Dear Reader
I have looked in the mirror rather a lot over the past few years. Many times it has seemed as if the person I saw there was was not the person I thought I was. I’m more comfortable now but there are still surprises and a few too many unknowns, which other people might be able to answer – or I might go looking a bit more when I (and my family) recover from the Doctorate. This dissertation in publication will be an open document as well as a living one.
So what I want to know next are these:
- Do I really not feel music, or do I not recognise that I do? Is alexithymia overriding cognitive empathy?
- What is the real relationship between social empathy and feeling music?
- Do other Asperger composers share my experiences?
- Is oxytocin really a factor in studios?
- How can I take my “music-making empathy” out of the studio?
- At my age, how do I improve my eye contact? Will it help or overwhelm me?
- How many others make their own Virtual Heart? Will they share it with me?