Isolation in the Judicial Career

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Isaiah M. Zimmerman, Isolation in the Judicial Career, 36 CT. REV. 4 (2000)
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Summary

Dr. Zimmerman writes that in his twenty years of working as a consultant or psychotherapist with state and federal judges, approximately 70% of judges that he has interviewed spontaneously have expressed that they feel isolation. The demanding workload contributes significantly to this isolation, as the average judge works evenings and weekends. They have limited time for family, friends, community service, and engaging in other interests. In addition, the Code of Judicial Conduct requirement to maintain an appearance of fairness contributes to the isolation. Judges explain they keep their distance at social and professional gatherings and are careful about their comments. The role of judge itself contributes to the isolation, as well. Once one becomes a judge, “former lawyer colleagues immediately begin to show deference,” and this barrier between judges and lawyers is reinforced by the formalities of the courtroom and wearing of robes. Over time, judges can experience greater difficulty shedding their “robes” even in close personal settings. Another result is a reduction in “honest and robust dialogue” that furthers the isolation. These systemic factors that contribute to isolation are exacerbated by the fact that a majority of judges tend toward introversion, thus making it even a greater challenge to avoid isolation. All of this combines to create greater interpersonal isolation, resulting in a “withdrawal from intellectual and community involvement.”

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Nice Guys Finish First

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David Brooks, Nice Guys Finish First, N.Y. Times (May 16, 2011)
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Summary

Mr. Brooks questions the validity of the prevailing notion that humans are innately selfish, competitive, and motivated only to maximize their own benefit. He summarizes several recent articles and books that discuss the intrinsic human motivation to work in teams and the inherent value of cooperation. “These are books about sympathy, empathy, cooperation and collaboration, written by scientists, evolutionary psychologists, neuroscientists and others. It seems there’s been a shift among those who study this ground, yielding a more nuanced, and often gentler picture of our nature.”

“[W]e often have an incentive to repay kindness with kindness, so others will do us favors when we’re in need. We have an incentive to establish a reputation for niceness, so people will want to work with us. We have an incentive to work in teams, even against our short-term self-interest because cohesive groups thrive. Cooperation is as central to evolution as mutation and selection.”

One study “found that the act of helping another person triggers activity in the caudate nucleus and anterior cingulate cortex regions of the brain, the parts involved in pleasure and reward. That is, serving others may produce the same sort of pleasure as gratifying a personal desire.”

“[N]atural selection takes place not only when individuals compete with other individuals, but also when groups compete with other groups. Both competitions are examples of the survival of the fittest, but when groups compete, it’s the cohesive, cooperative, internally altruistic groups that win and pass on their genes….[H]umans developed moral minds that help them and their groups succeed. Humans build moral communities out of shared norms, habits, emotions and gods, and then will fight and even sometimes die to defend their communities.” 

Fostering Civility Within the Legal Profession: Expanding the Inns of Court Model of Communal Dining.

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Celeste F. Bremer, Fostering Civility Within the Legal Profession: Expanding the Inns of Court Model of Communal Dining.
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Summary

Judge Bremer writes that in addition to good manners and respect, civility also includes “concern for the public good.” Further, she explains that ethics and professionalism are analytically distinct from civility: Professionalism defines “what a lawyer ‘should’ do”; ethics are the “minimums by which a lawyer must act….” She suggests the civility requires lawyers to “go one step further.”

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Staying connected to friends and family, not necessarily your PDA, helps keep stress at bay

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A.B.A., Staying connected to friends and family, not necessarily your PDA, helps keep stress at bay (Sept. 2011)
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Summary

Experts on stress reduction at an ABA meeting in Toronto in 2011 suggested 5 steps to balance one’s professional and personal life:

  1. Stay true to your values.
  2. Don’t demonize the other side.
  3. Maintain connections with friends and family.
  4. Set boundaries around clients contacting you.
  5. Be careful and monitor the impact of electronic-communications technology.

