Learn Hardcore Indonesian: Stres di kantor bisa melemahkan tubuh kalau kita tidak istirahat cukup. - Stress at the office can weaken the body if we do not rest enough.

Stres in Indonesian is a borrowed word from English stress, and in this sentence it has the same meaning: mental or emotional pressure related to work.

A few notes:

stres (noun) = stress
- Saya banyak stres di kantor. = I have a lot of stress at the office.
stres can also be used like an adjective in casual speech:
- Saya lagi stres. = I’m stressed (right now).

So here, Stres di kantor literally means Stress at the office and functions as the subject of the sentence.

Why is it di kantor and not something like pada kantor or just kantor?

di is the normal preposition for physical location, roughly at / in / on.

di kantor = at the office / in the office

pada is more formal and is usually used for:

abstract locations/targets (e.g., pada situasi ini – in this situation)
more formal writing
indirect objects in formal style (berbicara pada saya = talk to me)

So:

Stres di kantor... = Stress at the office...
Just stres kantor would be wrong; you need the preposition di to show location.

What is the function of bisa in this sentence?

bisa is a modal verb meaning can / is able to / can potentially.

bisa melemahkan tubuh = can weaken the body / is capable of weakening the body

Without bisa, the sentence:

Stres di kantor melemahkan tubuh...

would sound more like a statement of fact: Office stress weakens the body... (it does weaken, not just can).

With bisa, it emphasizes possibility or potential: stress can weaken the body.

What is the difference between melemahkan and just lemah?

The root word is lemah (weak).

lemah = weak (adjective)
- Tubuh saya lemah. = My body is weak.

melemahkan is me- + lemah + -kan, a causative verb:

melemahkan = to weaken (to make something weak)

So:

Stres di kantor bisa melemahkan tubuh... = Office stress can weaken the body (can make the body weak).

If you said:

Stres di kantor bisa membuat tubuh lemah...

that would literally be stress can make the body weak. Similar meaning, different structure.

Why do we use tubuh here instead of badan? Are they the same?

Both tubuh and badan can mean body, but there are nuances:

tubuh
- Often a bit more formal or neutral
- Common in health, medicine, scientific or written contexts
- tubuh manusia = the human body
badan
- Can mean body physically (badan saya sakit – my body hurts)
- Also has many extended meanings: badan usaha (business entity), badan pemerintah (government body)
- Informal speech often uses badan for the physical body too

In this sentence, tubuh matches the somewhat general/health-related tone: weakening the body in a physical-health sense. Using badan would not be wrong, just a bit different in feel.

How is kalau used here? Does it mean if or when? How is it different from jika?

In this sentence, kalau means if:

...kalau kita tidak istirahat cukup.
= ...if we don’t rest enough.

About kalau:

Very common in everyday speech.
Can often mean if or when, depending on context:
- Kalau hujan, saya bawa payung.
  = If/When it rains, I bring an umbrella.

jika also means if, but:

More formal or neutral than kalau.
Common in written or formal Indonesian (documents, essays).

You could say:

Stres di kantor bisa melemahkan tubuh jika kita tidak istirahat cukup.

This sounds slightly more formal, but the meaning is essentially the same.

Why is it kita and not kami or kamu?

Indonesian distinguishes two kinds of we:

kita = we (including the person you’re talking to) – inclusive
kami = we (excluding the person you’re talking to) – exclusive

Here, kita is used in a general or universal sense, like English we or you (meaning people in general):

...kalau kita tidak istirahat cukup.
= ...if we don’t rest enough / if we (people) don’t rest enough.

Using kami would sound like a specific group that does not include the listener. Using kamu would change it to you specifically, not people in general.

So kita nicely expresses the idea all of us / people in general.

Why is it tidak istirahat cukup instead of something like tidak cukup istirahat or tidak cukup beristirahat?

All of these are possible, but with slightly different style:

tidak istirahat cukup (as in the sentence)
- Literally: do not rest enough
- Common and natural in speech.
- cucup comes after the verb istirahat.
tidak cukup istirahat
- Literally: do not have enough rest
- Focus can feel slightly more on the amount of rest as a thing.
tidak cukup beristirahat
- More grammatically complete/formal (using beristirahat, the verb form).
- Sounds a bit more careful/standard:
  - kalau kita tidak cukup beristirahat = if we do not rest enough.

In everyday spoken Indonesian, tidak istirahat cukup and tidak cukup istirahat are both common. The sentence you have is very natural.

What does cukup mean exactly here, and where can it go in the sentence?

cukup basically means enough / sufficiently.

Here, tidak istirahat cukup = not rest enough.

Position:

istirahat cukup = rest enough
cukup istirahat = enough rest
tidak istirahat cukup = not rest enough
tidak cukup istirahat = not enough rest

So cukup can go:

before a noun: cukup waktu = enough time
before an adjective: cukup besar = big enough
before or after some verbs, especially in everyday speech.

In this sentence, placing cukup after istirahat is natural and clear.

There is no tense marking in bisa melemahkan. How do we know if it means can weaken, could weaken, or could have weakened?

Indonesian verbs usually do not change form for tense. Time and aspect are expressed by:

context
time words (e.g., kemarin – yesterday, sudah – already, akan – will)

In this sentence:

bisa melemahkan by itself can map to English can weaken / could weaken, depending on context.

If you really wanted to specify time:

Past (could have weakened):
Stres di kantor bisa saja sudah melemahkan tubuh...
(Office stress might already have weakened the body...)
Future (will be able to/can in future):
Stres di kantor bisa akan melemahkan tubuh...
(not very natural; usually context plus akan elsewhere in the sentence)

But for general, timeless statements like:

Office stress can weaken the body if we don’t rest enough.

Indonesian just uses the plain form:

Stres di kantor bisa melemahkan tubuh kalau kita tidak istirahat cukup.

Why is there no subject pronoun like itu or ini with stres di kantor? Is stres di kantor itself the subject?

Yes, Stres di kantor is the subject of the sentence.

The structure is:

Stres di kantor (subject)
bisa melemahkan (verb phrase: can weaken)
tubuh (object)
kalau kita tidak istirahat cukup (adverbial clause of condition: if we don’t rest enough)

You don’t need itu or ini here. If you said:

Stres di kantor itu bisa melemahkan tubuh...

it would mean That office stress can weaken the body..., referring to some specific stress already known in the context.

Without itu, it’s a general statement about office stress.

Could the word order be changed, like putting kalau kita tidak istirahat cukup at the beginning?

Yes. Indonesian is quite flexible with clause order. You can say:

Kalau kita tidak istirahat cukup, stres di kantor bisa melemahkan tubuh.

This is perfectly correct and very natural. The meaning is the same:

If we don’t rest enough, office stress can weaken the body.

The choice of order is mostly about emphasis and flow, just like in English.