I have a habit that drives my kids crazy but keeps me sane. I sigh. I guess I do it much more than I realize, because every time it happens, somebody asks, What did I do wrong now?

But what they dont realize is I sigh for a very good reason.

I sigh so I dont scream. There are times during the course of my day when screaming would be the perfect, automatic response. Like when the garbage bag tears, when I open my hydro bill, when I realize that one of the kids ate the last brownie or when my cat jumps on the counter and eats a big chunk out of the roast.

But in most places and cases, screaming isnt considered an appropriate response. If I had opened that hydro bill at the post office, for example, and let out a loud shriek, there would no doubt be a small crowd of frightened people frozen with their keys in their hands, frantically wondering which exit would get them out the fastest.

If I started hollering in the store when I saw the price of groceries, mothers would quickly and silently pull their children to another aisle. So, instead of shrieking, I sigh. And if I listen real close, I realize Im not the only one doing it.

I hear them in lineups at the bank, in waiting rooms and beside hospital beds, at traffic lights, and in lunch rooms when coffee break is over. I hear sighs from school teachers when the same kid in the back row is whispering again and outside dressing rooms when the person inside asks for another size.

The act of sighing is truly an amazing thing. We unconsciously breathe in the bad, processing it, letting the reality of the number on the bathroom scale or the total on the invoice sink in. Then, when our soul is ready to release it, we let it go, slowly, carefully relinquishing that initial response of pain, shock or disappointment, not even realizing that our body performed its own self-protective therapy without our permission, and all with a single breath.

A sigh speaks volumes. Someone once said that most of the sighs we hear have been edited. If we could hear the full version, they would tell of our anger, frustration, dismay and fear. They would reveal something beneath the serene surface. But instead of the whining, the complaining and the expletives, we simply hear the sigh.

Along with release, a sigh signals submission or acceptance. Its silent permission our bodies give us to get over it and move on.

Its a form of meditation we often arent even aware were doing. Driving home from the hospital the other day, after visiting a loved one, I noticed this blazing sunset in the distance. Instead of heading home, I drove west to the outskirts of town and pulled over to the side of the road, ready to receive this amazing gift of colour God had painted for me.

I watched the oranges and reds blend and fade and noticed other cars slowing and drivers staring at the crazy woman standing in the cold gazing up at the sky. And as the last little fringe of gold sunk into the horizon, I sighed. It said, Wow. Today was tough. Tomorrow will be better. And if the last thing I ever see is this sunset, Ill die happy. Funny, how one little breath can say so much.

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COLUMN: Don't Mind the Mess - Take a deep breath - Winnipeg Free Press

1 deep /dip/ adjective

deeper; deepest

deeper; deepest

Britannica Dictionary definition of DEEP

We walked in the deep snow.

a deep well/pool/hole

a deep valley between the mountains

The water is deepest in the middle of the lake.

She's afraid of swimming in deep water.

a plant with deep roots

The animals live deep in/within the forest/jungle/mountains, far from any people.

His hands were deep in his pockets.

The sound came from deep within his throat.

This enormous canyon is over a mile deep.

The shelves are 10 inches deep.

We walked through knee-deep snow [=snow as high as our knees] to get to school.

The basement was waist-deep in water. [=the top of the water that filled the basement was as high as a person's waist]

He stepped into an ankle-deep puddle of mud.

She's always been a deep [=profound] thinker. = She's very deep.

This book is far too deep for me.

He has some very deep thoughts on the issue.

a deep discussion on the meaning of life

The country's economy fell into a deep depression/recession.

There are still deep divisions within the group. [=people in the group have very different opinions and can't agree]

Many people here live in deep poverty. [=many people are very poor]

The entire family was in deep shock after hearing about the accident.

I got in deep trouble with my parents for staying out too late.

I offered them my deepest sympathy.

They shared a deep [=profound] concern for the environment.

She felt a deep [=heartfelt] connection with the culture.

a deep sense of happiness and well-being

the deep emotional bond between parent and child

deep feelings of loss

The book made a deep impression on his young mind.

If you are in a deep sleep, you are thoroughly asleep and it is hard to wake you up.

in deep water

the deep end informal

After graduating, he was not afraid to jump in at the deep end and start his new business alone.

Teachers are thrown in the deep end when they first start teaching.

To go off the deep end is to go crazy, such as by behaving foolishly or by becoming very angry or upset.

Her friends thought she had gone off the deep end when she suddenly decided to quit her job.

After his wife died, he started going off the deep end.

I understand that you're angry, but there's no reason to go off the deep end.

deepness noun [noncount]

2 deep /dip/ adverb

deeper; deepest

deeper; deepest

Britannica Dictionary definition of DEEP

The ship now lies deep below/beneath the water's surface.

Our feet sank deeper into the mud.

The treasure was buried deep within the ground.

Their secret offices were located deep underground.

Her angry words hurt/cut him deep. [=deeply]

He stared deep into her eyes.

The detective dug deeper into the murder case.

I stood three feet deep in the water.

They parked the cars three deep [=three cars in a row], and our car was stuck in the middle.

We walked knee-deep in the snow. [=we walked in snow that was deep enough to reach our knees]

He stepped ankle-deep into a puddle of mud.

sports

If you breathe deep, you take a large amount of air into your lungs.

deep down (inside)

If you feel or believe something deep down or deep down inside, you feel or believe it completely even if you do not say it or show it to other people.

He knew deep down inside that she was right.

I believed deep down that we were going to win.

Deep down, I think we all felt the same way.

He might look like a mean old man, but deep down inside he is a very kind person.

in (too) deep informal

run deep

3 deep /dip/ noun

Britannica Dictionary definition of DEEP

the deep

the briny deep

creatures of the deep

the deeps literary + formal

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Deep Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary

You probably dont think about your breath that often. Its always there, in the background, when you need it.

