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The first Todmorden Book Festival launches with unveiling of patron
Todmorden Book Festival: Rising poetry star Andrew McMillan has agreed to be its first patron
Published: 12:21 Wednesday 24 January 2018
Todmorden is to have its own book festival later this year - and one of the country's rising poetry stars has agreed to become patron of the new event.
Todmorden Book Festival will debut this autumn, running from November 16 to 24, bookended by two weekends.
Autumn date: Todmorden will host the nine-day festival
Organisers have begun planning the festival and exploring potential funding sources, are delighted poet and writer Andrew McMillan has agreed to become its first patron.
South Yorkshire-born, Manchester-based Andrew's debut collection "physical" was the first ever poetry collection to win The Guardian First Book Award and it went on to collect a host of leading prizes including the 2016 Somerset Maugham Award and Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year 2016, and was a was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation for Autumn 2015.
His second collection "playtime" will be published by Jonatyhan Cape this year.
Andrew said: "I'm delighted to be joining Todmorden Book Festival as patron; in this current time, there has never been a greater need for books and for the written word - to understand ourselves and those around us.
"A book festival that sits, as Todmorden does, on the borderlands between counties, between rural and urban, between the landscape and city, feels like a thrilling and vital thing."
Involving Team Tod, Todmorden Information Centre and Calderdale Libraries representatives, the organising committee also includes volunteers experienced in organising book festivals elsewhere in the country.
A festival spokesperson said: "Our aim is to inspire, challenge and entertain people through provision of a quality programme of events with new and established writers of fiction, non-fiction, poetry and storytellers."


Sharks have captured our imaginations for hundreds of years, stirring the fears and fascination of ocean goers and scientists alike.
If you've driven past Viera East lately, you may have noticed construction and a "Coming Soon" sign for Earth Fare—the newest grocery store to arrive in Viera this winter. The soon to open new Viera Earth Fare is located at 5410 Murrell Road in Viera.
Earth Fare, a specialty organic and natural grocery store and full-service supermarket, will open this winter on Viera Boulevard and Murrell Road in Viera. The 26,000 square-foot store will be part of the Viera East Village Shopping Center, currently being redeveloped by The Benchmark Group.


There is nothing like a coast redwood. Sequoia sempervirens is the planet's tallest tree, soaring to heights of more than 320 feet into the sky. They have trunks of more than 27 feet wide and can live for over 2,000 years. Some of the arboreal gentle giants living today were alive during the time of the Roman Empire.
Before the mid-19th century, coast redwoods spread throughout a range of some 2 million acres along the California coast, starting at Big Sur and stretching all the way into southern Oregon. People had been peacefully co-existing with the forests forever. But with the gold rush came the logging; today only 5 percent of the original old-growth coast redwood forest remains along a 450-mile strip of coast. And as the planet warms up, the specific conditions required by the redwoods change; their future doesn't look so great. Animals can migrate north to escape the south's warming temperatures and consequential habitat change; trees, not so much.
But with David Milarch on the case, maybe they can.
In 1991, Milarch, an arborist from Michigan, literally died from renal failure, before being revived and springing back to life. There's nothing like a near-death experience to inspire a new course in life, as was the case with Milarch. His new quest? To harvest the genetics of the coast redwoods and give them an assist in migration.
"I feel tremendous sorrow that 95 percent of them were killed and we didn't even know what they do to anchor our ability as human beings to live on this planet," says Milarch. "We killed them. That's the bad news. It's my job when I walk through there [the forest] to yell out to those trees, to hold those trees, and say I'm here to do everything in my power on Earth to bring all the human beings and all the help that I can to put this back. To put back every single tree that was cut down and killed. And I'm going to do it."
To learn more about Milarch and the work he is doing, watch this wonderful short film. It might make you wonder if one can become an angel from a near-death experience alone.
For more on the project and how to help, visit Archangel Ancient Tree Archive.


Www.digitalplayspace.com - Other Words For Outer Space. Scrapbooking is quickly becoming an extremely popular career choice for those considering combining their love for art by using their love for computing. With movies like Monsters Inc. and Cars holding the attention of children and adults alike, it's no surprise that animation technicians are becoming popular after. This can be relevant to Other Words For Outer Space.
3D Cartoon animation has arrive up as among probably the most endorsed systems in the present personal computer age. That is a type of graphic imaging that has taken more than second or scale design puppets likewise as drawings which ended up usually often called stop motion animation. In excess of the several years, there has been an ever expanding demand for cartoon films in addition as the use of 3D cartoon animation in the media for endorsement of brand name names that has initiated much better plus much more innovative imaging software's in the market.
If you were to inquire lots of people what their beloved productions have been without a doubt just about every would have their very own specific lists. You should be amazed at the amount of animated types that will be incorporated. So if who ever explained that cartoons are for children? They're something which touches the hearts from the younger and outdated for possibly gender.
Associated to Other Words For Outer Space, A cartoon is defined like an visual shift in a scene with respect to time. The visual change in the spectacle isn't only associated with the shift in the career of the object, but additionally using its own shape, color, transparency, texture and structure. An important thing about cartoon is that it usually signifies the hand drawn or drawn sequence of images, which contrasts into the pictures where performers performances with real-world scenes are recorded.
This post talks concerning the distinction of cartoon and anime, plus the definition of every in several types. Anime, generally from Japan, demonstrates by itself for being a whole lot further and very well thought-out in plot and character growth than all those of cartoons.


