Happy Thanksgiving: Level Up In Business & Leadership by Practicing Gratitude

keywords

gratitude, faith, marriage, family, health, leadership, business, podcasting, personal growth, community

summary

In this solo episode of the Off the Ladder podcast, Branden Sewell reflects on gratitude as he prepares for Thanksgiving. He discusses the importance of faith in his life, the blessings of marriage and family, the significance of health and personal growth, and the impact of his business on the community. Branden also shares his journey in podcasting and his love for nature and adventure, emphasizing the power of gratitude in shaping a positive perspective on life.

takeaways

• Gratitude is essential for a fulfilling life.
• Faith provides direction and grounding in challenging times.
• A healthy marriage is a significant blessing.
• Being a parent is both challenging and rewarding.
• Health and fitness are crucial for personal growth.
• Business can create opportunities for community impact.
• Podcasting has been a valuable learning experience.
• Nature and adventure bring joy and perspective.
• Practicing gratitude can transform your outlook.
• Connecting with others enhances the podcasting experience.

titles

Chapters

00:00
Introduction to Gratitude

14:35
The Importance of Faith

26:29
Celebrating Marriage and Family

32:41
Reflections on Podcasting

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Transcript

Branden Sewell (00:01.08)
Hi everyone, my name is Brandon Sewell. I'm the owner of Seal Pro Painting, located in central Florida. I'm also the host of the Off the Ladder podcast. And we exist to help home service business owners learn so that they can lead well and ultimately live life off of the ladder. Thank you guys so much for joining in to this episode today. This is gonna be a solo episode, so no guest.

But today I wanted to talk with you about gratitude. Obviously, we've got Thanksgiving coming up, and it's a time of celebrating everything that we are thankful for. And man, I have so much to be thankful for and so much to show gratitude for. And you know, the first thing that I want to talk about and I think is the most important thing in my life, and that is my faith. Now,

to some of you, may be listening to this and you may not have faith, you may not believe and that's okay. I hope that you still listen and I hope that you still get something from this episode. And you know, there's a couple things I wanted to talk about really quick and you know, for me, the reason why my faith is so important is because it keeps me grounded in every area of my life and from being married,

being a father, being a business owner, my physical fitness, my health. Having faith really keeps me grounded in all of those areas. It helps to provide direction and kind of like a guidepost for how I'm doing in life. you know, it's there to give me course correction when I'm going the wrong way and put up guideposts and

So I really, I couldn't do what I do without my faith. You know, there's a lot of challenges that we face day to day. You know, whether you're a business owner or not, and my faith really sustains me in the challenges of life. And, you know, I think that there could be an argument that your faith could be like a crutch and

Branden Sewell (02:25.838)
that if you're strong, you don't need faith. And I don't think that's true. think it would be easy to just dismiss having faith. But what I find is challenging is in times where I feel like I don't have control or circumstances are tough. It can be hard to just let go.

But there's strength, I believe, in being able to humble yourself before God and to take a lowly place and realize that you don't have to be the one to try and figure everything out and get through all those challenges and hardships and to just have the vulnerability.

and the strength to let go. And I think it does, it takes strength to be able to do that. You know, I was reading a devotional, and I might even read some of it, but it's about Job. And Job was somebody, if you're not familiar with the Bible, Job was somebody who he endured incredible hardships.

in every area of his life from his health being attacked, his family losing loved ones to his finances, his wealth and prosperity, every area of friendships and relationships. But through all of that testing and enduring, he

He still was able to bless God. And I think that's a really powerful thing. I think it's easy to have faith when everything is great. I think it's easy to have faith when nothing's going wrong or when everything in life is just on the up and up. It's another thing to have faith when your back's against the wall, when everything around you is crumbling and falling apart.

