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As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the concept of "why can't I do this myself?" I had an email from someone here recently and, people, I won't say they are on their worst behavior but they can be very odd when dealing with lawyers. I don't know why.

I have never seen any other profession or any other business or any other commercial or customer service or relationship or interaction or any type of transaction that quite occurs in the same way as a lawyer. That said, doctors have a unique role to play so it is just kind of part and parcel with the profession but one thing, it doesn't come up all the time, but I see every few months I will get an email when we tell people look this is what we can do for you etc., etc. they will send back "well why can't I do that myself?" "Well, why can't you?" is sort of my response. Yes of course you can do it yourself. You can drive a car with your feet, it doesn't make it a good idea. You can do anything you want. Now I am not saying it is necessarily a bad idea sometimes to do it oneself but I always find it funny because it seems to be that the implied question within the question is: "Why should I hire you?" Well that is up to you. People that have dealt with me in a professional setting, I don't really try to push them into anything. If you want to retain us to assist you, we are happy to do that and we will advise as to what it is going to take to get that done. If you don't, that is fine too. Many people do their taxes on their own; many people do their Immigration matters on their own; many people do things on their own and that is fine but just because you can't do it on your own, I am just sort of at a loss for words on why the question is even posed. Yes, you can do it on your own oftentimes. I think there is a certain subset of folks that view a lawyer as only supposed to be used when it is impossible and frankly those types of folks are really difficult to deal with in a client relationship setting because often times, and I have seen this, they will get themselves into a situation that is a total quagmire and then they are almost resentful that they need you around.

So, I am making this video mostly to provide some insight into how I as a lawyer see some things, sort of my perspective on the world, but also because that is a question to ask yourself. If you are posing that question to me, I don't really have a response for you other than there is nothing that keeps you from doing this yourself. If you are asking yourself that question, you think you can do it, go ahead. No one is stopping you. If you are contacting me for assistance, well that's fine too. Just as for example, I deal with a lot of CPAs, I am a Tax Attorney, people will sometimes say "Well why do I need somebody to fill out my taxes?" You don't. People do their own taxes all the time but some people don't want to do that. In most cases we deal with, with respect to a lot of what we do especially in the US Immigration field, people will tell me, they will say, “I could learn to do this and spend hours on end trying to learn to do this and ultimately doing it and then I have this skill set that I will never use again or I can just use you.” It is convenience thing. I also understand times are tough; cost is an issue; fees are an issue. I don't disrespect that and I am not making this video to be derogatory. It is more a video again, if you are asking me that question, I turn it back on you, "well why can't you?" It is not on me to try and convince you to use me. I don't really believe in that at all frankly. It is on me to do my job once I am retained to do it. It is not on me to convince you that you can't do this yourself and you really need me. No, that is not necessarily the thing. 

Now, there are certain circumstances, look trying your own murder case, where you are on defense for your life or something, you are probably going to want some Counsel to assist with that; now that is an extreme example. There are other circumstances. If you are in a really difficult situation or you found yourself, we have dealt with a few cases like this here recently where people have inadvertently had to deal with the possibility that they might fall out of status and frankly we probably were in a position to help them where they could not help themselves. They just didn't know the ins and outs and could not have acted with the alacrity that we were able to solve the problem. That said, I mean that is not all of our clients by any stretch of the imagination. In my opinion, most of our clients essentially retain us and hire us for convenience more than anything. It is not really a matter of "can you do it yourself?" it is a matter of "do you want to?"