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Your Mindful Compass
How Understanding Your Family System Can Change Your Life
Introduction to Andrea Schara and the Mindful Compass web site
History of the Mindful Compass Concept
a. Vision: Defining a Self and Sustaining Goals
b. Resistance: Preparing for Change
c. Connecting: The Influence of the Relationship Systems
d. Separating: The Emotional Field or the Lovelock
e. Aloneness: Trying Not to Convince Others
f. Reality: Trial and Error Learning
g. Mindfulness: Self in the Relationship Patterns
My Book- Your Mindful Compass For more information click over to https://www.observingsystems.net
The Mindful Compass In French
Questions for Leaders
Awareness of Social Systems
Harvesting Leadership Wisdom
Evolutionary Forces, Parenting and Social Pressures
Leading through the Relationship Jungle
The Organizational Compass: Principles, Cooperation and Openess, Paradoxes and Polorization, Cost of Seeing Problems
The Family Influence on Ten Leaders from the U. S.
Interviews: J. Walsh, G. Resnick, A House
Interviews: The Powells, L. Lee, G. McDonald
Interviews: R. Duffy, B.DiFlorio, S. Waite
Questions for Leaders Being Interviewed
Interviews with Leaders from Mexico
Family Emotional Process and the Big Picture
About Bowen Theory
#1 Differentiation of Self Scale
#2 Triangles
#3 Nuclear Family Emotional System
#4 Family Projection Process
#5 Emotional Cutoff
#6 Multigenerational Family System
#7 Sibling Position
#8 Societal Emotional Process
#9 Supernatural Phenomena
August 29, 2012 August 29, 2012 ideastoaction
What Does it Take to be a Self in Any Social System
Murray Bowen Photo by Andrea Maloney Schara 1979
What Does it Take to be a Self in any Social System?
Just as no one ant can build an ant colony, no one person can create for him or herself all that is needed for survival. We are dependent on the work of others for our food, water, clothes, education and protection, among other things. By cooperating we benefit. Therefore the pressure to fit in and cooperate is enormous and can intrude on our equally deep urges to become our unique selves.
Murray Bowen, in collecting the facts of family functioning, observed how this tension between the two forces, to be for self (individuality) and to be for others (togetherness), resulted in what he called one's level of differentiation of self. Evolutionary theory and Bowen theory both consider how these two forces have formed the bedrock for life itself.
The emotional system consists of instincts. It is an automatic guidance system. Many of its ancient mechanisms no longer function as well in the modern world. The tigers in the social jungle have been replaced by traffic jams.
Without a Mindful Compass, individuals find it difficult to cooperate, instead responding automatically to the reactive emotional system's dictates. These basic urges of the individual emotional system can be observed just like we observe the movements of the planets. The greatest challenge for any observer is to get outside the system in order to see it. Instead of planets, we see our parents and siblings pressuring us to conform or reacting to our commitment to our own forward progress. Of course it is hard to be neutral about our mothers and others. And without neutrality it is hard to be an observer.
Understanding the two forces, togetherness and individuality, may help explain some of our sensitivities, our prejudices and even what seems to be the capricious or nasty side of human nature.
In order to see how relationship systems impact the individuals in them, Bowen described the patterns of the tugs, pushes and pulls (or the sensitivity and reactivity) within relationship systems, leading to some able to develop more independence than others. In 1967 he published his description of his own efforts to redirect the anxiety in his family and to step outside the system itself. This effort required him to be less reactive to others and more aware of the tendency of relationships to form in predictable coalitions.
Bowen observed how the family unit determines the actions of individuals. He saw that when people did not behave as they should, social pressure was put on them to act the way that was expected or even needed by the group (family). Since we are often not aware of the nature of the system's influences (togetherness) on us, we take things personally and are reactive.
Bowen understood the primitive nature of the emotional system and by preparing himself to deal with the family force field he was better able to stand aside from the pushes and pulls of the system. He called this ability to respond to the social system in a more thoughtful way, differentiation of self.
The ability to be relatively free from the "commands" of the emotional system arise naturally in us and also require a disciplined effort by us to understand both emotional process and our own early family experiences.
Bowen postulated that a relationship system operates with the emotional processes found in all social species. Therefore he assumed, and gathered evidence to show, that natural selection operates on both the individuals and the social groups to which they belong. Under social pressure individual organisms react by: 1) distance – emotional cut off, 2) conflict – posturing or aggressive fighting, 3) triangles – passing on the problems by involving others, 4) reciprocal relationships and forming hierarchies – giving up self to others, 5) differentiation of self – redirecting the flow of anxiety through the social group through the more mature functioning of one individual.
Below Bowen explains the primal nature of and the challenge we face in our ordinary efforts to fit in with the group and at the same time, to be more of our unique selves.
The emotional system operates with predictable, knowable stimuli that govern the instinctual life behavior in all forms of life. The more a life is governed by the emotional system the more it follows the course of all instinctual behavior, in spite of intellectualization to the contrary. A well-differentiated person is one whose intellect can function separately from the emotional system. P 363
A more differentiated person can participate freely in the emotional sphere without fear of becoming too fused with others. P 364
It is the pseudo self that is involved in fusion and the many ways of giving, receiving, lending, borrowing trading and exchange of self… The borrowing and trading of selves can end up with one employee one down, while the other gains self… The exchanges can be brief – for instance criticism that makes one feel bad for a couple of days or it can be a long term process in which a spouse becomes so de-selfed, he or she is no longer able to make decisions and collapses in selfless dysfunction, psychosis or chronic physical illness. The process of people losing and gaining self in an emotional network is so complex and the degree of shifts so great that it is impossible to estimate functional levels of differentiation except from following a life pattern over long periods. P366
Every emotional unit, whether it be the family or the total of society, exerts pressure on group members to conform to the ideals and principles of the group. P365
The overall goal is to help individual family members rise up out of the emotional togetherness that binds us all. The instinctual force towards differentiation is built into the organism, just as are the emotional forces that oppose it. The togetherness forces are so strong in maintaining the status quo that any small step towards differentiation is met with vigorous disapproval of the group. Without help, the differentiating one will fall back into the togetherness to get emotional harmony for the moment. P371
Family Therapy in Clinical Practice, Murray Bowen, MD
The Advantages to "Thinking Systems"
Many people with family or work problems continue to believe in the commonly accepted analysis, which has been part of medicine for decades: turn the problem over to professionals. The professionals will reassure us that indeed one person is serious troubled, symptomatic or to blame and should be diagnosed, medicated, helped or fired. Extruding troublesome individuals from organizations or medicating symptomatic family members are seen as the answers for most severe relationship issues in the workplace or in families.
Instead of focusing on a symptomatic individual, Bowen outlined a process to develop the capacity to neutrally observe and understand family, and by extension work and even larger social systems. (It is clear that it takes an intellectual and disciplined effort to be able to remain outside the commands of the emotional system although it is not clear whether this capacity lies in the intellect and/or emotional system.) This effort to stand outside the system, but stay connected to it, gives people a way to look more objectively or even neutrally at how anxiety is absorbed, often in one or a few individuals in the group. A broader view, where one is not participating in the families' ongoing conflicts can reduces the focus on "fixing" the symptomatic one.
Work and social groups, while often less intense than family groups, contain the same reactivity and relationship patterns as do families. The people Bowen coached could tell him how problems in one generation were transmitted to another and begin the process of being more objective. The more he learned from them the more they learned from him. This was his research design: to check the facts of each family's functioning against his theoretical concepts about relationship systems.
It was Dr. Bowen's powerful observational skills that allowed him to see similar patterns of behavior in all families, from those with schizophrenia to the neurotic. In developing the "differentiation of self scale", Bowen noted that for those individuals with the most severe symptoms, their intellectual and emotional centers were fused, making it more and more challenging to make logical or principle-based decisions. The more anxious people are, the more con-fusion they experience in relationship to others close to them. Those without the ability to know the difference between their thinking and their feelings are the ones who initially became symptomatic. However, as he noted people can also develop symptoms in an effort to pull up their functioning.
However once people see the system and the automatic pressure throughout the family, the cost of giving into this kind of social pressure is usually too high a price to pay. Being able to be more separate gives people a small glimpse being loose and free. They also see the people they care about being able to grow more independently once they refuse to take the emotional bait. Once someone experiences being more separate yet connected in a social system, they are hooked. Then it is hard to get people to stop the effort. Here is an emotional process that has been going on for generations and finally "you" get a view of actions that you can take to alter "the predictable " future for you and your near and dear. Your choice!
One of the hallmarks of Bowen theory is that if the differentiating person is less reactive, and in better contact with a broad variety of people, then fewer individuals will absorb anxiety "for the group". It may be that anxiety can also be absorbed in the effort to manage self, not just in symptoms. For example, if one is stressed he/she might collapse, go to bed, get mad at someone else, or get "reorganized". By "reorganizing", an individual can find a more mature way to deal with the increasing anxiety. This takes integrating their intellect and emotions.
One might take a really deep breath and then call up people in the family with whom he or she has had little contact. Of course you had been meaning to talk to your mother's sister but that would upset your mother and dealing with your mother and your aunt requires energy. How do you speak to your family members in a neutral way about this kind of "emotional programming"? If you can say things like, "Mom, I asked your sister what has led to so much distance in the family?" You're not taking sides with anyone. Your stance is simply to take an action to describe the emotional glue that holds families together.
Over time in coaching family members, Bowen saw that individuals could increase their emotional and cognitive functioning. While gathering information on their own family history, people began to tell more coherent stories about their life experiences. They became more aware, observant and less reactive towards spouses and other family members. Their efforts to understand self in their relationship system often increased the opportunity to form new relationships with extended family members. These individuals diagramed their family relationship system and could see how anxiety flowed and infected the whole group. Eventually these motivated individuals achieved a new level of functioning, and others in their families became less reactive and better defined. Individuals were able to interrupt the automatic clues pressuring them to react in the old ways and could then engage in new relationship patterns.
By studying families over many years, Bowen saw that a percentage of people do have the ability to see the family as a system and to do something about the part they play in maintaining the anxiety-driven status quo. Some individuals can describe beautifully the pull of the intense reactivity to others and are capable of almost immediately inhibiting their own reactive responses. Other take a long time to see that reactivity is an emotional yank from the system, which dumps them into con-fusion, and makes them more sensitive and vulnerable
It takes time to see how a system functions. During the early years of Bowen's work with families, he noted that only about 25% of psychiatric residents were willing to work on their extended family relationships. Getting to know people in one's extended three or four-generation family can seem like a waste of time or even nonsense to those in the middle of an intense marital crisis or in the intensity of an expansion of one's business.
Most people, in the face of rising external anxiety or intense opposition at work, will retreat, hoping to find comfort in their nuclear family. But this automatic reaction only increases the pressure on each family member to manage the increasing anxiety, with fewer and fewer places for the anxiety to go.
The overall goal for motivated individuals is to discipline self, and not react to ongoing issues by taking sides or being pulled into the togetherness. The effort requires focus on observing patterns, resisting the lure of status quo thinking and defining one's differences with others in as playful and loose (not uptight) way as possible. People in relationship with a good Bowen coach can slowly change their thinking from content thinking, ("It is his fault!") to seeing the anxiety and figuring out how to respond thoughtfully.
People have more of a choice about how to function once they know something about the system they are living in. A systems view avoids blame and an automatic focus on the "other" and gives people choices in the management of anxiety. Once one is able to think more objectively about the ongoing nature of the relationships system and one's part in it, new options appear. People can see some way to stay in an "I" position and allow others to have choices too. If the symptoms are intense and the anxiety is high it can take years for people to begin to get surer of being a more contained and separate self.
It is difficult to stay on this higher ground when it can be washed away during family storms. But if people have experience developing their emotional backbone and sticking to their self defined principles, they are more likely to avoid becoming caught up in the con-fusion with others. It is a relief to know there is a way to manage self rather than thrashing about in the confusion of blaming and focusing on others.
Increasing your knowledge of your relationship system by getting to know members of your extended family requires that you see the advantage of having more information about family emotional process and more opportunity to define and separate a self. Sometimes I coach people to get to know individuals in their extended family by using this analogy. Observe a tree with shallow or cut off roots. Such a tree is not able to withstand storms, while the ones with deep roots have greater strength and resiliency in the face of stormy problems.
Other Living System: What Can We Learn from Them?
As mentioned earlier, if there are general laws organizing emotional systems, we should see evidence for this in other forms of life. No one can be an expert in all the areas of the natural sciences, so with gratitude we turn to experts to learn more about how living things manage to live and work together.
Deborah Gordon, among others, has demonstrated that if you remove ants from one job like searching for food, the colony automatically compensates for this by decreasing the rate at which ants are assigned to the tasks of removing garbage or defending the nest. The functioning of one ant is communicated and impacts others but the individual ants need no "awareness" of this. The mechanisms for guiding the behaviors of ants in the colony are present and nothing has to be learned. Body scents and touching antennas are all the signals needed to provide functional role assignments.
Without much of a brain, ants know what the others in the colony are up to.[1] But of course ants cannot say to one another, "I am making this decision to alter my functioning based on the numbers needed for the various jobs." Neither we humans nor ants need much of a brain to pick up signals about the needs of the group or colony and what we need to do now.
Ants also build complex cities, go to war with other colonies, take slaves (which they care for rather than eat), and raise and keep other insects for food, just like humans raise cattle. They are the only other species besides humans that cultivate food. They may be the most well known for cooperating and team work resulting in each individual becoming part of an organism called an ant colony.[2]
