Hey guys, welcome to part five of the Perfectly Imperfect Series on Excellence with Pastor
Brandon Major.
Here we're going to dive into his wisdom on personal growth, emphasizing authenticity,
fostering community, and embracing sacrifice.
We're going to gain some practical insights for a transformative journey towards a more
fulfilling life.
Guys, get ready.
We're going in.
See you in there.
Hey guys, how's it going?
Welcome to this episode of Technically Sure.
I'm Thomas.
I'm Shawn.
And you know, we're in the series Perfectly Imperfect and this is, I believe, part seven
or eight, whichever one it is.
And yeah, we have another special guest.
Hello.
Guess who it is.
Welcome Brandon.
Hello guys.
It's so good to be with you guys.
Thanks so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
Of course.
Yeah, for sure.
I'd like to say right from the outset, I know you want to say something, but I'm going to.
I'd like to say from the outset that I believe that I'm your number one fan and I'm just
going to let everybody listening to this know that ahead of time.
I think I've listened to every episode and so I'm so honored to be here with you guys.
I love what you're doing just as a friend.
I want to say from the outset, I'm really proud of you guys for doing this.
This takes a lot to get outside of your comfort zone and to just be willing to put yourself
out there like this.
So I'm proud of you guys.
I love being here.
Let's kick it and have some fun.
Yeah, for sure.
Well, really appreciate you saying all those things because I guess you listen to the last
of the pubs so you know kind of know where we're going to start off.
I do.
I've been dreading this.
It's so awkward.
It's sweet.
It's the good stuff.
Yeah, we want to give you some exaltations or words of affirmation.
I love that.
So we always think about what's the first thing that pop in our head and I had to say
for a couple minutes and like what's the first thing and one thing is that you say what you
mean and your yes is yes, your no is no.
Great leader and encourager and that's the thing I've noticed and also lifts others up
and this is particularly something that Josh mentioned in his episode that you see things
in people that they don't see in themselves and exemplify that part of them.
Wow.
And I'm sure you're doing that with more than this Josh, but that was an example he brought
up.
Wow.
That's so kind, Thomas.
Wow.
You guys are the best.
Wow.
Thank you so much.
Well, what can I say about my mentor?
I can honestly say that he is very kind, strong, funny inspiration.
Like he's his inspiration to the generation.
Like he is, I would say a servant of God and like he has a heart for the people, but he
also has heart for God.
So he's just doing everything that he should be doing.
You know what I mean?
Hold on.
Thanks, Shawn.
You're making me blush over here.
I'm glad there's no video.
No, I love you guys.
Thank you so much.
I'm sure to be here.
Yeah.
I don't know.
Like that's always like, I don't know why that was the way we like we decided to start
it and forget what it was.
Michaela was the first one we did it with.
Cause you might've been Michaela.
Yeah.
Show up Michaela.
What an episode.
Yeah.
That was a good one for sure.
The noiting in the mostly family.
No, I love that you start out that way.
Yeah.
The world needs more of that.
Build each other up.
Encouragement all around it.
And I love that.
It's beautiful.
It was just, yeah, just something that popped in her head and yeah, we want to like set
the episode on a good foot.
So start off on a good foot.
Yeah.
Set a nice foundation for it before we dive in.
Yeah, I love that.
And but with that, with that part out of the way and like say it was hard to do, but the,
why don't you give like a quick 30, 60 quick intro about who you are.
The good old elevator pitch.
Okay.
Well, I am Brandon Major.
I love Jesus.
I love to serve Jesus and we know each other from church, Amplified Church, where I serve
as one of the pastors.
I'm kind of, I feel like a floating pastor there where I just hop from thing to thing
to thing.
So I don't want to put a specific label on it because it just, I feel like I hop around
and I love music.
I love sports and I love friends and community.
And so things like this, man, they energize me because I love hanging out with awesome
people and doing things like this.
I also have a podcast.
You have Josh on.
Okay.
What's the name of it?
The who needs the name podcast.
And you know, we're just trying to live up to your standard guys.
Okay.
We can dream.
We can hope.
