You use the word “would” in front of several of your verbs.

E.g.,
—“Plaintiff would drive 45 minutes longer for the new role.”

—“Plaintiff would contribute $100,000 to the fund.”

In each, there’s ambiguity:

Learn these today so you don’t get points off in law school:

1️⃣

In the legal world, we spell the word “judgment” without an “e.”

—> Change your Word settings so they autocorrect “judgement” to “judgment” when you type.

Three years ago, I started a pinboard to help me stay motivated.

It hangs on the wall next to where I write.

On it, I’ve collected 10 mottos.

1: Don’t compare yourself to other people. You do YOU.
2: People think about you FAR less than you believe.

📍 At this point in time

✅ “Currently” is better

*

📍 At the present time

✅ “Now” is better

Dear Legal Writer,

Back when I was drafting briefs all the time, I often faced a “this” vs. “that” dilemma:

—It came up most when I needed to describe an argument made by the other side before I could explain that the argument didn’t work.

Here are 3 examples:

1️⃣

❌ Instead of:

"For a claim of negligence to be successful, it must be shown that a duty of care existed."

A most unexpected eventuality:

My book’s just hit #1 in the “Law” category!

Now, I’m not so naive.
Nothing’s guaranteed,
The rank is just for one day.

My book came out on Amazon, but I’m panicked that no one will focus on it,

—> which will cause Amazon to bury it in their search results.

I’m just me here.
—I have no publisher or big team,
—I fear that I’m running out of steam.

But I REALLY believe the book will help so many new law students.

Kindle: https://lnkd.in/gecBqjGd

Paperback: https://lnkd.in/gJHmkWKs

Both versions will “publish” in 4 DAYS:

👉 Tues, June 25, 2024

Order TODAY to lock in promotion-week pricing!

Monkey see. Monkey do?
Take 4 sentence-snippers to the zoo:

🔪 “there are”

“Four monkeys play at the zoo today.”

—is shorter than—

“There are four monkeys playing at the zoo today.”

When I started, I didn’t even know how to “tag” someone. In fact, I didn’t even know it was called a “tag.”

I recall asking someone (who seemed non judgmental):

— “How do you make it so a person’s name lights up in blue bold so they get a notification that I mentioned them?”

I was 47, and I had no clients.

What firm wanted a 47 year-old, BigLaw burn-out with no book of business?

I felt old, useless, unemployable.

I tried to become a law professor, but that failed fast.

Dear Legal Writer,

I wanted to title a post, “do’s & don’ts.” But I had no clue how to make either word plural. So I enlisted my friend, Lindsey Lawton, to help.

Here’s what we found out:

I’m spending the weekend in a final push on the book:

going through the last round of comments from the final proofreader.

A surreal feeling suddenly came over me on this early June morning, and I thought I’d share.

It made me hate legal writing.
It made me never want to write.

Why am I telling you this?

Well, law school grades just came back.
Maybe you bombed writing, too?