Humans, like ants, don't act as one colony but are able to cooperate because they have an automatic sensing capability attuned to changes in the relationship system. Our highly emotional interactions are coded into memory, and perhaps like the ants we read and react to one another's functioning states in ways that are out of our awareness. We humans are more capable than ants of independent thinking and are aware of the cost of social control. Humans understand that the group does not always know the right way to go.
Sensitive and reactive individuals are more prone to respond to pressure from others by rebelling or adapting and conforming until the social pressure creates symptoms in vulnerable individuals. The most common family problem is parent's pressure on children to do well in school. The children rebel by staying out late, having parties and using drugs. Sometimes harder to see is a husband who comes home and "demands" that his wife listen to his problems and she begins to drink. In the best of times social pressure results in-group members "cooperating" well enough to enhance survival. The children do well in school and the wife actually helps the husband deal with his problems.
We can also see how the impulse to help others can happen on a societal level. When there is a tremendous crisis, as in the hurricane in Haiti or the nuclear plant meltdown in Japan, people do all kinds of amazing things for one another without question or the hope of being paid back for the effort. But as social pressures increase to solve impossible problems, the cost of "helping/cooperating" becomes higher then people can bear. They may seek distance, blame the government or become symptomatic themselves at which point the initial impulse to "cooperate" breaks down. The cost for some individuals becomes too great. Individuals who increase their awareness of the pushes and pulls of the relationship system have a better chance to define, in some reasoned way, the limits of what they can and cannot do. A deeply emotional impulse to help others often has no limits.
Ants, unlike humans, may not have the flexibility to turn down the urge to cooperate and go along with the group. But then ants and bees that form social colonies are not operating under the guidance of fear states generating cortisol because they have no adrenal glands. Instead ants and bees operate under a kind of democracy. "Bees operate with a quorum set high enough to guarantee that swarms make highly accurate decisions rather that just super speedy ones."[3] They wait for the crowd to decide which direction to go and that turns out to be the best strategy when organisms need to choose accurately not rapidly. Ants and bees have little reason to develop individuality beyond role specific functions. What is amazing is that these little organisms have the same basic genetic heritage, and yet so many physical and physiological differences emerge in the colony.
Up the Evolutionary Ladder to Awareness and Fear States
Humans are sensitized by states of fear that they are not aware of. They bump into one another and exchange information about the state of the social group. These encounters between individual humans can change their chemistry but not necessarily their awareness. People say, "My parents died when I way young but that did not bother me." Yet when you look at the brains of these people you find the "chemistry of depression".[4] The biochemical pathways tell us what the mind cannot. These people are unaware of the impact of the social group on them and cannot perceive the environment accurately. Drugs used to alter their brain chemistry, give these individuals a greater chance to integrate the reality of their situation and to promote a better adaptation to the changed environment. Depression is a symptom that can inform people that their view of reality is skewed. Drugs may alleviate some of the suffering but don't necessarily increase cognitive functioning or increase awareness.
Our automatic compass is built on automatic signaling processes enabling us to fit in with the social group. This can result in making decisions, like ants and bees, that spring from the importance of the group to decide where to build the hive and where to find food. Individual ants do not have to decide what to do. They are dependent on the group's perception of the environment. Even with our complex brain we are often unaware that stress can result in our being overly sensitive and dependent on social relationships. Perhaps we become more like ants under stress.
It is safe to say, however, that sometimes we all live in psychic darkness, with many emotional states unavailable to us for reflection or introspection. But that is not the end of the story. We know we can form hypotheses and look for facts to support our viewpoint. To check out our hypotheses, we can talk with others about our ideas. This is often part of a therapeutic experience: to talk about our ideas and to be challenged by a good coach to see things differently and call into question our most cherished beliefs.
The Brain Lights up The Relationship Pathways
For many years we had only clinical descriptions to explain how relationships influence people's functioning. But now we can see the impact of relationships reflected in brain chemistry. We can ask people to think about different scenarios, from winning at tennis or looking at a love object, to frightening scenes, while we examine their brain chemistry through machines like MRI's. This research verifies that different areas of the brain "light up" with different types of subjects. Investigators have even tried to understand the "chemistry" of love.
A handful of researchers, armed with MRIs, have begun to sift out the chemical mix that makes up love. "Until recently, we regarded love as supernatural," says Helen Fisher, a professor of anthropology at Rutgers who is one of the world's leading researchers on brain chemistry and sexual relationships and half of the team of scientists poking through my cranium. "We were willing to study the brain chemistry of fear and depression and anger but not love. I love thee with serotonin produced by my raphe Nuclei. I love thee with testosterone receptors deep in my hypothalamus. I love thee with dopamine that floods my primitive lizard brain.[5]
The brain is multilayered, evolutionarily designed and connects us with other mammalian and reptilian species. Because of the "design" of the brain, it is very difficult to become aware of deep emotional states in one's own brain or self. We have in common with reptiles, the most primitive instincts like mating, defense of territory and giving in to the dominant ones. These behaviors reside at the top of the spine and in the center of the brain. These areas lack the ability to be in direct communication with the more cognitive part of the brain. Instead the newer part of the brain, the neo cortex or "slower" part of the brain, has to inhibit the older faster parts of the brain (the limbic and reptilian complex) when necessary. The three parts of the brain reflecting our evolutionary heritage (reptile, mammalian and the cortex) are inter-connected but one is never sure which part is in charge of actions and reactions.
Take the fear response, for example. It can only be inhibited once it has begun and by then the chemical cascade has been released into the body. Fear in the reptilian complex does not say to the higher cognitive center, the neo cortex: "So do you think it is reasonable that I react to that stick?" Instead we do react and then the memory of all things pertaining to sticks kicks in. The limbic system contains the memory of the past and is able to remind us that usually sticks are inert and not dreaded snakes. It can take a long time for the different parts of the brain to send signals to inhibit the initial reactivity to the "stick/snake" and there are physiological consequences for the one who experiences the fear.
The basic biological values of all mammalian brains were built upon the same basic plan, laid out in consciousness-creating affective circuits that are concentrated in subcortial regions, far below the neocortical "thinking cap" that is so highly developed in humans.[7] Jaak Panksepp
Perhaps as neuroscience advances we will discover general laws regulating the primary emotional states of humans, mammals and reptiles. For example, we know that species are linked to others species because of the biochemistry and structure of our brains. This is the reason we can be relatively sure that if drugs work on mice they just might work on men. We also know that there are instinctual structures in very ancient parts of our brain. Their job is to provide us with some very old directions about the value of specific sets of behaviors like reproduction, defending territory, and the urge to be altruistic and to survival. As a complex evolutionary tool for living, our brain also has a cognitive capacity to interpret or explain the social world we inhabit.
We have been able to explore the biochemistry of both the "fear" and "care pathways in the brain. Since our brain chemistry is similar to that of mice and chickens researchers can experiment on these animals to show that the biochemistry of care, and feelings of safety, produce opiates in the brain.[8] The chemicals that can inhibit fear or promote caring are disrupted when people are fearful. Those with disrupted relationships early in life show markers of disturbance and over connection in the brain. When this happens we see humans with these kinds of markers have been repeating negative stories about their life experiences. These stories reinforce the over connected pathways in the brain.[9] These are the people who are vulnerable to drug use later in life. In various forms of cognitive therapy people are trying to correct the deficits from increasing stress, a loss of caring relationships, etc. by having healthier relationships and having better stores to tell.
Most mammals and invertebrates like ants have no need for a sophisticated apparatus like the human brain to become aware of how their actions impact others. They are simply influenced by the interactions and the needs of the colony and their body chemistry reflects the cumulative and current state of relationships in the colony.
Darwin's Life as an Example of the Force to be an Individual
Charles Darwin's life is a fantastic example of one individual who had to figure out his way around the togetherness forces in his family and society. Early on, Darwin had to triangle in his uncle to get his father's permission to take the voyage on the Beagle. [10] This is a good example of people naturally knowing about triangles and what it takes to become a more differentiated self. No one had written down the methods, but somehow Darwin knew and overcame the emotional forces to give up and go along with the group (his family to name just one).
Charles Darwin was concerned about how his theory, which he finally articulated in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species,would be received by his peers and his family, most especially his wife, Emma.[11] Darwin's wife was a particularly religious individual and he was concerned about taking a very public position that was different from his wife's cherished and deeply held beliefs. Hesitating for more than twenty years to publish his work, Darwin gradually formed a loose association of supporters who were crucial in enabling him to maintain himself despite the threat of disapproval from others. Darwin himself and his books continue to be controversial today.[12]
Not only was Darwin's life and example of an effort to differentiate a self and be less reactive to social control in his family and in society, his ideas about evolution enabled millions of people to understand that humans like other animals are forced to adapt or perish as their environment changes.
Darwin's Ideas and the Importance of Facts for Thinking Systems
Perhaps Darwin's most challenging idea was that given enough time, natural selection alone could produce the diversity of the world around us. The idea was heresy to some during Darwin's lifetime, who believed that God created nature and the world only 10,000 years ago.[13] This is an example of how scientific evidence is not very compelling when it challenges long held beliefs.
Darwin suggested that natural selection occurs through random mutations and the selection of what some referred to as the "fittest." He observed that differences in traits between animals living on different islands could enable some individuals to have a survival advantage over others. Herbert Spencer's phrase, " the survival of the fittest," described how well animals could contend with and adapt to changes in the local environment. Darwin noted that some differences (size of beak in a bird) greatly enhance survival, but some differences such as eye color do not add to the survival benefits of an animal.
Darwin was an amazingly accurate observer of the natural world. His curiosity and detailed accounting of what he saw led to the accumulation of incredible piles of evidence to support his thesis that traits that have enhanced survival in one era are selected for and maintained even in environments where they may no longer function as well. He coined the term natural selection to distinguish it from artificial selection. All his life Darwin was fascinated with plants and breeding animals that were artificially "selected" to produce desired and specific outcomes. But during his trip on the Beagle he saw that natural selection operated on the observable characteristics of an organism. Those animals or plants, which could sustain life, become more prevalent in the population.
Forty some years ago, Peter and Rosemary Grant returned to the very islands where Darwin studied the finches and began to research individual differences in survival among the finches. Unlike Darwin, the Grants were able to return every year for twenty years to follow these birds over twenty generations. They recognized individual birds and noted the impact of selection on the types of birds that survived. This allowed them to offer reasons about how the fittest were able to gain predominance. They proved that, at least for finches, natural selection happens quickly, and not necessarily as slowly as Darwin believed.
Selection follows alterations in the environment. In the case of the finches, the rainy season produced more birds with small beaks because the seeds were plentiful and easy to open. During dry spells, these small beaked birds diminished in number as the size of their beaks made it difficult to impossible to open the few remaining hard seeds. The difference between death and survival during the several years of drought was only one-half of a millimeter in the size of a finch's beak. The birds with larger, stronger beaks prospered because they could crack open the seeds and survive the harsh conditions.[14]
Since the publication of Darwin's Origin of Species, we have learned more about the ability of selection to act on the actual physical characteristics of a population as it adapts to changes in the environment. This may have implications for how selection may be at work today in humans.
Differentiation of Self: A (Selective) Advantage?
Who knows if a similar selection process may be operating on humans now? We are living in the midst of vast changes in the environment: growing population, diminishing and sometimes unreliable energy and food resources and global warming to name a few. And these changes may be creating selective pressure on humans. Perhaps those who are better able to adapt to the changes will be "selected" to survive.
Consider this: We know that under stress people tend to lose their ability to perceive the environment well, to cooperate with others and to adapt. Could it be then, that an ancient orienting response towards togetherness, to fit in or go along with the group, will dominate as humans face current and future challenges? Or will the balance tip in the other direction because it is more adaptive to be a more defined individual, capable of cooperating as appropriate, and not just unthinkingly react to the herd? Remember that herds of animals sometimes go off in the wrong direction and fall off cliffs. (Lemmings are famous for this and lack of food triggers this response.)
If better-defined people who cooperate "appropriately" are to be "selected" for, could the balance be altered in the general population between the forces for togetherness and for self? Though this is highly speculative, it is possible that just as a family crisis can produce a family leader, so too may societal challenges produce more differentiated and more mature leaders. Without this urge to be come more differentiated, humans may well fall back to making decisions in a more primitive togetherness orientation.
The Down Side of Togetherness
Obedience is as basic an element in the structure of social life
as one can point to. Some system of authority is a requirement of all communal living, and it is only the person dwelling in isolation, who is not forced to respond,
with defiance or submission, to the commands of others. For many people,
obedience is a deeply ingrained behavior tendency, indeed a potent impulse
overriding training in ethics, sympathy, and moral conduct.
Stanley Milgram
Stanley Milgram, a social scientist, conducted groundbreaking research showing how people's obedience to authority is automatic, even when it leads to the potential death of innocent people.[15] His goal was to study what conditions are necessary in a social group to lead to an event like the holocaust. How can good and normal people be so blind to the consequences of their behavior? His work doesn't reflect family systems theory but gives us factual evidence about the nature of the togetherness force among groups of unrelated humans. His research demonstrates that a majority of people will do harm to others based on a command from an authority figure even if that command goes against a value not to harm others. We are tremendously vulnerable to certain types of social pressure and the more we can know about this the better off we are.
How can we understand this kind of automatic behavior to go along with authority to the detriment of an individual or the social group as a whole? If behavior in social groups makes no adaptive sense on a "local" level, then we have to move to the larger evolutionary stage to see how selection itself may have led to our species' sensitivity to the togetherness forces in the group.
