Nurturing Wellness for a Healthier Legal Community
Our Mission
Recognize and Acknowledge that the legal profession faces problematic, disproportionate rates of stress, anxiety, depression, substance abuse and suicide. As lawyers, we bear unique responsibilities and carry significant weight for our clients and for society. Deadline driven, high-stakes, intellectual, competitive, and adversarial, the wins are big, and the losses hit even bigger. Wellness Jurist seeks to normalize the fact that lawyers are profoundly affected by mental health struggles, for good reasons.
Provide Proven Tools & Resources for individuals and law firms to reduce burnout, problematic rates of stress, substance abuse, and suicide. Wellness Jurist is partnered with psychologists, psychiatrists, practicing lawyers, meditation teachers, yoga teachers, life coaches, and medical providers who have scientifically-based, healthy coping strategies for high achieving lawyers.
Build Safe Spaces Within the Legal Community. With the recognition that we lawyers are human, Wellness Jurist seeks to build safe spaces for personal growth, professional growth, and community. It is incredible how being able to simply express pain and realizing that other lawyers in the community struggle with similar issues can provide the comfort and fuel that we need to go back to focusing on our work.
The Stats
A 2016 study conducted by the American Bar Association revealed that lawyers are statistically more likely to experience mental health distress, including depression, anxiety, and stress that can lead to problematic levels of substance abuse. It is no surprise, given the fast-paced, high pressure environments of law school, law firms, and managing client expectations. What is a surprise is that lawyers are less likely to seek help for our problems.
Couple the pressures of our profession with the recent COVID-19 pandemic, where we as a society have become increasingly more isolated and lonely, there is no doubt that raising awareness about attorney mental health and wellness and finding real solutions is vital to our profession.
Founder Betty Nguyen Davis.
How Wellness Jurist Was Born
As a practicing lawyer, mother, and owner of The Davis Injury Firm, I know how the everyday pressures of life in the law can lead to stress, anxiety, and burnout. As I entered into my 40s and had been practicing law for almost twenty years, I became increasingly mindful about how I managed (or failed to manage) stress and coped and reacted to stress in unhealthy ways. Often, I wasn’t even aware that stress or anxiety was affecting me because I failed to acknowledge it, thinking that if I ignored it, it would go away.
I did not begin my wellness journey intentionally. Yoga was my gateway into learning about breathing, meditation, and mindfulness, and only because I could not do my usual hardcore workouts while I was pregnant with my children. Before that, I always thought yoga was slow and boring. I started small but later found hot, power vinyasa flow yoga was actually also a good work out, and it taught me the value of slowing down, noticing my breath, and practice letting go of what did not serve me. That led me to a meditation “lite” practice, which taught me how to recognize physical and emotional signs of stress and anxiety.
In my search for sanity and wellness, I met other people who were facing similar life challenges and seeking similar life changes. During my journey, I have discovered useful tools and information that I want to share with my colleagues and friends. Wellness Jurist was born out of my desire to share what I have learned.
Wellness Jurist’s mission is to raise awareness about lawyer mental health and wellbeing and give lawyers and law firms the tools and resources to successfully manage and reduce stress and burnout, and build a supportive community for lawyers, all for the betterment of our profession.
