From your first day of law school to your first year as an associate attorney, one thing remains incredibly valuable but largely scarce: time.

Search “time management in law school” on Google, and you will get countless results from law schools, blogs, and Reddit. But one thing these articles lack is the importance of picking your priorities in law school, and how your health needs to be one of them.

Not Enough Hours

Whether you’re a post-undergraduate starting law school or a more unconventional student coming from a career, law school is a shift. You spend your days reading, preparing for classes, involving yourself in the activities that will provide your future career as an attorney with a boost, and there simply aren’t enough hours in the day.

When I first started law school, I remember the immense overwhelming wave coming over me, as I had homework and readings due before I even began my first semester. Coming from undergrad, where my schedule was mine to design and classwork was more busy work than anything, I found myself struggling with the transition to a law school schedule designed by my first-year advisors and classwork that never seemed to end.

Additionally, law school provides a unique space where many of your colleagues are now pushing you harder than you have been pushed before, by virtue of everyone with high career goals put in the same room to compete on a graded curve.

Finding My Top Three

To combat these feelings, I chose organization and time management. This isn’t shocking, given it’s what law schools preach as the best way to succeed.

However, my version of time management didn’t just include schoolwork as most people did. It included my “top three.” I started using this after I realized there simply would never been enough time in the day to get everything on my list done, whether that included completing a case analysis or throwing in a load of laundry.

In the beginning of my law school career, I would take a sticky note (or agenda) and write down my schoolwork goals for the day. This was helpful for organizational purposes: I managed deadlines, ensured I had the time to do my work, and time for questions.

Where I failed was realizing that between classes and trying so hard to complete my schoolwork list, I had no time for my other priorities. My “top three” were consistently

1. law schoolwork;
2. law schoolwork;
3. law schoolwork;

So, after one semester of law school scrambling to find balance with the workload, I decided I needed my “top three” to include more than just law school. I needed it to include what my priorities truly were.

When I sat down to think about this, I realized that my priorities fell along these lines:

1. Law school – I was here to pass, to succeed, to get a degree for my dream job, and to move myself closer to my dream life. That wasn’t going to change from my top three.
2. Social life – I moved to Miami for the school, but I was not going to let my three-year stint in such a social city go to waste in that time. I wanted time to experience all the city had to offer, from food to nightlife. Friends and time to enjoy life and smile outside the library was important to me.
3. Health – I was never the athletic person or health guru growing up, but in law school, I found it to be worth the time spent. Working out provided me with relief from the high levels of stress, and prioritizing little health choices, like making time to cook and to sleep a full eight hours, made all the difference in my day to day.

With my new priorities finalized, I needed to change my approach to my “top three.” That sticky note I was using changed to reflect my top three by giving myself rewards for completing my schoolwork. I remember reading a contracts case (my least favorite topic in law school) and rewarding myself with a gym trip. Or on Saturdays, I’d spend my morning at the coffee shop with friends working on schoolwork, to reward myself with a dinner out at a restaurant later that night.

‘My Brain was Functioning Faster’

Most importantly from these “top three” was the choice to prioritize my health. Suddenly, I found myself happier each day, and more importantly, less sick, less often. I enjoyed my workouts, even if they were just a walk around the block with friends between research sessions at the library.

I also made the conscious decision to force myself to sleep the regular eight hours. In the beginning, this was hard. I struggled to cut myself off when I wasn’t “finished” with my work for the day. Soon, though, I learned that if I was going to go into class with only half the reading completed (it will happen to you, I promise!), it was better for me to at least have a solid eight hours behind me to act fast, than it was to half-read while half-asleep before the night of and the next day.

In prioritizing my health (and mostly, my sleep), I started seeing great benefits. My brain was functioning faster each day, I was quicker on my feet, and I was more adaptable than a lot of my sleep-deprived colleagues.

Habits Easily Continue After Graduation

While some of you may not be totally convinced by my changes and their effects, I give you this benefit that I certainly didn’t know I was preparing for in law school: balancing my health and workload in law school set me up with great habits that were easy to continue as a busy associate attorney.

Therefore, I implore you, whether you are a new law student or near the end of your law school journey, to revisit your priorities. Question if they are truly benefiting you. Those that may benefit you now may not benefit you in the long term.

Are there little changes you can make each day? What are your “top three”?

Above all, I encourage you to put health in your “top three,” as it was life changing for me – and can be for you, too.

This article was originally published on the State Bar of Wisconsin’s Law Student Blog, Just the Facts. The State Bar offers a variety of resources to help law students connect with the legal profession, including finding mentors and clerkships. Find out more on Wisbar.org.