Hessel Bay and the Power of Pause
Updated: Jan 23
Rich Nollen is one of the most respected healthcare business development professionals in the US and a global thinker, known for creating strategies that drive growth. As founder and CEO of Innovare HP, he specializes in demand capture and pipeline acceleration, helping healthcare brands forge meaningful connections and create lasting impact.
I didn’t expect Hessel Bay to teach me anything. I thought it would just be another stop, a pretty slice of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, some good food, a walk, a view. But this trip was already unusual for me. I broke a birthday tradition I had kept for years, celebrating overseas. Paris one year, Manila another, sometimes someplace in between. This year, I stayed close to home. And in doing so, I found something I didn’t know I was looking for.
A different kind of table
My first stop was the Les Cheneaux Culinary School, a nonprofit teaching kitchen and restaurant set just a couple of blocks from the water in Hessel. The menu was seasonal and thoughtful, dishes crafted by students and chefs working side by side, each plate prepared with a kind of care that makes you slow down without trying.
But what stayed with me was not only the food. It was the sense of place, knowing the bay was just beyond, sunlight still finding its way into the room, conversations carrying the same unhurried rhythm as the town itself. I remember sitting there, fork in hand, realizing I had not felt that kind of ease in a long time. It was not just a meal. It was permission to breathe.
Walking into “Narnia”
Outside of town, locals pointed me to a trail they call “Narnia.” The name sounded whimsical, almost too much, until I stepped beneath its canopy. The world really did change there. The air cooled. Light filtered in streaks. The silence thickened, but in a way that felt alive.
Every step slowed me down, not because I wanted to, but because it felt wrong to rush. It struck me how rarely I give myself that kind of space, to walk and listen without filling the silence with a text, a call, or a to-do list already waiting back home.
Roads that carry more than cars
Later, driving the backroads that bend around the water, I noticed the cottages. Some looked as though they had been standing for generations, their paint faded but proud. I imagined the families who filled them, the fishermen returning at dusk, kids racing barefoot toward the water.
These roads were not just routes to somewhere. They felt like memory itself, reminding me that life does not have to speed by in order to matter.
The lesson I took home, the power of pause
When I think of Hessel Bay now, I don’t recall the exact dishes I ordered or the precise path I hiked. I remember the pause. The way time seemed to loosen its grip, the way stillness stopped being something to resist. Hessel Bay gave me more than a getaway. It gave me a recalibration.
For years, I had chased new stamps in my passport as a way of marking time, as if distance equaled meaning. But Hessel Bay showed me something different. You don’t always need another country to find a new perspective. Sometimes, the place that changes you is only a few hours from home.
I left reminded that slowing down is not indulgence. It is survival. It is how we return to ourselves when the world tries to pull us too far away. And maybe that is the real gift of places like Hessel Bay. They do not just change your view, they change your pace.
For me, that shift came on a birthday when I expected less by staying close to home, and ended up finding more than I ever had a world away.
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Rich Nollen, BSN, RN, Healthcare Marketing and Strategic Growth
Rich Nollen is a nurse turned entrepreneur and the driving force behind Innovare HP, a healthcare marketing agency that's transforming how providers connect with communities. After transitioning from bedside to boardroom, Rich’s journey has been nothing short of wild, fueled by a passion to spark ideas, share stories, and empower others. With a growing presence across multiple states, including Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, and California, Innovare HP is committed to making healthcare more accessible and impactful. Rich’s message, if a nurse can dream big and invest in change, so can you.
