Podcast, Episode 1: A conversation with Lisa on blogging and career breaks

In this podcast, we’re covering two pretty big topics in under 5 minutes – blogging and career breaks. My guest is Lisa who runs the blog A Lawyer and Her Money. We’ll talk about her openness with her audience, navigating the online environment and get her take on career breaks. Join us, as Lisa shares her insights. 

Podcast Transcript

[Intro music] Instrumental music with a hip-hop vibe. Music: North Oakland Extasy by Squadda B, via YouTube Audio Library.

[Belinda]:

Is blogging or writing for social media something that interests you? Or maybe you are interested in a taking a career break? These are very different topics in their own right but today, I’m speaking with Lisa, who can offer us insight into both. Lisa took a career break during 2019 and 2020 and has taken to the medium of blogging to document and share her experience with others.

Hi Lisa. How are things going?

[Lisa]:

Things are going great. How are you?

[Belinda]:

I’m not too bad.

I’d like to start off by asking you about your blogging practice.

In your case, you were blogging about your career break journey while on the journey, and I think that’s quite brave. Did you have any concerns about how open you would be with your audience?

[Lisa]:

In terms of vulnerability during the career break … I thought about it a little bit because there are people who know about my blog who know me in real life and I think I tried to be as open as possible, and I knew that there would be mistakes and I would change my mind about things, but part of the reason that I enjoyed blogging so much is that I have a record of what I thought before and my growth. I wanted it to be an authentic experience.

[Belinda]:

Blogging, social media and the internet can get into some tricky territory at times (I’m referring to things like defamation, copyright, platform moderation and comments, which can be scary to people without legal experience). You actually have a legal background. Do you think it has prepared you for this environment?

[Lisa]:

I think for some of those. I’m not an attorney in defamation and copyright, or in internet law. So I don’t have that much more experience with it than perhaps the regular person. I think where being an attorney was useful was about privacy and that is a growing concern. My own privacy and I guess the privacy of people I moderate.

[Belinda]:

Before you go, I’d like to get some of your thoughts on career breaks as it’s a topic you’re passionate about.

[Lisa]:

I wondered how I should identify myself during the career break. I considered … I continued to call myself a lawyer because I was still barred even though I wasn’t working during my career break.

I didn’t know that I would go back into law. I did look into … I did start looking at other professions but most of the jobs I applied to were in law.

I always liked the work that I did. I just didn’t necessarily like the conditions.

I don’t think I’m as wedded to the idea of being a lawyer forever. I don’t think it’s my whole identity. But I am very excited to be working in the law.

One of my friends had asked me, knowing what I know now about the lockdown and pandemic, would I have quit my job? And absolutely I still would have quit my job. And absolutely during 2020, I never once was jealous of anyone who was working and thinking oh, I wish I was in this same environment but at a job.

There were times when I was bored or I questioned what … if I was doing enough with my career break, or what I wanted to do with my life. But there wasn’t a time when I was wanting to be in the same job as before, or wanting to be in any job at all.

[Belinda]:

You definitely raise some really good points about what a horrible year it would have been to actually be working, and all the uncertainty with the pandemic on top of just everyday work stress.

Thank you so much for your time today. It’s been great chatting with you.

[Lisa]:

Thank you so much.

[Belinda]:

And that was my very first podcast.

Feel free to leave a comment, get in touch or check out some of my blog articles.

[Outro music] Instrumental music with a chilled vibe. Music: Sunday Rain by Cheel, via YouTube Audio Library.

Podcast recorded with Lisa’s permission.