How Slowing Down Helped Me Reclaim My Dreams

“For fast acting relief, try slowing down.” ~Lily Tomlin

“Are you the owner?” asks, well, yet another customer at our local Italian eatery.

“Nope—I’m just old!” I reply, all sheepish but pleased.

It’s true. At fifty, I’m not exactly your classic, college-struggling part-timer.

Actually, I’m the oldest employee at our restaurant—the staff “mom,” if you will. I’ve been at this serving gig three years now and haven’t looked back. Which might seem weird considering how I got here in the first place. What a contrast to the world I once lived in.

I co-owned a financial services company with my dad for sixteen years. We had a good thing going. Our clients were well taken care of—we were winning awards, and the money reflected that. At forty-five, I had it all: a full-tilt career, a decent marriage, two kids, and a nice house.

To say that wasn’t enough for me wouldn’t be honest. No, it was more like it was TOO much.

I felt overwhelmed by the life I’d helped build. 

I was stuck on the treadmill of Keeping It All Together, running faster and faster with each passing year, terrified I’d fly off the back end in one spectacular “Sam-Style” crash. I longed to slow down enough to examine my choices, my reality, and myself. The pace was killing me. Whoever the “me” was that I’d become.

Couldn’t I just walk for a while?

My running took me to a thirty-three-day meander on the Camino de Santiago in Spain in May of 2019. It was one of those “sort-out-your-shit” mid-life pilgrimages. I walked in, a pile of cynicism and confusion, but walked out with confidence, clutching one very ballsy answer:

“Quit your career.”

For context, it was driving me crazy. I’d crossed a threshold where it didn’t matter how much money I was making because I was miserable. Investing for others never felt like me—artsy-fartsy “Sam” was drowning in portfolio pressures. Uncontrollables like market returns and regulation built on the assumption that all financial advisors could be out to screw their clients had me on edge 24/7.

Looking back, I am grateful for those years that never felt like me. Because they eventually helped inform a more authentic life. That’s the one I’m living now. It’s a more peaceful, more meaningful existence. Even if I am “just serving up pasta.”

See, when you’re stuck on the treadmill and the universe keeps ratcheting up the pace, it’s all you can do to breathe, let alone hold any other aspiration in your head.

You simply can’t. There’s no time for that sort of fluff.

You’ve got clients and deadlines and responsibilities and targets. Your files come home with you. Your conversations with loved ones center around what ridiculous head office battle you had to fight against today, just to keep up with the demands of your job.

Dream?! Snort. This IS the dream… Isn’t it?!

Apparently, it wasn’t MY dream.

Fast forward to a world where I’m out three or four nights a week, doing a literal (and warmly received) tap dance if the kitchen is backed up. I collect tip pools on Wednesdays. I clock in, I clock out. And when I’m home, I am not thinking about work.

This is a far cry from my Sunday night anxiety, when I would lie awake in dread over what fires I’d have to put out the following morning.

As a server, I’m counted on to provide care, kindness, good humor, and advice for tourists and newcomers on our area, along with the obvious meals prepared to their liking. It’s a curated experience that comes with a smile. A can’t-fake-it smile.