Stop The Shame Loop and Let the Process of Habit Change Unfold

I’ve never considered myself a very disciplined person. Let’s just say I’ve never met a french fry I didn’t eat, I hit the snooze button easily, and I’m always the one around the office you can count on to say yes to the impromptu lunch (abandoning the lunch I packed).

Even with an established meditation practice, as a busy mom and lawyer, I often find myself stumbling through each day just trying to keep all the balls in the air and ending each day in bed cycling through the long list of things I didn’t get done or should have done: I should have exercised today. Why didn’t I meditate? I didn’t get through all my emails. Do my kids have clean underwear for tomorrow? I need to clean the bathroom (why is the bathroom always so dirty?)? Did I eat a vegetable today? Did my kids eat a vegetable this week? When was last time anyone in my family ate a vegetable? And on and on and on.

For so long I was stuck in a loop: try to cultivate a habit or make a change, feel like I was failing, feel ashamed and beat myself up, give up. Telling myself the story that I’m just not a disciplined person.

Then I found the work of Leo Babauta and his blog Zen Habits. Babauta’s work focuses on productivity using a Zen based minimalist philosophy. As women we are conditioned that success means we do it all and we do it perfectly. Babauta’s work helped me start to deconstruct that. He introduced me to the idea of starting small and just doing less.

The focus on productivity helped, but I was still stuck in the habit change loop (start, stop, feel ashamed…). That’s when I found Kelly McGonigal’s work and the 10% Happier Habit Change Course. McGonigal is a behavioral psychologist at Stanford that studies habit formation and teaches using mindfulness practices.

The first time I took the 10% Happier Habit Change Course, I learned the basics of habit change and how to create routines to support habit changes. The basic steps of habit formation are to choose a trigger, associate it with a behavior, and reward yourself for doing the behavior. McGonigal teaches that in order to build lasting habit changes we must connect them to our higher goals of the kind of person we want to be and the life we want to lead.

Establishing a regular exercise is a big habit for me. I have herniated discs and when I’m running and stretching regularly my back hurts less. The first time I took the Habits Course I took McGonigal’s advice. I’m also 44 years old with young kids. I want to be able to run around with my kids (and grandkids some day!). Yes, my increasing amounts of cellulite and my pants fitting too tight are part of the motivation to exercise, but once I connected exercise to my higher goals (feeling good and being active with my kids) it got a little easier.

I learned to incorporate visual reminders of these higher goals into my routine. I cut a picture out of a magazine of a mother and daughter smiling and running on a beach together and hung it up by my bed. This picture is a visible reminder to me when I don’t feel like exercising that the reason I want to put on those running shoes is so that I can be active with my kids and be pain free.

Practical tips and understanding the psychology behind habit change helped, but I was still stuck in the shame loop so I took the 10% Happier Habit Change Course again. This time I heard McGonigal’s words about cultivating self-compassion. I learned that the habit I really need to change is the mental habit of shame when I don’t do what I think I should be doing.

McGonigal says acknowledging that you even want to change something is the “bravest version of yourself” and that self-compassion means being gentle with yourself and acknowledge that you’re doing the best you can. She says “life is unfolding process” and that self-compassion is the bedrock of opening up to that process. I can feel myself opening up to the idea that habit change is a lifelong process up and for the first time I’m starting to interrupt the shame loop.

I will never be the most disciplined person, but maybe, just maybe, I can be someone who does her best and doesn’t beat herself up every time she doesn’t do exactly what she should be doing. Maybe I can finally embrace the concept of the lifelong process. Maybe some day I’ll be the person who exercises somewhat regularly, maybe eats a vegetable once in a while, and meditates regularly. Maybe I’ll be the kind of woman that lays in bed and thinks: I did my best today, isn’t that great? Good job, me.

So if there’s a new habit you’re trying to cultivate or a not-so-great habit you’re trying to break – whatever you do go easy on yourself.

Loren VanDyke Wolff is an attorney, mom, community leader, and long-time meditator who lives and practices law in Covington, Kentucky. She has contributed several pieces to the blog and has a passion for improving the legal profession. You can connect with her on LinkedIn.

