PhronesisWe develop a formal dynamical account of compulsive affect-flattening as a wrong-attractor configuration in the state space of expressive presence. Beginning from the ground state S^0 — defined as the basin of calibrated expressive presence in which affective responses are proportionate, context-sensitive, and relationally available — we characterize compulsive affect-flattening as a systematic displacement D() that accrues into total deadening = D()\,dt over time.
The wrong attractor W emerges not from a single retreat but from iterated vulnerability-neutralization cycles that progressively deepen the foreclosure basin, making spontaneous return to S^0 energetically costly. We prove nine formal propositions covering: the structural definition of W, the convexity properties of the displacement cost function, the depth and geometry of the foreclosure basin, the mechanism by which authentic-response pathways are foreclosed, phase-transition dynamics between flat and responsive regimes, intervention theory, recovery trajectory shape, systemic relational effects, and the ethical asymmetry between chosen and compelled flattening.
The framework yields concrete predictions about intervention timing, relapse risk, and the order of magnitude of accumulated deadening in chronic cases. We close with a discussion of return paths from W to S^0 and the role of witness, language, and relational re-entry in reactivating foreclosed response channels.