Let's Talk Stress: Five Tips in Keeping Physically and Mentally Fit!

Libby Wilkins

Diversity & Wellbeing Subcommittee Member

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“It’s a marathon, not a sprint.”

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We’ve all heard it. This ‘well-utilised’ statement is typically offered by our superiors to remind us to pace ourselves in our study habits, particularly in the early days when we’re finding our feet.

While many of us would agree that ‘sprinting’ early on in our studies can result in heightened fatigue, a sense of overwhelm, and loss of motivation (i.e., burnout!)[1], running a ‘marathon’ isn’t any ‘walk in the park’.

So, how do we go about this? How can we make our law journey more maintainable on this long and arduous path?

The answer… maintaining our physical and mental wellbeing!

This is probably another piece of advice you’ve heard before… but it actually holds significant weight (stay with me here)! Australian and International data has found that there is a clear correlation between poor self-care and heightened psychological distress amongst uni students.[2] So, keeping a fit and healthy body must promote improved mental health.

Let’s get physical and strive for better mental and physiological fitness. Here are my top five self-care tips:

(1) Get Moving

As cliché as it is, staying physically active is the key to optimal self-wellbeing. It doesn’t need to be a pumping HIIT workout. It can be as simple as going on a brisk 30-minute walk. Personally, I find that getting up bright and early each day for an hour-long walk is idyllic. Walking in the morning sun helps improve brain health and gives you that natural boost of energy.[3] Plus, a regular walking routine can help set your natural circadian rhythm (that is, setting a sleep pattern). [4]

(2) Socialise

Having our own space is important (trust me, as a secret introvert I get it). But, staying connected and communicating with other people is also essential in maintaining mental wellness. Staying connected doesn’t require you to do anything grand. It can be as simple as grabbing a coffee with a friend, giving your relatives a call, or even going along to one of the UQLS’ many social events. Start making those connections NOW!

(3) Eating well (and eating good)

While we all know that maintaining a nutritious diet is key to optimal physical health, enjoying your favourite foods is also important. I find that the 80/20 method is perfect in staying physically fit, whilst also giving myself the opportunity to splurge on my favourite treats. With ANZAC Day just past, try out my spin on the Day’s classic – chewy ANZAC biscuits with choc-chips. PSA – for my international friends, ANZAC Day is where Australian and New Zealanders commemorate our fallen servicemen and recognise our armed forces. Try them out!

(4) Sleep

I cannot stress this enough. Sleep should definitely be up on your priority list. Whilst getting good sleep won’t necessarily give you more ‘awake’ time, it does give you far better use of the ‘awake’ time that you actually have.[5] I recommend going to bed at a reasonable hour (no later than 10pm), setting a consistent sleep schedule (hint: go on an early morning walk – see Tip 1!), and be firm with your priorities – your seminar prep can certainly wait until the morning.

(5) Breathe

Sit straight. Close your eyes and start focussing on your breathing. Feel the air come in through your nose and out through your mouth. Inhale for 4 seconds through your nose, feeling your ribs expand. Hold for 7 seconds. Then exhale out through your mouth for 8. Repeat 10 times.

Doing this simple exercise just once a day can make a world of difference. It might sound silly, but observing your breathing can relieve stress and open your body to a more mindful lifestyle.[6]

We all share the same one goal – we want to get through law school. Let’s get through this ‘marathon’ the best way we can.

You’ve got this!

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[1] ‘How Much Studying Is Too Much: Effects Of Overstudying & How To Prevent It’, Scholars (Web Page, 24 January 2024) <https://www.scholarsed.com/effects-of-overstudying/>.

[2] Vivienne Browne, Jonathan Munro, Jeremy Cass, ‘The Mental Health of Australian University Students’ (2005) 50 Journal of the Australian and New Zealand Student Services Association 51, 51.

