The Affection Motivation

What Affection looks like in an animal

The attachment path. This animal exists for its person. It picks one - occasionally two - and organises its whole day around them: following room to room, sleeping against them, waiting at the door well before they arrive. Affection is given generously and asked for constantly, and its wellbeing rises and falls with the state of that bond. The cost is separation: this is the type most prone to distress when left alone, and to grief when its person, or a companion animal it paired with, is gone. Build tolerance for alone time early and gently, keep departures and returns undramatic, and give it a second steady human so its whole world does not rest on one.

What Affection asks of you

And this is the half that is not about the animal at all. A person's mandate asks something of the person who has it; an animal cannot act on its own — it cannot go and find work, practise being alone, or seek out better company. So every one of these six asks something of the keeper instead.

This is the mandate that asks for work when nothing is wrong, and that is exactly why it is usually skipped. The animal will attach hard whatever you do; what it cannot do is teach itself to survive your absence, and by the time the problem is visible the lesson is much harder to give. So the ask is early and unglamorous: undramatic departures, time alone practised in small doses long before it is needed, and a second person the animal knows well enough to be left with. It goes wrong through kindness. Big greetings and long goodbyes feel like love and function as an alarm, and an animal that is never left alone while it is easy will be left alone eventually while it is not. The other failure is one person carrying the entire bond, which works until that person is ill or away. Working well, this is the most rewarding of the six to live with, and it stays that way because somebody did the boring part first.

The human reading of the same mandate is self-knowledge. This one is instructions, which is the whole difference between the Romance mandate and this page.

Affection as a palace, and as a Motivation

Every animal has all twelve palaces and exactly one Motivation, and a Motivation is always one of six particular palaces seen in a larger role. So the Affection palace describes one part of an animal's life, and this page describes what it means when that part is the thing the whole life organises itself around. Reading the pair is the fastest way to see the difference.

A pet reaches both at Bond Level 3, one rung later than a person, because its first two rungs go on species and breed and then on birth year. Nothing else arrives with it: there are no Karma Credits, no Vessel Stats and no Difficulty reading on a pet ladder at any rung.

The other five mandates

A chart returns one of six and never a blend of two, so the five below are the alternatives this one was read instead of.

• Nature & Temperament— path of the self-possessed animal
• Bloodline & Luck— path of lineage and luck
• Play & Purpose— path of work and purpose
• Socialising & Impressions— path of roaming and meeting
• Territory & Treats— path of food, treats and treasured things

Frequently asked

What does the Affection Motivation mean in an animal?

The attachment path. This animal exists for its person. It picks one - occasionally two - and organises its whole day around them: following room to room, sleeping against them, waiting at the door well before they arrive. Affection is given generously and asked for constantly, and its wellbeing rises and falls with the state of that bond. The cost is separation: this is the type most prone to distress when left alone, and to grief when its person, or a companion animal it paired with, is gone. Build tolerance for alone time early and gently, keep departures and returns undramatic, and give it a second steady human so its whole world does not rest on one.

What does the Affection Motivation ask of me as a keeper?

This is the mandate that asks for work when nothing is wrong, and that is exactly why it is usually skipped. The animal will attach hard whatever you do; what it cannot do is teach itself to survive your absence, and by the time the problem is visible the lesson is much harder to give. So the ask is early and unglamorous: undramatic departures, time alone practised in small doses long before it is needed, and a second person the animal knows well enough to be left with. It goes wrong through kindness. Big greetings and long goodbyes feel like love and function as an alarm, and an animal that is never left alone while it is easy will be left alone eventually while it is not. The other failure is one person carrying the entire bond, which works until that person is ill or away. Working well, this is the most rewarding of the six to live with, and it stays that way because somebody did the boring part first.

Is this the same as the Romance Motivation for a person?

It is the same cell of the same cast chart, and it asks something completely different. A person's mandate asks something of the person who has it — that is what a Motivation is for them. An animal cannot act on its own mandate at all: it cannot go and find work, practise being alone, or seek out better company. So every one of these six asks something of you instead. The human reading is self-knowledge; this one is a set of instructions.

When can I read my pet's Motivation?

At Bond Level 3, which is one rung later than a person reaches theirs. An animal's first two rungs are spent on species and breed, and then on birth year and gender, so the birth hour that actually casts a chart is the last thing it is given rather than the first. There are 6 mandates in total and a chart returns exactly one, never a blend — the other 5 are Nature & Temperament, Bloodline & Luck, Play & Purpose, Socialising & Impressions, Territory & Treats.