Text & photo: Jaya L.
Indonesia’s underdevelopment is not of fortunes or assets, but of mindset. All this time our people had been using the wrong mindset as a fundament of thinking that causes a wrong foundation of thinking. M. Arief Budiman explained this during Creative Giving event, 20 May 2012 in the DreamLab Building Petakumpet, Yogyakarta. The event organized under the collaboration of Petakumpet, Akademi Berbagi and Wedangan was a part of the Sharing Fresh Ideas event that was held earlier in the afternoon.
The event scheduled to start at 7PM only just began almost an hour later to wait for the arrival of the projector that will be used for the presentation. While waiting for the event to star, audience filled the available space on the floor and enjoyed the prepared warm beverage and snacks.
In a structure, the foundation is the most important thing. But it’s often neglected or forgotten. Usually this was realized once it’s already too late. It could be observed during the big earthquake in Yogyakarta 2006 which caused approximately 6.000 casualties and nearly one hundred thousands unit of residencies were flat to the ground. People whose houses collapsed only just realized the importance of a strong foundation when they saw there were surviving houses.
Similar thing also happened during the economy crisis in Asia circa 1998-1999. Within a couple of months 80% of business in Asia collapsed. This were also because the businesses were lacking strong foundations as it was developed.
By bringing up the two examples, Arief Budiman stated that to stand in equal with other nations what’s required from us is a strong foundation. Foundation in this case is a mindset. Our nation had been broken for a long time, during colonialism our mindset had been broken. This would later rooted deep and even though we’re liberated we’re still experiencing the colonized nation syndrome, with symptoms such as low self-esteem, narrow mindedness, lacking in initiatives, hot headed, reluctant to change, fearing risks and bandwagoning.
Based on the idea Arief Budiman organized a roadshow program for Sharing Fresh Ideas to 40 different cities to discover big people to support. Aried Budiman stated that we do have big people with quality in par with Mother Theresa and Martin Luther King. Currently we have big people like the Young Teachers at Indonesia Teaches who are sent to secluded areas in Indonesia to teach in Elementary Schools. History also wrote of big people such as Soekarno and General Soedirman. People who are willing to take risks are getting rare nowadays.
Next Aried Budiman said that if we wanted something, with focus to the goals to achieve, it will be achieved. The success gained by Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are the fruit of their seriousness and focus. Since young they had chosen and paved the way as an effort to achieve their dream. They pushed aside issues they do not need. Living as simple and as minimalist as they could. For years, until he passed away, Steve Jobs’ environment was only his office and his home. Steve Jobs was very serious with his work he sacrificed family time and the development of his children. He sacrificed it to work and giving something precious for the humankind.
Changes happen all the time. Thus we need to focus to be able to compete. Reality that creative industry actors must face right now is: the age of creaive industry actors are getting younger. The number of people in their early 20s already in the position of Creative Director–even Executive Director–is increasing; Online world tipping point will be reached any time soon, so one should be getting involved and taking shares immediately or being left behind; Communication line is getting more liquid; A shorter and more egalitarian learning cycles; also the fact that our creativity can compete in the world level, but we are lacking insights.
Arief Budiman then screened the “Microsoft Future vision 2019″ campaign video, depicting technology advances in 2019. After the video Arief said that sooner or later change will come. The question is when change happened, where will we be? Will we still be the audience and consumers, or will we be the agent of change?
The campaign video produced by Microsoft is to visualize their dream and transmit it so it becomes a common dream. By making it a common dream it’s getting easier to realized. Thus, Arief Budiman also creating a campaign ti make Indonesia the most creative country in the world in 2020. Encouraging everyone to dream together and work hard to realize it.
Lulus dari Fakultas Hukum UGM program kekhususan HaKI. Aktif terlibat dalam skena musik lokal dan gerakan DIY pada pertengahan 90-an sampai awal 2007, sementara juga bekerja sebagai sound engineer, perancang grafis, kontributor zine, dan pemilik clothing label. Sejak tahun 2007 bekerja sebagai manajer proyek seni rupa lepas dan sound designer.