Branden Sewell (04:53.494)
challenging to not try to find blame in those moments and maybe to blame the one person that you think has control of it all, that being God and you know, so that's a that's a challenging thing to take on is to face hardships and still be able to say like Job did, you know, blessed be the name of the Lord. And

knowing that whether he gives or takes away that you'll still bless him. So I think that's a really powerful thing. But as leaders, I think there's a lot that we can learn from Job's life. you know, again, why I'm so thankful for my faith is because I learned these these principles that helped me to get through. I want to read a couple things. And this is from a leadership devotional, John Maxwell. And

for today, you know, talked about job and then it gave five crucial keys to leadership. And the first one that it says is leaders must be a visionary, yet they cannot see everything in the future. And you know, that's man as a leader, that's tough. Like when when you're the business owner, you've got a cast vision for

your team. And sometimes you're making decisions and casting vision without knowing exactly what's going to happen in the future. And there's been times where I've cast vision and not being able to know what future circumstances would hold, you know, ended up leading us into really challenging times. And then you have to lead through that. And you have to still pick yourself up and move forward. And so that's really challenging. But

That's what leaders have to do. Two, instead of pretending to be in control, leaders must model being under control. And one of the things that I would say has been one of the most important things that I've learned in leadership is this principle here is, you know, in the midst of everything that happens in business, the ups, the downs, the challenging jobs,

Branden Sewell (07:18.936)
challenging customers, challenging employees in the midst of it, remaining controlled is an under control. And I think what he's trying to say there is instead of being in control, being under control, it's like being controlled by, and I don't know if I like the way that says it, like being controlled by God, but being submitted to him and allowing...

the word and your faith to determine your demeanor in the midst of everything that's going on, whether it's challenges and hardships or good times. The third point was leaders must model humanity and identify with the limitations of followers. And you know, I think this is such a crucial point and

I think it takes a lot of self control, also a lot of like self awareness. I think that it's it's unfortunate. And I think for myself, I told myself I would never be the leader that led with ego or without empathy. Because I remember having jobs where I would work for somebody and I felt

unappreciated or underappreciated and felt like I was misunderstood, that I was just like, meant to be this robot or like workhorse, you know, with no regards to my humanity or, you know, it's just like, you know, no empathy, just do what has to get done. And it doesn't matter how you feel.

And I understand there can be a time and a place for that, but I think you also have to understand like people are people and people have real challenges and people have real life circumstances that they're trying to get through. And man, I think back to challenges that I faced as a business owner. And I tell people that sometimes like if, if me being a business owner was based on whether I got it right all the time or whether I was deserving.

Branden Sewell (09:43.928)
qualified or whatever, then I should fire myself because I mess up. make mistakes. I don't do what I'm supposed to do sometimes. And I fall short and I make bad judgment calls. And, the list goes on. And I think that there has to be like a balance to that. And same with your employees, you know, and people you're leading. Like you have to realize they are

are human, they have limitations and we have to kind of just understand that. So I think that's healthy as a leader. Fourth point was leaders must model an anchored life acting from character, not emotions. And I tell people that like employees and people that I'm leading this often that, you know, as a business owner, you can find yourself in situations where I call it the temperature.

can be raised by another party, whether that's an employee or a customer or a vendor. But either way, the temperature of a conversation or situation could be raised by that individual, whether that's raising their voice or something they say their attitude. And I think as leaders, it's very important to not

feed that so it we control the temperature of the conversation we control the temperature of the room so if somebody else wants to get hot headed or raise the temperature while you have to have the self control to not fuel that or take it to another level by remaining calm and talking

you can control that temperature and you can actually bring that person down. I've seen it. I I've talked to people where they've like their temperature is risen and they are hot headed and coming at me. And I have two choices. I can either feed that or I can come in the opposite spirit, if you will, and bring them down, bring that temperature down. And so I think it's really important to

Branden Sewell (12:07.424)
model that for the people that we lead. And I can say like that's a discipline that you have to learn. it took me a while, especially early on as a business owner, to learn not to respond to everything with emotion. You know, because that's a lot of what most people do is they respond to a lot of things out of emotion.