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What Dry January Taught Me about Alcohol, Mindfulness, and Shame

I successfully did Dry January this year but it taught me a surprising lesson about shame. No, I have not been living under a rock. I know about Brene Brown. I watched the Netflix special. Yes, it was amazing. I’ve read many of her books. I know that the research says that shame can steal our power and keep us in a box. But it’s one thing to read or hear about a concept and another to live it, feel it, and understand it as you do.

I had experienced shame before this year, so it was not necessarily a new thing for me. But in general, the feeling was so intense and unmistakable that I could not ignore it. The shame I learned about after doing Dry January, however, was different.

Shame about Alcohol Can Be Hard to Identify

It was subtle. It was like a ghost in a haunted house that left signs of its presence but would disappear into the ether when you looked for it. It was not a big, bold feeling for me, but instead the faintest of senses that told me that I shouldn’t think too deeply (or even at all) about my drinking.

It is for this reason that I had to try Dry January before I could properly diagnose my own condition: I had been ashamed that my use of alcohol had become so habitual.

For months before January, 2021 rolled around, I had been bored with alcohol. Literally bored. Still, I kept finding myself going to the fridge to grab a beer at the end of the day as if by compulsion.

Shame Can Silently Prevent You from Seeing Your Patterns

Like most people, I had come to associate alcohol with fun and relaxation. Those things being in short supply during the pandemic, my consumption of alcohol increased to fill this gap. Since I hardly ever needed to drive, there were usually very few reasons to say no either. So my habit became regular and stayed regular even after I started to be concerned about it.

But to be “concerned” about one’s own consumption of alcohol raises all kinds of issues, doesn’t it? If one is “concerned” about one’s use of alcohol, then it raises the question about whether one needs to stop. And we know that if one needs to stop, then they have a ”problem” with alcohol and they must stop totally and forever, full stop.

Right? Furthermore, if I—a meditation teacher who espouses the values of mindfulness at every turn—could not control my own use of alcohol, what kind of teacher would I be? And don’t even get me started about what kind of lawyer I might be if I can’t even control myself.

Image with quote that says "Shame can steal your power and keep you in a box. Mindfulness and compassion can help you move out of shame."

Mindfulness Helped Me Drop the Shame about Alcohol

As it turns out, I am just the human kind. Despite eight years of meditation, I’m not enlightened yet and I have cravings just like everyone else. My meditation practice certainly helped me maintain stability during the pandemic but I don’t think anything could make living through a pandemic easy for any of us. Ultimately, though, it was my meditation practice that helped me get out of this mess.

Though shame and anxiety about alcohol kept making my mind force concerns about it to the side, basic awareness helped me wake up. I love beer, but I started to notice that it didn’t seem to taste as good. That helped me to see that I wasn’t really getting the enjoyment I was seeking when I went to grab one from the fridge.

I also noticed that many days I would make a secret goal not to get a beer, but find myself walking to the fridge anyway. This helped me see that I was not a terrible out of control mess, but rather just someone who developed less than ideal habits while stuck at home social distancing.

Mindfulness Can Help You Examine Habits Nonjudgmentally

When I started to examine my beer drinking nonjudgmentally as a habit, rather than an inherent character flaw, it made me curious. Rather than worry about having to quit for all time and what that might imply about me, I instead started to wonder whether I could just change what I was doing. I had never tried Dry January before, but found myself in a Dry January Facebook group in December.

Reading the posts and stories of other members helped normalize what I had experienced and it actually made me excited to try. As it happened, I had already signed up for a virtual meditation retreat for the weekend of New Years Eve. Having done this retreat before, I knew that I would refrain from drinking during the retreat. That was an ideal time to start, since the first few days of any new habit program are always the hardest.

Dry January Was Not Nearly as Hard as I Expected

To my surprise, when I returned from the retreat, it was easier than I had expected to just not drink. I had helped myself out on this by removing all the beer from the fridge because I knew I would be very unlikely to be so desperate that I drank a warm beer.

