Neil Pasricha talks on TED about the 3 A’s of awesome in life. This is such a perfect way to kick off 2011. It’s much more than winning the Lotto (although that would be pretty awesome) or winning the Heisman trophy. It’s really the little things in life that make up all the awesomeness. It’s the awareness and appreciation of the little things that make the big things mean so much. In 2011, I encourage you all to become aware and appreciative of the little things around you! 2011 is the year to CREATE anything you want in your life.

Peace, Love, and a million successes to you all.

Blake

Technorati Tags: attitude, awareness, awesome, being bold, goals, happiness, lesson, love, personal power, positive thinking, reflection, success, video

Easily one of the greatest viral videos of 2010, and perfect for Applied Happiness friends. So many people follow the societal agreement that being alone is a negative thing. This video lends another side of the argument, and I love it. You can experience so many things alone hat connect you with the world – because as long as you’re alive, you’re never alone.

Peace, Love, and a million successes to you all!

Blake

Technorati Tags: attitude, awareness, clearing, faith, goals, happiness, lessons, love, perception, personal power, reflection, video

I have made it so far through the book, that it’s about time I started getting the word out about it. I am asking for help in getting it published and on store shelves.  The additional funds will be used to get the new Suicide Prevention and Life Celebration charity started.  These are exciting times, and I would be honored if any one of my readers became a contributor.

“The Unlimited Landscape – Exploring the power within you” is about the journey to that ‘more to life’ place we’re all searching for. Sometimes it’s a quest for success. Sometimes it’s a search for deeper meaning in the world around you. Often it’s a combination of many things. This book is an experiential piece – filled with exercises and lessons to guide you in discovering your potential, and explore that power. It is written with humor and sarcasm because that’s the kind of guy I am – as if we needed another sarcastic writer in the world, right?

The book is really a stepping-stone for Applied Happiness, and myself. I am raising money to get the book published and on shelves, but I’m also using any additional funds to put together a charity for Suicide Prevention and the celebration of life. I feel in my soul that the emotions in this project, and the passion of the positive paradigm, will make the future charity possible – and I would be honored if you were a founding contributor to our success.

Please check out the fund page by clicking the book cover image above. There are incentives to donors as well. We have three packages that allow you to receive some great gifts for your donation. Check them out!

Peace, Love, and a million successes to us!

Blake

Technorati Tags: appreciation, coaching, fund raising, goals, gratitude, love, personal power, positive thinking, success, teaching

“Once an old woman came to Buddha and asked him how to meditate. He told her to remain aware of every movement of her hands as she drew the water from the well, knowing that if she did, she would soon find herself in that state of alert and spacious calm that is meditation.”

“Water, if you don’t stir it, will become clear; the mind left unaltered will find its own natural peace.”

Sometimes we get so caught up in the rattle of everyday life that an overwhelming blindness washes over us. We’re blind to the true nature of the world around us, our place in it, and what we really want for ourselves. We are so in tune with the ‘noise’ that the voice inside becomes inaudible, and we often end up somewhere we don’t feel we belong. Some of us lose our way from time to time, right?

Stillness is such a powerful tool for reconnecting to that little voice. When the mind tunes out the noise, and instead, listens to the calm repetition of breathing, the soul can often take the moment and speak up – often with such clarity. Mindfulness meditation is an easy way to reach this stillness. I personally use an activity (one in which I can focus, and be on autopilot) as a catalyst to stillness. I wash and wax my car to ‘tune out’ the noise.

The calm I get in slowly covering the car in soap and rinsing her clean is immense. I’ve done this a few hundred times, so it’s nothing I really need to concentrate on, but I couldn’t have a conversation while doing it either – and why would I want to?!? I let my mind slowly shut off by focusing on the movement of my hands across the paint, and the shine that I reveal. Before long, I can hear my heart telling me how satisfying this activity is, and what parts of my life it also feels satisfied. I get a chance to really reflect without the rattle of my mind coming into play. This stillness of my mind is priceless.

In the Karate Kid movies, Mr. Miyagi puts Daniel(son) to work by having him wax the car and paint the fence. This not only teaches him Kata Karate movements, but it introduces him to stillness and mindful meditation. It’s often in the stillness that we come to great realizations. It’s almost cliche now, but how many times have you fallen in love with someone in the stillness between the two of you? Think about it!

The homework this time is to practice stillness, my friends. If you know how to meditate, please do that and listen to what your mind and body say when you tune the ‘noise’ out. If you do not know how to meditate, try to simply sit quietly with your eyes closed and concentrate on your breathing only. Concentrate on breathing slowly in your nose, and out your mouth. Soon enough your mind will unravel from its grip on the rattle, and you’ll find peace. That’s where you’ll also hear that inner voice speak to you. It’s incredible what he/she has to say sometimes.

