Major life lessons I learned while roasting coffee beans. 

Currently I’m between jobs. What better time to check out something I’ve been curious about: coffee roasting. Shocking full disclosure: I’m not a coffee drinker. And by not a coffee drinker, what I mean is I don’t need it first thing in the a.m. to get me going. To me, coffee is a treat I like to have once in a while. I know, it seems strange, but go with me. What I do love about coffee is the smell. That incredible aroma of toasted chocolate meeting earthy hay gets me fired up. 

I’ve been crushing on a local small roaster in my neighborhood called Santa Mama Coffee for a few years. They hosted a cupping when they first opened. Ever since, it got my wheels turning. I wanted to know more about the roasting process. Unfortunately, life took over with a full-time job and other commitments. My coffee curiosity got neatly folded up and tucked away in the back of my mind. 

Things changed this past fall. My job was getting the best of me. What used to be something I loved doing had turned into misery. I was having a hard time sleeping and was unhappy. Since this publication is all about kindness, it was time for me to practice what I preached. Full disclosure: as someone who works in a creative field, I’ve had lots of jobs. LinkedIn has me at over 25 gigs. That doesn’t mean I’m a flake. It just means I like to challenge myself and try new things. Sometimes I’ve quit. Sometimes I’ve been fired. By now I’m pretty good at knowing when it’s time for me to move on and do something new. So I quit.

Now there is time to think, read, and pursue some ideas I’ve been kicking around. I’ve been trying to use the phrase “I’m interested in …” when it comes to this mode of thinking. In the past month alone, that phrase has gotten me on a plane to catch up with family I’ve missed, put me in a web design class, and landed me a front row seat to see how coffee is roasted. 

To get that front row audience was pretty simple. I snagged the owner and pitched my idea of a one-day internship. All I wanted to do was observe, ask some questions, and take in the aromas. He agreed and I locked in a date on my calendar. A dream of mine has always been to ride a bike to wherever I work. So on the day of my internship I hopped on my bike and took off down the road. 

I met up with John, the head roaster. He had been roasting the night before so the place already smelled fantastic. John walked me through the process of how a coffee bean goes from a green bean to the roasted bean that winds up as your beverage. What I loved most about this process was seeing John’s passion for what he was doing. Most everything was done by hand. In a world that seems to be getting farther away from the hand crafted, this coffee roaster was pretty much all by hand and sensory guided. There was some computer software that helped run the roasting machine. But John could sense when a batch was ready by smelling and listening to what the beans were doing. It was pretty magical to observe, especially by someone who spends most of his day in front of a computer screen. 

Once the beans were done roasting, a blend was made. Coffee bags for wholesale accounts were stamped with the roast date, filled, weighed, and ready for delivery. It was all so complex, yet simple at the same time. 

Do I want to become a coffee roaster? No. However, this ‘internship’ helped answer so many questions as I continue on my path to whatever comes next. I opened a door with the roaster, and who knows what it can lead to? I’m hopeful I’ll be working with them in the future, but I have no idea in what capacity. The point of this one-day internship was to open my mind to the possibilities of something new and different. I also got to learn some different things about coffee, made a new friend, and gained newfound respect for how coffee is made. So my challenge to you is this: What are you curious about? What is your passion? Is there something you could spend an afternoon learning more about? Tell me by leaving a comment below. Who knows what it will inspire or what it could lead to. I’ll be sure to keep you posted (or maybe roasted?) on what comes next for me.