when the assessment is middling to negative, we can feel deflated, defeated, and hurt.
Can mindfulness help lawyers navigate receiving feedback? You bet. This post will explain how and offer some steps to help you implement it for yourself.
Feedback and The Eight Worldly Winds
Feedback seems like a fact of modern life. Even if you aren’t looking for a rating of yourself, you may find it by doing the most basic things. Most lawyers have LinkedIn profiles that allow others to recommend them. If you avoid LinkedIn, you probably still use some social media that allows people to rate how they like your posts or comments.
This constant evaluation can be troubling for sure, but it isn’t new. In fact, humans have always rated, judged, and reacted to each other. If you doubt me, you might consider the Buddhist teachings on the eight worldly winds.
These include:
Praise and blame
Gain and loss
Pleasure and pain
Success and failure
Of course, these are the manifestations of impermanence in everyday life. Good things come and go and so do bad things. Nothing lasts forever, they each blow around us, much like the wind.
Cultivating Equanimity Helps
To say that these things are “like the wind” is not to suggest that we can simply ignore them. Sure, we may not notice when a gentle breeze rolls by, but any of us can get knocked or slowed down by a storm or hefty gust.
Part of the skill here, though, can be hard but essential to learn. That part is clinging or resistance. Most people, including us lawyers, usually cling to the pleasant things but resist the bad things.
Why Feedback Is Hard for Lawyers
This is where feedback can be challenging. Even though many of us claim to be above such things, most lawyers care deeply about our reputations and social status. There is good reason for this too. Our reputations matter to the success of our law practices and can even affect our ability to serve our clients.
As a result, it is only natural that lawyers would crave, cling to and strive for positive ratings of our performance or character. On the other hand, we will also dislike, actively avoid, and resist negative evaluations. Or we may try to block all these feelings and live with a buried sense of imposter syndrome.
Given this, it may sound unattainable that any lawyer could ever bring a sense of equanimity to getting feedback. But the truth is that we can build this trait, just like we can build the traits of mindfulness and compassion.
Steps for Responding to Feedback with Equanimity
As I have written before, meditation practice goes a long way in cultivating the trait of equanimity. Every time you bring your wandering mind back to the breath or pause before scratching an itch, you are building patience. In each tiny moment like this, you are creating equanimity by choosing to not react in a huge way to every issue that comes along.
Even so, some types of feedback may require a bit more attention and skill. After years of meditation, I am the first to say that feedback still can get to me. All of us may need a framework to help us navigate reviews, ratings and assessments of ourselves with kindness and skill. Here are the steps that help me.
1. Don’t Argue or Gush
Because feedback is so likely to activate our egos, one of the easiest ways to get stuck with it is by arguing with or wallowing in it. Negative ratings may push us to argue the facts underlying it or challenge the intent or credibility of the reviewer. Positive ratings may have the opposite effect, causing us to obsess and puff up the meaning or importance of the assessment.
This is why one of the best ways to promote equanimity and your own sanity is to just receive the feedback for exactly what it is. Don’t add on to it or try to diminish it unfairly. As much as you can, just hear it or see it for what it is.
2. Allow Your Feelings
Of course, receiving feedback is bound to produce feelings. Equanimity does not mean blocking or resisting your feelings. Far from it. True equanimity means accepting your feelings for what they are. That means giving yourself the time and space you need to allow your feelings without doing violence to yourself or others.
That means you can feel hurt or angry or defensive when you receive a negative rating. It also means you are allowed to feel happy, grateful, and proud when someone praises you or your performance.
The important thing to understand, though, is that these feelings, like all feelings, are temporary. Let them come and let them go and recognize that no amount of good or bad feedback will make any feelings last forever.
3. Keep Perspective
Another thing that makes feedback challenging is that we don’t always request or consent to it. To make things worse, much of the feedback we receive may be offered thoughtlessly or unskillfully.
As I mentioned, lawyers may be subject to many kinds of feedback that are brief, perfunctory, and casual. Even when an evaluation is more thorough and well thought out, it still remains a singular data point rather than a final referendum on our character. One of the ways that we can help ourselves not get hooked with every rating or review is to keep them in perspective.
Primarily, I do this by putting it in a context by considering the following factors:
Was the feedback relevant, timely, and offered with good intent?
Did I explicitly or implicitly request the assessment?
Did the review provide useful and practical information or did it appear to rate me as a person?
Was the assessment consistent with other assessments I have received or was it an outlier?
Would I provide feedback like the rating I received to someone whose growth and development mattered to me?
This is a rough outline of questions that help me put feedback in perspective. More “yes” answers to these questions suggest feedback that deserves more of my attention. If I answer most or all of the questions in the negative, that is a strong sign I just need to move on and let go.
4. Learn What You Can and Move On
Even though they can challenge us, evaluations from others really can help us learn and grow. In truth, not everyone will tell you what they really think. This is why, most of the time, feedback can be valuable even if we have to take it with a large grain of salt.
For this reason, the last step before moving on is take whatever lessons you can from the evaluation. With skillfully offered feedback that you have requested, this may be easy. You may get practical ideas about how to adjust or improve.
For ratings that are more generic or less skillful, the lesson may be as simple as slow down, choose your words carefully, or you can’t please everyone. In short, if there is a message in the feedback that you need to hear, take it, reflect on it, and then move on.
Conclusion
In the end, there is no secret recipe for being unbothered and unaffected when lawyers get feedback. That’s because mindfulness practice is not about checking out on life, but being more present in it. All of us are wired to crave praise and resist and reject blame. We want people to like us and think well of us and we don’t want them to tell us negative information about ourselves or our performance.
Mindfulness is not a magic pill that can make the worldly winds of life go away. But with time and practice, it may help you cultivate equanimity an essential trait for navigating ups and downs in life and work. By using the steps offered in this post, I hope you can bring equanimity to your next encounter with feedback.
Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.
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