And one thing I've tried to do is pause. And I think there's a lot of value in any situation you find yourself in. It could even not be related to people. There could be like a situation in your business where you're going to respond emotionally with like anxiousness or panic or fear. we kind of, if we jump, you know, to a conclusion based on our emotions, we can create

scenarios in our mind or something that don't even exist or like the way that a situation is going to play out as an even based in reality, we're just leading with our emotions instead of pausing and really evaluating a situation and waiting for things to kind of unfold. And so I think there's anyway, I think there's just a lot of power in pausing and waiting and not responding with emotion.

Five, while leaders don't know what tomorrow holds, they know who holds tomorrow. And I think that's a good closing point to, you know, just having gratitude for faith. And like I said, you know, my faith is what grounds me and really is the anchor to every other part of my life. So I'm just

Again, as we're talking about gratitude and thankfulness, again, faith is just it's so key in my life as a in every area. So I'm very thankful to have that. Let's go into the next thing that I'm very thankful for. I'm very thankful for my marriage. And, you know, I think, man, what a blessing.

Branden Sewell (14:34.958)
It is to have a healthy marriage to have an amazing spouse. It's really a gift from God. know scripture says that he who finds a good wife finds a good thing. And man, I just feel incredibly blessed. I feel like God orchestrated my wife and I's relationship.

us coming together. And another thing that I'll say is what I feel like, you know, there's a season in my life where I didn't really, you know, I wanted to, I understood the concept of honoring God with my relationships, and what I mean, specifically relationships with like, patent pass relationships with women.

I understood the concept of honoring God in those relationships, but practicing that honor, I fell short and, you know, made decisions that weren't honoring to God. And the result of that was, you know, was those relationships not being healthy and falling apart. Rightfully so. And

What's amazing is when you honor God with your relationships, it's incredible, the blessing and the health that comes out of that. I've seen so many people, whether it's friends, family members, or whoever, acquaintances, who go into relationships and there isn't like this

foundation or God honoring foundation. And I know there's people who go into relationships and they don't have that and it works. And but I would say that there's probably an overwhelming majority that when they don't have that foundation, it can be kind of rocky. And so all that to say is I'm thankful that my wife and I both have a

Branden Sewell (16:53.816)
solid foundation of Christ in our lives and that our relationship was founded on that foundation of Christ and our faith and with a mutual goal of honoring God in our lives, in our marriage, and just every area, really. you know,

My wife is just an incredible support system for me. She has never, the business has gone through like incredible ups and downs and really good times and really bad times. But my wife has never ever made me feel like I've ever done anything wrong.

in those moments of like maybe putting us in really tough, a tough spot, whether that was like, really just financially with the business. But when we face those challenging times, she's never once made like tried to tell me to quit. She usually just encourages me that, you know, I have what it takes and to keep pushing forward. She cheers me on, believes in me.

You know, I tell her all of my crazy ideas and she never she never makes me feel like she doesn't support them or believe I could do it. I think she very much, you know, believes in whatever I want to try to take on. And it's funny, I thought of this song. You've probably heard it if you like country music.

It's called the painter. I think the artist is Cody Johnson. And I feel like this, mean, one, I love the song because of the title, because it's like I own a painting company. But two, I feel like this song in so many ways describes describes my wife and her character.

Branden Sewell (19:13.272)
I'm going to read some of those lyrics. And the beginning it says she talks about the future like she's flipping through a magazine, finds the beauty in the thrown away and broken things, gets excited about all my crazy dreams. like, you know, in those, definitely in those two last lines, like, that's my wife to a T. She, it's funny, we

We'll go, we live near the beach, so we'll go for a walk on the beach and we'll pick up shells and look for like little treasures in the sand to keep. And you know, me, I'm always looking for the like the perfect shell that doesn't have any flaws. And I remember like one of the first times we were doing this, you know, we're picking up shells and I like, you know, turned to my wife and she's got these like broken shells with holes in them or like half a shell and like all this stuff. I'm like,

are you doing? Why do want this shell? And she, you know, I'm pretty sure she had some type of, you know, comparison of like us being broken and how the Lord, you know, still chooses us. And there's beauty in that brokenness. And I'm just like, wow, like to see the world through her eyes and to see those things like those little broken things and to see that value is just it's

