How to Nurture Your Children's Inner Strengths

ANNIE MURPHY PAUL is a journalist and author whose books include Origins: How the Nine Months Before Birth Shape the Rest of our Lives, The Cult of Personality Testing, and The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain. In part 2 of this interview by UDAY KUMAR, she speaks more about interoception and self-awareness, and how gestures and physical expressions are as important as verbal communication in helping our children to learn.

- UDAY KUMAR

Q: As you do research on the extended mind, what do you think about the role of mirror neurons?

I don’t refer to mirror neurons. I am not convinced that we know enough about how they operate and how central they are to the processes of empathy and communication. And I don’t think it is necessary to understand. I say this in the book: Humans naturally engage in mimicry, subtle automatic miming of each other, when talking face to face. It’s by making those expressions and gestures, and by assuming the postures of the other person, that we then read off our own bodies what those postures and expressions make us feel. That’s how we get access to what another person is feeling and thinking. Research has found that people who are more attuned to their own internal signals can be more empathetic because they then feel more acutely the signals they read from the other person. I am fascinated by processes like this in which humans bridge the divide between us, so we are not as separate as we think we are. So in my case I didn’t feel the need to draw in the research about mirror neurons.

Q: You also touch upon sensing, labeling and verbalizing of emotions. One of the core practices of many meditation systems, including Heartfulness, is journaling at the end of a meditation session.

Oh, interesting!

Q: We observe ourselves at the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual levels, and train ourselves in the vocabulary of journaling. We develop the capacity to have one eye always looking inward while looking at another person. We learn to become adept at witnessing through meditation and journaling.