#312: Are You a Checklist Lawyer?

Are You a Checklist Lawyer 

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In today's episode of Be A Better Lawyer, I want to talk to you about breaking free of the checklist mentality and learning about three principles that will help guide you into loving your practice more. Hello, my friend. I hope you are having a really good week. 

I have been digging into my old Eckhart Tolle books, my old Carlos Castaneda books in preparation for the Reconnect classes that I have been running. In the next few weeks, I'm going to tell you more about those classes. They were made available at the beginning of April for my email subscribers, and I've decided that I'm going to offer it as an on-demand course when it's completed that's going to be available on my website. 

And if you're newer to the podcast, you may not know that I studied and taught yoga about 15 years ago, and I dug deep into more spiritual aspects because I was always trying to find quote unquote, what's missing. And over the years, I discovered that I wasn't missing anything. It was that I had a lot of structures built in my life that weren't serving me. 

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They became habits and they were blocking me from reconnecting with myself and accessing my higher knowing my intuition. So if this is something that's up your alley, check out my website and look for the Reconnect program coming soon. I will mention it again on the podcast when it is ready for you to purchase on the website, which is actually the perfect segue into what I want to talk to you about today, because we're talking about structures and the ones that don't serve us in our law practices or our businesses. 

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I believe that how we have been instructed to live our lives has very much been as a checklist lawyer. I talk a lot about the checklist lawyer mentality in a masterclass that I did, and I'm it's really important if this is something that resonates with you to watch. It's at dinacataldo.com forward slash 312. 

You can get instant access to it. It is a must watch for lawyers who feel overwhelmed or like their law practice is really running your life. So I give you specific examples of where this checklist lawyer mentality might be showing up in your practice and how to change things. 

The way our educational system is structured and the way we are trained in the legal profession is very much about checking off lists and doing things the quote unquote right way. And to a certain extent, this is something that we need to master within the

structures of the law. So for instance, if you're a contract lawyer, of course, you need certain paragraphs within your contracts to address certain issues. 

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And you want to be able to have a framework, a checklist of sorts. And if you're a criminal lawyer, there are certain checklists you need to abide by to ensure that you get evidence into the record. And when it comes to delegating work, we want to have SOPs, checklists of sorts, again, for assistants and associates to complete the work the way that we want it done. 

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So I'm not talking about throwing those types of things out of the window. But what we've been trained to do is take these concepts, right, these checklist concepts that are needed in this particular realm, and they become the adult equivalent of homework and getting an A. And that ensures that we're not really going to do the best job for our client and we're using them against ourselves. So I want to give you a couple examples. 

For instance, I'll see an attorney create a task list for themselves. And then at the end of the week, if the task list isn't completed, they will beat themselves up and tell themselves they're failing. They will procrastinate the following week. 

They won't get other client work done. They won't get the client work done that they wanted to do the week prior because they're beating themselves up for not working on it sooner. So what's happening here is that we take this concept of the checklist. 

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Let's get it done. Let's put it on the list. Let's check it off. 

And we use that against ourselves and we create all this pain and suffering, which then leads us to feel like we're falling further and further behind, right? And our brain has lots of evidence, right? New cases are coming in, but we haven't completed the old cases. And that doesn't mean anything, but our brain is making it mean something. It means we're failing. 

We're not getting the A, right? So that's one example. Another example is I will see attorneys creating checklists of expectations for their assistants, but then they never communicate those expectations clearly. And then they feel really frustrated that their assistants aren't meeting their expectations. 

Recently, an attorney told me that her assistant didn't get a trial binder to her on time. And I asked her, Hey, when did you tell her it was supposed to be completed? When I asked her that question, she realized she never told her assistant when it was due. She

was so frustrated because her assistant didn't check this thing off the list, but she didn't actually communicate what it is that she wanted her to do. 

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So we're looking at these problems in a really myopic view when we approach it as a checklist lawyer, thinking it's very black and white, right? And we want to look at overarching concepts, bigger principles so that we aren't falling into the trap of this small checklist, which is great. It serves a purpose for certain things and using it in a bigger way that actually creates more harm. We want to find those areas where we're using 

checklists against ourselves and apply these larger concepts. 

