What the Ministers of The Republic of Tea had to say to me.

*This blog entry is due to a negative feeling that I was experiencing when I woke up to let my dog out, poor doggy, it’s really not his fault. I made the choice to let it bother me! He was just being a dog. Can’t blame him for when you got to go… You got to go!

Having just gotten up after only five hours of sleep, I find myself feeling lazy, yet pressured to do something productive. But, how can one do this on only five hours of sleep? It is interesting enough, to me at least, how what I read, whether on the web or in a book, I can relate it to what is or will be happening in my life.

Let me explain.

Last night I was reading a wonderful little book called, Success@life: A Zentrepreneur’s Guide How to Catch and Live Your Dream. It is very well written by the Ministers of The Republic of Tea: Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold. In this book they talk about what it takes to make your dream a reality. Something that I have been struggling to do for, oh my whole life! But, as of late, I have been finally starting to “get it”. Anyways, back to the point! I was reading this book and I got to a part that, at first, didn’t speak to me, until, I sat down at my computer this afternoon to work on the first draft of my novel.

It was about failure. The kind Ministers of The Republic of Tea basically said that you will fail, so expect it. Now, I know all too well about failure. As I have failed many times in my life. At the time of me reading this, I thought, I know I will fail. I know that the past couple of days have been great and it won’t always last.

For you see, last week was sort of rough for me. I didn’t write much, I had gotten lazy. But, then, as the weekend neared, my mood started to lift and soon I found my spirits revived. By Monday, I was gun ho on my writing. I was refreshed, revitalized!

See, I work the night shift. I get every weekend off and most of the time I try and get a nap in before work, when I have had a few days off. But, for the past two Mondays, I have been unable to get that nap, which has resulted in a “dampened mood” at home and at work.

Now, maybe you are thinking to yourself, “Gee, this girl needs some help! She is already expecting to have a bad day, so she most likely she will!” Your right!

So when I got a three hour nap this past Monday after having slept a good five hours Sunday night/Monday morning, I was happy. Monday had been a great day of balance between: working on the first draft of my novel, cleaning the house, chatting with my son and husband, and relaxing by playing a few video games. Naturally, having gotten all that sleep, my mood was good and going to work in this state was awesome!

"What have you done different?" my husband asked. I replied with,

“I am just going with the flow. Living in the moment and enjoying each new task to its fullest.”

He smiled, and liked this idea. I remained positive and optimistic well into Tuesday.

Once again, Tuesday proved to be another great day of sleep, writing, cleaning and cooking and spending time with my family. Then I got to work, and still moods are in check, doing well. On my lunch break I picked up the book that I had mentioned above and began to read and I take this directly from their book.

"And on and on you go, standing rock solid, ready with the knowledge and insight, the earnestness and courage to do all that is necessary to succeed at life and catch and live your dream, and if you said “Yess!” to all our cogent comments and followed the criterion given, and if you know deep in your soul that the course you will take is as right as right could possibly be…Guess what?

You’re going to fail.

And that is being optimistic."

See, I had already figured this out. I knew I would fail and would have future failures.

I didn’t need a book to tell me that, I had already experienced it!

I continued to read. A chapter later, they talked about how everything is connected in this place we call our world. Duh! I knew that too! Because, you see, I had been reading books by the great Deepak Chopra. So I knew all about self awareness and had been enlightened on how we are one with our universe. But, what I didn’t realize at that moment, until now, was this book had a message for me. A warning that was trying to speak to me, but at the time I wouldn’t hear of it. It was telling me that I wasn’t going to have a good day today, Wednesday.

Now it didn’t outright say, hey you’re going to have a bad day today so be prepared. But, in around about way it did.

Let me again show you.

I came home this morning, my spirits still grand. I went to bed around 8am. I was then awakened promptly at 1pm by my dog licking my face, telling me he had to go potty. I, sleepy eyed, got up and took him out. After only five hours of somewhat decent sleep, I couldn’t go back to bed. I was, now, awake. Of course what does five hours of sleep do for a person? For some it is enough to get by on, but, for me, not so much. I was immediately cranky and in a bad mood and I immediately wanted to do nothing. I realized that this bad attitude was going to affect me the rest of the day and I just wasn’t going to have it. That was when I decided to write about it, journal it, get it out of my very being.

So here I am, still in my pj’s typing, and thinking about how grumpy I was, but no longer am thanks to journaling and thanks to my little basset hound that was just being a good little doggy. And if I have learned anything about the Zen way, it is this:

There are no coincidences. Everything is connected. And there are very much signs that will point you in the right direction if you just learn to pay attention to them and become aware of your surroundings. For me, it was this book: Success@life: A Zentrepreneur’s Guide How to Catch and Live Your Dream. Written by two wonderful guys, Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold, who have obviously failed and yet went on to have successful lives and a dream that they made a reality. I thank you, the Ministers of The Republic of Tea for reminding me of things I already knew, but refused to see whole heartily.

*For more information about The Republic of Tea you can check it out at: http://www.republicoftea.com/