Yesterday night, while I roam around Jakarta with no particular destination in mind, I visited some places I used to explore a decade ago, witnessing some nostalgic yet different vibes from that places, triggering specific neuron pathways leading to some sort of realizations.

One particular place reminds me of a conversation I had with my friend—a debate, more like—about conservative common sense that forever change my view of the world around me.

This one friend has been exposed to many side of the world, experience many cultural differences, in some way, have changed the way he thinks, I actually admire him, like he views things differently than many of us.

He told me this story about his military friend, been serving in the military for almost a decade before he finally married and having a child, he had achieved quite high rank in the military. As you might know, military life is demanding and requires strict discipline, soldiers go through rigorous mental and physical training, often pushing beyond their limits to achieve breakthroughs in resilience.

If you familiar with Gerald Reinier from the Insidious: The Last Key, he’s Elise’s father, a prison guard at Dewbend State Penitentiary in the movie, after corrupted by the Keyface demon from “The Further” realm, Gerald became abusive towards his children, particularly his daughter Elise, he disciplined and punish her, by beating her hand and her back whenever she shows her ability to perceive and communicate with ghosts.

His military friend is basically like Gerald, without the demon and abusive part of course, he however, often punishes his child and his wife either verbally or physically, but never abusive, just barely. To “discipline” them he said.

So my friend ask for my opinion regarding this story, we then having quite heated debate, back and forth presenting the pros, cons and the long term effects for his family, the children especially.

You know, we as a human are always progressing, whether or not you notice it, doing it intentionally or by being forced by the Universe itself, we’ll always progressing. The rule of thumbs are, a good progress equal growth, a bad-ish progress equal less growth. There are always growth nonetheless.

I—well, I think all of us—have had lots of embarassing moments and beliefs than what we care to admit, but here’s some perspective, if we’re remember those moments and/or beliefs as embarassing today, which mean we’ve grown, learning and understanding our world better than the time those embarassing things happened.

I used to be emotionally attached to everything, taking things personally, always think things less rationally and more emotionally like, “aww, that’s terrible thing to say, can you not say that pleaseeee, it hurt my feelings 🥺👉👈”, that results in my decision making that are—most often than not—based solely on my emotional response.

Not that it’s a bad thing though, there are lots of situations that requires more emotional influences, and there are also lots of situations that needs more logical reasoning, the key is balance. If you’d take and only lean towards one side, usually it complicate things more than what it actually are.

With that being said, I responded to my friend with emotional stand. As a father who’s supposedly nurturing, providing and taking care of his family, he should do no harm whatsoever, I stand with a statement that saying what his friend does was wrong, and he’s not suppose to do that to his family, period. “That’s wrong things to do! Please have some common sense, man!”—I said.

He chuckles at my response—I’m a little bit offended to be honest—before he followed up with one of the greatest wisdom I’ve ever heard, that helps me open my mind.

“I understand why you’re so naive—you’re still young, single, and have no family yet, you don’t know how to take care of one”, he said.

“You talk big about having common sense. Have you thought about his military background—how he was raised by his parents?”, he continued.

“You can’t generalize everything; each person is unique. Taking care of family is complicated thing—lots of factors have to be considered. You talk about common sense—whose common sense? you think you’re right—according to who?”, he continued, again.

“Your common sense, my common sense, and his common sense are all different in some ways—indeed, we might agree on certain things; however, we all have our own perspective, shaped by our own experiences”, he then concluded.

I thought to myself, “Hmmm, why didn’t I think of that…”, from here, we then continue to discuss about how we often take “universal truths” blindly regardless they serves a good purpose or fit within personal contexts.

That was one of many pivotal moments for me towards more logical and rational thinking, rather than completely relying to my emotional influences. Isn’t it funny, the older we get, our heart and head are constantly in an endless battles in the face of the Mighty Indifference Universe.

Deeper Meaning Arises from Tiny Fractions

Sometimes I get abruptly lost in life’s minutiae—those tiny, seemingly insignificant moments that most people just walk past without a second glance. Like stumbling upon a perfectly crafted detail and spending what some might call an absurd amount of time trying to decode the “why” after the “how”.

“That’s not very practical, and kinda waste of your time” my friend would say with that particular smile reserved for well-meaning criticism. Fair point—most folks prefer their progress small and measurable, particularly for people that’s always on this societal theatrical stage.

But there’s something rather magical about going all in into these tiny little adventures. It’s like being an explorer in a world others dismiss as meh. What appears so simple on the surface often unfolds into a rather fascinating complexity, that only reveals its secrets only to those who spent enough time to look closer.

The pragmatists, find this approach baffling. “What tangible benefits could possibly come from such an endeavor?” they ask, perhaps missing the point entirely. Well, I do it for the joy of discovery, for those “aha” moments that come from understanding something deeply, even if that something seems trivial to the outside world.

After all, isn’t life too short to just barely know the “how”?

Towards meaning and what it diminishes

A brief reality check towards the irony of deep-rooted hypocrisy, surrounded by folks that seem to have everything figured out—in theory at least; spent their entirity of breath profoundly discussing about the grand theories—yet, left out the technicalities.

Being in the same room with people who seem to be filled with remorse, constantly agitated by being in one state for too long, and always seem to run away from things—their past, it appears.

Then an almost cosmical contrast, adventurers who knows nothing, yet constantly figuring things out managed to shape their own technical and practical understanding which solves their own conundrums.

I sat down on the side of the street; at the Indomaret seatings, with Good Day Tiramisu and a warm Onigiri I just bought. Plug my earphone and hit play on Scofield’s Camelus from the Überjam Deux, looked at my watch and it’s 3 am.

“There are no tragedies that ends in poems”, this line suddenly come to mind.

I’am a huge fan of Kahlil Gibran works, have been helping me through difficult times, lots of his poems resonates deeply; at the level no words can describe, yet I notice some tendencies in his writings, he tends to romanticize every tragedies into poems, on love—especially.

And aren’t we all? We romanticize all the time; a noble war, heroic death sacrifices, women’s miraculous birth, and divine love. Those in and on its own is bloody tragedies, a painful one—nonetheless. At cosmic scale—it meant nothing.

Yet we romanticize to survive; we spin pain into purpose, tragedy into morality, suffering into meaning. to the point it convince ourselves there’s something profound in the chaos, if only we’re to endure it.

Take Romeo & Juliet and Titanic. These are the prime examples of love’s grandeur, yet full of tragedies, despair and illusions. But, there are no tragedies that ends in poems.

This opens to one interpretation left to be desired; what arbitrary meanings we should give to our sufferings, our tragedies, our pains, our noble acts and last but not least—our life.

Between denial and despair

The one who terribly clever, and yet terribly broken, concluded on a long enough timescale in this Universe, that’s so wide and apparently indifferent, oneself have no ultimate significance.

To leave behind the soul and this fleeting world is no great strife,

But to part from the place where she lingers—this wounds eternity itself.

What is the essence of separation?

Is it the breaking of a heart that loves even as it grieves?

No, it is the silent rift between spirit and form.

I know well that you are without fault,

Yet the heart of a lover, fragile and boundless, births its own despair.

— Jalaluddin Rumi

---

It’s 5 am, time to go home I guess.