So I want you to think about these larger concepts like it's a pie. So a pie is standing in for the larger concept that I'm going to be talking about in a few minutes. There's three of them I'm going to talk to you about. 

So inside the pie, there's all kinds of ingredients, right? You've got flour, you've got sugar, you've got berries, whatever it is, right? The ingredients can be very similar from pie to pie, but you can also make different pies. You can have a blueberry pie, an apple pie, a blackberry pie, a raspberry pie, right? You could have all these kinds, rhubarb pie. So for instance, if you're making a blueberry pie, you're going to use the same ingredients for the most part, right? The crust is going to have the same ingredients as any other, but then you're going to need blueberries. 

And once you understand how to make a blueberry pie, you can use that concept and figure out how to make a raspberry pie, because it's a similar process, but with a twist on the ingredients, maybe the temperature of the oven, that kind of thing. So if something doesn't go the way you want it to, when you make a new pie, like the crust isn't crispy enough for you, you can tweak an ingredient in the pie or just, you know, how long you bake it or the temperature that you bake it at. And for the pie aficionados out there, please do not send me hate mail if I messed up this analogy. 

I'm really great at eating pie, but my baking experience is limited when it comes to pies. So this pie baking process is the same process scientists go through when they're testing experiments. They have a very basic premise and they know the basic ingredients to their experiment, but then they need to test and tweak to get the results that they want. 

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So there's certain fundamental principles that can help us change how we are being in the world and can help us look at problems differently and then create results we want. If we're paying attention to these three larger principles that I'm going to talk to you about, and we're not thinking that there's a checklist somewhere that it's just going to solve the problem for us. Okay.

So what I want to share with you is how to begin thinking in these larger principles about everything you do. And I really want to break this down in a way that feels simple and that you can just start applying it right away. The first principle I want to share with you is the principle of total responsibility. 

Total responsibility is not about blame. It's not about putting the world's problems on your shoulders. It's not about deciding that you are the only person in the world who can solve problems. 

What total responsibility means is you begin looking at everything that's happening in your practice, everything that's happening in your life, your relationships as something that you have powerful influence over. And this is an extension of what I talked about in episode 277, becoming a powerful creator in your life. If you aren't using this concept of total responsibility in your life, you cannot become a powerful creator. 

We are not taught to be powerful creators. We are taught to be at the mercy of other people, of time, of work. And we begin taking that on as an identity. 

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Think about when you were a kid, we were at the mercy of what did the teacher think was a good thing? What did my parent think was a good thing? How do I behave? When I behave a certain way, I get a certain response. And so we're playing our personality, our identity against other people. But as an adult, we have to take a look at any of those habits that we might've formed and clean those up, because we won't be able to enter total responsibility. 

We'll be in that victim mentality mode. And I've been there. I have been the person who felt totally at the mercy of my boss, totally at the mercy of a filing deadline or my inbox. 

And when I truly grasped this concept of total responsibility, I was better able to see how I was impacting my life and how I was making it harder than it needed to be. It wasn't other people. It was me. 

And I began seeing how I was creating chaos in my practice. I could see how I was negatively impacting my body with the stress that I was putting myself under. I could see how I was negatively impacting my relationships. 

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And until we accept this principle of total responsibility, this way of being in our life, in our businesses, we cannot become a powerful creator. We cannot change things. Because we are always at the mercy of something else, we have no power. 

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And if something else is always causing us to feel something or to behave in certain ways, causing us not to be able to manage our time or not to use a calendar, then we will never have any power. And I got tired of living that way. It was exhausting. 

I didn't like the idea that there were things outside of me that had control over me and had such a huge influence. And I really wanted more power over my life. I wanted to feel more in control. 

And I also wanted to feel more at peace, more at ease. And that's what I gained when I started applying this principle and the two others that I'm going to share with you. And I know I've talked about this on the podcast before, but when I underwent chemotherapy way back in the day, and I felt like that was a vacation from my trial practice, I had peace and I had calm. 