But if you want to check us out over there, it's a fun time.
And we'll post the link, the links to all the socials and platforms in the show notes.
What a guy.
I don't even know how to do that.
That's impressive.
I don't know how to do that.
I don't know how to do that either.
Shawn, Shawn, does Thomas carry the weight of this?
Absolutely.
I love it.
Gotta be honest.
He's the Josh, the PB and J.
Yeah.
Josh carries us.
I just kind of show up and talk.
He's a real one.
He's a total G. I love Josh.
That's the same.
Well, all right.
We're just diving to the meat of the episode.
Just do it.
Let's dive in.
So, you know, this is a series on excellence.
Yeah.
And you know, like we're actually a very vague question.
Yeah.
And so to you and answer this, however, however you want.
Yeah.
What is excellence?
I love that question.
And I also would say I love all the people who I've listened to on here and define that
and explain the reasoning for it, because I think there's there's truth in what every
person saying and they're defining what excellence is.
But there's wisdom and insight to glean from everybody.
I think excellence for me, I would first define it as what it's not.
And it's not perfection.
Right.
It's not because if you if you view excellence as perfection, you're going to live a performance
based life in every single thing.
Your identity, your value, your validation all becomes a result of have I succeeded and
have I been successful and have I hit every metric in every mark?
I don't think that's what excellence is.
I think excellence is pursuing with a pure heart, at least if I can bring in like the
spiritual end.
OK, so spiritual excellence when we talk excellence within the church or within biblical terms,
I really think it is passionately pursuing everything Jesus has called you to pursue
with everything you have.
Not perfectly, not without failure and not without some falls along the way.
But it's that mentality that you're going to get back up.
You're going to keep chasing after him.
And I think that's really maybe maybe that's not it's hard to measure.
But I think that might be better defined as like the heart of excellence.
Yeah.
Right.
Like and maybe not so much the byproduct that we would measure and consider.
Yeah, that was done excellently because you can kind of see those things, feel those things,
touch those things.
But I kind of I think I'm speaking more to the heart of at least from a believer.
What's the heart of excellence?
I think it comes down to what are your motives?
Are you chasing after him?
Are you leaving other people to him?
And are you giving your whole life to that?
Does that make sense?
Yeah, it makes perfect sense.
Really good.
I think it's very similar kind of to what Michaela brought up in her episode about not
striving but seeking.
Love that.
Yep, 100 percent.
That's my sister-in-law, everybody.
So shout out Michaela.
The wisdom.
The wisdom in her podcast.
Oh my gosh, check that out.
Paradox and perspective podcast.
But 100 percent, it's a difference between I need to work to be good enough to I am already
good enough because of Jesus and now my work is a result of that.
You know what I mean?
Flipping it on its head and just getting out of the religious mindset into just walking
freely with him.
Yeah.
And for those who don't know, like what is a religious mindset?
Oh, the religious mindset is just I got to do enough to be enough.
Yep.
You know, it's I got to strive, I got to try, I got to put in effort and that's why people
walk away from that.
Yeah.
Because you realize that's never going to lead you to anything lasting or any success
because you're trying to live up to a standard you can't attain and that's the whole point
of the cross.
So then you cheapen the cross of Christ and not to make it this all spiritual.
I know this is for everybody.
Even if you don't follow Jesus, you can still glean from this.
Yeah.
You cheapen the cross and you say, Oh, I need to be good enough.
I need to work for excellence.
It's like, no, no, no.
You are who Jesus says you are.
Yeah.
Now we walk is that like that's all Paul's message and cut me off because I like to talk.
No, this is coming off if you need to.
But like that's Paul's message time and time and time again.
It's this is who you are.
Do not be conformed to the patterns of this world.
Yeah.
What he's actually saying is do not be what you are not.
But then he says, be transformed by the renewing of your mind through Christ, through his thoughts,
all that.
Right.
And that word is basically transformed.
Be who you actually are.
So now live into who you are.
So it's, I think excellence is flipping this mindset that does.
I need to perform.
I need to do enough.
I need to be enough to know.
I just need to walk in who I already am.
