In a study published in the Journal of Neuroscience in October 2013, Max Planck researchers identified that the tendency to be egocentric is innate for human beings, but part of our brain recognizes a lack of empathy and autocorrects. This specific part of our brain is called the right supramarginal gyrus. When this brain region doesn't function properly or, when we have to make particularly quick decisions, the ability for empathy is dramatically reduced. This area of the brain helps us to distinguish our own emotional state from that of other people and is responsible for empathy and compassion. The supramarginal gyrus is a part of the cerebral cortex and is approximately located at the junction of the parietal, temporal, and frontal lobe. The same neural systems get activated in a part of the cortex called the insula, which is part of the mirror neuron system, and in the emotional brain areas associated with the observed emotion. However, the amount of activation is slightly smaller for the mirrored experience than when the same emotion is experienced directly. Iacoboni says, these results indicate that a healthy mirror neuron system is crucial for normal social development. If you have broken mirrors, or deficits in mirror neurons, you likely end up having social problems as patients with autism do and sociopaths.

What are mirror neurons? Mirror neurons were first discovered in the early 1990s by Italian scientists who noticed that the cells in the observer's brain mirrored the activity in the performer's brain. A similar phenomenon takes place when we watch someone experience an emotion and feel the same emotion in response, says Marco Iacoboni, a neuroscientist at the University of California. Mirror neurons are smart cells in our brains that allow us to understand others' actions, intentions, and feelings. The mirror neurons are in many areas of our brain, and they fire when we perform an action or when we see others performing the action. As it turns out, our mirror neurons fire when we experience an emotion and similarly when we see others experiencing an emotion, such as happiness, fear, anger, or sadness. When we see someone feeling sad, for example, our mirror neurons fire and that allows us to experience the same sadness and to feel empathy. We don't need to think about the other person being sad, we actually experience it firsthand.

When assessing the world around us and our fellow humans, we tend to project our own emotional state onto others, when our mirror neurons are working properly. It is assumed that our own emotional state can distort our understanding of other people's emotions, in particular if these are completely different to our own. But this emotional egocentricity had not been measured before now. When you are in a nice, beautiful, agreeable and comfortable situation it is more difficult to empathize with another person's suffering. Without a properly functioning supramarginal gyrus, your brain has a tough time putting itself in someone else's shoes. To test this in the laboratory the Max Planck researchers used a perception experiment in which participants, who worked in teams of two, were exposed to either pleasant or unpleasant simultaneous visual and tactile stimuli. Major differences arose during the test when one partner was confronted with pleasant stimuli and the other with unpleasant ones. In this scenario a person's capacity for empathy plummeted. The participants' own emotions distorted their assessment of the other person's feelings. The participants who were feeling good themselves assessed their partner's negative experiences as less severe than they actually were. In contrast, those who had just had an unpleasant experience assessed their partner's good experiences less positively.

Until now, social neuroscience has assumed that people simply rely on their own emotions as a reference for empathy. However, this only works if we are in a neutral state or the same state as our counterpart. Otherwise, the brain must use the right supramarginal gyrus to counteract and correct a tendency for self-centered perceptions of another's pain, suffering or discomfort. When psychopaths imagine others in pain, the brain areas responsible for feeling empathy and concern for others fail to become active and connect to the brain regions involved in affective processing and compassionate decision-making. Because our brain's neural circuitry is malleable and can be rewired through neuroplasticity one's tendency for empathy and compassion can always be improved. We all need to practice putting ourselves in someone else's shoes to reinforce the neural networks that allow us to care more for our family, friends, co-worker, organization, community, and humankind at large. But please, when practicing your empathy daily, don't follow the flawed old sayings: "Love thy neighbor as thyself" and "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"--if you don't love yourself, you don't love your neighbor and what makes you happy doesn't necessarily make others happy. Love thy neighbor with an open-heart, no-judgment, acceptance and compassion. Do unto others what makes them happy.

Neuroscience allows us to see inside the human brain and better understand our minds. With this knowledge we can begin to make daily choices of mindset and behavior that not only reshape our neural circuitry, but can alter the way human beings interact with one another. Mindfulness meditation that includes loving-kindness meditation (LKM) can rewire your brain. Practicing LKM is easy. All you have to do is take a few minutes everyday to sit quietly and systematically send loving and compassionate thoughts to:

• Family and friends
• Someone with whom you have a tension or a conflict
• Strangers around the world who are suffering
• Self-compassion, forgiveness and self-love to yourself

Doing this simple four step LKM practice, literally, rewires your brain by engaging neural connections linked to empathy. Volunteerism also reinforces the empathetic wiring of your brain while making a contribution to reduce the suffering of someone less fortunate. Are you or your organization a part of a volunteerism association or group? These are all small steps, but taken together they can fortify empathy and altruism at a neurobiological level for each individual. Collectively, these small steps can help make the world a better place.