You're a poet, and you know it Previous Post: the dalailama dilemma

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You’re a poet, and you know it.

We live between worlds—sometimes literally, sometimes metaphorically. Some of us grew up wearing uniforms, our daily routines policed by rigorous discipline. Others sailed through childhood in T-shirts and sneakers with nearly limitless freedom. As we mature, we realize these polar opposite upbringings share one thing: contradiction. Where there is total control, there is also rebellion. Where there is supposed absolute freedom, there is often hidden oppression or exploitation. We teeter on these paradoxes every day.

If you’re reading this, you may already feel the tension: the push and pull of tradition versus independence, the longing for acceptance from parents or society versus the hunger to discover your authentic self. In some parts of the world, speaking out is taboo. Speaking out is celebrated by others, yet those voices can be drowned out by a million other distractions.

It’s like we’re tesseracts—complex, multidimensional beings—living in a one-dimensional world that only moves from side to side. We recognize multiple truths and contradictions simultaneously. Meanwhile, everyone else seems locked in a single axis of motion, never seeing the deeper facets or the broader contexts that exist just out of sight.

This piece is a reflection on those contradictions—the interplay between cultures of control and cultures of freedom, between worlds that dominate and worlds that liberate. It’s also a story about becoming—grappling with how we’re raised, challenged, and ultimately, the world we’re co-creating with each conversation and action we take.

The World That Raised Me

Routine and Surveillance

My earliest school memories revolve around morning assemblies: a massive, uniformed crowd of children assembled in neat rows, uniforms crisp, ties straight, shoes polished. Discipline was relentless. Every morning, there was always someone prowling with an eagle eye:

Haircuts had to be neat—no excessive length, no fancy styling.
Nails trimmed short, or you’d get a remark.
Hair oiled, neatly combed (for many, that was non-negotiable).
The uniform is meticulously pressed, from the school badge on the shirt pocket to the socks pulled up.
Shoes polished until they glimmered under fluorescent lights.
Tie properly knotted and centered.

Missing any of these and your calendar—a small school-issued diary—would gain a remark: an official note that demanded an explanation from your parents. Collect enough remarks, and you will quickly find yourself in serious trouble.

This micro-management extended well beyond personal grooming. We had to line up for everything—from morning prayer to lunch breaks, library visits, and physical training sessions. You’d be singled out if you spoke at the wrong time or looked in the wrong direction. Every teacher was an authority figure. Every adult had the right to scold, correct, or lecture you on your moral obligations. To a child, the entire world looked like a sprawling disciplinary system.

Hierarchy and Controlled Interaction

This culture of discipline fed into how students interacted. We had 6–10 sections in each grade, with 30 to 50 classmates. This might be normal in many places, but one particular rule was jarring: boys and girls were not allowed to sit together. There was no coed seating arrangement. If a teacher wanted to punish you, they made you share a bench with a classmate of the opposite sex. This alone reflects an entire worldview:

The idea that children must be shielded from inter-gender interactions.
The assumption that such proximity is inherently problematic or distracting.
The use of enforced closeness to the opposite sex as a disciplinary measure, reinforcing old-school notions of “propriety.”

In an environment like this, it’s easy to see how we learned boundaries—not necessarily in a healthy way, but by fear, intimidation, or taboo. We absorbed an implicit message that curiosity about other genders, or, more broadly, about difference, was suspect.

Teenage Whiplash

Then came 10th grade. We completed our board exams—an exhausting, high-stakes rite of passage. Suddenly, everything flipped. Gone were the uniforms, the daily remarks, the unrelenting scrutiny of our hair and nails. All that control vanished almost overnight. Suddenly:

Piercings? Sure, why not?
Tattoos? You can do that now (though your family might raise an eyebrow).
Parties, road trips, exposure to alcohol, cigarettes, or more? Many found themselves flung into a world of near-limitless possibility.

Being thrust into near-total freedom can feel surreal, dizzying, or even terrifying when raised in near-total control. Some people adapt smoothly. Others rebel too hard, too fast, turning to reckless driving, substance abuse, or anything that gives them the rush of having no rules. The complete removal of boundaries often leads to a new kind of chaos.

The more profound realization is that neither extreme is genuinely free. In a hyper-controlled environment, you’re locked down by external rules. In an “anything goes” environment, you might become a slave to impulse or the fleeting approval of your peers. Which one is more suffocating?

That; was normal then. This; is normal now. I still don’t know if I’ve ever seen the truth.

Cultural Contradictions

When I hear how my colleagues were raised, Their shock and discomfort mirrors my own disbelief At what they considered normal: A culture of freedom. A culture of individualism. Of expression. And the joys and pains it brings. But also— A culture of exploitation. A culture of lobbying. Of guns and violence. Of carefully crafted narratives. And the joys and pains it brings.

