Sean Michael Crane's Unstoppable Mindset

How Prison Changed My Life

• Sean Michael Crane • Episode 133

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A mirror in a six-by-eight cell, a blur of scratches, and one hard truth: nothing changes until you do. That’s where Sean Crane rebuilt his life from the inside out—trading resentment for forgiveness, numbness for discipline, and chaos for purpose.

We dive into Sean’s early years in Santa Barbara marked by parental addiction, anxiety, and a spiral into substance abuse. A violent night and a wrongful focus by authorities led to an arrest and a sentence that could have broken him. Instead, isolation became a workshop for transformation. Sean shares the routines that saved his life—prayer, brutal bodyweight workouts, relentless reading, and strict control of his thoughts—and explains how forgiving his parents unlocked the energy to move forward. He also unpacks why faith wasn’t a flourish, but a survival tool that became a compass.

The conversation follows his evolution in prison: earning four associate degrees, mentoring others, and speaking his vision out loud before he could prove it. On release, the free world hit hard—anxiety, noise, and uncertainty—yet he chose purpose over comfort, launched a fitness business, and later pivoted online during COVID to help people battle anxiety, depression, and addiction with practical habits. Sean breaks down a simple recovery framework: make peace with the past, define a meaningful future, and operationalize it with daily, measurable actions. He also offers clear guidance on loving someone with addiction while setting boundaries that protect your own growth.

This is a raw, hopeful roadmap for anyone stuck between pain and possibility. If you’re ready to turn trauma into tools, build unbreakable habits, and follow a calling with courage, press play and lean in. If the story moved you, subscribe, share it with a friend who needs hope, and leave a review telling us the one habit you’ll start today.

SPEAKER_00:

When you truly like transcend your trauma and your pain and you you get clear on what God wants you to do in life, like that purpose we feel in our heart, and you have the courage to go down that path for a long period of time and overcome all those challenges on the way, like magic starts to happen in your life. Where then the things that once affected you in the past, now they they aid you. You know, they're like tools because there's lessons you learned along the way. So that's the main thing that I still take away from all those years is like the lessons that I acquired are invaluable. My name is Sean Crane. Um, I'm the founder of Unstoppable 365, which is a health and fitness program and company for men and women who want to make health a priority and develop the mindset and habits to not only get results but sustain them. Uh and I've been on a journey to this point. This is something, you know, my life right now is something that I once prayed for and envisioned for years. I have my beautiful wife, three children. We have one more on the way. I have a company that allows me to make an impact and help people, something that is is dear to my heart. Um, I live in, you know, I have a life by design. These are all the things that I wanted to achieve as far as having my career be my passion, being able to help people, have a family, and raise my children and share all those beautiful memories together. But it it took me a long time to get here and I went through a lot of struggle, uh, a lot of hardship, a lot of adversity. I grew up in Santa Barbara, California, which is a beautiful part of the world. Great people, tons of opportunities. I mean, this is a place that movie stars and athletes and celebrities moved to to call home. And I was so fortunate to grow up here. And as a kid, I loved going to the beach. I loved playing sports, I loved spending time with my cousins and my friends. And all I wanted to do was be a professional athlete. I remember from an early age, I wanted to be a professional baseball player, basketball player, football player. Like I loved sports, and I get I became very passionate around surfing as well as I got older. So I was always active and doing things as a kid. I was passionate, I was full of life. And, you know, at a young age, though, I started seeing a lot of things at home that changed my perception of the world. I started noticing my parents were both struggling with addiction. They were, you know, the first thing I noticed is that they were different than my friend's parents, and they were different than a lot of my aunts and uncles. I'd see them fight, I'd see them drunk, I'd see them passed out. I started seeing all these things at a young age that really affected me. And the thing that really stands out the most is at 10 years old, I saw my mother overdose for the first time. So I was literally watching her lifeless on the ground, and I pulled my brother and sister who are younger than me into the next room to shelter them and kind of protect them while my uncle and my dad were doing CPR on her. And that was the first of three times I saw her overdose and get wheeled out on a stretcher by the paramedics. And it was just horrifying as a kid. I mean, I started to have these nervous habits, I guess you could call them. I remember I'd I'd bite my nails, I'd be worried that something bad was going to happen at home, or if I'd see an ambulance with the lights on near our house, driving home from school or going somewhere, I'd get very nervous and almost overwhelmed with um anxiety and stress and fear. So from a young age, I started seeing those things, and it it changed my attitude and perception towards life. And then at 14, uh, my freshman year in high school, the first month in school, uh as a freshman, you know, it was a really pivotal age for me. I'm trying to figure out who I am as a young man and a person in that in this world. And I came home one day and my dad was drunk, he was blacked out drunk. You could tell by the look on his face, and he had a pistol in his lap. And I don't know what he was gonna do with it. He had had an argument with someone the day before and he was just completely out of his mind. And the cops ended up coming to our house and having a standoff with him. And I remember just thinking my dad was gonna be shot and killed in front of us. And luckily, he surrendered to the cops, gave up the gun, and they took him to jail, and he ended up going off to prison. And so at that time, my mom, instead of stepping up and being there to take care of us, she started falling worse into her addiction, and she stopped coming home at night. She found a boyfriend, and she abandoned me and my siblings. And so at 14, that's literally when my whole world went dark and completely flipped upside down. I lost both my parents in a very short period of time, and uh thank God I had my uncle Mike