“May it please you Sir, although my client has a long record, he realises that he has come to the crossroads of his criminal career, and he is determined from now on to go straight, and not spend the rest of his life in and out of prison. He realises that his true place is with his wife and family, and asks you to pass a lenient sentence on him, so as to enable him to join them before too long. Also there is another baby on the way”. That sort of claptrap is churned out year after year by each generation of young barristers, simply because they have not the courage to say something original. (Sometimes of course there is nothing else to say). And the truth is that in one's early years one has to steel oneself to say even that; one has to force oneself to speak at all.
Then, as years go by, it comes easier with experience, until suddenly one finds one has confidence. It does not happen in a moment of course, but over a period of time. When confidence comes however, one can say what one likes. One can say the most outrageous things, if they serve one's client's cause, and get away with it; provided one has prepared the ground thoroughly, and provided always that one speaks the truth. Apart from the risk of being found out, the penalties for not speaking the truth are faulty judgment, lack of boldness, and a cloudy consciousness which ceases to be able to distinguish any longer the clear distinction between truth and falsehood. Put shortly; if one perseveres honestly, confidence comes with experience. Or putting it more generally; insofar as one perseveres honestly, confidence comes with experience, because I suppose none of us is completely honest.
But there is another way of overcoming a sense of inadequacy, - by pretending it is not there. And since in dealing with one's professional colleagues, one is on the whole dealing with fairly hard-headed, shrewd, people; they are not going to be deceived by this facade of confidence, unless first one…