The "togetherness" force is a deep part of the life force, an instinct so deep in the brains of animals that no awareness is needed for the behaviors to manifest. Togetherness has advantages and disadvantages. A flock of birds or herd of elk may be able to avoid predators as they keep an eye on one another's location, while for a group of lemmings the togetherness force has deadly consequences.
For the human, the instinct to cooperate and the tendency to go along with coercive social pressure is also built on these same deep instincts about which we are totally unaware.
It is difficult for us to know how we are being socially controlled and influenced to be "in the service of others". It is difficult to know if we are doing or even thinking things about our own individual viewpoints or if our thinking is simply a reflection of our deep connection to instinctive programming as part of a group. It requires both an awareness of these instinctive forces and the ability to carefully consider one's reactions and beliefs in order to pull a real self out of the mire of the togetherness forces.
We also know that for both humans and other forms of life under stress, the natural urge to go along with the social group decreases the ability of individuals to accurately gauge the reality of the situation. Solomon Ashe, a social scientist, has run experiments that show that people will doubt their own perception of reality (a line on a piece of paper in one of his experiments) in order to fit in with the social group. Reality becomes a "social reality" under pressure.
Here is how Asch's test went: A student signs up for a psychology experiment, and others arrive whom he assumes are also students, but who in reality are actors. The actors' behavior has been carefully programmed. Two cards are placed in front of the subjects; the one on the left has one vertical line, while the one on the right has three lines of varying length.
The experimenter then asks each participant, one at a time, to choose which of the three lines on the right-hand card match the length of the line on the left-hand card. This process is repeated several times with different cards.[16]
On some occasions, the other "subjects" unanimously chose the wrong line. When this happened, it was clear to the real student that the others were wrong, even though they had all given the same answer. What would you do? Would you go along with the majority opinion, or would you stick to your guns and trust your own eyes?
To Asch's surprise, 37 of the 50 subjects went along with the majority at least once, and 14 of them did so on more than six of the 12 trials. When faced with a unanimous wrong answer by the other group members, the average subject conformed on four of the 12 trials.
Asch was disturbed by these results and said:
"Life in society requires consensus as an indispensable condition. But consensus, to be productive, requires that each individual contribute independently out of his experience and insight. When consensus comes under the dominance of conformity, the social process is polluted and the individual at the same time surrenders the powers on which his functioning as a feeling and thinking being depends. That we have found the tendency to conformity in our society so strong that reasonably intelligent and well-meaning young people are willing to call white black is a matter of concern. It raises questions about our ways of education and about the values that guide our conduct."[17]
Social pressure and a "togetherness" orientation to go along with the group is deeply instinctual and is incorporated into the psychological belief and value system of the human. Togetherness may usurp and hide under a pleasant sounding request like: "Can you please just cooperate with us?" We are urged to cooperate with others rather than to think carefully about how we can cooperate with others to manifest our individuality. There is no self in going along with others without our individual thought.
These more instinctive urges to go along with or to "cooperate" with others have been acquired over evolutionary time and spring from the more primitive parts of the non-verbal brain. Once verbalized, via our brain stem to our cortex, "cooperation" becomes a positive "value," forcing others to behave in the "right" way. The difference between one being mature enough to cooperate based on a principled position that values the action, is very different from being forced to cooperate by people using and/or giving into various mechanisms of social control.
There are many numerous beliefs that reflect our more primitive urges to be for others and to give up self or to be for self and to abandon or even harm others. When instincts are converted into values and beliefs we tend not to question them. Our beliefs reside in the emotional part of the brain, "far away" from the brain's cognitive center. Bowen believed that thinking (via our cortex or slower part of the brain) could gradually influence feelings but that this would be a slow process because of the way the brain is structured.
Trying to be logical with highly emotional subjects may only intensify emotions, like throwing dry leaves to throw on a forest fire. There is a distinct advantage for humans to become more aware of one another's different positions and at the same time, to take greater responsibility for self's decisions. The challenge is to "allow" others to be free to accept responsibility for their own actions and beliefs.
Bowen's Road Map
No one before Bowen described a road map allowing us to understand how to be a more separate and defined individual, and at the same time be able to be close to those who are different from us and even oppose our points of view.
Although the steps for defining a self have been mentioned earlier in this book, here they are again:
· Individuals state what they will or will not do.
· The others in the system object to the apparent change represented in the individual saying what he will or will not do and they begin to make demands that the individual change his or her stance. The demands may turn to threats that the differentiating one must change back "or else".
· The differentiating one does not react. He/she may interrupt, be silly, say nothing or keep in contact in a mild mannered way, while the system reorganizes.
The ability of one person to influence a system towards greater maturity by managing and focusing on self is powerful. But so too is the emotional fusion that binds people to one another (togetherness). When the balance between the two is off kilter we see this as an ineffective and often habitual way of binding anxiety. When the differentiating one takes a stand, usually the others cannot see the problem. They say, "Why would this person make such a stink about such a thing?" There is no pat on the back or love and approval (no "atta" boys or "atta" girls) for the person making the effort. The differentiating one has to endure loneliness. The hope is that eventually there will be greater awareness and more respect between people, although this is not guaranteed. Differentiation offers the potential for human growth that nothing else does. By publishing his observations of the family as a unit and his thinking as to how one person can be less reactive and more principle oriented, Bowen highlighted the understanding of this potential in the human.
Bowen did his research effort in his family during a time of relatively low anxiety. He found that often, unless the family crisis was big enough, few were willing to take on separating a self for the fun of it. The togetherness force is too strong. The differentiating one is perceived as cold or even heartless. Their response to cries for help from the group is with interruptive and challenging comments that confuse the group. But these kinds of challenges can, over time, result in more independent thought, less blame and often a more profound and mature way of acting in response to a crisis.
Managing Social Relationships is a Skill Based in Our Instinctive Nature
We have inherited the cognitive ability to become better observers of our interactions with others. We have the ability to question others' and our own functioning and to question the way we relate to others and how they relate to us. This ability to increase our awareness and self-control is part of our evolutionary heritage. It conveys specific advantages to the social groups whose members have this ability.[18] The increasing awareness and self-control of humans is the evolutionary advantage that allows social systems to reorganize and survive.
I believe that evolution itself has applied selective pressure to family groups to promote the ability of individuals to define a better way to be for self and for the group. Moreover, selective pressure then favors those groups with more independent but appropriately cooperative individuals, who are able to adapt to the reality of situations, not just to social pressures.
There are reasons that social pressure to conform to the group has persisted. One may be that energy is conserved by conforming to the past ways of functioning encoded in the "rules" of the social group. And this may be useful when there is little change in the environment. It takes energy to define a more separate self from the group and such efforts disturb the group and increase the cost to the group because each individual has to use energy to adapt to the changing individual. However, once the environment begins to undergo rapid changes, the group itself needs more individuals who are less sensitive to social pressure and more realistic about the environmental changes. Such people can, through their own non-anxious presence, enable others to be less reactive and more aware, both of which contribute to the survival of the group.
By increasing awareness through developing one's Mindful Compass, individuals are more capable of functioning effectively in relationships with others, even when they are under pressure. The conflict that occurs with the expression of differences in a healthy system allows for the opportunity to decrease sensitivity and emotional reactivity and increase individuals' capacity to manage increasing anxiety. As a result individuals learn to interrupt the status quo, often by simply describing the ongoing interactions and defining what they will or will not do. These individuals have capacity to wait, stand their ground without pressuring or impinging on others and allow time for others to think for themselves.
It takes courage and the development of an emotional backbone to define a self in the face of emotional pressure from the group. As long as more individuals are capable of learning, reflecting, reasoning and correcting errors, the family (and work) system as a whole will have a better chance to adapt to the demands of the environment, not the emotional demands for "comfort" that maintains the status quo.
The Redistribution of Anxiety
Organizing self to deal with increasing threats or anxiety has allowed groups, from bacteria to humans, to survive. Here are strategies that people have found useful in managing anxiety.
1. Observing how systems function and how one's family has functioned over generations.
2. Understanding the mechanisms for absorbing anxiety, which can take the sting out of, or depersonalize our feelings about the way people behave. Eventually one can be more neutral about how families survive through one or two family members absorbing more anxiety and having more symptoms than the other members of the family.
3. Developing the ability of one or two people in the family to be less reactive and more thoughtful to interrupt emotional contagions.
4. Defining one's self to the family around important events.
5. Using various methodologies to lower anxiety: neurofeedback, cardio exercise, meditation, etc.
If these efforts cannot be made, then the individual and the family will simply return to the automatic ways of managing anxiety: distance, conflict, physical or emotional problems, reciprocal relationships (the borrowing and lending of self between two) and projection of fear and anxiety onto others. How is it that families do not see problems coming? It may be the status quo is so seductive that change must wait until 1) a family crisis is large enough and/or 2) one person is willing to alter their part in the relationships system. It is difficult and confusing to figure out how much energy I devote for self and how much for others, and especially during times of crisis the instinctual urge for individual survival is to cooperate.
Summary: We have considered the general "laws" which impact the way that the forces of individuality and togetherness achieve a balance in emotional systems. During the development of various species, specific adaptive balances evolved between being for the social group and being for the individual.
The work of a few experts in the natural and social science fields shows how at one end of the spectrum, ants and bees have the ability to be for the colony in ways that are totally instinctual. Becoming one with the colonies has enabled these amazing creatures to adapt and spread over millions of years.
In contrast, social scientists such as Stanley Milgram and Solomon Ashe show us how problems occur when blind obedience leads humans to (sometimes tragic) errors in judgment. Some humans have the ability to separate from the togetherness in the social group and this capability over time, can impact the social group. The social group itself may need to become more oriented to developing independence in its members during times of rapid change. Individuals who become more aware of the past, and less reactive to others can be more responsible for self. I speculate that if differentiation does confer an adaptive response during times of great change, we should see more of this ability become manifest in social groups.
[1] Ant Encounters: Interaction Networks and Colony Behavior, by Deborah M. Gordon
[2] http://quotations.hubpages.com/hub/Intelligent_Ants
[3] Honeybee Democracy by Thomas D. Seeley, page 213
[4] The GABA neurotransmitter and its receptors are critical to how humans think and act, Dr. Levinson adds. "We apply so many conscious and unconscious perceptions and judgments to our actions at every second, without even realizing that we are doing so," she says. "GABA is part of the brain system that allows us to fine-tune our moods, thoughts, and actions with an incredible level of detail." http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100301102803.htm
[5] http://www.esquire.com/features/mri-of-love-0609
[6]http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.buffalostate.edu/orgs/bcp/brainbasics/brain3.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.buffalostate.edu/orgs/bcp/brainbasics/triune.html&h=318&w=510&sz=7&tbnid=kShYg6G0kd34wM:&tbnh=84&tbnw=134&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dtriune%2Bbrain%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=triune+brain&usg=__zPmU7i0uuxmP4UhFChYmBF4po0A=&docid=b_d892HEtInHTM&sa=X&ei=th81UIAvxu7SAaqmgcAD&ved=0CCsQ9QEwAQ&dur=2266
[7] The Archaeology of Mind: Neuroevolutionary Origins of Human Emotions (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology) by Jaak Panksepp and Lucy Biven (Sep 17, 2012) Page 1
[8] The Archaeology of Mind: Neuroevolutionary Origins of Human Emotions (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology) by Jaak Panksepp and Lucy Biven (Sep 17, 2012) pg 330
[9] Like an overwhelmed traffic cop, the depressed brain may transmit signals among regions in a dysfunctional way. Recent brain-imaging studies suggest that areas of the brain involved in mood, concentration and conscious thought are hyperconnected, which scientists believe could lead to the problems with focus, anxiety and memory frequently seen in depression. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-depression-connection
[10] Returning from their geological excursion together in North Wales (August 1831), he found a letter from Henslow urging him to apply for the position of naturalist on the "Beagle," about to start on a surveying expedition. His father at first disliked the idea, but his uncle, the second Josiah Wedgwood, pleaded with success, and Darwin started on the 27th of December 1831, the voyage lasting until the 2nd of October 1836.http://www.darwin-literature.com/l_biography.html
[11] Darwin: The Life of a Tormented Evolutionist by Adrian Desmond, James Moore
[12] From So Simple a Beginning: Darwin's Four Great Books (Voyage of the Beagle, The Origin of Species, The Descent of Man, The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals) by Charles Darwin and Edward O. Wilson (Nov 7, 2005)
[13] Four in 10 Americans, slightly fewer today than in years past, believe God created humans in their present form about 10,000 years ago. Thirty-eight percent believe God guided a process by which humans developed over millions of years from less advanced life forms, while 16%, up slightly from years past, believe humans developed over millions of years, without God's involvement. http://www.gallup.com/poll/145286/four-americans-believe-strict-creationism.aspx
[14] The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our Time by Jonathan Weiner (May 30, 1995)
[15] http://www.experiment-resources.com/stanley-milgram-experiment.html
[16] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asch_conformity_experiments
[17] http://www.panarchy.org/asch/social.pressure.1955.html –Scientific American, 193, 31-35.
[18] Others by Laurin Lassiter in Ghimeras and Consciousness: Evolution of the Sensory Self, Edited by Lynn Margulis, Celeste Asikainen, and Wolfgang E. Krumbein
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Raised in Virgina Beach I grew up with a love and respect for nature. My family life lead me to a deep interest in human behavior. Love to exchange ideas with my friends and colleagues. The complexity of families fascinates me. I have learned to enjoy solving problems and listening to people's stories. My passion is to make a difference in enabling people to understand systems thinking. My new book gives away most of the secrets. Find it on amazon... "Your Mindful Compass: Breakthrough Strategies For Navigating Life/Work Relationships In Any Social Jungle" '	View all posts by ideastoaction
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


