Dan Siegel is a psychiatrist who specializes in child development and disturbances in attachment that can lead to difficulties not only in childhood, but also throughout adult life. His new book is called The Mindful Brain. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND this new book (as well as the previous one, The Developing Mind)!

Siegel’s Mindful Brain describes his own introduction to the scientific basis for using mindfulness-based practices as methods for enhancing the functioning of the brain. He draws a comparison between the empathic attunement between parent and child (which is necessary for proper neuronal growth and connections in support of emotion regulation) and our human capacity for self-attunement by way of mindfulness practice.

Siegel’s attention has long been directed toward the concept of “secure attachment” that results (especially within parent-child relationships) when there is proper interpersonal attunement. Attunement is the label Siegel uses for a process that is set in motion when one person “focuses attention on the internal world of another.” This process “enables two people to ‘feel felt’ by each other”; it is the very same process that is brought about in a healthy psychotherapeutic relationship. In fact, attunement (fostered by the empathic stance of the therapist) may very well be the most important “ingredient” among the many different variables that are brought into play in psychotherapy of all types. Siegel asserts, and demonstrates by a thorough review of current literature in psychology and neuropsychiatry, that this process promotes resilience, and enhances interpersonal functioning and emotion regulation.

Siegel’s major innovation in this new book is to make explicit the connection between empathic attunement between individuals (interpersonal attunement), and the intrapersonal attunement that takes place in the brain of a person who engages in mindfulness practice. He contends that these are fundamentally similar processes, and with similar beneficial results (this is also supported by recent findings in relevant scientific literature). As he puts it, there is an “overlap of the ways in which well-being and resilience [are] promoted by secure attachment and by mindful awareness practice,” (p. xix).

Siegel finds that mindfulness practice promotes neural integration within the brain and a healthy flow of interconnections among and between brain, mind, and relationships. As a Co-Director of the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center [see link to this Center at the bottom of this page!], he (along with Dr. Lidia Zylowska, who I visited earlier this year) is engaged in education and research on Mindful Awareness Practices. One of their current projects involves the use of mindfulness-based interventions for individuals who experience deficits in attentional capacities; early findings are very promising!

We at Avila University are also currently engaged in the design and implementation of research and education programs that include mindfulness-based interventions. We believe that the findings of researchers in the area of mindfulness are converging with findings in related areas such as Positive Psychology and psychoneuroimmunology to provide a solid footing for programs that promote healthy functioning in mind, body, and spirit.