Even so, I only occasionally had thoughts about drinking and I was able to avoid it by just doing something else, like playing with my kids, meditating, or working out. I also found other tasty things to drink, like hot tea with honey or seltzer water to satiate my hankering for bubbles. In other words, I learned that I wasn’t totally out of control when it came to alcohol.

Rather, I had just needed to disrupt my habit of not exerting any control when it came to alcohol. Dry January gave me the chance to experiment with that and see what happened when I just gave myself a reason to say “no” for a while.

Dry January Didn’t Change My Life but It Improved It

Did this experience drastically change my life? Not really, but it improved it. The most significant change was that I slept better. Sleeping better, in turn, helped me get up earlier, focus better, have more energy, and get more done.

I liked that so much that, before the end of January, I committed to 300/65 – which means that I would only consume alcohol on 65 days for the rest of the year. In short, while I had been previously afraid to put restrictions on my use of alcohol before, because I didn’t want to think about that might mean, the reality was that the restrictions supported me and improved my life.

Image with tips about habit change that may help lawyers or others attempting Dry January, including dropping judgment, getting curious, observing the impact of the habit, and considering the value of a gradual approach

Sharing My Experience with Dry January Helped Me Let Go of Shame

I was so surprised by this that I found myself doing something else entirely surprising: I wrote about my experience with Dry January on social media. Not only were people not judgmental; they were supportive and curious. In response to this, one contact reached out and told me to read Quit Like a Woman (paid link).

I started it soon after and it helped me better understand my own experience. In the book, the author traced her own struggles with drugs, alcohol, depression, anxiety, and eating disorders and how she used a gradual approach coupled with self-care practices, including yoga, meditation, and therapy to eventually lead a sober life.

Dry January Helped Me Reevaluate the Concept of Sobriety

I was not surprised in the least that meditation was among the author’s toolkit, but I had never heard anyone before suggest that one could adopt a reducetarian approach to alcohol. Everything I had ever heard about sobriety before was that you either were or you weren’t and there was no in between.

In the same way, I had never consciously considered the possibility that a life without (or with less) alcohol might be better. As the author argued, I saw that I perhaps had been unwittingly affected by the negative and one-sided portrayals of recovery in TV and movies and the marketing efforts of the alcohol industry.

Dry January Helped Me Evaluate Whether My Habits Were Contributing to the Life I Wanted to Live

I did not think the book was perfect. I disagreed with the author often but it shared something about alcohol that I was finally ready to hear: a new way of thinking about it. Rather than considering whether alcohol and I just don’t mix, I learned that the better question was whether I was living my life the way I really wanted to live it?

As it turns out, I already had everything I needed to make a change. Just like QLAW recommends, I got curious and let myself experiment and observe how alcohol affected me, I was open to a gradual approach, and I had already established a toolkit of self-care practices, including meditation, to help me deal with stress or cravings or bouts of self-doubt. In short, neither Dry January nor QLAW convinced me that I needed to entirely quit alcohol but they both made it clear that if I was going to examine my habits and build a better life I first had to quit shame.

To learn more about this subject, check out the IG Live I did with contributing author Loren VanDyke Wolff on the subject of alcohol, habits, mindfulness, and shame.

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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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How Mindfulness Helped Me Learn to Love Networking

One of my pandemic projects was publishing a book about networking with 19 other women lawyers. It’s called #Networked and it was a bestseller on Amazon in a few categories. For natural networkers, this might just be a cool thing but for me it was a milestone. It was one of the things that helped me fully and finally put to rest the idea that I was not good at networking.

In case my incessant droning on about sitting quietly had not clued you in, I am a bit of a nerd. I am an introvert and love reading and writing and quiet things. I love deep conversations or presenting on subjects about which I am passionate, but I detest small talk. I hate trying to come up with things to say to people I don’t know, and I am terrible at acting like I am having a good time when I am not.

In law school, these tendencies combined to cause me to literally run away from a networking event during a failed big law summer clerkship experience. On a Saturday in 90+ degree weather in full sun, I stood in the posh backyard of a soon-to-be partner trying to “get to know” the firm’s attorneys and socialize with my fellow clerks. That was the cover story, at least. It was really an audition and I knew it and the only thing I could think about while pretending to drink my warm beer was trying to not sweat. After an hour, I made some excuse and left, knowing my fate was sealed.

