Insane Curiosity

No physical health, no curiosity?

Right now some quick thoughts: first… it seems that curiosity, curiosity is best when it is strong, unabated, antifragile.

Second thought… It seems that if you don’t have physical strength, insanely great strength, strength and vigor… you cannot be curious. Why? Assuming that you only slept two hours last night, or feel like shit… my theory is that the pathways for curiosity are shut off.

First, you need an over abundance of health. Therefore, my personal suggestion is almost all a limits of your life should be optimized to promote your Max well-being health strength bigger muscle sleep rest recovery healing etc.

How to heal yourself

So in video games, you’re playing Final Fantasy, any RPG, MMORPG, role-play game etc.… What it seems that is that who is the most important character? Not the champion or the hero on the front line… But actually… The healer.

Truth be told, nobody wants to be the healer. It is kind of a thankless job, but also at the same time, the most critical job. Why?

Let us say that you’re doing a big boss battle, whether you are doing it by yourself or in a party. If you don’t have a healer… Even if you’re the best fighter… You will not win.

Also very interesting… even in the Iliad, when you’re thinking about the dramas and battles which are unfolding, the number one critical thing is when the heroes get injured. For example, deus, Ajax, king Egon, etc. Even getting a small spear wound to the knee or the shoulder is pretty destroying, because it reduces your lethality in battle.

In fact, what is really interesting is that even the gods get wounded. And feel pain. And this is such a radically big idea, because even though that the gods are immortal, which means that they are not immortals, what it means is that God could feel pain, God could get wounded, yet… They just cannot die.

For example, I think there are certain moments in which Achilles or some of the other gods end up spearing Aries, Athena, some of the other gods and goddesses and as a consequence feel deep pain, and injury. And pain and suffering is not stopped until Zeus, Send some sort of magic healer, and then longer feel pain.

Pain?

Obviously no one likes to be in pain. Yet… I think Paine is one of the most intelligent things that we got in our body which does not lie. If you are in Paine, it don’t matter what your theory is… Obviously something is wrong or you’re doing something wrong.

Example… plantar Fasciitis, foot pain, ankle pain the pain back pain whatever. I think the primary issues and problems are our shoes, the way we work on computer desktop or laptops or sitting or even standing whatever… Essentially all the plantar fasciitis foot pains experiment with all those stupid $500 overpriced orthotics etc., and literally none of my foot pain went away until I got the view from five finger shoes, and then boom, almost magically all of my foot pain ankle pain the pain went away! And for a long time, I stopped wearing them because I just thought they looked weird and I felt ashamed to wear them in public. But now I could care less… I am a demigod in the flesh. I don’t know any other human being in real life in embodied reality looks as great and glorious as I do. Even the most jacked guys… They end up having chicken legs.

I’m the biggest goat?

Body elitism

OK, a funny thought:

Technically, body elitism is very democratic. Why? You don’t matter who you are, your age you’re sex or gender racial background whatever… Anyone can build a elite body, assuming that you lift heavyweights, fast, do intermittent fasting, hundred percent carnivore diet, you quit alcohol smoking weed starches sugars drugs, sugars, real sugars fake sugars etc.

And it is so simple and straightforward — I literally got the key right here!

Never eat breakfast for dinner, hard-core interment fasting… Actually is not even that hard… It’s like I have been doing Ramadan every single day for the last seven years. And I can still drink black coffee and drink water! People who do real Ramadan… 1 trillion times more difficult because they are not even permitted to drink water during Ramadan? And obviously… Anyone who thinks that you will die if you don’t eat breakfast or lunch, and you fast until sundown is obviously wrong because there are millions of people who Participate in fasting, during Ramadan all around the world, and obviously nobody’s dying here.
100% carnivore diet: no no no you’re not gonna die and get a heart attack. You’re only gonna get a heart attack and die from type two diabetes, or type three diabetes (alzheimers disease), which is a metabolic disease which is caused by over consumption of sugars, sweets, snacks, desserts, cookies pastries, fake sugar real sugar, dairy, real dairy fake dairy etc.
Just quit alcohol and all drugs. Even the good ones. The only drugs you should consume is maybe 100% black coffee, just drink fine robusta– ERIC KIM OMAKASE COFFEE, or get some from CREO–. Or better yet… Don’t drink any coffee. I actually met this one guy Christopher, who doesn’t drink, doesn’t smoke, smoke weed, doesn’t even drink coffee! So much respect.
Quit beer, wine, even red wine… No no no, Reservatrol is not “good for you”– this is just some fake pseudoscience, which was essentially paid by these greedy vitamin making corporations, akin to Amway… or also it is fake science which just tries to make all these fat old people feel less bad about being alcoholics, or trying to feel good about their degenerate lifestyles? Just think… Have you ever met an academic or a scholar or an important literary person who doesn’t drink alcohol not even red wine?

How society is bad

It is all drugs. Your iPhone is the most potent drug, social media Instagram Facebook TikTok, YouTube, Hulu, Spotify podcast… All of them are drugs. Drugs for your mind, drugs your body, drugs for your soul etc.

Why is this a big issue?

First and foremost, what is the number one critical ill in modern Society? Sleep. Most people that I meet… Tend to go to sleep anywhere between midnight and maybe even 3 AM. This is really bad. Technically the popper time to do things is maybe Break your fast and eat an insanely massive 100% carnivore dinner, 3 to 4 pounds of beef, maybe throw some bone marrow ribs and organ meats like beef liver in there. Apparently even lamb liver is really good, you can get them at local Halal markets.

> Don’t buy the lamb (Lamborghini), eat the lamb!

For example, we went to Ranch 99, one of the local Asian Chinese supermarkets, and got a bunch of bone marrow that’s already prepackaged, sliced, and frozen… Which makes for really really good bone marrow, you could just throw it frozen in the air fryer for about 30 minutes on full blast, and boom, you got Liquid steroids for yourself, your kids, your family!

In fact, pro tip for any new parent, what is the one thing you should be optimizing for your kids health? Bone marrow. It is not a choking hazard, it is like steroids in yogurt form. It is literally might be the most nutritious and nutrition dense thing that you could feed your kid, to have them grow, become strong and big, etc.

Feed your kid like Achilles

Currently reading the Emily Wilson translation of the Iliad, and essentially what I want to do is feed myself and Seneca as if he and me and we were Achilles.

Assuming I am Achilles, and Achilles had a son… Seneca, how would we all look like? How and what would we eat, how would we eat, how would we train, what would be our life ethos Telos and desired outcome?

First, maybe the best idea is to train as if you are training for battle, for war.

Your armor is a 60 pound weight vest, whenever your training just keep it on because even apparently the armor of Achilles we in between 100 to 150 pounds, and the average weight of armor for a Greek hop light was maybe in the range of 70 to 60 pounds. So even a 60 pound weight is quite modest… I’m kind of thinking of trying to buy or procure or maybe create or innovate an even heavier weight vest.

And some simple exercises you could do… Very easy, if you assume that you’re 6 pound weight vest is almost like your ancient Greek armor, and you’re Achilles… How would you train?

First, always trained with the 60 pound weight vest on because certainly if you’re going to be training like you’re actually going to go to war or battle… Imagine Achilles with his brand new suit of armor and shield ready for battle… You want to train with your armor on! Let us assume that you were an operator, swat team, delta force, a ranger, etc– a door kicker etc ,,,, how would you train?

And assuming that we’re not using any pussy guns here. In fact, I love John Wick to death, and Keanu Reeves… But if I was Chad, and I am directing the new John Wick six or whatever… I would put Keanu Reeves on a 100% diet, Feed him nothing but beef liver, beef, beef kidney, beef lungs, bone marrow, and Wagyu short ribs… Had him lift her very very heavyweights, ERIC KIM hype lifting style, atlas lift, rack full, dead lift, dead lift walk, squat walk whatever… And have him do his thing.

What happened to muscle?

What are my pride was as a kid growing up, even to college and beyond was my muscle. I did not have techniques or skill, but I had muscle, I had strength, I had courage, I had my ego, and I had my muscles.

For me, in my mind I saw myself like a Shaquille O’Neal when playing basketball… I would always play center, because nobody could out muscle me, and also my legs are so insanely strong… I don’t know anybody with stronger legs than I do. Somebody who could lift over 1000 pounds, over 10 plates on the squad rack, and assuming they are not one of those fats steroid guys on the strongman competitions, come get at me.

Anyways, one thing I liked about playing basketball was that most of these guys who played basketball, they are skinny, too wimpy, etc. Even the most dominant player in the NBA… LeBron James, it looks like he could eat more red meat, and lift heavier weights. He almost looks a little bit too green, not muscular and big enough. I would love to see another Dwight Howard, or Shaquille O’Neal, or ideally hybrid between Yao Ming and Shaquille O’Neal… This would be my ideal aesthetic.

