When I finally finished my last Bar School exam, I was hit with a sense of incompletion. I knew that there was far more for me to do before I could officially call myself a practising barrister. With this in mind, I spent a long time thinking about what I am going to do until I get another chance to apply for a pupillage starting in 2021.
In this post I share my mindset going forward and what my plans are looking like as a not quite qualified barrister.
But first, Hot Girl Summer
The first thing I wanted to focus on was letting my hair down and enjoying the heck out of my Summer. Thanks to rapper Megan Thee Stallion, #HotGirlSummer has been in full effect and everyone has been enjoying living life at the maximum. I’ve travelled to four countries, been to the best parties and clubs and danced off all my BPTC biscuit weight.
It’s been fun just being myself and releasing the shackles of Bar school. I almost forgot how much I loved wearing cute outfits, dancing and living my best life. I’m looking forward to continuing to embrace my love of fashion, music and a bougie lifestyle. For the first time in months I am regularly getting my nails done and it’s nice to finally have the time to take care of myself. I hated how bummy I felt on the BPTC. Now I really do feel like The Chic Legal Geek™.
Internship then full-time employment
As I have mentioned in my Saturday subscriber check-in and on Instagram, I will be spending the rest of August in Cape Town completing an internship at the University of the Western Cape Legal Advice Clinic. I will be covering my time here in a travel vlog so subscribe to the BATB YouTube channel and watch it there.
I’ve also successfully landed myself a job as a paralegal for 12 months for a high profile Public law matter. It’s honestly the perfect way for me to spend my first year outside of formal education and I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity. I’m also happy that I’ll actually be making money because I was really worried about that. This experience should supercharge my pupillage applications but as I mentioned in my pupillage applications video for Law Careers Net, I will be keeping a diary of all of the different things I see and experience during my time here.
Upgrading my content creation game
Now that I am done with studying I also have the room to upgrade my content creation. I underestimated how difficult it would be to juggle BPTC alongside podcasting, video creation and growing my following on Instagram. With more time to work on these projects I am planning a lot of exciting things including regular podcast episodes, merchandise and even a book!
In case you haven’t already, follow me on Instagram (@blessingatthebar) and my personal Instagram (@blessingmukosha). I’m really focusing on producing quality content and reaching new followers so if you like what I post, then share it!
Embracing my creative side
Another thing I am excited to embrace is my creative side. I am really into music and have been writing and singing since I was a kid. I’ve been working on a lot of music for a while now and now I have more time I’ll be releasing my music towards September/October. Its fun to be creative and be able to express myself through music. For a long time I have found it stressful to share the musical side of myself because I wasn’t sure how that fit with being a barrister. I’ve let that go now and I’m having fun playing in the musical side of my brain again.
Focusing on being authentically myself
The difficulty with Bar school is that the course can feel artificial in comparison to the realities of practice/life. This can leave you feeling as if you are ‘performing’ what a barrister should be like and by the end of the course you’re exhausted and don’t feel as if you are you any more. I’ve been working through this myself (as I mentioned earlier in this post) and the remedy has been to really remind myself of who I am and what it is that makes me special, unique and happy. Having sacrificed so much of myself for the BPTC and pupillage applications, living for myself has been a refreshing experience and one that has helped lift the post-BPTC exhaustion.
Year one is covered. Year two on the otherhand…
Without trying to stress myself out, I know that at some point I will need to plan out what I intend to do with my second year post-BPTC. Whilst this may be far away, deadlines for placements such as Judicial Assistants are a year before they are due to start. This means that along with writing more pupillage applications, I will also be searching for new work. That’s definitely going to be difficult and in anticipation of this I am starting to plan out my applications now.
That’s it for now…
Now that you know what I’m working on over the next year or so it will make it that much easier for you to understand what I’m doing and support me!
Until next time,