Peace, Love, and a million successes to you all,

Blake

Technorati Tags: appreciation, attitude, awareness, Buddha, gratitude, happiness, lesson, love, peace, stillness, teaching, wisdom

Free Coaching Session!

With 2010 coming to the half-way point in the next couple of weeks, are you happy with where your year has taken you?  Are there things you’d love to change, improve, increase, or achieve?  Maybe you would only like a little clarity about where you are and where you feel you’re headed on this crazy winding road.  Have you had a day where you left your office for some lunch and thought, “what am I doing?” or “is this really all there is?” or even “man, it would be so incredible if I could only (fill-in the blank)”?

Coaching is such a powerful place to turn to when you’re looking for some insight and fulfillment in your life.  Maybe you’ve looked into getting a coach, but you doubted your ability to afford it…

GREAT NEWS!

We’re giving away 30 minute coaching sessions!  No, really, we are!  F-R-E-E !

Not only are we giving away the first 30 minute session, we’ve discounted our fees to help get you closer to your dream without taking away your savings!  Head to the contact page and send us a message to set-up a free coaching call (or face-to-face meeting), and take us for a test drive!  If you feel like you could benefit from having your own incredible coach, we are offering 30 minute sessions for $25 each for the first 90 days!  Imagine as much as 12 complete weeks of personalized attention, focus, and support to help you discover your best self and show you how to create S-M-A-R-T action plans to get you moving forward.

FOR PEANUTS!

For those of you thinking, “C’mon, there’s no such thing as a free lunch,” truly, there’s no risk. No contracts, no gimmicks, no strings, nothing. The time is yours,and the decision after your session is yours. No hard sell. No fine print. NONE.

Head over to the assessment page and see what you, personally, come up with. They’re free too. If you find some area of your life you might like to improve, we would be more than happy to give you the free session to touch on it. Call 847-754-9615 or send a message our way to set-up your FREE session today! 

As a bonus for signing up for your free session, we’ll send you the Applied Happiness Inspired Action Workbook at no charge! This 30 page workbook will help you get a head start on what motivates you, and what might be holding you back from getting what you want.  This is $10 value, absolutely free.

Don’t wait! This offer only runs through August!

Call or write us today, and discover what a coach can add to your life!

Audentes Fortuna Iuvat – Fortune Favors the Bold.

- The Applied Happiness Team

Technorati Tags: appreciation, attitude, awareness, being bold, clearing, coaching, gratitude, happiness, lessons, love, personal power, positive thinking, success, teaching, wisdom

On this very special day, I want to give very deep thanks to my mother, and all the mothers in the world. They’ve given so much to us all, and without them, there wouldn’t be life. I am so blessed to have a brilliant, savvy, sarcastic, and sincere mother to keep me on my toes, and keep me moving forward. I wish everyone could know the kind of love in my family. Wish your mom a Happy Mother’s Day, and tell her how important she is. Even if she’s no longer with us, voice your love to the sky.

Happy Mother’s Day, Moms!

Peace, Love, and a million successes to you all!

Blake

Technorati Tags: appreciation, gratitude, love, mother's day

Contrary to popular belief, happiness is not a destination. Happiness is not someplace in which to arrive, rather, it’s the story of your journey to anything that makes you smile, inspires you, or motivates you to keep moving. In fact, you may not even be aware of the incredible trip you’ve been on for so long! Consider the places you’ve been, your struggles, your defeats, your triumphs – consider everything that brought you to where you are now.  It’s a pretty good story isn’t it?

So let’s take a look at some powerful questions.  Instead of looking at the goals you haven’t hit, or the achievements you haven’t managed to attain just yet, start looking back at what you did, what you learned along the way, and how it brought you to where you are now.  Instead of feeling a sense of disappointment or discouragement from unfulfilled desires, and asking yourself, “What’s wrong with me?” Instead, ask yourself “What’s right with me?  What are my greatest qualities?  Who has had the greatest impact on my life so far?  How have I impacted someone else’s life in a great way?”

One great way to get into the groove of appreciating you own power is to take stock of yourself.  You’ve heard me say this before, but it’s too important to only share just once!  Make an inventory list of all the strengths you feel you possess.  BETTER YET, head over to viastrengths.org and take the Values in Action – Inventory of Strengths assessment, and see a ranked inventory of your strengths right away!  It’s completely free, and pretty enlightening!

Now that you’ve taken stock of your strengths, you’ve become aware of your power.  Step Two is to make note of their impact in your life.  What triumphs have you experienced using your strengths? Recall an instance in which your greatest strength made an impact on your life or the lives of others.

See, the secret to happiness isn’t about working hard to cross the threshold into ‘the good life’ – rather, it’s becoming aware of the events, people, places, and feelings you’re grateful for in your life, and how they’ve made an impact.   Check out my post on The Gratitude Journal Review to learn more about getting into the attitude of gratitude, and getting more aware!