[3] ‘9 health benefits of a morning walk’, IRT (Web Page, 20 July 2022) < https://www.irt.org.au/the-good-life/9-health-benefits-of-a-morning-walk/>.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Andrew Ayers, ‘Prioritize Sleep: A Good Way To Make Sure You Stay Healthy’, Andrew M Ayers (Web Page) <https://www.andrewmayers.com/blog/prioritize-sleep-a-good-way-to-make-sure-you-stay-healthy-.cfm#:~:text=As%20they%20point%20out%2C%20%E2%80%9CGetting,to%20blue%20light%20at%20night>.

[6] ‘Breath meditation: A great way to relieve stress’, Harvard Health Publishing (Web Page, 15 April 2014) <https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/breath-meditation-a-great-way-to-relieve-stress>.

5 People with Law Degrees Who Have Taken or Created an Unconventional Path

by Imogen Price

UQLS Diversity & Wellbeing Subcommittee Member

1.   Mahatma Gandhi – independence leader and activist

Indian Independence and spiritual leader, Gandhi, continues to inspire peaceful resistance and religious tolerance as a renowned advocate of non-violent protest. After studying Law in London and attempting to practice in India, Gandhi developed his early activist skills in South Africa where he lived for over 20 years.[1] Gaining the title Mahatma, ‘great soul’, and having his birthday celebrated as the International Day of Non-Violence, Gandhi’s legal work in South Africa, political works with the Indian National Congress and simultaneous activism is an exemplary model for using your legal studies to impart meaningful change. His expectations of the legal systems and their consequential shortcomings led Gandhi to a life of peaceful civil disobedience, “an expression of one’s highest respect for the law.”[2]

2.   Rebel Wilson – writer, producer and actress

For Wilson, she knew she wanted to be on the big screen, but in such a competitive and volatile industry, she had to have a fallback – that was her Arts/Law degree. Despite the obscene 4am-9:30pm days she spent at uni whilst balancing her TV career, Wilson was determined to finish her degree. Her legal skills have proved invaluable in her dealings with film industry being the first Australian Actor to maintain the intellectual property rights to her characters on an SBS show, conducting the DVD distribution of her first TV show, dealing with her own contracts and winning arbitration matters on movie classifications.[3] Without her law degree, Wilson’s acting career could have looked vastly different.

3.   Mario Ancic – tennis player

Once world no.7 forced into retirement due to the implications of his battle with mononucleosis, now finance lawyer.[4] Ancic was heading towards his career peak before injury ended his tennis career and began his legal career, initially at the University of Split, Croatia, and later at Columbia University. Merging his two paths, Ancic wrote his thesis on the organisation of the ATP Tour and researched doping in professional tennis at Harvard.[5] Ancic now works in private equity law in New York City, entirely reinventing himself in the law beyond his sporting background.

4.   Nelson Mandela – activist and politician

South Africa’s first democratically elected President studied initially at the University of South Africa Law School and is remembered as one of the most influential activists in history. Mandela was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his anti-apartheid work after spending 27 years in prison for his advocacy against, and resistance to the National Party of South Africa and their enforcement of racial segregation.[6] By using his law degree to combine human rights and politics, Mandela was a force for meaningful change.

5.   Annabell Crabb – journalist and author

Political Journalist, Annabel Crabb, is one of Australia’s most recognisable TV and news personalities who has covered Australian politics for over 25 years. Training to be a journalist after studying law but never practicing, Crabb employed her legal knowledge of the government and our democratic systems to commentate on numerous elections, the inner workings of parliament, party relations and gender in the public sphere among other things.[7] She remains a key political personality in Australian media.

Sources

[1] “Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.” All Voices of Partition people, British Library. Accessed 16 Oct 2023.

[2] DiSalvo, Charles R.. “M. K. Gandhi, Attorney at Law: The Man Before the Mahatma”. University of California Press, 2013. ProQuest Ebook Central, <https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uql/detail.action?docID=1375716>.

[3] “Exam rituals, sleeping in the library, and countless parking tickets: Rebel Wilson reflects on her time at UNSW.” UNSW Alumni & Giving – News, < https://www.alumni.giving.unsw.edu.au/news-events/news/exam-rituals-sleeping-library-and-countless-parking-tickets-rebel-wilson-reflects>.

