SPfx Issues Using Gulp Serve

JordanWall I am not sur what is happening, since I have seen gulp serve return errors, or be very slow to start the first time, but have never seen it freeze.  I would start with environment.

I have a blog post that covers how to quickly set up environment, so you might check there to see if you missed anything. https://www.donkirkham.com/blog/spfx2022/ 

If you are using nvm, I would create a new environment with the following commands.

nvm install 14.9.0
nvm use 14.9.0
npm install gulp-cli yo @microsoft/generator-sharepoint -g

From there, change to your current project folder and execute the following

npm i -force
gulp serve --nobrowser

IF that doesn't work, try 

gulp build

If that doesn't work, try creating a new solution and execute 

yo @microsoft/sharepoint
gulp serve --nobrowser

I hope this helps but troubleshooting these types of problem in the forum can be challenging.

Please click Mark as Best Response & Like if my post helped you to answer or resolve your issue. This will help others to find the correct solution easily. It also closes the item. If the post was useful in other ways, please consider giving it Like.