Here’s a cool app out of a research project at the London School of Economics: Mappiness. Throughout the day, you enter a few key things about how you feel and what you’re doing and the app maps out what has you be most happy.

You’ll be able to track what situations you are most happy in and where. I think this is great because it might not be what you think. Also, you can notice when you aren’t that happy and learn what can improve your mood. Mood is an internal experience of association, not an external accident.

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mappiness/id385082965?mt=8

Flow is a word often used to describe a state of being so in the present, so in the moment, everything seems to be working perfectly. You experience flow when you are happily playing with your mate and mental time disappears to reveal simply love and beauty. Or, that time you were working with some colleagues and it seemed everything just worked. In sports, they often call it “being in the Zone” when all time disappears and that perfect football pass, 100-yard dash, or golf shot happens. Flow comes from within you, you create it, it’s not an accident or a product you buy.

Here’s way to remember getting in Flow as an acronym:

• Faith
• Love
• Openness
• Willingness

Remember a time when you have felt each one. What do you picture, hear? Where do you feel it in your body? Consider deeply what each word means. The mind shuts off, you return to these feeling places. You return to Flow, your natural state.

OK, I just had to share this. Last night, I finally got to check out the weekly summer concert series at our Santa Monica Pier.

The band was this week was Led Zeppagain, a tribute to Led Zeppelin, my favorite band in High School. When I was a sophomore, my best friends and I heard Zeppelin was coming back to the U.S. for a tour. We planed to jump in my friends well know 1960’s jalopy van and road trip down to L.A. But on September 25th, 1980, our dream was crushed when we heard that the drummer, John Bonham, had died. Last night, it was like I finally got to see them, in L.A., 30 years later.

Now here’s the crazy part. Afterwards, I waited in the huge line to get my bicycle. When I pulled out the ticket, this is what I saw.

So what are the odds? The tickets are cycled upward all summer and there are hundreds of bicycles each concert. I’m sure wondering what the “G” stands for!

The best-selling author of The Four Hour Work Week, Tim Ferriss, just posted an insider’s article to current state of the book publishing world. Thing are changing quickly because of the iPad and Kindle.

Some keys:

• Though digital books are hot, he only gets 1.6% of his royalties from digital versions.
• Hard covers have the best overall royalty. Don’t move to paperback too quickly.
• Digital doesn’t count towards best seller list.
• Books are not a good revenue stream. It’s your other activities.

Tim also shares some books he used to learn how to become a best seller.

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2010/08/23/seth-godin-and-print-publishing/

Here’s a bonus article where Tim shares more specifics on how he got his book published: http://okdork.com/2007/04/24/how-to-get-a-book-deal-with-world%E2%80%99s-largest-publisher/

I’m still surprised how many people I meet that “want to make it big” in some arena of media and yet they don’t take the time to learn from those who have already done it. It’s called “modeling”, one of the cores of NLP. Save time, learn what the best in the business already did, and do that, making it your own.

In a brief conversation I had with my father once, a conversation of amends, I apologized for being so difficult as a young man. He chuckled and said, “They didn’t give us a manual at the hospital.” So where is the manual?

One of the greatest errors I see in raising children is what we call “enmeshment”. The parent doesn’t realize the child is not them, not an extension of them, or even for them.

I am reminded of this beautiful story which tells us most of what we need to know. I hope you’ll forward this story to all the parents you know, and soon to be parents, so we have a world that supports the unfolding of happy beings, not conditioned extensions of past generations.

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said,
“Speak to us of Children”.
And he said:

“Your children are not your children,
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but are not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and
He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
So he loves also the bow that is stable.”

If is from The Prophet by Khalil Gibran.

I’ve been catching up on the brilliant History Channel series “America – The Story of Us.” http://www.history.com/shows/america-the-story-of-us

It’s an inspiring story of American pioneer spirit and innovation. As the intro says, “We turn our dreams into the truth.” In this Great Recession, we forget that our forefathers and sisters faced odds much greater than anything we can imagine. Locusts and dust storms that blotted out the sun for hundreds of miles and days at a time. Two world wars and countless times of famine. We’ve become convinced by corporations that we are simply consumers and that life is unbearable without the next toy. In truth, we care CREATORS, not consumers.

This passage from a guidebook at Ellis Island, where millions of immigrants saw the promise of America, and built this great country with their hope and hard work, sums up well the spirit we can all be reminded of today:

“Forget your customs and ideals. Select a goal and pursue it with all your might. You will experience a bad time, but sooner or later, you will achieve your goal. Don’t take a moment’s rest. Run.”