Civility in Our Conversations about Race and Culture

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Mary I. Yu, Civility in Our Conversations about Race and Culture, 66 Wash Bar News 5, (May 2011)
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Summary

Judge Yu proposes that civility should be used both within and outside the legal profession to start important and necessary conversations about race. “Civility calls us to a state of compassion and empathy. An active and civil engagement about a difficult topic such as race would also permit us to reveal our own biases, share our unfamiliarity of traditions and practices, and expose our ignorance of certain facts without causing personal pain to another. And when we inadvertently cause pain to another, civility requires an apology and a request to rewind and start over. At the same time, the practice of civility also requires vulnerability; it means that some of us must take the risk of sharing the pain of being on the receiving end of bigotry, both real and perceived, with the hope that the listener might better understand its impact.”

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Inspired by the Wonder of Poetry

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Janet Ellen Raasch, Inspired by the Wonder of Poetry, A.B.A.
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Summary

Can even the most cynical lawyer be softened by poetry?  Yes, according to Janet Ellen Rausch who describes a law firm retreat that incorporated poetry, mosaic building and a significant contribution to a local school library.  School children wrote letter of thanks to the attorneys and the lawyers responded.  This is community in action. 

Dr. Maya Angelou and David Whyte inspired the lawyers at Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher with their poetry.  Artist Synthia Saint James contributed with her design for a mosaic that the 800 lawyers constructed together.

William Wegner, a trial partner described the retreat.  “It was an experience that provided something for the spirit and soul of everyone in the firm.” 

Revenge of the Right Brain

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Daniel H. Pink, Revenge of the Right Brain: Logical and precise, left-brain thinking gave us the Information Age. Now Comes the Conceptual Age - ruled by artistry, empathy, and emotion, Wired, Issue 13.02 (2005)
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Summary

Mr. Pink posits that our economy has shifted from the Information Age, which was based largely on left-brain logic skills, to the Conceptual Age, which requires more right-brain inventive and empathic skills. He explains that “[w]e've progressed from a society of farmers to a society of factory workers to a society of knowledge workers. And now we're progressing yet again - to a society of creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. He attributes this shift to Asia, automation, and abundance.

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Lost in Translation

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Lera Boroditsky, Lost in Translation, The Wall Street Journal, July 23, 2010
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Summary

Language impacts our thinking; how we see, understand, and interpret events; and our relationship to time, space, and causality.

That language influences our thinking has been demonstrated in studies of Russian language speakers, indigenous tribes, the Piraha, and Spanish and Japanese language speakers. Because the Russian language has more words for light and dark blues, Russian speakers have greater ability to visually discriminate shades of blue. Because some indigenous tribes use “north, south, east and west” instead of “left” and “right” to indicate direction, members of these tribes have great spatial orientation. Because the Piraha use inexact terms such as “few” and “many” instead of actual numbers to quantify, they are not able to keep track of exact quantities. Because Spanish and Japanese languages don’t have agents of causality of accidents, ("The vase broke itself," rather than "John broke the vase.") they are less able to remember the agent of the accident. In a study comparing cross-linguistic eye-witness memory of Spanish, Japanese, and English speakers, subjects watched videos of people doing something intentionally or accidentally. When asked to recall who did the action, Spanish and Japanese speakers were able to remember the agents of intentional events as well as English speakers because their language would mention the agent of intentional events; however, they were not able to remember the agents of accidental events as well as English speakers.

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Lose the Box

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Steven Keeva, Lose the Box (Sept. 12, 2004, 11:46 AM CST), A.B.A. J.
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Summary

Mr. Keeva explores the loss of creativity in law school. He observes that when law students’ motivations shift from internal to external ones — a well-documented process in the first year of law school — they often lose their creativity at the same time.

The California Western Law School’s focus on solving legal problems is a valuable shift in sustaining the creative juices for law students. Thomas Barton, who teaches creative problem-solving and preventative law at Cal Western, believes our communities require well-solved problems. In addition “doing creative work feels great.”