Peace, Love, and a million successes to you all!

Blake

Technorati Tags: appreciation, awareness, inspiration, journey, life, love, reflection

The world around us is often run at breakneck speed, and some of us consider ourselves lucky to have a moment to breathe!  There is a huge benefit in how you spend those ‘breath-catching’ moments, however.  Frequently those moments are filled with thoughts of what you still have to do, when they should be spent reflecting on what you’ve already done.  You can easily build strength, stamina, motivation, and drive simply by recalling your accomplishments, and how that success felt.

Savoring is all about enjoying, even relishing, the past moments with great appreciation, present moments of enjoyment, and even future golden moments by anticipating them.  Many people see that word and imagine having a meal and eating is slowly to savor the flavor, so to speak.  Truth is, savoring every moment, including a good meal, is an incredible psychological tool to boost positivity and motivation.

It strengthens in three ways: it prolongs enjoyable moments; it can act as a vaccination that protects you psychologically over long periods of time; and it intensifies positive experiences. So turn up the volume of your good-mood by basking in the enjoyment of your success!  Enhance it further by creating set-points for savoring later.

‘Savory-Set-Points’ are images, feelings, sensations – anything you can use to store your enjoyment for recall later.  Essentially, you can create positive memories for later by noticing details of things you enjoy now.  When something makes you feel great or accomplished, make a mental note of your surroundings – the sights, sounds, tastes, feelings, smells, and the people are great at pinning down memories for later. In fact, people can be quite instrumental in your quest! Share your story with them, and let them enjoy with you!

Narratives are often easier to recall, and the act of sharing often leads others to initiate the savoring in the future! Tell a great story, and people will bring it up, and re-savor that moment with you for quite some time after.  So without further delay, here is your assignment:

Write out one of your great stories – one that takes you, and the reader, on a journey of success. Take a stroll down memory lane and describe, in detail, the way you felt, how your peers felt and made you feel, whether you felt motivated or inspired, and end the story by describing how you feel right now – telling the story again.

If this is a story of a time that inspired or motivated you, you may find that simply retelling it can re-motivate you all over again!   This is one of my favorite exercises with clients.  Everyone loves to tell a great story – especially one that details an exciting, inspiring, or motivating experience!

Try it out!

Technorati Tags: appreciation, inspiration, love, reflection, stillness, success

Ever feel like you just can’t catch a break?  As your day wears on, you just get bombarded with one dose of bad news after another?  It truly brings meaning to the phrase ‘when it rains, it pours.’  I am no different from you. We both experience the same days.  Hell, sometimes you come out of a relationship and all you want to do is start fresh, but it seems like it’s just not in the cards.  Welcome to your current train of thought.  Let me explain what I mean.

We’ve all been there.  We’ve all had our hearts broken.  Some of us have even broken some hearts ourselves.  More often than any other subject, the topic of healing a broken heart comes up in advice columns and support groups around the world. When your life changes, and you find yourself single in a world where you once were part of a pair, it can feel like another country – a hostile country too!  The bills can pile up, the weather can turn cold, you can get sick – these are all symptoms of your current train of thought.  This is not you.  This is NOT your life.  You DO NOT exist for this.  This is just your current state of energy. You need to step back and see what your motivating emotions truly are, and weigh them against your goals.

I was recently discussing with a friend of mine the importance of healing yourself for yourself after a break-up.  Too many people try to cling to what once was, and spin their wheels to keep some semblence of their former existence after their proverbial fall from grace.  Actions like these are motivated by fear, and are admittedly a futile attempt to keep up with the status quo.  When all your attempts to stay strong are motivated by fear, you end up experiencing such loss and pain, that your fears manifest.  You have to clear yourself.

 Define yourself better.  You are NOT the broken windshield wiper on your car at the end of a long day of work. You are NOT the ridiculous electric bill this summer.  You are NOT the shell of a person you think you are as you work past a recent break-up.  That may be your current state, but it isn’t you, and your life does no thave to be defined as such.  Realize that you’re much more than that, and write them all down.  Define yourself.

“I know phenomenal things are coming to me, because I radiate awesome.”

“I am an incredibly loving mother.”

“I am so grateful for my amazing family.”

“I am loved so deeply by everyone around me.”

Define yourself differently and get yourself out of the curret state you’re in.  Current is a funny word, ya know. It can mean now, and it can also mean flow. What I want you to do is change the CURRENT of your current.  When you stop flowing the wrong direction, and letting all the negativity and despair propel you further into what you do not want, you’ll see a bigger, brighter, more promising world before you.  Trust me – I have been there, and I have had to embrace the void left in heartbreak.

Technorati Tags: break-up, breakup, broken heart, clearing, clearing doubt, guilt, love