Though I clerked the following summer in the firm where I ultimately made equity partner and had a vastly different experience, that memory haunted me for years. It repeatedly told me that I was no good at networking and that I would never be able to develop business and make partner. As I just said, though, I made partner and I literally just published a book about networking. So, clearly something very drastic has changed. As with a lot of things in my life, my mindfulness practice is one of the things that helped me change my own mind about networking. Here’s how.

1. Body Awareness Helped Me Manage Energy

Before I started meditating, I was constantly in my head. Body scans and breath practice, however, constantly reminded me to focus on the sensations in my body instead. Eventually, that shift in focus started to permeate my life even out of seated practice and I was better aware when I felt nervous or tired or just not into it when I had to go to a social event. When I could, I learned to meditate for a few minutes before or just send myself some loving-kindness during those times. That really helped and I found I was better able to tolerate and monitor the energy drain that large social events often caused me so I could focus better on the people there.

2. Awareness of Thoughts = Awareness of Ideas

I really like to write and do it all the time now. Years ago, though, I only did “extra” writing outside of my law practice occasionally. As a big overthinker, one of the main benefits of my meditation practice was that it gave my thoughts enough space so I could see them more clearly. I eventually found that my thoughts were ideas for written content, so slowly and surely I started writing. Now, most of us don’t think of writing as a networking activity, but when I started to do it consistently and on platforms like LinkedIn, I found that it absolutely was.

When you put written content out there, you are sending out a verbal handshake to whomsoever on the internet may find it. If, like me, you learn to be yourself, people will reach out and want to talk more. But, unlike networking at happy hours with total strangers, you don’t have to make small talk because you already have something specific that brought you together. In other words, mindfulness turned my introversion into networking gold.

3. Consistently Returning to the Breath Practices Persistence

This next one is basic, but its importance cannot be overstated. Even if you never get a single amazing insight or spiritual experience from meditation, you can be pretty sure that the practice will teach you at least one thing: persistence. Anyone who has done breath practice knows that it can drive you nuts to keep going back to the breath over and over and over again. But we do it and hope it will pay off. It paid off for me and still does today. It helped me practice persistence and persistence is absolutely critical to networking. Nobody builds an empire or a community overnight. It takes a bunch of teeny tiny acts done consistently and maybe with a little bit of skill and luck mixed in. There is nothing that teaches you better about the impact of a bunch of teeny tiny acts than a regular meditation practice.

4. Compassion Helped Me Learn to Be Myself

The number one change I made to my networking game was to stop trying to “fit in.” I used to go to events and try to “look natural” and “seem upbeat” and “appear friendly.” In other words, I was trying to look like an extrovert and look like I was having fun doing it. Nobody bought this, including myself. My meditation practice taught me something that helped me stop this foolishness: there is nothing wrong with me. Specifically, loving-kindness practice helped me understand that I was loving, wanted to be of service to others, and was loved by many.

It also helped me appreciate that some particular social settings, small talk with strangers and loud group events, were painful for me, while others, deep conversation with a small group of friends, made me feel like I could conqu e r the world. When I learned this and accepted it as okay, I shifted my focus. I realized that my networking could include smaller events or activities with friends or even writing on LinkedIn. In other words, when I realized that my introvert tendencies were not bad character traits, I finally started to use them. And, when I started to network like me, instead of trying to mimic or go along with my extroverted friends, I made progress.

5. Giving Feels Good

Most of the best networkers tell you that their secret to success is giving. They will tell you to focus on proactively offering value to your network more than you focus on plucking benefits from it. This is good advice and my life experience tells me that we are more likely to do things when they feel good to do. My mindfulness practice helped me not only to pay more attention to how my body feels but also to more fully accept that I need to nourish myself to do my work.

Though I hated networking at first, everything changed when I started focusing on giving, rather than taking. I started small by taking on projects that I cared about, joining groups with a mission that I supported, or writing about topics that mattered to me. This soon put me in the position to help others by connecting friends, sharing tips that could help others, or doing good work for my community. When I noticed how good—how satisfied—that made me feel, I wanted to do more and had the energy to do it even with all my other obligations.

