When Knowledge Is A Bad Thing... As Told Through My Chickens

Welcome to Million Dollar Grit, the podcast that dives deep into the world of entrepreneurship, where tenacity meets strategy and dreams meet reality. My name is Julie, and I explore the raw, often overlooked truths of what it takes to succeed in business and in life. It's not just about the glossy success stories, it's about the grit it takes to get there.

Hey everyone, this is Julie. Welcome back to Million Dollar Grit. Today I want to talk about something I noticed recently that made me stop and ask, when did good "Stop Being Good Enough." This is about the curse and downside of knowledge, which I've talked about before, but I'm hoping that this story about my chickens—yes, I know, it's going to be a chicken episode—really spiraled into an epiphany about knowledge, about business, and how we slowly lose momentum and trust in our own selves. So it's part story, part gut check. And I want you to picture me in 2021, brand new chicken mom. This is before I even really talked about chickens on my Instagram account. Zero clue. I just bought a bunch of chickens and I stuck them in my coop, and because I didn't have a big giant run, I just let them free-range. You know, with 15 acres in Connecticut, why not? The problem was that every fox and coyote and owl within a 5-mile radius sent me a thank you card. And within, I don't know, a year or so, all— I think I had 22 chickens— they all had died because they had gotten eaten by predators. And I have to say, I wasn't, you know, I wasn't paying super close attention. I felt like, well, c'est la vie, like, I guess one less chicken for one less egg. I wasn't really super attached to them at the time. I was also— there was a lot going on. But what happened in this phase of my chicken adventures is that I had a failure that taught me a very important lesson, and the only reason I had the failure was because I was willing to do something without making sure I had checked all the boxes. So I want you to think about in business, the people who take action quickly, even when it's not perfect, even when all their T's aren't crossed and I's aren't dotted. Will they fail? Yeah, they probably will fail more, but what you realize in that is that you learn so much through that process, and you can't learn it just by absorbing information. So this is what I learned, is that chickens in my area of the woods can't be left free-range, okay? So the second phase was what I call the chicken palace era, and I decided it was 2024. It had been a couple years. I said, okay, well, if we're going to do chickens again, I don't want this to happen, so we need to build a secure run, and AC heard build a chicken palace, right? So he built something actually way more grand than I had envisioned, but I loved it, and I thought, this is perfect. Now I have chickens, they lay eggs, and they won't get eaten by creditors, and I was satisfied, and I was content. I want you to hear me, right? This was like wisdom put into action. So I want you to think about your business, and I want you to think about, you learn something, you fail, and then you learn something, and then the next time it works, did you stop to be content about it? Because if you didn't, then you don't ever get that moment of celebration, all right? And I'm going somewhere with this if you just kind of hang tight. All right, so this is where it all went like sideways. I decided that I was going to hatch some chickens because we had a rooster and I wanted to see if the eggs were fertilized and all this stuff. That wasn't really the true problem. The true problem is I started searching online for information about incubators and chicks, and I started to do what? I started to do research. I started to accumulate knowledge. Now, some of this knowledge was helpful, but what happened was the TikTok/Instagram algorithms smelled poultry hobbyist and went absolute gangbusters on my feed. So I started to get coop decor, chicken swings, window boxes, like, oh, you need these supplements. Oh, these sicknesses could hit your chickens, or don't give them mealworms and corn, give them this, right? And what started to happen is as I consumed all of this knowledge, right, without taking action, mind you, and also consuming knowledge that wasn't even related to a problem I had— I didn't even have a problem. Like, the chicken palace was working great, the chickens were doing great, everything was great, and I was super content with what was happening. But because I had searched for hatching chickens, I was now getting absolutely barraged with chicken stuff, and all of that swiping and scrolling and consuming destroyed my contentment. Now, it was important for me to get the knowledge about hatching chicks so that I could actually hatch chicks, and if you watched on my Instagram, I really used ChatGPT to help me. There were a few chicks that got stuck in their eggs, their shells, and I needed to get them out. One I saved, one I didn't, you know, is a whole, whole story. And I learned a lot, but I started consuming knowledge that was not related to the problem that I had. And how many times in your business when you go searching for a solution to a problem, you then inadvertently start consuming information that has nothing to do with the problem you're trying to solve? Because what happened to me in my mind is that all of a sudden my contentment was destroyed. Now my chicken palace, looked absolutely medieval, right? I was like, oh my gosh, we don't have mulch and we don't have sand and we don't have a swing and we don't have a bridge and we don't have a mirror and we don't have, I mean, and then I started like asking AC to help me build all this stuff and I didn't build it and we bought stuff and built stuff. And it's not that, it's not that it's not fun and it's not that the chicken palace is like awesome, but it was the goalpost was moving. And now I was just on Instagram or TikTok a couple days ago, and I was looking at these coops with, you know, beautiful floors and chandeliers inside. I mean, it's just like absolutely wild. And I felt this level of like disappointment in what I had. And I thought, man, this is a curse because the goalpost is moving and I'm just gonna keep consuming and keep thinking I'm not good enough and I'm not good