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悱 (fěi) denotes the frustration of being unable to articulate one's thoughts or emotions. It is a phono-semantic compound: the heart radical 忄 (xīn) on the left signals its connection to emotions and mental states, while the right side 非 (fēi) indicates the pronunciation. The character is famously used in the Analects to depict a student's eager yet frustrated state before a teacher provides the precise words to clarify their intellectual confusion.
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