Mental health issues in our profession are finally being recognized. While mental health issues are not unique to lawyers, the profession and it's client service mantra present unique challenges.

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I struggle with how to carve out time to take care of myself. Email is mostly a glance at a smart phone away. Being profitable/an in demand associate sometimes means taking on as many assignments as possible (or simply being assigned work regardless of capacity). With constant reminders of competing deadlines it's hard for me to prioritize downtime. My desire to turn in quality work is real and, despite high reviews, I am often my own worst critic (which sometimes results in an ongoing negative dialogue with myself). More than once I've found myself paralyzed by responsibility and have forced myself to take a vacation and put the email away. That release has felt better than anything. My problem is that I then treat my tank as empty and will easily let the pressure/burden build up all over. Not healthy for sure but I'm terrible at creating better habits.

Other times I release pressure (deatructivley) on the weekends in the form of heavy drinking (or, more nicely, partying).

Generally I'd like to work on creating a healthier balance and learn to tune out work when I need a break. The goal would be to avoid any heavy weekend release and/or reaching an annual breaking point.

Curious about your collective thoughts? Can a healthy level of work be quantified in monthly hours billed? Is it practice specific? Number of matters worked on simultaneously? Hourswise I aim for anything between 185-210 real billables/month.

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What's your firm's billable hour requirement?

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Additional Posts in Mental Health and the Legal Profession

Reminder to everyone: use your 2021 vacation time. Don’t let it pass you by just because you’re not traveling. Take a long weekend once a month to nap and eat chips in sweat pants all day. We all need to do our part to normalize self care, and sitting at home doing “nothing” is just as worthy of a vacation day as pina coladas on the beach.

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Choose to be happy today

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Guilt and shame about working in a legal position for years where, instead of using my law degree (was supposed to do legal work per the job posting), I served as a personal assistant to my boss/did nothing for maybe half the time. I feel like I was paid for work I didn't do. I've since left that job but the guilt and shame remains. I feel that I lack the character of a lawyer and that I am unworthy of the profession. I don't know how to make up for the lost years or how to forgive myself.

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Most/Least stressful areas of practice (in either transition or litigation)

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