But paying more attention to how youre breathing canmakea big impact on your stress levels.

When youre stressed or anxious, your breathing tends to be irregular and shallow, saysKristoffer Rhoads, a clinical neuropsychologist who treats patients at theUW MedicineMemory & Brain Wellness Centerat Harborview Medical Center. Your chest cavity can only expand and contract so much, which makes it hard to get more air in.

Deep breathing (sometimes called diaphragmatic breathing) is a practice that enables more air to flow into your body and can help calm your nerves, reducing stress and anxiety. It can also help youimprove your attention spanandlower pain levels.

Ready to give it a try?

Your breath isnt just part ofyour bodys stress response, its key to it. In fact, you caninduce a state of anxiety or panicin someone just by having them take shallow, short breaths from their chest, Rhoads says.(Youve probably heard of this as hyperventilation.)

That means that purposeful deep breathing can physically calm your body down if youre feeling stressed or anxious.It can be helpful for dealing with day-to-day anxiety as well as more pervasive problems such asgeneralized anxiety disorder.

But why does deep breathing work? It has to do with how your nervous system functions.

Heres a quick and painless biology lesson: Your autonomic nervous system, which controls involuntary actions like heart rate and digestion, is split into two parts. One part, the sympathetic nervous system, controls your fight-or-flight response. The other part, the parasympathetic nervous system, controls your rest-and-relaxresponse.

While both parts of your nervous system arealways active, deep breathing can help quiet your sympathetic nervous system and therefore reduce feelings of stress or anxiety.

It is not possible to turn the sympatheticnervoussystem off completely, but I think of shifting ones breathing to a modulated, slow, relaxed pattern of not overly deep inhales and exhales as a way to turn the volume down on it, Rhoads explains.

Deep breathing instead involves taking slower, longer breaths from your stomach to counter the short, rapid breaths that you default to when stressed or anxious.

Rhoads likes to teach deep breathing by first having someone activate their sympathetic nervous system. You can do this by sitting comfortably, closing youreyesand imagining an extremely stressful situation. Notice how your body responds: Your chest might tighten, your breathing might growshallowerand your heart might beat faster.

Next, turn your attention to your breath. Focus on breathing from your stomach, pushing your stomach out each time you inhale. Take longer breaths, counting to at least three for each inhalation and exhalation. Keep doing this even though it may feel uncomfortable at first. After a while, you will start to notice your body feeling more relaxed.

Noticing the differences for yourself in how your body feels is more powerful than anyone describing it to you, Rhoads says.

Deep breathing may be simple, but it isnt necessarily easy. It can quiet your nervous system in a short amount of time, though it probably wont provide instant relief from all anxiety. The more you practice, the better youll get at it and the more youll be able to use it in times of stress to help calm yourself down.

Here are some ways to up your deep breathing game.

There aremany waysto breathe deeply, so play around to find one that feels natural to you.

Try breathing in for four counts, then out for six. Or try square breathing: in for four, hold for four, out for four, hold for four.

As long asyourestill keepingyour breathing slow and deep, theres no pattern thats better than the others.

Be kind to yourself as you practice deep breathing. Recognize that you might not notice results immediately, and thats OK.

Give yourself credit for trying, and keep practicing,even just for aminute or twoat a time, until you reach a point where you notice its starting to help you manage your stress.

Then keep at it. Deep breathing isnt like riding a bike; youmustdo it regularly for it to be helpful.

Being mindful can enhance your deep breathing practice.Mindfulnessis about recognizing your emotions and whats going on in your body without judging any of it as bad or good.

To be mindful during deep breathing, focus on your breath and let any thoughts fade away. Dont judge yourself for having them, but dont pursue them; try to let them go.

Notice if your body is tense or if your mind keeps trying to go back to a particular unpleasant topic, but dont get down on yourselfjust recognize whats going on as a way of gathering information about yourself and your stress response.

If trying to guide your own deep breathing isnt working well, try aphone appor website or audiobook that will guide you throughthe practice.

You might find it helpful to record yourself talking through a breathing exercise and then playing it back when you want to practice. Or, if you need peer support, ask a friend to join you or research local meditation groups.

Original post:

Deep Breathing Benefits and How-To | Right as Rain

Caffe is a deep learning framework made with expression, speed, and modularity in mind.It is developed by Berkeley AI Research (BAIR) and by community contributors.Yangqing Jia created the project during his PhD at UC Berkeley.Caffe is released under the BSD 2-Clause license.

Check out our web image classification demo!

Expressive architecture encourages application and innovation.Models and optimization are defined by configuration without hard-coding.Switch between CPU and GPU by setting a single flag to train on a GPU machine then deploy to commodity clusters or mobile devices.

Extensible code fosters active development.In Caffes first year, it has been forked by over 1,000 developers and had many significant changes contributed back.Thanks to these contributors the framework tracks the state-of-the-art in both code and models.

Speed makes Caffe perfect for research experiments and industry deployment.Caffe can process over 60M images per day with a single NVIDIA K40 GPU*.Thats 1 ms/image for inference and 4 ms/image for learning and more recent library versions and hardware are faster still.We believe that Caffe is among the fastest convnet implementations available.

Community: Caffe already powers academic research projects, startup prototypes, and even large-scale industrial applications in vision, speech, and multimedia.Join our community of brewers on the caffe-users group and Github.

Please cite Caffe in your publications if it helps your research:

If you do publish a paper where Caffe helped your research, we encourage you to cite the framework for tracking by Google Scholar.

Join the caffe-users group to ask questions and discuss methods and models. This is where we talk about usage, installation, and applications.

Framework development discussions and thorough bug reports are collected on Issues.

The BAIR Caffe developers would like to thank NVIDIA for GPU donation, A9 and Amazon Web Services for a research grant in support of Caffe development and reproducible research in deep learning, and BAIR PI Trevor Darrell for guidance.

