Author: David Willis

Learning to be consistent. In cooking and in life.

~ David Willis ~ 1 Comment

I am a Food Network junkie. It is usually what we have on in the evenings. (So much so that my son, who is two and a half, knows most all of the Food Network chef’s and asks for them by name…) One of my new favorite shows is Restaurant: Impossible. It is a lot like Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares, but without all the swearing.

On one episode, Chef Robert Irvine had the kitchen staff, four people in total, cook him the same dish off the menu. Each of them was to cook it the way they would serve it, without communicating with one another. The result? Each person cooked it a different way. The chef’s point was this: if a person comes into the restaurant and orders a dish they want it cooked the same way every time. Because there was no communication in the kitchen (no head chef) there was no consistency to the meal. Success can not be built in that way. It made a lot of sense to me.

I posted a few weeks ago about a disaster I had in the kitchen. You can read about it here. I made a dish called Pasta Carbonara. It is a delicious fettuccine meal that has bacon pieces in a cream sauce. I made it again last night, and atoned for my sins a few weeks ago. While making the dish last night I realized something. I used the wrong recipe a few weeks ago. (I even linked the wrong recipe in my last post…I couldn’t believe it!) I used the wrong blasted recipe! How do I expect to get the same results if I don’t follow the same steps…or at least use the same ingredients?!! It was a lesson in consistency for sure.

This lead me down the path of thought even further. This is one of the lessons I have been learning over the past few months. Learning to be consistent. I am finding it is the path to greater achievement. This has been true in blogging, building relationships, exercising, working, and just about every other area I can think of.  You can’t go to the gym sporadically and expect to build a perfect physique. You can’t spend random time with your spouse and expect for your marriage to be perfect. You can’t expect the dish to come out perfect if you don’t follow the recipe the same way every time. To build (or cook) things of quality and lasting value, you have to be consistent.

It sure makes things taste better when you are.

A knight in shining armor?

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

I have been reading back through some stuff I wrote a while back. What you see in italics below is circa 2002, I think. I wrote this bit about how I viewed my relationship with Marixa. I would like to share it with you. I will add some comments at the bottom.

My armor is not as shiny as it used to be. Armor that has been used rarely is. It has withstood the attacks. My lady is safe. This is my achievement. She feels safe, cared for, and loved. I know with certainty she sees no problem with her knight.

In days long ago another tried to take up the shield and sword to defend her. His armor was polished, as was his sword. But, they were both poorly made. His armor cracked. His sword shattered. He fled and left her alone in the wild. Now, she is my lady. This will not happen.

My armor is thick and heavy. It may not shine as it once did, but no matter. Its dull finish is a reminder to those who would try and do her harm. This knight has seen battle and won. I will not take the armor off to polish it. My lady must not suffer attack. Her protection and her honor require that, to the very giving of my life.

I wrote this after we had been married for 3 years. I feel every word of it even more 9 years later. As her husband it is my honor to defend her. She is a strong woman who is more than capable of taking care of herself, but at the same time she has to know that I am fighting for her. Loving her. Caring for her needs. Protecting her and our family from harm. She knows that I am for her.

One of the reasons I remember writing this was to ask this question: Is a knight in shining armor the best? Or is it the one who has fought and proved himself? What do you think?

 

 

Telling the story well.

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Some people are natural storytellers. It is like breathing. They draw you in and you are with them until the very end of the telling. Some people are really good at this. Others are not. But, that shouldn’t stop you from telling a story worth hearing. Especially if it is one that you have lived.

The trick is knowing which details to include and which to omit. If you watch the best storytellers, they don’t bombard you with meaningless or trivial details. Every reference they make, every word of the story is driving to the climax and resolution. There is very little useless filler. Very little rabbit chasing (which I, unfortunately, am prone to from time to time!).

How is this accomplished? Here are a few ways to prepare your story for the telling:

1. List out the important details of the story on paper. (If it is a story worth telling more than once, you might as well write it down and solidify it in your mind.)

2. Keep it fairly short. Take enough time to include all of the important details, but remember that the average attention span is not so….hey look! Theres a squirrel. You get my point. We have all sat in on a person recounting a story that should have lasted 2 minutes and lasted 20. Don’t do that.

3. Even though the story might be about you, invite your listeners in and make it feel like they were a part of it as well. Ask questions about the emotions involved in the story. Engage them in the telling. Make it a group experience and not just a way for you to show off.

While storytelling doesn’t come naturally to some, it is something that can be learned. We all have experiences that are worth the telling. Yes. It is true. You have a story worth telling. With a little bit of practice you can learn to tell it well and people will benefit from it.

Get me out of this rut.

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Have you ever had a conversation with someone and thought, “Wow, it feels like no time has gone by at all”? I had one of these not too long ago. I hadn’t seen them in many years, but we picked back up into conversations that we had long ago. The same types of coversations anyway. They spent time telling me about life and I instinctively knew how to respond. It felt weird. They were just as I remembered. Very little had changed.

I have thought about this a lot. How much different am I now compared to then? Have I really changed all that much? In a word? Yes. I am very different than I was even 5 years ago. I spent a lot of time stuck in ruts over the years. I have learned from many of them. I don’t want to go back to them. I am very different, because I have chosen to be.

What is the old quote? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results is the definition of insanity. The bad thing is this: most of the time we don’t realize we are doing the same thing over and over. When you are stuck in the rut, often times you don’t know you are stuck at all. You just think life is hard, or out to get you, or that it isn’t fair. We may even realize we are in a rut, but we stay on autopilot and keep doing the same things. Years go by and we are still there and don’t know why.

Here are 3 things to think about when facing a rut:

1. How long has it been since you have done something completely new? Do you drive the same way to work everyday? Do you eat the same things every week? Do you have the same conversations over and over? If you answered yes on any of these things, pick one new thing to do this week.

2. What are you putting into your mind? Are you reading and engaging your mind with positive uplifitng material? Or, do you veg out in front of the TV every spare minute? What you put in is what comes out.

3. Do you find yourself complaining about the same things over and over? Maybe it is time to ask yourself this question: What really is the problem? Talking about the problem seems so much easier than doing the work of solving the problem, but wouldn’t it be better to address the complaints now before any more time goes by?

What have you done when you have found yourself in a rut? How hard was it to escape?

Snow day, what a wonderful day.

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

We had a snow day today. I live in Oklahoma. Snow and Oklahoma and not usually friends. They have been making up for lost time over the last day. There is a 4 foot snow drift on my back porch. My poor dogs can even get into the back yard to do go…you know. (My daschund will hardly step foot out the back door.) It is 8 degrees outside my window right now (it was 72 just 3 days ago…what is up with that?).

It has been a great day. I have a clean office for the first time in a while (thank you Marixa for helping me get this done.) I got to be creatvie in the kitchen this evening. I took my first stab at home made Mac and Cheese. (Still a work in progress.) The best part of the day though was I had to slow down. And I did. I spent the day soaking up being here with Marixa and Trey. That is priceless.

There are not many days that come along where I have to stay home and there is nothing going on. Today was one of those days. I feel plugged into my family. It is a good feeling. One I need to cultivate on more than just snow days.

I hope, wherever you are, you are safe and warm.