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&lt;p&gt;Ah, mothers&amp;mdash;they worry so. We know they just want the best for us and our futures. It&amp;rsquo;s just&amp;hellip;get off our backs!&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Here is the Dean of Stanford Law School, Larry Kramer, telling the readers of &lt;em&gt;Real Simple&lt;/em&gt; to reign in that urge to tell recent grads that they should go to law school.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;p&gt;Many college graduates jump into law school because they don&amp;rsquo;t know what they actually want to do. Parents and friends suggest it because they think it&amp;rsquo;s a safe default. But a grad should choose his life&amp;rsquo;s path only once he knows himself well enough to be sure of what he wants. I think people should first spend a few years exploring to figure out what engages their passions. I ended up in law school because my mother pressured me to &amp;ldquo;do something already.&amp;rdquo; She wanted me to go to medical school but settled for law. I got lucky and stumbled into a field I love. Unfortunately, it doesn&amp;rsquo;t end up that way for everyone.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;p&gt;Kramer may have given in to his mother&amp;rsquo;s influence, but he did get to have a brief phase of youthful exploration. According to a 2004 profile in &lt;em&gt;Stanford Lawyer&lt;/em&gt;, after graduating from Brown in 1980 with a degree in religious studies and psychology, a New Wave music-obsessed Kramer rented a loft in Soho with some friends where they &amp;ldquo;proceeded to have the kind of fun young people could be expected to have in New York.&amp;rdquo;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;p&gt;At the time, Kramer worked as a paralegal. Not because of any interest in the law, he explained, but because &amp;ldquo;it paid reasonably well and was a relatively easy job. I was going to be an artist or a writer. I was going to change the world somehow, but not with any of those bourgeois professions.&amp;rdquo; But Kramer&amp;rsquo;s mother continued to prod him to become a doctor, or at least a lawyer. During his freshman year at Brown, Kramer had tried, and rejected, pre-med. As for the law, &amp;ldquo;My sister went to law school before me. I held her in utter contempt for going.&amp;rdquo; But finally Kramer relented, and to satisfy his mother applied to law school. &amp;ldquo;I sort of agreed to go to law school, thinking in the back of my mind that if I hated it, as I expected to, I would drop out and then I could say to her, &amp;lsquo;I tried, now leave me alone. I&amp;rsquo;m going back to New York.&amp;rsquo;&quot;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;p&gt;You can read the rest of Kramer&amp;rsquo;s story here (starts on pg.10).&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;[Real Simple, via TaxProf Blog]&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p style=&quot;text-align: center;&quot;&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://www.vault.com/VCM/blogs/f_logo.jpg&quot; alt=&quot;&quot; width=&quot;23&quot; height=&quot;23&quot;&gt; &lt;strong&gt;Like us on Facebook&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;img style=&quot;display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;&quot; src=&quot;http://twitter-badges.s3.amazonaws.com/follow_me-c.png&quot; alt=&quot;Follow VaultMBA on Twitter&quot; width=&quot;134&quot; height=&quot;23&quot;&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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