Life Lessons from the Army: Drills
Drills never made sense to me back then.
Under the blazing sun, I learned Malay words I still remember today.
Kanan pusing. Kiri pusing.
Left turn, right turn, repeat until your brain melts before your body does.
At night, we polished our boots until we could see our teeth in the reflection.
No matter how much we cleaned the rifle, the inspecting corporal would still find “the elephant in the barrel.”
At the time, it felt pointless.
Ridiculous, even.
Only much later did it make sense.
Drills were never about turning left or right.
They were about obedience.
Following instructions without hesitation.
Compliance without questioning.
That’s how you train soldiers.
And in a battlefield, that makes sense.
But here’s the part the army doesn’t teach you.
Civilian life runs on a completely different operating system.
As a civilian, I learned what not to do.
I learned to do the opposite.
Question the status quo.
Slaughter sacred cows.
Ask why.
Why?
Because the boss is not always right.
And the majority is often confidently wrong.
The moment you disobey, you become an outlier.
You stop fitting into the mold.
You’re no longer welcome in certain rooms.
You may even be quietly excommunicated, from organizations, from communities, from polite conversation.
That’s the price.
But here’s the real danger.
When you’re not allowed to express your thoughts freely.
When people are afraid to speak up.
When only one narrative is acceptable.
That’s when you know who controls the game.
And that’s usually the moment freedom has already slipped out the back door.
The army trained me to obey.
Life taught me when not to.
The most dangerous drill is the one that teaches you to stop thinking.