If you hate networking, you aren’t alone but don’t discount the possibility that you may only dislike the version of networking you have experienced so far. I used to hate networking too when I tried to mimic the way that others did it. When I started focusing on what I liked and worked for me, I learned to enjoy and even love networking. Mindfulness practices could help you do the same thing. Sure, meditation in itself won’t turn you into a super connector, that will take many other steps and a whole lot of time. But it can help you do the preliminary work you might need in order to begin taking those steps. Meditation can help you turn inward to appreciate what is truly unique about you, so that you can turn outward with more confidence and skill. So, if you’ve had enough running away from crowded networking events in tears, try sitting quietly by yourself for a few minutes instead.

If you need a meditation to get you started, check out this guided meditation we created that uses loving-kindness practice to help you shift your mindset about networking.

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How Mindfulness Helped Me Learn to Ride the Wave in a Life Full of Transitions

Spring is about transition. The days are getting longer, the weather is warming up a bit, and we’re starting to shake off the winter blahs. For me right now, it is also about life transitions. I’m 44, I have 3 kids one of which had a kidney transplant as a baby, I left a job at a law firm in December, and we decided to move in January. And, of course, let’s not forget we’re a year into a global pandemic that has required us to basically reinvent our lives. So, let’s just say that transition is kind of my jam these days.

The past year, strange as it has been, is not strange at all in the context of the last decade. These past 10ish years feel like they have been nothing but transition for me. In the span of a few years, my husband and I started our own law practice, rehabbed a house built in 1870, and had our first baby. Then, in 2012, our second child, William, was born with end stage renal disease which began what I like to refer to as: The Five-Year Pause.

For the first 18 months of William’s life we were in perpetual crisis mode. It was exhausting – both physically and emotionally. At 18 months old William received a kidney transplant and by the time he was five he was in school and we had settled into a life with an immunosuppressed kid. Our law practice continued to grow and in 2015 we had a third kid.

Then I turned 40, and thought “now what”? I spent a lot of time thinking about what I would do next and I ended up leaving the law practice I had with my husband and joined a law firm. Though I learned a lot at that firm, it wasn’t the right fit. And, like so many others, COVID also had my family in turmoil. My son’s ADHD and anxiety made virtual school incredibly stressful. My 11-year-old daughter was suffering—we were all suffering. So, I joined the 140,000 women that left their jobs in December.

In the midst of all of this, I’ve realized that I’ve experienced growth. Here I am—spring is around the corner, we’re still in the middle of a global pandemic, and I’m in the middle of yet another major life transition trying to figure out what’s next for my career. But, unlike when William was born, I now have a regular meditation and mindfulness practice to help me. Through all that change, I have learned a skill, a strategy, a practice to cling to when times feel hard.

Let me be clear. I have a lot of days where life feels really hard. Mindfulness does not mean I’m floating around blissed out all the time (picture one of those smiling Buddha statues). That is definitely not me. I’m still a mom that yells at my kids sometimes, feels overwhelmed a lot, and sometimes feels like I’m not smart enough. I still fall victim to all the other harmful thought patterns that go with anxiety and stress to which women lawyers are especially prone. And did I mention we’re in the middle of a global pandemic?

The difference is that my mindfulness and meditation practice makes me feel a little less terrible. I now have a more skillful way to handle difficult feelings when they come up and I’m able to ride the wave of the hard days with a little more ease. And I’m able to appreciate the less-hard days which has brought a little more joy and happiness into my life. And above all, my mindfulness practice helps me show up every day and practice – again and again.

At its core, a mindfulness meditation practice is about cultivating the ability to be fully present – to bring awareness to how we feel. It’s also about compassion—for ourselves and others. An essential step in a meditation practice is cultivating a nonjudgmental space in our own brains where we can feel our body and experience emotions without being reactive or feeling overwhelmed. And for me, a major ah-ha moment in my meditation practice was reaching the understanding that it is just that – a practice. Which means I will be working on it for my entire life. I mean, sure, maybe I’ll reach enlightenment, but assuming I won’t, I’m going to continue practice because the truth is I just feel a little better when I do. And especially during times like now – when life feels especially overwhelming – my mindfulness practice allows me to be present with the hard feelings without completely freaking out. And, sometimes, when life is hard, not freaking out is a victory.