Sharing these stories with colleagues from more “liberal” backgrounds, I was struck by their shock and discomfort. While they grew up with relative autonomy—questioning parents, forging their own paths, making mistakes without being shamed publicly—my entire upbringing seemed like something from a different planet. But ironically, the more I learned about their “free” environment, the more I saw its own constraints:

Freedom of expression can lead to a tyranny of opinion, as everyone competes to be heard.
Open individualism can breed isolation, with people retreating into their own heads and personal anxieties.
Few or no rules can cause confusion: “What exactly do I do with my life, if nobody tells me?”

When you’re free from the noise of the outside world, you risk becoming a slave to your own mind. Isolation, depression, and existential dread can creep in when no external authority is guiding you. We realize that control can come from society, or it can come from the incessant demands of our own minds.

It made me wonder: When you’re free from the noise of the world, Are you just a slave to the noise of your own mind? Presence of either—worldly control or mental chaos—can make you go crazy.

Which is worse? Is one brand of “control” more straightforward to break free from? The older we get, the more these questions merge into one big swirl of contradictory truths.

The absence of neither is the strange balance and imbalance we all pursue.

The World That Challenges Me

And I started to think. I’m still thinking.

Culture Shock and Acculturation

The shock can be profound for people who leave controlled environments to study or work in places like the United States. As an industry expert (looking at real-world transitions), these individuals often find themselves caught in “acculturation stress”:

Language barriers go beyond words to deeper cues like sarcasm, humor, directness, or self-promotion.
Social norms in Western settings encourage direct eye contact and personal opinions, which can feel taboo if you come from a culture emphasizing respect and hierarchy.
Moral codes might differ drastically. Drinking at 18 can be expected for one person and deeply shameful for another. Dating openly might be celebrated in some circles and considered scandalous in others.

As a data-driven researcher, we see countless studies documenting how immigrants or exchange students experience significant mental and emotional strain adapting to new cultural norms. Depression, anxiety, and identity conflicts often spike within the first year of living abroad. Adjustment is real work.

Family Dynamics: The Control vs. Independence Battle

They don’t realize they’re inside a bubble. The kids don’t either. Both are fighting the good fight—to find balance.

Nowhere does cultural tension manifest more painfully than within families. Parents who grew up in a controlling environment might inadvertently become narcissistic, imposing those same rigid structures on their children. Kids, meanwhile, are shaped by modern influences:

They crave attention in a world dominated by social media.
They crave love, often missing in households that are too busy enforcing discipline to offer warmth.
They crave independence, seeing their peers elsewhere enjoying personal freedoms they don’t have.

When these kids finally attempt to assert themselves—maybe by choosing a major their parents disapprove of or pursuing a romantic relationship that crosses social boundaries—parents panic. They fear losing the control that was once so normal to them. They resort to emotional manipulation or “socialist” guilt trips: “After all we’ve done for you…”

It’s easy to demonize these parents, but remember: they are also inside a bubble they never questioned. One generation’s “normal” is often the next generation’s “trauma.” Both sides are fighting the good fight, in a sense—parents want to protect their children from perceived dangers. In contrast, children enjoy the freedom to explore and define themselves. Neither truly sees how the other’s worldview formed.

Liberals vs. Conservatives: Two Ends of the Same Tunnel

How to break free? How can the kids see the light at the end of the liberal tunnel is conservative? How to break free? How can the parents see the light at the end of the conservative tunnel is liberal?

“The conservative parents don’t like liberal ideas; the liberal kids don’t like conservative ideas.” This line reveals a more profound truth: both sides travel through the same tunnel of dogmatic thinking from opposite ends. Each group thinks it’s seeing the light, but that ‘light’ might be the other side’s illusions.

The conservative lens emphasizes tradition, discipline, and order, vital for cohesion but often stifle individual expression.
The liberal lens emphasizes personal freedom, autonomy, and self-expression, which are ideal for creativity but frequently lack shared grounding or communal support.

The paradox is that both ends claim moral superiority, yet each cling to extremes. As a contrarian innovator, I’d argue that the real solutions emerge in the messy middle—where you can honor traditions and shared responsibilities and embrace personal liberties without letting them devolve into chaos.

Standing at Tiananmen Square, Standing at the Wall

How can kids “stand in front of their parents at Tiananmen Square,” defying oppressive norms, while parents stand as “guards at the wall,” telling their children not to defect? The imagery is evocative. Both sides see themselves as protectors of something precious: kids want to protect their freedom, and parents want to preserve their stability.

Key insight: True resolution comes from confrontation alone and shared vulnerability. When families manage to have open, honest conversations—about expectations, love, and fear—they often discover they share common goals: well-being, growth, and happiness. They simply differ on the means.

How can either side find balance? How can either surrender— Without believing they’ve lost?

What If the Way Out Isn’t Through… But With?

