I enjoy it. It's stressful sometimes because of the curve and the job market.

I'm a law student and I'm not miserable, although there are certain parts of law school that are miserable (like LRW).

Law school is a gigantic pain in the ass, and I'm so burned out by it at this point that I can scarcely force myself to read at this point.

I'm glad I went, though, and I would make the same decision 1,000 times out of 1,000 if I had it to do over again. But I will not pretend that I've enjoyed the overall experience. And I knew that would be the case coming in. I am a 3L with a job, and there is nothing I'd rather do right now on a Saturday night than play with my poor, neglected dog for a little while, then maybe head out on the town with friends. Instead, I'm reading for Monday and trying to get cranking on a paper that has to be turned in by mid-May.

Pain. In. The. Ass.

But worth it.

Same here, second career after working in charter transportation for 7 years. Its a 24/7 business, calls at all hours of the night etc. Law school time commitment is a breeze compared to that, I actually get to see my family for dinner!

I'm also taking heavy advantage of all the practical opportunities (clinics and externships) offered at my school. Among my colleagues it seems like the ones who are cramming five or six substantive law courses a semester are the least happy, getting out of the law school and into the community is a great remedy to library drudgery.

I really enjoyed law school. I was an engineering major before, and found the material in law school a lot more interesting. Class discussions are a lot better than listening to some difficult to understand foreign professor going dryly through derivation after derivation. There are a lot more people in law school with chips on their shoulder than were in engineering school, but at the same time there are also a lot of witty, funny people. After going to a big state school I loved the amount of attention I got from professors and getting to know nearly everyone in my ~250 person class. And perhaps if I had been an arts major all the work would've cramped my social life, but only having to really study the last month or so before finals instead of having problem sets due every week actually opened up my social life a lot.

TL;DR: I really enjoyed law school, am a little sad to be graduating, and would definitely make the same decision again.

I enjoy law school a good amount. I like my professors, the construct of classes, the material, the thought process that's used in the work, the subject matter, etc. I've really enjoyed all of that. I just don't like the clique-ish middle school-esque feeling of law school. Sometimes it does feel like I'm 12 all over again. All in all though, I enjoy my classes, having worked in the field before school I enjoyed it and am legitimately excited for my summer job.

I love law school!

Compared to working for a living, law school is easy, fun and interesting. I am graduating next month, and though I am happy to be moving on to a paying job, I will miss my time here. Do not understand why people don't like law school, though I am married with kids, so probably avoid some of the fake drama.

I'm married with children also, and that's one reason I'm tired of LS. Just ready to move on with my life in a job situation, where my research and learning is more directed at a purpose that affects other people besides me. Sometimes LS just feels like three years of hazing.

With a family to think about, I think what most irritates me is that I don't always feel like profs respect your time. I don't necessarily think it's on purpose. For example, they'll assign a 20-page case, and then you end up talking about two small points in it. Or you read 30 pages in the casebook and don't even cover long portions of it. I try to use some of those notes cases on exams and such, or just to deepen my understanding of the concepts, but it would be nice on days when I'm short on time to know exactly what I have to read to be prepared for class. Sometimes you can get the hang of it, but I still always feel like I'm white-knuckling it if I don't read everything.

I'm definitely with you on the being insulated from drama, though. I'm embarrassed to say I didn't even realize there was LS social drama!

Is there?

The school-specific threads all seem pretty happy.

I'm finishing 2L year. So far I've experienced high levels of ecstasy and had about 3-4 nervous breakdowns. In between those moments, I felt a moderate amount of misery (more so in the past several months than any other time).

If I had to do it again, I would take a gap year or two, then go to law school. A lot of my misery stems from me feeling that I am missing out on life while drudging away countless hours of law school work every.single.day. I'm sure a gap year would have given me some perspective.

But, I am excited for my summer job and a laid back 3L year. I am grateful to be here and will most likely be in 4X better financial position than if I didn't go to law school.

