Hi, and welcome to The Former Lawyer Podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Cottrell. I practiced law for 10 years and now I help unhappy lawyers ditch their soul-sucking jobs. On this show, I share advice and strategies for aspiring former lawyers, and interviews with former lawyers who have left the law behind to find careers and lives that they love.

So one of the things I think about a lot is what are some things that people who are thinking about leaving law and/or know they want to leave eventually but aren't ready to do it yet, what are some things that you can do to help yourself be in a better position once you decide you're ready to go? What's something you could do today that would put you on a better path?

And one of the things that came to mind is something that I want to talk about on this episode, which is hobbies, which probably sounds a little bit like, "What?" But here's the thing. So many lawyers who realize, "I don't want to be doing this," will tell me, "All I do is work. I don't do anything else really other than basic life maintenance." There are these things that I like or that I'm interested in or that I was interested in in the past that I engaged in, whether it's reading or some crafting or some sports or whatever it is, right? And they don't do it anymore because it got pushed out by the work.

This is not me saying, "Oh, you are so not well-rounded and blah, blah, blah." Because the reality is that happens for a lot of us. I used to say when I was at the law firm, my hobbies were getting groceries and picking up dry cleaning because those were the things that I did outside of my work, basically.

So if that's been your experience, you're like, "I feel like I have no interests anymore," or at least no interests that I'm engaged with, that's very normal. Re-engaging with any hobby that appeals to you, either one that you did before or just one that you've thought about, can be so helpful in your overall move toward a better career for you.

The reason for that is that so much of figuring out what is the right move for you is about figuring out who you actually are, what you actually like and what you're good at, and what it is that you actually want to be doing, as opposed to what many of us thought about when we decided to go to law school, which was more like, "What should I do?"

Picking up a hobby, either picking up one that you put down in the past or one that's new and just something that's interesting to you, is a way to start to exercise what I think of as almost like a muscle that is practicing knowing what feels good for you and doing it. That is something that you can do even if you are not planning on leaving anytime soon, even if you don't have tons of time.

Here's the other thing. It doesn't have to be like, "I'm going to pick up a hobby and now I'm going to turn it into the most hardcore thing ever." You don't have to be like, "Oh, I would like to get back into fitness. I'm going to run a marathon." Like calm down, calm down. I mean, you can if you want to. But also you could go for a walk for 10 minutes a day or run a mile or two a couple times a week. You could decide to try to read one fiction book of the type of fiction that you like per month, as opposed to, "And now I will read a book a week and it will be this whole thing."

Then when you don't do it, you feel like you're failing and blah, blah, blah. That is contrary to the spirit of what this exercise is about. What this exercise is about is being able to have a sense of what is interesting to you, and then to do something about it. It's like the connecting of the knowing or the intuitive sense and then the actual action that helps you.

It is harder to leave law if that is your whole life. For a lot of us, it's like there's only so much you can do when you're working so many hours per day, right? So I'm not trying to say, in addition to exhausting yourself, do all these other things. If thinking about this or doing this in any way creates stress or anxiety, it is not something that is worth doing, or at least worth doing in whatever way you're thinking about doing it.

But also it does not have to be huge, right? It can be like, "I like fancy candles and I have not lit a fancy candle in a long time because who has the time." So every day or every week, whatever, I'm going to light the fancy candle that I've been saving for a special occasion. Or in the afternoon, I'm going to have a cup of tea in a mug that makes me happy. You know, barely a hobby, right? This is not, "Go crochet a scarf," which you can also crochet a scarf. I mean, you do you. That's awesome. Love that for you.

But it really is more about recognizing the things that bring you joy and letting yourself pause to do something like that, to remind yourself that you are a human person and not a machine. That's good. That's good.

And sometimes hobbies can be very chill, like walking around the block, which again, I think a lot of us don't necessarily think of as a hobby. And hobby is probably not even the best word for some of these things. Some of them are just patterns or even rituals, just things to create a rhythm of recognizing the things that bring you joy and giving yourself permission to take the time for those things.

If it is something that's more like, I don't know, if you're someone who's really into Dungeons and Dragons, which is something that I've never played but kind of like something that maybe at some point in my life I should have based on my overall who I am. Nonetheless, let's say that's something that you are into and that isn't something you've done in a long time. The benefit of picking back up something like that is that it also involves other people.

Like I said, it is harder to leave when you feel like your whole life is your job. So if the thing that you're picking back up is something that also involves other people, like Dungeons and Dragons or playing basketball, these things help you to build community with people who are not having the same experience that you are in your job. That is very helpful when you're thinking about leaving.

But ultimately, as I said at the beginning, the whole goal of all of this is to practice being connected with what it is that you actually want and what you enjoy. Because ultimately, that skill that you're developing will serve you when you are in the process of trying to figure out what's next for your career. It's one of the most important skills that you can develop.

Like I said, it's something that you can do right now, even if you are not close to leaving or not close to being able to really go through the process of figuring things out. This is a great thing that you can be doing for yourself to set yourself up for success ultimately in the process. Thanks so much for listening. I'll talk to you next week.

Thanks so much for listening. I absolutely love getting to share this podcast with you. If you haven't yet, I invite you to download my free guide: First Steps to Leaving the Law at formerlawyer.com/first. Until next time, have a great week.