My love-hate relationship with law

I'm one of the interns at TARGETjobs and I'm also halfway through a law degree. This week I'm giving you my insights into the law experience so far and the importance of perseverance!

I've found that telling people that I study law tends to elicit one of two responses: either ‘Oh wow, how exciting!’ or ‘But why would you do that to yourself?’

I've been back and forth between the two sides myself. A lot. There were many, many times in my first year that I doubted whether I was cut out for law and I actually considered leaving and reapplying for a different course once or twice. However, now I'm at the end of my second year, I think that a law degree is like an annoying song you hear on the radio for the first time and vow you’ll never like – it grows on you.

Law school really throws you in at the deep end from your first week and if you’re anything like me, you spend the first year pretending you know what’s going on and pining for the familiarity of a school classroom. I'm so glad I didn't quit though. In your second year you know what you need to do and you have much more of a sense of direction (you also learn how to balance your social life and work). A year ago I would have avoided talking about the legal profession wherever possible; OK, it still scares me but now it’s hard to get me to shut up about a legal reform or case (which I find exciting regardless of everyone around me falling asleep).

It’s a lot of work but now I love my degree so much that I've extended it to four years and I'm looking forward to getting some more legal work experience before leaving uni. Of course there are still times when I can’t bear to trawl through another endless judgement or even look at my statute book, but they've become far less frequent.

Law students, persevere until you can give an extremely long and convincing answer (backed up with cases and legislation, naturally) to the question ‘Why would you do that to yourself?’ It’s definitely worth it.

- Laura