When do we become consumed by the process instead of enjoying the process?

By Jackie Zykan

WHEN DO WE BECOME CONSUMED BY THE PROCESS INSTEAD OF ENJOYING THE PROCESS? 

SURVIVAL HONEY SYRUP 

• 8 oz honey 

• 6 oz hot water 

• 1 TBSP lemon balm 

• 1 TBSP rose hips 

• 1 TBSP chamomile flowers 

Directions: Steep all herbs in hot water for 7 minutes. Strain. Stir in honey until dissolved. Store in the refrigerator. For the dried herbs in this recipe, visit sacredplantco.com. Save 15% with code VOICE at checkout.

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Everyone is going through it. In their own way, at their own pace, in their own worlds, but as a collective it seems we are being shoved up against our edges. It’s an acceptably half hearted joke anymore to acknowledge this, “the world is crazy these days”, “the holidays are intense”, “eggs are expensive”, but yet we still find ourselves going through the motions of trying to keep it all together and chug along, exhausted of the constant rerouting of life’s detours. This month, I found myself pushed to the brink, and at the eleventh hour fresh out of time to forage, research, experiment, and write. But what I did have was a forced pause before my sanity fully left me, and a moment of reflection which brought on insights worth gold. While we are all in our own messes, in our own way, at our own pace, in our own worlds, we are in it together. And when we share our battle stories, we connect and find reprieve from the struggle silos we inhabit. 

There will not be a cocktail feature, per se, for December. Nor a nudge to go forage around the state looking for obscure ingredients. But there is a recipe for a honey syrup which I have personally found very supportive during the saga of 2025. The stress reducing chamomile and lemon balm pair beautifully with the vitamin C boost in the rose hips, making this a delightful tonic to keep you grounded, healthy, and balanced during times of intensity.

Technically, this brew is a tea within a honey, so you need only keep a bottle on hand and add to hot water to taste. And should you feel so inclined, you can always add a splash of your favorite Kentucky bourbon for an instant hot toddy. 

So fix yourself a cup of warm survival honey tea, and indulge in this tale of death, birth, and perspective shifts.

I began my fragrance company, ODUOAK, 5 years ago. It was born out of a random lightning bolt idea which came to me while loitering around tide pools in Maine. I didn’t know how, or what it would be. I only knew I didn’t have a choice but to do it. I tossed my paddle aside and surrendered to riding a canoe down a river I had never even heard of, much less knew what lurked around the bends, where the waterfalls would be, and when, if ever, it finally reached the sea. But I was in it. 

The original concept was to create a unisex fragrance line using whiskey as a base. Not only as an aromatic component to the scent story, but as a means of me transmuting the guilt I carried after decades of glorifying a substance which has caused deep suffering for people I loved. Each scent is based on an experience I had while swimming in a life of whiskey, and all the scent memories from those moments went into the bottle. And I was shifting my experience with every spray. Every heart break, disappointment, hard learned lesson was spritzed into the air, released, transformed into someone else’s special occasion, gift, date night, etc. This wasn’t just about starting a business, although bills still need to be paid. It was about transmuting my pain into something positive. 

Being a one woman show, every decision and responsibility was on my shoulders. Which is a blessing and a curse, as all things tend to be. If I wanted to change the scents, I could immediately. I didn’t need anyone’s permission for any of the choices I felt intuitively inclined to make. Change the package? Change the logo? Change the colors? Prices? Marketing? Every single thing. And as I was learning as I went, I had one opportunity after another to learn and improve. The core approach to the brand became to hold loosely to it all. As long as I enjoyed what I was doing, I was doing what I was here in this life to be doing. 

Growth has been smooth, consistent, sustainable. But you don’t outgrow a shell and move into another one that’s smaller or even the same size. There’s constant pressure to fill in the potential space of the next. And not because the goal is to scale a company, but rather because there’s still life happening and this has now become my outlet for inspired creation to channel and integrate my own personal evolution. 

The first packaging I remember ordering infrequently and by the dozens. And now I wait for pallet deliveries to block my driveway. And in between those two chapters existed years of constant learning, constant effort, constant hope and faith and feeling like a cartoon character that had run off the edge of a cliff and not looked down yet. Issues of self worth, confidence, vulnerability, deserve levels, scarcity, burn out, balance, health, trust, isolation, control…these are the flavors which revealed themselves in that soupy space I struggle to remember which happened between the beginning and now. And I’m tired. Bone tired. 

Every packaging update or new collection release has taken everything I have to birth into this world. From a thought to a bottle. The entire process done by hand. Each collection serves as a showcase of a year of life I am now trying to integrate while surviving the present. Every detail of the blends, the fonts, the box, the displays for markets - all hold clues to the story behind the idea. Each collection was a capture of scent memories. Until this one. 

