0:00:05.4 S1: Welcome to the Lgal Learning Podcast. I’m Jolene, your host, with the Legal Learning Center, I help pre-law students and law students with their legal journey. Today’s guest is Angela Han, founder of the Fit to Practice Society. She’s a full-time attorney, a Mom and coach, and has a very practical approach to mental health. I’ll give you my top takeaways, but first, a quick word from our sponsor, Financially Free Aspiring Attorneys is a course with over $300,000 in money saving tips. If you wanna go to law school, but I don’t wanna pay for it. Visit legallearningcenter.com./Financially-free. For more information on how you can avoid law loans.
0:00:52.5 S2: My name is Angela Han, I am, during the day I’m in-house council at a healthcare company in the Baltimore area, and I also am a health coach for lawyers, and from that I have started the Fit to Practice Podcast and have created the Fit to Practice Society where we come together as a community all across the country and across the globe, where we come together and work out Yoga, fireside chats and really grow together. So the Fit to Practice Society itself, we have workouts on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, and then on Saturdays we have yoga, and then on Wednesdays, every other Wednesday, we have fireside chats with people that we are inspired by, so that we can… Because I think that right now with the pandemic, there is a lot going on and we kind of are looking for some clarity and purpose and direction, and for me, I was able to find that through finding a community of people that I look up to, and so that is really the kind of main goal of the society.
0:01:51.6 S1: That’s great, because I know that for myself, I’ve let exercise kinda fall off the chart in the pandemic, I think the first month or so, I was planning to get back to normalcy, so I kept up my exercise routine, and then when it became clear we were just gonna be sitting at home for quite a while, it started to fall apart, so it’s great that you’re offering something for people to do just about every other day of the week, so that they can have somewhere to go and be with people… Now, are you finding that most of the people who join you are attorneys?
0:02:25.8 S2: Yes, most of them are ’cause primarily, my audience is primarily lawyers, because I understand being a lawyer at best, I’m not gonna presume to understand what it’s like to be any other profession, I was a teacher before law school, but right now I’m most in touch with being a lawyer.
0:02:43.6 S1: So what type of exercises do you guys do, is there a range? Or does it focus?
0:02:49.3 S2: It’s really mostly kind of a high interval intensity and our yoga training, but at the same time, it’s not as intense as we think it is because a lot of the times we get intimidated by high intensity interval training. But the thing is, if we do it together with a community of people that we feel safe around, the time passes pretty quickly.
0:03:17.8 S1: So how long are these sessions…
S2: Half hour.
S1: That’s so great. I find it motivating 20-30 minutes. I think it’s just so much more motivating than an hour.
S2: Exactly, exactly.
S1: I think the phrase that you use on your site was getting into mental health through physical health, something like that. Is that right?
S2: That was true. Yeah, yeah,
S1: I love that because I think a lot of people focus on their physical health for their physical health, and not for their mental health, but I think the pandemic has shown a lot of us that physical health is really mental health, they are very intertwined. Did you have any type of training or how did you kinda stumble across that thought process and this whole thing…
0:04:07.3 S2: So with physical training, I graduated from law school, and then I got certified as soon as I passed the bar, and then I kinda just walked into the nearest gym and said, Hey, I just got certified, I need some on-the job experience to be a good trainer, and so then they accepted me after I badgered them for two months, and then I got some great experience, learned a lot about how to be a personal trainer, and then I had to move away from the city, and so I didn’t have any gyms near me… And so I had to put up my own shingle and create my own business and start training people online.
0:04:43.6 S1: So were you training online even before the pandemic?
0:04:46.6 S2: Yeah. Even before, because I didn’t have the bandwidth to travel from one place to the other, ’cause a lot of people wanted it within their homes to be able to work out, and instead of them traveling to me or me traveling to them… I was fully online.