I felt really good about it. And it felt like a vacation should without worrying about the work. And a big part of that is because my brain had an opportunity to disconnect from that victim mentality. 

I didn't realize this at the time. I was only realizing it as I was preparing this podcast for you. I was able to clear my head of those influences for a period of months. 

I was really able to calm myself. And I didn't realize how to do that myself. I didn't even know it was possible. 

I thought that was just the way of the world is that I was just going to be stressed and overwhelmed for however long I was going to be. And that's just what it meant to be a lawyer. And then when I took myself out of that victim mentality, I realized, wait a minute, I, my whole body can feel different. 

I can feel relaxed. I can feel calm. And then for me, the whole puzzle piecing together was figuring out how could I have the same sense of calm and peace and be a lawyer. 

It's like, okay, I'm going to figure this out. And I did like, that's what I did. And then I felt like I had so much more control because I could see, okay, I'm influencing it. 

It didn't happen overnight. In fact, I went back to the office and I fell into my old habits only because I didn't know anything about coaching. I didn't have a coach. 

I didn't know anything about mindset. I was just trying to figure it out on my own. I was kind of like flailing in the water, but once I got a coach, it helped me really clear things up. 

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So when I figured this out, does it mean that suddenly I'm above all feelings? I'm above all victim mentality? No, I still feel anxiety. I still feel stressed. Sometimes I still, still feel

overwhelmed. 

Sometimes I'm a human being, right? I have emotions. I can't turn them off, but what I can do is use the tools on myself, right? I don't spend so much time there. I pivot so much faster. 

I'm not procrastinating because I see it immediately. I know exactly what's going on. I talk to myself, I apply these principles and then I get out of it and I keep moving, right? Or I give myself what I need in that moment, depending on what's going on. 

Maybe it is time for me to take rest, but I'm totally responsible for the decisions that I make. I'm never blaming something else. I'm always looking at what are my decisions? How am I creating what's here right now? And once I see a problem, as long as I don't beat myself up about it, I can solve for it. 

I'm going to talk about that in just a second. But if I beat myself up and I tell myself I'm at the mercy of fill in the blank, I will not be able to problem solve. When I look at every problem with total responsibility, then I can create solutions. 

And the most common place I see this is when a lawyer tells me that their assistant isn't doing what they want them to do. And there could be multiple problems, but I always like to ask myself, how did I create this problem? Was it because I didn't communicate something? Is it because I didn't create a clear SOP? Is it because I didn't give her a specific deadline to have this information? Is it because I didn't give it to her soon enough to get it done? I'm always looking at what is it that I need to do to help the process along? It doesn't mean there might not be problems on their side, but I always like to look at me first because I might be a very simple solution to whatever bottleneck I'm seeing. And then I can go to the assistant. 

I can say, hey, this is really what I was looking for. Or I can ask them, hey, what happened here? Was there some sort of confusion here? But I can't even get to that place if I'm blaming. Or I don't even want to talk to the assistant because I'm so annoyed. 

I just can't even have the conversation. But once we start taking total responsibility, we can see, oh, okay, maybe there were some places that we can clean up and then we can have some real conversations that are calm and about problem solving with that assistant. And if you own your own firm, you can take this a step further. 

When you're embracing this principle of total responsibility, you can ask yourself, how did this person get hired by my firm? You see how this larger principle of total responsibility really applies everywhere. And I was holding my monthly business strategy call last week, and this topic came up. When you're hiring someone, it is essential that you look at who's currently in your firm, look at their performance and break down step-by-step how they were hired. 

My one-on-one clients get business strategy calls as a bonus. But if you want to join and gain access to any of the calls that we've had so far, including this one on hiring your dream employees, you can go to my website to sign up. Now, the next overarching principle is total compassion, total compassion. 

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Maybe this one should go first. So as a human who lacked compassion for herself for the first 40 years of her life and applied blame and anger to just about every problem that I saw in my life, I can speak from personal experience how powerful compassion is. I could not problem solve. 

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I would ruminate constantly. I would spend an enormous amount of time complaining either in my head or to someone else and just spreading that negative energy around. I was not giving myself any grace, so I could not give other people grace either. 

