By October, I’ll have spent eleven years working in kitchens. I didn’t grow up knowing I wanted to cook. I didn’t watch cooking shows or spend time in the kitchen with my grandma or mom. Yet, somehow, it found me when I was broke, desperate, and uncertain about my future.
It started when my first chef gave me a chance after only washing dishes for two months. After months of failing, something finally clicked, and I knew I never wanted to do anything else ever again.
In the years that followed, my love grew and diminished. I went to culinary school, dropped out of culinary school. Worked at countless restaurants, most lasting less than a year. I worked crazy hours. I pushed everyone around me. Driven to the point of being mean, angry, and impatient. I wanted nothing else than to be the best chef possible. Every night, I spent reading cookbooks cover to cover and watching hours of YouTube videos and cooking shows. I developed a dream so colossal that the weight of it became almost impossible to handle. It consumed my every waking moment.
I’ve now found myself in a weird moment in my life. After the COVID shutdown, with many restaurants, some permanently closing, I decided I should go back to school to ensure I had a backup plan. I was prepared to walk away from restaurants completely and start a new chapter in my life. It was short-lived, as the golf course I was working at needed a cook. I stepped in on the condition that it would be until they found a permanent replacement. That never happened. For two seasons, I worked at catering events, cooking and prepping. I worked the hotline. Outside the golf course, I did occasional private events and dinners. It seemed cooking, despite my best efforts, wasn’t something I could easily walk away from.
Now that I have graduated, I’ve worked at three different restaurants, including one as a pastry chef. Through this, I’ve come to the realization that perhaps I can never truly let go.
I have been reflecting heavily on what I should do next with my life. Apply to grad school, take the LSATs, go back to culinary school, and find a way to make writing my full-time job. However, there’s something inside me that refuses to walk away. I’m admittedly burnt out by this life. The dream still exists, but the realities of the world have graciously informed me, some dreams don’t come true. Despite my best efforts, I will not be the best pastry chef in my city. Nor will I receive James Beard awards or a Michelin star. As a result I feel stuck.
To be in my thirties with years of experience and a genuine love for what I do should feel like hitting the jackpot. Most days, that feels true. Yet, here I am, forcing myself to admit that I have reached career burnout.
Now that I make sandwiches to pay the bills, every day is a struggle to not go back to the restaurants that inspired me to cook. To be a chef again. It’s difficult to describe. Do I continue to do the thing that brings me joy, or do I finally let go, so that I can have a better life? One that is free of cuts and burns. One that will save whatever is left of my back and knees. To preserve my mental health, which I’ve worked so hard to improve.
A time when I should be looking to advance in my career, I’m instead looking for ways to leave it behind. It’s like a partner you desperately hope to remain friends with because you love them, but know it will never work. The love you have is too much.
The answer to this problem isn’t simply to find a career that pays the bills and allows you to cook as a hobby. Every time someone tells me that, I look at them with a look of disappointment. It’s evident that they don’t understand. For me, cooking at home, for myself, takes the joy away from why I fell in love with food in the first place. Chefs cook to nurture others. It’s the one absolute truth of the culinary arts. What does one do when they find what they want in life, but it doesn’t provide the life that’s expected? When a dream seems so far from reality. Do you keep fighting, or do you let go?
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