there to take care of us. He was like my guardian angel my whole life. He was the person there checking in on us, living with us, making sure that the harm that my parents were doing to themselves wasn't affecting us, and it was, but he was there to protect us. Um, but still, I became so angry and resentful and confused at that time. I didn't know how to deal with all the emotion I was experiencing. And this is still when I was I I love sports, I love surfing. I was a good kid, you know, and I I had good friends at that time, and I I changed overnight. I stopped going to school, I stopped hanging out with my old friends, I stopped going to family functions because I didn't want to be around anybody that would ask me about my mom and dad or remind me of my reality. I I couldn't accept it. I just couldn't. I couldn't believe that my life had changed so drastically, and it hurt me so bad. It hurt me so bad because then I'd continue to see my mom in the neighborhood drunk or come home after not seeing us for a week. And so it wasn't just the pain of that initial event, but it was the continuation of the pain, like constantly being reminded of what had happened and seeing my parents just completely fall apart in front of us. So for the next you know, 10 years, my my dad was in and out of prison, my mom was in and out of my life, she was losing her mind to her to her drug addiction. She completely changed. Um, and I started to become an addict myself. So when I stopped going to school and hanging out with my old friends and going to family functions, I found a new group of friends who I could I somewhat relate to. We were all going through hardships in our lives, and we were all angry, and we were all numbing our pain with drugs and alcohol. And so that's what I did. I started partying, I started getting high every day, I started drinking every day, and that was the only escape or relief I could find at the time. So I had, you know, codependent relationships with my friends. I I had a codependent relationship with my dad. We started using uh together and drinking together at that time. And it was just this warped, chaotic life, you know, where uh friends were dying from accidental overdoses, family members were dying. Um, my dad was so close to dying on many occasions, and and my life was very precarious, uh, very, very um chaotic, and just you never know what was going to happen day to day. And so, you know, I actually managed to to go through high school and graduate. They basically let me graduate after going to an alternative school and getting credits um and just kind of doing their best they could with me. But I was getting in fights at school because I was angry and at the world and taking out that anger on people or or situations, didn't know how to control my emotions. Um, I'd miss a lot of school. And just at that time, I had nothing going for me. I didn't play any sports, I didn't have any goals. I I couldn't, I couldn't even think of that stuff. And so then after high school, I started working for one of my uncle's tree service businesses, and it was a great experience for me. It was taught me the value of hard work, taught me um what it was like to actually get out in the real world and earn your money. And it was one of the greatest accomplishments of my life to that point because my mom and dad weren't around. My uncle was struggling to pay the bills at our house and keep a roof over our head, and my siblings were still in school. And so I remember at 18, right out of high school, I'd I'd work all week, I'd make$1,000 cash, and I'd come home and I'd give my uncle Mike$900 every week. So I'd only keep$100. And I was working my butt off. I was climbing trees, carrying logs up hills. Like I was working with grown men and I was pushing myself because that this was my uncle's company. I took pride in that and I wanted to make him proud, and I was grateful I had a job. But at the same time, I was working with my dad too. He was always in and out of the picture. And we would drink at work, we would drink after work. Um, and so I never was like actually healing or fixing what was wrong with me. I was just continuing to mask it and numb it. And uh I was I was happy that I was able to work and help provide for my family, but I was still a mess. And so that happened all the way from 18 till 23. And then when I was 23, I actually had a relationship with a girl that we ended up moving in together. We moved out of Santa Barbara to try to get away from that toxic environment I was in. And for a little period of time, we actually had a pretty decent life. Like I was trying to get sober, I wasn't as bad as I was when I was younger, but I would still drink, I would still take pills, but I was working and I felt like I kind of had a grip on life. I was away from my parents. Um, and then me and that girl broke up at 23. She left. Uh we weren't happy together anymore. And my dad actually came to live with me at that time. And it was like the codependency and the drug use and the alcohol abuse, it just went through the roof. It was the worst it had ever been. I was heartbroken. It was the first time I dealt with a breakup. Um, and so there's these certain events in life, whether it's a loss of a loved one, you lose your job and you're in financial uh stress, or maybe you have a breakup that can trigger us to just relapse or go back into our drug use and alcohol use uh tenfold. And that's what happened to me. And I really felt like at that time I almost had a death wish. You know, I was taking handfuls of pills every morning just to get out of bed, drinking alcohol all day long. And I'm so lucky at that time I didn't accidentally overdose because I had I had no care in the world, meaning like I was reckless, I was heartbroken, and I almost had a death sentence, it seemed like. And um, you know, so then during that time I started going back to Santa Barbara, back to my old friends, socializing, going back out to parties and bars, and just maybe trying to find a new girl or escape the pain I was experiencing. And that's when I went to a party in a really beautiful place in Santa Barbara called the Mesa, which overlooks the Pacific Ocean. And it's it's like world renowned, you know, it's amazing. And there's a lot of college kids that live in that area because there's a uh Santa Barbara City College close by. And I remember that night I went to the party with one friend. I didn't know anybody else. We were just going there to drink, socialize, have a good time. And right when I got there, there were these two groups of guys who were starting to argue and fight. And you could tell they had some past issue that they were uh bringing back up or they were gonna try to resolve right then and there. And I've been to so many parties as a young person where everyone's drinking, and by the end of the night, a group of guys are fighting. Like it just happened all the