HIGHLIGHT CORNER
HIGHLIGHT CORNER
Freedom from the Inner Critic for Lawyers: 10 Reasons to Reduce your Inner Critic
ELIZABETH PYJOV
" Self-compassion is the highest form of service … and self-compassion actually helps you become more successful, especially in the legal profession.” – Elizabeth Pyjov, JD MTS, Professor at Loyola University Chicago School of Law
Introduction
Being a lawyer is very rewarding, but it can also be stressful and overwhelming.
It is not news that we live in challenging times, socially and politically. The stressors of being a lawyer combined with the stressors of living in today ' s 24 / 7, driven-to-distraction, smartphone addicted, social-media saturated, everchanging world leads to all kinds of obstacles.
What is the Inner Critic?
The inner critic, basically, is the voice that makes us miserable. It’ s the voice that makes us procrastinate. It’ s the voice that is not objective. It’ s the voice that makes us feel like we are not enough no matter what happens.
The inner critic is fundamentally unreasonable, and the way it speaks to us is through a tone of frustration, disappointment, and aggression.
How the Legal Profession Cultivates a Strong Inner Critic
The legal profession is uniquely positioned to cultivate a strong inner critic, which only adds to the stress. First, clients have the expectation of perfection. A client often wants something faster or cheaper or concluding in a different outcome than what a lawyer can provide in a particular situation. This can be incredibly stressful.
Second, law follows the apprenticeship system, in which those who are more senior explain how to practice law to those more junior. In an apprenticeship system, the training often takes place through criticism. Lawyers internalize this criticism from those who are senior to them.
Third, because the practice of law is consuming, lawyers often come home to criticism from loved ones for working too much.
Thus, lawyers are surrounded by criticism everywhere. As they listen to that criticism from various sources and voices, it becomes their inner voice. Billable pressure, adversarial environments, perfectionism that’ s so common in the field, and burnout also don’ t help.
Other Names for the Inner Critic
• The perfectionist.
• The task-master.
• The controller.
• The guilt-tripper.
• The underminer.
• The molder.
• The belittler.
• The inner tyrant
10 Reasons to Reduce your Inner Critic
1. You become much more pleasant to be around. The smaller your inner critic( toward you and others), the happier everyone feels around you. Significant others, family, and co-workers will thank you.
2. You ' ll feel physically better. Inner criticism carries an emotional resistance to it. This resistance creates stress. This stress leads to inflammation in the body.
Inflammation makes you feel agitated and sick and contributes to chronic conditions.
( The goal is to move from an inner critic to observations and discernments, which don ' t have that emotional resistance).
3. Clearer legal judgment under pressure. Less inner critic leads to less emotional reactivity, which in turn facilitates better analysis, fewer impulsive decisions in court, negotiations, and client advice.
4. We have 60,000 thoughts a day. 80 % of our thoughts are negative. Most of those thoughts are self-critical. First, what a heavy burden to bear. Second, they can ' t all be correct, right?
5. Stronger leadership, more impactful mentoring, better client relationships, and more trust. Lawyers who aren’ t internally attacking themselves tend to listen more fully, communicate more calmly, and inspire more confidence. Partners and senior attorneys who reduce self-criticism create psychologically safer teams, which improves junior attorney performance and retention.
6. Freedom from the inner critic has been my way of thriving in very competitive environments( including Harvard Law School and one of the most competitive law firms in the world). Whatever environment you find yourself in, the degree to which you can stay calm and at ease is a key to success.
7. Burnout is a huge problem in the legal profession. One of the things that drains energy is the inner critic!
( Continued on next page)
PBCBA BAR BULLETIN 15