I still remember in my early days when I was a candidate attorney in 2016/2017, and my supervisor asked me to draft a letter in terms of Section 129 and 130 of the National Credit Act 34 of 2005, and how terrified I was to give him my first draft because I was afraid of looking stupid.  I spent two/three weeks drafting the letter and on the fourth week, I decided to give it to him, and oh boy (I mean girl!), oops lady, you know what I mean.  I was in for a surprise; I had to re-do it 10 times before I mastered my letter of demand.

At first I would beat myself up about it, like, come on Puleng, are you serious?  Did you just spent an entire month drafting a letter of demand when it took your colleagues 15 minutes to draft the same letter, and here you are taking an entire month.  Clearly you must be in the wrong career?

Five to six months later in my articles, I drafted the same letter of demand in less than 10 minutes an if ever I was given a pleading to draft, I would first read the rules and then draft the pleading and only then go to my supervisor for corrections.  That is how I learned.  It is amazing how much you learn with each and every mistake, and trust me, you will never make the same mistake again.

My reaction now when I receive constructive criticism is to learn from it, because that is the only way to improve and master your skills in this legal fraternity.