time. I was in the mix often. Like I was fighting, I've gotten jumped in the past, I've gotten in trouble for fighting. And then it would always die out, though, and everyone would go home, and it was like that was almost a weekly thing as a young person going to college parties. Um, but this night, one of the groups of men, they had weapons with them, and no one knew that. But as this big fight broke out, uh, they started assaulting the other group with weapons, with knives. And I was right there watching the fight, like way too close. I was drunk, I was acting like an idiot, I was there to watch the fight, and all of a sudden I get tackled from the side and I'm wrestling around with this guy on the ground, thinking that they're jumping me because they thought I was part of the other group of men. Um, and you know, nobody was kicking me in the head, no one was hurting me. I was just wrestling with this big guy on top of me that I couldn't get off. And when I stood up, uh, I was covered in blood. And everyone at the party saw that, and they saw me wrestling with him, and then everyone dispersed. Everybody ran, and no one really saw the initial attack or knew what happened. It was dark, we were in the front yard, um, and it was just like a melee. And so we ran and left, and I knew something bad had happened. You know, I was covered in blood. I knew it wasn't my blood, it wasn't from a bloody nose. Like the amount of blood was horrific. And the next morning I woke up after being drunk and passed out, and I Googled fight on the mesa, and that's when it said that there have been two men stabbed and one was in critical condition. And right then and there I knew like my life was gonna change forever. I just I knew something really bad had happened, and I thought, honestly, this is how naive I was, or maybe it's because I know in my heart I'm innocent, but I thought the cops were gonna come and question me and try to get me to tell on who did the crime. I never assumed that they were looking at me as the number one suspect, the guilty suspect. And but they did. They came the next day and arrested me at gunpoint. They had dozens of police officers, dogs, the forensic unit, they had AR-15s, they put me on the ground, put the gun to my back, and they cuffed me and brought me in the car. And uh I was like, man, they're really pulling out all the stops to like scare the hell out of me right here. This is insane. And when I got to the police station, again, that's what I thought they were gonna do. But they said, We're charging you for attempted murder. Um, there's a number of eyewitnesses that said they saw you wrestling around with this guy who was stabbed, he's gonna die, you're gonna go to prison for homicide. And that's literally what they told me. They were trying to scare the heck out of me. And I was in shock, I was numb, I was in disbelief. And I remember just getting to the county jail and calling my Uncle Mike, and you just get like a 10-second phone call right then and there when you're getting booked in. And I like I was choking back tears almost. I'm like, Mike, they charged me with attempted murder. I didn't do it. Like, I don't know what's gonna happen. Um, and then so for the next couple of weeks, I was going back and forth to court, and like I remember the first day I walked into court, uh, and all these news people are there, the media is there, they're taking pictures of me. There's like the journalists writing out, you know, the notes of the day and what's happening. And they put my picture on the front page of the Santa Barbara news press. It said Sean Crane charged with attempted murder. And the first thing my lawyer told me is that the judge and the DA are talking about amending your charges today to homicide. The victim's in a coma. No one thinks he's gonna survive, he's brain dead. And that was the first thing they told me. And I was 23 years old and I was looking at life in prison for something I didn't do. And so for the next couple of months, I'm going back and forth to court. I'm hoping that, you know, at that point I still thought the truth was gonna come out. I still thought that somehow, somehow, people in the party were gonna tell the truth, that the the real culprit of the crime was gonna be found, you know, found guilty, or that new information had to come out. Like you're sitting in a situation going, this can't be real. You know, I've seen this in movies, I've read about it in books, but this can't actually be my life right now. Like I remember just being in such shock. And here's the thing, too, is like in jail, guys are using drugs and stuff, and it's the same lifestyle in there as it is out here. So I remember when I saw guys bringing drugs in and they offered me some, I was relieved. I finally could numb out the truth again. I was repeating the same behavior in there as I was out here. This is how how twisted and sick the addiction is, right? Like anything to just help me to escape reality. And it it worked, but it wasn't making the truth or of the matter go away. It wasn't making, you know, my problems go out. I was still stuck in jail. And uh I got a couple fights in there. I got in a couple fights and they moved me back to a part of the jail where you're now in isolation, you're locked down 24 hours a day. Uh, you just go to court and that's it. Or you might get to shower like three times a week. They never gave you yard time. If they did, it was just a bigger concrete box. So here I'm stuck in this six-byte cell. It was so small I could touch both walls at the same time. I'm coming off these drugs and all the stuff that I was doing both on the streets and then and there. And I remember I just had this moment where I looked in the mirror and the mirror's all scratched out. You can barely see your reflection, but I felt so horrible. I was coming off of drugs, my skin felt nasty, I'm all dirty, I'm I'm smelling. I'm like, Sean, what are you doing in your life right now? Like, this, what are you doing? You're doing the same stuff in here as you were doing out there. And like, I just had this moment of clarity where I realized I gotta change before anything else changes. It doesn't matter if I go to prison, if I get out, it doesn't matter what happens in my life. If I don't change myself, nothing good is gonna happen in my life. And I have no control, you know? It was just this really sobering moment where I think we all go through times in our life where we expect other people to help us or something else to change. Like we think it's gonna be an external shift. It's an internal shift that has to take place before we see it reflected in anything external, whether that's our relationships, our career, our health, our financial situation, whatever. If we want to truly see things change in our lives, we have to change first. And in that moment, I just sat there and I thought about my life to that point, and I couldn't