Finding Your Why

Finding Purpose in Personal Injury Law

I often ask young lawyers why they chose personal injury law. What's your why??

Many say they want to help their clients. They want to pay off their medical bills, get them back on their feet, put some money in their pocket, etc.

So I ask, "Is there something bigger than just your singular client that is your why? Is it more meaningful, more systematic?

For example, prosecutors' purpose is to protect our society. They enforce the laws, and they punish criminals.

Criminal Defense Lawyers protect our system. They protect our communities from an abusive government. They make sure that the government proves their case beyond a reasonable doubt. They also ensure that the government does the work necessary to meet the state's standard for punishing a criminal.

With prosecutors and criminal defense lawyers, it's not just about the singular criminal. It's about the system as a whole.

Even family lawyers make sure that families split fairly. The stronger person in a relationship should not take advantage of the less strong or financially or physically less strong. Our laws ensure that children are taken care of. If one spouse stays home and takes care of the home and the other works, teamwork is acknowledged and accepted when the family splits.

So, I think most lawyers have a societal purpose that is larger and more important than the singular client we represent in that case. But personal injury lawyers seem to lose sight of that purpose.

We focus on the client in front of us instead of the system as a whole.

So, what is the larger purpose of personal injury lawyers??

Don’t we ensure that those responsible for hurting one of us are held accountable through the jury system? We ensure our laws make those responsible for injuring someone pay for what they did.

Accountability. Holding defendants accountable for what they did.

Choosing Personal Injury Law

As lawyers, we can do whatever we want within the law. So my next question is, “Why did you choose this part of the law?”?

Doctors specialize. They focus on a particular part of medicine. In medical school, students begin to narrow their focus. They decide whether to specialize in emergency medicine, pediatrics, neurology, or infectious disease. Surgeons even have a particular body part on which they perform surgery.

But lawyers can do anything. My main focus is being a plaintiff’s trial lawyer. If I specialize in anything, it’s negligent security, traumatic brain injuries, and other catastrophic injuries. But I can draft contracts, buy and sell real estate, and prosecute criminals. I can try cases in any state by filing a court motion with local counsel. I can defend or represent plaintiffs. Lawyers can be in any law we want.

“So why did you choose to be a personal injury lawyer?”

Answering that question requires us to tap into ourselves. To understand why it is that out of all the areas of law, we chose personal injury law.

There's a guy named Rick Rubin, a music director and producer. He focuses on hip-hop but also does pop and even country music. He doesn’t play any instrument. He cannot read or write music. He knows what sounds good. And how to get the most out of the artist.

He says, “Everything we make as artists is a diary entry.” This means that true art is when we're true to ourselves. He talks about how songs, movies, and other art forms fail because they were made for the audience. Artists thought the audience would want them.

If we do things for ourselves, the audience will respond. So why are you a personal injury lawyer?

Chris Owens is a very close friend from Dallas. We’ve known each other since we were 14 or 15 years old. He played in the NBA for a few years and had an amazing professional career outside the United States. After he retired, he tried to buy a condominium in a nice hotel in Dallas. But the transaction went bad, and he lost a ton of money. He got screwed.

But like the professional athlete he was, he refused to back down. He got his real estate license. He became determined to learn the system and help people avoid the disaster he suffered.

Chris helped me buy my first home and did an amazing job. He knew all the potential ways the transaction could go bad and helped me avoid them. He took his bad experience and used it as motivation. He found his why and turned it into a profession as a realtor to help others.

Finding Purpose in Personal Experiences

If we find our why, we can tap into the meaning of our work over a career. Our life's work.?

Two big events led me to be a personal injury trial lawyer. The first was when I got hurt playing college basketball at 18 years old. I was on a full scholarship to play basketball at Vanderbilt in the SEC. The first week of practice I herniated a disc in my low back.

The next day, they told me the x-ray showed a stress fracture in my lower back. They said it was a pre-existing injury and that I was fine. Even though I couldn't tie my shoes or feel my legs, they convinced me I was already hurt and that my pain was not a big deal. They put me in a back brace, and I missed one day of practice. I redshirted that year and then transferred to a Division II school. I played an entire season there without being able to tie my shoes.

When I finally got an MRI at the Division II school, they found a herniated disk in my lower back. I had surgery almost 2 years after I got hurt and went on to play three more years of college basketball and eight years professionally overseas. I traveled the world, learned different languages, and had a great career. But I still deal with my back injury every day.

The second major event that led me to law school happened after I finished playing basketball. A business partner sued me so he could keep the money we had made. He shut off my email, changed the locks on the door, and put my belongings in the parking lot. Then, he sued the court to declare that our contract was unenforceable.

The fear of that lawsuit drove me to go to law school. I had no idea what to do, where to go, who to talk to, or how to handle the lawsuit.

I was lucky enough to find an amazing trial lawyer through my network of connections. And I fell in love with the legal system. The litigation process fascinated me because it was the most complicated puzzle ever. But mostly, I went to law school because I didn’t want anybody else to feel like I did when this guy sued me. I wanted to help people hurt and bullied by the legal system.

And that is personal injury law. The insurance defense industry bullies and scares injured people into settling for less. The more they try to convince us we’re worth less, the more they try to convince us we’re worthless.

I get out of bed every morning excited to work on my law firm and work on my skills as a trial lawyer. I enjoy learning from other lawyers. I try to share my ideas and experiences to help others.

I have been lucky enough to have two different professions in my life that I'm passionate about and love. That's the key to happiness and success in life because we get to define happiness and success.

Jordan Peterson is a famous professor and speaker. He asks his students, “Raise your hand if you waste 10 hours a day?” About 10% of the class raises their hand. “How many of you waste 8 hours a day?” More hands go up. “Six hours a day.” More hands go up. At four hours wasted a day, 90% of the hands in the class are up, even though he never defined what waste means.

He lets them define what wasting their day means to them. Imagine being in the twilight of your life and looking back and thinking that you wasted 10 hours a day.

I was sitting at a cafe one Sunday, eating breakfast and working. A friend from my neighborhood came and sat next to me. We started talking about his job and how he works for a big company as a manager. He makes good money and lives comfortably.

He goes, “My job's easy. I do the same thing every day and manage the same people. But I don't have to work on a Sunday,” as he points at my iPad in front of me.

I go, “Yeah, but I love what I do.” I love building my business and representing clients that I care about. I enjoy working on causes that I care about. I hold companies accountable for doing dangerous things and make them change their behavior. In the process, I hope to make our society safer.

That's what I'm passionate about doing, and that's why I get up every morning. I found my why.

Defining Success and Happiness

Understand what it is that you love doing and are passionate about. Then, figure out a way to make an adequate amount of money flow to that passion.

You can define your success and your happiness. When other people come up to you and say their job is easy and meaningless to them, at least they don't have to work on a Sunday. You can say, “Well, my job has much meaning; it’s endlessly complex and rewarding, and I love working. I don't feel like I've wasted any of my life because I spend it doing what I love to do.”