Rental Person Who Does Nothing

by Shoji Morimoto

But Kokoroya argued that people should be paid for just being there—that people have a value even if they do nothing.

Things can be different simply because someone is there. They don’t have to be there, but if they are, something changes.

How do such situations change when a person is rented out simply “to be there”?

felt comfortable in a community that existed just

for the moment, with simple, temporary relationships uncomplicated by past or future.

Depth of discussion and depth of relationship don’t always go hand in hand. The fact that you’re very close to someone doesn’t mean you can necessarily open up to them. In truth, closeness quite often makes people keep their mouths shut.

get a surprising number of requests to listen to people.

They have a story they have to tell and it’s my role to be there while they tell it. In one of Aesop’s fables, a character longs to tell a secret

and so tells it to the reeds. I’m just there, like those reeds.

Another reason why people ask me to listen to them seems to be that I don’t give advice.

So when I listen to clients, I try not to evaluate at all.

I just nod and say something along the lines of “Uh-huh” or “I see.”

With these “accompanying” and “watching” requests, my role is really, of course, just to be there.

The request is just for me “to be there.” I don’t go along to learn, observe or comment.

Here’s another case where there was a positive outcome in spite of my refusing Twitter requests:

I refuse any case where it looks as though I’ll have to use my own judgment. This includes lining up to buy something or running an errand, even where I have been given directions or orders. On the other hand, I would probably accept a request to keep a place for a cherry blossom viewing

party, assuming that I’d go with the client and they’d choose the place in the park they wanted to reserve. Then I would be nothing more than a person sitting on tarpaulin sheeting until the party started.

In fact, this is another reason I don’t prioritize concerts—while the music is playing, clients can’t say much.

My dream of doing nothing is already a reality, so in fact, it is a dream of keeping things as they are. Why shouldn’t a dream focus on the here and now? Why is there an

assumption that it must be about the future?

No deep commitment is expected and no personality required.

It’s the complete opposite of what was expected of me at my previous company. It’s funny that someone like Rental Person should be in demand. I suppose you could say my lack of individuality has become my “product.”

could see the brim of the cap above my eyes, and I felt as if that was blocking out people’s gaze. I know that in a crowd like that nobody was really going to look at me, but self-consciousness is difficult to control. Another advantage of the cap was that with a restricted field of vision I could be more introspective, hiding away in my own world.

I think this easy introspection, and the sense of freedom from people’s gaze, helped me to be honest with myself, to face up to the feeling that I wanted to do nothing. Saying that, I may be overplaying the role of the

cap, but it was certainly very soon after buying it that I hit on the Rental Person idea, so perhap...

I’m not wearing a complete uniform, I think my cap helps clients relax. I feel it gives a reassuring formality to our relationship, which is nice for me too. Although they don’t know me at all, it’s as if there’s a kind of manual allowing them to handle the situation with minimal communication.

a beanie, or a baseball cap—just a work cap. And for me, the cap is useful if I want to block out a client’s gaze, or to shut down completely. So, although it may not be very polite, I don’t take the cap off even when I introduce myself to clients. Or perhaps I’m so reliant on it that I’m embarrassed to take it off at all.

So what I really want as Rental Person is to have no defining attributes—no good points, no bad points.

In a sense, this is at the heart of this do-nothing service—I’d like the world to be one where even if people can’t do anything for others, even if they can make no contribution to society, they can still live stress-free lives.

This is very important to me because of the gap that exists between the value that I sense in people and the value assigned to them by society.

For me, though, she had value simply because she was there. Gaps like that in their perceived value can be a huge source of stress for anybody

who, by society’s standards, doesn’t seem able to do anything. People can die because of the stress of adapting to society. Or they can lose every ounce of their energy. I’ve seen it happen.

told my wife about them and she said she didn’t like the sound of anyone who said of themselves that they were good at listening. I broadly agree.

Lots of people want me to listen to them, but when I listen, it is always in a passive way. I’m not doing anything—I’m just hearing what they say while I’m with them.

When people ask me to listen to them, the topic is often something that they feel they can’t talk to other people about.

“I don’t know what to say about myself,” he told me, “and I feel guilty when I make things up.” He didn’t have a past that he

could tell people about; the past that had molded him into what he was today—his childhood memories, where he’d lived, the people he’d been brought up among—this real past couldn’t be mentioned, it had to remain a secret.

Since then, I think I’ve looked at people in a different way, realizing that even the most ordinary, upright-looking people may not be what they seem.

If real listening is a matter of getting very close to the other person, tuning in one’s feelings, then that’s not what I do.

The only exception was the event when people spoke about their dreams and it got too much so I had to leave. Perhaps I can only behave the way I do because of my policy of normally only seeing clients once.

Everyone has to accept there are times when they can’t talk about what they want to talk about.

In those situations, Rental Person may be a solution.

So, broadly speaking, there are people who are clearly happy afterward and there are people who still feel anxious. Those who still feel anxious seem to me to be people who wanted some kind of advice. But, as I keep saying, that’s not something I can give.

As Rental Person, though, I don’t have to comfort anybody and I’m never asked for sympathy. When I’ve felt that just being there may help a bit, I’ve accepted the request.

I enjoyed hearing about his experiences around the world, and as usual I just nodded or said things like “Oh really?”

But then I don’t do anything—I simply stay with a client for as long as necessary.

just stuff that was too much bother to throw away. I liked her attitude: she seemed emotionally detached from the situation.

As a stranger being asked to do things that normally would be done by a relative, I get glimpses of human drama. I’ve dealt with a lot of cases; I don’t remember many of them, but when a situation is sad or painful it tends to leave an impression, and these impressions seem to build up into something more general: a sense of what happens, or what can be done, in different types of situation.

As I don’t have friends this was an experience I wouldn’t otherwise have had.

I like to be free, so I normally do things on my own, but it was so nice to have the security of a companion.