In All About Love, bell hooks (note that hooks intentionally does not capitalize her name) describes love as a deliberate action. Love is a verb, a thing we do, and we should do it intentionally. This is foundational for a loving ethic. Throughout her book, hooks argues how love has space in all aspects of our lives, including the workplace. In order to cultivate self-love, we need to surround ourselves with loving environments. This includes our work environment, given how work takes up a lot of our time. So, when choosing work, we must do so by living purposely, allowing us to bolster our self-esteem through a loving ethic.
hooks distinguishes between the effects of doing work we love and work we hate. Doing work we hate destroys our self-esteem, leading to lovelessness, whereas doing work we love allows our self-esteem to flourish, leading to the potential for self-love. hooks notes there is a way to bypass lovelessness in work we do not enjoy. To find satisfaction in such work, one must give their “absolute best.” Doing so gives your work purpose, leading to a greater sense of fulfilment, and ultimately the potential for self-love.
This chapter of All About Love has stuck with me. As a 1L, I am very (very, very) aware of the upcoming 2L recruit. I feel as though I have some sense of what kind of law I want to do. Probably family law, or maybe immigration—all I know is I want to do something focused on individuals. I want to have a career where I can help people and see real change in their lives. This is the kind of career that I think would allow me to live purposely in the way that bell hooks advocates for. This is work that I would love, work that would allow my self-esteem to flourish, and work that will allow me to nurture my self-love and live a loving life.
Despite this, there is still a part of me that tends to wonder if I am making the right choice. Morally, I know that I am—this is the kind of career that strongly aligns with my ethics. I know I want to do something that will allow me to help people, while still being able to do work that challenges me intellectually and allows me to pursue my interests. Yet I can’t help but look at starting salaries for other legal paths, and then glance at my bank statement and wonder if I should sacrifice what I would love for something I could maybe tolerate.
It’s not just my life that I consider in this deliberation, but my family too. I want to be able to support my parents, and one day my future children. I feel a sense of conflict between wanting to pursue a high-paying job versus doing something I’m interested in. On one end, I risk burnout and disinterest in my career, and on the other, I see myself loving my job but possibly living in debt for much longer.
hooks’ excerpts on love and work have come to me at the perfect time, helping me try and reconcile this dilemma I’ve been facing. She writes that “[w]henever possible, it is best to seek work we love and to avoid work we hate.” It is not always possible to make money off doing what you love—either you find yourself working purposely and giving it your all in a job you do not necessarily love to support what you truly love, or you luck out and get the best of both worlds. Sometimes, you find out what work you need to avoid by trying what you hate before being able to do what you love.
With this in mind, I attended a corporate networking event. I think I knew this would not change my mind, but I still wanted to see what it was like. Either I’d have a change of heart, or have my current career trajectory reinforced. On the way to the event, and throughout the night, bell hooks’ words echoed in my ears. The lawyers at the event were passionate about what they do—they love their jobs, and it certainly pays well. And yet, as they went into detail about what their work entailed, I could feel my eyes glazing over. I know that’s not my calling. I do not think this is work I could do purposely—my self-love could not flourish.
Yet I can see bell hooks’ philosophy at work here. hooks describes how the atmosphere of a workplace can be felt as soon as you walk into it. You can tell whether the people who work there love what they do or not. This was evident to me at the networking event, hearing different lawyers at different levels of seniority share their experiences. They worked purposely and their workplace had a loving ethic.
That night, I left the event unchanged regarding my future ambitions. However, I felt a sense of joy having discovered that loving ethics can be found throughout the legal field. I admit to having prejudices towards the corporate world before the event, thinking it would be hard to actually enjoy doing that work (my sincerest apologies to any genuine corporate law lovers out there reading this—I recognize and concede to my bias).
I am left feeling hopeful. I feel hopeful for my future. I know I lead a purposeful life, and everything I have done so far towards my career aligns with that. I feel hopeful that I will find a loving ethic in my career. Not only that, but I am allowing myself some naivety. I hope other law students and practicing legal professionals out there choose to live a loving ethic with their careers too. The night I went to that networking event, I could sense a loving ethic. It felt transformative. Ultimately, loving what we do is meant to support our overall life satisfaction, cultivated through our self-love. Given stories of burnout in law, I hope we are all able to listen to bell hooks and seek the work we love. I know I will.