In our quest to transcend these boundaries, we often talk about “pushing through,” “breaking free,” or “fighting for your rights.” But what if real progress requires recognizing that none of us is entirely free or fully controlled? We are constantly co-creating our realities. Collaborating with those who seem opposed to us sometimes reveals pathways nobody else saw.

The real crisis is that while we chase some grand legacy or dream for our offspring, we risk missing the everyday truths—kindness, empathy, shared humanity—that can bind us. We can’t fix society by ignoring half of it or labeling the other side as the “villain.” We have to coexist, or we’ll both remain enslaved to illusions.

In our pursuit of leaving behind a legacy, We’re losing sight of the Big Bang— That was, That is, And always will be.

The World We Are Creating

We come from a world where a perceived original idea Sends ripples through the system. Yet a genuinely original one? It breaks the damn system apart.

Seeing Both Sides

We come from a world with a 300,000-year-old history— Yet we also come from a world that can’t move past The last 300 years of slavery.

Those of us who have navigated between extremes—immigrants, third-culture kids, global nomads—often find ourselves asked: “So which side are you on? Are you from the old world or the new?”

The answer, invariably, is: both. We come from “two worlds,” or from all we’ve experienced. This multiplicity is both a gift and a curse. It allows us to see truths others miss but leaves us feeling unmoored and misunderstood.

Global Contradictions

We come from a world where armies defend countries from weapons of mass destruction— Yet those very countries use words of mental dominance To wage war against their own people.

In a time when technology has made our planet more interwoven than ever, these contradictions scale up:

China’s Great Firewall vs. the hearts of the Chinese people who yearn for connection and understanding.
Lobbying for sugary drinks vs. the refusal to acknowledge universal rights for women.
Celebration of pseudo-original ideas vs. the system-shattering impact of truly original innovations.
Immediate sirens for missile threats vs. the casual acceptance of unidentified balloons crossing borders.
Mantras of “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” vs. shipping massive amounts of waste to vulnerable nations to Swallow it, Suffer it, Survive it
Fostering armies to defend against external threats vs. using psychological warfare on one’s citizens.
Transparency is a virtue vs. hyper-sensitive culture, where directness is taken as an insult.
Long histories stretching back 300,000 years vs. societies unable to move beyond centuries-old traumas.

These are not just headlines; they symbolize core tensions in our modern era—some driven by politics, others by economics, and others by deeply ingrained cultural norms. Each tension demands a deeper look. Which side is “right” in a world teeming with illusions? Probably neither or both, depending on your angle.

Legions and Religions, Explorers and Lovers

We come from two worlds. One with legions. And one with religions.

We come from two worlds. One with explorers. And one with lovers.

One way to visualize the split is that one world organizes itself like a legion: uniformed, disciplined, top-down, emphasizing order. The other organizes itself around personal beliefs, creativity, or religion—holding personal moral compasses above group commands. We’re caught in a cosmic dance between explorers—those who push boundaries—and lovers—those who cling to familiar ideals.

Each type is necessary for the bigger picture:

Legions bring structure and progress in adversity, forging roads, building institutions, and ensuring safety.
Religions (in the broad sense) provide meaning, tradition, moral frameworks, and community.
Explorers question the status quo, discovering new horizons and refusing to be bound by old assumptions.
Lovers remind us of compassion, empathy, and the emotional truths that keep us human.

A Tesseract in a One-Dimensional World

You become multidimensional when you sense that you belong to both legion and religion, both explorer and lover. Meanwhile, society often operates as if there’s only one axis—either you’re with us or against us, either you’re conservative or liberal, either you’re from here or from there. That’s a one-dimensional lens.

But the tesseract is a symbol of higher dimensionality. A tesseract (a “hypercube” in four dimensions) can’t be fully described from our usual vantage point. It’s the perfect metaphor for those who’ve lived multiple realities. You’ve seen the illusions of “freedom,” “control,” and the illusions of believing you can only pick one. When you try to articulate this complexity, you might be met with blank stares—like a 4D object explaining itself to a 1D creature.

Existential Drift and the Pull of Legacy

We often cling to “legacies”—family names, cultural traditions, achievements—to anchor ourselves in the face of many contradictions. It’s comforting to believe we’ll leave a mark that outlasts the flux of daily life. Yet, in chasing legacy, we can blind ourselves to immediate realities:

Parents might push children to become doctors or engineers to uphold the family reputation, ignoring the child’s real passions.

Entire societies might cling to outdated norms, refusing to update policies or beliefs because “this is our heritage.”
Individuals might pursue personal glory—money, fame, recognition—thinking it will secure their place in history, only to discover it fosters disconnection and dissatisfaction.

What if the “Big Bang” was, and always will be, simply creation—the ongoing, dynamic interplay of relationships and experiences? If so, no one can freeze life into a comfortable legacy forever. The world we are creating demands constant reinterpretation. We discover more profound layers of humanity each time we open ourselves to others’ perspectives.

