Bench & Bar March/April 2026

2026 ANNUAL CONVENTION OVERVIEW ON PAGE 6

STEP AND STAY IN THE ARENA. For young lawyers, the difference between stagnation and growth is often the differ ence between observing and participating. You don’t need to be perfect. You don’t need to have decades of experience. You simply need to step forward – again and again – until the arena becomes a place where you operate with confidence, clarity, and impact. Presence is a choice. Courage is practice. Insurmountable opportunities are every where. Show up –especially when you don’t feel ready. That is where your career truly begins.

They are the ones who lean forward in the wake of an “insurmountable opportunity.” They earn the trust of their colleagues and clients. They become the people who are “in the arena” often enough that responsibility naturally shifts toward them. THE COURAGE TO BE SEEN – “I CAN TRY”! Presence requires vulnerability—the will ingness to take risks. This might mean offering a solution during a strategy session, even if you fear it might be off the mark. It could mean drafting a first version of something complex rather than waiting for direction. It might mean admitting when you don’t understand something and asking for clarification. Ironically, young lawyers often think that asking questions or acknowledging uncer tainty reveals weakness. In practice, it reveals professionalism, self-awareness, and maturity. You cannot grow in silence. You cannot get better by hiding gaps in knowl edge. And you cannot become a trusted member of a team by pretending to have and know the answer every time. Courage in the legal profession rarely looks like a dramatic primetime court room drama. More often, courage is found when a lawyer raises their hand and saying, “I can try.” Roosevelt’s message is not simply about ambition—it is about purpose. The law can be demanding, but it can also be profoundly meaningful. Lawyers have the privilege of helping folks in times of vulnerability, advocating for justice, solving real-world problems, and influencing outcomes that matter. Presence allows you to recognize and appreciate these moments and that responsibility. FINDING MEANING IN THE ARENA.

BEING PRESENT IS MORE THAN JUST SITTING IN THE ARENA. Being in the arena is more than just occupy ing space—it is being present with purpose and understanding that being a lawyer is intensely human. Good lawyers succeed not just because of analytical skill, but because they build trust—with colleagues, with opposing counsel, with clients, and with courts. You cannot build trust without being present and listening. OPPORTUNITIES REALLY DON’T JUST KNOCK AT THE DOOR. Opportunities never arrive in pre-marked packages with clear labels. They are often disguised as obstacles 1 : the partner who asks if you can attend a hearing on short notice, the messy case file no one wants to touch, the project that requires late-night problem-solving, the client who asks for something outside your comfort zone. Your career will be shaped less by the tasks you complete and more by the chances you seize. And in most cases, those chances will look like work. Presence allows you to spot those moments—not because they are glamorous, but because they are gateways. The lawyers who advance most rapidly are not the ones who do only what is required.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

KYLE R. BUNNELL is the chair of the Young Lawyers Division of the KBA and is also a member of

the KBA’s Communications and Pub lications Committee. He is an attorney in the Lexington office of Dinsmore & Shohl LLP where he focuses his prac tice on complex commercial litigation, as well as bad faith insurance, equine law, and product liability. In addition to his bar service, Bunnell is active in the community. He is the vice-chair of the University of Kentucky Rosenberg College of Law Alumni Association and serves on the board of the Chil dren’s Law Center. ENDNOTES 1 Several years ago, while doing some ob scure research, I ran across a law review article penned by Sixth Circuit Judge Danny J. Boggs who cleverly dubbed a bad situation as an “insurmountable op portunity ” instead of an “insurmountable obstacle .” See Boggs, Danny J., “The Right to a Fair Trial,” University of Chicago Legal Forum: Vol. 1998: Iss. 1, Article 2. Available at: http://chicagounbound.uchi cago.edu/uclf/vol1998/iss1/2

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