You don't know what you think you know. Hi, I'm Jim Hacking, immigration lawyer practicing law throughout the United States at our offices in St. Louis, Missouri. We have a great new attorney in our office. She's a lovely young lady, and she's learning her way through becoming an immigration lawyer. We really loved having her in the office. She was messaging some of the other lawyers in the office the other day about a potential lead that she had.
This lead was thinking about applying for asylum and they were obsessed about the fact that their visa into the United States was about to expire. Now, when your visa is about to expire if you're already in the United States, it doesn't really matter if that visa is expired in certain types of cases. This person had been admitted for the duration of status.
Like international students who study and come on an F1, this lead had a valid visa when entering the United States, was in the United States, was maintaining his status in the United States, but had been planning on applying for asylum. He was obsessed with the idea that his visit visa or his visa, I'm sorry, that he had was about to expire. Our attorney was asking us, "This is what the potential client is really excited about and concerned about. What do you guys think we should do?"
Andrew, one of the other attorneys in our office, and I were talking back and forth with the attorney, and we talked about the fact that this client was obsessed about the wrong thing. The client did not understand what was really important, and that was getting an asylum application on file within one year of arrival. Now, this potential client has plenty of time to do that, but was focused on the wrong thing. Andrew sent a message and I loved it so much that I wanted to shoot this video.
He said, "I think a lot of times our job as lawyers is educating our clients on what they need to obsess about and to ignore what they don't need to obsess about. So many people coming to the immigration process thinking that they know everything and that they know what they need to know." The fact is, I learn something new as an immigration lawyer every single day. I've been practicing law since 1997 and immigration law exclusively since 2007. That's something that I learn still every single day, that there's always something new to learn.
There's always a change. The idea that immigration lawyers who practice in this area every single day might have to learn things every single day should tell you how complex it is and how complicated it is. And that a lot of times as clients, you get obsessed and worry about the wrong thing. Sometimes it's all about speed. We have a lot of clients worried, "When am I going to get my case approved? When am I going to get my case approved?" And instead of talking about when, they should actually be talking about if. If my case is going to be approved, would it be approved?
Will it be approved? Those are the kinds of questions that you should be asking, whether it's going to be approved. These are the things that are important. A lot of times people get obsessed about the wrong things and I don't want you to make that mistake in immigration, which is why we made this video. I loved Andrew's message. One of the benefits, and there are many of working with qualified immigration lawyers, is that you find out what's important. And almost as importantly, you get to put to the side what's not important.
I hope this makes sense. I hope you liked this video. If you did, please be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel down below. Please be sure to share our video out on social media. Join us in our Facebook group which is called Immigrant Home. You can always call us if you need our help, 314-961-8200, and you can email us, [email protected]. Thanks a lot and have a great day.
