My first week of law school was filled with plenty of reading from over-sized casebooks, lots of training my brain to think about the law from a different perspective, and many new, friendly faces.
I could complain about the workload.
But I won’t (or at least try not to).
I chose this path. This was my decision to come back. So I’ll do my best.
But I finally realize how difficult it is for people to balance working out, training, cooking, and overall healthy living into their lives.
There are so many things going on.
It’s easy to say screw it to waking up early and hitting the gym. It’s easy to choose going out and grabbing a quick bite to eat over spending 30 minutes cooking. It’s easy to justify not getting a run in when you have 50 pages to read in one night.
But nobody ever said healthy living was easy.
Most things worth doing are never easy, but they will transform your life forever.
I no longer live in my little bubble world of no school, no job.
Law school is a full-time job.
And I have to discover how to balance my new life with my healthy living mentality. This will require some sacrifices, but I think the end result – my health – is worth fighting for.
I might have to skip out on a few dinners with friends. I might have to pass on hanging out at a buddy’s house. I might have to say no to that drink at the bar.
And that’s ok.
I need to live for myself. I need to live a life worth fighting for.
How do you balance work, school, and other obligations with healthy living?
What positive choices have you made this week that have improved your health?
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Female. 25 years old. Chinese. Cook. Foodie. UCLA grad. Traveler. Musician. Scuba diver. GWU Law. Runner.
I am right there with you! Just finished up my second week of law school. It’s crazy trying to juggle the priorities of part-time law school, full-time work, full-time healthy eating/gym time & of course seeing my boyfriend and parents and friends occasionally. But we’ve got this! We always just need a battle plan
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Amen! I completely understand how you feel, I don’t work during my time in law school. It’s incredibly hard but once you get into it and find your law niche it gets easier. Surrounding yourself with law school buds takes some pressure off as you’re with people who are struggling to get in the same papers on time and do the same exams. You can do it!!
New follower and so happy to have found this place! As a law school graduate, I was curious to see when you’d first address the all-consuming nature of law school and strategies for maintaining balance. I didn’t gain the freshman 15 in college, but I gained 20 pounds during law school. 20 pounds I’m still fighting to lose forever 10 years later.
Your post is so true. It’s easy to get caught up in the pressures of things with deadlines and push aside that workout or opt for the quick route of picking up drive-thru or ordering in. Lord knows that’s what I did. Knowing that taking care of yourself first will make everything else easier and better is key. It’s a lesson I wish I’d known during my law school days. Best of luck to you as you embark on this exciting journey!
What a great post! I work full time in addition to other projects on the side that all threaten to interfere with living healthier. My biggest problem is cooking – I’m still mastering the art of cooking enough ahead of time so that I have healthy things to eat on the days when I don’t have time to cook new stuff. But time will have to be made. I am my new priority!
If you think balancing law school and life is hard, you are going to have a very rude awakening in 3 years, assuming you go to a firm! You’re in class right now less than 20 hours per week, plus study time. When you’re working, you’ll be expected to bill about 45 per week, which means working close to 60, plus all the non-billables that are expected — helping on articles, doing recruiting, becoming active in some non-profit or the bar to get your name out there, etc. And quite frequently you end up working 6-7 days a week, 12 or more hours per day during the week, a little less than half that on weekends.
You’ll be able to find the balance now and maintain it for a lifetime I’m sure, but it’s not going to get any easier after school. But hey, you can take comfort in this — starting after semester break during your 2L year after you’ve got your clerkships lined up, the last 1.5 years of law school are a cake walk — plenty of time for running, skiing, vacationing, cooking, going out, etc. All you have to do at that point is graduate without doing anything stupid.
How do I balance work, school and other obligations with healthy living? HA! Very poorly. You’re my hero for having some self-restraint.
I started my healthier life in one of the busiest years of my life — got a promotion and planning our long-distance wedding. You’re answering the questions yourself — you’ll just have to strike a balance. But like Carina said, just wait. One of my closest friends growing up is an attorney now and is nothing but busy. Combined with his overly full-time job and home life, he still finds time for his much-needed “me time.” You just do it … there’s no other easier way to say it.
I started my healthier life in one of the busiest years of my life — got a promotion and planning our long-distance wedding. You’re answering the questions yourself — you’ll just have to strike a balance. But like Carina said, just wait. One of my closest friends growing up is an attorney now and is nothing but busy. Combined with his overly full-time job and home life, he still finds time for his much-needed “me time.” You just do it … there’s no other easier way to say it.
I make going to the gym the first thing I do every morning. No matter my work schedule. If I was working until 11p, I was at the gym at 6a the next morning. If I didn’t have to be anywhere until noon, I was still at the gym at 6a.
The last couple of months have afforded me lots of time off but I still committed to being at the gym first thing. I know if I tried to wait until the afternoon I never would make it. My life = my first priority. It never was before this journey and that may have been the problem.
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But more applicable for Jess’s post-law school life, what do you do when you work until 4 a.m. so that the partner in NY can have the brief in his/her email when he/she wakes up at 5 a.m., and then you’re expected to be back at your desk at 9 a.m., looking presentable? Do you go work out at 6 a.m. and then just live on 1 hour of sleep? Or do shut your office door, sleep for 4.5 hours on your floor, and then use the gym’s shower and the suit hanging on the back of your office door? At that point, you don’t even want to waste 15 minutes of time commuting home and back. And sometimes that schedule will persist for days before a closing or a deadline.
I firmly believe you don’t have to do anything — all of life is a choice of what you prioritize — but I think it’s very hard to balance in certain jobs. Working til 11 at night and working out at 6 a.m. would be tough, but completely do-able, it’s really the all-nighters that completely throw off your balance.
The obvious solution there is not to take the kind of job that demands the all-nighters, but it’s hard not to choose that when they’re waving the bucks, you’re 100k in debt from law school, and they’re the ones who do the most recruiting and appear to offer you the most lateral opportunity after you slog it out for a few years.
I am not doing anything healthy this week as I seem to have caught the flu. In any case, I just wanted to remind you of what we KNOW when we’re not in the midst of law school, but forget once classes start…
Taking 30 minutes to cook a meal will NOT cause you to totally fail. Your brain needs food to work. Those people who are in the library all day eating junk food and never cook a real meal/sleep/or leave will not benefit from their antics. The world doesn’t end when you stop studying
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Good luck this year!!
I am so glad to hear you talking about balancing school with healthy living. Because I totally didn’t, and I gained about 50 pounds in law school. It totally wasn’t worth it. You have to learn when to put the books down and walk away. There will ALWAYS be one more case to read, more work to do. In law school and in life. So make your LIFE your #1 priority, and build your school schedule around that. I know you’ll do great!
Law school is more than a full-time job, Jess! So if you’re balancing your healthy living with law school successfully, you’re doing really well. While you may definitely have to pass up on some social commitments from time to time, I’d also encourage you to do what Seattle Runner Girl says and be sure to build your school schedule around other things from time to time, too. I remember my contracts professor encouraging us not to go home for Thanksgiving. Worst…Advice…Ever… You need the time to recharge with your family and friends so that you can be successful in school. Balance in all things! You’ll do great!
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