So, here’s my intention for this spring: I’m going to use this time to reset. To begin again. To remind myself that while life’s transitions can feel difficult, they also bring growth. I will be brave and remain open to the possibilities. I’m also going to work on my self-compassion practice (which means I’m going to practice cutting myself some slack because life is hard right now and I’m doing the best I can).

And, maybe for just a moment, I will celebrate all the change, and all the joy and pain, and all the people in my life who helped me survive and grow in the last 10 years. Because the truth is life will be hard sometimes no matter what I do and I’ve learned that sometimes it helps to just take a deep breath and ride the wave.

To learn more about this topic, check out the video of founder Loren and our Founder, Claire E. Parsons, discussing how even short mindfulness practices can help you deal with the turbulence of life:

Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out the new book from our founder, Claire E. Parsons, called How to Be a Badass Lawyer which is now available.

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How Mindfulness Can Help You Survive Virtual Litigation

Before the pandemic, I had almost never used Zoom at all but I have now litigated numerous virtual hearings and done too many webinar presentations to count. If the past year was good for anything, it at least forced me to learn how to take depositions and put on proof over Zoom. Virtual litigation offers many benefits, especially efficiency and convenience, but it is exhausting in every sense of the word. When litigation is already exhausting in normal circumstances, this impact cannot be taken lightly.

Even as we begin to come out of the pandemic, I think its fair to say that virtual litigation options are going to persist even if they are not so common as they have been in the last year. So, you may wonder if there are any tips or tricks for making virtual litigation a little less painful. Several lessons from my own mindfulness practice helped me stay steady during virtual hearings and they might help you too. Here are my tips:

1. Remember Your Limits

One of the first mindfulness lessons I learned is one that many of us lawyers often forget: we are not just brains. We have bodies. Those bodies have needs and limits. When we don’t respect those limits and honor those needs, our performance suffers and we experience a lot of needless pain. The way I handled this when litigating cases remotely was to be conservative in scheduling the cases on the front end. Rather than try to power through with 8-10 hour days on Zoom, we opted for ½ days spread out over time. While I was initially concerned that we wouldn’t finish even with the days allotted, we ended up finishing the proof early because we were conscious of time every day. This reduced the need for multiple breaks and allowed us all to avoid the fatigue and problems that came with prolonged time staring at the computer. Even if you can’t schedule a case this particular way, think practically about how long you can tolerate Zoom litigation as you set the schedule because remembering your humanity in scheduling will help the case go more smoothly.

2. Pick Your Battles

Another lesson my mindfulness practice taught me is that fighting is often unnecessary. Stipulations are essential for managing many hearings and trials to avoid wasting time on undisputed things. When you add the logistical complications of virtual presentation to the mix, that sentiment is even more important. In addition to stipulations of fact or evidence that could make things go more quickly, consider setting procedures or developing plans to make sure everyone is on the same page for the hearing. It may even be useful to hold a dry run with counsel for all parties to ensure that everyone is familiar with the platform you are using. While it may seem foreign to work closely with your opponent in this way, you may find that letting go of fights about minor things can help you all focus better on the disputes that really matter.

3. Plan for Disruptions

Anyone who meditates knows that disruptions happen no matter how much we try to avoid them. Likewise, anyone who has tried a trial or lengthy hearing knows that they almost never happen without a hitch. Prepare yourself for the disruptions. Have a plan for technology issues. Try to develop schedules of witnesses to avoid lag times if testimony goes quicker or slower than expected. In addition, it generally helps not to be a jerk about your opposing party’s situation because it will eventually happen that you are the one who needs the mercy. In one of my virtual hearings, I learned an hour before testimony was set to start that my daughter was required to quarantine due to a close contact at school. I was fortunate that my client, opposing counsel, and the hearing officer granted me a postponement for that day so I could pick her up from school. If my relationships had been less cordial, however, I may have gotten a different result.

