TEDx Talk: Living Sustainably, One Lipstick at a Time

My personal conflict was that I want to live sustainably, which most times mean that we need to take a look at your living habits and let go of things that aren’t essential. But I also love beauty (amongst other things). I can’t be that person who drops everything and just go to an island to start over life. Can I be both? Sustainable and a beauty lover?

A note: I wrote this post in June 2020, while the talk took place in February 2020. It has only been less than 4 months, but meanwhile, the world has changed so much. It changes the way we work, interacts with others, and with the global recession coming, it’s changing the way we buy beauty products. I believe most of the points are still valid, sustainability is still the way to move forward. Oh, except for one thing: it will take me longer to finish lipsticks because of the mask-wearing, but it’s a sacrifice worth doing. #inthistogether

Exploring this on a TEDx stage does feel a bit strange. After all, over there, everyone seemed to be very sure of their purposes and all ideas looked like it’s the most breakthrough experiment known to humankind (some, for sure!). My explorations turned to the conclusion that sustainable change of behavior takes one small step at a time, a change of habit, instead of an abrupt jump.

The TEDx Talk (at TEDx x HUBerlin)

My Main Learnings

With beauty, as in all other industries, there are two parts of the issue: the producer and the consumer. The beauty industry already responded to some of the challenges in producing sustainable beauty products, some big companies stepped up, and many smaller indie brands are taking the challenge (and winning!).

As a Consumer

Is there more we can do than obviously buy sustainable products? We need to look into the habits of how we use the products. For example, in calculating the CO2 emission of shampoo, it is 20% product and 80% usage.

Next time we’re taking a shower, make it short to save water (together with your boo, perhaps?) and lower the shower temperatures.

Another behavior that all beauty lovers know very well:

Yours truly included. It’s definitely had been one of my sins. Thus became the pivoting start for twindly as an app to love your beauty stash.

And just for fun, here is the real picture of my 104 lipsticks. Yes, remember that 75% number? It will take me 25 years to finish this whole stash, based on the little research we put up here.

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On my #tedxtalk at #tedxhuberlin I confessed of having 104 lipsticks. Here they are along with 11 lipglosses (I swear it’s true, I’m not a lipgloss addict, just definitely a lipstick addict 🙈💄💄💋 ). At the current rate I’m wearing them, it’s going to take me 25 years to finish them all… with the mask wearing 😷 and working at home, it might take even longer 🙃. I know I wouldn’t be able to wear them all up, but understanding my past behavior, inventorying what i bought, and not buying new ones until I ran out of options… it is my way of moving forward. I might need a red, mauve, pink, coral, purple, and black, but I definitely don’t need 5 of the similar shade. Now aiming to be the proud owner of 103 lipsticks soon 😆😆. #declutteryourlife #nobuy #lipstickjunkie

A post shared by Astrid Paramita (@astridparamita) on Apr 7, 2020 at 6:02am PDT

Afterthoughts

You know, the quote that life begins at the end of your comfort zone? Giving this talk turned out to be one of the things that are so far out of my comfort zone. I love TED Talks, but giving one is totally different beast. I realized I still have so much more to learn but I am so glad I took the courage to do this (one has to start somewhere!).