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The Mindful Lawyer

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Robert Zeglovitch, The Mindful Lawyer, GPSolo Magazine (Oct.-Nov. 2006).
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Summary

Mr. Zeglovitch advocates for lawyers to practice what he calls “mindfulness meditation.” To practice mindfulness meditation, a person must mentally and physically slow down enough to become aware of movement within and around them. Mr. Zeglovitch explains that a mediation practice can benefit lawyers for the following reasons:

  • Stress-related health problems, depression, and substance abuse rates are high for lawyers; meditation is proven to reduce the effects of stress, which can help lawyers.
  • Lawyers measure themselves in terms of success and failure. “Meditation practice has no expectations of outcome; the goal is simply to be….Lawyers can benefit from regularly setting aside a mind consumed by winning and losing.”
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Lawyers: Leading with Integrity

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Stella Rabaut, Lawyers: Leading with Integrity, Washington State Bar Association, (October 2013)
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Summary

Ms. Rabaut suggests that lawyer leadership work begins with inner personal work that helps the legal profession evolve into a more conscious, creative and collaborative practice:

  • Consciousness — undertaking mindfulness exercises helps lawyers feel and perform better, derive and deliver more satisfaction, and relieve suffering in themselves and others.
  • Creativity — viewing law as a healing profession turns adversaries into healers, provocateurs into peacemakers, entrepreneurs into service providers.
  • Collaboration — shifting from an adversarial and competitive stance to one of collaboration and problem-solving for their clients can achieve more satisfying results.

She advocates for lawyers to integrate the rational and logical skills of the head with the reflective, imaginative, and relational skills of the heart. Among the practical behaviors to engender this integration, she suggests that lawyers establish time for reflection, time for pursuing clarity about underlying values, and time for constantly reassessing their actions and deeper purpose.

Law Prof Teaches Meditation Techniques for Lawyers

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Leslie A. Gordon, Law Prof Teaches Meditation Techniques for Lawyers, A.B.A. J. (Feb. 1, 2014)
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Summary

Professor Charles Halpern is currently a scholar in residence at University of California at Berkeley’s Boalt Hall and director of the Berkeley Initiative for Mindfulness in Law. He is a pioneer in the contemplative law movement, having led meditation retreats for law professors and law students in the 1990’s for Yale Law School. He currently teaches a course on effective and sustainable law practice at Boalt Hall and offers retreats for legal professionals in Marin County, California. 

Prof. Halpern explains that through a regular practice of reflection and meditation, lawyers learn

“a cluster of emotional intelligence skills that are undervalued in legal practice and education.”

In addition, such practices enhance “listening skills, improve…focused attention in complex situations and enable…attorneys to make empathetic connections with others.”

Seeking Serenity: When Lawyers Go Zen

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Amanda Enayati, Seeking Serenity: When Lawyers Go Zen (May 2011)
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Summary

Ms. Enayati states that meditation not only can help lawyers avoid the propensity for depression, substance abuse, and dissatisfaction, but more importantly, it also helps lawyers be more effective and is influencing the practice. She explains that mindfulness practice for lawyers is becoming much more common, along with mindfulness-related law-school courses, retreats, workshops and CLEs. Notably, Justice Stephen Breyer sits quietly for 10-15 minutes, twice a day, thinking about nothing or as little as possible. Although he doesn’t call it “meditation,” he says it makes him “more peaceful, focused and better able to do [his] work.” Beyond stress management, mindfulness practice helps lawyers be more focused, more active listeners, better at helping clients, and better at serving justice. Mindfulness practice is also contributing to innovations in the law. These include collaborative law in family practice, which emphasizes trouble-shooting and problem-solving in divorces, rather than a fight to win, and restorative justice in criminal law, which focuses on reconciliation, restoration, healing, and rehabilitation. Overall, there is a movement towards the emergence of law as a healing profession and lawyers as peacemakers.