Mindsight is the term that Dr. Daniel J. Siegel, a pioneer in the emerging field of interpersonal neurobiology, coined to help us understand how we can harness the power of our minds for personal transformation. With Practicing Mindsight, this acclaimed author and speaker invites you to join him for an online course that explores how to resculpt our neural pathways, and break free from the mental patterns that hold us back from living life to the fullest. A thorough distillation of his life’s work, this immersive six-session course includes four instructional sessions, and two Q&A sessions—more than seven hours of paradigm-shifting insights, cutting-edge science, and helpful tools for developing this valuable life skill.

Practicing Mindsight:  Self-guided Video Course

Mindsight is a new science of personal transformation devoted to learning how we can change our brains and our relationships. By learning how we can use our minds to shape our brains, we can strengthen and cultivate our brains according to our personal preferences, as well as improve our interpersonal communications. Our Mindsight practice can also begin to consciously affect culture itself. For instance, by awakening to the consequences of how our current cultural behavior negatively affects our environment, we can discover and generate healthier behavior that will improve life for ourselves and all living things. | How can we use Mindsight to create a healthy mind, a healthy brain, and healthy relationships? First, we must understand how the brain changes through experience (neuroplasticity), how relationships facilitate our ability to share energy and information with others, how the mind is a process that regulates that flow of energy and information, and how to cultivate our own awareness in order to direct that attention. We can then begin to focus the mind in new ways that drive energy and information through the brain to create new patterns that permanently change the way it functions. Using Mindsight—or an awakened mind that possesses openness, objectivity, and observation—we no longer have to follow our old, habitual, dysfunctional, unsatisfactory habits, and instead can choose to behave in positive new ways.

What Is The Mind?

An Introduction to Mindsight

Topics covered: | Neuroplasticity and the brain | How the mind changes the brain

The Birth Of The Idea Of Mindsight

Topics covered: | How we can learn to observe our subjective experience from an objective point of view | Attachment and the importance of a personal narrative in individual and social development | The connection between mind and the brain and human relationships

Becoming Aware of the Mind

Topics covered: | The brain as the extended nervous system

Defining the Mind

Topics covered: | Mind as an embodied and relational process that regulates the flow of energy and information; “mind” as a verb, not a noun | The three qualities of a healthy mind: | Openness to what is | Objectivity—your mental activity is not your whole identity | Observation—being aware of your inner state | How stabilizing attention is essential to the fullness of experience | The triangle of mind, brain, and relationships | The effects of resolved and unresolved trauma | The function of mirror neurons and how we are hard-wired for empathy

A More Detailed Definition of Mind

Topics covered: | How the flow of information and energy is structured by the brain, but regulated by the mind | How our relationships are affected by this flow of energy and information, and how the mind regulates its flow

The Brain and Personal Narrative

Topics covered: | How cultural evolution proceeds via interactions of the brain, mind, and relationships | How mindfulness meditation improves executive brain functions as much as or more than taking medications | The definition of attention | How using focused attention to drive information and energy can create specific circuits and carve new pathways in the brain | Using the concept that “neurons that fire together wire together” to create new neural circuits and change the way you focus your attention

Using Mindsight to Get Out of the Brain

Topics covered: | A case study on the subjective and objective effects of brain injury | How understanding brain injury can generate healthier minds, brains, and relationships

How the Brain Is Changed by the Mind

Recorded Interactive Session with Dr. Daniel J. Siegel

Probability theory has identified three basic states: chaos (differentiation but no linkage), rigidity (linkage but no differentiation), and harmony (differentiation allied with linkage). Applying this model to our emotional life, we can learn how to transform our own states of chaos or rigidity (or those in others) to a state of harmony or well-being. In Session Two, we will learn how to strengthen the synaptic connections we desire by using attention to control the direction of energy and information flow in order to create new patterns that change the way the brain functions. It is first important to understand how the brain is formed, how it functions, and how it changes. | Topics covered: | SNAG: Stimulate Neuronal Activation Growth | How we can learn to activate genes and strengthen synaptic connections | Determining how we want to change our brains | What it means to have a healthy brain

Using Mindsight to Create a Healthy Mind

Topics covered: | A scientific discussion on the importance of relationships on the developing brain | Emotions and emotional well-being | The multiple definitions of emotion

The Developing Mind

Topics covered: | How emotion shifts the integration of the different aspects of our lives | Emotional health as integration; impairment as chaos and rigidity | Rigidity, chaos, and harmony

