Miriam Boleyn-Fitzgerald - Pictures of the Mind: What the New Neuroscience Tells Us About Who We Are

Pictures of the Mind is an extraordinary book. It makes the unfolding scientific story of consciousness vivid, even joyous, while offering a sophisticated tour of what is known about ourselves, our emotions, and our brains. A beautiful read.

Ruth R. Faden,
Philip Franklin Wagley Professor of Biomedical Ethics and
Director of the Berman Institute of Bioethics at Johns Hopkins University

This book explores the many ways in which neuroscience is revealing remarkable things about the inner workings of our mindsnot the least of which is the transformative impact that meditation can have on destructive thoughts and behavior. I have no doubt that Miriam Boleyn-Fitzgeralds work will be of great benefit to those with an interest in this fascinating new area of inquiry.

Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche,
Author of The Joy of Living: Unlocking the Secret and Science of Happiness

The mind is embodied, and it is relational. In this straightforward and illuminating book, Miriam Boleyn-Fitzgerald reveals pictures in both visual and narrative form that capture the power of the mind to transform the brain. How our mental lives shape and are shaped by neural circuitryitself forever being molded by experienceis the central theme of these powerful portraits of what it means to be human. By learning to focus our minds in more compassionate waystoward ourselves and otherswe can literally promote a healthier and more integrated brain. Read these pages, and youll be able to see for yourself!

Daniel J. Siegel, M.D.,
Author of Mindsight: The New Science of Personal Transformation,
Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine,
Co-Investigator at the Center for Culture, Brain, and Development, and
CoDirector of the Mindful Awareness Research Center

Miriam Boleyn-Fitzgerald has given us a remarkably clear and engaging account of the ways that the new brain imaging technologies can give us deep insights into our gravest maladies. Her conclusion, that healing may often lie with us, joins science with the wisdom of the ages.

Jonathan D. Moreno,
Author of Mind Wars, David and Lyn Silfen University Professor, and
Professor of Medical Ethics and of History and
Sociology of Science at the University of Pennsylvania

An engaging and compelling read that illustrates how the new brain science can help us understand elements of our basic humanity.

Zindel Segal,
Author of The Mindful Way through Depression and
Cameron Wilson Chair in Depression Studies at the University of Toronto
and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health

What the New Neuroscience Tells Us About Who We Are

Miriam Boleyn-Fitzgerald

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Cover image courtesy of Steven Laureys, from S. Laureys, The Neural Correlates of (Un)awareness: Lessons from the Vegetative State, Trends in Cognitive Sciences 9, no. 12 (December 2005): 556-559, http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/13646613.
Copyright 2005, reprinted with permission from Elsevier.

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Printed in the United States of America
First Printing January 2010

ISBN-10: 0-13-715516-6
ISBN-13: 978-0-13-715516-3

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Boleyn-Fitzgerald, Miriam.
Pictures of the mind : what the new neuroscience tells us about who we are Miriam
>Boleyn-Fitzgerald.
p. cm.
ISBN-13: 978-0-13-715516-3 (hardback : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-13-715516-6 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Neurosciences. 2. BrainPsychophysiology.
I. Title.
RC341.B65 2010
616.8dc22
2009040031

In memory of my brother Steven.

Imagine your mind is a yard on a clear March day. Youve been offered a chance to walk around. You may choose to clear fresh paths through the brown winter muck, pick up bits of trash you forgot were buried under all that ice and snow, decide what new seeds to plant and where. Youve been told your soil is richmuch richer than you thoughtand now you are sure that with time and attention and a lot of gritty work, you can grow almost anything. You roll up your sleeves and take stock. What habits of mind will you dig up and toss on the compost heap? What mental skills and emotional states, what beliefs about yourself and the world will you choose to cultivate?

Little more than a decade ago, the physical landscape of our minds was perfectly invisible to us and, for all we knew, as fertile and productive as it was ever going to get. Even if we were aware of our thoughts, ideas, and emotions, we had no way of watching the neural activity associated with mental phenomena arise, do its thing inside our heads, and pass away. We had no way of watching that activity actually alter and strengthen our neural networks. Now, thanks to powerful new imaging tools like functional MRI (fMRI) and positron emission tomography (PET), we can watch the organ of the mind in action, and what we see is exhilarating: The brain has the capacity to heal, grow, and change itself in ways that before were thought impossible.

Conventional scientific wisdom used to paint a starkly different picture of the adult brain, one in which its physical structure was essentially immutable. By the age of three, the story went, most neural networks were in place, and by late adolescence, our temperamentour baseline chemical state of happiness or irritabilitywas thought to be fixed. If we had always been a sunny kid, our outlook would probably tend toward the golden for the rest of our lives, but for those of us born and raised on the dark side of the moon, we would probably always struggle with negative emotions like anxiety, sadness, and aggression. Compounding the depressing picture was the conviction that, were we to lose nerve cells through disease, aging, or injury, there was very little point in ever wishing them back.

Now we can watch our brains on-screen, healing and adapting to challenges, and we see that our genes and early experiences absolutely