The identity Jesus already has inside of me and flow in that every single day.
And that's the heart of excellence.
So good.
Yeah.
Well, that's like, I like I said it in Josh's episode, but then like I said it, I think
I said it.
No, no.
Yeah.
Mike's episode.
They know that about that by now.
I love Mike.
I haven't got to hear it yet.
Oh, okay.
Okay.
And and like all of you guys, like you say something different, but it's all it all lines
up.
Yeah.
And then there's the other one here, which like it tells me and you guys, like it tells
me that like Shana are in a good circle of people.
Hey, come on.
Cause like you guys, like you all have a different take on what excellence is, but it all comes
from the same source.
Yeah.
And it's all, and it all has the same kind of core.
Like you said, the heart.
Yeah.
And the you have different ways to say it, which I think is awesome because like you
say it in a different way.
It will, it will line up with different people, different, different people will understand
what Mike Mike said better than I want to pretend.
Yeah.
And same with you.
Yeah.
And so like people will probably always understand what Mike says more than what I say because
that man, I love Mike so much.
No, I love that man.
And, um, I know you have other questions, but just to kind of elaborate a little bit.
Yeah.
I think to build off of that.
If you have that heart, I think that's key then the heart produces, right?
And so excellence and excellent heart should produce, I believe some measurable progress
in your life.
Right?
So I'm not trying to make it all mystical, all impractical.
There are very practical things, but I think one, you start with that heart and then you
realize, okay, if I'm really just trying to live into who God has made me to be, and that's
the heart, then my life should start to produce fruit that falls into alignment with that.
And so if I'm not seeing that fruit, I want to get back to the heart of the matter.
I want to get back to the root, right?
It's something I think Josh mentioned.
Yeah.
I said the roots.
Yep.
Being the cause of the fruit.
And so if I'm not seeing the fruit, I want to get back to the root and say, okay, why
do I not see this?
So you should look at the measurables.
You should look at the practicals, but they're almost the indicators, not the problem.
Right.
Problem is the heart.
And that's good.
And you're going to say, I'm taking notes while you're talking.
And I just named the episode, the heart of excellence.
The heart of excellence.
Boom.
There we go.
It was like, look at Thomas multitasking.
Oh my gosh.
This man.
Love it.
And with something with growth, I mentioned this pretty much every episode in this series,
but I listened to a lot of John Maxwell's podcast, leadership podcast, we've read his
books and I have this leadership Bible right there.
Yep.
Which is great.
And I'm looking at it.
He does in fact, it's confirmed.
It's on the table.
And John Maxwell, a couple of different things that he said about excellence are kind of
floating around in my mind, but the one that's standing out right now is like, excellence
is, sorry, I throw this going all weird.
It happens, man.
Couple of things.
Excellence is exceeding expectations.
And in order to know what those expect, in order to exceed the expectations, you have
to know what they are.
Yeah.
So in the way that you talked about excellence, like, and I, you say you want to go for what
Jesus is calling you to.
Yeah.
So in this aspect, I don't know, I, I, right off the top of my head, I don't know the answer
to this.
I'm going to ask.
Like, what would be in that case, is there an answer to that question to like, what are
the expectations?
Um, this is a great question.
I think yes.
And I think it's a spectrum of how practical.
Okay.
A lot of this might seem ambiguous, but again, getting to the heart, but then also measurables.
Right.
So let's answer twofold.
First off, I think there are some clear metrics we can look at.
First Corinthians 13, right?
If you do everything in your life, you achieve all sorts of things.
You attain all the fame, all the glamor, all the glory, but you don't love people and the
process that's not an excellent life.
It's a life that missed the mark.
Right.
And so if I can look back on my day and I can say, Oh, I checked my to-do list.
I did all these things.
Um, yes, I actually have a to-do list that surprises people cause I'm not that organized.
Um, but if I look back and I said, I did all the things, but I didn't love anybody and
I didn't care about anybody.
And I didn't really shine the light of Christ to anybody.
Have I really succeeded?
Have I really lived that day?
Excellently.
I don't think so.
Right.
