The Case for Pushing Through (And Why I Finally Dropped It)
Every lawyer I know has used this strategy. Here's what it actually costs.
Pushing through works.
If you’ve been reading my stuff for a while, that may sound like something I wouldn’t normally say.
But, hear me out - because I’m pretty sure you know exactly what I’m talking about.
When the it was midnight but you knew you could get a few more things done on the closing agenda - you push through.
When the client is having a complete freak out and you know you can deal with it with just a few more hours - you push through.
When opposing counsel is playing games but you need to have it all wrapped before 3 pm on Christmas Eve when everyone is going to disappear for a week straight - you push through.
Pushing through is what got it done. It’s what made you indispensable. And, often times, it made you feel invincible.
It certainly did for me anyway. It’s almost - maybe even actually is - addictive.
So, I’m not going to sit here and tell you that pushing through is naive, or weak, or unintelligent or unsophisticated. Because, it’s none of those things.
It’s actually a strategy - and a remarkably effective one.
At this point, you may be wondering, “Jordan - what is it that you are doing here? What are you trying to tell me? This is not what I came here for.”
I know. And, that is why I’m not really trying to tell you anything.
Rather, I want to ask you something instead: what is it costing you while “pushing through” is working?
Because I know what it cost me.
It cost me time with my family - not quantity, but quality. I was physically present at a lot of things I wasn’t actually at. Countless meals where I was running arguments in my head. Bedtimes where I was ruminating about some argument that hadn’t yet happened - and meanwhile, I am 7 pages into the story and don’t realize how I got there. Vacations that had three people on them: my wife, me, and whoever was having that week’s crisis (and, you all know - there’s always one client who does this just that much more often).
It cost me my health. Not dramatically — no collapse, no heart attack, no obesity. Just the slow erosion of the things that filled me up. Exercise became more optional than required. Sleep was less than restful. To cite Bessel van der Kolk, the body was keeping score.
It cost me my focus. Not on the work - I was always able to zone in as much as I needed to to get good work done. It was the focus on everything else. I had poured so much of myself into my clients’ outcomes that I was entirely preoccupied with them. Their anxiety became my anxiety. At some point I stopped being able to tell the difference between their problems and mine.
It cost me my confidence - which, I realize, sounds counterintuitive for someone who was performing at a high level. But I had made an error: I had started measuring my worth against the results I could deliver. Which is, of course, absurd. Results in law are never fully yours to control. The outcome is always, at least partly, someone else’s. But I had tied my identity to it anyway. So every less-than-ideal outcome landed like a judgment on who I was - as a lawyer and as a person.
It cost me my peace of mind. I was always thinking ahead. What’s the next response? What’s the better argument? How do I prepare for the next turn? The need to perform - to really be the best at this work - had effectively taken over the parts of my mind that were supposed to be off (or at least engaged in something more creative and, maybe, more fun). There was no off
This one is harder to say, but, many times, it cost me my decency. Some files were so combative that I had to become someone I didn’t particularly like in order to get through them. I had to steel myself, put on a kind of armour and face the war of the work. And it always worked. The deals would get done and the clients would be happy (and they’d pay well for that too). But on the drive home after work that day (or night)?I’d wonder who the hell that person was and try to turn him off at home - which, of course, was easier said than done.
So, again - I’m not telling you that pushing through doesn’t work.
It does.
But does it have to be the price of entry?
I don’t think so any longer.
Let me leave you with one last cost. This - this is the one that took me the longest to name. It cost me the love I could have had for myself. Because I was filling a role that was, in many ways, against who I was at my core. And the longer I played it - like some super intense method actor - the harder it became to step out of the role and just be myself.
Still think it's just the price of doing business?
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