0:05:01.4 S1: That’s great because that’s also something you could do depending on where you work, in your office as well, I mean, you don’t have to go home if you’re in between morning and afternoon sessions at court, you could just do a little bit… You don’t have to get all sweaty really, But do a little work. Have you had any of your clients tell you that they have noticed mental improvements through regular physical exercise.
0:05:28.9 S2: Oh yeah, definitely. And then… That’s why they keep coming back.
0:05:34.5 S1: This also seems like something doable for law students as well, their schedule is so tight, but a half hour, a few days a week, and that’s during their lunch hour as well, it sounds just so doable for so many people… Now, I saw, first of all, all your posts on LinedIn are inspirational… I love them. I was going through them and they’re just like… That’s a good thought. Oh, that’s just so inspiring. Is there a way that you kind of make that happen or…
0:06:04.7 S2: It really took a while for me to get any sort of traction, I think I started about two years ago on LinkedIn, and I didn’t really get any traction whatsoever for a year… I remember this one time I posted in my very first video and I had zero engagement whatsoever, and so I thought maybe I’ve thought so many times in my head, maybe my ideas are just not just not good enough, but I kept pushing without trying to be too attached to the outcome, and I try to really observe what was resonating, what was not, and so then that kinda helped me find my voice. I also try to listen a little bit more to my ideal audience, what their thoughts are, how they are talking, and how they are writing, and what is their experience right now and their mental and physical and professional health, and so then that kind of inform my voice as well, so it’s not just my voice or somebody else’s voice it is really a combination of all of our thoughts and actions and feelings
0:07:12.3 S1: That really does come through in your posts, because definitely it’s stuff that I feel or I feel like the people around me feel. Even if it’s not directly something I have felt I relate to it in a more generic sense. So yeah, so definitely you mentioned something that I think is important to point out too, ’cause it’s been hovering, but we didn’t exactly say it, which is when you have good physical health or work towards it, it doesn’t just affect your mental health, it affects your professional health too, I know for me, I play normally competitive soccer, so that’s my one hour of pure exercise, brain-less ness. It’s all about the ball. There’s nothing else going on. I don’t worry about the trial tomorrow, I don’t worry about this snarky thing opposing counsel said to me today, or the complaining of the clients, it’s just my me time, me and the ball, and that really helps me obviously running for the ball, physical, and being able to clear my mind as mental, but also just being able to get through those professional problems, it really does help me professionally as well.
0:08:18.6 S2: In my work as a health coach, my number one priority is mental health, and then I think underneath that there’s physical health and there’s professional health, and then it kind of feeds into the mental health and mental health also branches out to those two areas too, and so with physical health, I think that, Yeah, with food and exercise, the basic things, and also just our mentality around it without feeling like because it’s physical activity it need to yield physical results, like with loss or fat loss or whatever it is, and so I think getting outside of the mentality where our bodies are already great at what it does, and so it’s already great at detoxing. We don’t need any extra detox cleansing or whatever it is, because our bodies are already good at it, and so once we realize that our bodies are excellent at not only processing everything internally, but also telling us what we need, whether it’s exercise, food or sleep, and then accepting that and then using exercise a way to manifest the power that we already have in our bodies, and that is able to kind of feed into both our physical and mental health, whereas with professional health, as I was kind of saying earlier, is that right now, especially with us being stuck at home, or we get to be a home, there are so many thoughts that we have and so many changes that we have to deal with, so many adjustments, and so we’re kind of re-framing What’s going on, trying to adjust our direction, what should I do, should I get a new career? Should I start a business? A podcast.
0:09:51.5 S2: And so with all of these options and opportunities that are out there, we want to feel fulfilled, not just in our work, but also what’s going on outside of those hours, and so when we try to address the professional health where we are feeling fulfilled, 24/7 not just eight hours of a day, then that also feeds for mental health, and it’s kind of like an ongoing cycle.