The BAIR members who have contributed to Caffe are (alphabetical by first name):Carl Doersch, Eric Tzeng, Evan Shelhamer, Jeff Donahue, Jon Long, Philipp Krhenbhl, Ronghang Hu, Ross Girshick, Sergey Karayev, Sergio Guadarrama, Takuya Narihira, and Yangqing Jia.

The open-source community plays an important and growing role in Caffes development.Check out the Github project pulse for recent activity and the contributors for the full list.

We sincerely appreciate your interest and contributions!If youd like to contribute, please read the developing & contributing guide.

Yangqing would like to give a personal thanks to the NVIDIA Academic program for providing GPUs, Oriol Vinyals for discussions along the journey, and BAIR PI Trevor Darrell for advice.

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Caffe | Deep Learning Framework

How do you get to know someones true personality? It would seem weird to ask a relative stranger about their values and beliefs.

Luckily, the following questions are good conversation starters that reveal more than you might think. Read on to find some great deep questions to ask someone to get to know them better.

When thinking of deep questions to ask people to get a conversation started, it can be wise to pick ones that cant be answered with a yes or no. Those types of questions lead to stilted conversations and awkward pauses.

Instead, pick an interesting subject that will help the other person open up a bit about themselves and their views.

Asking the right questions can stimulate more meaningful and interesting conversations. They can lead to the discovery of common interests and mutual understanding.

It is as well to be cautious about how you ask someone questions. You dont want them to feel they are being grilled or that you are asking questions that are too revealing. Bear these points in mind and choose questions that gradually help you to get to know the other person.

The most important factor in getting to know someone is actually as much to do with how you listen than what questions you ask them. Give your attention fully to what they say so that you can respond appropriately and begin to develop a deeper bond.

Dont forget to share something about yourself too. If you force the other person into doing all the talking, they can begin to feel pressured. This can make them feel vulnerable and as if the relationship is one-sided. Sharing something personal, but not too personal, about yourself can help to build trust.

These questions are light-hearted and will not seem too weird to a potential new acquaintance. However, they can actually reveal a lot about what the other person enjoys, cares for and dreams of.

Once you know someone a bit better, you might like to ask some deeper questions. These questions reveal more about a persons background and fundamental beliefs and values as well as their accomplishments and what drives them in life.

The last questions are some of the deepest and should be saved for when you know someone reasonably well. Some of them ask the other person to reveal very personal details and become quite vulnerable.

So make sure they are comfortable with the questions and dont push too hard if they dont want to answer. If they seem uneasy, switch back to some more light-hearted questions for now.

These questions are all great conversation starters, but they often reveal more than you think about a persons values in life. They seem quite casual but can tell us a lot about another persons personality, desires and values.

Of course, you must consider the situation and the other persons reaction. Some people do not like to give away too much information about themselves too quickly.

Allow the person to feel comfortable in what they reveal about themselves and dial it back if you suspect they are uneasy.

At the end of the day, there is no point in rushing into a relationship with someone. Asking these questions can help you get started, but remember that the best friendships and relationships take time and commitment to develop.

Contributing writer at Learning Mind

Kirstie Pursey holds a diploma in creative writing from the Open University and works as a writer, blogger, and storyteller. She lives in London with her family of people, dogs, and cats. She is a lover of reading, writing, being in nature, fairy lights, candles, fireside, and afternoon tea.

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21 Deep Questions to Ask to Get to Know Someones ... - Learning Mind

Deep Mind has extended AlphaZero to mathematics to unlock new possibilities for research Algorithms.

AlphaTensor, builds upon AlphaZero, an agent that has shown superhuman performance on board games, like chess, Go and shogi, and this work shows the journey of AlphaZero from playing games to tackling unsolved mathematical problems for the first time.

The ancient Egyptians created an algorithm to multiply two numbers without requiring a multiplication table, and Greek mathematician Euclid described an algorithm to compute the greatest common divisor, which is still in use today.

During the Islamic Golden Age, Persian mathematician Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi designed new algorithms to solve linear and quadratic equations. In fact, al-Khwarizmis name, translated into Latin as Algoritmi, led to the term algorithm. But, despite the familiarity with algorithms today used throughout society from classroom algebra to cutting edge scientific research the process of discovering new algorithms is incredibly difficult, and an example of the amazing reasoning abilities of the human mind.

They published in Nature. AlphaTensor is the first artificial intelligence (AI) system for discovering novel, efficient, and provably correct algorithms for fundamental tasks such as matrix multiplication. This sheds light on a 50-year-old open question in mathematics about finding the fastest way to multiply two matrices.

Trained from scratch, AlphaTensor discovers matrix multiplication algorithms that are more efficient than existing human and computer-designed algorithms. Despite improving over known algorithms, they note that a limitation of AlphaTensor is the need to pre-define a set of potential factor entries F, which discretizes the search space but can possibly lead to missing out on efficient algorithms. An interesting direction for future research is to adapt AlphaTensor to search for F. One important strength of AlphaTensor is its flexibility to support complex stochastic and non-differentiable rewards (from the tensor rank to practical efficiency on specific hardware), in addition to finding algorithms for custom operations in a wide variety of spaces (such as finite fields). They believe this will spur applications of AlphaTensor towards designing algorithms that optimize metrics that we did not consider here, such as numerical stability or energy usage.

The discovery of matrix multiplication algorithms has far-reaching implications, as matrix multiplication sits at the core of many computational tasks, such as matrix inversion, computing the determinant and solving linear systems.

