Wellness Resources

The State Bar of New Mexico Provides 4 Wellness Programs:

•  The NM Well-Being Committee members have a well-being focus and concern with respect to the NM legal community. It is this committee's goal to examine and create initiatives centered around wellness. This includes mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health and substance use struggles within the New Mexico legal community. 
• The New Mexico Lawyer Assistance Program (NM LAP) is a free service for all members of the New Mexico bench and bar and law students. NM LAP offers confidential professional and peer assistance to help individuals identify and address problems with alcohol and other drugs, depression, and other mental health/emotional disorders, as well as with issues related to cognitive impairment. NM LAP endeavors to improve the well-being of its members through support and early intervention, and to help reduce the public harm caused by impaired members of the legal profession. 
• The State Bar of New Mexico's Employee Assistance Program is a free service offered by NM LAP that is provided by The Solutions Group. Services include up to four FREE counseling sessions per issueper year for ANY mental health, addiction, relationship conflict, anxiety and/or depression issue. Counseling sessions are with a professionally licensed therapist. Other FREE services include management consultation, stress management education, critical incident stress debriefing, video counseling, and 24X7 call center. Providers are located throughout the state.
• The NM Judicial Wellness Program was created to promote health and wellness among New Mexico Judges by creating and facilitating programs (educational or otherwise) and practices that encourage a supportive environment for the restoration and maintenance of overall mental, emotional, physical and spiritual health. The initiative behind the Judicial Wellness Program:
  • To create a culture change within the NM Judiciary that decreases the stigma surrounding a Judge reaching out to ask for help for any mental or behavioral health struggle.
  • To create a safe, confidential program for judges to connect with where they can receive the help and support they need without job related consequences being attached to the connection.
  • To achieve sustainable progress on judicial wellness, this will in turn strengthen the NM Judiciary Community.

What A Healthy Legal Community Looks Like

In 2022, the NM Well-Being Committee will be focusing on the different types of legal communities and asking questions of those communities such as: What does your organization do to create and promote well-being for the individual staff members?; What could your organization do better or different?; and What are challenges or barriers to offering well-being resources and/or services? Some of the legal communities that we will be focusing on are as follows: Law Office of the Public Defender, UNM School of Law, Paralegals, Solo and Small Firm, large law firms, and AG’s Office.; these are but a few legal communities in New Mexico. The goal of 2022’s well-being campaign is to understand the state of well-being in legal organizations, enlist leaders to help define what well-being looks like for their populace, identify priorities for their particular community, and measure, evaluate, and improve.

What a Healthy Lawyer Looks Like Campaign