think of anything I was truly proud of. You know, I I remember wanting to be a professional athlete. I had big dreams as a kid. I wanted to help people. I wanted to do something significant in my life. You know, I always felt like I was capable of that. And I felt ashamed and bad that I had let myself down. I felt, you know, it was the first time I really took responsibility and accountability for my actions. I, you know, I blamed my parents for so long. I I had like the F the world mentality. I was so angry and upset at what happened. And I had acted like a victim because of that. And so it was the first time in my life I realized I have to make the change. I'm in control. It's I I it's I have to be accountable. And, you know, I thought about all the things I didn't do, all the stuff I wish I would have done. Um, and and I really felt like my life was over because they were telling me life in prison, you know? And I treated it like that. I treated it like I was on my deathbed. And I think I experienced in my jail cell what a lot of people will feel and experience at the end of their life. They thought they had more time. There was this truth in their heart about who they wanted to be and the things they wanted to achieve and the places they wanted to go, but they kept putting it off, or they kept making excuses, or they had fear and doubt around these changes, and they never actually lived the life they wanted to live. You know, and that's my whole purpose for now being a speaker and a coach and doing what I do is to reach as many people as possible to ensure that they don't have that same feeling that I had in that jail cell when they're on their deathbed. Like I want people to look back on their lives with tears of joy in their eyes and a heart full of gratitude, not thinking, oh my gosh, I wish I had a second chance. Like, is there a do-over? Because there's not. And so in that moment in my cell, I just made two promises to myself. The first one was that I was gonna truly go all in to become the best version I could ever be. Like I had to do it for me. I had to be my truest and authentic self, and I was gonna face every fear, go after every goal, and I'm truly all in on this life. And the second promise was that I was gonna be sober for the rest of my life. I made those commitments to myself because I knew that it was life or death, and I never again wanted to contribute to that feeling that I experienced in my jail cell. And so from that moment forward, every day I would find ways to be productive and focused on my growth. I started working out every morning. I started reading books, I started praying and meditating. Every second of my day, I was just trying to do something productive to stay busy so that I could pass the time in a productive manner, but also so that I wasn't suffering in that cell. Because if you're not doing positive things every day that build you up, like working out, reading, just being productive and consuming your energy and time on things in your control, your mind starts to go crazy. You start to think about how you're gonna be in that cell forever. You start wondering what's your girlfriend or your ex-girlfriend's doing, or thinking about loved ones that you can't see. You're just you start thinking about all the stuff outside of your control, about the DA and the judge and how no one's coming to help you, no one's trying to tell the truth. And your mind will just ruin you. You'll have anxiety, stress, suicidal thoughts, depression. And that's why guys go back to the drugs, or you see people that are in that situation take their own lives. And that's when I realized how powerful our thoughts are. And everything that I teach now, and all the coaching principles that I share with my clients and even from stage derive from those moments and what I learned. The first thing I learned is like your thoughts are literally your reality. And if you're sitting there entertaining negative thoughts, it's gonna affect your subsequent actions, the effort you put forth in your life, your emotional stability, how you're feeling, how you're treating others, everything derives from your thoughts. And so every morning I'd get up and the first thing I'd do is just pray to God for strength and guidance. I'd think about all my loved ones and picture them doing good in their lives and you know, anything positive I could to create this gratitude perspective. And that started helping me to have better thoughts. And then I'd look at my tiny little cell, and instead of thinking negative thoughts, I'd go, well, what can I do today to improve myself? What can I do in this limited space to get a little bit better today, to feel to feel productive? And that's why I started working out, and that's why I started reading books, and I even looked up words in the dictionary every day, over and over and over. And the craziest thing happened, but I started feeling something in my life I had never felt, and that was joy and gratitude and pride in the way I was living. And I hadn't experienced that for you know many, many years, since I was a little kid. And I realized, wow, these daily actions are shifting my energy. I'm I'm feeling different, I'm feeling optimistic. How is this possible? I'm feeling gratitude, and it was because I was doing things every single day that made me feel proud of who I was, and I was focusing on what was within my control, and I was I was safeguarding my thoughts, I was focusing on positive thoughts and positive future outcomes, not negative ones. Um couple reasons this was possible that I really want to touch on. First, it was the ability to accept the past and the things I could no longer change and make peace with those life events that had ruined me and and hurt me so devastating so badly, and forgive my parents. A lot of people carry around trauma and baggage and issues from the past that they can't deal with or they they haven't faced, and it continues to cause harm in their lives currently and in the future. And that was me over and over and over, just angry at the world, upset at my parents, just taking that that emotional distress I had was bottled up inside of me. And that's why I use drugs and alcohol to try to numb it out. And I remember I was just sitting there in my cell and I thought, man, I I gotta let go of the past. Like this challenge that I'm facing right now is life or death. If I don't give 100% of my energy and focus to this challenge, I'm not gonna make it out of this cell. And I remember just realizing I gotta let go of the past, man. I gotta forgive my parents. Like, I can't change that now. This challenge is so much bigger, it requires all my attention. And I also did it because I didn't want my parents to self-destruct further. And I had a fear that they were both gonna overdose and die while I was gone because they felt bad about my situation and and guilty because of how they contributed