The process and progress of automating algorithmic discoveryFirst, they converted the problem of finding efficient algorithms for matrix multiplication into a single-player game. In this game, the board is a three-dimensional tensor (array of numbers), capturing how far from correct the current algorithm is. Through a set of allowed moves, corresponding to algorithm instructions, the player attempts to modify the tensor and zero out its entries. When the player manages to do so, this results in a provably correct matrix multiplication algorithm for any pair of matrices, and its efficiency is captured by the number of steps taken to zero out the tensor.

This game is incredibly challenging the number of possible algorithms to consider is much greater than the number of atoms in the universe, even for small cases of matrix multiplication. Compared to the game of Go, which remained a challenge for AI for decades, the number of possible moves at each step of their game is 30 orders of magnitude larger (above 10^33 for one of the settings they consider).

Essentially, to play this game well, one needs to identify the tiniest of needles in a gigantic haystack of possibilities. To tackle the challenges of this domain, which significantly departs from traditional games, we developed multiple crucial components including a novel neural network architecture that incorporates problem-specific inductive biases, a procedure to generate useful synthetic data, and a recipe to leverage symmetries of the problem.

They then trained an AlphaTensor agent using reinforcement learning to play the game, starting without any knowledge about existing matrix multiplication algorithms. Through learning, AlphaTensor gradually improves over time, re-discovering historical fast matrix multiplication algorithms such as Strassens, eventually surpassing the realm of human intuition and discovering algorithms faster than previously known.

Exploring the impact on future research and applicationsFrom a mathematical standpoint, their results can guide further research in complexity theory, which aims to determine the fastest algorithms for solving computational problems. By exploring the space of possible algorithms in a more effective way than previous approaches, AlphaTensor helps advance our understanding of the richness of matrix multiplication algorithms. Understanding this space may unlock new results for helping determine the asymptotic complexity of matrix multiplication, one of the most fundamental open problems in computer science.

Because matrix multiplication is a core component in many computational tasks, spanning computer graphics, digital communications, neural network training, and scientific computing, AlphaTensor-discovered algorithms could make computations in these fields significantly more efficient. AlphaTensors flexibility to consider any kind of objective could also spur new applications for designing algorithms that optimise metrics such as energy usage and numerical stability, helping prevent small rounding errors from snowballing as an algorithm works.

While they focused here on the particular problem of matrix multiplication, we hope that our paper will inspire others in using AI to guide algorithmic discovery for other fundamental computational tasks. Their research also shows that AlphaZero is a powerful algorithm that can be extended well beyond the domain of traditional games to help solve open problems in mathematics. Building upon our research, they hope to spur on a greater body of work applying AI to help society solve some of the most important challenges in mathematics and across the sciences.

Nature Discovering faster matrix multiplication algorithms with reinforcement learning

AbstractImproving the efficiency of algorithms for fundamental computations can have a widespread impact, as it can affect the overall speed of a large amount of computations. Matrix multiplication is one such primitive task, occurring in many systemsfrom neural networks to scientific computing routines. The automatic discovery of algorithms using machine learning offers the prospect of reaching beyond human intuition and outperforming the current best human-designed algorithms. However, automating the algorithm discovery procedure is intricate, as the space of possible algorithms is enormous. Here we report a deep reinforcement learning approach based on AlphaZero1for discovering efficient and provably correct algorithms for the multiplication of arbitrary matrices. Our agent, AlphaTensor, is trained to play a single-player game where the objective is finding tensor decompositions within a finite factor space. AlphaTensor discovered algorithms that outperform the state-of-the-art complexity for many matrix sizes. Particularly relevant is the case of 44 matrices in a finite field, where AlphaTensors algorithm improves on Strassens two-level algorithm for the first time, to our knowledge, since its discovery 50 years ago2. We further showcase the flexibility of AlphaTensor through different use-cases: algorithms with state-of-the-art complexity for structured matrix multiplication and improved practical efficiency by optimizing matrix multiplication for runtime on specific hardware. Our results highlight AlphaTensors ability to accelerate the process of algorithmic discovery on a range of problems, and to optimize for different criteria.

Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.

Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.

A frequent speaker at corporations, he has been a TEDx speaker, a Singularity University speaker and guest at numerous interviews for radio and podcasts. He is open to public speaking and advising engagements.

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Deep Mind AlphaTensor Will Discover New Algorithms

For many of us, relaxation means zoning out in front of the TV at the end of a stressful day. But this does little to reduce the damaging effects of stress. To effectively combat stress, we need to activate the bodys natural relaxation response. The Relaxation Response was discovered and coined by AIS Founding Trustee and Fellow,Dr. Herbert Benson . The relaxation response is a physical state of deep rest that changes the physical and emotional responses to stress (e.g., decreases in heart rate, blood pressure, rate of breathing, and muscle tension).

When eliciting the relaxation response:

Your metabolism decreases

Your heart beats slower and your muscles relax

Your breathing becomes slower

Your blood pressure decreases

Your levels of nitric oxide are increased

At AIS we are often asked, What is the best way to relive my stress and relax? Our typical answer includes an explanation that just as the definition of stress is different for everyone, so are the best stress reduction techniques. However, there is one Super Stress Buster that evokes the relaxation response that we widely recommend as useful for everyone- even kids. Can you guess what it is? BREATHING! That is right, simply breathing. It is free and can be practiced anywhere- I bet you are even breathing right now! The key, of course, is focused breathing.

The relaxation response is not lying on the couch or sleeping but a mentally active process that leaves the body relaxed, calm, and focused.

Abdominal breathing for 20 to 30 minutes each day will reduce anxiety and reduce stress. Deep breathing increases the supply of oxygen to your brain and stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system, which promotes a state of calmness. Breathing techniques help you feel connected to your bodyit brings your awareness away from the worries in your head and quiets your mind.

AIS endorses several breathing techniques and even a few tools that can be useful for progression in mastering your breathing, reconnecting your body and mind and stopping the stress response.

