Your dreams don’t begin on the couch in front of the TV. Your life’s purpose won’t be found in bright shiny objects or the singular pursuit of money.

And although the keys to personal and financial fulfillment won’t be found in one book, you’ll get closer than ever with Jon Acuff’s new book “Start: Punch Fear in the Face, Escape Average and Do Work that Matters.”

Are You On the Road to Average, or Awesome?

You know the drill: As a kid, grownups tell us if you go to school, study for a career and get a good job, you’ll make lots of money and be happy for the rest of your life.

What a load of crap.

If you’re a LiveWorkDream reader, you know as well as I do that this isn’t how life works. Even for the folks who were smart enough to study for a money-making career (I wasn’t), it all comes at a price. Time and personal fulfillment are the biggest sacrifices. If you want to ensure that you reach the end of your life as a happy individual who’s made a positive impact on the world doing what you love most, get your hands on a copy of this book.

“Start” is a roadmap for a trip to awesomeness. Acuff shares what it takes to be personally and financially fulfilled no matter how many times you find yourself in the unemployment line or just bored with your line of work. He lays out the steps that all successful people have taken, like his mentor Dave Ramsey, and clearly articulates the path to achieve awesomeness (fair warning: awesome is his favorite word in this book and mentioned at least a thousand times).

Unfortunately, just like the dogma we’re fed as kids, the road to awesome isn’t that easy either:

“If it’s that easy to walk down the path though, if the steps are so clearly marked, why don’t more people do it? Well, the bad news is it’s not the only path on the map. And, like a back road through the mountains, the path to awesome is much narrower than the other, more common path.

Billions of people have traveled and continue to travel the other path, and it grows wider every year. The terrain is easy – grassy even – and after a brief incline it follows a safe and steady decline that mostly allows for casual coasting.

It sounds nice. It feels effortless when you’re on it.

The trouble is that on this wide path, you don’t end up at awesome. You just end up at old. This path is called “average.”

So how do you get to be old and awesome? Follow Acuff’s book. Come to terms with the fact that “retirement” is dead and most of us will need to reinvent ourselves at least a half dozen times throughout our lives. Being awesome means harnessing the power of technology and the Internet to learn, to showcase your expertise to the world, to do good by helping others with the activities that rock your world and boost your bank account.

“Regardless of your age or station in life, it all comes down to one simple truth: you just have to start.”

Acuff is a witty, funny author with a razor-sharp style that encourages full-speed ahead reading. He takes you by the hand and guides you through the trajectory of a successful career and life by breaking up the road to awesome into five key areas

1. Learning: Educating yourself about pursuits that bring fulfillment, not just money
2. Editing: Winnowing down the activities that rock your world
3. Mastering: Fine tuning your talents
4. Harvesting: Reaping the benefits of your accomplishments in both personal and financial aspects
5. Guiding: Giving back, passing on what you’ve learned to others

You’ll laugh out loud more than once, especially when he humorously but humbly describes his own less-than-successful career moves like stealing money from his grandma’s church or losing over 20,000 Facebook fans after he neglected to maintain the group that launched his career. Using what he’s learned, Acuff teaches you how to dream, but “dream honestly” so you can pursue your life’s passions without sacrificing your career employer, friends and family’s needs.

“Anyone can dream. It’s the doing that’s such a hassle.”

You’ll love the practical advice to help you discover if you’re really following your dreams or just talking about it. Tips such as

• Survey the seven key areas of your life: physical, spiritual, financial, family, social, intellectual and career. Which ones feel average?
• Do a seventy-two hour audit, writing down the thirty-minute chunks of time you spend over a three-day period [two weekdays and one weekend day]).
• Answer the question: “If I died today, what would I regret not being able to do?” Write down one to five answers, then ask yourself, “Are those the things I’m spending time doing right now?”
• Ask this question first: “What gives me the most joy?” Don’t ask, “What am I good at right now?” or “What will make the most money?” or “What will cause the least inconvenience in my life?”
• Create a list of people who are doing what you’d like to do. Research one to three things from each of these people that you can incorporate into your own road to awesome.