0:10:14.6 S1: I love everything you just said, and I think that for most people, their first approach to improving themselves or feeling better usually goes more towards the physical or even professional versus the mental health, a lot of people even resist the mental health or they don’t know what to do with it. So I love your approach where it’s like, Let’s work on your physical, let’s work on your professional, and it helps the mental… And so that way people don’t… For those who don’t, I don’t know, wanna discuss their mental health, they don’t have to… It’s almost like secondary. And then for those who don’t mind talking about their mental health, but they’re just not sure where to start, what to do, or maybe they’ve tried other things that don’t work, this is hands-on practical that you can do, and it’s incremental, half an hour, a couple of times a week, that kind of thing. And then they can check it, is my mental health feeling better? So I love this ’cause most people really gravitate towards practical, and that mental health gets brushed aside and left behind and not treated equally to the other parts.
0:11:19.4 S1: It seems like with your program, it doesn’t even have to technically be head-on addressed, it’ll flow into the package.
S2: Right, exactly.
S1:I know you said you do have a podcast, so what’s the name of your podcast?
S2: It’s called Fit to Practice.
S1: And what type of subject matter do you cover?
0:11:36.4 S2: So I interview attorneys who talk about what it means to be fit to practice and how their own unique journeys have informed the way they practice law.
0:11:47.2 S1: Yeah, I love the interviews, the people you interview are just a wealth of information and they have really useful tips and just… Yeah, they’re very inspirational. I love your podcast.
S2: Thank you so much.
S1: Now, I know on your LinkedIn “about” page, you said, “I help you get from, I don’t know to I know to I’m doing the work, to I’m living the life”. When we think about our dreams again, such a vague thing is kind of that mental health thing. It’s a vague thing. How do I get there? How can I attack it practically? And I love this, I don’t know how to get to my dream. Okay, I know what my dream is and how to get there. Now I’m doing the work to get there. And now I’m there is so great. What a great concept.
S2: Thank you,
S1: just again, and it probably comes from being a lawyer, you have it down to a science on, let’s get it so that you understand my argument, you can live your dream, taking something so big and making it so specific is just, I think, so helpful.
0:12:55.7 S1: Can you give me an example of maybe some way that you help someone get from, I don’t know, to the… I’m living the life.
0:13:03.3 S2: Yeah, a lot of the clients that I work with, they are in one of those spaces, either in stage one or two or three, and so with people who are in the, I don’t know phase, I help them get those answers by asking the right questions, because a lot of the times when you’re at the I don’t know phase, then we rely on all kinds of external things, whether it’s courses, books, podcast, certifications, whatever it is, we try to pack all our knowledge on paper, but then the reality is the answer to actually what we want to do, and what we are able to offer is already within us, and it takes the right questions to draw it out of us, as in functions were things on things that we don’t wanna talk about, being challenged on concepts that have been in our minds for so long and really kind of opening up that bucket or led or whatever that allows us to say, Oh my gosh, that was there all along, and all I needed to do was this is I helped them come to that idea and that… I don’t know. Stage, I know stage, I think the biggest problem there is going from I know to taking the action, because if you wanna stay and just…
0:14:28.1 S2: I know, then you’re gonna kinda sit there and be like, Oh yeah, I know so much, like I know so much, and I have all this to prove that I know this much, but at the end of the day, you kinda start feeling a little bit empty because you’re like, I know this, but what are my silos to do with this? I know that I want to be… I know I want to start a business, where do I even start? And do I need to do this, this, and this, and this? It’s just so overwhelming. And so at that stage I help them break down the practical steps, and as they’re taking those steps, I help them address the fear so that once they take action, it’s inspired action and it’s fulfilling action, so that it continues the momentum. So they get to that next stage where they are living that life.
0:15:20.5 S1: That’s great, and that’s all through one-on-one counseling…
0:15:23.2 S2: Yes. Right now it’s just 1 on 1. Yep.
0:15:25.4 S1: Okay, now, how long does it usually take somebody to get from… I don’t know to… I’m living the life.