1. Quieting Response utilizes visualization and deep breathing (a powerful combination) to stop an acute stress response in its tracks. The entire exercise only takes 6 seconds! First smile inwardly with your eyes and mouth and release the tension in your shoulders. This is a powerful muscle release in the places where most people hold their muscles tense. Then imagine holes in the soles of your feet. As you take a deep breath in, visualize hot air flowing through these holes moving slowly up your legs, through your abdomen and filling your lungs. Relax your muscles sequentially as the hot air moves through them up your body. When you exhale reverse the visualization so you see hot air coming out the same holes in your feet. Repeat throughout the day whenever you need to feel calm and relaxed.

2. Sudarshan Kriya or SKY incorporates specific natural rhythms of the breath which harmonize the body, mind and emotions. This unique breathing technique eliminates stress, fatigue and negative emotions such as anger, frustration and depression, leaving you calm yet energized, focused yet relaxed. There are a series of exercises that you can practice to find relief. To read more about SKY visit one of our new AIS Certified organizations: The Art of Living at http://www.artofliving.org. We will soon post several Art of Living breath courses in our Learning Center.

3. This one is for kidsTeddy Bear Breathing Lie on your back, place one hand on your chest and place your favorite teddy bear on your belly button. Close your eyes and relax your whole body. Breath in slowly through your nose. Your teddy bear should slowly rise, but your chest should not. When you have taken a full deep breath, hold it, count to three then slowly breathe out. Repeat a few times, until your feel relaxed.

1. Stress Eraser-The StressEraser is an award-winning portable biofeedback device that helps you learn to activate your bodys natural relaxation response in minutes without the use of medication. Read More

2. EmWave-The emWave 2 and the emWave Desktop is a scientifically validated heart-rate monitoring system that facilitates learning techniques to create an optimal state in which the heart, mind and emotions are operating in-sync and balanced. Read More

Learning the basics of these breathing techniques isnt difficult, but it does take practice. AIS stress experts recommend setting aside at least 10 to 20 minutes a day for your relaxation practice. If that sounds like a daunting commitment, remember that many of these techniques can be incorporated into your existing daily schedulepracticed at your desk over lunch or on the bus during your morning commute.

If possible, schedule a set time to practice each day. Set aside one or two periods each day. You may find that its easier to stick with your practice if you do it first thing in the morning, before other tasks and responsibilities get in the way.

Practice relaxation techniques while youre doing other things. Meditate while commuting to work on a bus or train, or waiting for a dentist appointment. Try deep breathing while youre doing housework or mowing the lawn. Mindfulness walking can be done while exercising your dog, walking to your car, or climbing the stairs at work instead of using the elevator. Once youve learned techniques such as tai chi or yoga, you can practice them in your office or in the park at lunchtime.

If you exercise, improve the relaxation benefits by adopting mindfulness. Instead of zoning out or staring at a TV as you exercise, try focusing your attention on your body. If youre resistance training, for example, focus on coordinating your breathing with your movements and pay attention to how your body feels as you raise and lower the weights.

Avoid practicing when youre sleepy. These techniques can relax you so much that they can make you very sleepy, especially if its close to bedtime. You will get the most benefit if you practice when youre fully awake and alert. Do not practice after eating a heavy meal or while using drugs, tobacco, or alcohol. Absolutely do not practice any relaxation technique that might make you drowsy while driving.

Expect ups and downs. Dont be discouraged if you skip a few days or even a few weeks. It happens. Just get started again and slowly build up to your old momentum.

I want to hear from you. Do you use focused breathing to reduce stress? What works, what doesnt? Post a comment here or start a conversation in the AIS forum. To read more about these and other stress topics visit The American Institute of Stresss website: http://www.stress.org

Contributed by: Kellie Marksberry

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Take a Deep Breath - The American Institute of Stress

To sit in a car with Alex Fury during fashion week is to take a deep dive into a fashion obsessives mind.No sooner have the doors closed and the vehicle began to speed off to the next show on the schedule, AnOthers fashion features director and self-proclaimed fashion nerd is reeling off obscure reference points and influences from throughout fashion history and name-dropping specific looks from specific collections all while barely looking up from his phone.

Hes also a great person to live vicariously through, as he disappears off to meet fashion dealers, or for appointments in hidden-away vintage stores, before arriving back and detailing the fabulous old Lacroix, or Galliano, or Westwood pieces hes just managed to score for his growing archive.

Though Fury has mostly kept this archive, which now boasts over 3,000 pieces, under wraps, lending select pieces to exhibitions around the world, or otherwise to various magazines for editorial shoots, during this seasons Haute Couture shows in Paris, the writer and editor opened it up for a small exhibition.

Conceptualised in partnership with OG luxury resale destination Re:SEE, Fury pulled a selection of black and white pieces from the vaults namely a full-to-bursting room in his East London home, and a decidedly non-glam storage unit a few miles away to herald the launch of a new column dedicated to vintage fashion on the site.

Landing every month, Behind the Seams will revisit iconic collections, hone in on legendary garments, unpack historic fashion references popularised on the runways of today, and, more pragmatically, detail how to start your own archive, should you be into that sort of thing.

Its going to be very instinctive, explains Fury of the column. Id probably say its obsessive for other obsessives, talking about the passion for collecting and trying to open up the stories that I think inspired people like myself to start collecting. I think when you think about vintage you can look at it in so many different ways. There will be ones based on specific designers, ones on eras, and so on.

Given its debut coincided with the AW22 couture shows, unsurprisingly, the first edition discusses the excitement to be found in slipping into some of fashions most grandiose, exquisitely made garments.

