Billy Keels  0:00  

The powerful little hidden secret I learned from baking chickpeas. Today's episode is sponsored by Billy Keels Advisory Services. If you want to learn more about how to make your 99 optional, just go to make it optional.com Once again, that's make it optional.com

Speaker 1  0:19  

helping you build freedom without losing your edge. This is the Going Long Podcast with Billy Keels.

Billy Keels  0:32  

The powerful little secret I learned from baking chickpeas is, well, yeah, it's about cooking, and at the same time it has a lot to do with being able to build a profitable side business on the side, and some of the things that you absolutely do not want to do, and this is something that I absolutely learned from, like baking, and the reason I say that is, if you've ever felt like you've got to do everything perfectly the first time, and that is the thing that's absolutely holding you back, just literally, this is going to be a super brief episode. Just listen to the story about the chickpeas. I know it sounds a little bit different. It's extremely authentic, I promise. And it's going to be an extremely brief episode, because there is a.. there's a certain point, then.. and I may have shared a little bit about this before, but you know, after life changes for you, and you start to realize, like, hey, listen, this is your opportunity to build new skills. Well, you know, since I've gone through divorce, one of the things that I get to do is become an even better chef. So, this is one of the major benefits that I am enjoying, as it relates to moving into this next version of me and becoming an excellent chef, excellent for me, maybe not excellent for you, but I will, and also compared to previous me, and the thing that this helps me to do is it helps to consistently like work a muscle to take me outside of my comfort zone, because I did not grow up doing a lot of cooking. Very fortunately, my mother is an amazing cook, and for many, many years growing up, well, she was just an amazing cook. Afterwards, I let's just say I didn't do a lot of cooking, and now I am back to cooking even more, and you know, got a partner who cooks really, really well as well nowadays. But I'm not going to digress from that. I'm just going to actually talk about what this whole thing is about, which is about baking chickpeas, and what this, and how this is actually tying into someone who has a perfectionist mindset, and always wanting to get things right the first time. This cooking is one of the things that is a constant reminder, as you have to go through a process. You have before you can be great, you have to be good. Before you can be good, you have to be actually bad. And let's just say that, as a recovering perfectionist, not getting it right the first time is something that I have to be constantly reminded of, and that's absolutely what this episode is about. And at the same time, I realized that I wanted to be able to continue to, and I will will continue to develop new skills, I want to continue to nourish my children, because that is extremely important, and me being able to cook, not just burn up a credit card all the time, is something that it's, it's also something I want to pass on to my kids, right? I want them to be able to see, like, hey, look, this is a fun thing to be able to do, to get together, and now even cook together, which is great, and you know, I want to be able to entertain friends, I think that that's kind of a cool thing, but at the same time I guess secretly I want to know, maybe not even secretly, because I'm sharing it here, even though I did say that there's a hidden little secret, and I do want to be known as a, as a better chef, as someone who cooks and is able to do things that are bringing people together and uplifting others, because I guess after 26 well, I guess 25 years of living in Europe, one of the things that I've really, really understood, especially in the Mediterranean part of Europe, is food and the whole experience. It is such an important part of developing and deepening relationships, and I want to be a centerpiece for being able to do that kind of stuff. So, and after making the same thing all the time, like, how boring is that?

