The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being

by Daniel J. Siegel

Book Overview

From the author of the internationally-acclaimed best-selling text The Developing Mind, and esteemed leader and educator in the field of mental health, comes the first book ever to integrate neuroscience research with the ancient art of mindfulness. The result is a groundbreaking approach to not simply mental health, but life in general, which shows readers how personal awareness and attunement can actually stimulate emotional circuits in the brain, leading to a host of physiological benefits, including greater well-being, resilience, emotional balance, and improved cardiac and immune function. For clinicians and laypeople alike, Siegel's illuminating discussions of the power of the focused mind provide a wealth of ideas that can transform our lives and deepen our connections with others, and with ourselves.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 039370470X
• ISBN13: 9780393704709
• Release Date: April 2007
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Length: 416 Pages
• Weight: 1.87 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.1" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Compassion, Mirror Neurons, & Neuroplasticity - Excellent!

I think that this is most important book that Dr. Siegel has written. There are many comprehensive reviews here, so I want to limit this one to a few additional points. First, Siegel has integrated mirror neuron theory into his model, with great finesse. Mirror neurons hypothetically allow us to experience in our brain what other people are thinking and feeling in their brain. This neural "resonance" may be an essential key to understanding how empathy and compassion works, and meditation practices appear to strengthen those parts of the brain where mirror neurons reside. Siegel's model, as a prior reviewer pointed out, is hypothetical, but interestingly Andrew Newberg and I independently came to similar conclusions, based on our brain-scan research of a wide variety of contemplative meditation practices, which we report in our forthcoming book How God Changes Your Brain: Breakthrough Findings from a Leading Neuroscientist. Although the neuroscience of compassion and empathy is in its infancy, we concur with Siegel that meditation may be the best psychological tool we have for enhancing social awareness and responsiveness. It can be combined with psychotherapy and medication, and may even have a longer lasting effect than either, especially when treating chronic forms of anxiety and depression. I also want to point out that Siegel and our research emphasizes the plasticity of the human brain, and in specific our ability to consciously rewire our own neural circuits in ways that appear to increase cognition and perhaps longevity as well. I listened to the CD version first, then bought the book. The CD is excellent (it's narrated by Siegel) and is an abridgment of the book, which means that a lot of the detailed neuroscience is left out, but this has benefits for those who prefer to shy away from the intricacies of medial prefrontal circuits and the like.

Hands down the best book on this topic.....

I've always been a fan of this author, he is a scholar, excellent writer and based on his writing a wise individual. What makes this book especially good from my perspective is the balancing of subjective information from the world's wisdom traditions and his own interior experience with their physical correlates i.e. rigorous science without reducing either to the other. This is extremely refreshing and this carefully researched book adopts an attitude of openness, curiosity and wonder. In addition, THE MINDFUL BRAIN is NOT written soley for academically minded individuals or psychologists. It is very readable by any intelligent layperson and extremely engaging. It is theoritical, but also compellingly practical in the spirit of Parenting From the Inside Out, which I highly recommend as well. I also The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are is an incredible book. However, this is much less accessible to the average person than this volume and the one in the proceeding paragraph. More concisely, what Daniel Siegel has done is brought together what we know from the various contemplative traditions, mind-body medicine and neuroscience together in a compelling argument for the value of mindfulness to everyday life, happiness and health. I would think this would be something everyone would be interested in. While it's a wonderful adaptation to be able to think ahead, plan, etc. This often carries one out of the HERE and NOW moment and keeps us on a treadmill of postponing our fulfillment. This book is about balancing our ability to look forward while remaining anchored in the present... the only place where love, happiness and peace could be found. I work in this area and have graduate education in biology, biochemistry and psychology. This is my life's passion and I own many books on this topic and present workshops. This is in many ways the book I wish I had written although humbly I must admit Daniel Siegel would be an extremely difficult person to top. Hopefully, however, someday I will be able to add value by complimenting his and other people's good work.

Could be a life changing book

This book outlines the steps one can take to develop a self observer. It is the self observer within us that allows us to become architects of our destinies. Backed up with current research on how emotional trauma or experience lays down pathways in our brains that, once identified, can be re routed if need be.

The Foundations for a Sea Change in Psychological Health and Personal Development

A favorite book of mine is Ellen Langer's "Mindfulness." Happily still in print though it is nearly twenty years old. With it, Ellen, an eminent academic at Harvard introduced the psychological community to something that lies at the core of many religious, spiritual and contemplative practices. This marvelous book by the co-director of the UCLA Mindful Awareness Center is a next step. To give you a flavor of the book, let me quote from the Preface, "Welcome to a journey into the heart of our lives. Being mindfully aware, attending to the richness of our here-and-now experiences, creates scientifically recognized enhancements in out physiology, our mental functions, and our inter-personal relationships. Being fully present in out awareness opens our lives to new possibilities of well-being. Almost all cultures have practices that help people develop awareness of the moment. Each of the major religions of the world utilizes some method to enable individuals to focus their attention, from meditation to prayer, yoga to t'ai chi." For Daniel Siegel, being "mindful: means being aware, of being conscientious, with kindness and care." He uses a helpful acronym: COAL, for curiosity, openness, acceptance and love. As Daniel points out, we are in desperate need of finding a new way of being, not just in ourselves, but in our relationships, schools and in society as a whole. Professionals constantly see the terrible consequences for people who feel social isolation, dislocation and alienation. Yet until the advent of the Positive Psychology movement, academic psychology, psychotherapy and psychiatry had all focused almost exclusively on the sick mind. To this day, most people working in these fields have been taught little if anything about mental health, ad even fewer are engaged in practices that can keep them healthy and resilient. It is no coincidence that people working in psychology and psychiatry have some of the highest burnout rates of any of the major professions. The burgeoning evidence of the extraordinary plasticity of the human brain also has another side to it: if we are not mindful, if we are in unhealthy relationships, and if we are without any kind of inspiration or moral compass, our brains get wired in ways that they should not. And the earlier in life that it happens, the more difficult it is to unravel later. This is the reason why abuse in childhood can have effects that last decades. This book is an attempt to redress the balance. The book is divided into four sections, fourteen chapters and three appendices: PART I MIND, BRAIN, AND AWARENESS 1. A Mindful Awareness 2. Brain Basics PART II IMMERSION IN DIRECT EXPERIENCE 3. A Week of Silence 4. Suffering and the Streams of Awareness PART III FACETS OF THE MINDFUL BRAIN 5. Subjectivity and Science 6. Harnessing the Hub: Attentio

Unexpected insights

I read widely on mindfulness, meditation, neuroscience, and psychology. I didn't expect to find a book that provided so much insight into the practice of mindfulness from a neuroscience perspective. There are many useful ideas here about how to deepen and extend mindfulness practice and to sustain mindfulness over longer periods of time. Though I'm not a therapist or educator the suggestions about how mindfulnesss can contribute in both of these fields seem very promising.