"Imagination is your power to go beyond the known and the unknown to create your utopia. It's lamentable that our focus is always on what exists rather than on what could exist."

Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold, the authors of the highly acclaimed Success at Life and Dragon Spirit, continue the journey in their breakthrough Zentrepreneur Guide® series with Tiger Heart, Tiger Mind: How to Empower Your Dream, illustrated with a dozen wondrous Zen drawings.

Through timeless philosophies and state-of-the-art insights, the authors reveal a charted path of lessons and learnings that will deliver the reader beyond the horizon to new vistas and unlimited possibilities. In this energizing volume, life-changing chapters include such topics as: "Dare to Dream, Dream to Dare: Create an Idea Log"; "From Know Fear to No Fear: Cultivate your Courage"; "Walk the Talk: Determine Your Direction"; and "Surround Sound the Vow of WOW: Find Supportive Someones."

Tiger Heart, Tiger Mind is a guide for enlightenment and empowerment in the twenty-first century that can awaken the way within. Every page of this groundbreaking book reveals how to strengthen the will of the heart and polish the power of the mind, cultivating attitude, actions, and behaviors that allow for a love-what-you-do, do-what-you-love life.

Tiger Heart, Tiger Mind is brimming with the authors' enthusiasm about waking up every morning with a will and a willingness to practice doing and being. On this Zentrepreneur pilgrimage of practice and expansion, readers will be inspired to actively take responsibility for their lives and fully experience their richly deserved dream.

Authors Ron Rubin bought and took charge of The Republic of Tea in 1994, a two-year-old company that had been founded by the same people who created The Banana Republic. Shortly thereafter, marketing veteran Stuart Avery Gold joined Rubin in the company's mission to create a Tea Revolution. The Republic of Tea, one of the most successful and fastest-growing cachet brands in America today, has its headquarters in Novato, California. The Republic of Tea sells the finest teas and herbs in the world to specialty food and select department stores, cafés, and restaurants, as well as through its award-winning mail order catalog and website.

In keeping with its whimsical identity as an independent republic, people working for The Republic of Tea are not managers or vice presidents; the company designates its employees as Ministers and Ambassadors, its customers Citizens, and its sales outlets Embassies.

Ron Rubin, the "Minister of Tea," is Chairman of the Board of The Republic of Tea. He lives in Clayton, Missouri. Stuart Avery Gold, the "Minister of Travel," is COO, and the lauded editorial "voice" for the company's Tea Revolution. He lives in Boca Raton, Florida. Together, they are the authors of the Zentrepreneur Guide® Series, including Success at Life, Dragon Spirit, Wowisms and Tiger Heart, Tiger Mind.

For more information, please visit www.zentrepreneurs.com or www.writtenvoices.com.

Reviews "If you have a hidden dream that you long to realize, you owe it to yourself to read this book. Ron and Stuart have once again created a wise and witty gem that will inspire you to take action on your dreams right now!" --Cheryl Richardson, author of Stand Up for Your Life

"The tiger is an awesome metaphor for this book's message: Your mind matters. And so does this book." --Jeffrey J. Fox, author of How to Make Big Money in Your Own Small Business

"Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold remind us that there is no day but today to start living the life we imagine... a must read for anyone seeking the courage to pursue their dream." --Judith Wright, author of There Must Be More Than This

"The subtitle "How to Empower Your Dream," is certainly an accurate preview of the content, but, in their usual short, clear style, the authors tell how to do much more. This book is about creativity, self-motivation, self-inspiration, becoming and being. It is about self-making, self-knowing, self-nurturing and self-growth. It is about being the self that is an entrepreneur (but the process works for you even if you work for someone else)." --SuperPerformance.com

Excerpt The following is an excerpt from the book Tiger Heart, Tiger Mind by Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold Published by New Market Press; April 2004; $19.95US; 1-5570-4621-2 Copyright © 2004 Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold

From Chapter 2 "Dare to Dream, Dream to Dare"

Imagination is your power to go beyond the known and the unknown to create your utopia. Artist Paul Gauguin stated, "I shut my eyes in order to see." It's lamentable that our focus is always on what exists rather than on what could exist. To that we say, become an imagineer! Pay attention to your imagination, intuition, insight, and inspiration, the flashes that come from out of whatever divine blue, for this is the stuff that dreams are made of. Be alert and sensitive to the finite notes that strike a chord and rock you. Listen to it. Grab hold of it. Shake it and see what falls out.

Then, and this is paramount, quickly write it down before it shifts, alters, and goes thud, never to return. Francis Bacon advocated, "A man would do well to carry a pencil in his pocket, and write down the thoughts of the moment." Splendid advice, since the spark of one idea gives birth to another, which in turn creates another idea that can support, enhance, and empower actions that help materialize the idea into a reality. That's the magic of awareness. Ideas have a wonderful symmetry. You embrace an idea because you need an idea and because it needs you. With this very much in mind, keep a notebook handy at all times. Or a legal pad. Or a day planner. Or 3x5 cards. A microcassette, digital recorder, or text messager. If you have a handheld computer, good for you. I have one but found that the lunatic thing works me more than I can work it. Not important. What is important is that you provide a space for ideas to land when they come around circling.