It's amazing. And I can say that challenges me because I'm not always like that. You know, I want that perfect shell with nothing broken or any problems. But yeah, so she sees that beauty and it's a beautiful part about her and something I love about her. It says she gets excited about all my crazy dreams. Like I said, when it comes to business, I'm a dreamer, I'm a visionary and you know, she never tells me that

my dreams or anything that I want to do is dumb. She always cheers me on and tells me to go for it. Let's see. There's a line in the next verse. It says the skies are brighter looking at it through her eyes. And that's definitely true. She's by nature just a very positive person and a very

Branden Sewell (21:39.66)
right outlook on a lot of things and I love that about her. She doesn't complain. She's, she definitely helps me to try and stay positive because I think I can be a little more pessimistic sometimes. Let's see. I don't remember life before she came into the picture. Brought the beauty I was missing with her. Showed me colors I ain't never seen.

She took chances with every wall I built. She saw a canvas. I thank God every day for how he made her. My life was black and white, but she's the painter. Anyway, I could read the whole song, but I would say check out the lyrics, listen to it. But that's that's her. You know, her, her and I were pretty much completely different in our

our personalities and how we were brought up. Our childhoods were basically opposites. When it came to school, you know, we were opposites. You know, she came from a family where her parents were, or, you know, they're still married 40 plus years. I think they're at like 44 or something. She grew up in the same house.

from the time she was born to the time she went off to college and her parents still live in that house. you know, she was valedictorian of her high school class. was, you know, the top of her class in her major, I believe is what it was, for her college. And, she was a division one athlete. and just, you know, amazing, like an amazing person.

just dedicated and disciplined. And then there was me, you know, I had divorced parents grew up in a broken home, moved all over the place. I tell people I've moved over 50 times in my life and I'm 32. And so I didn't really have stability. I didn't have like, you know that

Branden Sewell (24:04.212)
ideal like marriage to look up to. I was not top of my class in high school. did like just what I needed to do to get by. And luckily, you know, I was able to just like kind of pay attention in high school and not do everything that I was supposed to like homework and study for tests and I still did really well. But it was just doing the minimum.

get by. And, you know, I went to college, but I dropped out. And, yeah, just a lot of complete, just our stories are completely opposite, I believe, in a lot of ways. But she brings a lot of, you know, those really positive things from, from her upbringing into

our marriage and into our life. Just that stability, that discipline, the structure, all those things. And obviously, are everything. Those are things I was looking for. You know, I knew that for myself, I wanted to build a family and I wanted to do it the way that I always thought it or I always wish it would have been for me, you know.

I wish my parents were together. I wish I could have had the stability of living in one home and not moving, you know, 50 times. I wish I would have had, you know, more financial security and I wish I would have had applied myself more in high school and had accountability and, you know, maybe gone to college or focused on sports. I was an athlete, but

I just didn't really have that. I don't want to say my mom didn't support me, but it was just different. You know, I don't feel like I had the structure and everything that I needed to really flourish in athletics. And so anyway, not to go too far on that, but she is just she really is. She's everything that I wanted and needed to create the life that I really always hoped for. And so

Branden Sewell (26:28.782)
She's just a huge blessing to me. So, love my wife and I am extremely blessed by her. Going into another thing I'm really thankful for is my kids. You know, as a kid, coming from a place where I had divorced parents, unfortunately, I think my dad...

wanted to be around, but he wasn't. was, you know, several states away when I was growing up. Just didn't really see him much. Sometimes I would go, you know, a couple of years without seeing him. So I didn't really have a father figure in my life consistently. And obviously that, you know, provided its challenges. But

You know, and I'm thankful that I didn't have it super easy and in other ways, too, because I learned a lot. made me who I am, made me a really resilient person. I'm very I can adapt in a lot of different situations because we knew so much. But all of that to say is that my childhood experience made me want to be a father and to be a good father, you know, like an amazing father to be the dad.

that I wished I had. And so that's really probably one of the most important things to me in my entire life is to be a great father and to be present, to be everything, like I said, that I wished I had and to love my kids well and to give them opportunities that...