When people ask me what would I save if the house was burning down, I always say its the black and white Galliano dress from AW95 [worn by Carla Bruni, of which only six were ever made] Alexander Fury

With Fury sticking to a theme of black and white for the launch exhibition (There was no deep and meaningful there, it just felt quite concise I could have just as easily done pink, or denim), a vintage Westwood bustle and corset from the designers AW95 collection stood alongside that SS97 Gucci thong, while a cocktail dress by criminally overlooked British designer Antony Price rubbed shoulders with a coat from Gaultiers controversial Chic Rabbis show of 1993.

But its John Galliano who features most heavily within the small edit, with a selection of looks spanning the course of the 90s, including Furys own holy fashion grail, on the line-up. When people ask me what would I save if the house was burning down, I always say its the black and white Galliano dress from AW95 [worn by Carla Bruni, of which only six were ever made], he says.

For me, it was the start of this journey into fashion as something magical and transformative and transporting, which is why I also love fashion and why I think fashions important and why so many kids fall in love with fashion. Its always my counterargument when people talk about fashion being elitist and for the chosen few. The images are available to everyone. They can make all kinds of little kids dream.

Read the first edition of Furys column here.

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Go inside the mind of one of fashions biggest galaxy brains - Dazed

'Black Bird'Few writers explore the criminal mind as well as Dennis Lehane, the chief force behind this gripping limited series. Taron Egerton ("Rocketman") stars as a convicted drug dealer whose early release depends on whether or not he can trick fellow prisoner ("Richard Jewell's" Paul Walter Hauser) into admitting he killed a number of teenage girls. The "Mystic River" novelist's knowledge of the justice system clearly comes in handy here, as does the top-notch cast, which includes Ray Liotta in one of his last screen roles. Debuts Friday, Apple TV Plus NEAL JUSTIN

'Bad Times at the El Royale'Chris Hemsworth is an odd movie star: huge in all of the many Marvel Cinematic Universe titles in which he appears (including the latest, reprising his title role in "Thor: Love and Thunder") but barely noticeable in everything else. His best work is in this twisty and entertaining Quentin Tarantino knockoff, which also features Dakota Johnson and Cynthia Erivo. Hemsworth plays a Charles Manson-ish thug who does a slinky dance to Deep Purple's "Hush." Disney PlusC.H.

'How to Build a Sex Room'Melanie Rose may look like an innocent grandma but she's got a few deviant ideas that would make most teenagers blush. This reality show follows the British interior decorator as she helps open-minded couples convert parts of their homes into pleasure zones tailor-made for kinky fun. Don't get too worked up. The process is so clinical that the series feels more like HGTV than Hustler magazine. Starts Friday, NetflixN.J.

'Conjuring Kesha'Discovery Plus' obsession with the supernatural continues, this time with the "TikTok" pop star as lead ghost hunter. In every episode, the singer teams up with celebrities like Betty Who as they explore haunted spaces, including the Tennessee penitentiary that used to house James Earl Ray. Kesha is clearly a true believer, but you have to wonder what she's doing as the show's host. She seems spooked by the sound of her own voice. Drops Friday, Discovery PlusN.J.

'The House'Stop-motion animation is a great format for paranoia. Even if you're not thinking about how a film is put together they shoot a frame, then move the figures a tiny amount, shoot another frame, repeat there's an awareness of the oddity of the process that's apt to make you wonder what's happening in between shots. What, in other words, is just outside the frame? All of that is skillfully exploited in this three-part psychological thriller in which three different sets of people (voiced by Helena Bonham Carter, among others) interact with a beautifully detailed haunted house. NetflixC.H.

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Crime drama 'Black Bird' takes deep dive into the mind of a murderer - Star Tribune

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Your memory is SUBSTANTIAL. Your sensitivity is MONUMENTAL. Your urge to nurture is DEEP. Your complexity is EPIC. Your feelings are BOTTOMLESS. Your imagination is PRODIGIOUS. Because of all these aptitudes and capacities, you are TOO MUCH for some people. Not everyone can handle your intricate and sometimes puzzling BEAUTY. But there are enough folks out there who do appreciate and thrive on your gifts. In the coming weeks and months, make it your quest to focus your urge to merge on them.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): I love these lines by Leo poet Conrad Aiken: "Remember (when time comes) how chaos died to shape the shining leaf." I hope this lyrical thought will help you understand the transformation you're going through. The time has come for some of your chaos to expireand in doing so, generate your personal equivalent of shining leaves. Can you imagine what the process would look and feel like? How might it unfold? Your homework is to ponder these wonders.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): A British woman named Andie Holman calls herself the Scar Queen. She says, "Tight scar tissue creates pain, impacts mobility, affects your posture, and usually looks bad." Her specialty is to diminish the limiting effects of scars, restoring flexibility and decreasing aches. Of course, she works with actual physical wounds, not the psychological kind. I wish I could refer you to healers who would help you with the latter, Virgo. Do you know any? If not, seek one out. The good news is that you now have more personal power than usual to recover from your old traumas and diminish your scars. I urge you to make such work a priority in the coming weeks.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Ancient Roman philosopher Seneca wrote, "Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity." But a Spanish proverb suggests a different element may be necessary: "Good luck comes by elbowing." (Elbowing refers to the gesture you use as you push your way through a crowd, nudging people away from the path you want to take.) A Danish proverb says that preparation and elbowing aren't enough: "Luck will carry someone across the brook if they are not too lazy to leap." Modern author Wendy Walker has the last word: "Fortune adores audacity." I hope I've inspired you to be alert to the possibility that extra luck is now available to you. And I hope I've convinced you to be audacious, energetic, well-prepared, and willing to engage in elbowing. Take maximum advantage of this opportunity.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Many Scorpios imagine sex to be a magnificent devotion, a quintessential mode of worship, an unparalleled celebration of sacred earthiness. I endorse and admire this perspective. If our culture had more of it, the art and entertainment industries would offer far less of the demeaning, superficial versions of sexuality that are so rampant. Here's another thing I love about Scorpios: So many of you grasp the value of sublimating lust into other fun and constructive accomplishments. You're skilled at channeling your high-powered libido into practical actions that may have no apparent erotic element. The coming weeks will be an excellent time for you to do a lot of that.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): A Sagittarius reader named Jenny-Sue asked, "What are actions I could take to make my life more magical?" I'm glad she asked. The coming weeks will be a favorable time to raise your delight and enchantment levels, to bask in the blessed glories of alluring mysteries and uncanny synchronicities. Here are a few tips: 1. Learn the moon's phases and keep track of them. 2. Acquire a new sacred treasure and keep it under your pillow or in your bed. 3. Before sleep, ask your deep mind to provide you with dreams that help generate creative answers to a specific question. 4. Go on walks at night or at dawn. 5. Compose a wild or funny prayer and shout it aloud it as you run through a field. 6. Sing a soulful song to yourself as you gaze into a mirror.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Being able to receive love doesn't come easy for some Capricorns. You may also not be adept at making yourself fully available for gifts and blessings. But you can learn these things. You can practice. With enough mindful attention, you might eventually become skilled at the art of getting a lot of what you need and knowing what to do with it. And I believe the coming weeks will be a marvelous time to increase your mastery.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): "If I don't practice one day, I know it; two days, the critics know it; three days, the public knows it." This quote is variously attributed to violinist Jascha Heifetz, trumpeter Louis Armstrong, and violinist Isaac Stern. It's a fundamental principle for everyone who wants to get skilled at any task, not just for musicians. To become a master of what you love to do, you must work on it with extreme regularity. This is always true, of course. But according to my astrological analysis, it will be even more intensely true and desirable for you during the coming months. Life is inviting you to raise your expertise to a higher level. I hope you'll respond!

