Stress wreaks havoc on daily life

I live in an age where a lot of my communication is conducted online, via text or social media. I recognize I also live in an age where everything seems to be rush, rush, rush, or this should have been done yesterday.

I am a part of an impatient society. It’s wanting everything now, and when it doesn’t come instantaneously, my reactions sometimes tend to be mired in anxiety and frustration.

As a practicing attorney, I am made ever so aware of the nuances and stressors of working in a deadline-driven environment.

How many times have I gone over to the Daley Center and tapped my foot in annoyance at someone holding up the elevators because they don’t have a clue where they are going? Oh, and I am already three minutes late and the elevator is stopping at every floor in the bank.

How about waiting in line at Starbucks, waiting for my turn to order my daily double espresso because I already know it’s going to be a hell of a day, nose buried in my phone, exasperated at the person in front who can’t decide if it is a vanilla latte or white chocolate mocha kind of day.

These are just a few instances where it seems I may be pushed to the edge and carry around that aggravation without even noticing. After a while, it slowly becomes a way of life and work.

Working in my office, I notice a shudder at e-mails I have to respond to and maybe a snappy response at those around when asked the simplest of questions. Or, I begin responding to the latest motion to dismiss with a sharp tongue even though I already know it adds nothing to the substantive argument just because I believe a motion should not have been filed in the first place.

Sometimes I have to explain to clients when they ask “why is this taking so long,” when the “this” happened only three weeks ago, that these things take time and to please be patient. Meanwhile, I am seriously on the verge of squeezing my eye balls out. Maybe that is a complete exaggeration, but I am sure you get my drift.

But really I am sure these examples are a small percentage of the day-to-day practice of law, which adds to our stressful and hurried existence at work.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the practice of law; the day I don’t will be the day that I stop coming to work.

It’s just that the sooner we admit that we do get irritated, the sooner we can begin to formulate a plan of attack so we don’t get burnt out.

Too many times we feel we are trapped by our work lives, but I don’t think that is the case at all. We are trapped by our reactions to our stressful work environments, which is a very different thing.

How I react to situations is the only thing I have control over. How many times have you thought to yourself, “I am so stressed out by work,” or have answered someone when they have asked how work was with a sardonic, “Busy and stressed?”

What makes it stressful? Conflict and personality issues will always exist. It doesn’t matter if you practice law in a 1,000-person firm or you have decided to hang your hammock up in some remote island. People are people. I have started to realize that it is usually our perception of life situations that agitates us and stresses us out. This perception is flawed, yet it leads to burnout.

It’s bad for your health and mental well-being. It is bad for your practice. In the words of a 16-year-old, Karen, chill out.

Next time I am at the Daley Center, annoyed at the elevator hold-up, I’ll think to myself about the time I didn’t know where I was going.

Or maybe the next time I am at Starbucks, I should lay off the caffeine and order a tea. It is not the worst thing in the world to have to wait an extra 35 seconds to order.

What I am getting at is if I let my impulsive and immediate reactions constantly control me, yes, I will end up feeling stressed and overwhelmed, unable to handle the smallest of things, such as the breakdown of a copy machine or a dripping coffee maker.

If we can’t deal with an unsent fax, how can we hope to be there for our clients in their time of need?

The next time I am confronted with what seems to be a stress-filled situation, I am going to adjust my reaction to it.

We do not always need to feel like we are putting out fires in order to effectively practice law. When we learn to navigate the ebbs and flows of the practice, we do ourselves, our clients and the practice a huge favor.

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