Some motivation for law students

It's exam time at the University of Auckland. I feel my friends' pain. For some of them, these are their last university exams ever. Though of course, that fact doesn't make studying for or sitting exams any better. I don't envy them. Long hours spent reading and revising, making exam notes, consuming copious amounts of Red Bull to keep going, burning the midnight oil, bloodshot eyes, exhaustion and despair... It's not the best of times, just the worst of times. 

My finals at UVA Law School aren't until December. But the pressure here is starting to build up too. I spent most of today doing schoolwork. I had a bunch of lectures to go over for International Law and Antitrust, and over 100 pages of reading to do for my Wrongful Convictions seminar (I didn't manage to finish the reading, I'll have to complete it tomorrow morning before class). I also attended a "How to Succeed at Law School" Exam Writing Workshop for 1Ls, which was packed out. People here are serious as about their studies, man. They love to have fun but when it comes down to it, they're here to get good grades for good jobs, and underneath the collegiality of UVA culture there's a stern sense of competition. Although I only have to pass my papers here, I'm not exempt from the pressure; I'm still in bondage to the overwhelming sentiment of the need to do well. 

I recapped lectures until about 12:30am, and at the end of it I wasn't feeling so great. My mind fell into a state of moroseness, and I found myself asking a series of rhetorical questions. Why is Law School so hard? Why is there so much reading to do? Why are there so many abstract concepts to understand? What's all this for? On and on, on and on.

But then I stopped. And then I thought some more, but from a different angle. I was being stupid and selfish. In the busyness of everything that I have to do, I so often forget how privileged I am to be studying this revered discipline. I think we all do. Law kids, we're so lucky! We're living the dream of thousands of people that didn't make the cut into second year. We're living the dream of millions of people in the world that don't have the opportunity to go to primary school, let alone university. We're working towards a great degree. And whatever law we end up practising, our work is going to make a real difference in people's lives, be they at the individual level or broader than that. It's amazing how fortunate we are to be studying law.

With that in mind, let's really go hard with studying and with our upcoming exams, you guys. Especially those of us for whom this is our final semester at university: we won't ever get the chance to do this again! We owe it to so many people beyond just ourselves to do awesomely in our studies. We have an obligation to be the best lawyers that we can be so that we're able to assist our clients competently, and for now that means rocking our exams as law students. It's so worth the effort. Let's take pride in what we're doing and give it our all.

I hope these thoughts help to motivate some people when things get real bad, myself included. Peace out.

G.