I wish I had to have that support and the structure and the stability that I always dreamed of. you know, I think we all have a why and they're definitely a big part of my why and why I do what I do is

Branden Sewell (28:48.842)
is really goodness. I I think everything that I do is based around my family and really wanting to create a different future for them than I ever experienced. So anyway, being a being a parent is challenging, but man, it's one of the most rewarding things. And it's something that I'm really proud about. really proud to be a dad.

I'm really proud of my family. I'm really proud of what my wife and I have built, what we are building together. And I think it's really beautiful. So yeah, my family and then I'm thankful for my health and I'm getting older and I'm not super old. I'm 32 so I'm young, but I'm super young, not super old. But anyway, I'm starting to get to that point where, I wake up and

My body hurts and I don't know why. But I am thankful that I have the ability to work on getting better and, you know, go to the gym and work out and try to be the best version of myself that I can. And that kind of plays into trying to be a better father and husband because like I want to be healthy and I want to be a good example.

So I'm not perfect by any means and man, I really want to do better. But I'm constantly growing and working on getting better. So I think that's a huge, huge part of it. You know, you're never going to be perfect. But are you trying to get better? Are you striving every day to push forward and be better than you were before? And I'm just going to

make a comment that man doing these podcasts late at night, getting them ready for the next day. I get tired. So I don't know if you watch this live and you watch the video, you'll see I probably look pretty tired. And I probably start to get to point where I'm just rambling on. But I hope you're still enjoying this episode. So yeah, fitness and health. That's that's important. I'm thankful for that.

Branden Sewell (31:14.83)
I'm thankful for my business. thankful for a way to provide for my family and to really provide for the families of my employees and to have an opportunity to give back to our community. And I'm thankful for each one of my customers just that make that possible. I'm thankful for my employees that make that possible.

I couldn't do it alone. So it's definitely like all of us coming together and building something together. You know, my family's part of that. God and my faith is part of that. Community is part of that. So anyway, I'm thankful for the business and I'm thankful for all the parts of that that make it what it is. I'm thankful for this podcast. I've learned so much from doing this podcast.

I've wanted to start a podcast probably since 2017 and I didn't and you know, it probably was a good thing that I didn't because I started the podcast a year ago. And I think if I would have started it sooner, there is still too much that I needed to learn. And I feel like I've learned so much in the time.

between starting my business and starting the podcast that now I feel like I can really give more value. But starting a podcast was always a dream of mine and now I'm doing it and you know, that's another thing. It's not perfect, but I'm working on making it better and you know, hope to continue doing it and seeing it reach more people and hopefully make continue to make a difference.

One thing that I'd love to see happen in the coming year with the podcast is building more community through it. like for those who listen to it or, you know, check it out regularly. I'd love to connect and, you know, hear what you think about the podcast here, what could be better? What would you who would you like to hear us interview? Who would you like to have one as a guest and

Branden Sewell (33:41.474)
What topics do you want to cover? What's important to you? What questions you have about business that you want answered that we could help answer? You know, all those things. So please, if you're listening, connect with me. I'd love to hear from you. That would be amazing. So, yeah, I'd say just really quick before I close this out, a few other things I'm thankful for.

would be surfing. I grew up my whole life surfing and I love the sport. It's unique because there's such a small percentage of people that ever get to do it or experience it because obviously, mean, except for with technology that's coming out now with wave pools, but up until then, you had to live on the coast or live close and

That's how you get to experience surfing. And so I feel really fortunate that I've been able to grow up enjoying the sport and to experience going out into nature and I mean, in the ocean and getting to surf waves. mean, it just blows my mind sometimes to think that I even get to do it. you know, one of my favorite quotes is that,

about surfing and it's, I believe it goes something like when I go surfing, all my fears, anxiety, and all of that sit on the beach. And because they can't swim or something like that. But anyway, it's just the concept that there's freedom when you're out there in the water.