When my partner passed in January, the complete dismantling of who I had ever known myself to be happened instantaneously. The trauma of the shock sent my soul out of my body. I had been dealing with heartbreaks for years by means of turning moments into perfume. That wasn’t going to move the needle on this wound. It felt cheap and emotional exhibition had no place in the depths of my shatter. 

Having worked with herbs and distillations of botanicals for years, I turned to every modality I could to find relief. That path took me to Costa Rica where I met a fascinating expat by happenstance who was practicing healing modalities with various local flora. One of which was flower essence. These tools had been on my radar for a while but I had yet to encounter anyone actively using them in our region. Not to say they don’t or weren’t then, but I will absolutely own that my hermit lifestyle keeps me a bit sheltered. The woman I met mentored me through the process of creation and facilitation, and of course, she started in the alcohol industry then decided to change directions. It was destined. The next collection was conceived shortly thereafter. It wouldn’t just be a fragrance that captured the aromas of memories. I had to honor him in a bigger way. I set out to gather essences from specific plants around the country to blend liquid which held the energetic thumbprint of the moments. You aren’t just smelling the memory. Your etheric field is calibrated to FEEL how he made me feel. In this way, I was keeping him alive. I wasn’t trying to rid myself of the history, I was trying to share the beauty of it with as many people as possible. 

This meant an entire new package for the brand, not just new products. Amber glass needed to be utilized to protect the essences inside from UV light. Custom bags and boxes and new labels brought with them clumsy trials, massive setbacks, and muscle memory resetting from scratch. As my grief evolved, so did the products and despite shipping delays, tariff drama, economic pressures, wrong bottles and broken machinery, the finished goods are now in my hands. The more I attached to a launch date, the more work opportunities I committed to to counteract the financial investment in new packaging, the more went wrong. The more I tried to achieve what I had planned, the more I crashed and burned. Events cancelled, a thousand bottles destroyed, countless other redirections including this rogue, cocktail-less piece of writing. 

I had become consumed by the process instead of following what I enjoyed about it. And I can hear the collective thoughts now, “but you can’t just not make products because you have to make money”. Quitting is always an option, but it didn’t feel like the right path. Just because there are challenges doesn’t mean to throw the baby out with the bath water, so to say. What this chapter forced me to do was get excruciatingly slow in the production process, even if it was out of paranoia of leaks or misalignments. Orders were piling up, holiday markets fast approaching, and new retailers were showing up all while transitioning branding and packaging and launching a line I unconsciously was hesitating to let go of. 

Each bottle, one at a time, filled, quadruple checked, triple cleaned, and packaged with a hand written heart and note of gratitude. One by one by one. Every single step required full presence, which brought connection to the physical item and the emotional significance of it. And then I found it. The joy in the process. 

Instead of focusing on mass quantities and deadlines, I chiseled away one by one with a viscous scrutiny until my hands gave out. Then I stopped. Then when it didn’t feel like a burdensome to-do, I started back up again. 

I liken it to my experiences with hiking brutally long trails at high altitude. Get to that next rock. Ok. At the rock. Breathe. Now get to that next rock. Ok. Now that one. Now that one. The mindset of “summit the mountain” only wears on you like a wet blanket. Useless, heavy, and missing the point. 

Anymore I feel there’s a sort of collective fatigue around the advice of slowing down. I will happily be the first to admit to being at the mercy of the narrative “but if I don’t do it then it doesn’t get done”. As a single mother / small business solo owner / self employed masochist, I assure you I understand. But the thing is, whatever “it” is to you, be it holiday hosting or bespoke perfume making, we lose the point when we fixate and become consumed by our attachment to the result. The process is the point. Enjoyment is the point. The “why” and not the “what” is the point. Slowing down and maintaining a speed which keeps you in alignment and balance will generate a deeper experience. And that’s what we’re all here to do, experience. 

So while there may not be cases of finished goods stacked to the ceiling in my office like I had hoped by now, there are some cases of the best product I have ever made. Bottles and boxes with more love, more attention, and more gratitude packed in them than anything I have ever created before. The disasters of the past months, the tears and the breakdowns, all served as midwives to this pearl of wisdom. They weren’t fun, but they ultimately guided me back in place. 

When we find the gifts hidden within the discord, we can transform even the ugliest moments of life into something beautiful, meaningful, and deliciously heart filled. 

I’m not saying to burn Christmas dinner on purpose to see what sort of enlightenment you can achieve. I am simply sharing my experience to hopefully encourage you to hold compassion for yourself when the detours strike. Hidden within them are the resources to find your joy amid chaos. Slow down. Let yourself feel everything. Loosen the grip and find the blessings in it all exactly as it is. Don’t wish the year to be over. Milk everything it has left to offer you. Then bake, not purposely burn, some cookies to go with it. Much love. Happy holidays.