Do You Care About What You Do?

"We are living in a moment of time, the first moment of time, when a billion people are connected, when your work is judged (more than ever before) based on what you do rather than who you are, and when credentials, access to capital, and raw power have been dwarfed by the simple question "Do you care about what you do?  We built this world for you.  Not so you would watch more online videos, keep up on your feeds, and LOL with your high school friends.  We built it so you could do what you're capable of.  Without apology and without excuse.  Go."  Seth Godin, The Icarus Deception.

My little law school, Appalachian School of Law (ASL), sets itself apart from the crowd in several ways, but perhaps its unique feature is a fearless bet on students who might not otherwise have the opportunity to attend professional school.  We tell them: "Go."  Our students, often showing a poorer performance on the standardized admission exam, show great promise as they master the knowledge, skills, and professional values taught by our faculty, staff, and alumni.  Most of our students still flow in from the surrounding Appalachian Mountains or the adjacent plateaus of Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, and Tennessee.  Many of them are the first person in their immediate families to earn a college or graduate degree.  We are lifting students from proud working class backgrounds into the professional world with all the advantages that world offers.    

As a current member of the Admission's Committee, I am struck by the courage applicants show in overcoming obstacles they have faced.  Some have experienced severe trauma -- rape, accidents, illnesses, death of a close loved-one, an abusive or alcoholic parent, homelessness, and immigration with the challenges of adapting to a new culture and learning a new language.  As human beings tend to do, they take these hardships and forge a strong will to change the world with their energy, intelligence, commitment, and work.  In a very short time, a number of our graduates have become prosecutors, public defenders, judges, state legislators, and other community leaders -- which reflects the mission of our school.

In 2005, of the 250 counties in the U.S. with the lowest per capita incomes, Kentuckyclaimed thirty-five of those counties.  Only Texas, a much larger state, had as many people living in impoverished counties.  Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginiaadded another twenty-four counties to this list.  Thus, the region ASLserves includes 23 percent of the poorest counties in the United States.

The school's founders believed that lawyers educated within the region, who were steeped in notions of professional service, would more likely stay in and provide service to the people of the region.  Graduates have validated that belief.   In 2008, approximately half of our alumni were employed in small law firms in Virginia, West Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky, and North Carolina.

Overall, the founders envisioned a graduate who would emphasize problem-solving skills and adhere to high professional ethics.  The graduates would represent a throw back to an earlier generation of lawyers, who were more than hired guns, and instead were esteemed leaders in their local communities.  We call these types of lawyers “community-based generalists.”

My contacts with alumni through my Facebook page, inspire me daily.  They have bought houses, married, started families, found meaningful jobs, and played hard.  They are courageously creating the lives they dream, despite a sour job market for new grads and a debt load often called "crushing."  They serve the public or clients and, with some exceptions, seem to do it with great joy.   I sense that they care deeply about what they do.

Before I became a law professor, I worked for 20 years in the private practice of law as an energy lawyer and then a commercial litigator.  The work was exhausting many days, but also intellectually challenging and satisfying on many levels.  I was lucky to have jobs in which I cared deeply about our clients and knew that I made a positive contribution to the collective good.  Most days, I arrived at the office excited, energized, and  thrilled by the opportunities the day might bring.  I cared a great deal about what I did.

Now, I have the rare pleasure of engaging with young professionals as a law professor.  I can't imagine a better job.  I love to see them grow in competence and confidence.  I love to see their courage and compassion.  I can't wait to see what they decide to care about -- what art they decide to create.

Lawyer as Artist.

As I read Seth Godin's new book, The Icarus Deception, I kept asking myself: What is my art?  What do I create joyously, diligently, passionately, and with increasingly greater skill and insight?

In the early 1970s, my high school  -- University City High -- had one of the most REMARKABLE art departments in all of St. Louis County.  Staffed by three teachers, the program taught painting, drawing, sculpture, ceramics, and fiber arts. Thirty years later, I still have pieces of art I created at that time: pencil drawings of my boyfriend and the male rhinoceros at the zoo; a bronze cast sculpture of a heavy-bottomed woman; a huge hookah pipe, made of coiled clay, I now use as a deck ornament; a silk screened T-shirt imprinted with an original design; and watercolor landscapes.

