Yardstick

This entry is inspired by Diga's shared item about judgments.

When I was going through my Junior College education in Raffles, I have a favorite dwelling spot two floors on top of my room that I frequent. It is no other than Michael Aditya's room. I believe we have this little thing about how the neighbor's is always greener, and back then, so was Michael's room. It was cleaner, fresher, and always ample with sunlight. I go there almost every instant I feel distracted from my studies, when I have a big decision to make and needed advice, when I missed Jakarta and felt homesick, or needed a company generally.

Michael's room was the Diga-room-equivalent in Raffles JC, with the difference being Diga's room was adjacent to mine.

Anyway, Michael was the first non-family member whom I shared about my late spiritual mentor, and I remember we were discussing about the development of human beings, or as Michael likes to refer it as, the "more enlightened ones". Of course, we come to the necessary foundation of any developmental/progressivist model: What constitutes human development, and how is this development measured? In other words, what makes one human being more developed than the other?

Here, Diga's shared article comes to play. There are certain yardsticks I use to evaluate other people, divided into two categories: ideal and practical. These yardsticks are by no means finalized, as I develop further I shall refine them further as well. Nonetheless, these are the fruits of discussion with the more enlightened ones coupled with the observations and the reflections by yours truly.

Here are my ideal yardsticks: Rahayu, Tajir, and Sadar. My practical yardsticks are the person's world outlook, future horizon, and grandest creation.

I would like to begin by explaining the distinctions between the ideal and practical yardsticks. Ideal yardsticks require a sharper and keener intuition to judge, coupled with usually longer time spent with the person. Judgments based on practical yardsticks, on the other hand, can be meted out based on a single conversation and a few questions. However, a person can easily lie their way out of a judgment based on practical yardsticks, but never can the ideal yardstick be fooled.

I like to compare a person with him or herself in the past, and usually questions about their world outlook, future horizon, and grandest creation will give me a good idea about how developed the person is provided the person is absolutely honest about these. In general, the broader the person's world outlook, the more open-minded the person is to new ideas, and thus the more developed the person is. Having a broader world outlook does not mean being a liberal, nor does it mean to have a precarious stance on his own world views. Rather, it calls the ability to accept and acknowledge that different people come with different perspectives, and the willingness to accommodate and integrate the beneficial or advantageous aspects of another's perspective in order to strengthen and enrich one's own.

A person with a future horizon is a person with vision. He is confident of their lives and continues to believe for a better tomorrow. He has the faith and the energy to improve the lives of others. He is not afraid to break his boring routines and step out of his comfort zone to realize his ideals and ambitions. However, do not fall into the trap of thinking that the person with vision is the person with the grandest ambitions and dreams. Everyone has their own stories and personal legends (copying from Paulo Coelho) and the person with a future horizon strives toward them. His perseverance, confidence, and relentless energy sustaining his vision makes him a step more developed than the rest.

Lastly, a person with karya or creation signals that the person is brimmed with the necessary perseverance, work-ethic, and determination to create something and nurture it. Again, creation should not be reduced to mere gigantic skyscrapers or leviathan robots: Food, painting, music, or even a philosophical teaching are all creations. I confess that not all creations are created equally, but a man is his creation.

However, we all see that a person can lie or inflate stories about their world outlook, future horizon, and grandest creations. That is why these yardsticks are easily administered but easily manipulated as well. Let us get to the ideal yardsticks of a human's development: Rahayu, Tajir, and Sadar.

Rahayu is a Javanese word roughly translating to being happy and at peace with the state of affairs. A developed person may not have the best circumstances in the world, but he or she accepts whatever the conditions are and makes the best out of it. He understands that he needs to accept things the way they are before he can start changing them for the better. Therefore, he is happy, accepting, and is at peace. He is confident that things will go well too.

Tajir is an Indonesian slang which translates roughly to being rich. I like to say Tajir Lahir Batin, a catchphrase an acquaintance introduced to me. It translates to being rich internally and externally. A person becomes rich only when he has the vision, puts in the effort, and conducts himself according to the right attitudes. Again, a person may be physically rich, blessed with tons of money, but mentally poor. In this case, the person is by no means tajir, but instead his wealth only causes him to suffer. On the other hand, I always believe that once a person is tajir in his attitude and internally, the external tajir will soon follow after. Even the poorest of the people may have the Tajir attitude: Generous, believing in abundance instead of competition, not stingy, and charitable. The developed person is Tajir.

Sadar is an Indonesian word for being awakened or conscious. The developed person is always conscious. He is a keen observer of what is happening around themselves, and is able to distinguish between the dramas of the daily lives and the necessary lessons to be learned from these dramas. A sadar person realizes that there is no such thing as coincidence, and is always alert to the possible meanings the Universe seeks to give him through others. Sadar leads to the vision and the confidence and conviction that sustains the vision of the person. The developed person is wide awake and aware of his life's own purpose, and walks through it with confidence, calmness, and conviction, as he is aware of the signposts and roadmaps of life written by the Universe: He won't get lost. By being sadar, a person inevitably becomes tajir and rahayu.

Numerous questions arise from these writings. I am well-aware that these concepts would require further elaborations and examples, especially how to achieve these states of development I am talking about. Well, let me conclude with a short reflection.

Some believe that it is only human to try and give meaning to everything. Birthday is not merely getting a year older, New Year is not merely a new calendar. Death is not merely the ceasing of the human body's function, but people feel compelled to narrate numerous explanations about and after it. Skeptics argue that we are trying too hard to give meaning to everything. The wise see that there is actually meaning to everything, anything, and nothing, and it is up to us to choose whether to acknowledge the fact and seek out the meanings or just live in denial and ignore it altogether.

The external world is driven, but how we respond to it and which path we choose is our own responsibility. The script is thrown to us, but we decide how we act it out.

Everyone has different scripts, connected by the Story behind the scripts, and perhaps in living life with this realization, we understand that we are only playing along with our different scripts. We have every right to enjoy our journey, and thus no wonder the grand masters of the game of life seem to be so peaceful, happy, and free of burden. As a chocolate to our five year old mind, living the ideal/universal way of life would even allow us to sneak a peek on our past or coming scripts, or even others! More on to this later.

Anyhow, Diga, this is my yardstick. This is how I judge myself and other people. What's your move? ;)

Truly Indonesia's Finest,