An interview with Samorn Selim, author of “Career Unicorns 90-Day 5-Minute Gratitude Journal: An Easy & Proven Way To Cultivate Mindfulness, Beat Burnout & Find Career Joy.”
Burnout is at an all-time high, especially in the legal profession. Deloitte reports 77% of employees are experiencing burnout, and Gallup finds 67% are feeling disengaged.
Samorn Selim, daughter of Lao refugees and a first-generation professional, knows this struggle intimately. After experiencing career burnout multiple times, she’s now dedicated her life to helping others build joyful, sustainable, and thriving careers.
As the founder of Career Unicorns and former Director of Employer Outreach at Berkeley Law, she has coached over 1,000 women, BIPOC, and first-generation professionals. Her latest book offers a practical solution: a 90-day career gratitude journal designed to beat burnout in just five minutes a day.
Olga Mack: You describe yourself as a “recovering workaholic” who experienced burnout multiple times in your career, including when you were a Biglaw lawyer. Can you paint a picture of what that looked like at its worst?
Samorn Selim: As a Type A, workaholic, perfectionist lawyer in Biglaw, I was working 7 a.m. to 4 a.m. during trial. I was struggling with chronic migraines, back pain, and what doctors called “undiagnosable fatigue.” I hit rock bottom and was so burnt out, anxious, and depressed that I could barely get out of bed. It was a wake-up call that my approach to work was literally destroying my health and well-being.
OM: When you sought help, you were told to make “lifestyle changes,” but felt overwhelmed by all the options. How did you figure out what actually worked?
SS: Yes. It was very overwhelming. Everyone tells you to meditate, journal, or do yoga. But when you’re already overwhelmed, having a laundry list of wellness practices feels impossible. Do you start with meditation? Which type? For how long? Through trial and error over 10 years of practice, I discovered that small, consistent practices made the biggest difference. Research actually backs this up, showing that frequent, shorter breaks and consistent daily practices are more effective than a two-week vacation.
OM: Your journal combines several practices: deep breathing, gratitude, journaling, inspirational quotes, positive affirmations, and self-care tips. Why this specific combination?
SS: After trying literally hundreds of strategies over a decade, I found that this particular combination of practices helped me feel better little by little. Each element serves a purpose: deep breathing calms your nervous system in the moment, gratitude shifts your mindset from scarcity to abundance, journaling helps process thoughts and emotions, while inspirational quotes and affirmations reinforce positive thinking patterns. The daily self-care tips ensure you’re taking small, concrete, bite-sized actions for your well-being.
OM: You’ve been featured by Forbes, Harvard Business Review, BBC, and Google for your career coaching expertise. What patterns do you see among the 1,000-plus professionals you’ve helped?
SS: The struggles are remarkably similar across industries and backgrounds. People are feeling disengaged, drained, and burnt out, and those statistics from Deloitte and Gallup prove this isn’t just anecdotal. What’s fascinating is that when my clients start focusing on gratitude and shift their mindset from scarcity to abundance, everything changes. They start landing dream jobs, successfully negotiating raises, getting promoted into leadership roles, and building truly sustainable careers. Research shows that focusing on gratitude at work reduces stress and improves mental health, so this makes perfect sense.
OM: Why 90 days specifically, and why just five minutes a day?
SS: Several studies show that 90 days is the ideal timeframe for building lasting habits, though it varies by person. As a recovering perfectionist, I know firsthand how overwhelming self-care can feel when you’re already stretched thin, so the journal is designed with people who are already busy and overwhelmed in mind. Five minutes (less than 0.1 billable hours) is achievable for even the busiest professional. It’s about consistency over intensity. I’ve seen how just five minutes a day can completely change someone’s perspective and spark genuine career joy.
OM: Your journal includes 90 gratitude questions, plus inspirational quotes, positive affirmations, and self-care tips. How should busy legal professionals approach this practice?
SS: The beauty is there’s no “right” way to do this. Whether you prefer full sentences, bullet points, or even drawings, the key is simply showing up and being present with yourself. I encourage people to create a writing ritual: set intentions, designate a specific time and place. Maybe it’s 9 a.m. with your coffee, or before bed on your nightstand. Make it visible, make it easy, and have compassion with yourself if you miss a day.
OM: What’s your advice for legal professionals who think they don’t have time for even five minutes of self-care?
SS: I totally get it. I was the person who worked 20-hour days, thinking self-care was either selfish or impossible. But those five minutes aren’t time lost, they’re an investment that will help you get grounded and actually lead to more productivity. When you’re burnt out, you’re not operating at full capacity anyway. These practices help you show up better, think clearly, and work more effectively. Research shows that gratitude practices reduce stress and improve mental health, which ultimately makes you more productive, not less.
OM: What do you hope readers will take away from this journal after 90 days?
SS: My hope is that they’ll experience a fundamental shift from scarcity to abundance. That they’ll have practical tools to manage stress and prevent burnout before it reaches crisis levels. Most importantly, I want them to rediscover joy in their careers. Not just survive their workday, but actually thrive. After 14 years of career coaching, I’ve seen this transformation happen again and again. It starts with something as simple as five minutes of gratitude, but it can genuinely change the trajectory of your entire career and help you build a sustainable and thriving career.
Olga V. Mack is the CEO of TermScout, an AI-powered contract certification platform that accelerates revenue and eliminates friction by certifying contracts as fair, balanced, and market-ready. A serial CEO and legal tech executive, she previously led a company through a successful acquisition by LexisNexis. Olga is also a Fellow at CodeX, The Stanford Center for Legal Informatics, and the Generative AI Editor at law.MIT. She is a visionary executive reshaping how we law—how legal systems are built, experienced, and trusted. Olga teaches at Berkeley Law, lectures widely, and advises companies of all sizes, as well as boards and institutions. An award-winning general counsel turned builder, she also leads early-stage ventures including Virtual Gabby (Better Parenting Plan), Product Law Hub, ESI Flow, and Notes to My (Legal) Self, each rethinking the practice and business of law through technology, data, and human-centered design. She has authored The Rise of Product Lawyers, Legal Operations in the Age of AI and Data, Blockchain Value, and Get on Board, with Visual IQ for Lawyers (ABA) forthcoming. Olga is a 6x TEDx speaker and has been recognized as a Silicon Valley Woman of Influence and an ABA Woman in Legal Tech. Her work reimagines people’s relationship with law—making it more accessible, inclusive, data-driven, and aligned with how the world actually works. She is also the host of the Notes to My (Legal) Self podcast (streaming on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube), and her insights regularly appear in Forbes, Bloomberg Law, Newsweek, VentureBeat, ACC Docket, and Above the Law. She earned her B.A. and J.D. from UC Berkeley. Follow her on LinkedIn and X @olgavmack.
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