Affective Mask Training

[from: Daybook Near Daybed, by Donna]

Consulted with Hon. Reptily "La Chama" Mlaf re: [long story] on the couches in my living room with some big pillows and drinks, Persian cats.

SUMMARY: Rev. La Chama suspects (not psychotic/ hallucinatory) that she is being called to another world. It's not so much that she wants to go, but she feels it's a consensus of parties and interests beyond her control. More than ever, there is disregard, impatience, suspicion. She believes she is misunderstood by friends from California who keep telling her it's what she puts out into the universe. She tells them she must be a pretty shitty person then. They do not disagree. The Reverend concludes that she is responding to a real social phenomenon, not necessarily the supernatural decision of a supreme being, but she also understands how many parishioners conflate God and mob. I do not disagree.

RECOMMENDATION: Invent AMT, Affective Mask Training. Co-habitators of La Chama's environment not only resent her status as a goddess but are also off put by her ability to mirror exactly their emotions and sometimes secrets. This is because La Chama's emotional reaction to others is essentially sympathetic, and having at least one parent from the reptilian genus rhynchoedura ornata, even her color could change depending on a lunch companion's skirt/sweater set. Is she trying to gain intimacy with her freaked-out interlocutors? Does she seek to intimidate? We think particularly not, maybe secondary. Her principal aim, though a struggle, is understanding, to categorize and label. But when she senses hostility or fear, they are amplified by a natural flaring hormone common to her father's species. Hyperbolic mimesia can spiral into mutual hostility and mistrust. AMT, mounted in the eyeglass lens, could be the next Biofeedback, but through the use of emerging facial recognition technologies, and for a very specific purpose: cosmetic psychology, which could conceivably branch into studies of Forensic Cosmetology, but most importantly, save lives.


Dr. Donna Thong [Reinstatement Imminent]
Editorial Board Member
Journal of the Meta-Cognitive Talk Therapy Apologist Movement