Editing…. ‘Where do these clowns spring from? Who throws them on the stage?’ (lyrics from L. Mahairitsas’ song The Bull)

Mirror neurons

Brief extract from Dr Dan Siegel’s book – Mindsight: the New Science of Personal Transformation (Bantam Books, 2010, page 223-224)

‘I awoke with the tune of one of my favourite songs; James Taylor’s ‘Carolina in My Mind’, playing in my head. It had acquired some new words:

In my mind I’m driven by mirror neurons. / Can’t you just see intention /  Can’t you just feel emotion / Ain’t it just like history to sneak up from behind / Cause I’m driven by mirror neurons in my mind / There’s a holy host of others gathered between us. / Maybe we’re on the dark side of the road / And it seems like it goes on and on forever. /You must forgive me / Cause in my mind I’m driven by mirror neurons……..

Mirror neurons are the antennae that pick up information about the intentions and feelings of others, and they create in us both emotional resonance and behavioural imitation. We engage in mirroring automatically and spontaneously without conscious effort or intention. In our mind the ‘host of others’ that put us ‘on the dark side of the road’ are the suboptimal influences of our early relationships that dim or distort the mirrors. Our mirror neuron system ‘learns’ by how it couples our own internal state with what we see in someone else’.

Brief talk on mirror neurons by Dan Siegel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tq1-ZxV9Dc4