July / August-ish, 2024
Why am I studying law?
Have I told you I’m studying law? I’m sure I’ve mentioned the fact, but if not well I, my friends, am a law student.
Sounds impressive doesn’t it? I worry that that alone is the reason I am doing it. To impress people with my capability. It’s a prestige degree after-all. For context, I am 9 subjects down, which is nearly all of the core subjects (there are 11) and then I have to complete a whole bunch of others. So I think that means I am nearly half way. That’s a bit awesome. It’s a part-time course and I am essentially doing it part-part time. Quarter time? I started back in 2020 when Covid took off and I wanted to use my brain for more than just Ori’s nap schedule.
Thing is…do I want to be a lawyer? No. Hell no. Why am I studying law? Great question. Really excellent, poignant question that I have been asked (and asked myself) many, many times, to which I have multiple answers that I have honed over the last 4 years.
The first is; ‘to use my brain’. Der.
An early one was because I’ve been told law is a great degree to do because it can open a range of doors. I don’t currently know what doors I want to open, but hey, if there are doors to be opened, you can be damn sure I want to give myself every opportunity to open said doors if and when I find any particular doors I like the look of and want opened.
I also genuinely feel learning law is a great way to arm oneself with a knowledge that could really help me in my life. You see I am not a confrontational human being. I am usually too scared to face anything head on. I am more of a shrug and think ‘it’ll all be fine’, brush it aside, avoidant kind of gal. A very accomplished avoider, you might say, all dressed up in layers of ‘chillax bro, nothing gets to me, it’s all water-off-a-ducks back’ kind of vibe. I am not one to inherently want to dig deep into anything and nut out the specifics. My brain is so ok with accepting the status quo and moving on. When someone says something in class, I often find myself thinking ‘oh yeah, that’s a really good point’, and then someone brings up an opposing argument and I’m like ‘oh gosh yeah, that’s a good point too.’ Some lawyer I would make. The Switzerland of lawyering. Fence-sitters-R-Us. So I genuinely wonder if this sort of study is good brain training for me. To go against my natural order and I have to say, it has given me a confidence I didn’t have before. Although that might be because I am getting older and wiser and less able to be bothered to sweat the small stuff. Or it’s cos I have a kid and a part-time job, while also auditioning and studying law, so I just don’t have the time or energy to sweat the small stuff. What I do have though is a motivation that I never had before to get off my ass and make something of myself. To stop faffing about. It’s even bled into its own kind of anxiety, but I’m getting side-tracked.
I worry that I am studying law more for the prestige than anything else. Seriously. Am I that shallow? Maybe. Probably.
Another reason I’ve clung to, that I heard ages ago when I was starting my study, was Roger’s comment that Conveyancing can be a really rewarding and flexible side gig. Apparently it’s a people-friendly job, helping home buyers and all that, it pays reasonably well and can be done on the side of say…an acting career? Always a good sign your acting career is going well when you spend a thousand more hours on gaining a suitable, stable side job.
Another reason; I wonder if I would be quite good at ADR. Alternate Dispute Resolution. You know, mediation or arbitration. Getting a casual job at a medical practice when covid was just taking off (that was a steep learning curve, let me tell you) has shown myself to be quite the complaint handler. Ombudsman here I come.
A reason that popped into my head very recently when I was at the library studying for my latest exam (Admin Law for those wondering, which is actually a lot more interesting than it sounds) is that it’s given me a confidence in being able to write. And by that, I do not mean write well. I mean being able to literally write. Put words down on a page. You see law exams are, for the most part, open book, or at least all of mine have been so far. This means my exam revision process is to collate all my lecture notes, with case studies and text book notes, into one big exam revision document. Then I print it the day before the exam and put tabs on all the topics and parts that are really important so they’re easy to find. I know I am a law student now that I have sticky tabs in my pencil case. (Or that I carry around a pencil case, for that matter.) I really honed this exam revision process when I was doing Equity, which was three subjects ago. Equity is big. And Equity is hard. But I really liked it and wanted to do well. So I revised the shit out of it and my exam revision document got to something like 200 pages, which was about 64,000 words. 64. Thousand. That’s a goddamn novel. Nay that’s a textbook. So I have learnt that I can write. And yes, of course quantity is not always better than quality and while I cannot say I know how to write well, I can say I did bloody well in that exam. So that means something.
P.s. For anyone wanting to study law, knowing everything is not essential, nor is it even possible, but knowing where to find what you need when you need it, is everything. Well, maybe not everything but its damn helpful in an exam and has proved to work for me so far, so you’re welcome.
So anyway, I’m whinging about the fact that I have chosen to study law, I have worked bloody hard at said degree and found some unexpected bonuses, but why the fuck am I studying law? Wah wah wah.