When Rhythm Breaks: Protests and the Javanese Sense of Time, Balance, and Justice
On 25 August 2025, thousands of Indonesians gathered outside Parliament in Jakarta. What sparked them was simple but heavy: lawmakers were receiving generous housing allowances, while ordinary people faced rising costs, austerity in health and education, and wages that barely stretched.
By the end of August, protests had spread beyond Jakarta. Buildings in Surabaya burned, students clashed with police, and anger rippled across provinces. What many felt was this: the rhythm of society had broken. Those in power were dancing to a beat far removed from the people they claimed to serve.
In Javanese cosmology, when cycles are ignored or balance is broken, disruption follows. And this month, the echoes of Indonesia’s unrest traveled far, to Nepal and the Philippines, showing how imbalance resonates across borders.
Indonesia: The Spark of August
The protests that began on 25 August 2025 weren’t just about housing allowances. They were about inequality. How could lawmakers enjoy luxury perks while cuts were being made to public services? How could Parliament defend privilege while families struggled to pay for schoolbooks or medicine?
For many, it wasn’t only economic. It was moral. In Javanese terms, it was ora adil, unjust. The cycle between leaders and citizens, a rhythm meant to keep society steady, had been disrupted.
Nepal: Digital Silence and Gen Z’s Roar
Just days later, on 4 September 2025, Nepal’s government announced a ban on 26 social media platforms, citing a lack of registration. To Gen Z, who live and breathe digitally, this was more than an inconvenience. It was censorship.
Protests erupted across Kathmandu and beyond. By 8–9 September, demonstrations grew violent, government buildings were set ablaze, and lives were lost.
Here too, rhythm had broken. The younger generation felt silenced, excluded from their rightful place in society’s cycle. Their protests were a demand to be heard, a push to restore balance.
Philippines: Floods and Sovereignty
In the Philippines, September opened with two powerful demonstrations.
On 1 September 2025, citizens protested stolen flood control funds, calling it “drowning in money while drowning in floods.” Misused infrastructure budgets meant lives at risk, corruption taking from both wallets and lungs. (SCMP)
On 8 September 2025, fishermen and activists sailed near Scarborough Shoal, protesting the government’s handling of sovereignty in the South China Sea. For them, it wasn’t abstract geopolitics. It was survival: the right to fish, to live, to exist. (AP News)
Both protests pointed to the same wound: when governance forgets its people, when power ignores its duty, the rhythm breaks.
When Cycles Collapse
Looking at Indonesia, Nepal, and the Philippines, it’s easy to see different issues: lawmaker perks, censorship, corruption, and sovereignty. But underneath, they share a pattern.
It’s the cycle of imbalance:
Privilege over fairness.
Silence over dialogue.
Self-interest over duty.
And like all cycles, it repeats. Promises made, promises broken, protests rise, silence follows, until the cycle spins again.
The Javanese Lens: Rhythm, Balance, and Elinga
Javanese cosmology teaches us that life is not a straight line. It moves in cycles, weton days that repeat every 35 days, pasaran rhythms that shape daily life, rituals that remind us to pause.
When the cycle is honored, balance feels natural. When it is broken, unrest emerges.
Weton reminds us that our birth carries rhythm.
Selametan rituals remind us that small acts of remembrance restore harmony.
Elinga, remembering keeps us grounded when the world forgets.
These aren’t just personal practices. They reflect how society itself should function: leaders and citizens moving in rhythm, power, and people sharing the same beat.
Protest as Resik-Resik Jiwa
In Javanese tradition, cleansing rituals (resik-resik jiwa) are ways to reset the soul. On a larger scale, protests are society’s cleansing.
In Indonesia, citizens cleansed corruption with their voices.
In Nepal, Gen Z cleansed censorship with their refusal to be silenced.
In the Philippines, people cleansed betrayal with demands for accountability and survival.
Each act of protest, however messy, is a cycle of breaking before renewal. It’s a reminder that an imbalance cannot last forever.
Finding Rhythm in Personal Life
These demonstrations show us how fragile balance can be when ignored. But they also invite reflection: what rhythms are we neglecting in our own lives?
In Javanese thought, personal cycles mirror collective ones. When you lose balance, the world feels chaotic. When you honor your rhythm, your weton, your daily pauses, your moments of elinga, you find steadiness again.
From Society to Self
When rhythm breaks in society, protests rise. When rhythm breaks in the self, unrest stirs quietly within. Both demand attention. Both seek renewal.
For me, Javanese cosmology offers a language for both. It teaches that cycles matter. That balance is sacred. That remembering is an act of resistance.
And maybe, just as nations protest to restore justice, each of us can look inward to restore our own rhythm.
If you’re curious about your own cycles, your weton, the day that anchors your personal rhythm, I offer personal Javanese life calendar readings. It’s a way to see how your birth rhythm might guide reflection in turbulent times. Reach me directly on WhatsApp.
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