I love law school and have from the start. I find most of my classmates to be really smart, interesting people. I've made awesome friends, done cool summer internships, and feel like I learned a lot. I'm also a bit of a slacker and go to a school without real grades, which probably helped a bit.

I think part of the reason I liked it is that I didn't do things in law school just because I felt like I should do them. I didn't do a journal, didn't try and do law review, took classes I wanted to take, and did rather atypical summer work abroad. I also took some language classes. I traveled during spring and winter breaks and kept up hobbies I had before law school.

In my opinion a lot of law students are extremely dramatic about how bad law school is. Yes sometimes it's stressful and it's not all incredibly enjoyable, but seriously...it's not that bad.

3L here. Median at a T25, about to graduate, jobless, and looking at a ton of debt. However, that being said, I really enjoyed law school, really enjoy the practice of law, and I am optimistic about the future (although I guess that could change if I still don't have a job in a few months).

Law school is fairly easy, the subject is interesting, and I love my professors.

It's the poor career outlook, and the FUCKING VULGAR tuition we pay, that upset me.

I agree with almost all of this, although I would add in "drinking and sexing like an undergrad again" as a significant plus-factor. Those of us who do that are pretty damn happy. Those who don't seem to be sipping on the misanthropy sizzurp.

**high-five**

The above answer shuts down the thread! While almost all of the answers given so far have great validity (actually, they all seem to, but just in case I missed something...), the biggest reason BY FAR that there are so many miserable law students is that most of them don't really want to be lawyers. They don't love the game the way Kobe Bryant loves basketball, the way Natalie Portman loves being an actress, or the way Donald Trump loves deal-making. They don't love the law the way Baryshnikov loves to dance...the way porn stars love to bone.

To enjoy something that is so difficult - and which requires one to take on great responsibility - one has to live and breathe his craft. Most law students should be doing something else, and that's just a fact. As far as a causal relationship goes, one can more fairly glean that those who already love the game will do well and thus enjoy it more. The law is equal parts intellect, art, and war, and you have to love all of it to be one of the good ones. To be truly great, you must not only love it, you have to absolutely crave it.

I forget the poster who said it - but I think selection bias is the big answer here. The happy ones aren't on the internet making daily updates to their "Law School Happiness" blogs. They're doing the things that make them happy.

One of the things I'm really trying to focus on prior to 1L is perfecting my time management skills. Though I'm a 0L, I work a job that requires 60 and sometimes up to 80 hours a week where I bill by the hour. Work is rarely awesome (unless you're a hero from an Ayn Rand novel, which is unlikely considering you're hanging around on TLS). In fact it will usually be painful. Finding happiness in any demanding environment - assuming you have the raw intellectual horsepower to at least keep up with the material - is all about finding a way to schedule the pain in such a way that you can maximize the amount of pleasure without compromising your desired results (top 10%, law review, whatever).

I'm a 0L, so I can't speak to what nuanced prep one should do to be a huge success in law school. Hoewever, I know that one right answer to being happier is ALWAYS to sharpen your organziational and time management skills. It's not the only way to be happy that's for sure, but in my opinion it's one of the most reliable no matter what you're trying to accomplish. The more free time you have, the more time you have to do what you enjoy whether it be sexing undergrads or calligraphy.

GTFO 0L.

No.

Edit: Tell you what. I get it and I know what happens next in this thread. PMd.

Yes. Many, many grains of salt. And one whiskey, straight.

3L. Law school is fine. It's boring and I'm not a huge fan of the people, but I haven't found it nearly as stressful as people make it out to be, and quite frankly outside of the 3 week run up to finals I have had way way more free time(to spend with non law school people and enjoy myself) than I imagine I will again until I retire.

You sound intelligent and focused. You'll probably do fine in law school. This forum is riddled with abject losers prowling for opportunities to be obnoxious and to show the world that eight-year-olds with ADD can get into law school if they've just got a 25-year-old's body.