4. Slow Down. Then Slow Down Some More.

Rushing is something we all do, especially when we are stressed, but my mindfulness practice has helped me notice it, slow down, and respond more skillfully to life. For most of us, hearings are going to make us stressed whether they are virtual or not. When you present virtually, everything goes through a filter so rushing can quickly become disastrous to your case. To avoid this, remind yourself as much as possible to slow down. Come back to your breath frequently or do a quick body sweep (check your brow, eyes, jaw, neck, shoulders, chest belly, hips, hands) to return to your body. If you are noticing the signs of tension or quick or shallow breathing, try to relax your body and open up your breath. You can do those things in a second or two and it can help keep you steady, focused, and even as you ask questions and present proof.

5. Get Some Rest.

Finally, another important mindfulness lesson is the importance of rest. When we let our attention settle on the breath, we give our minds a chance to stop trying for a moment. For us achiever types, even a little bit of rest goes a long way. When you sit in front of a glaring screen all day and have to listen intently to less than great audio, you need to check in with yourself after and give yourself a break. That likely means an activity away from your computer with some different sensory input. Your normal exercise or relaxation routine might be enough, but I found that I needed to pull out all the stops for my weeks of virtual hearings. In addition to normal exercise, I needed some extra yoga sessions, warm baths, and any time outside that I could get. When you are in a trial or a hearing, it may be tempting to dive right into your inbox piling up with emails but a well-timed break may make your efforts less painful and more efficient.

I hope we are leaving the COVID-19 era of social distancing but I think the brave new world of virtual litigation is here to stay. Litigating cases remotely presents its challenges to be sure, but the lessons from our mindfulness practices can help us to reduce suffering on Zoom in the same way that they help us to reduce suffering in our lives. If we remember to care for ourselves and bring awareness to the unique challenges and opportunities that virtual litigation presents, we can then focus our whole attention on getting great results for our clients.

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Calm Down Lawyers: Meditation Will Make You More Effective, Not Soft

Image of lawyer with quote that says "We lawyers can be both aggressive and compassionate."

Mental wellness is a top concern for many attorneys, bar associations, and firms. Meditation practices are often recommended to attorneys as simple, cheap, effective and research-based ways to ease and manage stress. Yet, one of the concerns I commonly hear lawyers, especially litigators, express is that they are worried that meditation will cause them to “lose their edge.”

Lawyers Want Well-Being but Fear the Results

As a litigator, I know clients praise attorneys for being “aggressive” and that even we lawyers often talk about litigation as if we are discussing war. Thus, there is some truth to the idea that to be an effective litigator you can’t have too thin of a skin.

Still, when you really break it down, the idea that meditation will make a litigator’s skin any thinner is kind of silly. You may wonder why someone trying to persuade you to meditate would use such a judgmental word to mock the concerns of fellow attorneys. Well, that that’s not actually what I mean.

I don’t mean lawyers are silly for being concerned about the importance of mental or emotional toughness in litigation. Rather, I’m saying that the thought: a meditation practice will make me less tough, assertive, or action-oriented as a lawyer—is funny. When you examine this thought in very practical terms it actually might make you laugh. Please allow me to demonstrate.

Meditation Is Not Magic.

First, the concern that meditation will cause lawyers to be less aggressive is based on an arrogant assumption. Seriously guys, if anyone was going to think of this argument it would be lawyers, right? It posits that, obviously, if any of us high-achieving lawyers set out to meditate we’d attain enlightenment in no time, with minimal effort, no resistance, no struggle, and our lives would be forever changed.

We’d immediately uproot all difficult emotions the first time we focused on the breath and it would supplant any tendency toward anger, reactivity, ambition, or competition. In a word, this worry about “being soft” sort of assumes that you will be good at meditation and attain instant chill.

Meditation Can Actually Be a Struggle

Those of us who have actually tried to meditate know that this isn’t likely to be true (unless perhaps you are Eckhart Tolle). For the vast majority of us, this process is much more gradual. The changes are more subtle.