It's definitely a place where I'm able to forget about everything and just be in the moment, clear my mind. I mean, you have to be focused when you're surfing. Obviously, there's a lot to that, especially if you're in bigger waves or if you're surfing during hurricane swells or whatever.

Branden Sewell (36:00.152)
there, you have to be focused. So you, kind of are able to let go of whatever's going on, whatever cares or concerns you have, but it brings things into perspective to surfing, you know, when you're out there in the water and how powerful the ocean is and you know, you're, you're away from everything and you get to experience nature, whether it's dolphins swimming by or sharks or

You know, the birds and the fish, sea turtles and jellyfish and, you know, just getting to be in that is a pretty remarkable thing to get to experience. anyway, so I just I love having surfing as part of my life. Fishing too, so. Love fishing, I got a boat this year, so love being out on the boat, whether it's with my family or going out with my buddies or employees or whoever to go fish.

And fishing does that for me too. It's a place of being able to escape and just relax. you know, you're when you're fishing, you know, for me, that's what I'm thinking of is like, trying to think of how do I trick these fish into eating a piece of plastic? You know, and it's a lot of fun. It's challenging and it's a great experience and

super exciting, you know, when you catch big fish and bigger fish than you've caught before. And anyway, so it's a and sometimes it's not even about catching the fish. It's like when you go out on the boat and you're in the river and you see the stingrays and you see manatees and you see fish, maybe you don't catch them, but you see like a big school of fish swim by or, you know, you see turtles and see turtles in the river.

you know, birds and, or you see where the water's, you know, crystal clear and there's beautiful seagrass and crabs. And anyway, it's just experiencing nature. And, you know, again, that's something that not everybody gets to experience. So I'm thankful for it because I'm so blessed by it. And it's beautiful, you know, when you get out there and you just, you're around nature.

Branden Sewell (38:23.822)
funny, it reminds me of a book called Wild at Heart. And I would recommend any, any man to read it. It's really just about how each one of us men we have this like, by God to want to be adventurous and to be outdoors. And that's for sure. In me, you know, I love being outside, I love adventure, and it makes me feel alive.

And so yeah, that's, I think as we bring this to a close, that is what I'm thankful for. man, I'm so blessed. And I hope that during this season, you're able to stop and think of all the things that you're thankful for in your life and really reflect and practice gratitude.

And man, even after talking about all of this, I just feel amazing because I don't think we do that enough. I don't think we stop enough and really just think about all the things we're grateful for and how blessed we are. And I, you know, when you practice gratitude, it's amazing what happens. I think it's powerful for your life.

to practice gratitude. And I think if we all practice gratitude more often, we would accomplish more in life and we would have a better sense of our purpose and just a better...

I not just purpose but sense of accomplishment is what I was going to try and say is like when we sit back and we are grateful, we can we see like, wow, like, man, I really am blessed, puts things into perspective. So

Branden Sewell (40:40.626)
I hope that you have enjoyed this episode. I feel like I'm starting to sound like a late night radio host because I'm tired and this episode is going to go live tomorrow so it is 9.50 and I still have to edit this and get it out there. thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Off the Ladder podcast.

If you're listening on YouTube, I hope that you will like this video comment on it share your feedback Let me know something you're grateful for Share it with somebody Let somebody know you're grateful for them if you're listening on Apple or Spotify Please rate and review the show. I greatly appreciate that help us reach more people and as always

Thank you so much for listening and I hope to connect with you again on the next episode of the Off the Ladder podcast. Take care. Good night. Stay blessed.