This Cost How Much in Tuition?!

As this is my second to last semester of law school and because last spring semester almost killed me, I decided to “slack” a bit with my schedule.  Specifically, one of my classes this semester is “Mindfulness and Legal Skills” which is a two credit pass/fail course exploring meditation and how it helps balance the stress of the legal profession while improving your negotiating skills . . .

This is where I eat crow because in a prior post, I talked about how I select classes because “I could care less if my future profs are tough graders and brutal in class.  I spend a lot of money each semester to learn the law and so long as my profs help me become an attorney through their teaching, it doesn’t matter to me that their final is a pee-your-pants-while-vomiting nightmare.”  I also indicated in that post that I wouldn’t take a class just because it was pass/fail . . . umm . . .

In my defense this is my FOURTH year of law school, because I work full-time I had to stretch out this “amazing” experience over the course of four years because of ABA requirements and quite frankly, I need a little “fluff” in my curriculum in order to make it to May 2012.

So I signed up for this Mindfulness class because several students who took it last year said it was awesome and I figured with all the stress in my life, I could benefit from some meditation.

The first several weeks of this class backfired on me, I was more crabby and agitated than normal (shocking).  In our first class session we spent twenty minutes “listening” to a raisin (as in former grape) . . . WTH?  When I told my coworkers about this experience, they all raised eyebrows and said, “do you know how much in tuition those 20 minutes of raisin conversation cost you?!”  . . . I calculated and that was one expensive conversation.

I struggled in the early weeks of the semester with my weekly journals and outside-class meditation sessions.  These sessions were akin to when I begin a workout regimen . . . I would spend up to an hour convincing myself to just sit and focus on my breathing and thoughts.  In class meditation sessions were similar, my thoughts tended to be ”I’m so hungry . . . I have some left-over pasta . . . there’s half a box of stale Triscuits in the pantry . . .” or I thought nothing and found myself dozing off (the class is 7:30-9:30 p.m.).

But I hit a couple of breakthroughs and epiphanies in recent weeks.  I’m learning that the reason I hate taking moments to sit with my thoughts is because most of my thoughts are negative, especially when it comes to me.  Goodness, my subconscious thoughts really put me down. 

And now that the intense portion of learning various meditation techniques are done, the class now focuses on how to use these various techniques when handling client relationships, working with opposing counsel, etc.  Essentially, everything is making more sense to me.

Yesterday, we (as in the whole class) had to spend all day in a meditation retreat, no talking for six hours as we went through various half hour meditation sessions, alternating between sitting, laying down, and walking (yes, you can practice mindfulness/meditation while walking). 

I was dreading this day because I don’t know when I haven’t spoken for six hours (I failed on that part, see below) and I wasn’t entirely sure I was ready to do all these intense meditation sessions since I’m still struggling with that portion.

But the day ended up being really good.  The retreat was held in a small building at a wooded park in an outlying suburb.  The place was gorgeous . . .

Just one of the many beautiful paths in the woods

 

And the day went by faster than I thought it would.  I admit, I broke the “no talking rule” but it wasn’t a big deal (according to the prof later).  Specifically, I have two friends in the class and during one of our morning walking meditations (after two hours of silent reflection), we met up on one of the wooded paths and all non-verbally communicated which direction we would head.  We then hid out of view of the building and whispered for a bit.  It was somewhat comical.  One of my friends pulled out three peanut butter cups from her coat pocket and while we munched on them (we were starving and our silent lunch wasn’t going to be for another two hours), she suddenly declared, “sh*t, I feel like I’m back in high school when I used to skip out of gym class and hide out behind the bleachers to sneak a smoke”. 

 

Despite my bending the rules, I got a lot out of this retreat.  I spent most of the indoor meditation time sorting out some stuff going on at work (it was a very rough past week) and exploring why I was feeling the way I do.  What I discovered was very enlightening and I began to figure how I want to proceed over this next year. 

 

I came home absolutely exhausted (I fell asleep at 9:00 p.m. last night trying to type this post), but I also came home feeling calm, refreshed, and more balanced than I have in a really long time.

 

So maybe this class wasn’t as “slacker” as I originally thought it would be when I registered for it . . .

 

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