Roman Lifson built the kind of legal career many lawyers are taught to want. He became a trial lawyer, a partner, and a litigator handling cases from both the plaintiff and defense sides. Outside the courtroom, he found another demanding arena: competitive race car driving. But somewhere along that path, Roman began asking a harder question. What is being a lawyer actually costing us? In this episode of That One Lawyer Podcast, Neal Goldstein sits down with Roman for a deeply personal conversation about the pressures lawyers learn to normalize and the parts of themselves they often learn to hide. Roman’s story begins in Moscow during the Soviet era. He immigrated to the United States with his family at 10 years old after they left almost everything behind. During the immigration process, Roman watched his father, a neurosurgeon, study as many as 12 to 16 hours a day to pass the exams that would allow him to practice medicine in America. That experience helped shape Roman’s own ambitious path: college, law school, law firm, partnership, and decades of litigation. For years, Roman describes his life as intensely linear. Choose the destination, put on the blinders, and keep moving toward it. Eventually, his perspective changed. Roman and Neal explore what happens when lawyers become so conditioned to professional performance that admitting uncertainty, fear, or failure starts to feel dangerous. Lawyers can comfortably talk about wins, successful careers, families, homes, and vacations. Roman argues that it becomes much harder to tell another person where we failed, what we’re ashamed of, or what we’re afraid of. In a profession built around competition and identifying weaknesses, vulnerability can feel like a liability. Roman believes some of that conditioning begins in law school. He describes legal education as teaching students to solve everything “from the neck up.” Analyze the problem. Find the answer. Respond quickly. Never appear uncertain. Those habits can follow attorneys throughout their careers. The conversation also examines Roman’s relationship with his wife, Hallie, and how their work together changed his understanding of authentic connection, emotional expression, and the relationships lawyers need when professional competence isn’t enough. That perspective has also changed the way Roman practices law. Clients often arrive already carrying anger, fear, distrust, and hurt. Roman believes lawyers have a choice. They can help clients move through that conflict, or they can pick up the baton and escalate the war. As Roman says, lawyers are supposed to be problem solvers. Sometimes they become problem creators. That realization connects two seemingly different parts of his life: litigation and racing. On a racetrack, Roman competes intensely while trusting the drivers around him with his safety. Everyone wants to win, but everyone also understands what can happen when competition overwhelms judgment. For Roman, there’s a lesson there for lawyers. This conversation isn’t about abandoning ambition or pretending litigation isn’t adversarial. It’s about examining whether the habits that make lawyers successful professionally can sometimes make it harder to stay connected to themselves and the people around them. And whether success is still success when nobody feels safe enough to talk about what it costs. Subscribe to That One Lawyer Podcast for conversations about the people, relationships, pressure, and experiences behind a life in law.

CONNECT WITH ROMAN LIFSON: https://www.mythicadventuretravel.com/liberating-lawyers-for-life

https://www.cblaw.com/roman-lifson/ https://hallie-lifson.mykajabi.com/magdalene-womb-temple

CONNECT WITH NEAL GOLDSTEIN / THAT ONE LAWYER PODCAST: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@UC9V41LAfvZS-7AmQKduNp5Q

IG: @nealagoldsteinlaw LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/nealagoldsteinlaw/