self-sabotage

I think that when those of us that will become chefs, there is a decision-making process involved that no one can really understand; it's a thought process that ultimately makes you decide that you will be the best, and that you will do whatever it takes to get there -- it's kind of a rockstar attitude, if you think about it.

Then, reality strikes. There's a lot that you don't know -- there's a lot of experience out there that you have to learn in not a lot of time. A lot of times, you overcompensate, however you can. Maybe you yell, maybe you take really basic dishes and try to get them to a point of inutterable perfection, maybe you flirt with the waitstaff. There just always has to be something that puts you on top or makes you unique from the others -- more noteworthy.

This leads to a lot of self-sabotage. With the long hours and the moments of intense stress, things get blown way out of proportion. Someone borrowing your knife suddenly becomes someone disrespecting you and yours. Long days of pent up aggression at work get taken home and hard as you might try to smile, you're surly. Other nights, you get so fed up you can't handle anything and you end up wanting to be anywhere but in bed. You lose friends, because you don't they understand, and you gain drinking buddies, because they always do.

Then, when it's quiet, you check yourself and see what you have left in your reserves.

If you come up with a little bit left, you invest it. You find something precious to you and you invest it and pray that in the long run, the investment will blossom with your career. If you come up empty, you find that at the end of the day, the best things you have in your life are your knives.


-w