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): In May 2021, Jessica and Ben Laws got married on their dairy farm. The ceremony unfolded smoothly, but an unforeseen event interrupted the reception party. A friend who had been monitoring their herd came to tell the happy couple that their pregnant cow had gone into labor and was experiencing difficulties. Jessica ran to the barn and plunged into active assistance, still clad in her lovely floor-length bridal gown and silver tiara. The dress got muddy and trashed, but the birth was successful. The new bride had no regrets. I propose making her your role model for now. Put practicality over idealism. Opt for raw and gritty necessities instead of neat formalities. Serve what's soulful, even if it's messy.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): With a fanciful flourish, Aries poet Seamus Heaney wrote, "I ate the day / Deliberately, that its tang / Might quicken me all into verb, pure verb." I'd love for you to be a pure verb for a while, Aries. Doing so would put you in robust rapport with astrological rhythms. As a pure verb, you'll never be static. Flowing and transformation will be your specialties. A steady stream of fresh inspiration and new meanings will come your way. You already have an abundance of raw potential for living like a verbmore than all the other signs of the zodiac. And in the coming weeks, your aptitude for that fluidic state will be even stronger than usual.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): According to Arthurian myth, the Holy Grail is a cup that confers magical powers. Among them are eternal youth, miraculous healing, the restoration of hope, the resurrection of the dead, and an unending supply of healthy and delicious food and drink. Did the Grail ever exist as a material object? Some believe so. After 34 years of research, historian David Adkins thinks he's close to finding it. He says it's buried beneath an old house in Burton-on-Trent, a town in central England. I propose we make this tantalizing prospect your metaphor of power during the coming weeks. Why? I suspect there's a chance you will discover a treasure or precious source of vitality. It may be partially hidden in plain sight or barely disguised in a mundane setting.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): I'm pleased to authorize you to be extra vast and extensive in the coming weeks. Like Gemini poet Walt Whitman, you should never apologize and always be proud of the fact that you contain multitudes. Your multivalent, wide-ranging outlook will be an asset, not a liability. We should all thank you for being a grand compendium of different selves. Your versatility and elasticity will enhance the well-being of all of us whose lives you touch. Homework: Ask a friend or loved one to tell you a good secret. Newsletter.FreeWillAstrology.com

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Horoscope Week of July 7, 2022 - The Source Weekly

The 150th Open. Its a span of time thats difficult to grasp. None of us has any experience of what life was like when Old Tom Morris was stuffing featheries in 1860. Although itd be fun to tell Old Tom what Branden Graces caddie made last week.

I recently traveled to St. Andrews ahead of this milestone Open. The trip marked 16 years since I lived there as a university student, a period when I went round the Old nearly 150 times between playing and caddying. The local caddiesall guys named Dave, Scot, Colin, Willie and Angus didnt have to pass the two-hour written exam on the history of the 112 bunkers to caddie like my American-self did, which was fair. You can imagine the initial disappointment golfers experienced after traveling to the mecca only to find the caddie with their bag on the first tee was Max from upstate New York.

This time I returned to St. Andrews with my wife, for whom I was a woeful tour guide. There are only three main streets in the city (a designation that has nothing to do with population but everything to do with having a cathedral), and I struggled to remember where all the important heretics were burned as well as some of my favorite haunts. The Castle Pub, Aikmans and The Vic Cafe are where I left them, but Ma Bells is now something called Champions Grill and PMs is no more. Where does one go for a late night haggis roll?

Before golf was even an idea there was a university here, founded in 1413, and you cant help but wonder what they were teaching before The Renaissance. We walked past a brand new university building that looked like itd been there forever, and got turned around by some construction scaffolding near my former dorm. Fresh masonry along cobblestone streets tricks the mind. A new stone or two here, a different paint job on a door there, and suddenly youre not sure where your best friends apartment was.