[4] Sinha, Smriti. “From the tennis court to the court of law: Mario Ancic's new career.” Sports Illustrated, 15 Aug 2014, <https://www.si.com/tennis/2014/08/15/mario-ancic-columbia-law-student>.

[5] Lattman, Peter. “Former Tennis Star Makes a Mark at Columbia Law School.” The New York Times, 7 Sep 2012, <https://archive.nytimes.com/dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/09/07/former-tennis-star-makes-a-mark-at-columbia-law-school/>.

[6] “Nelson Mandela – Biographical”. NobelPrize.org, Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2023. 15 Oct 2023, <https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1993/mandela/biographical/>.

[7] “Annabel Crabb starts with 'The Advertiser' in Adelaide to cook up stylish commentary on Australian politics.” Adelaide AZ, <https://adelaideaz.com/articles/annabel-crabb-goes-from--the-advertiser--in-adelaide-to-cook-up-commentary-of-australian-politics-with-style>.

“Different legal systems, same story”: A Short Analysis of How Many More Women? by Jennifer Robinson and Keina Yoshida

By Phoebe Smith

UQLS Diversity & Wellbeing Subcommittee Member

“Different legal systems, same story”. This quote from Shiori Ito summarises Jennifer Robinson and Keina Yoshida’s exploration of an international trend of silencing women through the law. The authors trace a pattern of increasing use of legal action to ‘silence’ women as the number of women speaking out against gender-based violence has increased following the MeToo movement. They frame their analysis in terms of an international ‘playbook’ used by powerful, wealthy men to silence women. The law, in various forms, is a crucial component of this silencing.

This ‘legal silencing’ occurs across multiple legal areas, including criminal law, but Robinson and Yoshida primarily focus on defamation and contract. These topics are central to our legal system, and our legal education. UQ law students are exposed to contract and tort in the first years of their undergraduate studies. Therefore, the issues analysed by Robinson and Yoshida are not merely peripheral to our understanding of the law, but form an integral part of our legal system.

A Legal ‘Double-Bind’

The phrase ‘double-bind’ is used, particularly within feminist literature, to describe the situations in which women have very few options, and all of them have negative effects. In this book, it takes the form of women who have faced gender-based violence experiencing negative outcomes in both criminal and civil areas of law. Women who choose to pursue sexual assault and rape cases through the law often face adverse outcomes. In Australia, only 1.5% of reported sexual assault cases result in a conviction and this statistic does not account for the majority of cases that are not reported. Even for those who reach a conviction, the criminal process can be difficult, long and re-traumatising. Having failed to receive a satisfying outcome from the criminal justice system, where can these women turn to? In the wake of the MeToo movement, an increasing number of women are choosing to share their story publicly. In some cases, such as for Eryn Jean Norvill, these stories are shared by journalists without explicit permission. Either way, this publication exposes women to the second half of the double-bind: defamation claims.

Defamation: Her Truth vs. His Reputation

Throughout the book Robinson and Yoshida frame defamation claims in terms of the competing rights involved. Is the law effectively balancing a women’s right to speak with a man’s right to reputation? According to Robinson and Yoshida, the answer is overwhelmingly no. However, even before there are any defamation proceedings, defamation law still presents as an obstacle to women’s speech. Defamation laws across the world often deter journalists from publishing women’s stories of assault or rape in fear that they will then be exposed to the costs of defamation proceedings. Alternatively, women posting on social media about assault or rape may be totally unaware that these actions may be defamatory. A litany of new issues arises when defamation claims are actually made. The nature of defamation means that individual women may not even be a party to the defamation proceedings in which her story is put through a legal standard of proof. Depending on the nature of the publication, a media outlet or other third parties such as friends, families and activists may be sued instead of, or as well as, the women who actually experienced gender-based violence. Robinson and Yoshida are able to weave together stories and experiences from across jurisdictions to deeply analyse these issues. The resulting picture is one that portrays a world-wide trend of the struggles women face within defamation law while attempting to tell their truth about gender-based violence.

