Rojong: Grateful Lightness of Work Together - Indonesian
The sensitive difference between all time together and when needed together
I’m a huge fan of the individual’s power. Before being a crowd, a society, a commune, or any plural form of people, every person must be standing straight alone as much as possible as an individual. In other words, and maybe as a more friendly metaphor, every ingredient of a soup must create its own flavor, color, and character before being mixed in a pot.
I worked in a corporate firm for a long time, I was first a project manager, and tham a team manager who had to work in teams and moreover, who had to make people work in teams. So, I closely witnessed the magic that teams bring to life. I felt all the synergy and solid work where any individual couldn’t otherwise succeed.
On the other hand, while working with people all day, I was so much longing to work alone. The most beautiful moments were the ones I could sit on my desk and had some time to work alone, to write something, to make some research, or just make some plans with my pen and paper. Me, and myself, alone. I was missing solitude like water. I needed to hear my own voice, listen to my soul and make something that nobody but I could only think of. One of the reasons that I quitted corporate life and chose a solopreneur life which gives a refined solitude, even more than you could want, is my intensive tendency to defend my own work time.
Having lived five years as a solopreneur, I can't express enough how I’m content with my sharp decision to choose myself over all the offerings that a big company gives. The freedom to manage my time, my life, making my own choice almost every day, feeding myself with art and literature is matchless.
After so much praise for individualism and even loneliness, I can excuse myself by saying that it is a consequence of dialectics that today's word is about solidarity.
Rojong is an Indonesian word expressing the lightness that felt when carrying a burden together with others.
When I read about rojong, my love for individual’s power and the joy of solitude was evoked within me, so I wrote about it but all the story of humanity, the success of humankind over all other species —you would immediately remember Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari— is based on our ability to gather around a goal and work together when needed.
Thinking from the most basic level, even parenting is mostly a team work. If you’re not a single parent for any reason —it may be your choice or a matter of chance— parenting is assumed to be done as a team of two: a mother and a father. And, as a solitude fan, I can confess that being a single parent can be exhausting most of the time. My husband is travelling a lot, literally a lot, so I experience single parenting quite heavily and I can say that it’s not easy.
It sounds logical to end this subject saying that human needs solitude as well as solidarity. It shouldn't be so difficult to give some private space for every one, especially those desparately need it.
I wish you a great week of experiencing the perks of being a wallfower as well as the laughing, chirping and working one among human team mates in work or parties.
— Gulsun
Note: Due to heavy sinusitis that ate my last week I could manage to publish my essay today. I had to make a choice between publishing any possible piece under the pressure of catching the deadline and publishing a sincere and well-written piece when I could properly finish it. As always, I chose the latter. Choices make a life.
We are made of stories—that is, of words.
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