Life & Career Coaching for Lawyers
Life & Career Coaching for Lawyers
It is not uncommon in coaching to work through big decisions One of the reasons some decisions seem so impossible is because there are some choices in life that feel like they put us on a stage for public shaming and ridicule. So how do we navigate the court of public opinion and make decisions when it feels terrifying?
All things are yin and yang and there are always going to be things that we simply don’t want to do. It is during those moments when we can rise up as fully grown humans and accept that even when there are things we don’t want to do, we must simply accept that part of life and proceed anyway.
A common theme amongst we lady attorneys? The tendency to fail ahead of time. You know that feeling when everything seems to be going well on paper but you just. can’t. seem. to get excited and believe it’s going to work out? That feeling of constant dread and failure (before the ax has even dropped) is what we call failing ahead of time. Today we are going to explore this concept why it is critical to your success to stop this pattern.
There are all these rules about how we are supposed to live and how things are supposed to work out and many of us wholeheartedly believe these rules and it is keeping us stagnant. How to get unstuck and open to new possibilities.
In order to create the life of our dreams, we have to be open to the possibility that what we have been believing all along is not necessarily true. It’s just our opinion. In other words, we cannot shift any beliefs until we find ourselves in a place where we can see the old beliefs as what they are — not facts and clearly not places we choose to our energy. Only from there can we shift our energy to something new and start creating something new.
Certainty is the enemy of growth.
In order to progress, scientists (and the rest of us) had to let go of our closely held beliefs and be open to the possibility that those old beliefs weren’t serving us. One of the hallmarks of good science is constantly challenging our prior conclusions — to never truly be “fixed” in any given certainty. To grow, we have to constantly question our beliefs about ourselves, others, and our reality. That is how we evolve.
The practice of law is challenging and, for better or worse, the practice of law usually requires interactions with some very *challenging* humans. While we truly believe that we have been belittled and treated unfairly, it is not productive to set up camp with those thoughts. So what do we do instead
Our beliefs about ourselves and our abilities bubble below the surface in everything that we do.
I can support you to identify your negative thinking patterns and shift to some prettier thinking but if the beliefs you have about yourself are toxic, none of our work will stick.
Perfectionism is a way to stay stuck. To convince yourself that your efforts are noble. You simply want to do it right and you can’t move forward until you do that. It seems valid. It seems reasonable. But this is simply fear masquerading in a more “honorable” outfit. The fear of failure, dressed as perfectionism.
Lately, I had several clients who are struggling to make decisions. One client was struggling to select a topic for a presentation she was giving at a seminar. Another client was struggling to decide whether to ask for a raise. These decisions were weighing heavily on them and they were paralyzed with the options. In their minds, these decisions were momentous. Decisions that could make or break their careers. How to move forward?
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