0:15:30.5 S2: So it really depends on the person, but I can tell you the possibility is that you can do it in an instant, because if you are open to being coached, if you are committed to getting from point A to point B, then you will make that jump instantly because the reality is, we have so much going on and we can either decide, I am, I’m drown because of all of this, or I am thriving because of all of this. And so the key question to ask there is, whatever is happening, how can I make this the best thing that ever happened to me? How can I make this work in my favor? And once you start asking that question, you get from point A to point B in an instant, and then you start shifting, not just your mind, but the way you approach things, the way you talk to people, and the way you spend your hours, and the way you delegate and spend your money and your energy on whatever it is that you wanna spend on…
0:16:29.0 S1: Do you find that the people who are looking for this kind of help, or again, tend to be lawyers who are trying to shift gears a bit, or is it just anybody
0:16:38.1 S2: Right now, only because I’ve been talking mostly to lawyers, they’re all either lawyers or have been in the legal industry, or currently in the legal industry, but I’m not gonna reject anyone, it’s not based on their profession, I will reject people who are not ready, but I won’t reject people because of their profession.
0:16:58.3 S1: Can you tell us a little bit about how you balance everything, ’cause between being a full-time lawyer and then having this business and having a child, it’s just a lot of work, it sounds like… How do you make that balance?
0:17:11.9 S2: Number one, I would encourage anybody who feels like they’re out of time to take a closer look at how they’re spending it, because we can always optimize it even better. Number two is I can always create more time, I can always buy more time so that I have more than 24 hours. And the way to do that is to hire. And so what… In order to know who to hire, we have to first know what are the things that only I can do, like for example, I’m… In this interview with you, I can’t outsource this to somebody else, so what are the things that I can outsource, like managing my calendar, for example, or managing the administrative parts of my business and following up with certain people or whatever that might be, and so those things it does take a lot of training on the front end with the people that you’re outsourcing it to Or delegating to, but really in the long term, it frees up so much time and helps you let go of the things that are not… Things that only you can do, and it makes you really, really, really think about your zone of genius and the way only you can contribute to the people around you.
0:18:23.0 S1: That makes a lot of sense, because I think to outsource… And we don’t realize it. At points, we may hire a maid right, or we may hire… There’s people who walk your dog, pick up the dog poop, that kind of thing, you mow your lawn, whatever your gardener. So we do outsource because we don’t have time for everything… Yeah, we can create more than 24 hours in a day. At first, I had no idea what you were talking about. But it’s true, I already do that, so yes. Now, do you find that your society, the people in there are actually making connections with each other… Yeah.
0:18:52.8 S2: I mean, to the best of my knowledge, they almost kind of immediately connect with one another if they don’t already know each other, and then I have a system on Slack where you have to share your LinkedIn profile and you have to connect with at least one other person?
0:19:07.4 S1: That’s great. I think the more you talk to people that you didn’t previously know, the better you learn so much… I know I just met you in the last year, and just watching again, your inspirational posts, but just also watching and hearing more people talk about the exercise routines that they’re doing with you, it really is just uplifting. It’s nice to hear, it’s odd, but it’s nice to hear that other people are exercising, that kind of thing, it’s nice to hear that people are taking care of themselves, and it’s also inspiring too, when I’m feeling lazy… Okay, they all did it. I can do it too. Let’s just get out there and do a few things on.
Okay, do you have any tips for students who are just starting law school, so their schedule is highly impacted, I know you’ve got your lunch time, exercise, any other tips that you can recommend for law students who are just starting out, who are probably going to just drop everything, right? How to maintain some of that physical and mental health.
