Stepping Back

The last six years of my life have been intense in ways I didn’t fully understand while I was living them. I built a lot in a short period of time. A community, a business, a persona. Two cookbooks. TV shows. All the things a foodie girl could dream of. I’ve opened this blank page more times than I can count over the last few months to tell you the truth of it all. Every version I started felt either too polished or too dramatic, and neither felt right. So I’m going to write this the way it actually unfolded.

Since early 2020, I was making boards and tables for events nearly every day of the week. Corporate clients. Weddings. Workshops. VIRTUAL WORKSHOPS. Momentum that didn’t seem to slow down and opportunities that felt terrifying to turn down. From the outside, it looked like growth and expansion and success. But what most people didn’t see was the pace behind it.

For over five years, I have been producing three to five pieces of content every single day. Photos, reels, captions, blog posts, emails, collaborations. It didn’t matter if I was exhausted, traveling, overwhelmed, or sick. It didn't matter if my kids needed me, friends wanted to hang, or my husband just needed to cuddle. The content still had to go out. That level of output becomes normal after a while. You stop questioning it. You just operate inside of it.

I'm very good at functioning at a high level. I definitely got very good at looking capable. I told myself this was just what building required. I told myself it was a season. I told myself I could rest later. I told myself it was worth it.

Then one afternoon last July my daughter Indie said something simple. She told me she hated how I was always gone at the shop and that she missed me. She wasn’t trying to hurt me. She was just being honest. And it hit in a way nothing else had. It wasn’t dramatic. It was clarity.

I realized I had built something beautiful, but I was running on adrenaline. I didn’t want my kids remembering me as the mom who was always somewhere else trying to keep something afloat. There’s another layer to this that I’ve been unpacking too. I never set out to build a money machine. Yes, it became a business and money matters. But at the beginning, I was just creating. I loved styling food like art. I loved gathering people around a table. I loved turning something simple into something beautiful. Over time, art turned into output. Creativity turned into getting paid, scheduling and content calendars.

That’s not wrong. That’s growth.

But I had to admit that I’m an artist at heart. I wake up thinking about ideas, not revenue strategy. And when your creativity starts answering to numbers every day, something inside you tightens.

I think a lot of women understand that tension. When what you love becomes what has to perform. When you feel proud and grateful and exhausted at the same time. Like being a mama.

The last six months have been quieter. And quiet has been uncomfortable for this crazy girl. When you stop running at full speed, you start noticing how wired you were. You start noticing how much of your identity is wrapped up in being productive.

I’ve been rebuilding this chunk of life in smaller, more sustainable ways.

I’ve been lifting heavy instead of trying to shrink away from all that I created. Walking daily because it regulates my nervous system. Prioritizing protein. Cutting out pork. Eating far less cheese than I used to, which still feels ironic considering my entire brand was built on it. Focusing on anti-inflammatory foods because I’m in my 40s now and my body responds differently than it did in my 20s. I’ve done extremes before. I know how to go all in. I also know how quickly that turns into burnout. This time I’m choosing consistency over intensity. Strength over smaller. Steady over dramatic.

If you’re in this decade of life, you probably understand. Hormones shift. Stress lingers. You can’t out-cardio a dysregulated nervous system. You can’t skip sleep and expect everything to bounce back. It’s humbling, but it’s clarifying.

Food is still part of my life. It always will be. But the way I relate to it is different now. I care less about impressing people and more about how I feel at 3pm. I care more about energy and long-term strength than I do about applause.

That doesn’t mean I’ve stopped creating.

I am still a stylist and photographer. I still curate high-end grazing experiences and pop off on my socials. I still love transforming something simple into something thoughtful and memorable. I attend select events and private gatherings that align with my life instead of running something seven days a week. Creating for a special evening feels very different than operating at full production speed every day.

This space will evolve with me. There will still be recipes. I have years of them. There will still be beautiful food. I don’t have a dramatic comeback. I don’t have a perfectly mapped out re-brand. I just know I’m choosing being me over the pressure and tuning in to what God has for me. And if you’re in a season where you’re re-evaluating what success looks like, where you’re rebuilding your body or your priorities or your pace, you’re not alone.

Maybe this next chapter isn’t about building bigger. Maybe it’s about becoming better.

And maybe we can do that together.

XO,

LEA