… The problem is that there is this notion in sports science that somehow have bigger muscles make you slower, weaker, whatever? And I think 99.9% of sports science is pseudoscience at best… As long as people still talk about “calories“, or “burning calories… There are a bunch of fools. You cannot burn a calorie. That’s not how human metabolism works. even my PhD friends who graduated in biology do not understand this.

As long as you see somebody with an Apple Watch fitness tracker or whatever… They are fools. And actually, shame on you Apple… You know that these metrics are all fake. Why do you give them to people still?

Once again, all these fat people who into running, my simple solution is just give everybody a 60 pound weight, give them a pair of shoes, and have them just walk, this is 1 trillion times more effective than running, which is maybe the most useless exercise on the planet. And causes the most injuries, waste time and money, is hateful, nobody likes to run, not even runners. The only virtuous thing is sprinting… Maybe 50 m, Usain Bolt status.

Back to the topic at hand

Anyways the reason why I care about this and so passion about this is that actually… If you really think about it, your health your sleep your physiological energy power is one quadrillion times more important than your iPhone. For example, I would easily say that it is more virtuous to spend $1000 or $1200 on beef ribs, bone marrow, beef liver heart beef kidneys, organ meat etc.…

And I also have a new experimental idea, maybe I’ll experiment this with myself. A 100% organ meat diet, only beef liver beef hard beef kidneys, bone marrow etc.

I’ll keep you updated.

The mountain

I suppose the goal is to become like Hafthor, obviously without the steroids.

The desired end, the desired goal

OK, I think I got it figured out guys.

The secret of happiness is your kid, your children, having kids etc. The supreme joy and the happiness in life is to have a son, assuming you’re a man, at least one male heir. If you do not have a son, you cannot birth an Achilles.

Let us to say that your first kid, is and by happens to be a boy a man a male… If this is the case, consider yourself infinitely blessed times 1 trillion… After this point, life is all upside no downside.

And if you don’t have any boys, let us say that you’re family with five girls etc.… And the joy is that your daughters is going to have kids of their own… And as long as you birth at least one grandson, you should be fine.

I would actually say the greatest tragedy in life is if you’re 90 years old on your deathbed, no children, no wife, no grandchildren, no great grandchildren etc.,,, the ultimate cruelty in life.

You cannot leave your dog your bitcoin.

Goals

In context of fitness and exercise and training… Maybe the best and most intelligence strategy is to train for battle, to train for war.

Last year, when I was trying to figure out my whole off the grid gym concept, I went on a buying spree, buying a bunch of different weightlifting equipment, functional fitness stuff, etc.

Some interesting things I discovered was the rickshaw farmers walk carry dead lift concept, as well as farmers carry handles, because even though you cannot lift as much like doing one rep Max, on a barbell… It becomes a different type of exercise, which is less about increasing your numbers, but maybe, engaging different parts of your body that typically are not engaged?

Girl

In the ilia… The way that the men taught each other is calling each other little girls.

First, we should not call women girls… This is insanely denigrating. You would not call Hera a girl.

Second, ultimately, when it comes to human beings, it is a binary: do you have a penis and testicles, or do you have cavernous vagina?

I was actually thinking about it, what is unique about having a little boy, and also… Never circumcise your kid, even if you’re Catholic or Jewish … it is essentially genitalia male mutilation for boys. A boy, a man, a male has a penis that sticks outside, and balls and testicles which also stick outside.

A female has a slit, and all of her sexual organs are on the inside.

That technically because we are all women I think when we are born… I think randomly, the way that genetics works is that the ovaries can turn into testicles? And the clitoris is just like a really tiny penis? Not 100% sure, but something like that.

Anyways, just think about the obvious reality: if you have sexual organs would look 1 trillion times different, one is on the outside and one is on the inside, certainly this is going to change your hormones, your physiology, the way you look and feel, Etc.?

Another example… The way that women ululate fat in their hips their butt their back, is patently different than men. Even if you are a very very fit woman, assume you do CrossFit, and you try to do all the gender androgynous stuff whatever, you chop your hair to look like a boy, you dress like a boy or a guy or whatever… Sooner or later, even assuming that you’re 100% ball, button in the flash, you could see within half a second whether somebody is a man or a woman. and obviously, no hormone therapy. Hormone therapy might be the worst thing on the planet, assuming that it is not a life or that situation. Yes yes yes, get steroids if you have HIV aids or whatever, and also, I think medicine, even psychiatric medicine, is good and virtuous if people are literally about to kill themselves, but beyond this, we should take more hands off natural approach, via negativa, none of this ”interventionalista” approach (NASSIM TALEB Antifragile idea). Some intervention is good, like wise interventions. But what should be avoided is naïve intervention, which is bad.

Thoughts of the future

I am a huge ChatGPT, AI proponent. And actually what is very interesting is that my thought is the future of writing, creativity art, prose poetry etc. is more random, more ratchet, less standard.

For example, if you want to use perfect New York Times, Oxford English, ChatGPT will destroy you 1000 times over. Or if you want typical academic scholarly talk, ChatGPT could do that far better than you can. It can pretend to be Hayek, or any constipated childless French philosopher thinker you want it to be.

I am the next Steve Jobs

OK, time to get my Steve Jobs on:

Ideas for Apple, I know you’re reading this (Eric [at] erickim.com)

First, good idea on creating a “quick draw“ option on the iPhone, it looks like you listened to my idea.

Second, the next evolution of photographic styles is also good, I think this is also where you listen to me, having a little bit more flexibility when it comes to adding grain, new image aesthetics to the photos etc.

Streamlined thoughts

Ok Apple, you got a big opportunity here with the future of ChatGPT, AI, etc. Don’t mess this up.

First, do not call it Apple Intelligence, what you need to do is just give Siri a facelift, or a boob job or a butt job, or just think of Siri on steroids.

You’re starting to confuse people, even myself. The question:

What’s the difference between apple intelligence and Siri?

Nobody knows, not even the Apple marketing team!

The image playground for Apple Intelligence sucks

I think you should just ask it. The images look really really bad and ugly. Nobody cares about a disco pigeon… It is even worse than a novelty.

Merging with ChatGPT is a good idea

In fact, the really intelligent strategy would be to just take your chest, and see if you could purchase ChatGPT, open AI etc. If you can’t beat them, Buy them.

Focus on the product not the humans

OK, I saw the new iPhone Pro commercial in the marketing page with the weekend, it was so insanely lame. First, the weekend, it was bad for him… It shows that he is just another skinny fat guy, who doesn’t actually look at handsome or impressive in real life.

Second, that really lame visual of the tiny umbrella on an iPhone Pro, shooting a music video? Don’t try to fool people — nobody in their right mind will ever try to shoot any really really serious video on an iPhone or iPhone Pro. It is like a really bad gimmick.

What people really really want for their iPhone is a stronger a better camera, with better image quality. The new camera control thing, it really makes no sense to me… And upgrading the ultra wide lens was a good idea, but don’t try to do the marketing language that an iPhone is somehow like a DSLR or DSLR replacement. Why? First and Foremost… Nobody uses digital SLE cameras anymore, – it seems that all real working professionals are probably using some sort of Sony A7 camera, maybe a red dragon camera for video, or like an aria camera. and hobbyist photographers are shooting with a Fujifilm X 100 camera, a Ricoh GR camera, or a Leica M or a Leica Q camera.

So, who is the iPhone, iPhone Pro four? Essentially your mom, or maybe Gen Z or millennial? Or like my friend Soren Zhane says, “Zillenial?”

Now what?

How to Become a Millionaire

Big idea: how to store value without a trusted intermediary?

One of the issues with batteries, electric cars, Teslas… You cannot store the value, store the energy! It will slowly bleed. I suppose one of the upside of having a Prius, is the gasoline will sit in your car, and not lose value or energy or power.

Also… If you think about MPG is like maintenance cost… Then he or she becomes the richest, is basically predicated on the fact of here who has the lowest maintenance costs.

the secret of becoming rich

OK, now with my net worth with Cindy and Seneca over 1M, 1.2M and beyond… I suppose now I can say I am a “millionaire“. Yet the irony:

I haven’t bought myself anything in almost 5 years.

The only thing I purchased recently about a year ago was my infamous Texas power squat bar, fully worth it, about $500 USD I think including shipping. this is what allowed me to lift my infamous atlas lift, to visualize this imagine the power squat rack with 10 plates on each side, with a 25 pounder and a five strapped on.

Think plates, not poundage or numbers

Also as this random small aside… Do not think and consider Official numbers, better to think and consider how many plates you could lift. I think we human beings deal better with visuals, rather than arbitrary numbers like how many pounds it weigh or whatever. For example you could tell somebody you could lift 1000 pounds, but that notion is almost too abstract and difficult to decipher. Easier to say that I could lift over 10 plates — my next goal, to lift 11 plates, or 12 plates and beyond?

I suppose the reason why this is so interesting to me is because also I think if we think about bitcoin… Already now… You can measure your wealth by how many bitcoin you own. Casual conversation: how many bitcoin do you own right now? Are you buying bitcoin yet?