The program also introduced me to many techniques and materials that I have used fearlessly throughout my life. The course made me a better problem-solver.  About a week ago, I needed to create a "vision board" that suggested how our Lion's Lounge at the law school would look after renovations.  I had no trouble creating this board in just a few hours.  I had many of the materials I needed stored in my basement waiting for me to turn them into something else.

Most importantly, the high school program cultivated my eye for design, color, shape, texture, and space. I see the world differently from the way many people see it.  I now understand that I access the right side of my brain more routinely than other folks.  Have I always had that ability?  Or, did exposure to art courses help me access it more confidently throughout life?  Most recently, I used my art to choose and place accessories in the Lion's Lounge in anticipation of our Open House for prospective students. Overnight, I transformed the feel of the room, and interestingly, students are using it more.

Over the last decade, I have carefully and lovingly designed my garden.  I think of it as a living canvass of color, texture, shape, and scent.  My house, decorated with many primitive antiques from central Appalachia, also expresses my design eye.

For me, most of these activities seem more like hobbies than art.  For me, my art takes other forms these days: teaching, writing, and public speaking.  I am especially excited when I am drafting complicated simulations for student use.  They are multi-layered stories, typically based on a news articles, that reflect the complex emotions, interests, and needs of several parties, all of whom must "bargain in the shadow of the law."

When I was still in private practice, my art took the form of creatively solving a client's problem, communicating emphatically with clients, counseling them effectively, and writing persuasive motions and briefs.  That art also included the thoughtful design of deposition questions or the well-designed presentation of evidence that effectively told my client's story.

More recently, that art expresses itself in my mediation practice.  I now use all my talents to design the best process I can for parties, with careful thought given to the location of the mediation, the food I offer, the communication skills I use, the way I encourage them to brainstorm creative options, and the ability to bring peace into the room.

I hope that my students see the path they have chosen, not just as the path of the professional, but also as the path of the artist.

Nov. 23, 2013 Update:  Another take on the topic.  http://www.abajournal.com/legalrebels/article/is_practicing_law_like_creating_art/?utm_source=maestro&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=weekly_email

Make art. Think like an artist.

I finished Seth Godin's new book, The Icarus Deception.  I like his "big ideas."

In this book, he argues that in a post-industrial economy, in which we are bombarded with media messages, we will stand out only if we give a gift to the world that is REMARKABLE.  The gift, freely given from a place of urgency and pure joy, is our art.

While I don't see an effort to clearly define what "art" he means, he uses the term so broadly that it could include any creative effort that you pursue diligently, passionately, and with increasingly greater skill and insight.  It requires you to face down your own fears of failure and inadequacy (which he attributes to the "lizard brain," aka the amygdala and other fear centers of the left brain, mostly).

It requires you to pursue your art even when those around you discourage you actively and more passively.  It requires you to separate your art from your own self-worth, so criticism of your art does not unbalance or undermine your identity as an artist. It requires you to make better art, all the time.  It requires a fearless commitment to expressing yourself in a way that sets you apart from everyone else.  It makes you REMARKABLE.

He argues that our economy is one based on connectivity, provided by the world wide web, in which we now have the luxury of finding all the people who may share with us even the narrowest interest in music, photos, painting, gourmet meals, sports, fiction, poetry, gardening, woodworking, web design, crafting, fashion, home decor, architecture, research, film, theater, and every other form of creative endevour.

In the old days, an author needed to find an established publisher.  Now with Kickstarter fundraising and on-line publishing tools, an artist can bring his or her work quickly to an audience.  In the old days, a musician had a minuscule chance of every getting a record label to produce a commercially viable recording.  Now YouTube watchers regularly discover new talent.  iTunes provides the vehicle to make that new talent a commercial blockbuster.   The difference now from then?  The artist must use these new tools to create the audience for his or her art.  She no longer needs, or should rely on, a middleman.

How exciting is that big idea?  How will I apply it in my own life?  I'll tell you later.