#31DaysOfStoryWriting — Before 30

10 min readMar 22, 2021

This post is a continuation of my personal #31DaysOfStoryWriting challenge in March 2021. This 4th week will be dedicated to my story before I’m turning 30 years old.

I’ll turn 30 years old by May 2021, it’s an exciting time to wait for, and also a good time for reflection, what I have achieved, and what I have failed to do. I remember back when I worked for a game developer company, there is a ritual to do a retrospective about the game project that we have done. Now, I’ll try to re-do it in my way to reach 30 years old, what a long year to live, thanks to God.

For those who don’t know yet, I’ll dedicate March 2021 as the revival month for my writing hobby. I’ll try to write a short story every day in this medium blog with this theme plans:

Day 28 — Why I’m So Grateful About My 20s

I realized when we’re getting older, our social circle is getting smaller, our time becomes more limited, and our stress level is increased. Thankfully, I felt the opposite condition, helped by the decision to chase my personal legend (inspired by The Alchemist book). I’m not thinking too much about being in a relationship during my 20s, do what I love and love what I do, and keep growing my spiritual life. Recently, I just realized it’s a privilege to become a single person in my 20s, my social circle is getting bigger, I have more free time, and I can control my stress level thanks to the prayer life.

Thinking about being 30s soon, helped me to realize that I’ll face more challenges and life lessons. I might start in married life later, building my own startup, find my settlement, or the big dream to help Indonesia, shaping its 2045 vision. But rather than thinking too much about the future, I should learn about chasing the present, keep looking for my ikigai, or only just do small things with great love.

Day 27 — Life Lesson Through Video Game Story

My life is not complete without video game inspiration. Let me share one of the video game stories that still imprint in my long-term memory. If you asked me which video game is totally making me have a mind-blow experience when finished the story, it’s a video game named Heavy Rain made by French game developer, Quantic Dreams. My childhood was mostly influenced by Save the Princess kind of game, mostly from Japanese RPG. But when first-time playing this story-driven game, it was a truly cinematic experience while keep myself being part of the main character’s life decision. This game told me a life lesson especially regarding our mental health as human beings. Grief and self-blaming when you lose someone that you loved so much are beautifully integrated into this game story. The murder-case mystery with Sherlock Holmes-style also inserted into the main plot, which made our mind wondering about who is the real culprit. And the best part, you control the story through multiple plots and ending scenarios which are very interesting to explore.

Day 26 — Minimalism and Stoicism

What I learned a lot during my 20s are most of the things that you owned is not an essential thing to have. My first encounter with minimalism is through the “Goodbye Things” book by Japanese author, Fumio Sasaki. I read that just in time before I moved from Sydney to Darwin during my working holiday time in Australia. As I realized it’s such a hassle to bring too many things when I don’t have a place to settle yet, this book really helped to sort out some unessential things that I can sell or donate. The mindset to buy what I need, not what I want, also helped me to free myself from attachment to things. In short, minimalism is not only become a way of life but also a new habit to care more about people surrounding us rather than non-living things.

A couple of days before I moved to Estonia, my friend gave me a farewell gift, a book about stoicism named “Filosofi Teras” (in English: Terrace Philosophy), a beginner-friendly book to introduce me to stoicism. It became my travel companion during my long-haul trip to Estonia. Made me miss the travel time, which is the best time to finish reading some books. Through stoicism, I getting to know about some Philosopher names like Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, and Epictetus. Responding to any event that happened to my life also became calmer now rather than fully reactive. It’s truly a must-have skill in the era of information overflow.

Day 25 — Two Podcast Episodes That Changed My Life Perspectives

Since 2018, I felt that podcast content in Indonesia is growing rapidly in a good way. Actually, before the podcast term itself became more popular, I already listened to many audio spiritual reflections such DailyFreshJuice or FullTank by Bo Sanchez regularly almost every day. And then, when I went back to Indonesia in November 2018, Indonesian podcast content become my regular consumption, mentioning some names such as Box2Box Football Podcast, Thirty Days of Lunch, Suarane, Ceritanya Developer, and also some content from Inspigo podcast platform. Some data science podcasts also become my “to-listen” list, as written here. Let me write some of the podcast episodes that eventually shaping my way of thinking about life perspective.

First is “Spiritual Awareness for Happiness” by Gobind Vashdev on Inspigo platform. Listening to this episode really enlighten me, about how crazy (in a good way) Gobind Vashdev’s way of life is. It gave me the mindset of “every day is time for learning, every person is a teacher, every place is a school”, no matter how bad or good it is. I also made one podcast episode to review about his first book “Happiness Inside”. What a blessing to know such a person like him exists on this planet earth.

