Mirror Neuron

Our brain's direct action makes us "mirror" other people emotions.

A theory called "mirror neuron" has gained support and has deep implications on our evolutionary language development.  "Mirror neurons" are a brain "short-cuts" which start in the part of the brain responsible for the recognition of faces and facial expressions. What is interesting is that these "mirror neurons" bypass consciousness and generate "mimicking" action. Our subconscious has direct minor control of our facial expression. This goes a long way in explaining why people get "intuitive" feeling about specific persons when they are face-to-face and also explains why we get the feeling of empathy. If a person has empathy, he also has "knowledge" of the other person's state of mind. All this has great implications as to what is  behind some people who have "mind reading" abilities. This whole process is still not very well understood. 

As a starting point, please check the following web site:

http://www.nlptoday.com/Ezine_April2001_Mirroring.htm

http://www.anticipation.info/texte/gallese2/Gallese&Goldman.pdf 

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/ramachandran/ramachandran_p2.html