I must apologise for not writing for over a month while I was back in the UK – it was a hectic time in England. I'm back in Perth, Australia and ready to write again!
In April I wrote about our water filter episode and how Mike's hand was having problems healing. He's been back in the UK for 3 months and his hand has not healed. I had thought the problem may have been the chlorine in the water in Perth, so once he was back in Yorkshire his hand should have healed. So what now?
There is another product that we all use which is considered to cause problems to people with sensitive skin – Sodium Lauryl Sulphate (SLS). It's found in most shampoo, soap, body wash, toothpaste, bubble bath – anything that needs to produce a lather! It's a cheap, effective foaming agent which when used in high concentrations is an extreme skin irritant, can produce eye problems and cause hair growth problems as it corrodes the hair follicles.
Sodium Lauryl Sulphate (SLS) is also a strong and harsh detergent used in industry as a degreaser. In the same way as it dissolves the grease on car engines, sodium lauryl sulfate also dissolves the oils on your skin, which can cause a drying effect. It is also well documented that it denatures skin proteins, which causes not only irritation, but also allows environmental contaminants easier access to the lower, sensitive layers of the skin.
Which leads me question the soaps that Mike is using in the UK. In Perth we had started to use SLS-free bath soap, hand soap and shampoo, but we did have high chlorine levels in the water. Now he's back in the UK and constantly having his hands in contact with SLS products. I read an article yesterday which mentioned that it can take 8 weeks for skin to return to normal after stopping SLS product usage.
As usual there are websites blasting SLS and its potentially terrible side effects (Natural Health Information Centre, Health Report) and websites saying its not bad at all (Queensland Health Department, Lush Cosmetics). What I'd like to know is why Lush make this comment on their website?