So I think that's a metric.
Yeah.
I think, um, if we look and you just get in, you mentioned you have this Bible sitting
here, right?
And you get into the word and you say, Oh my gosh, as a believer, I'm not supposed to
gossip about people.
Yeah.
Right.
But I realized every single day of my life in subtle ways, I'm gossiping or, Oh, my speech
is not above reproach.
Like little things as you get in God's word, you can say, really it's laying out for you.
Hey, this is what a life of excellence looks like.
Why?
It's a life of sanctification and it's not, Oh, I've arrived and it's not, Oh, I'm not
going to mess up, but it is, Oh, this is what I get to walk it.
And this is what an excellent life looks like.
Yeah.
Does that make sense?
I think it is kind of outlined for us.
Yeah.
Some of it in more practical and some in more kind of intangible ways.
I think that's one thing that people like people that like, I don't mean this to attack
anybody.
I think it's just like, I used to be like this, like if you don't know what the Bible
is, like you don't know that there is, and like you just have this, Oh, it's just this
thing that like religious people use and like, and like, and they don't know what's actually
in there.
Cause I'm like, I'm working on reading through the whole thing right now.
There's things in there.
I'm like, yeah, I was like, I like, especially with this version of the, with this, uh, with
John Maxwell's comments in there, talking about leadership and like, it's like, wow,
I would never like thought about like Nathan and King David and like Nathan who like led
David while he was the king.
And like, well, important for our role, like we play in each other's lives.
And that's like, you said that's laid out for us in the Bible.
And I, um, as he talks about things like the interserval.
Yeah, that's good.
And like, it's like, it's hard, like sometimes like you can get like into part books, like
numbers and it can be really dry and you're like, man, okay, I'm done.
But like, dude, that's my favorite book.
I get it.
That's good.
Oh yeah.
So, um, I guess my question for you would be, how do you laying out excellence in your
daily life, but also how are you leading the next generation?
Oh, excellence.
That's that's a big two parter.
I like that, Shawn.
Um, I think that in my own life, and we've talked about this a good bit and we were actually
in dive into this today.
Um, but I try to just develop some disciplines in my life.
I think if you want to live a life again, you have to have the heart of excellence,
but then if you want to see the fruit of excellence, you needed to develop disciplines in your
daily life that you can go back to and you can say, okay, practically speaking, have
I, have I accomplished the things that I'm setting out to, like you said, you need to
have a goal that you're trying to hit.
Right.
And so of course, take that back, make sure it's a healthy goal in line with the heart,
all that.
But then there is a very practical reality to just go do it, just go get it done.
Right.
And so I've realized that I've been so surprised in my life, I've used the excuse so much
like, Oh, I would, but I don't have time.
And I realized whenever you just stop telling yourself that, and you actually just say,
I have to get this done, how you will make time for what's important, you know?
And so the amount that you're actually able to accomplish fit in a day is actually kind
of mind blowing.
If you stay disciplined and you say, so practicals, right?
Last year I started just going to the gym and I didn't think I could do it because I
was like, that's multiple hours a day between driving, getting there, actually working out.
I was not in good shape at the time.
I was like, this, it might kill me, you know, like this might be the enemy, but I just said,
okay, you know what?
It's important.
I'm going to make time.
And it's amazing how you're actually, your, your time is freed up and then you realize,
I'm actually able to do other stuff while I'm at the gym, right?
Between sets, maybe in like, if you use time and steward time well, it's amazing the disciplines
you can develop within your day.
So I think you need to fall back.
Um, Craig Grishel says, you don't rise to the level of your dreams.
You fall to the level of your disciplines.
Right?
And so it's good to dream, but then it's necessary to put disciplines in place to arrive at the
dream.
Right?
And so making sure you prioritize the dreams every single day and you walk in this part
or two of your question, let's go.
And I think this is probably not just for next gen, but just how do you teach this in
general?
One, I'm not perfect at this.
So like, I don't want people to look at me.
I fall.
I made mistakes, but I do think there's something to first off, just being authentic, right?
Owning that upfront.
Like I'm not perfect.