0:20:05.9 S2: Yeah, I think that the last thing that law students need is any more guilt or shame for whatever that they’re doing. I think that when I was in my 1L year, I just remember feeling like, How do I even read a case, or how do I even answer this question, how do I use office hours to my advantage? And I was just kind of blindly going in not having a single idea what to do, and so I think that what I would have done in my 1L year is to hire or at least work with or be part of a community, somehow somehow hold yourself accountable to the action that you wanna take and get some clarity and direction on how to really maximize your mental health and also your potential and in your career. For your first year in law school. So I would hire people like Jolene or ask for help from people like Jolene be like, Hey, I just started law school at… Yeah, I’m working out. Yeah, I’m doing less, that’s not helping me… I’m not helping me what I really need is direction, what I really need is like to figure out how do I even study for my exams, so more than me and what I can offer, I would really direct them to you, you didn’t ask me to say that…
0:21:37.1 S1: Okay, by me.
S2: But I really, if I were in my 1L year, I wish I was on LinkedIn at the time, or at least I’d have done some sort of Google search where I felt like, Okay, I don’t wanna feel like the dumbest person in the room. So that’s what… That’s my advice.
0:21:55.9 S1: A great advice because there’s actually… And I have another episode where I discussed with my guests, yeah, how do people avoid adding any extra pressure of failure of they’re doing things wrong or whatever, ’cause you really need to focus on your studies and not feel like a failure in any other way, so… Okay, I didn’t exercise today, I suck on that kind of thing, you need to eliminate that, and whether that means eliminating exercise, I don’t know that that’s always an individualized conversation there, but overall, if you exercise once a week or once every other week… Okay, great. Take it as a win, not a loss, that I didn’t do it three times a week, and it’s really hard, you have to shift your mentality before you start 1L year because you need to remember your focus is your education, and there’s no flexibility. You can’t just drop a class like you can in college, so you need to just remember, you’re there for your studies and that’s your primary goal, but in general, yeah, physical health helps your mental health helps your studying, so again, without bringing you down, let’s try to maintain but ultimately, you gotta let that guilt and that shame go, you can’t add to your plate, especially first semester.
0:23:13.7 S1: Alright, well, thank you so much for joining me today, Angela, I really appreciate.
before we get into my top takeaways, a quick word from our sponsor, Juno. Now, if you need to take out student loans, check in with Juno first, judo can often offer law students one to 2% less on their interest rates for their student loans below government loans, not only with no cost to the student, but often times cash back as well visit joinjuno.com/p/legallearningcenter for more information.
So my top takeaways from this chat with Angela. Angela is almost like a mathematician, she created formulas for the two things she does outside of her day job as an attorney, she helps people turn their dreams into a reality with very easy to understand steps to take a nebulus subject, and make it concrete. And then likewise, she’s developed the system to improve mental health through physical health. I think people put off their mental health needs much more than they do their physical needs, and we’re bad enough with that, so tricking people basically into mental health with practical steps that involve physical focus makes mental improvement available to so many more people. And to gain attention to her posts on LinkedIn, she looked at what was resonating with the people that she wanted to connect with, she then took that and made it her own, she applied herself to that, this made her feel good and it made her ideal connections feel good. 0:24:48.1 S1: So try this next time that you’re posting something and tag me while you’re at it, I’d love to see what you’re up to, and I’ll definitely comment If you do tag me, and then I’ll go ahead and bring you on into my circle of influence as well. Now, all tips, links and so forth will be available in the show notes, a full transcript is available at legallearningcenter.com/fittopractice, and be sure to check in next week when we speak with Jessica Madina, who is an attorney turned financial coach. She’s going to share with us how her law experience helps her clients and how she can help you, and if you learn something today, please like share, comment, subscribe, that just makes the show more visible so that those who need it can see it. Thanks.
Although this is Episode 1 of the Self Care series, be sure to check out Episodes 1-3 where people who left the law share how they have benefitted from really acknowledging when they were not on the right path. Episode 1: Meagan – Leaving the Law After 1L Year; http://legallearningcenter.com/denise; Episode 3 – Leaving the Law in Less than 5 Years