Because an idea is a thing with feathers.

They can fly away as easily as they come, never to revisit you again. What enlivens and excites can be momentary and ephemeral, if it is not acted upon. Take this on faith, when God in all Her wisdom decides to provide you with creative unfoldment, do not let it get away. Get it down. Record it before it leaves you.

Aside: Rolling Stone and crypt kicker, rock god Keith Richards wrote the forever famous guitar riff for "Satisfaction" after waking up in the middle of the night in a hotel room. When he crawled out of bed the next afternoon, he had forgotten he'd written a song until he played his cassette recorder later that day and heard himself muttering the now rock-classic tune. End of aside.

Be a thinker-upper/writer-downer.

The point to be polished here is that even if you have an elephant's memory, by writing down your idea, and this is crucial, you create its existence in tangible form. You can see it, feel its charge of energy, and go back to it again later to review and consider if it still excites and fills you with positive feelings and purpose, because, in time, some ideas stiffen, while some remain such wonders the next time and the time after the next time.

Keep an idea log. Maybe it's a journal or whatever name you honor it with, do not deprive yourself of this vital instrument of manifestation. An idea log is a powerful tool to assist you in building the foundation and framework for empowering your dream. And if this seems like some off-the-wall suggestion, know that museums, universities, and private collections the world over, house the imaginative jottings of Archimedes, Michelangelo, da Vinci, Copernicus, Picasso, the Wright brothers, and Einstein, just to name hardly any. Truth to know is that there exists a lengthy written trail of providential bursts, cultivated revelations penned by the hand of their creative greats. Tangible reminders of ideas recorded to ensure that they didn't get lost in the tumult of daily events. No wonder that since 1978, the Smithsonian and Rutgers University have been hard at work archiving the over 5 million pages of ideas, notes, and other papers that Thomas Edison left behind. Fortunately for our hyper-inattentive world, Edison knew that a sharp mind deserves a sharp pencil.

So when you luck into an idea, write it down. That's the best basic advice for empowering your dream. Keeping an idea log is, at once, a very important way of knotting together action and reaction. A process for allowing connectives to click, which can bring into form ideas that can create energy, thoughts that can lead to actions, dreams that can turn into living realities. An idea log is, in sweet reality, a portfolio of possibilities. When geeky Billy Gates began to visualize the software that would change the daily revolving of the world, he made his mark, pressing pencil to paper, recording his bright efforts, delivering destiny. William Wordsworth said, "Fill your paper with the beating of your heart." Giving your idea a palpable presence is the very first step in looking at what wants to be looked at, transforming it from a flash of mental energy into a charge of physical energy. You will find it amazing, fascinating, reassuring, and absolutely faith-building when you begin to document and keep track of how many good ideas you have. Imagine the unimagined, ideas come from a new way of thinking.

And believing.

Excerpted from Tiger Heart, Tiger Mind: How to Empower Your Dream -- A Zentrepreneur's Guide® by Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold Copyright © 2004 by Ron Rubin and Stuart Avery Gold. Reprinted with permission of Newmarket Press, www.newmarketpress.com, www.zentrepreneurs.com.

For more information, please visit www.zentrepreneurs.com or www.writtenvoices.com

When was the last time you took a course to make yourself more marketable-and found yourself wondering just what in the world you were doing? Or watched "square peg" employees dropped into "round hole" positions only to fail miserably as revenues tumbled? There's a lesson to be learned in... ANIMALS, INC.

With its previous bestsellers-First, Break All the Rules and Now, Discover Your Strengths-The Gallup Organization rewrote the book on great management. Now Gallup finally makes its classic, hilarious parable, ANIMALS, INC., available to the general public. A story that has proven effective and popular with Gallup clients for over thirty years, this tale introduces you to a group of unforgettable barnyard animals trying to run a successful business.

Deciding that education is the key, the members of Animals, Inc. conduct employee surveys, evaluate competencies, and set up training classes. Filled with the excitement and hope that accompany any new project, they work hard to overcome their natural shortcomings. The workhorse tries to operate the computer, the shy sheep makes sales calls, the scarecrow attempts to lay eggs. What results will seem uncannily familiar to the human reader.

As revelatory as Who Moved My Cheese? and as funny as Fish!, ANIMALS, INC. will have you laughing and learning at the same time. Recharge your thinking with invaluable practical insights. Get an edge in the business world you won't discover anywhere else. And discover the key to effective management, reenergized morale, and super-heightened performance. Just listen to the animals.

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