Introduction & 1L

Law students are called L's. The number preceding "L" indicates the student's current year in law school. A 1L is a first year student and so on. I'm currently a 2L facing finals, so a soon-to-be 3L. I'm a student at Nashville School of Law (NSL), attending "full-time" which amounts to 2 nights a week. Unlike traditional law schools which have a 3-year program, NSL has a 4 year program with a much more affordable tuition.

I thought it would be beneficial and perhaps therapeutic to document the journey from 1L to Lawyer. To understand where I currently am, let me explain where I came from....

My grandfather is an attorney, my father is attorney. Anyone looking at pure external factors could suppose I would become an attorney as well. The internal was far from the truth. While attending college at Middle Tennessee State University and their Music Business program, I quickly decided I wanted nothing to do with law. I had developed a love for creating and performing music. I learned to play guitar later than most guitarists at age 16.

During college I joined a band and decided that I had found my life's calling. Long story short, I played for 4 years trying to "make it", only to discover that it wasn't working and I wasn't happy. I then began some serious soul searching, asking God what I was put here to do. To my disappointment at the time, it was revealed that law was to be my specialty. Now, I had done well in my law classes in college, but I hated the stigma of being an "attorney". But the more a dwelt on the concept of using the law to serve people, the more I fell in love with the idea of being an attorney. I began to see how I could serve people who needed help, people who were tragic victims of injustice.

I applied to attend Nashville School of Law where my father attended. I took the LSAT, arguably the worst 5 hours of my life. Once my scores were in, I sent my application and prayed. A few weeks went by and my acceptance letter arrived! I had 3 months before classes started and I couldn't wait to begin.

The week before classes started was orientation. The associate dean gave us 2 pieces of grim news: 1) at least half of us in the room would drop out before graduation (which in hindsight is 100% accurate), 2) we would read more in our first year than all 4 years of college combined (again, 100% accurate).

My first year was tough. I had virtually zero experience with the law or reading cases. Here I was reading 100+ pages a week of judge's opinions while having to look up almost every legal word in Black's Law Dictionary. But I persisted , I began to build my legal framework. Then came "the wall". It's the stumbling block 4-6 weeks into everyone's first year where your mind can't seem to hold any more information. You're learning so much, so fast. But my torts teacher gave some great advice: "Take it a week at a time; don't look at the weeks ahead or you'll get discouraged by the amount of work". That advice ended up being one of the most important elements of my first year's success.

Midterms came (play scary music here). Here was the test. Did I really have what it takes to make it through law school? My Contracts professor advised me to "outline everything". An outline is a concise framework of all the concepts you learn in a single class. Outlining helps you compartmentalize all the legal concepts in a single class while making sure you understand them. I learned to make outlines. It was extremely time-consuming. I was spending tens of hours a week studying for my midterms. Then the time came. I thought I did well. Then the waiting came. Days turned into weeks waiting for my grades. Waiting. Waiting. Checking the website every hour to see if they had been posted. Then, finally, there they were! I passed! Wait, I not only passed, I did well! It was a huge affirmation that I was on the right path.

The proceeding weeks began to blur together. I was becoming a well-oiled machine. Eat, sleep, work, go to class, take notes, repeat. Then the time for finals was fast approaching. I began to ask myself, "Can I repeat my midterm success?". I decided I would stick with my plan for midterms. If it worked then, why wouldn't it work again?

I outlined, I studied, I went to study groups with my study partners. I took the finals. I waited, and waited, and waited. Finally my grades were posted. I passed all classes with a fairly good GPA for a first year student. I was within the top 15% of my class. I felt I had overcome a major hurdle. We started out with approximately 110 student and were down to 75-80. I had made it! I now had 3 months off before second year began. I would need those 3 months off, as my wife was pregnant with our daughter, Violet.

Violet came on 12/16/2009, she was/is beautiful. After the craziness of having a baby began to unwind I began to think about my second year of law school. "Is it possible to still do well in school having 2 jobs, a wife, and a baby?". "Will I have the money to pay for school this year?". Doubts and seemingly unanswered questions began to constantly fill my mind during my 3 month break. Little did I know of the faithfulness God would display during my second year....