For example, do you have one bitcoin, two bitcoin, three bitcoin, five bitcoin, 10 bitcoin? 15 bitcoin, 16 bitcoin, 20 bitcoin, 22 bitcoin? Etc.?

Back to getting rich

My simple thought is now and nowadays, essentially what richness is is how many bitcoin you own? Bitcoin is the first and only real new true money, all other money is fake. This includes the US dollar, which is not real money.

Retention

There is an interesting new trend called “semen retention”– essentially the best idea is

How long can you conserve your spunk?

To me this is a really fasting idea because the biggest issue that a lot of people have is they are always blowing their load far too frequently, I can personally attest to this when all is in my teenage puberty years, my 20s, etc.

The problem is you have all these raging hormones, and rather than channeling that energy power testosterone and seminal power into sports, weightlifting, physical activity and combat… brother, we expelled it needlessly, by jerking off to porn.

Certainly better to jerk off to porn then get some random girl pregnant. Or catch an STD or an STI. Yet, if you’re an adult, in your 20s, beyond your 20s… Certainly once you hit your 30s… Then, I think to maintain your masculinity, to maintain and conserve your semen is a good idea. Only Conserve your semen for your wife, nothing else.

Money retention

Also, this is the funny irony:

Everyone wants to have $1 million in the bank or their checking account, in order to purchase the Lamborghini, the Bugatti, whatever.

But the question is: let us say you have 1.2 M saved up, then, do you mean legal out and buy the Bugatti? No! You conserve that money, you buy bitcoin and you grow that money!

The second that you spend your $1.2 million on a $1.2 million car, now you’re checking account or your balance become $0.00. And now you can’t even afford to pay for gas on it nor can you even pay your insurance on it, let alone for oil changes.

So the irony here is actually… Thought the most strategy is to just buy the Prius, or better yet, get it for free 99!

Never buy a car that cost more than $2500 USD

I would actually say one of my critical get rich abilities was never spending more than $2500 USD on a car. And I am 36 years old, born in 1988.

Tell me what you drive and I will tell you who you are.

Even a funny thing… I see that a lot of guys who work at dealerships… For example my beloved Toyota Culver City dealership… Most of the guys don’t actually even drive a Toyota? Oh she was funny… Always walk by it, and then I ask them… what car do you think I drive… One of the kids Kai said he thought maybe I drove a Porsche 911, which I appreciate it… Because cars are essentially an ethos or concept, not the car itself.

He drives a Lambo.

Now, i’m just going to joke and lie… And ask people when they think I drive what… I’ll just tell them that I drive a Hurucan Tecnica or a Hurucan Sterraro. Because honestly… Maybe currently that is my soul car. It is actually very very surprising to me, I don’t actually really like the Hurrican that much, but frankly speaking… The allure of the scissor doors aren’t really that interesting to me anymore? It just kind of a gimmick, if you think about the original Kouch, which wow was made in the 70s… I think 1974? Funny enough seeing the blog post on it by Lamborghini, it looks so ahead of its time, but now in the year 2024, why is all the design so basic and lame?

The ultimate flex?

If you’re rich, why would you not drive a Lamborghini? Honestly even though I am critical of the Lamborghini is still probably the coolest car.

Or better yet… Drive a Prius, and have your body look like a Lamborghini? This is the true and ultimate flex.

Think MPG, maintenance cost, insurance.

I’m currently watching some Michael Saylor videos on bitcoin as digital gold, the whole innovation behind it etc. Also philosophies on becoming rich etc.

What is the quickest way to get poor? purchase a Ferrari, which after 3 years… You’re going to eat at least $1 million of maintenance fees. After that it is probably a yacht, in which you will eat the maintenance cost after just three years.

Ultimate Granger of a Prius, especially the 2010 edition… It literally almost cost nothing to maintain it. All you gotta do is change the oil, and you’re good!

And also, then PG is on it is so good, I’m probably not spending more than $38 a month on gas. And Insurance is so so cheap, you could just get the cheapest liability insurance, because if you scratch your car, somebody hits it or whatever, it’s not really a big deal.

And also… The whole annoying thing about anxiety. For example, I’m pretty sure if I had the Lamborghini, there’d be a bunch of stupid kids scratching penises into my car, or trying to stand on top of my car and pose with it etc. or the anxiety of a random grandma who parks next to my car scratching my car etc.

Bird poop on your rolls Royce

So there is this really nice park I like to go to with Seneca, the Holmby Hills park and playground. I think I once saw Jimmy Iovine walking around there. Essentially, it is probably the ultimate rich people park, the record-breaking $150 million mansion is right across the street. And I think Hugh Hefner used to have his historic Playboy mansion in Holby Hills.

Anyways, it is a super super nice park, and whenever I take Seneca there… To find parking next to it is always a clutch thing. Unfortunately, my 2010 Prius is barely small enough to actually fit inside of it well. And whenever I park my Prius and find a parking spot, thank god, and I am not worried about birds pooping on my car, or getting leaves stuck on it or whatever… I am so grateful.

Even though I love cyber, I am so grateful that I don’t actually own one, because once again, the whole parking thing! Once again, I think cyber truck is more of a state of mind thing, and an attitude and a concept… Not actually the cybertruck itself.

And also, this is the whole Lamborghini thing. It ain’t really about the Lamborghini itself… Rather it is the attitude around it.

Smile!

What costs nothing, yeah it gives you everything? Super simple, smiling! Smiling a beautiful woman, smiling at kids, smiling at guys, handsome guys whatever.

I think this is the weird thing, for myself… I love all beautiful human beings. When people look dark morose and emo and unwell… They automatically turn me off.

I love beautiful women, I love beautiful men, I love everybody! I especially love children because they are so pure, uncorrupted by society… Since Seneca is not yet in school, he is once again totally un corrupted, and pure! I love this.

Back to money

Now that I’m rich and could essentially afford anything… Ironically enough more more of my gut feeling is towards creative constraints.

For example, growing up poor, given that you have enough wisdom, might be the biggest blessing. Why? When you you have too much money, do you often become lazy and you’re thinking, and also… You become less innovative.

For example, if Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak was not so scrappy, just building apple computers in Steve’s parents garage, Apple might not be the apple that we know today. I am sure that even IVM at the time, even though they were throwing millions of dollars at research and development, they could never match the genius of Steve Jobs.

Also what a lot of people don’t know about Elon Musk, is how insanely scrappy he was. He essentially lived like a homeless person, the first 5 to 10 years of his entrepreneurial endeavor. And even now… He lives a quite ascetic lifestyle, I think he just rents a two bed Bath apartment or structure or mobile thing somewhere in Austin?
So me… Just think, creative constraints. Do not spend money on stuff is actually more manly, more Spartan and more than to just piss away money even though you can!

ERIC

MODERN SUCCESS.

Some innovative thoughts about you, modern-day notions of success?

Rent forever, buy Bitcoin?

CULVER CITY IS PARADISE!

A world beyond email, email newsletters?

How to reach people

How to reach Eric Kim?

The death of email

At this point, I think I have an allergy or an aversion to email. I first had the epiphany when I went wholly off the grid in 2017, living in airplane mode, got rid of my phone, my phone plan for about two years, and spent about two years without checking my inbox or using email. I didn’t even have a phone! The only device I had was an iPad Air — and essentially I just spent all day going to coffee shops, drinking black coffee, zenning out, reading philosophy, thinking, writing, listening to music, making poetry and art, etc.

Essentially at this point… It seems that the “sales funnel” for marketing has to do almost 100% entirely with email, an email newsletter, etc.

But, the problem here:

But, if we imagine a future, beyond email… By the time Seneca is an adult… I doubt he will be using email or would care to use it?

For example, email might be one of the worst, antiquated technologies which exist. It was around since I was a kid, it was AOL 3.0, and getting the infamous “You got mail!”

I’m currently reading Frog and Toad, the audiobook that I got at the LA Public Library with Seneca and we listen to it in the city in our 2010 Prius, and also… We’ve been reading the Frog and Toad friends book that my sister Anna got us… there’s a story in which every single day, Toad is waiting for mail, and he is sad that he never gets it.

Fast forward to today… On average, I think the average American household might get an Amazon Prime delivery every one or two days, some families in the suburbs get one to three packages a day!

And with email, it is a nightmare. People still treat it like text messaging, and now that we have all these millennials, around my age, mid-30s, late 30s, early 40s whatever… who would prefer to text message over just doing a 30-second FaceTime call… All this technology and communication is getting ridiculous.

Even I remember… In the early days of me trying to get to the infamous inbox zero, becoming a Gmail ninja warrior… Email sucks.

First, it is an infinite mind trap. I’ll give you an extreme example… Let us say that you are Taylor Swift, and you get on average 100,000 emails a day, because everyone knows that your email is Taylorswift@gmail.com. If this is the case… How do you advance and proceed in life?