We are part of both these worlds— And yet, somehow, We’re in a league of our own.

Walking Between Worlds: Finding the Balance

Recognizing the Illusions

The first step to embracing this multidimensional identity is acknowledging the illusions on all sides:

Illusion of Absolute Control:
- Government, parents, or culture tries to contain chaos.
- Underneath, there’s always rebellion, dissatisfaction, or stagnation.
Illusion of Absolute Freedom:
- We think no rules mean total liberation.
- In reality, we often trade external control for internal pressure—anxiety, fear of missing out, confusion.
Illusion of Moral Superiority:
- We quickly label one approach “good” and another “bad.”
- But the more we learn about the complexities of each system, the more we see we’re all complicit in some way.
Illusion of Permanence:
- We cling to “tradition,” hoping it will provide stability.
- Everything changes. The relentless flow of ideas, technology, and demographics transforms societies continuously.

Healthy Strategies for Balancing Contradictions

Now, here’s where a few high-leverage “life hacks” or frameworks can help us function effectively—like a tesseract in a world that sees only one line:

Practice Cultural Code-Switching

Learn to adapt your communication style depending on context. When with family, express respect for their traditions. With peers from liberal backgrounds, speak openly about your autonomy. This is not duplicity—it’s empathy, acknowledging the norms of each world without losing your core self.
Create Micro-Environments of Trust

If you can’t change your entire cultural environment overnight, build pockets of space (friends, online communities, hobby clubs) where you can safely express the other parts of yourself. Over time, these micro-environments can expand, bridging the gap between “controlled” and “free” worlds.
Find Meaning in Contradiction

Stop viewing contradictions as failures; see them as dynamic spaces for growth. Each paradox forces you to clarify your values. Embrace the friction instead of fighting it. This approach fosters resilience and fluid thinking—a skill that sets you apart in any domain.
Document Your Evolution

Whether through journaling, blogging, vlogging, or private voice memos, track how your perspectives shift. Reflection quantifies your internal journey, helping you notice where your illusions or inherited biases persist and where you’ve made real progress.
Negotiate Family Boundaries

Instead of blanket rebellion, try structured negotiation with parents or elders. A contrarian approach can be: “I respect your concerns about security, but can we agree on a pilot phase? I’ll try living independently for six months and show you the results.” This shifts the conversation from emotional standoff to problem-solving.

Leveraging Your Multidimensional Insight

If you identify as the “tesseract”—someone who has glimpsed multiple cultural realities—understand that you have unique strengths:

Cultural Translator: You can mediate conflicts between conservative and liberal mindsets, offering both sides language they understand.
Adaptability: You thrive in uncertain environments, having already navigated polar extremes. This skill is highly valued in business, diplomacy, and creative fields.
Empathy: Having felt like an outsider in multiple contexts, you become more sensitive to the struggles of others.
Innovation: Contradiction breeds creativity. Operating at the intersection of cultures often reveals unexpected solutions.

Push yourself beyond your comfort zone, but do so strategically. Being a tesseract in a one-dimensional world means you can see patterns others overlook. However, your insights matter if you act on them decisively, share them effectively and stand firm when challenged.

Conclusion: We Are the Contradictions We Embrace

Ultimately, the question remains: From which world do we come? The short answer: We come from both. We come from every contradiction we’ve witnessed, from every culture that shaped us, from every bubble we burst through. We are shaped by our parents’ illusions, peers’ illusions, and the illusions we forged for ourselves.

Realizing this can be unsettling. It’s far easier to live under a single perspective, blaming the other side for your frustration. But that single-axis existence is a disservice to the depth of our lived experience. We do ourselves no favors by flattening the world into good vs. evil, free vs. controlled, or East vs. West.

Here is the final challenge: Embrace paradox without letting it paralyze you. The most extraordinary growth happens when we simultaneously hold two opposing truths and build something new. We can shape a future that isn’t stuck in the illusions of unyielding tradition or unbounded freedom but one that merges the best of both.

We are, indeed, tesseracts in a one-dimensional world. We can see the deeper dimension of culture, identity, and possibility—a dimension hidden from those who see only forward and backward, left and right, or conservative and liberal. Our job is to shine a light on that dimension, invite people in, and expand the space so others can step out of their lines and into a more nuanced reality.

We won’t all succeed at once, and we won’t do it cleanly. Some will always resist, clinging to illusions that feel safer. But if we commit to bridging the gap—even incrementally—we become the architects of a new norm: a world that values discipline and creative freedom, prizes individual autonomy and community ties, sees the illusions for what they are, and reaches beyond them.

And that is how we all move toward becoming tesseracts—hyper-dimensional beings—unafraid to inhabit multiple truths in a society that so often demands we pick just one.