text:
Satish K. Agnihotri (born 1 July 1956) is the former Chief Justice of Sikkim High Court. Earlier he has served as a judge of the Madras High Court at Chennai, Tamil Nadu and previously as the judge of Chhattisgarh High Court at Bilaspur Chhattisgarh. He was sworn in by Acting Chief Justice R.K. Agarwal on 26 September 2013 as a judge of the Madras High Court. On 13 February 2014, he assumed the charge as the acting Chief Justice of the Madras High Court. On 22 September 2016, Agnihotri took charge as the Chief Justice of the Sikkim High Court after Justice Sunil Kumar Sinha.

References

1956 births
Living people
Chief Justices of the Madras High Court
20th-century Indian judges
Additional Solicitors General of India
Judges of the Chhattisgarh High Court
20th-century Indian lawyers
Chief Justices of the Sikkim High Court

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Sometimes you are just too sleepy to function. Like this cute little sleepy chihuahua! Show how you look most mornings in comparison to morning people and rock your sleepy swag with this cute and funny, not a morning person, chihuahua, meme, sleepy shirt!


" Gratis postcards are available at the front desk; they'll even stamp and mail them for you. Electrical adaptors, reading glasses, walking sticks, wheelchairs and shower chairs are also available for loan."
I made use of the postcards in Vietnam. They didn't even give me a hassle about sending individual postcards to my 2 great nephews (brothers).
I wouldn't count on there being enough adapters. I would bring my own anyway.
Great. But ... if you are staying in Germany pre cruise or Hungary post cruise, you would still need adaptors for your hotel room. If not, then you are all set. BTW - adapter sets are very inexpensive - you can purchase an international adapter kit that covers over 150 countries for under $10. The kits are very small and take up very little room in your suitcase.
I also take a portable high capacity charger for my iphone - this will charge my phone 3 times without the need to plug it into the wall/computer & is great if my battery gets low when I am out and about.
Has anyone ever been to the Széchenyi Thermal Bath while in Budapest ? It looks like a great way to spend a few hours .. but it also depends on how far it is from where we will be docked ..
Yes, we have been to both Szechenyi and Gellert. The buildings in which they are housed are gorgeous. If you have not already done so, you can check-out their websites online.
Ships usually dock between Chain Bridge (Szechenyi Lanchid) and Liberty Bridge (Szabadsag hid).
Szechenyi is Budapest's largest bath complex and is on the Pest side of the river in the city park.
Gellert is, IMHO, the more beautiful of the two bath complexes and is on the Buda side of the river. Both are easily reached by tram or metro. Google is your friend - bring up Google maps and check it out.
Budapest is very easy to navigate - there is practically nowhere in the city that you cannot easily reach via the excellent public transportation system.
Do a little research - if you don't, you may miss out on many of the stellar sites the cities have to offer in your ports of call. For example, Budapest's Parliament is amazing and tours must be booked in advance - you can book online (they sell out so make sure to book if you want to tour the inside).
The above are nowhere near a complete list of sights to see in this fascinating city.
The included excursions in each port of call provide a nice overview. There are additional tours that one can add (for a fee). In the major cities (i.e.,Vienna, Budapest) you will want to know how to maximize your free time.
Spending a few days post cruise in Budapest would be great - it is a fascinating city.
I would suggest getting a Rick Steve's guide book and read about each port you are going to. In some ports, you have time to do some things on your own.
Ama is very generous with the wine pours at dinner, but after dinner, the cost of drinks are extra. The cocktail hour drinks are included. If GF feels she would like one more glass of wine and you're on a tight budget you can always purchase a bottle of wine in port and bring it back to the ship to drink in the cabin.
AMA wine pourers are happy to top you up at the end of dinner and you should be able to take the glass with you to enjoy later in your cabin. Or, as noted above, you can bring wine onboard – no corkage fee to drink it at dinner or in your cabin.
Thank You for the quick response.. and since I don't drink I guess we can both take a glass with us to the room .. And its good to know about bringing a bottle back on the ship.. Do they have corkscrews available? or should we pack one ?
1 more thing please .. did you get your passports stamped on the ship in each country you visited ? It would be nice to get some stamps .. They don't do it in the Caribbean..
We are still waiting to hear back from AMA about our cruise .. and Cruise Critic has reached out to them today.. I wish we would hear , since we only have until the end of April to book our cruise, according to the prize letter ..
Bartenders will happily open the bottle and provide glasses.
Passports aren't stamped by officials within the Schengen zone, but I don't know if AMA has unofficial stamps. Or, since AMA provides free postcards and stamps, you can send yourself a postcard from each country to get a collection of postmarks.
No passport stamps after you have entered the Schengen zone - your ship does not stamp your passport.
Next question.. will we need to bring adapters for our phone chargers? or is there USA 110 outlets in the rooms ?
Most AMA ships have a USB port in the cabin for charging your phone/tablet/toothbrush.
We will be doing this particular cruise with AMA in two weeks for the second time [First time was the 'Wine' version' which misses Bratislava] suggest to book the Chef's Table as soon as you board for mid week, as you may like we did get the invitation to 'Captains Table' on the last night.