First, can you imagine Taylor spending eight hours a day, just checking her Gmail, and trying to answer every single email? Of course not! We imagine that she has a manager, who does all the dirty work for her.

The problem is, a manager, being signed into a label or whatever… Still, there are some fetters on your freedom.

First, in theory, it is a good idea that you check your own email because you become the ultimate filter; an irony is that even NASSIM TALEB tells a story about meeting a super successful guy, and when asking about the secrets to success, his was a simple one: “Don’t have a personal assistant.” Why? A personal assistant essentially “optimizes” your schedule, kind of like a Kaiser doctor, in 15-minute intervals, ad infinitum, until it squeezes out the maximum productivity out of your sad constrained life.

No, what is the ultimate mark of success for us young millennials? I think it is actually to retire early, the whole financial independence, retire early notion.

Technically, you could already do it probably right now… You’re probably already rich enough. For example, if I told you that rent is only $300 a month in Hanoi, Vietnam… in a brand new studio apartment everything included, and assuming that eating street food, good street food is only a dollar or two a meal… Which means that you could feed yourself on two bucks a day, which is 60 bucks a month, and assuming that coffee is about a dollar a coffee, and let us say that your rough monthly expenses are $200 a month. So let us say that all included, food and rent included is only $500 a month… If you do the math, that means that you could live in Vietnam as a “digital nomad” for only $7000 USD a year!

What if you have kids?

I’m speaking to single people, without kids yet. But even if you had kids, assume you’re living abroad… You could probably send them to the best Montessori or private school, maybe only paying about 50 bucks a month, or 100 bucks a month? For the extreme luxury ones, maybe 200 bucks a month? Or $500 a month? Which is still a deal or a bargain compared to the States, I think some private schools for kids in America could cost $5000 USD a month.

Economic leverage

The other day, I met this very, very cool guy, Justin Atlan, the funnel guy, very smart and great human being and master marketer. Was chatting with him about bitcoin and future prices… Which had me thinking,

Maybe the next step for me to do things is to promote bitcoin, financial independence, freedom, etc.?

I told him that I’m currently 100% invested and vested in Bitcoin, and I told him very blank-faced that when bitcoin hits $10 million a bitcoin or $21 million a bitcoin in 20 years… My face didn’t even flinch.

The very simple economic strategy

Michael Saylor has this notion of being a “triple maxi”– triple (Bitcoin) maximalist. The basic idea is to pour 100% of your money, your income, your life savings into bitcoin, and enjoy the ride!

For myself, my simple economic strategy is this:

Retire today, by becoming so insanely frugal, Spartan, sexy style.

I’ll give you an example… What is the best outfit? Being naked! Second best, being shirtless and topless. Third best, being topless just in the speedo at the beach, Venice Beach muscle Beach, lifting like Arnold in his prime.

Who did Arnold want to become?

I thought that I always think to myself, is whenever there is somebody that you look up to, or somebody you desire to emulate or whatever… Seeking their heroes.

For example, I know that Steve Jobs looked up to Edwin Land, the inventor of the Polaroid camera. Also, Steve Jobs really loved the music of Bob Dylan, he had all the bootleg copies in the early days.

Jay Z was inspired by Afrika Bambaataa. Kanye was inspired by Lauryn Hill and André 3000.

“I wasn’t inspired since Lauryn Hill retired, and three stacks (a stack means a thousand, so three stacks is 3000– Andre 3000), man you’re speaking to the choir!” – Kanye

Everything you heard about me is true and legendary

NASSIM TALEB also has a notion when it comes to quotes. Reading his short book on aphorisms, The Bed of Procrustes, essentially, if you think about ancient literature in the past, there are tons of things that are quotable. But, nowadays, nothing or nobody is quotable anymore.

I’m starting to think… Maybe the true mark of success of a thinker, philosopher, innovator, entrepreneur, etc. is thinking on a 20, 30, or 40-year timeline… whether this person will be quoted or not anymore.

I’ll give you an example… When I was starting off in photography and street photography, there was a bunch of other famous photographers around me, none of them has lasted besides me. Their problems:

Not owning their own platform
Being almost 100% reliant on Flickr, which is now effectively dead (this is what is going to happen to Instagram, already right now with TikTok and other weird stuff coming on.)
Chasing abstract notions of legitimacy, in the real world in the art world etc. All of them are a bunch of insecure losers.

So now what?

The reason why I am all about the 100% pedestrian lifestyle is that when you are in the flesh, a flesh-bound human being, face-to-face with another human being, you can weigh yourself better.

For example, when you are stuck on the 10 or the 405 or local traffic… any skinny fat loser in a loser Range Rover or loser AMG G wagon can honk at you from behind. And it doesn’t matter if they are 4 feet tall, and they weigh 500 pounds. Or they are handicapped in a wheelchair, driving a Rolls-Royce or a Lamborghini. You never know until they pop out of the car!

In fact, typically what I have observed is people who drive very, very impressive cars, tend to be old, weak, some sag on their skinny pale legs, old and fat, baseball hat, etc.

And not to berate anybody but, ultimately, you want to look like Brad Pitt in Fight Club but on steroids… Like the ERIC Kim aesthetic — Adonis style.

Your body don’t lie

Some observations:

First, don’t trust any older bald guys. Why? The big issue here is that a lot of guys who look really, really buff and jacked and muscular, with swole biceps, and a swole chest, but bald and older… Or maybe they are bald but have an impressive beard, are either on steroids or have used steroids, or they are injecting their butt hole with exogenous testosterone etc.

Now the problem here is the truth be told, we always weigh ourselves comparing ourselves to other human beings. Whether we like it or not.

For example, when it comes to weightlifting, weights and numbers… It is all relative. The same goes with height. And wealth. Everything.

For example, is it better to be the person with the cheapest home in Beverly Hills, or is it better to be the richest person living in Inglewood?

Or, is it best to be the richest person in Malaysia, or a semi-successful person in America?

I used to think that 4 plates was a lot. Then 5 plates, then six plates, then seven plates, then eight plates,… actually the seven plate limit is the critical one here, then the nine plates, then the 10 plates, then my infamous thousand-pound lift, which is 10 plates in a 25 and I think a five strapped on each side.

But technically, if I then compare myself with these 7 feet steroided-out monsters, in the strongman competitions, like Hafthor and the like… Lifting 502kg deadlifts, which is 1200 pounds… then my numbers are very, very small. But if I compare myself with any typical gym-goer, even a powerlifter… I am a god in the flesh.

So why does this all matter?

What is the most valuable thing on planet earth? Ideas. Ideas are weightless, not bound by the laws of physics, and infinitely antifragile.

Even some interesting thoughts are that ideas, when they catch on like wildfire, or like a virus, and people remember the ideas inside their head… This is something you cannot strip out of them.

What is it all we desire?

When I was reading a lot of Nietzsche, he used this word a lot called “desiderata” or “desideratum”– I can never really figure out what it meant, but I think what it means is the thing desired.

Like an object, or a concept or an idea that you desire.

Now this is important because this is what shapes a lot of our lives. For example, what is the new modern-day desire, at least the new modern-day millennial desire? Maybe to own a single-family home, to be super-rich, travel the world, go to Japan, eat good omakase sushi etc — and or maybe, having no children, maybe or maybe not getting married, having a dog, etc.

Or, being this weird playboy traveling the world, no obligations, just sleeping with beautiful babes, no pregnancies or STDs, driving around in your Lamborghini with the scissor doors, being a super cool guy, etc.?

True desires vs artificial desires

So my general notion of a true desire versus an artificial one has to deal with maybe media, marketing, societal pressures, etc. For example, let us think about the notion of the desire to own property, a single-family home, or worse, a condo. Where does this desire come from, how did it get propagated, etc.?

First, we think historically… I think the whole American notion of having a single-family home that you own is kind of a post-World War II concept. The basic idea was after our boys came home from the long war, they deserved to have a nice home in the suburbs, purchase their dream Mustang or Corvette, or Stingray… Whatever it may be, and then live a happy family life, picket fence, nice lawn and green grass, 2.2 kids, a dog, a nice garage, etc.…

Certainly, if we think historically, this is a modern-day shift because if we think about ancient Greece, we think about Hector versus Achilles, the Iliad, etc. — or even the Odyssey, and Odysseus — the desires were different.

For example, what is it that Achilles desired? To take Briseis, his prize, and sail back to his fertile lands, and essentially just chill out and retire from war. What is it that Hector wanted? Simply defending Troy, his people, his wife, and his newborn son, which apparently after the fall of Troy, it might’ve been Odysseus or Ajax or one of the Greek heroes who, afraid that one day the child of Hector would avenge his father’s death, threw this poor baby boy off the walls to his untimely death.