to who I became, essentially. And I just sat there in my cell and I wrote them letters, multiple letters, um, addressing everything that we had never talked about, describing how I felt, describing the emotional effect their actions had on me. And I thought I was letting them off the hook and kind of like forgiving them for them. And that's when I realized forgiveness was for me. It was so that I could let go of all the anger towards them, the resentment. I could finally express how I felt and just honestly acknowledge my emotional state at that time. And I swear I felt the biggest weight lifted off my shoulders when I did that. I felt finally for the first time, like in a decade, that I was liberated from those traumatic life events and that it was okay, like that happened. I can't change it now, and I gotta move forward in my life. And I really made peace with the past, and uh it saved my life because I was so upset and sad and broken down because of that. And and so that was the first component to getting sober and changing. Like at that point, I had been sober because I chose to, and I was in a cell and I couldn't get drugs. But if there had been a liquor store there or a drug right there, who knows? Would I have used it? Probably. But when I when I let go of the anger towards them, like that was a really pivotal moment in my life. And the second one was believing that God was intervening in my life for a purpose, and that even though no one would choose to go to jail or face life in prison or going through what I was going through, maybe somehow, somehow it was divine intervention. And I chose to believe that because the opposite was so debilitating, so despairing. To just believe that it was by chance and that, you know, I could spend the rest of my life in prison and like that. I that was such a pessimistic view in my point, in my perspective. And I just realized, like, man, maybe God's putting you here to get you sober, Sean. Maybe if you didn't come to jail, you would have been like your friends or some of your loved ones who accidentally overdosed and your life would be over, you know. Or maybe this is the first opportunity you've had to figure out who you are as a person, not be around your dad and your friends and have those codependent, toxic relationships, but an opportunity to discover your true self and be that man. You know, and the big the biggest one for me was just believing that God had intervened in my life for a purpose. And even though I couldn't fully see it or understand it in that moment, there was a bigger plan. And there was, you know, God had a plan for me, and it was part of this master plan that I couldn't see or understand. And that gave me hope each day to keep doing my workouts, reading books. It was just that little bit of hope and faith that I started to develop that would get me through each day. Like maybe somehow, somehow, these moments are gonna add up. These moments are gonna get me to somewhere better in life. Um, faith is so important to have. And that's why, like in recovery, a lot of recovery groups talk about higher power and spirituality. Because if you don't have faith, what is it all for? What does it matter? You know, you get very negative and pessimistic real quick if you don't believe that something bigger, better is at work in our lives and that it could get better down the road, right? It's like, what's the point? We have to have some element of faith or belief, at least I did, because if I didn't, everything I learned was to be able to get through the day without wanting, and this just to be transparent, without wanting to hang myself, without wanting to use drugs. Like it was life or death. So at first I worked out because it made me feel happier. I would look up words in the dictionary because to learn a new word made me feel good about myself and it made me forget that I was stuck in a cell. Like believing that God was guiding me and asking for strength and becoming a spiritual person. It was survival. I needed help. I completely surrendered and like I'll do whatever it takes. Just like I needed to get through these days. And those days added up. And all of a sudden, eight months passed by. And I was completely different in eight months. I had transformed my mentality. I was sober, I was working out every day, I was in good shape. I was a believer. God was guiding me on this path. I had I started to get clarity around what could possibly be if I continued on this journey. Um, and that's when I found out I was going to prison. They told me I was gonna do seven years in prison. And at that time, I looked at it as the biggest challenge in my life, but I wasn't daunted. Because of that momentum I had built up in eight months and the faith that I had developed and the inner strength, I told myself, Sean, you're gonna go to prison, you're gonna make every day in there count, you're gonna overcome this challenge, and there's nothing in life you can't do after that. Like I looked at it as the defining moment in my life, and almost in this weird and twisted kind of way, part of me was a little excited to go face this challenge and show people in the world who I truly was and what I was capable of. I just felt, you know, and at the same time, you're scared, you're sad, you're you're in disbelief still. But part of me was like, Sean, you know what? Imagine who you're gonna become through this experience and what you can do later on in your life. Like, this is the biggest challenge you'll ever face. And, you know, as a kid, I always had like these visions of crazy things happening and overcoming them. I'd watch the Rocky movies, you know, like the underdog story. Um, and and part of us always we cheer for the underdog. He goes through so much adversity, so much struggle. He's beaten down. No one thinks he could ever come back from that. And he does. And we're like, oh my gosh. So as a kid, I'd picture like a bus going off a bridge into the water and jumping in there and saving everybody, you know, or like a house fire and like pulling your family members out, or like just this create these crazy scenarios where I was able to fulfill some potential I possessed because of that situation, you know, and this was it for me. And so when I got to prison, I stuck to myself. I focused every day on the same routines. I read so many books, I looked up so many words in the dictionary, I'd keep these vocab lists in my cell on these papers, and I'd memorize them. And I started using these words in my letters back home when I would speak to other people. I started feeling my mind come alive and my memory, my speed of thought improve. And I thought, oh my gosh, I'm changing in real time. I'm doing more push-ups, I'm getting in better conditioning, better shape. I'm learning, I'm growing. This is incredible. And that was the path I chose. You know, I stayed sober, I built some good relationships with guys