Okay, story time. After a recent event where I spoke about embracing your true self and you are the only version of you and maybe you're doing better than you think and all of those things, it's one of my absolute favorite messages that I have a chance to give.

I will give this to an executive management team, a youth group, a large church congregation, and as the Safeway Checkout Clerk once learned, late at night,

after making the mistake of asking me what I do for a living, even to one person,

who I think it turned out truly didn't want to know what I do for a living, but was just being nice.

But this came after speaking to a group of single adults over the age of 20.

And a guy in his late 20s came up to me, we will call him Ted. And Ted had said he had

this aha moment and he wanted to share and he said it had been sparked by a couple of recent

podcast episodes. So Ted thought, and I think this story probably resonates with a lot of people.

Ted always thought he would be married by now and he would again, late 20s. Ted always thought he would be married by now, and he would again, late 20s. Ted always thought he would be married by now.

But he told me he had been so caught up in the fear of dating the wrong girl,

worried that it might lead to marrying the wrong person, that he hardly dated at all.

And he was living in this constant fear of making a mistake.

And he was always trying to follow this script that he thought was meant for him, but then the script would a mistake. And he was always trying to follow this script

that he thought was meant for him, but then the script would continually change. And he said,

then, let me tell you about my career. So Ted's an engineer, again, has nothing to do with

a train as I thought as I was a kid. And then there's his career. Ted's an engineer,

nothing to do with a train. He said, he reminded me after hearing

me talk about that on a podcast. I always thought that was the thing. Then there's his career. Ted

is an engineer, not the railroad kind. And he said it was a path that he chose following his parents'

advice. And he said, it was a solid job. He made good money, so he should be happy, right? But he said deep down, he had this passion for reading and writing, and he said he had confided in me about this dream of going back to school to become a high school English teacher. And he said that he had brought it up with his parents a few times, but they were far more practical, he said. They wanted him to,

but they were all about the more practical path, saying that he needed to worry more about

making money and the potential to provide for his family in the future, etc., etc. And he said

...