Pitiless bronze, the ancient Greeks were cruel

Something which is very shocking to read in the Iliad, the ancient texts of Homer, is how cruel and pitiless they were.
For example, we modern, we have too much sympathy, too much empathy, too much pity. For example, the modern-day American soldier, assuming he kills a bad guy somewhere in the Middle East, might feel bad about it and it might haunt his nightmares in his dreams. Because the average American is still raised on notions of Christian Protestant Jesus morality. That killing anybody, even if you are “in the right” is bad and evil.

However, the ancient Greek heroes and champions had no pity, and would in fact after killing people or about to kill people… Taunt them, boast, brag, and do really terrible things. For example, even Hector wanted to chop off the head of Patroclus and feed his head and his body to the dogs of Troy. And even Achilles, after he avenges Patroclus, does one of the most disrespectful things of all time, which is taking the body, the dead body of Hector, maybe piercing or tying his back legs to the back of his chariot, and just essentially doing laps around Troy, dismembering the dead body of Hector.

No more goals?

I’m starting to think… Perhaps the whole notion of a goal is bad.

For example, if you think about sports… Do you think about soccer, what is it that people seek? To score a goal!

But the problem is in the context of the real world, there is no such thing as a goal. Or a goalie, or a striker.

“Just because there is a goalkeeper doesn’t mean you can’t score!”

For example, I’m starting to think the notion of records, goals, personal records, etc., is bad.

Why? All competition is bad competition. What is it that Achilles wanted? Not competition… He already knew he was the strongest! And everyone else knew it!

Also Hector… Very simple, defending his people! Super simple.

What would Achilles do

Also, what wouldn’t Achilles do?

Radical ideas

OK… Assuming that this might be the most interesting email newsletter on the planet… Some interesting radical ideas:

First, let us assume that I snapped a finger, and I could predict with 100% accuracy that in 20 years, by the time Seneca becomes 21… There will be no more email. Obviously, we will have it, but no one will really check it… Kind of like letters in the mail, 99% of it is spam.

Nobody likes physical mail anymore… And even now… Nobody likes electronic mail, digital mail.

I have a very simple solution, just make it cost a single Satoshi to send an email, or a message or digital message, as a consequence, people will think twice about sending a message to you or not.

This is really the secret to fixing spam, getting rid of spam, etc. We don’t need more Gmail or Gemini in our lives… We just need a new system, a new node, a new paradigm shift.

Satoshi is the way

So are you buying bitcoin yet?

Keep stacking them sats (Satoshis).

Maybe I should become the first bitcoin rapper?

Bitcoin rap
Don’t wrap your stacks
Don’t buy the Maybach, the fake Benz
See laser eyes, Michael Saylor vision lens.

Haha so fire, so lit!

Send emails, email newsletters that you would like to read!

Nobody ever opens up their inbox and says wow, I am so glad that I opened up my inbox, and I am so happy that I read that thing.

The problem is with email… Everyone is trying to sell you something or funnel you into one day buying something. But what if the creator, once they become independently wealthy bitcoin millionaires, and they’re just having fun, they just want to send you messages because they want you to have fun too? Maybe this is the ERIC KIM effect.

ERIC KIM

As an experiment, I’m gonna just start introducing myself like James Bond. Kim, ERIC KIM.

I believe this forever, that your first name and last name is your ultimate asset. For example, the genius that Cindy helped me purchase erickim.com, for about $1000 in 2017… I’m sure that name is now worth at least $100,000. Even my email eric@erickim.com — so clean, so succinct!

Your first and last name

Ryan Holiday — such a good name! Tim Ferriss, Tony Robbins, Guy Kawasaki — all these very successful modern-day entrepreneurs, all first and last names!

ELON MUSK, KANYE WEST, JAY Z, BEYONCÉ ETC.

Even impressive… You know that Beyoncé is influential once the Apple keyboard automatically adds the accent mark to Beyoncé.

Think telos

A new thought I am having in regards to weightlifting… I should be all about every single time, superseding my previous personal record. That every single time I lifted, my simple goal was to increase my one repetition maximum, 2.5 pounds on each side of the barbell, every single time.

Now, my new thought is just every single day, just lift something, just do something. No more need for there to be a plan, even an ethos; the goal is to just do something. No more optimization!

ERIC

Success?

My articles on the philosophy of success via ChatGPT 4o:

The Philosophy of Success
This article challenges traditional views of success, arguing that chasing success for external validation is a trap, and instead promotes self-fulfillment through personal growth.
Read more oai_citation:4,The Philosophy of “Success” – ERIC KIM.
The ‘T’ Technique of Success
Eric Kim shares insights on how to build success by developing a unique voice and mastering self-promotion in the creative field.
Read more oai_citation:3,The ‘T’ Technique of Success – ERIC KIM.
The Philosophy of Time Economics
This article explores how time should be viewed as the most valuable asset and how individuals can maximize their life’s worth by focusing on meaningful experiences.
Read more oai_citation:2,The Philosophy of Time Economics – ERIC KIM.
The Philosophy of Happiness
Kim reflects on happiness beyond material pleasures, encouraging a pursuit of high achievement and fulfillment through meaningful, impactful work.
Read more oai_citation:1,The Philosophy of Happiness – ERIC KIM.

Best entrepreneurship articles

Here are some of Eric Kim’s best entrepreneurship articles that offer valuable insights into his approach to building a successful, self-reliant career:

How to Think Like an Entrepreneur
This article emphasizes the importance of mindset over business strategies. Kim highlights taking risks, learning from failures, and balancing passion with financial security.
Read more oai_citation:4,Most influential eric Kim entrepreneurship articles and links – ERIC KIM.
The Point of Life is Entrepreneurship?
In this piece, Kim explores entrepreneurship as a tool for lifelong self-development and innovation. He stresses the importance of risk-taking and continuous growth.
Read more oai_citation:3,Most influential eric Kim entrepreneurship articles and links – ERIC KIM.
On Risk Taking and Entrepreneurship
Kim shares his journey of transitioning from a full-time job to full-time entrepreneurship, offering practical advice on reducing expenses and the importance of taking risks.
Read more oai_citation:2,On Risk Taking and Entrepreneurship – ERIC KIM.
20 Photography Marketing, Branding, and Entrepreneurship Tips
A collection of practical strategies for building a sustainable photography business, including advice on personal branding, marketing, and creating unique content.
Read more oai_citation:1,20 Photography Marketing, Branding, and Entrepreneurship Tips – ERIC KIM.

Keep learning:

PHOTOGRAPHY ENTREPRENEURSHIP 101 >

STRIKE TODAY!

ERIC

EK BLOG >

Modern Success

Some innovative thoughts about you, modern day notions of success?

Rent forever, buy Bitcoin?

CULVER CITY IS PARADISE!

A world beyond email, email newsletters?

How to reach people

How to reach Eric Kim?

The death of email

At this point, I think I have an allergy or an aversion to email. I first had the epiphany when I went holy off the grade in 2017, living in airplane mode, got rid of my phone, my phone plan for about two years, and spent about two years without checking my inbox or using email. I didn’t even have a phone! The only device I had was an iPad Air — and essentially I just spent all day, going to coffee shops, drinking black coffee, zenning out, reading philosophy, thinking, writing, listening to music, making poetry and art etc.

Essentially at this point… It seems that the “sales funnel” for marketing has to do almost 100% entirely with email, an email newsletter, etc.

But, the problem here:

But, if we imagine a future, beyond email… By the time Seneca is in adults… I doubt he will be using email or would care to use it?

For example, email might be one of the worst, antiquated technologies which exist. It was around since I was a kid, it was 3.0, and getting the infamous “You got mail!”

I’m currently reading frog and toad, the audiobook that I got at the LA Public library with Seneca and we listen to it on the city in our 2010 Prius, and also… We’ve been reading the frog and to our friends book that my sister Anna got us… there’s a story in which every every single day, Todd is waiting for mail, and he is sad that he never gets it.

Fast forward to today… On average, I think the average American household might get an Amazon prime delivery every one or two days, some families in the suburbs get one to three packages a day!

And with email, it is a nightmare. People still treated like text messaging, and now that we have all these millennials, around my age, mid 30s, late 30s, early 40s whatever… who would prefer to text message over just do 30 second FaceTime call… All this technology and communications is getting ridiculous.

Even I remember… In the early days of me trying to get to the infamous inbox zero, becoming a Gmail ninja warrior… Email sucks.

First, it is an infinite mind trap. I’ll give you an extreme example… Let us say that you are Taylor Swift, and you get on average 100,000 emails a day, because everyone knows that your email is Taylorswift@gmail.com . If this is the case… How do you advance and proceed in life?

First, can you imagine Taylor spending eight hours a day, just checking her Gmail, and trying to answer to every single email? Of course not! We imagined that she has a manager, who does all the dirty work for her.

The problem is, a manager, being signed into a label or whatever… Still, there are some fetters on your freedom.

