How Hard To Push

There is too much noise in my head.  Do this, make that happen, work harder over there.  Since leaving one job and going out on my own a couple of years ago, I find it difficult to whittle down the possibilities.  When I worked in a restaurant, the potential was not even on my radar.  Backbreaking, sweaty, exhausting, hard work.  But simple.  I knew what each day would look like, (a ridiculously long day), and I found comfort in that. 

Now every day looks different.  Sometimes I am cooking in Seattle, but often in another state with a whole new crew, along with Jaimy of course.  Some mornings begin with collecting eggs and cutting heads of lettuce and fennel bulbs from dewy garden beds, others begin lighting a wood stove and watching bald eagles hunt (or scavenge, really) for their morning meal.  Distractions include setting sail or watching a herd of elk cross a river.  Other times I am setting a stage for a celebrity chef, hundreds of audience members wondering when I’ll step aside so that Bobby Flay or Emeril can make their entrance.

These past few years have been a revelation.  Having committed to the culinary world for a profession continues to be the best difficult decision I’ve ever made.  But now I am coming to bear the full weight of what it means to create my own job.  And it is completely narcissistic.  I am not an employer trying to make payroll for dozens of hardworking cooks and servers.  I am simply trying to make it so that at the end of the day, I only answer to one person.  Me.

But me has been asking a lot of questions lately. 

“What have you actually gotten done today?” 

“Why are you spending hours researching food carts, when did you decide to do this?” 

“How is anyone ever going to find out about your services if you lock yourself in the office all day?”

Jaimy and I talk about our long term careers often.  Where do we see ourselves in a year?  In five? Ten? Thirty?  How do we plan to get there?  I often feel that we need a timeline, a bullet point list, and specific if-then analysis directly linking every single action we take to our future.  Control.  That noise in my head?  It sounds a lot like trying to control something that doesn’t want to be confined by my brain. 

Most will agree that everyone works best with a plan.  Creating goals and a path can be fun, and it also gets everyone on the same page.  But once the planning session is over, Jaimy is able to move on.  His mind finds peace in the present.  I marvel at this ability, explaining the constant stress discussion going on in my mind to him.  He tells me not to force it, just to open myself to the opportunities and allow it to happen.

Which leads to the question, how hard to push?

My business training taught me that we must focus on what we are good at, and find ways to get the other stuff done.  Whether it is hiring someone else to do the accounting, bringing in a gardener to tend the veggies, or even enlisting help to renovate an outdated living space, we can’t to everything ourselves.  It is inefficient and can be crazy making.  But I ignore the logic.  I want to dabble in everything, but also be an expert at it.  In a given day I decide that I would like to be a master gardener, a wine expert, teacher, interior designer, carpenter, bookkeeper, writer, chef, prep cook, and dishwasher. 

A friend says I should go on Top Chef, and I think, “YES!”  The neighborhood pea patch is looking for a new volunteer organizer, and I think, “I am the man for the job!”  A prize is being offered for the best literary work submitted to a magazine, and I think, “THIS is what I’ve been waiting for!”

So before I do it all, I will take a moment.  I’ll look out the back window at the freshly turned soil lightening in the afternoon sun and I will not begin sowing rows.  I’ll turn my head from the dishes in the sink.  I will not check my inbox, and while I’m at it, I’ll consolidate the recently collected tax documents and put them away.  I will close the artisan bread book and guide to molecular gastronomy and slide them back on the shelf.  And I will breathe.  And not push.  Not today.