The practice of meditation can help you make substantial and significant changes in your life, but it doesn’t change your personality or life goals instantaneously. In short, the idea that a meditation practice could derail your litigation practice on its own is tinged with a bit of magical thinking.

Mindfulness Won’t Change Who You Are Overnight

If you don’t believe me on this one, consider how you’d react if a friend told you that they were considering getting back into regular exercise but they were concerned that doing so would result in superhuman strength, speed, and agility that might disrupt their life. Such a concern may not be illogical so much as it is impractical.

After all, it would indeed be inconvenient if your friend inadvertently ripped off the driver’s side door while trying to get in their vehicle due to the superhuman strength they developed after only one weight training session. Yet, it would also be unlikely to happen. The same is true for meditation. You, yes even my beloved Type A lawyer friends, are very unlikely to become instantly enlightened after a few minutes of meditation. So just calm down and give it a try.

Meditation Helps You Pay More Attention Including to Changes in You

Moreover, the practice of meditation has been shown to help you focus and to pay attention to your direct experience rather than constantly being lost in a sea of thoughts. Therefore, if you start meditating for, let’s say, 5 minutes per day, you are more likely to notice if changes start to happen in your life or law practice.

Thus, it follows that if meditation is making you too happy or peaceful or filled with loving-kindness to be a good lawyer, you will probably see it. In that case, you can just stop meditating, adjust your practice, or do things like look at social media or TV news to raise your levels of aggression when needed for strategic purposes. In other words, you can cross that bridge when you come to it, but a regular meditation practice is likely to help light the path on the way to that proverbial bridge.

Lawyers Can Start Small with Meditation

Another thing I always think when I hear a lawyer worry out loud about the impact that meditation could have on their litigation skills is: “Whoa, how much are you planning to meditate?” Sure, if you are thinking of starting out for 8 hours a day, maybe the meditation practice might stand a chance of drastically and suddenly changing your personality.

Most notably, it could make you hate your life. Fortunately, for most of us mere mortals, a practice of a few minutes a day is all we can stand at the start. Do you really think a practice of 5 minutes a day is going to mean you can’t still be aggressive? You don’t think that. Nobody really thinks that.

Image of lawyer meditating with quote that says "When I hear lawyers worry that meditation will make them soft, I think 'Whoa, how much are you planning to meditate?'"

Meditation Can Help Lawyers Find Balance

Finally, I think litigators who worry that meditation may “change” their hard-nosed style forget that, with or without meditation, they are unlikely to be tough and competitive in all areas of their life.

I mean, are the lawyers worried that meditation will infect their soul with kindness and compassion saying that they are always tough, hard, difficult, and willing to fight? Are they saying that they don’t appreciate a softer touch, humor, kindness, or joy in any other parts of their day? My experience tells me that this isn’t what they mean.

Good Lawyers Have Many Skills and Traits

In addition to being a good, aggressive, calculating, tough lawyer, I am also a mom, a friend, a wife, a sister, a dog owner. On some occasions, these roles overlap. A few years ago, I called my husband from the courthouse steps while waiting on a jury to return a verdict to sing my toddler her night-in night songs.

Yes, my co-counsel laughed at me while I did so, but I was more worried about my toddler’s wrath when I returned home than I was about heckling from other lawyers. I hope you get where I’m going here: we lawyers can be both aggressive and compassionate. We can be incredibly forgiving and kind to our children and family and tough when we need to be for our clients. Sometimes we can, and I think we should, be both for our clients.

Meditation Makes Lawyers More Effective, Not Less

Compassion and care don’t detract from our ability to be strong when necessary. To the contrary, it is a normal and healthy way to live life. Balancing these emotions and different roles, of course, can be challenging and that is exactly why meditation practice can help lawyers to be not just “aggressive” but aggressive in a way that is effective for our clients.

So, if like me, you are a “mean” litigator and you are considering meditation to help you manage stress, increase personal happiness, and stop overthinking all of the time, you can start by not worrying that meditation will make you too soft. Meditation has drastically improved my litigation practice and I think it could do the same for you.

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