First, in theory it is a good idea that you check your own email because you become the ultimate filter; an irony is that even NASSIM TALEB tells a story about meeting a super successful guy, and when asking about the secrets to success, his one was a simple one: “Don’t have a personal assistant”. Why? A personal assistant essentially “optimizes” your schedule, kind of like a Kaiser doctor, in 15 minute intervals, ad infinitum, until it’s squeezes out the maximum productivity out of your sad constrained life.

No, what is the ultimate mark of success for us young millennials? I think it is actually to retire early, the whole financial independence, retire early notion.

Technically, you could already do it probably right now… You’re probably already rich enough. For example if I told you that rent is only $300 a month in Hanoi, Vietnam… in a brand new studio apartment everything included, and assuming that eating street food, good street food is only a dollar or two a meal… Which means that you could feed yourself on two bucks a day, which is 60 bucks a month, and assuming that coffee is about a dollar a coffee, and let us say that your rough monthly expenses is $200 a month. So let us say that all included, food and rent included is only $500 a month… If you do the math, that means that you could live in Vietnam as a “digital nomad” for only $7000 USD a year!

What if you have kids?

I’m speaking to single people, without kids yet. But even if you had kids, assume you’re living abroad… You could probably send them to the best Montessori or private school, maybe only paying about 50 bucks a month, or hundred bucks a month? For the extreme luxury ones, maybe 200 bucks a month? Or $500 a month? Which is still a deal or a bargain compared to the states, I think some private schools for kids in America could cost $5000 USD a month.

Economic leverage

The other day, I met this very very cool guy, Justin Atlan, the funnel guy, very smart and great human being and master marketer. Was chatting with him, Bob bitcoin and future prices… Which had me thinking,

Maybe the next step for me to do things is to promote bitcoin, financial independence, freedom, etc.?

I told him that I’m currently 100% invested and vested in Bitcoin, and I told him very blank face that when bitcoin hits $10 million a bitcoin or $21 million a bitcoin in 20 years… My face didn’t even flinch.

the very simple economic strategy

Michael Saylor has this notion of being a “triple maxi”– triple (Bitcoin) maximalist. The basic idea is pour 100% of your money your income your life savings into bitcoin, and enjoy the ride!

For myself, my simple economic strategy is this:

Retire today, by becoming so insanely frugal, Spartan, sexy style.

I’ll give you example… What is the best outfit? Being naked! Second best, being shirtless and topless. Third best, being topless just in the speedo at the beach, Venice Beach muscle Beach, lifting like Arnold in his prime.

Who did Arnold want to become?

I thought that I always think to myself, is whenever there is somebody that you look up to, or somebody you desire to emulate or whatever… Seeking their heroes.

For example, I know that Steve Jobs looked up to Edwin land, the inventor of the Polaroid camera. Also Steve Jobs really love the music of Bob Dylan, he had all the bootleg copies in the early days.

Jay Z was inspired by Afrika Bambaata. Kanye was inspired by Lauryn Hill and André 3000

“I wasn’t inspired since Lauryn Hill retired, and three stacks (a stack means a thousand, so three stacks is 3000– Andre 3000), man you’re speaking to the choir!” – Kanye

Everything you heard about me is true and legendary

NASSIM TALEB also has a notion, when it comes to quotes. Reading his short book on aphorisms, THE bed of Procrustes, essentially, if you think about ancient literature in the past, there are tons of things which are quotable. But, nowadays, nothing or nobody is quotable anymore.

I’m starting to think… Maybe the true mark of successive a thinker, philosopher, innovator entrepreneur etc. is thinking on a 20, 30 or 40 year timeline … whether this person will be quoted or not anymore.

I’ll give you example… When I was starting off in photography and street photography, there was a bunch of other famous photographers around me, none of them has lasted besides me. Their problems:

Not owning their own platform
Being almost 100% reliant on Flickr, which is now effectively dead (this is what is going to happen to Instagram, already right now with TikTok and other weird stuff coming on.)
Chasing abstract notions of legitimacy, in the real world in the art world etc. Although of them a bunch of insecure losers.

So now what?

The reason why I am all about the 100% pedestrian lifestyle, is that when you are in the flesh, a flesh bound human being, face-to-face when they’re not a human being, you can weigh yourself better.

For example, when you are stuck on the 10 or the 405 or local traffic… any skinny fat loser in a loser Range Rover or loser AMG G wagon can honk at you from behind. And it doesn’t matter if they are 4 feet tall, and they weigh 500 pounds. or they are handicapped in a wheelchair, driving a Rolls-Royce or a Lamborghini. You never know until they pop out of the car!

In fact, typically what I have observed is people who drive very very impressive cars, tend to be old, weak, some sage on their skinny pale legs, old and fat, baseball hat etc.

And not to berate anybody but, ultimately, you want to look like Brad Pitt in fight club but on steroids… Like the ERIC Kim aesthetic — Adonis style.

Your body don’t lie

Some observations:

First, don’t trust any older bald guys. Why? The big issue here is that a lot of guys who look really really buff and jacked and muscular, with swell biceps, and a swole chest, but bald and older… Or maybe they are bald but have an impressive beard, are either on steroids or have used steroids, or they injecting their butt hole with extrogenous testosterone etc.

Now the problem here is the truth be told, we always weigh ourselves comparing ourselves to other human beings. Whether we like it or not.

For example, when it comes to weightlifting, weights and numbers… It is all relative. The same goes with height. And wealth. Everything.

For example, is it better to be the person with the cheapest home in Beverly Hills, or is it better to be the richest person living in Inglewood?

Or, is it best to be the richest person in Malaysia, or a semi successful person in America?

I used to think that 4 plates was a lot. Then 5 plates, then six plates, then seven plates, then eight plates,… actually the seven plate limit is the critical one here, then the nine plates, then the 10 plates, then my infamous thousand pound lift, which is 10 plates in a 25 and I think of five strapped on each side.

But technically, if I then compare myself with these 7 feet steroids out monsters, in the strongman competitions, like Hafthor and thelike… Lifting 502kg deadlifts, which is 1200 pounds… that my numbers are very very small. But if I compare myself with any typical gym goer, even a powerlifters… I am a god in the flesh.

So why does this all matter?

What is the most valuable thing on the planet earth? Ideas. Ideas are weightless, not bound by the laws of physics, and infinitely anti-fragile.

Even some interesting thoughts is that ideas, when they catch on like wildfire, or like a virus, and people remember the ideas inside their head… This is something you cannot strip out of them.

What is it all we desire?

When I was reading a lot of Nietzsche, he used this word a lot called ”desiradata” or “desiridatum”– I can never really figure out what it meant, but I think what it means is the thing desired.

Like an object, or a concept or an idea that you desire.

Now this is important because this is what shapes a lot of our lives. For example, what is the new modern day desire, at least the new modern day millennial desire? Maybe to own a single-family home, to be super rich, travel the world, go to Japan, eat good omakase sushi etc — and or maybe, having no children, maybe or maybe not getting married, having a dog, etc.

Or, being this weird Playboy traveling the world, no obligations, just sleeping with beautiful babes, no pregnancies or STDs, driving around in your Lamborghini with the scissor doors, being a super cool guy, etc.?

True desires vs artificial desires

So my general notion of a true desire versus an artificial one has to deal with maybe media marketing societal pressures etc. For example, let us think about the notion of the desire to own property, a single-family home, or worse, a condo. Where does this desire come from, how did it get propagated, etc.?

First, we think historically… I think the whole American notion of having a single-family home that you own is kind of a post World War II concept. The basic idea was after our boys come home from the long war, they deserve to have a nice home in the suburbs, purchase their dream Mustang or Corvette, or stingray… Whatever it may be, and then live a happy family life, picket fence, nice lawn and green grass, 2.2 kids, a dog a nice garage etc.…

Certainly if we think historically, this is a modern day shift because if we think about ancient Greece, we think about Hector versus Achilles, the Iliad etc — or even the Odyssey.,, and Odysseus,,, the desires were different.

For example, what is it that Achilles desired? To take Breisis, his prize, and sail back to his fertile lands, and essentially just chill out and retire from war. What is it that Hector wanted? Simply defending Troy, his people, his wife and his newborn son, which apparently after the fall of Troy, it might’ve been Odysseus or Ajax or one of the Greek heroes who, afraid that one day the child of Hector would avenge his father‘s death, threw this poor baby boy off the walls to his untimely death.

Pitiless bronze, the ancient Greeks were cruel

Something which is very shocking to read in the Iliad, the ancient texts of Homer, is how cruel and pitiless they were.
For example, we modern, we have too much sympathy, too much empathy, too much pity. For example, the modern day American soldier, assuming he kills a bad guy somewhere in the Middle East, might feel bad about it and it might haunt his nightmares in his dreams. Because the average American is still raised on notions of Christian protestant to Jesus morality. That killing anybody, even if you are “in the right” is bad and evil.