Mikita Badziakouski wins the Triton Super High Roller Main event for $5,255,456. After winning the Triton Main Event three months ago in Montenegro, Badziakouski returned to the Triton Super High Roller Series in Jeju, South Korea. He topped the 55-entry competition including Jason Koon, David Peters, Bryn Kenney, Sam Greenwood, Phil Ivey, and several other top poker players. This is Badsziakouski's biggest live tournament score. He breaks down the pivotal hand in the tournament that doubled him up and led him to this historic win!


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Q: How can I draw only certain values in iOS charts? I am using swift charts and want to know if it is possible to set which values are drawn on a line chart.
In my chart, I skip the first and last values because they will be cut off the screen. Is this possible?

A: You can try to use your own value formatter to hide some values of data entries.
E.g. define value formatter class:
class MyValueFormatter: IValueFormatter {
    var hiddenEntries: [ChartDataEntry?] = []

    func stringForValue(_ value: Double, entry: ChartDataEntry, dataSetIndex: Int, viewPortHandler: ViewPortHandler?) -> String {
        return hiddenEntries.contains(entry) ? "" : "\(value)"
    }
}

and then use this formatter in your code to hide first and last values:
let myValueFormatter = MyValueFormatter()
myValueFormatter.hiddenEntries = [dataSet.entryForIndex(0), dataSet.entryForIndex(dataSet.entryCount-1)]
dataSet.valueFormatter = myValueFormatter

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


If your application needs to be available 24-7 then you must design for high availability. Designing for high availability means that you understand how design choices can help you maximize application availability and how testing can validate that the application meets its high availability requirement.
All applications are typically available for usage at least some of the time, but Web-based or business-critical applications are expected to be available round-the-clock. In general, availability is not easy to implement and typically requires a more complex architectural infrastructure than the previous generation of client-server applications.
The application can fail with no consequence.
The application can tolerate unplanned downtime but may require varying recovery strategies.
The application must provide high availability using standby replication strategies to guarantee instant and transparent recovery with virtually no downtime.
Lack of qualify software engineering practices.
Interactions with external systems or applications.
Different operating conditions (usage level changes, peak overloads).
Unusual events (security failure, viruses).
In general, 80% of these failures are software-related, 10% are hardware-related, and the remaining 10% are due to environmental and other miscellaneous problems.
Mean Time Between Failure MTBF Hours / Failure Count Average length of time the application runs before failure.
Mean Time to Recover MTTR Repair Hours / Failure Count Average length of time needed to repair and restore service after a failure.
The sections that follow discuss designing, testing, and best practices for creating a highly-available distributed application.
Who are the customers and what are their expectations.
How much downtime is acceptable.
Do internal company processes depend on the service.
What is the schedule and the budge.
As a starting point, your non-commercial application fails 10 times each year, giving a total downtime of about 88 hours per year. This is a typical application. It runs most of the time, and when it fails, some skilled staff identify the problem, devise a fix, restore data and restart the application.
A new business strategy requires that the application be upgraded to commercial standards. The first step is to apply some architectural analysis and re-engineer some components to reduce the failure count by half to 5. For example, if some of these errors were due to poor error handling, you re-engineer the error handling process and even resolve a few recoverable error conditions. You also look at the supporting infrastructure used by your application. Even by reducing the failure count to 5, it still means that you have to resolve errors in under 9 hours. You decide to shorten the repair time by creating a trouble-shooting document and provide hands-on failure training.
Making the transition from commercial availability at 99.50% to business-critical availability at 99.90% is much more difficult. Assume that with intensive analysis and component re-engineering you are able to reduce the failure count to just 4 failures per year. But the down time must still be reduced from 44 hours to just 9 hours a year (equivalent to 80% reduction). This is where industrial-strength availability engineering becomes critical.
Use transactions to handle all critical application logic in order to avoid data corruption.
You make a complete security overview with an eye on protecting data and application.
Implement advanced server functionality to provide memory protection, file protection, network load balancing (NLB), component load balancing (CLB) and rich distributed component services.
Install shared RAID disks for data stores.
Start by using two clusters, each with multiple servers and each with configures as a failover cluster. This will require enhanced application code that will reconnect database connections and restart transactions.
Add retry on failure logic in the client code.
Provide a graceful degradation if certain resources and hence operations are not available rather than fail the application.
Ensure all servers are stateless.
Where reliability is concerned with the question "Does it work?", availability is concerned with the question "How long does it take to fix?" Designing for availability is about anticipating, detecting, and automatically resolving software/hardware failures before they result in service errors.
While availability engineering is about reducing unplanned downtime, reducing planned downtime is also important. Such planned downtime may include maintenance changes, OS upgrades, backups, or any other activity that temporarily disables the application.
Using multiple CPUs. This approach usually has problems because disk IO and memory speed generally constrain the server.
Cost of idle hardware with no improvement in performance.
Service transfer difficulty because the current job on the failed server is generally lost.
Doubled maintenance with occasional benefit.
Increased network traffic from data replication with occasional benefit.
While these traditional methods still have uses and may be quite effective in certain cases, there are newer approaches to availability that make use of reduced hardware costs and advances in distributed computing architecture.
Clustering is the premier technology for creating high-availability applications. What is clustering? Clustering is linking a group of independent systems so that they work together as a single system. Clustering is about linking many physical servers such that if one fails, the running application is swapped over to another server and continues running as if nothing has happened. Under Microsoft Windows, clustering is hardware independent and additional servers can be added to handle increases workload. A client interacts with a cluster as if the cluster is a single server even through in reality a cluster is a collection of independent servers.
A cluster consists of multiple servers that are physically networked together and logically connected using clustering software. The clustering software allows these independent servers to act as if there were a single server - in the event of failure (CPU, Disk IO, memory storage, network card, application component, etc), the workload is transparently moved to another server, current client processes are switched over, and the failed service restarted. This is done all automatically with no apparent downtime.
In general, cluster software can provide failover support for applications, file and print services, databases, and messaging systems.
Maintain configuration and state information on a shared disk-storage.
Application must be written to reinstate database connections and restart transactions.
Customer's experience will not be interrupted with unplanned server downtimes. Workload will be automatically distributed when one of the cluster servers fail.
Servers within the cluster can be individually taken off-line without affecting availability.
RAID stands for Redundant Array of Independent Disks. RAID is a way to use multiple hard disks so that data is stored in multiple places. The benefit of RAID is that any disk failure automatically transfers control to a mirrored or reconstructable data image while allowing the application to run uninterrupted. The failed disk(s) can then be replaced with no interruption to the application. RAID provides one of the cheapest methods for increasing data-access fault-tolerance.
One of the best ways to avoid planned downtime is to use rolling updates. For example, if you need to update a component on a cluster server, simply move the server's resource groups to another server, take the server offline for maintenance, perform the update, and then bring the server online. During the server's downtime, other cluster servers handle the workload and the application experiences no downtime.
A high-availability application should not be risked by other applications. For missions critical applications it is extremely important that dependencies on data and system components from other applications be eliminated by using entirely separate physical backbone for each mission critical application. 'Using entirely separate physical backbone' means for example, not sharing a database, not sharing the same network infrastructure, not sharing the same front-end or back-end servers, and so on.
There are also other physical isolation techniques ranging from application-centric thread isolation to built-in latency using queues to limit external system dependency.
With queuing, an application communicates with other applications by sending and receiving asynchronous messages. When compared to synchronous messaging, queuing offers a very useful strategy for guaranteed delivery - this is because it does not matter whether or not the necessary connectivity currently exists. Queuing is very is very useful during periods of large workloads, the could otherwise stress the system and possibly cause failures.
The immediate benefit is that queuing removes a point of failure from your application. Queuing therefore improves availability by increasing the number of routes available for successful message delivery.
A Distributed File System is a logical file structure applied to multiple server and file shares. DFS improves availability by being able to point to redundant file copies and hence increasing the likelihood of accessing a needed file - even if the primary datastore is down.
Testing for availability means running the application for a predefined period of time while collecting information about failures and time to repair them. This information is then used to calculate availability levels and compare them with the original or predicted availability levels.
As the Mean Time To Recover (MTTR) goes to zero, percentage availability goes to 100%. This is the essential idea of availability testing: reduce and eliminate downtime. Towards reducing and eliminating downtime, remember that a software defect found after deployment is generally costs ten time more to fix than if found before deployment.
A business- or mission-critical application should not go into production until you can repeatedly perform error-free change control.
Create outages of catastrophic nature and test the recover process. For example, you could unplug network equipment and note how the system responds. Catastrophic testing validates the correctness of the recovery procedures and provides confidence for the recover team.
Pick a piece of hardware, say a disk controller, and unplug it. Then observe how fast the support team is table to identify and replace the failed hardware. Or you could pull the plug on one of the front-end or back-end servers and observe the clustering failover technology as it restarts the failed application on another server. The application should not only stay online, but every user process should be completed correctly.
Analyze the Windows Management Instrumentation WMI data using the intended monitoring reports and ensure that you can plainly see all resource consumption data and especially all test outages.
The help-desk must be fully trained and ready to handle customer inquiries and failure scenarios.
Availability engineering requires an in-depth understanding of an application's interactions with other processes and systems. Therefore, you must try to evaluate all the ways in which some other application might interfere with the intended service. You must also test for conflicts, and possible consider other design alternatives.
Applications often run slowly because they compete for system resources such as CPU, disk IO and network bandwidth. A slow application is technically available but not many users would want to wait for it. It might have well failed.
Clustering is a key technology for high-availability applications because it provides instant failover services in the event of a failure.
NLB enhances availability by detecting service failures and re-routing all traffic away from failed servers to still-running servers.
Continuous monitoring of operational workload and failure data is essential to discovering trends and improving service. Typically, the most important data is provided by Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI).
The help desk should be responsible for gathering problem information, determine problem history, and start immediate problem resolution. The help disk should be centrally involved in every failure recovery scenario.
A well-documented recover plan is only paper until it has been proven under rigorous test conditions. The recovery plan should be tested several times - pull a power plug, disconnect a network cable and observe response using the recovery plan.
Standardized hardware is essential for achieving high-availability. This ensures that replacement parts are easily available, reduces inventory parts, reduces training requirements, etc.
Enhance memory error detection and correction using only Error Corrective Coding (ECC) memory.
Use at least two servers running within a cluster with a fiber channel connection to a shared RAID array. The RAID array maintains data availability during a failure while server failures are covered by the cluster service. NTFS file system should also be used because it provides data integrity and security.
It is recommended that replication services be used within multiple databases. Because the replication process can queue user changes, the application can run without failure even if one database goes down.
Every server should have two network interface cards (NIC) to provide isolated public and private connectivity. Only front-end server (i.e., application- or business-logic servers) should have public addresses. This prevents direct public access to back-end servers (i.e., database servers). You should also implement multiple network paths to business- and mission-critical servers.
Use clustering for front-end servers along with Network Load Balancing (NLB) to smooth the workload and automatically redistribute network traffic in the event of a server failure. All front-end servers should deliver the same services and share the workload. With clustering and NLB, additional servers can be added to handle increased workload with no downtime. Use dedicated network interface cards so that servers can send heartbeats (periodic signals) to other servers and monitoring tools to verify application's status.
Operating systems and applications running on different servers must be time-synchronized. Otherwise, process and file-creation time stamps can become out of synch possibly confusing some other manual/automatic process.
Anticipate the possibility of server data corruption of loss. Maintaining data integrity is very important. One strategy for maintaining data integrity is to create a full back of the primary database and then incrementally test the source server for data corruption. You could also combine the back with transaction logs so that you can use SQL Server's the Database Consistency Checker (DBCC) to detect and repair corruption.


