Trepidation & Transition
Or is it the other way around? Reflections on right now.
Welcome to Conflict Confidential, a newsletter about relationships and, of course, conflict.
What is the end of year feeling like?
Is it full? Is it fraught?
Where I am it starts to get dark at 4:45pm. I spent hours outside today. It was damp. There was brief sun, then it peaced. The cold tricked my fingers into numb snausages. Eeking out the last bits of daylight I laid in a hammock, warming my hands on my skin under my clothes. I closed my eyes and thought about my worries, darkness behind my eyelids speckled negative sun-blips.
It’s still somewhat disorienting for some of us in this post-pandemic moment. Haven’t had a lot of time to reflect on where things are tbh. I’ve been really busy lately. It’s such a badge of honor, to be so busy. But busy means too busy to think sometimes. Today I took a beat to be with the shadow side of busy.
This past year I’ve jumped into new work head first and have phantom “goose-egg” bumps on my lobe to prove it. I’ve been stretching myself from a public defender to, what, a sort of visionary project engineer executor? Big leaps. Body and mind still adapting.
As a lawyer I was a solo practitioner running between courtrooms where everybody knew my name. My reputation of practicing in one place for a decade cushioned my interactions. I was familiar with every corner of the courts, of the system I operated in. I could weave through the intricacies of relational decision-making. Applying the law was, for me, the least inspiring part of the job. I did it attentively and with care because it was literally the job. I litigated the hell out of some cases, for sure. But when I reflect on being an attorney it’s not really what I think about. So much of being a public defender was the peopling. I was really good with the people part. I pine for that action. I miss the intimacy of the small booths where I met clients for the first time. I miss greeting clients or their families on the benches inside courtrooms and speaking with them privately in the hallways, always knowing what the fuck I was talking about. I loved the strategizing of a case - the steps I’d take at the start of the case with investigators and social workers to set the stage for the best outcome months later. There were some really amazing things about being a lawyer I’ll unlikely experience again.
But of course there was also the stress. The losses and the frustrations I’d hold in my body as the bearer of bad news or the person to blame when things didn’t work out in favor of the client. “I’m not a magician,” I’d occasionally say when sitting with a doozy of a situation the client and I both knew was insurmountable. I’d do my best, always. But there was always a steep Sisyphean climb to endure. Plus the fighting, so much fighting. A legal system designed to be competitive and secretive, adversarial and distrusting. Always, a battle. Sometimes with clients, but more often with judges, with prosecutors. I’d start with kindness but too often the conversations would threaten to bring out the worst in me. It became a test of doing the job with the most amount of grace and humility I could muster, even when the temptation to be ruthless beckoned at every turn. Judges and adversaries would take pleasure in humiliating, demeaning, and punishing my clients through me. I, human-shield; I, still a human. By the end of my career I felt punctured, deflated, battle-whipped. I couldn’t fathom taking on more. Although protecting people’s rights was my calling, I didn’t believe in the fight anymore. Working in a system designed for inflicting pain, it was almost inevitable I’d too at some point have to yell mercy.
I respect so deeply my colleagues still in the work. Some are still on the frontlines, doing their damndest in the trenches. Some are working in appeals now, crafting the next best shot for incarcerated clients holding steadily onto hope. I salute those who stay in the legal profession. But it wasn’t something I wanted to keep doing. I no longer wished to spar. I wanted to build.
So I did. I started building. First a new reality for myself by learning beyond what I already knew. I recreated myself professionally, and in many ways was rebuilding my identity. Who am I if not that tough but affable attorney on the record? And what does it mean to be someone who works collaboratively, or could help shape a sense of community? I can feel the strange shift in muscle-memory of being in guarded fight-mode fade to being in open acceptance of whatever is possible. It’s a tightrope walk of ego-death and self-surrender. Best believe I be stumbling. But I’m shedding layers, and nurturing new growth. I keep trying new things. Some seem to be working out, some definitely not. After having invested so much into being a lawyer, and being good at being said lawyer, it’s been humbling to be doing things from scratch. I’m exploring new ways to communicate. I’m meeting new people constantly. I’m discovering in various contexts people gel differently. I pay attention, I keep it pushing. A system of support has been helpful, and today on my walk I conjured one of my supporters. Just imagining their presence gave me some fuel.
So things are happening but still feel sort of unsettled right now. I wonder if I ever felt like things were firm. There was a moment in 2018/2019 I think- I knew my shit at work, was more experienced there, lived in Brooklyn in a cute apartment with my handsome husband and adorable daughter, had a gym membership I was serious about. But in life, even good times are short-lived and if you asked me then I for sure still had plenty to complain about.
Then in 2020 we all know what happened next. Now I’m here, end of 2023, and still in a sort of transition. A year into a new career path, living in a house in the woods, same handsome husband, double the adorable daughters. Everything is so different. Yet I’m still me. I’m finding myself doing surprising work, both in content and in objectives. Bold ideas with lots of moving pieces I put into motion then have to see through. The work is system-adjacent with ideals of shaping change. I’m being vague but I’ll just say it’s challenging and frustrating in a different way. Conflict arises as it does when humans come together to do something. The stress is not nearly as acute but also not nonexistent. In work, in life, I’m finding balance. Trying to place the next most elegant step.
The point is, no matter what there likely will always be things to worry about. It’s the human part of life. Taking a day just to not be busy is liberating, even if it can also be somewhat unpleasant. Like really not busy - screens off, hours of silence, rest. It moves things, it really does. Look, now I’m finishing a post, a sudden urge to connect with people. Wasn’t planning it, but a day of thinking got me here. It’s how it is.
Our bodies go through our cycles. Sometimes up, sometimes down.
We ebb, we flow.
Years come, years go.
Where we go next, who can know?
A chance to reflect, a chance to connect.
What if we met strangers and found we actually had a lot in common?
What if we did something out of the ordinary just because?
Join me and others on a Tuesday evening for an experimental community experience.
Will incorporate restorative practice and keep it chill. Who knows, maybe we’ll leave feeling more supported in these last days of 2023?
12.19.23 - 7pm ET/6pm CT/5pm MT/4pm PT
Excellent writing and an authentic look into a world through the lense of an authentic spirit! Thanks for sharing!