However the ancient Greek heroes and champions, had no pity, and would in fact after killing people or about to kill people… Taunt them, boast, brag, and do really terrible things. For example even Hector wanted to chop off the head of Patroclus and feed his head and his body to the dogs of Troy. And even Achilles, after he avenges Patroclus, does one of the most disrespectful things of all time, which is taking the body the dead body of hector, maybe piercing or tying his back legs to the back of his chariot, and just essentially doing laps around Troy, dismembering the dead body of Hector.

No more goals?

I’m starting to think… Perhaps the whole notion of a goal is bad.

For example, if you think about sports… Do you think about soccer, what is it that people seek? To score a goal!

But the problem is in the context of the real world, there is no such thing as a goal. Or a goalie, or a striker.

“Just because there is goalkeeper doesn’t mean you can’t score!”

For example, I’m starting to think the notion of records, goals, personal record etc., is bad.

Why? All competition is bad competition. What is it that Achilles wanted? Not competition… He already knew he was the strongest! And everyone else knew it!

Also Hector… Very simple, defending his people! Super simple.

What would Achilles do

Also, what wouldn’t Achilles do?

***

Radical ideas

OK… Assuming that this might be the most interesting email newsletter on the planet… Some interesting radical ideas:

First, let us assume that I snapped a finger, and I could predict with 100% accuracy that in 20 years, by the time Seneca becomes 21… There will be no more email. Obviously we will have it, but no one will really check it… Kind of like letters in the mail, 99% of it is spam.

Nobody likes physical mail anymore… And even now… Nobody likes electronic mail, digital mail.

I have a very simple solution, just make a cost a single Satoshi to send an email, or a message or digital message, as a consequence, people will think twice about sending a message to you or not.

This is really the secret to fixing spam, getting rid of spam etc. We don’t need more Gmail or Gemini in our lives… We just need a new system, a new node, a new paradigm shift.

Satoshi is the way

so are you buying bitcoin yet?

Keep stacking them sats (satoshis).

Maybe I should become the first bitcoin rapper?

Bitcoin rap
Don’t wrap your stacks
Don’t buy the Maybach, the fake Benz
See laser eyes, Michael Saylor vision lens.

Haha so fire so lit!

Send emails, email newsletters that you would like to read!

Nobody ever opens up their inbox and says wow, I am so glad that I opened up my inbox, and I am so happy that I read that thing.

ERIC KIM

As an experiment I’m gonna just start introducing myself like James Bond. Kim, ERIC KIM.

I believe this forever, that your first name and last name is your ultimate asset. For example, the genius that Cindy helped me purchase erickim.com, for about $1000 in 2017… I’m sure that name is now worth at least 100,000. Even my email eric@erickim.com — so clean, so succinct!

Your first and last name

Ryan Holiday — such a good name! Tim Ferriss, Tony Robbins, Guy Kawasaki– Aldi’s very successful modern day entrepreneurs, all first and last names!

ELON MUSK, KANYE WESR, JAY Z, BEYONCÉ ETC.

Even impressive… You know that Beyoncé is influential once the Apple keyboard automatically adds the accent mark to Beyoncé.

Think telos

Now, my new thought is just every single day, just lift something, just do something. No more need for there to be a plan, even an ethos; the goals to just do something. No more optimization!

ERIC

Street Photography 101

Becoming the uber-street photographer:

MASTER THE STREETS:

Ultimate-Beginners-Guide-to-Mastering-Street-Photography-by-Eric-Kim Download

The-Street-Portrait-Manual Download

100-Lessons-From-the-Masters-of-Street-Photography-by-ERIC-KIM Download

ERIC KIM CHATGPT BOTS

STREET PHOTOGRAPHY STARTER KIT

Open source:

What is Street Photography? (2.4gb) / Download
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Street Photography Starter Kit by ERIC KIM VIDEO

STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 101

STREET PHOTOGRAPHY STARTER KIT

Master street photography with STREET PHOTOGRAPHY STARTER KIT.

STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 101

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The Tactics Of Everyday Life

So ever since I was 16 years old, 18 years old, in college etc.… And beyond, I’ve always been really fascinated about this notion of “lifestyle”– to me it is a pragmatic thing, a combination of pragmatics; being self-employed, being your own boss– funny enough, the notion of “entrepreneur”, wasn’t really even mainstream yet…

What was my goals as a kid?

Funny enough I still remember this notion of not wanting to “work for the man” ever since I was a highschooler, and the dream was… To get a high paying job like being a doctor lawyer, and this grand vision and making $100 an hour, just working for a few hours and then just chilling for the rest of the time.

It was quite formative to me, just make a bunch of money for the sake of making a bunch of money was never the goal. And also the desire to purchase property or home or whatever it was also not a virtue or concept instilled on me growing up. We always rented our whole lives… And on average we moved every one to two years, and therefore a consequence, the notion of warning a house wasn’t even a concept.

Also, still in high school, my sense of self pride was strong. I was so insanely proud, 1 million X proud that I was maybe the only person in my whole high school, or anyone I knew… Who actually worked hard for his own money, and bought his own first car! at the age of 15… I think paying $1000 or $1200 for my first car… A very sturdy and reliable 1991 Nissan Sentra SE — a four-door sedan car, five speed manual transmission. Pretty low miles, maybe $100,000 or so? Getting it from Kevin, one of my mom‘s clients at her old sushi restaurant, who was an autumn mechanic in Oakland.

Anyways I had so much extreme pride to myself in my car. For a kid, the pride and joy of earning your own money and buying the thing you desire, was by far the most valuable thing. Not only that, but the pride that my car was a manual transmission… A five speed, and I had the ability to learn how to drive stick shift myself. Good memories of learning how to drive stick from my uncle Enzo, in the old Navy base in Alameda.

Anyways, I think maybe the problem in today’s world is we lack pride, self pride? And we tend to metric Kate our valor and self-worth via numbers, through 12 education to college and beyond.

For example, in school it is all about the grades, then your GPA, then your test scores, then the rank of your university, then the prestige of your job, then your salary, ones and zeros etc.

And then… When you become an adult, older maybe with kids or whatever, then becomes about your home price. Whether your house is worth 3.1 or $3.2 million, friends and family and random guests who check the proper value of your home on Zillow after the fact, rather than asking you directly.

Anyways, the reason why metrics are a poor measure of oneself is that if you are an 800 pound obese man, you cannot walk, but you are a trillionaire… And you own all the Rolls-Royce and Ferraris on the planet does that make you virtuous? I say no.

Desiredarum

Things to be desired

Also, as a man… What is it that we desire?

For example, I think one of the critical issues here is that men, it looks like there is something I call the Shorty guy syndrome – that Shorty guys will always feel inept, inferior… Because obviously you’re standing and valor is based on your height.

The reason why this is not fair is that it is mostly genetic, and maybe what you were fed as a kid.

For example… My insane gratitude that I was born in America, and raised on eating nothing but meat, Galbi Korean short ribs, and rice. I didn’t eat a single vegetable until I went to college.

As a consequence, I became very very tall, I’m around 5 foot 11… And I think I’m 182 cm tall.

Apparently in America, the average height of a man is only 5 foot seven, 5 foot eight? Even most of the famous actors and celebrities see on television, even Mark Wahlberg I think is only 5‘7“ tall?

As a consequence, a lot of these Shorty guys end up taking steroids are doing weird stuff to increase the size of their muscles, their biceps, the width of their body, because this is something that could actually be changed with steroids, lifting weights etc. However, you’ve been if you take all the steroids on the planet, and even if you’re a trillionaire, you cannot magically become 5 foot 7 to 6 foot 2.

Even something very shocking… I ChatGPT the height of Donald Trump, and I think he is 6 foot two?

The reason why I think it is important and critical to search the height of men, whether politicians, fitness celebrities, influencers whatever… Is that whether you like it or not, the tall guys will end up typically have more self-confidence, whereas the short guys will always feel inferior somehow.

Fortunately for myself… I’ve never been insecure about my height. I always knew that I was tall, obviously there were guys were taller than me… But I know that I was still in the “tall” category. And in high school in college… I certainly knew the guys who were short, or on the shorter end.

the Virtues of walking

I think Plato once said, it is impossible for there to be a beautiful small or short woman. She is very very small and short.

I think there is a genetic biased that we will always prefer taller individuals. In fact, why is it that all the super models are about 5 foot 10 and beyond? Because tallness is a virtue that we all desire!

And also apparently it is pretty common for there to be successful rich Shorty guys who want to marry 6 foot tall supermodels, because they desire their next generation of children to be a lot taller than them. Strategy. As a consequence, the optimization for men is to become maximally rich and successful, and attract the most beautiful tallest babe, and have Beautiful children with them.

Men, older men without any kids are uninteresting.

George Clooney is a loser, nobody cares about him anymore.

I think the big issue here is that a lot of people, who watched too much media, movies TV shows whatever… End up getting these strange new virtues or desired outcomes.

For example, there is a strange notion of being the most interesting man alive, but, all you do is drink whiskey and hard liquor, brought out your beard, and have sex with beautiful younger babes?

