The special insights that I learned from attending the Inner Temple's webinar

 

Ladies & Gentlemen, let me present to you the United Kingdom's 4 Inns of the Court with their magnificent emblems!

At 1 am in Philippine time, I managed to attend the webinar on "How to become a Barrister?" which was hosted by the Inner Temple in London.

If you asked me, what makes me attend the webinar. Well, I myself doesn't intend to work as a Barrister knowing that my finances, resources and status are not eligible enough to make me apply but I am seeking for some new perspectives and insights from the panelists who are barristers and here are the things that I learned from them.

First is have self-compassion and resilience because there are times that the tasks at the inn are too stressful and also even for those who are doing pupillage which makes some people push themselves too hard and for some, they might feel they might not be good enough. Self-compassion is all about despite of some limitations and flaws, you know how to bounce back by appreciating who you are, your capabilities and strengths and you keep doing your best until you achieve your goals while resilience is all about keeping yourself strong in amidst of setbacks. Self-compassion & resilience helps you in moving forward in your life and these are the things that must learn and serve as a reminder when feeling down.

What's surprising enough is if you heard some stereotypes for lawyers that they are acting big shots but these group of barristers are the opposite. They are humble and came from small beginnings. In the session, there are four panelists and one of them is the host. They came from the different Inns of the Court. None of them got a legal background even from their family and friends. 
Starting from the host, she came from a family of teachers but the passion of becoming one is there, then the first panelist is a blind barrister with the non-British background at first, it was a challenge because of his disability and his first language is not English but his friends and the determination to help people, he manage to get where he is and for the second one is a writer but her friends saw her potential to try becoming a Barrister and she goes with the flow to see how it goes and during the process she was able to see her forte and even though some challenges came but she also managed to pull it through then the next Barrister, started working on a Supermarket then later on he sees his potential in sales then later he decides to work as a Barrister, there was a point in his life that he face depression but through the help of his support people, he was able to overcome his depression and find meaning of his work. He encourages everyone that when experiencing mental health issues, do not be afraid to seek help from your loved ones that whom you can trust and mental health professionals and for the last Barrister, he got a medical background and, but he decided to be a Barrister and has a Litigation specialization.

From there, we can see that whatever challenge they faced they don't de-select themselves and they continued to pursue their career as a Barrister and what makes them have this strong resolve is their passion to serve people. They also know how to do Self-care and seek help from people when necessary.

Another interesting, that I learned is the importance of mooting and public speaking to develop your Advocacy skills. Advocacy skills is very important as Barrister if you are protecting people for good causes. Mooting helps you organize your thoughts, improves your research skills, be logical and make good arguments. It is like Martial Arts that you have to put into good use. I do feel that Barristers have to be impartial in handling cases.

Then the last interesting part that I discovered and learned in the session is, it would be great if the applicant has a care background. People skills/Soft skills are being emphasized. They are interested with those applicants who can share their experiences when to persuade people and act calm on a pressured situation. There is one applicant who shares a story on persuading and calming a child and they love it! The thing is, you don't need to have a grand story or background to convince someone but what these Barristers need is someone how to make use the prior skills in line with the profession that they are trying to be in. They simply preferred honesty, clear and be humble. These things are more endearing than simply bragging about your qualifications and backgrounds but on simple things and tough situations, you can't deliver and not a problem solver.

So, from this session, it completely changes the way I see them and if you wanted to achieve on something believe on it and do your best to reach your goal and know how to balance yourself emotionally, mentally, practically through time, resources and finances and spiritually and have a strong purpose and resolve to protect people.

This concludes my experience of attending the Inner Temple's session on "How to become a Barrister and we learn beautiful insights from it and apply it as we try to pursue the career we are dreaming of or even igniting a dream of becoming a Barrister ourselves.