that wanted to improve. Um I enrolled in college courses because they had a correspondence program. So I started studying psychology, social and behavioral sciences, all these interesting subjects and topics that I had neglected in my youth. And I became a scholar in that cell. I became an athlete, a visionary, a purpose-driven man. And so for the next five and a half years, that's what I did every day. And they gave me six months off my sentence because I got four associates' degrees during the time. I just took every course they had available. I passed them all. I think I had like a 3.8 GPA or 3.9. Um, and I started actually mentoring other inmates because the guys would see how dedicated and focused and disciplined I was. And at first they'd they wouldn't get it. They'd be like, What's this guy doing, man? Like he thinks he's gonna get out and do something in life. And guys would say that, like, Crane, what are you doing, man? You know you're gonna get out and go to the same old neighborhood, the same lifestyle. And no, I wasn't. Like, I'm gonna be different. I knew it. And every phone call, I'd get back home, I'd ask about how everyone was doing. And then I couldn't help but just sharing what I was doing, where I was going, the life that I wanted to live. You know, there's an element of speaking your truth out loud that's so important. There's two facets of it. On the one end of the spectrum, people are scared to talk about the past and the stuff that afflicted us. So we suppress that. We can't grow when we suppress our truth. And on the other end of the spectrum, people are scared to call their shot and tell people what's on their heart and the purpose that they feel and who they want to be and the goals they have, because there's an element of the unknown and it's not guaranteed. And so we have fear and doubt around those things. And for me, what I learned is like I had nothing to lose. And I'm truly all in. I don't care. If I crash and burn trying to achieve these goals, at least I tried. I'm never gonna have that regret that I had in my cell ever again. I'm gonna go all in. And so every phone call, every letter, every moment I got to express my truth, I would with full transparency, with 100% conviction. And I was believing and building that believability up in myself by speaking those words. But then I would always back it up with action. I'd be the guy up at five in the morning doing squats and push-ups in the corner of the dorm while everyone else is sleeping. I would do a thousand push-ups and a thousand squats before chow. And then I'd come back and I'd read my book and I'd take my college courses. And every day I was just becoming this machine. And I felt more productive in there than I ever had in my life. It was incredible. And so, you know, the other guys were drawn to that, and I was able to start mentoring other guys, working out with them, showing them what books I was reading, even getting them to enroll in college courses. And these are guys that are in there for murder, um, robbery, uh, multiple offenders, guys with tattoos on their faces, guys that initially we probably wouldn't have a lot in common because I wasn't in a like a gang and I didn't come from a uh like a lifestyle like that. But we could connect on so many other things, you know. Um, maybe because I was finally opening up about my struggles with drugs and alcohol or my parents or coming from a broken home. And then they saw me changing, and I was able to get those guys to start working out with me, building up confidence, um, seeing the potential they possessed. And I remember the moment it hit me, I was like, wow, this is my calling in life. Like my purpose initially was for redemption and to improve myself and to show people who what I was capable of, but now it became about everybody else. I realized that I could not only be an example, but I could make an impact on other people's lives by sharing with them what worked for me. And that's the when I knew definitively that I was gonna come home, I wanted to be a speaker, a coach, and this was my path. And so when I finally did get out, you know, I got out in 2017, right at the end, and uh I went and stayed in a trailer on my aunt and uncle's property. And the first couple months was really rough. You know, I had so much clarity and conviction in prison, and I was so regimented and structured with their rules and the way the life was life wasn't there. When I got out, you're in this free-frall. You know, I remember driving on the freeway and cars are going fast, everyone's on their phones. You know, the first time I got back on a phone, I had never had like Instagram. I had never barely even looked at an iPhone. And it was just so overwhelming to me. And so you see a lot of guys that get out, and the anxiety and stress is so much that they go back to their old ways. And uh I knew I wouldn't do that, I wouldn't break my sobriety, but I did deal with a lot of anxiety, a lot of just emotional distress. And I remember like just in this trailer on my aunt and uncle's property going, I thought it was gonna be different. Like I thought it was just gonna happen right away and it was almost gonna be effortless because I had just gone through the hard stuff, you know? Um and that's when I realized, no, Sean, just like you fought in there, you got to keep fighting every day for sobriety, for your dreams, your goals. And so after two months working for my uncle, doing the same tree work that I did before prison, I said, I'm not doing this anymore. This is not my passion. I'm not gonna ever spend another day of my life not pursuing my vision that God put on my heart. And I literally left that trailer with a backpack, like$700 of money I'd saved up, and I flew back to Santa Barbara. Um, and that day I was able to find a job as a personal trainer in a gym, find a room to rent out. I gave the guy all my money and um an old beat up car. It was actually my uncle's mechanic's car, uh, one of his cars, and he let me borrow it for a couple weeks until I could pay him back. And I literally went all in. Like I went back to Santa Barbara with nothing. And that same day I got a job, a place to stay, and a car. And I started training clients in the gym every day, building up a positive reputation, showing people my true self, getting results with people. And after about six to eight months, I left that gym and started my own fitness company in town. And now I'm training clients all over the place, and people are starting to see, you know, who I really am. The local news did a story on me. They called it the redemption story. You know, they filmed me and my family and me in the gym. And I was like, wow, okay, I'm doing it now, man. I'm doing it. And then um COVID shut all the gyms down. And so at that time, I had my wife Jessica. We had got married. We had my daughter, Scarlett, my oldest boy, Mason, he's my stepson. He was already