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Work is Work: Social Gatherings
I feel like a viejita lecturing about behavior at work, but I’m going to do it anyway. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ First, a story: I know someone (nameless and not me!) that got black out drunk at a company event; got sick the next day at work; and it took about two years (when the next new coworker got too drunk) before their coworkers (and bosses) stopped teasing them about it. Mortifying, no? So because the holiday season is here, it just seems like the appropriate time to remind ourselves to not be fooled by the glittery warmth that is the holiday season into thinking parties we attend during company time or with company…
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Find your Focus: Law School Finals
I’ll be honest and tell you that I do not envy law school students this time of year. Ok, I rarely envy law school students lol BUT this time of year is especially harrowing. There are so many deadlines and pressures looming over you. It feels impossible, even though it’s not. For those about to start to pressure-cooker that is law school finals, know that it’ll be ok and you’ll get past it–all you have to do is focus on exams. “No duh,” you say. But here’s the thing, often we are so overwhelmed (or confused) that we fail to study in a productive way. I remember going into my…
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Grateful for the Struggle
Around this time, I think it’s important to recognize the struggle one has overcome in order to to be where they are in their life. I know you’re thinking, “bih that’s all you do!” and you’re right lol. I do talk about our struggle a lot. A lot. And I do it because it’s easy to think this career trajectory is easy. It’s not. It’s hard becoming an attorney. For women of color, it’s even more difficult. It shouldn’t be this hard and I don’t condone that the system is this way– like I’m encouraging some weird hazing ritual. It shouldn’t be this way, especially when the reason why it’s…
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Put in the Work: Preparing for Finals
We talk a lot about stress in law school, especially during finals time because guuuurrrl it is stressful! Beyond anything you experience in college. It is a mental mind melt and it can feel confusing as to why it feels so rough. Trust that you’re not alone in feeling frustrated and that it’s very normal to feel like you’re at a loss during finals. You’re about to go into exams without any real idea of how well you understand the concepts you’ve been learning. It’s all riding on these grades and not only is it curved, but you also have to worry about format. Issa lot. But it’s not impossible.…
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Sidebar: Moving Day
Um, October was a whirlwind. We moved. Finally. It has been a long time coming but we have finally moved house. Whilst events leading up to this have been very stressful, I’m very excited for this next chapter in our lives. We do have a lot of things left to sort out though before we can finally call our house a home. So this has basically taken up all of my time. We were told that the house would be ready in a week, so we had to pack and get ready super fast. The house is amazing. Honestly, I could have moved anywhere because I had a lot of…
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Grit is not Enough
Are you gritty? Do you persevere above all obstacles to reach your goal? Chances are, if you are heading to law school, the answer is yes. We are so full of grit, y’all! Grit (perseverance and passion) is a quality characteristic–and students of color, living in poverty have it by the boatload. Yet, we place too heavy a burden on students of color when we focus on grit as the sole reason of why they succeed. Because when we only focus on the individual, we take away the responsibility schools and other systems of power have to help our communities. And grit isn’t enough for students to overcome those barriers.…
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Why is Law School Such a Trip?
Everyone knows that law school is hard. You know that going in, but for many of us, halfway into our first semester there’s a shift from difficult to seemingly impossible. Why is law school so mentally difficult? Why does it make us question our intelligence, our choices, and capacity? Law school is tough for practical reasons. Mostly, they are retraining you to think objectively. Thinking objectively is difficult to do. It goes against our nature, which often wants to choose a side rather than view everything from all angles. It’s hard to master, and it’s frustrating when you don’t “get” it—especially when you’re used to doing well in school. It’s…
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Pre-Law Probs: Mastering Your Personal Statement
When I tell you that I never prepared and planned harder for my law school application than anything else in my life I am not joking. I was serious about getting admitted and knew I needed as much preparation and help as possible. The biggest obstacle for me was my personal statement. I knew I had a lot of convincing to do as my LSAT score was very average. So I did things I never, ever did with my writing (that in retrospect should have been a habit lol). I had multiple friends give edits and suggestions. I went to the writing center–hand to god, I had never stepped foot…
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Where My Ladies At? Being Excluded from Networking Events
One of my fave work related blogs, ask a manager, recently had a post about a work situation that many of us may face. The men, often bosses, networking together in a way that excludes women. This happens a lot, especially in our field. The reason is rarely malicious, but rather some events are “standard” and the standards are still set by men. Womp womp. So in this example, a bunch of dudes wanted to go to an NFL game and most of the women weren’t into football so they ended up excluding women from this event because they assumed they wouldn’t want to attend. If you watch Insecure than…
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Sidebar: Is the World Ending? asking for a friend.
Wow. What a weird month. I have family in Tampa and prayed to Cristo Negro that they’d be safe. Thankfully they made it through, but then the horror in Mexico City, then more hurricanes–it’s too much. On top of all the political garbage… I avoid a lot of news and politics now because I know I can’t consume this horror in such a big scale. It’s too much. But I’m doing what little I can to help with DACA and the hurricanes aftermath. Ok, thankfully, not everything was horrible. Though, now that I think about it, it is kind of comical–E and I tried to celebrate the end of summer…