enough and I'm not good enough. Right? And so this is a very, very relatable scene that happens in business because you have a working offer and maybe you have a problem you're trying to solve. And so you go looking to solve that problem and then you get just absolutely bombarded with all of these shiny objects and other things that you could do and how this could be better. And you, and you don't see it coming and that contentment starts to just be destroyed and moved out. And what's in its place is this feeling of never good enough, never celebrating where you've been and where you are, always, you know, struggling with imposter syndrome. And it will destroy your budget, it will destroy your business, it will destroy your brain. Because you are consuming knowledge that's not related to the problem that you have. And so if there's any piece of advice I can give you here, and if God forbid you have OCD or ADHD or any of these sort of mental, uh, stressors that can make this even worse— like, as someone who has OCD, I started to notice that I was getting very anxious about sickness and illness in my chickens because I was reading about these supplements we needed and how often you have to clean the coop. And it was just, it was really a big drag on that part of my brain. And thankfully I was aware enough to be like, oh, hold on a second. A year ago I was perfectly content and my chickens were fine. And now all of a sudden I'm not content and my chickens are like on the verge of death. And the only thing that has changed is the consumption of knowledge. Like, that is it. Nothing has changed. In fact, their life has gotten 10 times better. So, uh, that was the wake-up call. So I immediately shut it down, and I was like, this is so, so dangerous. And if you have a brain that can kind of run away with you, it makes it even worse. So, you know, I, I think about this. If you are a business owner and you tend to wait until things are perfect you don't get the wisdom of failure, right? And the wisdom of failure is actually what taught me so much. And the curse of knowledge is when you are searching and consuming information that is not directly related to a problem. So the next time you're in your business and you're like, man, I have a problem, it's really important that you have a coach, a mentor, or whatever that can help you zero in on what the problem actually is so that you can go find the answer, solution, knowledge, for that problem, but you're going to need to protect your brain because there is an algorithm out there that is aiming to absolutely pummel you with every adjacent potential problem to create a sense of not good enough comparisonitis that will crush you if you don't watch it. Okay, so that was like my big aha related to chickens and related to business. I also have started a new book of the Bible. So I finished Matthew and I started Genesis. So of course I'm like back in the Garden of Eden, and I thought, well, this is interesting because in the Garden of Eden there was a tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And, you know, it— in the scripture, it was like the, the tree itself wasn't evil, or the fruit wasn't bad, but it— by eating it, it was a shortcut to knowledge and information without obedience and maturity. Right? And so that's why we— that's why there is this like powerful sort of reality, truth to knowledge. It's very good, but if we gorge on it and then we call it growth, we're actually not getting wisdom. And we're going to find at the end of that road is a lot of disappointment and discontent. So what can we do? Like, let's transition this story over to business. So here are some things that I suggest. Number 1, pay attention to your algorithm. Your algorithm is going to respond to your behavior. So even just the mildest slowdown as you're scrolling, it's going to register that. The words you use, and you will notice that the goalposts will start moving if you're starting to consume more and more content about a particular, you know, hobby or business tactic or what have you. So watch that. Number 2, make sure that you're getting advice from people who have done the thing, not just taught the thing. And I didn't really address this in this episode, but if we, if we look at the, the danger of consuming knowledge for problems you don't have yet and how it can derail you, there's also danger when people teach what they have not done. In certain— I mean, there's always exceptions to that rule, but in most cases, if you are working on a business, some sort of business strategy with someone, make sure they've done it and not just taught it. Okay, and let's add this action point as well. Look for information on problems you're actively trying to solve and make sure those problems are very clearly defined. And actively shut out knowledge that doesn't have to do with that problem. So you want to create this filter so that you don't get sucked in the way I was getting sucked in with these chicken coops. And, you know, it's not bad to want things to be better. So I don't want you to walk away from this episode and think, well, gosh, you know, Julie wishes that she hadn't upgraded her chicken palace. No, it was fun. It was fun, and I'm not sad that I did it, but I was very aware that my mindset had shifted, and that was sad because now I was looking at me like, oh, well, we don't have this and we don't have that. I was like, where did this come from? Like, 4 years ago, I was just, you know, I was just worried about them getting eaten, and now I'm like, I've got this completely different standard. And so that will help with that mindset piece. So I hope I hope this was helpful. I hope this will give you some, some insight if you're feeling really discontent about your business and you're not realizing how far you've come. And also some guidelines as you are searching for solutions to your problems and being careful about the curse of knowledge.

And there you have it, folks, another dose of Million Dollar Grit. I hope today's episode has left you feeling inspired, equipped, and ready to face your own entrepreneurial journey. With resolve. Remember, until next time, embrace the struggle, harness your grit, and keep pushing forward. You're stronger than any challenge you face. I'm Julie Chenell, and this has been Million Dollar Grit.