EEC 433: From Hostility You Didn't Know You Had to Healthy Strategic Action., with Joy Bertrand

Joy Bertrand attended law school at Indiana University-Bloomington and the University of Arizona. She received her Juris Doctorate from Indiana University-Bloomington in 1996. While on assignment with the US Attorney's Office, Joy tried and won four federal jury trials and successfully litigated several Seventh Circuit appeals, including a Solicitor General appeal.

• You've been a faculty member for Gerry Spence's Trial Lawyers College, which is about as elite and high-pressure as it gets. What did you witness happening to the best lawyers in the country over time that made you realize this was a health crisis, not just occupational stress?
• You describe hostility not as something that happens to us, but as a mindset — even a habit, no different than chronic complaining. Can you further explain that?
• What happens physiologically when someone spends years living in a state of constant conflict and high alert?
• You talk about an emotional scale, and you make the point that people don't have to leap from hostility all the way to gratitude to see real health benefits — that massive gains happen just by moving toward the middle. What does that middle ground look like, and how do people start finding it in the middle of a brutal workday?
• What does it actually look like to stop letting that pressure dismantle your health, your sleep, and your relationships — without losing your edge?

Joy Bertrand

Joy Bertrand attended law school at Indiana University-Bloomington and the University of Arizona. She received her Juris Doctorate from Indiana University-Bloomington in 1996.

While on assignment with the US Attorney's Office, Joy tried and won four federal jury trials and successfully litigated several Seventh Circuit appeals, including a Solicitor General appeal.

In 2005, Joy entered private practice, emphasizing federal litigation. Her criminal practice has handled all manner of cases, from disorderly conduct and littering to white collar fraud and homicide.

Her current practice interests include federal trial consulting, trial lawyer coaching, teaching trial advocacy, the medical and legal issues presented by pregnant women in custody, and advocating for the abolition of qualified of immunity.

In October 2011, Joy graduated from the Gerry Spence Trial Lawyers College in Dubois, Wyoming. She completed the Trial Lawyers College's faculty training in May 2014 and joined the TLC faculty shortly thereafter.

Joy is the host of the Athena in the Well podcast and author of the upcoming book, "How to Fight Giants and Win: the Secret Lives of Women Trial Lawyers." Joy is also a speaker and teacher.

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