in my life, and then she was pregnant again with Preston. So, like, literally within 18 months, all this happened. I I'm telling you, I did not waste time. And uh that was the moment I realized, okay, I'm never going back in life. Like I was scared, I was gonna go get a nine to five to support my family because I lost all my clients and all my revenue and everything overnight. And it was in that moment I realized more so than ever, the gift that prison had given me because everyone was locked down, they were scared, they didn't know how to handle this situation. I had just gone through this for half a decade. For me, COVID was nothing. Like being locked down, like it was nothing. The emotional effect that it had on people, I had just been through it and I realized, wow, I need to start sharing my story more online. I'm I'm I'm gonna go all in to being an online coach, you know, um a content creator, whatever you want to call it. I know that I can help people with more than just fitness and being in the gyms. I can help them with their mindset, I can help them combat depression, anxiety, the stuff that I overcame, addiction. And so I started sharing Facebook lives every day and my message and my story to the world. And that's when my online business just started taking off. And, you know, I never looked back ever since then. Now I have a team of 15 employees and team members, uh, my beautiful family. We live in a beautiful home. We got one more child on the way. I've been able to speak on big stages and share my message with, you know, thousands and thousands of people. I wrote my book, um, actually, it's right here, Prison of Your Own, that became a bestseller during COVID. And it's all the stuff that I envisioned for years and prayed for and worked relentlessly towards has manifested. And I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for my own recovery. And recovery is like multifaceted. It was healing and letting go of the past. It was having the courage to clarify my goals and articulate what I truly wanted out of life and pursue that in the future. It was the daily habits that I developed and how that shaped my mindset over time. And just reading books and being a student of life and wanting to then give back and share with others. You know, I think like whether it's in recovery or coaching or just in overall human evolution, our development from young people to more mature people, the act of being able then to give back and teach others, it's so fruitful because it reminds you of what life was like when you started, what your journey was like. You you live vicariously through the people you mentor and through the concepts that you continue to teach them. So for me, it keeps me grateful every day. I never forget those things I went through. Just because I have success now, I'm still humbled. I'm grateful God did all this for me. I'm just a vessel of that message and I'm willing to do the work. And I truly feel like now it's this new chapter of life where um I just want to be of service. I want to be an example, and I want to make an impact with as many people's lives as possible going forward. So that's where I'm at today. You know, I feel honestly so blessed and grateful. 12 years of sobriety, three beautiful children, one more on the way. Um, and I feel like I sacrificed a small amount of time in prison to learn a lifetime of wisdom. And I truly feel like all the lessons that God taught me during that time is gonna allow me to live the best life possible until the day I take my last breath. The things that once haunted me and I felt ashamed about are now my superpowers, you know. Like I'm I'm a very devoted family man. Family is my number one value. And and I'm, you know, this year the main thing I focused on as my business has grown is being present at home. It's a challenge for a lot of entrepreneurs. Um, but like I have so much presence there and I give my children so much love because I know what it's like to be the kid that just wanted his dad to be sober or to have his parents keep their promises. And like they broke my heart a thousand times over. And uh at the time it hurt tremendously. And but now it's it helps me to be a better father and to show my family more love. So that's just one example how when you truly like transcend your trauma and your pain, and you you get clear on what God wants you to do in life, like that purpose we feel in our heart, and you have the courage to go down that path for a long period of time and overcome all those challenges on the way, like magic starts to happen in your life. Where then the things that once affected you in the past, now they they aid you. You know, they're like tools because there's lessons you learned along the way. So that's the main thing that I still take away from all those years is like the lessons that I acquired are invaluable. Like I empathize 100% with anybody who has a brother, a sister, a parent, a significant other, like a friend who's struggling because the worst feeling in the world is when you love someone so much and you can't fix them. You can't do it for them. I mean, I saw my dad come back and forth from jail and prison. He overdosed one time. I had to give him mouth to mouth until the paramedics showed up. I thought he was dead. Uh and over and over, I had like I would get let down because he would promise to get sober, he'd have these little bouts of sobriety. Even towards the end, man, he got sober for a year before my daughter Scarlett was born. And I I was like, Man, maybe this is it. Like, maybe he's gonna be able to live the rest of his life sober and be here and watch me have a family and be a part of it. And uh you know, my dad was such a good person, like he was such a loving person. This is the hardest part. He had two sides of him. He had that loving, charismatic version of himself that can make anyone laugh and smile and feel special. But when he would drink or do drugs, it was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He became a really mean person and uh just a just not the same individual. And it's because he had so many demons and unresolved issues from his childhood that he he never won that battle, you know? And uh, so here's the truth like it's gonna be hard until the day they're gone. Maybe they make it, maybe they don't. There's no easy way to say that to somebody. What I'd say is like two things um I love my dad and I was there until the day he was gone. And I'm grateful for that because now I miss him and I I did everything I could, and you know, but it was almost a relief when he was gone too, because of the burden that it placed on me my whole life. And I never wanted him to die, but um, I felt like I couldn't really truly step into my potential and live my life until that relationship was over, you know, and so until the day he was here, I I was there for him. But because of that, part of me was always afflicted