I will screw up being authentic, genuinely caring about others, right?
Before people would care much, you know, they want to know how much you care.
Right?
And then showing them, Hey, I care about you.
I love you.
And then if people are willing, go on a journey with them, right?
Hold each other accountable.
Um, I've had so many next gen people like Solomon Cole, shout out Solomon.
Right?
Um, wax on wax off, wax on wax off podcast.
Like he and I for years have we've done Bible journeys together.
We've done fitness things together.
We've done all sorts of challenges with one another, just holding each other accountable
to live and to be all that we're created to be.
And it's not in this toxic way.
That's like, Oh, you're not good enough and you need to do this.
It's like, no, no, no, there's gold in you.
Right?
Like, and let's pull that out.
So I think starting with what do you see in somebody else?
Right?
If you see gold, say the gold.
Yeah.
If you see, Hey, this is inside of you.
It might feel awkward.
You know, I've done this from a stage in the middle of messages where you just stop the
message and you're like, Hey, I feel like I need to tell you this is inside of you.
And it feels really uncomfortable.
And I think it's supposed to, but because it pulls you outside of your own head and
your own comfort zone and you, you're transparent, you're honest.
And you say, this is in you.
And then you walk with them, you know, what's this mean?
And um, you just start to explore that.
Does that answer?
Wow.
That was good.
Yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
Am I answering too long?
No, because that countdown is clicking away over there.
For those who can't see, which I guess is everyone, Thomas has this beautiful countdown
on the television for how long I'm allowed to talk, you know, and we're dangerously
close.
So, so what else boys?
I'm sorry.
No worries.
Don't worry.
Well, we'll see.
I think my phone's okay.
We were talking about earlier, like if I might die, but yeah, we'll see what happens.
If you just stop for animal, that's why.
But um, where are we at?
What percent?
Oh, 38.
Oh, we're chilling.
The moon has blessed us.
Okay.
We started out with 43.
Yeah, we're chilling.
Okay.
Um, one thing you mentioned earlier, and like you actually, I wrote some things down and
like you already started and you actually went into them as you talked about your, the
things that you're doing and like, uh, with Solomon too.
Yeah.
So you mentioned one thing in the first part of your question, uh, the first part of the
question that Shawn asked and you, um, you mentioned Greg, Greg Rochelle's, it was like
his rendition of the one saying, I've heard so many renditions of that same one and they're
all good.
Like the one I've heard, I've heard them those says you don't rise to the occasion.
You fall to the level of your training.
Yeah.
And like, um, and I think like it's like the same, like it's the same idea.
Like maybe you write like people, that's a lot of things that people say, like whenever
you, whenever you use people think like, okay, whenever the hard times come, you'll rise
to the occasion.
But if you're not already prepared for that, if you're not already prepared before the
occasion comes, then you're just going to be able to do what you're already prepared
to do.
Wow.
That's good.
That's really good.
And so like, I feel like right now what you're doing and like something I, I tried to do
also, and I feel like everybody should have an aspect of this in their lives, like working
on some area of growth in your life so that like, even if you might not need it right
now, like it's like concept, I think I've heard it in a movie, like some kid movie.
It's like, it's better that have it and not need it and need it and uh, need it and not
have it.
Yeah.
And I might be rambling.
I think I like to ramble a lot, but I love that.
But like the, I don't know, man, like I, I, I just like, I think, I think about all that
a lot.
I don't know.
I think about that, that aspect all the time.
Yeah.
And I think like that's part of the reason why I'm like, I'm so gung ho on like personal
growth and development and why, and why this topic even came up.
Yeah.
It was because like, like I mentioned this on the podcast, Michaela's episode, but like
God just downloaded it into my brain on Sunday.
Yeah.
And I was like, I was like, well, everyone else was worshiping.
I was scribbling in my notebook.
I love that.
And I was like writing down like just what excellence is and who God is with excellence.
And like, like it was, um, and I know there's a reason for that.
And like this whole thing came out of that one moment.
Yeah.
It's like the last eight or so episodes.
Yeah.
And like, um, hopefully it happens again.
