jjgibo: When I was in my first year of law school, one of the best pieces of advice I got was to forget about all of my hobbies and interests and to focus on being the best lawyer I could possibly be and to get a job with the biggest, toughest firm I could. I got such a job and spent long hours at it. It made me a very good lawyer. Apart from the fact that being good at it made me actually enjoy the work, it ultimately gave me the freedom to enjoy other things. (Sitting in Oahu a bit more than two years ago, I decided to leave my firm and handle just a select few cases. Now I enjoy practicing law again...and I get to sail, fish and dive and to do so with my kid.)
Big tough firms will work you hard. Some say it is that they want to get their money's worth out of you. That's not completely true. What they want is to find out if you've got what it takes to be a partner and to someday run the firm. Remember, the current senior partners' retirements will be funded with income you generate when you are a senior partner. Thus, they want to make sure you have what it takes to be a senior partner. And, when the time comes (unless you chuck it early), you will want to make sure that your successors have what it takes, and the way to do that is to really test the kids you hire out of law school.
Right now, I will not have more than 10 open matters. That includes matters where I am hired to testify as an expert and matters where I act as a mediator for the Court of Appeal. It gives me time to enjoy life.
BTW: I'm still not ItsBruce.