The second is “Life At The Crossroad with Ivandeva Wing” by Thirty Days of Lunch podcast. The first season of this conversational podcast is truly inspirational. Listening to some of the episodes helped me get to know more about some personalities that I already knew in more personal and honest conversations, some of them like Willgoz, Najwa Shihab, Aakar ‘Jouska’, Joshua Kevin, and many more. But if I asked to choose one episode that best of the best, that’s the one with Ivandeva Wing. It hits me at that time, when I’m already at a crossroad, between start building my career again in Jakarta, Indonesia, and moving abroad to keep pursuing my dreaming to explore the world. Quotes from mas Ivandeva, “kamu itu ditunggu loh!”, means you’re being awaited by someone in the future. This message really touches my inner-self, which made me believe I still have a chance outside of Indonesia, and who knows that it’s Estonia, the country that I lived and study now. Thank you Ario and Ruby for making this podcast happened, and keep being continued until now.

Day 24 — Mindfulness Practice in Daily Life

My 90-days meditation streak using #Calm app

I remembered back that I’ve achieved a 90-day streak of meditation using Calm app, back in early 2017 in Sydney, Australia. It was the time when I try to adapt to the new place, and it’s so peaceful. One of the reasons why I’m able to do this is that I have a Monday to Friday commute routine to my workplace which is take around 1-hour journey, from the Hurstville suburb to the Sydney CBD area. I woke up around 5 AM, catch the bus from my home to the train station at 5:50 AM, getting the 6:10 AM train to Sydney Central Station, transit at 6:40 AM to NSW Light Rail to Pyrmont area, walk to Google Sydney office, and arrived around 6:55 AM to prepare for work at 7 AM till 3 PM. Based on that daily work routine, I able to spend 10–20 minutes meditation inside the train, just use my earphone and prepare the mobile data. I also listened to an audio podcast named DailyFreshJuice or Bo Sanchez Radiot to get a spiritual breakfast in the morning. The first six months in Australia feel more like a spiritual journey which beating how difficult the work I did in the kitchen,

Now in March 2021, it’s been 4 years since I’m practicing mindfulness, but I must admit that I’m not fully consistent to do it every day or every month. I have some time gaps in meditation practice which I’m trying to recover as Estonia facing a lockdown situation again and I have more free time when work and study from home. Instead of using mindfulness apps like Calm or Headspace, I’m trying different options such as Manifesting Hope meditation from Deepak Chopra or Omvana from Mindvalley. It’s been a couple of days since I’m trying that, and hopefully, I can reach the state of peacefulness through mindfulness again before reaching 30 years old :)

Day 23 — Unlimited Imagination

Look back at my childhood, I grew up with a kids magazine named “Bobo”, with its famous slogan “teman bermain dan belajar” (in English: our friend during play and study time). It became my most favorite moment when having a chance to visit a convenience store or book store, looking for the new release of the magazine which at that time has a weekly release. The magazine that later I knew came from The Netherlands, is my source of inspiration to getting know about the world, science, children story, and elementary school study exercise material. I also got motivation boost when heard that some of the famous artists and musician that I admire also read Bobo during their childhood. Thank you, Bobo!

When I became a teenager, I started to get hooked on video games. Every time I visited a book store, the video game magazine became my number one thing to do. I’m quite lucky that during that time, video game magazine is in their golden era. Some notable names from Indonesia like Kompas Gramedia’s Hotgame, Megindo’s Gamestation, Ultima, and Omega have become a part of my video game journey. Waiting for their game review, walkthrough, even gameshark became the ritual every two weeks (for Hotgame) and every one month (for Gamestation). They also release special editions in many cases such as the 100th edition, 5th birthday, or Final Fantasy collection. That was the beginning of my reading habit which leads me to have limitless imagination of the world that only can be discovered through a fantasy story.

Day 22 — My Pre-University Journey

Back in 2009, when I finished my 3-years senior high school and planning to start my university journey, I’m really want to be accepted into a prestigious public university like the University of Indonesia (UI) or Institute Technology Bandung (ITB). I tried the SIMAK UI entry test with very limited preparation, as most of my friends who takes the test were prepared themselves by joining the extra preparation course (in Indonesia: bimbingan belajar or Bimbel), some names that I remembered like Ganesha Operation, Inten, and some more. I don’t have much support from my parent, as they don’t want to spend extra money for study outside of the normal school, and I must admit that to join that extra course sometimes more expensive than my school tuition fee. More than 10 years later, but I believe this kind of Bimbel will be affected much by the education technology startup such as RuangGuru, Zenius, HarukaEdu, and many more.

I failed in SIMAK UI test, and my dad convinces me to not spend any money again for another public university test. I remembered there is a negative sentiment that for us as Chinese Indonesian, it’s more difficult to be accepted in public universities. Based on that assumption, I also skipped the UNMPTN (Indonesia’s National University Entry Test), and somehow I felt regret that I even didn’t try it. The main reason is that Gunadarma University in Bekasi successfully tease my dad with its scholarship opportunity based on my high school diploma and report score (in Indonesia: Rapot). My dad thought as it is still close to our home in Bekasi, and I don’t need to spend extra money for the house rental fee. Sometimes, I felt that my conservative way of living was influenced a lot by my father. Until a certain point in my life, finally, I learned how to make a decision by using my intuition, while still listening to what our parents told, as I believe their voice is God’s voice.