But like, let me go into like, there's one question.
Um, and this one, this one, and you can go as personal as you want with this.
Oh boy.
So like with like excellence is continuous growth.
That's one thing that I was talking about with this also.
Sure.
And like, like, and with growth and excellence comes sacrifice.
Yeah.
And so like, what is something that you've had to give up in order to experience the growth?
I like that question.
I like that a lot.
Um, I think for me, and I think it's different for everybody, although this one to a degree,
I think probably needs to be for everybody is I had to really stop caring what a lot
of people, and I think it's really, we become the sum of our friends, right?
So the reality is if you want to continually grow, like you're saying, what does that mean?
It also means that everyone may not be on that same journey, right?
And it might mean that you need to be willing to say, Hey, in this season, I'm going to
be really picky about whose opinions I care about.
And so you've hit on this in previous episodes, but I don't know that we've ever really gone
super deep, but the idea, you've definitely mentioned this inner circle, outer circle,
right?
And I had to be really intentional.
And this was for me, like in high school of, okay, if I want to grow into everything, I
believe I'm called to be, which by the way, we never arrive still growing, right?
And we should, um, I need to almost, and this is how my brain works.
It's weird.
I need to almost set up like a board of advisors for my life, right?
Where Hey, these select individuals who I know, who I trust, who have been consistent
and loyal and faithful, and I respect them.
I look up to them like they can speak into my life and I'm going to take their opinion
really seriously and I'm going to care a lot.
And if you're not one of those people, then it's almost like, I want to hear, I want to
learn, I want to grow, but it doesn't carry the same authority and the same impact and
influence in my life.
And so if I am believing, Hey, this is what I'm supposed to do.
This is what I'm called to do.
And some ordinary person comes up and they bash it.
I don't really care if one of those people comes up, right?
I'll say like Jason, I'll be pastor, right?
Like he'd be in that, right?
Jason and not the people I don't care about the people I do.
Right.
If he came up and he was like, Hey dude, like this isn't good.
I'd be like, Oh, why tell me, right?
Like I want to know, but that's hard to do because it means you need to sacrifice caring
about everybody's opinion about you.
And I read this also in a Craig Grashell book, but he basically writes about how your character
matters a lot more than reputation.
And so many of us, we spend our lives trying to build a reputation.
In other words, what does everybody think about me?
What's my image?
What's my perception?
What's this person thinking on my Instagram and this person on my Tik Tok and all of this?
And he basically says, if we would focus more on a few people and their voices who will
help us build character, we have a lot better off, a heck of a lot healthier and we'll actually
grow into who we're called to be.
No, that's really good.
Like that's focusing on the internal versus the external.
Yeah.
And it's like you work, you would do the inside work before like an inside work will come
out, will come out.
Like it will like feel like you don't have to worry about your reputation if you're worrying
about your character because your reputation will follow suit.
Yeah.
And I don't know, I think and whatever, I don't know what to say next.
So Shawn, did you have something?
Oh man.
Yeah, I was just pondering on it.
I was like thinking about what do you sacrifice?
Right.
And to be excellent, I feel like you have to sacrifice so much that like for one, you
have to like, I love what you said.
Like you have to worry about like nobody's besides your circles opinion of yourself.
Right.
And I also think it's like you also have to like sacrifice like how you're going to look
to people, but you also sacrifice in your body, like your pride, your ambition, your
things that were not going to help you grow.
Like you're just going to sacrifice all those.
So like I would say like on a practical level, what does that look like for a person to just
like, you know what, I'm going to sacrifice my pride, my ego, my ambition so I can, you
know, like,
Yeah, dude, that's a great question.
Honestly, I think Romans 12 says, I think it's Romans 12.
Someone can smack talk me in the comments, but it says offer your bodies as living sacrifices.
In other words, offer everything to God, sacrifice everything to God.
So coming from maybe more of the Christian angle on this, right?
When you say what's one thing you have to sacrifice really to walk in excellence, I
would say the one thing is everything.
Right.
If you want to walk in kingdom excellence, excellence that is not just I want to achieve
one particular goal, but excellence that is I want to impact eternity.