“Start” isn’t the kind of book you finish and forget about. It’s a reference book for the rest of your life, for every time that a little voice whispers in your head “Am I awesome . . . . or just average?”

If you’re here, I know that you aren’t average. “Get this book. Read it. Live it. Pass it on. Repeat.

And the party never ends . . .

Happy Sweet 16th Anniversary baby! xoxo

We’ve landed in Lake City Colorado for our summer workamping gig at Vickers Ranch.

It’s insanely beautiful here in the San Juans, but we’re an hour from the nearest place to do any real grocery shopping. Since we only get one, maybe two days a week off, neither one of us want to spend precious off-time on long-distance domestic duties.

Until last year, Lake City had just one small grocery store, known by locals as “The Food Museum” because the inventory is too close to their expiration dates for comfort.

Last year, a great little health food store opened up but with sporadic produce at best, we couldn’t rely on it for regular grocery store trips.

This year we are thrilled to see a second health food store is opening up with a huge choice of produce! Woohoo! We met the owners today and they’ve promised us regular deliveries of kale, lettuce and greens.

This new store, and the UPS truck, are going to be our lifeline while we work here all summer.

Thus, today we being our 2013 Shop Local in Lake City Challenge. We’re going to see if we can live off the provisions in a small mountain town without ever going to the big town. With a health food store, liquor store and post office, what else do you need?

We have not even left yet to return to our favorite workamping job back at the ranch for the summer, and we’re already talking about getting back to Texas next winter. So, I’ve finally uploaded this video of Kristyn Harris singing a fun rendition of ”Been Everywhere” – in true Texas fashion.

If you spend much time in Texas, see how many town names you recognize in this version of the Hank Snow classic. If you like this, you may also enjoy the Rick Moranis lyrics in his satirical adaptation, I Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere.

We were fortunate enough to catch Kristyn on camera at the 2012 Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Alpine, where the cowgirls clearly stole the show. Hopefully by the time we return, I’ll have updated our Cowboy Poetry Playlist with more videos from our last visit! For more home movies of local music from all around the country, check out the Musicamericana playlist on our Videos page.

All of my most memorable live music from our past six years on the road, has been in Small Town, USA. A few highlights include seeing Virgina governors jam with the Jug Busters at the Floyd Country Store, the Grassmatics performing Deep Ellum Blues upon request at Artz Ribs in Austin, Michael Martin Murphy (of Wildfire fame) up close and personal in Lake City, and of course every trip we’ve taken back to Luckenbach, Texas. OK, Austin isn’t exactly a small town, but Artz is sure a small venue!

Where have you seen great local music in America?

Please leave a comment to share your favorite musical memories from the road. And check out the Motornomadics Music page for more travel-inspired tunes!

White stuff stubbornly refuses to leave Northern Colorado mountains, but that’s OK, ’cause we’re outta here again.

This weekend we’ll haul our rig away from Jerry’s Acres and point it toward our annual summer workamping adventure in Lake City, on the opposite end of the state where it’s a bit warmer and lacking the kind of precipitation we’ve had on the Front Range.

Thanks to Workamper News, we found this great summer job way back in 2008 and have been returning ever since.

It’s a bit of an adjustment for us to get used to working working for someone else again, and I’ll certainly be utilizing many of Jon Acuff’s suggestions given in his new book, “Start;” like getting up at 5:00 AM before my workamper day begins, to keep our own business ventures running.

The temporary sacrifice of punching a clock is a small price to pay for a little extra cash, Colorado’s best scenery, an unforgettable cast of characters and honest, hard work that gets us away from our computers and out into the fresh alpine air.

As we salute another winter gone by, we’ll say hello to summer and embrace the change that comes along with this full-timing lifestyle.