Emotional Health as Integrative Health

Rigidity, Chaos, and Harmony

Topics covered: | How neural pathways are created, reinforced, and strengthened

Neuron Activity

Topics covered: | Using practices that promote the growth of integrative fibers to heal post-traumatic stress disorder | Defining trauma as overwhelming a system’s ability to adapt | The origin of the nervous system as the integration of inner and outer

How the Brain Is Wired

Topics covered: | The formation and function of the brain stem | The formation and function of the limbic area | Five functions of the limbic area: motivation, appraisal of meaning, emotion, memory, and relationships | The function of the back and the front areas of the cortex

The Brain Model

Topics covered: | The relationship between genes and experience, or epigenetics

Epigenetics

Topics covered: | The formation and function of the pre-frontal cortex | The function of the dorsal lateral area for attention and short-term memory | The function of the middle pre-frontal cortex | The orbital frontal cortex | The middle pre-frontal cortex | The ventral lateral pre-frontal cortex | The functions of the pre-frontal cortex: body regulation, attunement with others, emotional balance, modulation of fear, response flexibility, insight, empathy, morality, and intuition | The connection between wisdom traditions, attachment theory, mindfulness practice and well-being, and the functions of the pre-frontal cortex | Integration as a window into wisdom, kindness, and compassion

The Pre-Frontal Cortex

In this session we will learn how to stabilize the lens of our perceptual ability by identifying and integrating many of the domains of human experience that affect the triangle of mind, brain, and relationships. As we bring these domains into coherence, we will respond to situations more accurately and behave more effectively in our interactions with others. A healthy mind is the result of integration and coherence, qualities that are especially important if you are a teacher or a therapist. | Topics covered: | The integration of consciousness, attention, and awareness | Learning how to cultivate discernment or nonjudgmental awareness for longer and longer periods of time | The left shift in the brain and how it affects immune function

The Eight Domains of Integration

The Eight Domains of Integration, Part One

Topics covered: | The four streams of awareness promoted by mindfulness—SOCK: Sensory, Observing, Conceptual and non-conceptual Knowing | The five bodily senses | The sixth sense: The sense of the interior of the body | The seventh sense: Being aware of thoughts, feelings, images, etc. | The eighth sense: Your relational sense to others and your environment | An introduction to the Wheel of Awareness Practice | Awareness is separate from what you are aware of | The difference between mindfulness and relaxation

The Four Streams of Awareness

Topics covered: | Guided Wheel of Awareness Practice

The Wheel of Awareness Practice

Topics covered: | The benefits of mindfulness practices in treating the onset of bipolar disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder (in conjunction with aerobic exercise, sleep, hygiene, dietary changes, and supplements to develop the hub of the mind) | The first domain of integration: Consciousness

The First Domain of Integration

Topics covered: | The second domain of integration: Bilateral integration of the brain | The left and right modes of the brain

The Second Domain of Integration

Mindsight is an approach built on scientific theory, and yet it also easily transfers into the world of practical application. It is of interest not only to those involved in schools, organizations, and psychotherapy, but also to anyone interested in expanding the possibilities of their own lives. As we begin to apply the principles of Mindsight to our connections with others, we must first learn ways of being “artistic” rather than dogmatic in our interactions in order to generate an understanding of and respect for the unique personality formation and cognitive styles of each individual. In Session Four, we will explore the last six domains of integration, as well as the ninth level of integration—transpiration—which is the ability to “breathe” across the eight domains of integration to cultivate a more permeable sense of self and a genuine respect for the earth as our home. | Topics covered: | The difficulties of thinking about male and female differences on the individual level | The third domain of integration: Bodily awareness | Guided awareness exercise: The “Yes” and “No” exercise | Using Mindsight to see and change from reactivity to receptivity

The Third Domain of Integration

The Eight Domains of Integration, Part Two

Topics covered: | The fourth domain of integration: Memory | The six aspects of memory | The importance of dual focus in healing negative emotional memories | Why flashbacks do not lead to healing

The Fourth Domain of Integration

Topics covered: | The fifth domain of integration: Narrative | Creating meaning from your past experiences | The “ABCDE” of meaning | Choosing not to be a prisoner of the past

The Fifth Domain of Integration

The Sixth Domain of Integration

Topics covered: | The seventh domain of integration: Interpersonal | Does the mind need a brain? | The relationship between interpersonal integration, attachment, and synaptic functioning | The varieties of integration, attachment, and narrative

The Seventh Domain of Integration

Practicing Mindsight: Self-guided Video Course

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