cle (continuing living education)

I’m an attorney and an active member of the State Bar of Texas.* Even though I no longer practice law, the reason I’ve never gone inactive with the state bar is that the bar exam is concentric circles of hell, and if, for some catastrophic reason, I find myself having to practice law again, I’ll be damned if I’m going to take the bar exam a second time. Because I remain an active member of the bar, this means that I have to pay a license fee every year. But it also means that I have to take continuing legal education, or CLE.

In the state of Texas, lawyers are required to do fifteen hours of CLE every year, three hours of which must be in ethics.** Normally, lawyers will take CLEs that cover the subject matter of their individual practices, but because I don’t practice anymore, I pretty much take courses in anything that interests me — business law (because that’s what I used to practice, and as an entrepreneur, it makes sense for me to know something about changes in business law), but also copyright law, entertainment law, the legal implications of artificial intelligence — whatever. The presentations are generally pretty dry, but occasionally there are some really engaging instructors, and since many of the courses are offered virtually, I can get my CLE credits completed in the comfort of my own home.

The deadline for completing CLEs varies for everyone: you have to complete your fifteen hours by the last day of your birth month, or risk having your license suspended. Since next month is my birth month, I’ve been spending a lot of time over the last couple of weeks getting my hours in. As I’ve been watching these presentations, two things struck me.

First, it’s a little alarming how many of these presentations cite the show Ted Lasso as part of their authority. I mean, I love the show as much as the next guy, but literally every presentation I’ve watched — and there have been several — has quoted the show in some form or fashion. And I have to admit that in one particular case, the attorney who chose to dress in Ted Lasso drag for her presentation was hopelessly distracting, mostly because her fake mustache was way too big for her face.

Secondly, I wondered what would happen if we were all required to take CLE courses, regardless of our professions or our work. We could call it Continuing Living Education, and instead of being about the practice of law, the courses we would take would be for updating our learning on how to be good people, good citizens to each other, good caretakers of the planet. They would be offered in person or online, and the courses would update us on the state of the world, give us ideas on how we could make our lives and communities better, and even have an ethics component. I’m not sure how we would enforce the taking of CLEs, but still, wouldn’t the world be a bit better if we could?

Maybe that’s overthinking things.

But anyway: for this week, my wish for all of us is that we see, read, or listen to something that helps inspire us to be good people, good citizens to each other, and good caretakers of the planet.*** Because when we consume good, I think we’re inspired to become good.

* This probably goes without saying, but just in case: nothing I’ve written here, or frankly, anywhere else on the internet, should be taken as legal advice.

** Folks love to rag on attorneys as being unethical, but I’d like to go on record saying that in my experience, I’ve never worked with any attorney, either in law firms or when I worked as in-house counsel, who I considered unethical. I think the main reason is that every year the code of professional responsibility is drilled into all of us lawyers, and most of us are deathly afraid of doing anything that could get us disbarred.

*** Here are some of the kinds of Continuing Living Education that I think could work: videos from scientists teaching us how we can revive Planet Earth within the next twenty years. Or explanations about how moving our bodies helps make our minds healthier. Or, since apparently citing Ted Lasso is a thing, clips from the show emphasizing ways that we should be moving through the world. Those sorts of topics. What do you think?