Contract and NDA’s: ‘Rich Man’s Justice’

In Chapter 5, Robinson and Yoshida question why it took decades for the allegations against Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, and Bill Cosby to become public. In doing so they expose the systemic use of non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) as a tool to protect powerful men and silence the experiences of women. One of the most alarming things to read was that a lot of NDAs include clauses that purport to limit the ability to report criminal offences to police. These clauses are unenforceable before the courts, but that does not prevent women without access to adequate legal advice from being scared about reporting their assault or rape. A similar issue is circumstances in which women are improperly pressured into signing NDAs, often without understanding the legal implications of what they’re signing. Robinson and Yoshida navigate this topic through the story of Zelda, who was the first person to publicly break her NDA with Weinstein to talk publicly about her story. Robinson and Yoshida also explore other topics within NDAs, such as the reform responses to these issues and the question of whether the courts interest in upholding contract outweighs the public interest in women speaking out.

An International Trend

A key advantage of this book is it analyses law beyond Australia, UK and US, to form a truly international picture of these developing trends. Robinson and Yoshida draw upon individual experiences and cases from various states including Russia, Mexico, New Zealand, Canada, Columbia, Sri Lanka, India, South Korea, Japan, and more. In doing so Robinson and Yoshida also expose cultural bias and the intersectional nature of these issues. They question why the Australian public is more familiar with the names Grace Tame, Saxon Mullins, or Brittany Higgins, but not Dhanya Mani? Dhyana Mani worked in the NSW Supreme Court, where she reportedly faced sexual harassment from former High Court judge Dyson Heydon. A later internal court inquiry found that Heydon had sexually harassed at least six young women in his staff. Dhyana went on to found the campaign ‘Kate’s List’, formerly called ‘Changing Our Headline’, for survivors of sexual assault. This is just one example of how Robinson and Yoshida highlight diverse perspectives within the law that we may otherwise be unaware of.

The Relevance of Their Story

Sometimes studying law can feel detached from lived experience. Our main education exists within the bubble of the Walter Harrison Law Library. If we critically engage with the topics in How Many More Women? then our legal education can reach beyond this bubble. As we skim through High Court judgments, what onus is on us as students to engage with the wider social context and implication? For many women the law is not a neutral academic undertaking. Instead, as this book shows, it is a tool wielded by powerful men to silence them. The redacted sections throughout the book serve as a disturbing reminder of how cautious women have to be of the legal consequences of talking about gender-based violence. In fact, we need not look further than the slew of defamation litigation surrounding Brittany Higgins for a recent example of these trends within Australia.

How Many More Women? was an excellent reminder that our legal education should extend beyond knowing and applying the law. Robinson and Yoshida balance a critical analysis of the law with sharing the stories of women who have been directly affected by these laws. While the criminal law system is infamous for being substandard in regard to gender-based violence, how many of us considered these issues within defamation? The question that it all really comes down to is this: how many more women have to suffer this silence before legal systems across the world are able and willing to change? How Many More Women? critically examines these questions, and thus constitutes an excellent read for anyone wanting to critically engage with these international legal trends in reaction to the MeToo movement.

References

Damien Cave and Isabella Kwai, ‘A Sexual Harasser Spent Years on Australia’s Top Court, an Inquiry Finds’, The New York Times (online at 13 October 2023 <https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/23/world/australia/dyson-heydon-high-court-metoo.html>).

Jennifer Robinson and Keina Yoshida, How Many More Women: Exposing How the Law Silences Women (Allen & Unwin, 2022).

Marilyn Frye, The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory, (Crossing Press, 1982).

Wendy Tuohy, ‘Nearly 3 million Australians have survived sexual violence’, The Syndey Morning Herald (online at 13 October 2023 < https://www.smh.com.au/national/nearly-three-million-australians-have-survived-sexual-violence-20210823-p58l3e.html>).

Further campaigns and informational websites:

https://www.cantbuymysilence.com/

https://southallblacksisters.org.uk

www.teachusconsent.com

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jm7a4vAnGGg