Are there external forces that guide your day? Encourage creative thinking? Increase productivity?

For me, music tops the list, but there are other forces at play, and most of those come from the stream of information that I’m presented with throughout the day.

It is not a new theory that we are influenced by the information we consume, so I’ve setup a mix of feeds and email streams that serve me information on leadership, marketing, social media, innovation and public relations.

I enjoy diving into the themes presented and really thinking about how they can apply to my day to day situations. Recently, I have seen a greater focus on leadership, particularly the perceived lack of good global leadership in business and world affairs. If there’s not an article about issues with current leaders, then there’s an article about how non-traditional business strategies are being employed to shake up the people who are supposed to be managing for success today and laying the groundwork for dominance tomorrow.

Here are two Asian-inspired articles for you chew on as you think about leadership today:

Business Skills and Buddhist Mindfulness – WSJ

Some Executive-Education Professors Teach Ways Students Can Calm Their Minds, Increase Focus

The 21st-century samurai – Japan’s Nostalgia for Leadership – The Economist