rainwaterspark | Incoherent thoughts

One of the reasons why I've privately decided that I'm not going to enter a law-related career when I graduate is that I have really disliked my Legal Practice Workshop class, which is supposedly the most "practical" and relevant-to-actual-legal-work class. It's ridiculous. I received an email today from a TA talking about final drafts for our briefs and when oral arguments begin and oh yeah class on Wednesday, don't forget, and my mood immediately went from "okay/happy-ish" to "horrible."

I consistently feel terrible about myself. I feel inept and incompetent and crippled by social anxiety almost every day. But it's a feeling that's part hopelessness and also part anger. It's hard to explain what it's like to simultaneously feel trapped in a mental prison but also enraged that external forces are a major factor in constructing that prison in the first place.

I've often wondered whether social anxiety counts as a kind of disability, because to me it often feels like one, albeit even more invisible than something like depression. I don't want to talk about my social anxiety with anyone because I don't trust people not to tell me that it's either "all in my head" or I just need to "get over it." I'm really f***ing tired of being told, whether implicitly or explicitly, that I am inadequate and I need to change myself. There are so many people who say "you can't expect society to cater to your needs," but those are the people whom society caters to by default and they don't know what it feels like, how utterly crushing and painful it feels to be in an environment that is actively hostile to you all the time. For once, I want society to engage me on my own terms, not the other way around.

I'm also really angry because I've held jobs before where my social anxiety wasn't a problem, or even if my boss noticed I was quiet/shy, it didn't hurt my performance. I know it's possible for me to be a productive part of the workforce. I also know that I have no problems with social anxiety when I'm working on something that I'm really excited about (see: I was editor-in-chief of a magazine during college and managed an entire staff). But every time I listen to what it's like to be a lawyer, or read job descriptions, or go to freaking LPW, I get a crippling sense of anxiety and I feel hopeless and helpless and like garbage again.