"Feedback Loops: Challenge & Recovery" by Patrick Barry
 

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2025

Abstract

About halfway through the course on feedback I teach to law students, I tell them to take out their calendar and look over their recent schedule. How many days in the previous few weeks, I ask them, felt like "challenge days"? I explain that challenge days are days when you have to perform at a high level, whether because a major task requires a lot of your energy and mental bandwidth-studying for a big test, preparing for a tough negotiation, dealing with an unexpected family crisis-or because the time available to handle a lot of minor tasks seems cruelly inadequate. If "lunch" yesterday consisted of a KitKat, two phone calls, and some frantically typed emails, you likely had a challenge day. I then describe a different kind of day: "recovery days:• These are days that are intentionally much less hectic. Efficiency and execution are not the goals. Rejuvenation is.

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Copyright 2025 Illiniois State Bar Association. Reproduced with permission.


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