In case no one's asked you a provocative question lately, I've got four of them for you. Take your pick:

When was the last time you did something for the first time?

Do you care more about other people's expectations or what's right?

Have you paid attention to your dreams and followed them at a great cost?

What is the rut that is you?

It used to be that survival was an issue. In prior generations, you got a job because if you didn't, starvation was an option. Now, food takes up just 6% of the average person's budget. We have the luxury of following our dreams because failure has little downside.
We're not going to starve. The only thing at stake is our destiny.

But we're groomed to be timid, risk-averse souls. We're anesthetized, made numb to a world of possibilities. Here's how it often happens:

1. We become more concerned about getting a degree than discovering a call.

2. We sell ourselves into slavery to school loans, car payments, and a mortgage.

3. Along the way, we find ourselves buying stuff because advertisements tell us to.

4. We find ourselves far from our spiritual home - the narrow walk of faith Jesus described.

Without realizing it, all the big decisions in our life were made by somebody else. We never really decided to settle down and live the American dream.

It just happened. And we find ourselves leaning our ladders against walls that someone else built. Climbing up them, peering over the edge, only to discover they are facades.

A voice nags us along the way up our ladders, "Is this all there is?" It asks. We sense the answer is, "No," but we're too comfortable to do anything about it.