Right.
I want to lead people to him with my whole life.
I want to walk every day with him and intimacy.
Really I guess the answer to your question is, it's not just one thing, it's everything.
And in that process, what are we within living sacrifices, living the full life God has for
us.
And so it sounds counterintuitive, but it's really beautiful.
We find true life whenever we offer our lives completely to him.
And so I would say maybe actually you're spot on Shawn, which is the key to actual excellence
is total surrender, total sacrifice, total giving up my will.
My goals, my agenda to just, okay, Lord, what do you want to do?
You know, how do you want to speak?
And you guys know, I obsess over this, this idea of eternity.
Yeah.
I actually believe in that and I actually believe that Jesus is who he says that he
is then my goodness, he's worth everything for this little blob of time we have here,
you know, like this is a, it's here to they got tomorrow.
It's a vapor, you know, but if I can sacrifice to live a life of excellence that leads people
to him, that's worth it in the end.
Yeah.
That's good.
Like it has to think about it more.
Yeah.
I'm sorry.
I blanked, but you're good.
You're good.
I took you down a little bunny path there.
I'm sorry.
That's what we are here for.
No complete surrender, man.
Like it's that's one thing I'm going to say one thing that I have some ending questions.
Sure.
Like you mentioned about complete surrender, I think, I think it was, I think it was in
Mike one of Mike's episodes, um, part one, I don't remember which part, but, uh, maybe,
but like, uh, we mentioned about like, you can't, if you're striving or seeking to be
as excellent as you can be, but you never actually reached that pinnacle point because
it's like, God is excellent.
God is excellence.
Yeah.
Like, and with surrendering all those things to surrender, trying to completely surrender
yourself to God.
Yeah.
Like, like for us being such imperfect beings, and this is series called perfectly imperfect.
Yeah.
Like we're imperfect beings.
So is it actually possible?
If it is it possible for us to give literally everything to God or like as we, but, or yes,
continuously like giving things to God that we realize and then like, okay, now I get
this guy better.
Always.
So my mind always like, man, it's always something to weed out.
Oh dude, I, I would, I would agree with that.
I think that probably the better way to describe what I mean by that is live, live with an
open handed posture.
Yeah.
It's like Lord, I'm all yours.
Now when we get nitty gritty, what does that look like we're so complicated.
Yeah.
And that's why sanctification is something, which is a fancy word for day by day.
I look more and more like Jesus.
Why I identify areas, right?
And I'm like, I'll probably look back tomorrow on today and be like, I didn't even realize
that at the time, but God, I need to give this to you.
Yeah.
Right.
So it is, you're right.
It's, it's both.
It's a decision to say, God, I'm fully yours and as I see things, I'm going to hand them
off to you.
But then also understanding, I don't fully know what all those are.
Yeah.
And as I see them, I'm going to hand them off to you.
That's beautiful.
That's a really good point, dude.
That's a really good point.
Thank you.
Yeah.
It's something like, especially for this, hopefully this podcast is reaching more people
that not just people of faith, but also people that, and I like to make sure we expand on
things more.
Yeah.
I mean, I think about it from a perspective of some, like who I used to be, like, if I
would have heard that, I'm like, well, like Brennan's weird.
Yeah.
So it's just like, yeah.
Obviously, you know, like it wasn't me trying to come at you or anything.
It was like, let's expand.
Yeah.
But yeah, no, I love that.
That's really good.
No, I love that, man.
I think that excellence and walking in excellence is something that we discover more and more
every single day.
Right.
You know, and for anybody listening, any belief, any no belief, whatever, you know, whatever
you would say that you are, man, you can, you can still choose every single day that,
Hey, I want to, you know, continually improve, continually grow, set those disciplines, develop
who you are, have good voices in your life.
Like a lot of this is still a hundred percent of, yeah.
And that's one thing I hope, I hope like people that are listening right now have understood
so far and this whole series that everything, even though every person like had brought
up God and had brought up faith and God always comes up in our conversations.
Yeah.
Like this is strictly a podcast for everybody.