Combine the beauty of classical music with the raw style of hip hop and you will just begin to scratch the surface of what is included in the massive 2GB Hip Hop Strings sample pack. This pack is packed full of pristine recordings of classical musicians playing emotional, moody, dark, and uplifting melodies and arpeggios. The string players are fans of hip hop and regularly record with hip hop producers and this translates into loops that are well thought out and will fit perfectly in this genre. Elements such as weeping violins, cello power chords, pizzicato plucks, and harmonized riffs can all be combined to construct your own loops and patterns, just drag and drop them into your DAW or MPC for easy chopping and slicing. Not only is this pack full of string recordings, there is a huge section dedicated to gritty & raw drums. The drums have an organic quality and will sit perfectly along with the strings in the mix. Build up your own beats from scratch using the included.one shots, or chop up and slice to loops to build your own variations. We have also included 3 full songs broken down into stems which work as starters for immediate remixing.


What do Cosmopolitan Magazine, IBM, AMD, Jackie Chan, Netgear, Newegg, Best Buy, Nvidia, ExtremeTech, Nintendo, and Microsoft all have in common?
Answer: They'll all be at DigitalLife.
DigitalLife is a trade show that's organized and managed by Ziff-Davis. But it's not your typical trade show. Many large shows like CES or E3 are aimed at people who are buyers of massive amounts of technology for retail or online outlets, such as Best Buy or Amazon.com. Other shows, like Game Developer's Conference, WinHEC, or Apple's WWDC are aimed at people who will be developing products. To steal a bit of ancient Apple marketing, DigitalLife is the show for "the rest of us." It's aimed at people who are trying to figure out how technology—consumer electronics, PCs, home networking, HDTV—will fit into their lives. If you're looking to make a buying decision on a particular class of products—"do I buy an HDTV this year, and if so, which one," then DigitalLife is the show for you.


Sadly, Sorrento tends to be the ugly step-sister of the Amalfi Coast. Not that Sorrento is ugly, just that it is often overshadowed by trendier cities along the coast — Positano and Ravello for example. I have always stayed in Sorrento because of its strategic location. From Sorrento you can easily get to Naples, Capri and all the little cute towns along the coast. Despite always staying in Sorrento, however, I rarely took the time to explore or appreciate the city. Fortunately, the past couple of summers I have had a bit more time in Sorrento and I've had the chance to really explore the city. While it will never top Positano or Capri in terms of charm and elegance, it is a delightful city with a lot more to offer than simply a strategic base.
If you are looking for somewhere super fancy in the center of town, then the Grand Hotel Excelsior Vittoria is for you. It is pretty much the nicest place in Sorrento. I have personally never splurged to stay there, but I do enjoy their champagne bar at sunset! For a more budget-friendly (but still very nice, vacation-worthy) option, I really like the Hotel Royal and the Grand Hotel Ambasciatori, (Allie and I stayed at the Ambasciatori this summer and loved it). If you book early, you can find pretty good deals for both on Booking.com.
Sorrento is very much a tourist town in the summer, which means restaurants can be hit or miss. But generally, you will eat well in Sorrento. The city specializes in southern Italian cuisine and is famous for its gnocchi alla Sorentina. Personally, I love eating outside along the water in the Marina Grand — Da Emilia and Porta Marina are my two favorites. More in the center of town I like the creative pizzas (especially the lemon pizza) at Acqu' e sale, the zucchini pasta at Ristorante La Lanterna, pretty much everything at Ristorante O' Murzill', and the seafood dishes at Fuoro. And remembe wherever you go, Sorrento is famous for lemons so try as many lemon dishes as possible!
Sorrento is a beach town, but it doesn't really have much of a beach in the traditional sense. In fact, the entire region is rocky, so you will find rock rather than sand beaches. Sorrento sits on a cliff and has problem-solved this by building large platforms to sunbathe and swim from. There are several public "beaches" and many of the nicer hotels have private "beaches." While the rocks are not comfy or convenient, they make for some super clear, stunningly blue waters to enjoy.
If beaching isn't your thing, you can stroll and shop your way the adorable town center, visit an eclectic museum housed in an 18th-century villa (Museo Correale di Terranova), hire a private boat for the day (or one to take you to Capri), take the public ferry to Amalfi, Positano, or Capri for the day, hop on the local train to get your history on in Pompeii, or taste lemon-everything at the Cataldo lemon garden. But my favorite activity in Sorrento (and also in Positano) — shopping for custom made sandals! My favorite store in Sorrento is Sandali Arte Artigiana Sorrento (on Via Torquato Tasso).


VIU's broad diversity makes it critical that our classrooms become not only inclusive, but proactively so. Having community is, for many students, the catalyst for academic engagement. But inclusive environments may not always be enough for academic success.
How do we leverage a positive social dynamic for deeper student learning?
Over the past two years, approximately 25 of our VIU colleagues have found an answer to this question through the use of a teaching and learning strategy called team-based learning.
Team-based learning, in this case, is not simply the use of groups or even permanent student teams. It's a comprehensive design strategy (developed by organizational psychologist Larry Michaelsen) for turning our classrooms into close-knit communities of highly motivated learners.
The team learning strategy is increasingly popular internationally, and has worked effectively in both large and small classes, both theoretical and applied courses, in science, math, philosophy, literature, history, health and nursing, business, technology and trades. It can be adapted to nearly any teaching situation. It is particularly effective in bringing energy to courses that are extremely heavy in dry content.
VIU's Team-Based Learning Institute will be facilitated by Bill Roberson, Tine Reimers, and UBC's Jim Sibley. The program takes you through the complete design process for transforming a course using the Michaelsen Team-Based Learning Model. This offering is primarily for faculty members who will implement a course beginning in January 2017 with intention of applying the team-based learning strategy. For a brief introduction to what this entails, please read this overview.
For more information on registration, please proceed to our Application-Registration page and provide us with a bit of information about your plans.