If someone made a mistake, it was the end of the world. But it was also the end of the world if I made a mistake. And it seemed like I was constantly making mistakes. 

At least that's how my brain interpreted it because that's what I was focused on. I wasn't giving myself any compassion. Now I give myself total compassion, and it is a totally different world. 

I teach this concept of total compassion to my clients. Now there will be days that we don't follow through on what we say we do. There will be days that we make a mistake. 

And if we apply compassion to any of these situations, we can solve for it. And we can usually see that it wasn't such a big deal anyway. But when we get stuck in, I've got to be hard on myself because that's the only way I'm going to get things done. 

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You will continue to create pain for yourself. It's only when we begin to learn to understand ourselves and to understand other people and have empathy for ourselves and empathy for other people that we will be able to step back, look at a problem and problem solve. Because if you can't have compassion for yourself, you will continue to procrastinate. 

You will continue to tell yourself, berate yourself, you will continue to feel horrible, and you will not progress the way you want to. And you'll probably end up grinding yourself. You'll try to work harder.

But what work harder really looks like is I'm scrolling longer, I'm staying up later at night, I'm skipping the gym so I can work really, really hard, because I didn't spend much time at the office working, so I need to stay up late and getting more work done. But when you learn these concepts, and you really start to live them, you will not have to be at the office all the time. I'm telling you this from personal experience, which is the whole reason why I have this podcast is so I can share these concepts with you. 

So please, please, please take this to heart. The next overarching principle that I want to share with you is curiosity. One of the ways I actually was able to take responsibility for more things in my life, and I was able to apply the concept of total compassion was by applying the concept of curiosity. 

Now when I became curious about everything going on in my brain, right, everything going on in my life, everything that I was feeling, things started to look different, right? I started to make change faster in my life. It was really interesting just to kind of understand that this concept of curiosity wasn't about judging. It was just about being interested in myself, being interested in why I was doing the things that I was doing. 

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And it helped me create this distance from my actions, this distance that allowed me to get just enough away from the feelings that I was blaming myself and all of these things. I could just be curious, be interested, right? So when we're in curiosity, everything becomes like a chemistry experiment, or if you prefer, a pie experiment. It's not life or death, and we know we can change, so let's just figure out the problem, right? Let's just look at it. 

Let's just take a look under the hood, so to speak. And the more I started using this concept of curiosity, the less I procrastinated at work, the less hard I was on myself, the more I went to the gym, the less I stayed up late at the office because I wasn't able to get my work done during the day, right? So notice like this has a ripple effect once you start applying these concepts. Have you ever noticed that when you set a goal, you maybe stop working towards it, or you lower the goal, or you don't set your goal as high as you'd really like because you think, oh, there's no way that's just not realistic. 

And if so, then you're not applying the principle of curiosity. When we're curious, we don't give up on the goal. When we're curious, we evaluate what's happening. 

We see, okay, what's going on? Let's take a look at this. We look at this from different angles and we apply compassion and responsibility as well. And then we regroup and we figure out the next steps and that's it. 

But our checklist lawyer brain wants to say, well, I didn't do this thing on the list, so it's impossible to get the A now. So I may as well give up, but we want to change things

here. We want to be compassionate to that voice, right? Total compassion, even to our own voice and say, thank you so much for helping me get this far. 

It was really helpful in school. It really helped me make sure I was living up to the expectation of the colleges when I was applying for colleges, but I'm going to apply these three new principles now, the ones that really work. And I'm going to talk about, I'm going to use these principles of total responsibility, total compassion, and total curiosity now. 

Thank you so much, but we're done. And this episode really gives you a great introduction to these three principles, but the masterclass that I told you about at the beginning, I really want to encourage you to also watch that because it applies three additional principles to very specific problems that I see in different practice areas. And you can download it in the show notes at dinacataldo.com forward slash 312 to get instant access. 

And if you're ready to fast track your growth in your law practice and take back control of your time, book a strategy session with me. You can set up a time to talk with me at dinacataldo.com forward slash strategy session. And as a reminder, what you want matters and it is within your power to make it happen.