Blurry Window of My Life is moving to Medium!!

Hi guys! Just want to let you know that I will no longer post in this blog anymore due to some reasons. In the future I will post more on my Medium --> https://medium.com/@mettahandika
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Living a less toxic life... but how?

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“How can she live with her boyfriend? They haven’t even married yet.”

“A girl with tattoos is indeed a naughty one.”

“Boys who use makeup are gay.”

“Those LGBTQs will surely go to hell, I MUST save them!”

...

Do you ever feel that you put your nose in others’ faces too often? (Re: minding other people’s business)

Well, me too.

More than 7 billion people in this world, with different races, different religions, different personalities, different point of views, and of course, different thoughts.

I must admit that it is hard to live with those differences.

We often don’t realize that we are minding other people’s business too much. Not only minding as in we directly interfere others’ life, but also as in it produces toxic thoughts – the kind of thoughts that bring us a negative mind.

Then, how to live a less toxic life?

“Every religion is the same, they teach kindness.” – have you ever heard of this?

There are roughly 4200 religions in this world. In my opinion, yes maybe most of them are teaching kindness. But, it’s not that simple. The “kindness” in every religion is different.

Simple example: for Muslims, sacrificing animals during several occasions is kindness, a right thing to do. For Buddhists, absolutely not! Buddhists believe that killing animal is a sin, so it’s a wrong thing to do. But should we try to convince Muslims not to do that? Because it’s good to help others living a better life (based on our beliefs)? No.

For me, I divide my definition of right and wrong into 2 types.

The generals

I define the generals as the definition that I need to apply to everyone. As long as it doesn’t hurt other people, then I won’t say it’s a wrong thing to do. As long as it brings positive impacts to others, then it’s a right thing to do. But actually this kind of definition is still quite blurry too. If something can hurt me, doesn’t mean that it will 100% surely hurt you too.  Until now, I still use my common sense and try to put myself in others’ shoe too. Additional notes: If it’s not wrong, doesn’t mean it’s right. If it’s not right, doesn’t mean it’s wrong too.

The not-generals

The not-general is the definition that I will apply to myself. Every person has a point of view of what is wrong and what is right, despite from the generals; a point of view that can’t be applied to everyone. For example: because I’m a Buddhist, I believe that killing animal is a sin, including eating live seafood - therefore I try my best not to do it. But then it doesn’t mean that I need to interfere with other people’s life and scold them when they eat live seafood. I keep the definition for myself because it’s me who believe that it’s true.
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These definitions have been helping me a lot in living a less toxic life. When I try to think and act using these 2 definitions, I know better when are the times to voice my opinion and have a more not-biased thought. When seeing someone living his/her life according their not-generals definition, I try not to mind it even though it's wrong according to my not-generals definition.

Now let’s think again:

Does couple that live together hurt other people?

Does someone with tattoos hurt other people?

Does boy who use makeup hurt other people?

Does LGBTQ hurt other people?

Everyone has their own way to be happy, and it is most likely different for each of us. If what they do doesn’t hurt others, is it that hard to let them be happy in their own way?

A Story Behind (and About) My Trip to Beijing with Baidu Indonesia

"How can I go to Beijing?"

I still remember last year I asked this very-straightforward-question to someone in Baidu booth at Tech In Asia Jakarta (because one of my senior went there with Baidu) and they recommended me to join Baidu Marketing Competition. In order to join, I need to make a marketing plan in paper and presentation. That was the 2nd marketing competition I've ever joined, and I never make any structured marketing plan at all. My background is also very far away from marketing, as I am a Computer Science student. But still, I made the paper and presentation wholeheartedly with Beijing as my end in mind. I also asked people for references and googled a lot. (Special thanks to Hanie & Ko Tony who gave me references and advices!<3) I ended up being the 2nd winner of this competition, and I was given a trip to Beijing + some cash as the prize.

Hard work paid off! \(^O^)/

Long story short, last week was finally the time I went to Beijing. I went there with Ka Stara from Baidu and Haikal (The 1st winner). We were supposed to go with the 3rd winner also, but unfortunately she couldn't join us.

It was autumn in Beijing and I've never experienced autumn before, but I checked on the internet and they say autumn is the best time to visit Beijing. The best part was I can be tired by walking and climbing a lot but no sweating at all! Plus I can still bear the cold anyway so no biggie ^O^

In Beijing, we visited some popular tourism spots like The Great Wall, Summer Palace, Tian An Men Square, Olympic Stadium, Forbidden City; also some shopping places.

Here are some documentations:

Casually posing at The Great Wall 

The famous Forbidden City

Summer Palace in Autumn

Beijing Olympics Stadium

Despite from the famous tourism spots, we also visited Baidu's Headquarter, and it was a really nice experience. Baidu's Headquarter is really big! They even have some sliders inside the office. Besides, they also have garden, some restaurants (which the employees can eat there for free), gym, salon, and sleeping rooms! 

The garden

Sleeping rooms! Very cutee

Can you notice the slider?

With Mr Josh from Baidu Global Marketing Team

Me & Haikal in front of Baidu's headquarter!

Lastly, I would like to thank Baidu for giving me this precious opportunity to visit Beijing.

For me who's coming from a middle class family, it's quite hard to go abroad with my own money because I don't receive any pocket money anymore from my parents, and I don't have a stable income as I'm still a student. But with programs like this, it's not impossible anymore to go abroad, even though there are a lot of hard work that need to be done first.

Dreams are the ones that keep me doing tough things, and they do come true if you really work hard to achieve it!🙏🏻