Billy Keels  4:04  

When you're eating the same food all the time, every day, all day, it's like I don't want to break, I want to definitely break that mold and be doing something different. And also, I want to keep my family and friends on their toes, never knowing what's always predictable. Predictable to me is, well, it depends on what the context is, but as it relates to food and stuff like that, that's pretty boring, and I don't want to be known as a boring person. So I came up with this new idea of, well, I don't know if I actually came up with it, or it was through conversation, probably through conversation, but this whole idea to make a new plate, and the new plate was chickpeas, popcorn chickpeas, just like the name sounds, and so here's the, here's the thing. If I get this in my head, of course, I have to follow this really nice recipe. So I follow the recipe, and the recipe, you know, I laid it out. I followed the recipe to a T, and I explained what was in the recipe, but what I realized is that there was about 10 minutes where I was supposed to leave or. About 20 minutes that I was supposed to leave the the chickpeas in the oven, and so I read the instructions. I knew I wanted to do it. I followed the instructions, and as I read the instructions, I knew it was going to be about a 20 minute kind of like process, so that the chickpeas would come out the way that I wanted them to come out, and was going to compliment the meal that I was going to have, and all that stuff. Well, the thing is, is I made a little bit of a mistake. Yeah, it's a rookie mistake, of course, but this happens. I misread Fahrenheit for Celsius. Celsius for Fahrenheit was not a good thing. So I leave it 20 minutes, and I made another rookie mistake. Of course, I was not standing next to, and I'm going to put my hands up, not next to the oven, while things were in there. I mean, everything was secure, of course. So, let me not.. let me just say that everything was secure. But when I walked away, well, I walked away, and all of a sudden I hear this noise. A few minutes later, not 20 minutes later, but about 10 minutes, I hear this, and I'm a little bit concerned, because I'm like, I'm home alone. All of a sudden, there's all this crazy popping noise in the background, and a little do I know. I look over, I run into the kitchen, all of a sudden I smell this like burn. I look in, and the light was on, but inside of the oven, like, you can see this light, but there's like this black smoke popping all over the place, and it smelled literally like popcorn. I smell popcorn in the air, but like this Lowry season popcorn kind of thing, and it wasn't very nice. Let's just say it was a complete disaster. The first time was a complete disaster, it was completely burned up, and it didn't even take 30 minutes for that to happen, but what did happen was it was such a disaster, I had to get that area all clean, and I, you know, I invested probably I don't know, 1520, minutes to start to get at least part of it clean, and it was not nice, it was a, I had to wait a couple extra minutes, because even when I opened the door, you can imagine I'm putting my, my, I pulled it down a little bit, so all this smoke is going all over the is is in the air and stuff like that, and as the smoke is all in the air, it gets throughout the entire house, and don't forget the chickpeas are still super hot, so they're still popping, and they're popping out of the oven onto the floor in the kitchen. I was not a happy person, but guess what? I created all this, and the reason I say that, like I'm sharing the story about the chickpeas, because I have all of these great intentions of being able to do things.

Billy Keels  7:30  

Now, I did not have anybody to help me here at the house to guide me through the process, and when I made a mistake, I didn't actually see the mistake. So, what did it cost me? It cost me a stinky kitchen, burned fingers, and chickpeas all over the floor, right. And so, but the whole thing is, I realized that I made the mistake, I could walk it back, I could track it back, and see where it was. Now, had I had somebody there with me, guiding me through the process, well, guess what? I probably wouldn't have made that big of a mistake. I may have made a mistake, but it wouldn't have been that big a mistake. Where I ended up spending 30 minutes of my time of my life cleaning up crap that could have been done had I just had somebody there to help me. So I realized that one wasn't the end of the world, so guess what? I did. I tried it again afterward. When I tried it the second time, guess what happened? Well, I was number one. I read the right Fahrenheit in Celsius, and I had the right degrees in Celsius. It cooked at the time that it was supposed to cook. I was there the entire time. I did not go do anything else, so I stood very, very firmly to the plan, and my skills and my confidence improved. So, guess how many times I've done my chickpea, my popcorn chickpeas a couple more times, because I feel more confident. I recognize what's happening, and you're probably thinking, Billy, chickpeas, and building a side business. Well, it's the same process when there's something that you want to do that you're clear on what, why you want to do it, that business, that side business that you want to build. Why you want to build it? What are the specific process and the steps that you're going to take? The difference that I would say is don't do it alone, like I did it alone. That was not a very smart thing. It would have behooved me to have somebody else by my side to help me through that process, so I didn't have to make this major cleanup. Maybe it would have been something much, much smaller, because you got to learn, you got to make some, some, some challenges, maybe call them mistakes, whatever, but that would have been very, very helpful. So, if you've ever wanted to go it alone, think about it twice. It's best to have somebody by your side as you go through this process, and while you do it, your skills will improve, just like my skill set has improved. It's, it's gotten, continue to get much, much better. My culinary skills and others that are around me are enjoying the fact that I'm cooking and creating new dishes, because it's bringing us together, and we're developing even better relationships. So, if you. Know someone who has been in a very similar situation, they're trying to go up by themselves, and maybe it's not just chickpeas, it's trying to build that profitable side business, they've gotten stuck, they've gotten frustrated. Guess what? Let's, let's connect, let's have them understand what it is that they can be doing, and to do it differently, so that they don't go through the stinky smoke kind of smell, and in moment when my, like, I went through with my chickpeas, that everything comes out smelling like roses or like well-cooked chickpeas when they're not overly burned. So, if that's you, you know where to find me, and if that's not you, share today's episode with someone, get on the phone, share care, go from theory to practice, and you know what, while you're doing that, I'll be right here preparing for the next episode. So, until then, go out and make it a great day. And thank you

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