Why do we treat leaving law like a personal failure? I told a mentor I was thinking about opening a bakery, and he looked at me like I’d just confessed to a felony. There’s this weird cult-like mentality that if you don't use your degree to practice law, you've wasted your life. I spent $200k on this education, shouldn't I be allowed to use the skills I learned in a way that actually makes me happy?

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Because this profession is generally full of people with sticks up their a's who lack imagination and ambition.

Kidding aside (but not really kidding), it takes a lot to get a law degree, so your mentor thinks anything but law is a waste. This is simply untrue.

I have dozens of examples of people I know who went to law school and no longer practice law. My own husband opened up a separate business because he plans to exit the practice of law once the business (a gym) is able to replace his income. He started with 0 customers and is up to 200 and counting now. We're going to open another location in the next year.

A bakery sounds like an amazing idea. Good luck!

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At the end of the day, you have to do what makes you happy. I’m sure it’s hard for some people to understand why someone would go to law school and then not become a lawyer—but it isn’t really their business. Do what makes you happy.

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In fairness to your mentor, I don't see how opening a bakery would be using the skills you've learned. I mean, I presume you went to law school, not culinary school. People who leave law are not necessarily considered failures, it depends where they land. Look at someone like Charlie Munger. He said he got tired of listening to the problems of wealthy clients and said he'd rather be sitting on their side of the table and be wealthy himself. And even he transitioned into real estate development before leaving law entirely and becoming legendary with Berkshire.

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I heard of a lawyer that left practice to open a Jersey Mike’s franchise and was making money hand over fist. Every lawyer in the room discussing it were in total approval and were jealous.

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Probably because some people do leave law because they've failed. And the ones that didn't fail do not want to perceived as though they failed.

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Is this an AI-generated prompt to solicit engagement? The subject itself is so odd, and the hook seems designed to create cognitive dissonance in order to trigger an emotional response.

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Tbh this doesn’t strike me as AI but I’ve been wrong before - there is a ton of AI generated slop on this app though but I’m quick to remove it from here.

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The Former Lawyer podcast is an awesome resource for lawyers wanting to leave to the law and do something else.

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Why do we treat someone leaving medicine as a personal failure?

You need to do whatever makes you happy. A friend left the law after two years at a firm and went back to school to get a teaching degree. She was very happy and is now retired and traveling. Your mentor may take your choice as his/her personal failure- even though it of course isn’t.

There was a time when I took a spontaneous vacation to a Caribbean resort to take a break from my stressful job as an associate attorney. I met people from various walks of life who were working at the resort in different capacities for a change of pace. I fantasized about doing the same. Ultimately, I stayed in the law and switched to in-house jobs which didn’t have billable hours requirements but were stressful in other ways. If you feel like you want to open a bakery, DO IT! It’s your life!

I know someone who left law after twenty years to start an animal farm. They are happy and doing extremely well.

I told a mentor I was thinking of leaving biglaw to go do some other type of law and he still looked at me like I had two heads.

I think a lot of people get so used to the money that they don't understand how anyone could or would want to leave it.

Some people get so locked into an idea that the concept of doing anything else sounds so foreign to them. I hope your mentor didn't deter you from following your dreams.

I think the complete opposite
I am extremely jealous when I hear of lawyers leaving the profession and making a good living in a non lawyer role.

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