Yeah.
And like everything we've talked about, even though we bring up God and maybe you don't
believe in God, everything we're saying is like, Brennan said, practically applicable
to your life.
Yeah.
And you don't have to believe in God for that to be true.
Yeah.
But with that final, final thing, I have like some final questions just like we'll just
wrap it up and you might know what these questions are, but the, but when it comes to personal
growth, what are some, like some of the top resources you could recommend to people?
Oh, that's a great question.
I actually didn't prep for this.
I was like, shut up cause I've listened to your episode.
When it comes to personal growth, man, I think community, I know that's not a physical put
in your hands book or anything, but I think community is so important.
If you, if you really want to strive to be more than you currently are, surround yourself
with those types of people, you know, and you'll notice you naturally start to become
like them, you naturally start to glean things from them.
You make each other better.
So like surround yourself with those types of people.
I think a lot of the people we've mentioned, like Craig Grishel, like John Maxwell, I would
just kind of all in all recommend any of their books, you know, I think those are all solid.
I think if you're looking for different resources, this is great, right?
This pod right here.
Like this is amazing and I love you guys and again, honored to be here, but I think check
that out.
Craig Grishel also has a leadership podcast, like all those guys who we kind of mentioned,
this guy named Patrick Lencioni.
I don't know if you've heard of him.
I feel like I have.
He wrote the five dysfunctions of a team.
He's got a ton of great resources as well.
What was his last name?
I think it's Lencioni, but I, again, I should have prepped for this.
We can do a quick fact check on her, but like he's really awesome.
So I think things like that get good voices in your life.
And yeah, it is that I was correct.
Wow.
Sigh of relief.
So I think like what you said, like all kinds of like lines up, like you said community,
but then it's like, it's the voices are pouring into your life.
That voice can be from a podcast.
Yeah.
Of course you like, you want to get those people around you that are actual physical
people around you.
Yeah.
But you're not always around those people.
Well, yeah.
And a lot of people just learn and glean differently too.
And a lot of people might be very, very, they could be listening to this and given different
things in their life that have happened, they don't want to go out.
They don't want to meet people.
They're not in that place.
So baby step it.
Yeah.
Right.
And start inputting things where you don't need to go out, but you're starting to get
connected.
Yeah.
Wow.
That's so good.
Yeah.
So mentor, who would you like to be on the next episode of podcast?
I did think about this one and I feel strongly about it.
Okay.
I'm actually not even sure.
You may have recorded with her already.
Izzy.
Ah, Izzy is my nominee.
I think Izzy would be brilliant and she's so fun and so wise and I love her.
So we have, we have talked to her about it.
Okay.
She's very busy.
So she's like, she's like, she's like maybe sometime next year.
Izzy, let me put some pressure on sis.
Okay.
It's a fun time.
You guys can make it.
So she walks in and records walks out.
Yeah.
Right.
Come on.
We're just gonna have to do it.
I can't.
30 minutes.
Izzy they'll pay ya.
No, I'm kidding.
No, she'll say yes.
She'd be amazing.
Either way, we love you Izzy.
Oh, that's awesome.
That's great.
Um, well, well man, thank you for being on the podcast, Brandon.
Yeah.
This is the truth.
This was great.
It was a lot of fun and I guys, I hope you like this episode.
Thank you for listening to the whole thing.
Make sure you give us five stars.
Five stars only.
Yes.
Five star review.
Like you heard me say before, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything
at all.
Come on.
There you go.
And there's the, and yeah, you can share it out on all your socials.
Whatever you can do.
If you guys haven't already subscribed and you're listening to some episodes, definitely
subscribe, follow whatever it is on whatever platform you're on and subscribe to who needs
a name with PB and J.
Here we go.
Thank you.
I love you guys and I'm really proud of you.
It was an honor to do this.
You're amazing.
Thank you.
And save Josh.
Hashtag save Josh.
We don't want to get shot with the Nerf gun.
What?
That was so random.
And cut.
Alright guys, see you next time.
In starspedals we thank Jamie Wite, Patrick Potty, and Michael princess.