Here’s a clip a created from the show:

Liberty represents the hope that is America

http://inherentexcellence.com/blog/?p=458

This one is for the ladies too, so pay attention! If you want juicy sparks in your relationship, keep reading…

I hear of this so often, there’s just something wrong in the relationship. Something in the communication. The couple are even friends, things seems great, but every so often she just doesn’t feel heard. She feels like he isn’t hearing her, feeling her, caring, something is just wrong, and it is breaking her attraction.

The problem: the guy is treating her like an equal (i.e. another man). OK, I just upset some feminists, but hear me out.

You see, men challenge each other. That is how we show that we care. We just tell the truth of what we see and bring it to the man so they can improve, through challenge. That is masculine-to-masculine care, or love. The feminine in all of us grows through praise, not challenge. That receiving, heart-based, open and radiant self is our feminine.

Feminists taught us that we’re all “equal”. Most men did listen to this, especially boys in that era, because we want women, so to “respect” a woman we started treating women like equals. Now our masculine (stronger in males typically) wants to be appreciated for our mind and be challenged. So, men were taught to talk to a woman’s mind and challenge. Sure, this is great in the office, in the coffee shop, but not so great in the bedroom or when you want to be intimate (i.e. close).

So how does this masculine challenge look? “Say honey, are you sure you want to eat that? I thought you were on a diet?” This is telling the truth and challenging for improvement. I do it with my guy friends. I’ll just say, “Dude, you’re getting fat. Stop stuffing your face.” And my friend will reply, “Thanks man!”, because he gets that I care enough to tell him the truth and challenge him. If I don’t care, I won’t say anything to a man.

That is NOT the way to bring out your goddess’ radiance guys! Our feminine, on the other hand, grows through praise. Praise is noticing her radiance and subtly encouraging more of it. How does a guy know it is praise? Because it sounds like B.S. to a guy. Really! Imagine saying to a guy, “You look sexy in those jeans dude. Your diet is working.” See what I mean? Praise is notice the radiance you like (i.e. she is “sexy”) and how she has put in care to do it (i.e. her sacrifice of a “diet”). This is how to enhance the feminine. And you DO want to be with a feminine woman, don’t you?

Now I know what our inner feminist is saying, “Don’t B.S. a woman. She’s not dumb.” But notice, that again is saying, “Like a woman only for her mind. Treat her like a man.” (i.e. a big mind with a torso.) Thus the guide is, in work, challenge is OK, but to build intimacy, praise her, enhance her feminine, hold a space for her to radiate.

Praise is like fertilizer. To a man (a mind), the smell is distracting. But to a rose (or a woman, beauty in human form) it’s nutrients for blooming. You don’t challenge a rose, or yell at it, to make it bloom or become more beautiful, do you?

The moral of the story: If you want a radiant female, a woman, talk to her heart and stop talking to her head so much. When you are talking about the bills, sure, that’s men’s work. But most of the time, in your close relationship, you want a radiant nurturing goddess, don’t you? TALK TO HER HEART!

Thanks gang for pointing out that the couple video from Tony Robbins’ Breakthrough didn’t play in your email. I’ve updated the post so it also has a direct link to the NBC video.

Click here to see the video. http://inherentexcellence.com/blog/?p=448

If you’ve ever had a challenge connecting with your parents, especially because there was some rift between your spouse and parents, you’ll really want to check out this 4 minute video. Family separation is one of the greatest wounds in our culture today. We CAN let go of our need to be right and drop the past to make space for love to happen again.

Here’s a brilliant short on the chattering monkey ALL of us have in our head. Yes, you and me both. Are we selfish animals are humans? Though man has worked diligently to evolve, our inner monkey is still there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3I7TKW_QQbA

There’s a great behind-the-scenes look at the couple in Episode 2 of Breakthrough with Tony Robbins I think we can all learn from.

In the 30 days working with this couple, Tony discovered one reason why Ron was so emotional all the time. He was quite alone in the world. Turns out he hadn’t spoken to his parents in 5 years because of a fall-out between his wife and mother. Marie was feeling so much negativity and judgment from Ron’s parents, Ron made the decision to defend her by cutting his parents off. In picking sides, he tore apart his family, even though family is one of Ron’s highest values.

Cutting off his parents though was just the all too common practice of hoping a problem goes away. It’s an epidemic in America. Problems do not go away, they must be confronted with compassion and thought.

I think you’ll get so much inspiration from this short 4 minute video.

Watch online: http://www.nbc.com/breakthrough-with-tony-robbins/video/a-family-reunited/1242329/