up:: Concepts MOC tags::#concept
No-Face
The self-destructive primal tension everybody harbors.
No-Face is a spirit in the 2001 Japanese animated film Spirited Away. According to Hayao Miyazaki, No-Face is “the libido everybody secretly harbors.”
- If “you are what you eat,” No-Face eats the emotions of whatever is in front of it. It’s reactive, not proactive.
No-Face is aroused by (and absorbs) primal tension and aggressive drives, easily becoming a self-perpetuating feedback loop of hot emotions. It’s essentially Freud’s Id.
Handling No-Face
Do Not Engage! — When the primal part of people take over, it’s like they become No-Face. Do not perpetuate the aggression No-Face feeds off of. No-Face is best deflated by choosing not to respond aggressively (ie, sinking to its level), but rather by calling upon your reserves of discipline to enter a mindset of restraint and non-reaction; benevolence and patience—with an eye towards the well-being of the attacker while still holding your own.
In this way, you are not feeding the libido, but letting itself wear itself out. Just as No-Face’s aggressions are dissipated by Chihiro in Spirited Away.
There is an art to handling self-perpetuating aggressiveness. Look to Aikido for more insights into deflecting and dissipating an attacker’s energy.
Related
(previous thoughts: is organum indifferent, neither good nor evil; an emotion mirror, it becomes its environment)