The golf was similar. Everybody knows The Old Course wasnt built by a man, but by many men, and yet mostly sheep, rabbits, rain and wind. Sort of how buildings in the The Auld Gray Toon look different depending on the relative humidity, the fescue and gorse that frames the blind tee shots on The Old is unchanging except for its daily appearance. According to superintendent Gordon McKie, just the ninth keeper of the green in a lineage that dates to Old Tom, the lack of trammeling footsteps early in the pandemic allowed rough to grow high in spots it hadnt in decades, which really affected my recollection of sight lines. Bashfully, I had to ask my caddie for help to avoid both Cheapes and Coffin Bunkers. I venture its more true of The Old than any course in the world: prolonged absence renews the mystery of its angles.

Ill spare you the shot-by-shot of playing the beginner-friendly Strathtyrum with my wifea course I never played once in my student days not because Im a snob, but because it wouldve meant walking past the first tees of The Old, The New and The Jubilee. To be in the Eden clubhouse looking out across the revamped practice facility, I realized how ludicrous it was for me to have thought I could be any sort of tour guide to anyone. Every nook of St. Andrews has a story and it would take a lifetime here to know them all.

Gary Player pointed out for us the dune in the West Sands where he slept on the eve of the 1955 Open to save money. If there were a world championship held tomorrow for 86-year-olds, Player would lap the field. The thing about life is that we all die, and Player is that rare individual who is motivated rather than limited by aging. Swinging faster at the end of his tether, as it were. Our dinner lasted until midnight and hardly anybody else got a word in. Not that we minded; The Black Knight has stories for days. My favorite involved impressing Ben Hogan so much that Hogan offered young Gary a sponsorship to play Hogan irons for $2,000 a year. It was a difficult decision, but Player had a new family to support and ultimately went with a now defunct equipment company that paid him $9,000. Hogan never spoke to him again.

Under the circumstances, it was not the wrong decision, though being deprived of the chance to know Hogan was clearly a regret.

When I ordered ice cream to follow my steak, of course I got a ribbing from Player, whose lectures on nutrition and fitness are a masterclass in gesticulation. One day I will go to your funeral, young man! In a poignant moment, Players animation subsided and he looked down gravely at the one small glass of Cabernet he allows himself, swirled it, and said: I do this because I love life and I have such gratitude for every minute. He has friends in the sciences who have reasons to believe the maximal life span of a human being could be 140 years.

These large ideas about time reverberated when I made my selections at breakfast the next morning, and there is no better breakfast in golf than the fourth floor of the Old Course Hotel. Forget the farm-raised eggs, bacon, sausage, potato scones, beans, toast, tomatoes, mushrooms and black puddingthe view of the Old Course backed by the North Sea is... sublime. As the morning sun coming through the giant windows alights the steam of your coffee, its puzzling why the golfers in the 2nd and 17th fairway below are bundled in woolies and mitts. It neednt be said that as a scholarship student once grateful for the food stipend I spent at Tesco, I never set foot in this five-star hotel. Its hallways are literally the length of a par 4 and you could spend a week studying the paintings. Fun fact: in addition to a number, almost all of the rooms are named for Open Champions.

The opposite and corresponding view from breakfast, of course, is the upstairs office of R&A Chief Executive Martin Slumbers in the Royal & Ancient clubhouse. With a grand window and balcony above the first tee, its astonishing he ever gets any work done. Wisely, hes positioned his desk so as to avoid direct eye contact with the glory. Instead, Slumbers has it rigged so a stray glance will find one of two portraits of Seve Ballesteros, who hugged the Claret Jug just outside this office in 1984. Slumbers eyes light up on the topic of sustainability. With a fully electric fleet of mowers, solar paneling and batteries to power all tournament infrastructure, not to mention the eradication of single-use plastics, the 150th Open is far from perfect, but will send a global message about how we might get to another 150 years.

Downstairs I enjoyed a gin and tonic with Iain Pattinson, who is the Chairman of the General Committee of the Royal & Ancient Club (founded in 1754) as well as the Chairman of the Board of the R&A Group of Companies (founded in 2004). The latter licenses the Claret Jug from the former, and when you hear Pattinson explain why you recognize his distinct voice as the golf rules commentator from BBC. For the longest time the golf club and its members ran The Open, Pattinson will tell you, and the first year they accepted any type of commercial sponsorship around the championship (dont call it a tournament...) was 1981, when Rolex supplied all the clocks and timekeeping. While the club was initially cagey about a sponsor doing anything that might reflect poorly on the event, Pattinson knows as well as anyone that the prestige and reach of The Open has grown considerably in the past four decades thanks to the sorts of things only funding can do. The Group of Companies is the now separate commercial arm that deals with governance, rules, and conducting 25 championships across the world, so that the regular membership can focus on what regular members do best: play golf, eat, drink, enjoy camaraderie. Pattinson is a central link between the two groups, though his term will be over this fall. As a symbol of the success of this first and lasting commercial partnership, Pattinson points out a black and gold clock that hangs high above an entrance in the Great Room. It was a gift from Rolex in 1985, and is pulsed from a satellite so that its time is never off by a second.

Whether youre watching the broadcast at home or there in person as one of the expected 290,000 record breaking fans, theres another Rolex clock to look out for: a brand new one on the side of the Rusacks Hotel. This is a clock where there wasnt one before, and you could hit it with a wild slice off the 18th tee. For the most iconic backdrop in golf, there hasnt been a more conspicuous change since a top floor was deftly added to the Hamilton Grand. Which was Hamilton Hall in my day. I attended the very last student party there in 2006, where the goal was to make the walls remember.

This is a monumental Open, no doubt. The weight of the 150th sits atop the threat of a new era in professional golf, which may prove to be a blip, or not. If bumbling around St. Andrews gave me any clarity, its that to be nostalgic, to wish for what once was, is a kind of pointless sickness. Time marches on. This game, and particularly this place, has a way of preserving and honoring what matters most.

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The Next 150 Years and Other Deep Thoughts Ahead of The Open - GolfDigest.com