as well. So, you know, you can love them from a distance, you can be an example for them. Um, you can do everything in your power, and I hope that it helps them change. Look at I got sober because my uncle Mike did that for me my whole life. He he helped me, he saved my life by being always being there. But there was a chance that I couldn't have made it. And so, like all those years of his life that he spent on me, well, now I'm gone, right? That's what happened with me and my dad. So, what I'd say is like love him from a distance, be there for him, let them know that you care about them, but you can't change them. They have to want it for themselves and pray for them and do whatever you can. But I see a lot of people who just like me, they're afflicted their whole lives and they can never be their true self or go after what they want because they're always trying to help that other person. Like, I would I didn't even want to leave home sometimes because I was so scared of what would happen. I thought my dad might have another gun, or him and my uncle might get in a fight, or the house might burn down. So there were many times where like I never went out or I didn't go and do stuff I wanted to do because I was so worried about having to take care of him. So it it affected me tremendously in my life, is what I'm saying. Um in hindsight, like I wouldn't change a thing. I was there with him and I went through a lot of pain and anguish because of it, but um, I had a really good relationship with him in a twisted type of way. So I I still cherish those moments, even though they were hard for me. I hope that answers someone's question, you know, or that question, because and you see, I still get emotional behind it. Like my dad was my best friend for many years. Um there's no easy way to answer that. For some people, you might have to you might have to distance yourself from them for a while and they have to figure themselves out. For other people, you might want to somewhat stay close and show them that you love them so they don't feel abandoned. But it's like playing with fire, it's like rolling the dice. You don't know what's gonna happen. Before prison, I didn't go after anything I wanted to do, and I really like based my decisions based on how I thought it would affect my parents or what other people would think. After going to prison and getting out, I was like, like, screw everyone, I'm all in. I'll still show them love, but I'm never, I'm never again gonna put anything or anyone before my truth and my goals because I suffered immensely because of that. So when I got out, I had boundaries with my dad. Like I went after my goals in my career. I went after my goals in my relationship. I got married, I started having babies. Like he saw me rebuilding my life, and I'd still talk with him all the time and see him and let him know I love him, but it was different. I did have clear boundaries, and the difference was like I'm finally putting myself first. In the past, that felt selfish, but I realized, like, man, I get one life and I don't want to live my entire life putting everything and everyone else first, and then get to the end of my life and go, wait, I wanted more time to work on my stuff and me and make myself proud. So um, you know, I think the fear was always that like people aren't gonna understand, they're gonna get mad at you. And even if they do say things like, at the end of your life, are you gonna look back on this is the way I want to live and who I want to be? Or I did everything to make other people happy, but in the process lost myself. That's what happened to me. So boundaries are key. You got to make sure that you like prioritize your hobbies, your passions, do things every day that you like that make you fulfilled. And then in turn, you're actually a better supporter, friend, lover, whatever for the people around you because you feel more fulfilled and you actually are excited about the stuff you're doing in your life. So, you know, you actually become a better version of yourself for everyone else by doing that, you know? And uh I think when we go through struggles in life where we're battling addiction, we can either uh continuously escape from our problems and try to run from them, or we become we become victims of circumstance where we're like, we're always pointing at other people, we're pissed off at the world, which is somewhat of a natural reaction. But at some point you got to look yourself in the mirror and go, man, I'm the only person that can make a change. I gotta do it. What needs to change in my life to make it better? And it's empowering because you realize how capable you are. Like if you really take accountability and you're willing to do the work, you realize that you're immensely capable. Like that was one of the biggest takeaways I had when I was incarcerated. Uh is I realized that wow, I am smart, I am ambitious, I am like like all these things that we maybe feel like we're lacking, we can develop them by taking accountability and doing the work. And then you realize you're a million times stronger and more capable than you ever thought. You just gotta face it. You gotta face it, and just you gotta attack these goals, you gotta attack these challenges, you gotta be willing to face them head on. If anyone's listening to this and they feel hopeless, like that was a time where I felt immensely hopeless at rock bottom. I thought my life was completely over. And it's amazing because now I can look back on those times in my life and um it's not painful anymore. Life is beautiful, so much has changed in a relatively short period of time. So literally, just I want anybody listening to this, just hold on to even if it's 1% of hope, a little sliver of hope and faith that your life can get better, and then look for ways to improve it, you know, even if it's small things. Like I was reading the dictionary in my cell, I was doing push-ups, I focused on what I could do versus all the reasons I couldn't and all the negative aspects of my life. And and you got to build that foundation over time. But if you're willing to fight and you don't give up and you know that you deserve more for life and you are a special, unique person, like literally, there's nobody else in the world that's ever been like you or ever will be. You're very special and unique in the way you're designed. Recognize that. And there's a purpose behind that. And you have to you have to feel that in your heart that you're made to do something great in your life, and whatever struggles you're going through right now, maybe one day, like me now, you can look back and realize that was a part of a bigger plan for you. And they provided lessons and wisdoms that you desperately needed to go off and live that purposeful life.

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Sean Michael Crane

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