Let us be frank ,,, any man, who is on his deathbed at the age of 90, no children no legacy no nothing… We always end up regretting it.

You cannot end up leaving your Bitcoins to your dog

Let it say that you die, with your 20 bitcoin or so… Can you leave it behind to your dog? Obviously not.

Even the notion of creating your own charitable foundation seems a little bit superficial… I would put trust in any random administrative person to figure out how to allocate funds, seems that 80% of the funds of a foundation it’s just staff overhead… Paying the staff in office space of these administrators, who just click around and push around paper.

So a very simple thought for us men… Have at least one kid before you die. It could be a girl or a boy, just not a dog.

Are you allowed to be anti-dogs?

In two days insanely degenerate world, is it possible for you to be anti-dogs?

I will make the argument that dogs are 10,000 hundred thousand times worse for the planet and the “carbon footprint“, than any child.

First, there is a chance that your kid can be the one who invented the amazing machine which they really fixes all the climate issues on the planet. Imagine Elon Musk but on steroids.

Second, it is common for dogs to poop in public, even if the dog owners are quite vigilant. You’ll never see a grown child poop in public, even on the public sidewalk.

Strange purchasing behaviors

Let us also consider that dogs, you had to buy all the strange dog products for dogs and pets and animals, whereas for children they could just eat adult food.

Better to get sick than to die

One of the critical issues here is that maybe 99.9% of fatalities, which could be prevented to a certain degree is based on driving. Whether somebody hits you and you die, or whether you hit somebody somebody else and you kill somebody, etc.

As a consequence, perhaps you don’t want to die, minimum lifestyle is the supreme lifestyle.

Sometimes people make the other decision of thinking about purchasing a “safe” car, to offset the chance of dying in a car accident. But the strategy is not a good one because rather than buying safety, the more intelligent strategy is just not jump into the car at the first time!

Why do we try to purchase decisions?

Another foolish thing… We tend to try to buy solutions to our problems. This is the American way.

But I suppose a greater thing to consider… Is it possible for there to be a global economy which is not dependent on purchasing, advertising and marketing? Possibly —

Don’t think global

The reason why thinking about global, macro economics is not useful is that honestly, even if you became dictator the planet, and you had $100 trillion, whatever… It would be impossible for you to change the current global capitalistic market. Even if you had 100,000,000,000,000 times $100 trillion… You couldn’t do it.

This is where I advocate the simple local approach; change every day behaviors and tactics, rather than trying to change the planet.

The planet does not need your saving

A very interesting Taoist thought– to somehow think that the poor planet needs your help is a bit arrogant. The planet will be fine.

I think people who don’t go to church, don’t believe in God, don’t have a religion or whatever… they need some sort of new godhead, something to fasten their world beliefs to, etc.

But what if I told you… With 100% certainty… That within 30 years there will be somebody who invented an ultra amazing magic machine which magically saves the planet forever? If that were the case… What would be the new direction of your life?

What If You’re Already Rich Enough?

Or better yet… as Seneca the younger said… what if you are already too rich?

Wealth

Ever since the time of King Aggamenon, ancient Greeks, even the time of Seneca the younger, men would always lust for more gain. For example, we would want more cattle, more heads of oxen, more sheep, more goats, more tripods of gold, more girls to take as trophies and prizes, more slaves, more weapons armors and spoils of war etc.

Why?

First, I think it is human nature. Certainly if the ancient Greeks and Romans were facing with it… Maybe even the ancient Egyptians… Think about the pharaohs and king Ramses etc.… Certainly there is something in our blood or DNA which dictates this;

Enough is never enough.

However my funny thought:

It’s not a bug, it’s a feature!

Why? If we easily got satisfied too easily, we would all still probably be in a cave, munching on acorns. No photography, no Internet, no digital photography, no iPad Pros, no bitcoin etc.

For any strange individual who does not think that global capitalism has benefited most people, can you imagine just spending a week without running water, electricity, air conditioning and heating, or even a fan, Wi-Fi, or having a washing machine and dryer?

Even at our apartment… The in unit washer and dryer died, and we have been without a washer and dryer inside of our apartment, for maybe three or four days now, and it is a huge pain in the ass.

Fortunately we got air-conditioning for the LA heat wave… I feel bad for all these people who don’t have in unit air-conditioning, — no capitalism and consumerism, no air conditioners.

Reaping the upside, snipping the downside

I think in life, money wealth stuff tools equipment etc. have been one of the greatest booms to humanity. However with greater upsides also comes greater downsides.

For example, Elon Musk… Probably the most powerful man on the planet, but … He probably has $1 trillion worth of problems stressors and angst anxiety on his mind. for example, if you just read Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson… You could see how you do not want to be Elon Musk; all of his troubles anxieties, him waking up randomly in the middle of the night throwing up blood etc. And also, poor lifestyle choices… Parting all night, drinking alcohol, drinking Red Bulls, not good.

In fact, I don’t really trust anybody who drinks alcohol, smokes weed, drinks Red Bull, drinks Coca-Cola or Diet Coke or Coke zero, consumes protein powder or creatine, takes any dietary supplements, watches television or any streaming platforms, plays video games — pretty much nobody. And certainly nobody who has an Instagram account.

I think the critical issue here is that it is already difficult enough to understand yourself, and you know yourself with 100% precision. It is impossible to lie to yourself, because you have a true memory of everything.

For example, I could say and 100% certainty, that I have never even tried creatine, which was considered the slightly strange thing at the time when I was in college, around 2006. And now I don’t even consume protein powder.

I think the trouble here is that it is difficult to know what people do in private, and being a sociologist, and philosopher, I am always curious about the habits of others because I suppose what I am trying to get at is deriving some sort of greater knowledge or ideas about humanity at large, and obviously what I think and say is not true… They are just artful ideas.

Thoughts

Honestly it just comes down to an ethos thing. At the age of 36, now having Seneca, age 3 years five months, I’m actually kind of getting into the point that I don’t like to spend money, or I have an allergy to spending money. The only thing I don’t hesitate on purchasing is meat, red meat, Beef lamb etc.… Because this is a nonnegotiable good, I will consume it, and it will make me stronger.

To me, assuming life is a MMRPG, or a game of Diablo, consuming meat, red meat, bone marrow, beef ribs, etc. is almost like my experience points. Is that continue to lift weights, try more difficult variations, and develop my muscles, sinus, joints body etc.… I continue to become stronger, level up, gain skills and skill trees, and also, becomes stronger, more dominant, more fearsome.

Are people intimidated or fearful of me?

I’m starting to think… Maybe I am the level 70 barbarian night or paladin, and everyone else is just like a level two Druid.

I think the hard thing for people is when they see me, and they witness how tall, powerful, jacked, domineering, loud, ratchet, and friendly and unorthodox… They don’t know how to categorize me. And when it is difficult to categorize somebody or put them in a box, you end up feeling small, a bit nervous, because you cannot tame a wild animal.

For example, growing up in the 510, Alameda Oakland, East Bay as a kid… I graduated from high school in 2006, the whole youth culture was stupid dumb and hyphy, yellow bus retarded, ghost ride the whip, Kram the sneak and E-40, go dumb!

The bay area hyphy movement was really fascinating, because as a highschooler, it instilled me a grand sense of confidence, dancing skills and prowess, and the notion of being able to “go dumb”, was almost like our Maori tribal dance.

Anyways, also the good thing about the movement was a sense of egalitarianism, and everyone was cool and chill. As a guy, all you needed was a white T-shirt (I bang in my white tee), dark blue jeans, and maybe a pair of all white K Swiss tennis shoes, and you were cool! All kids could afford this. Even me!

But I think now, the problem is everything is becoming too hyper and extreme now. Can you imagine… Going to high school, and some kids in your school wearing $700 Balenciaga sneakers and tennis shoes, and wearing 100 supreme white T-shirts… Certainly this is going to diminish your ego. And the funny thing is that even if you send your kids to a private school, in which There is some sort of uniform dress code, the big issue here is that there will always be someway for kids to try to show off how rich they are, bye having the newest iPhone pro, or even bragging about how rich their parents are, seeing their parents pull up in a Lamborghini Urus to pick them up from school etc.

I think the big problem here is that dominance isn’t and shouldn’t be based on wealth and money. In someways, if you want to get super super rich it is pretty straightforward and easy, get a job as a cyber security person, or work some sort of dirty job, which is also dangerous. Or just buy bitcoin.

Why social hierarchy?

I think on a very very basic primal level, what human seek is some sort of primal dominance, because we seek the fairest mates, to produce the fairest children?

For example, I actually call as a highschooler and a college student… I guess my heart was pretty pure… I was always looking for “wifey material”– I still remember 18 years old, trying to find the woman that I would maybe one day marry and have kids with!

For me, very suspicious and scared of sleeping around, because also being raised in my generation, in the 90s and early 2000s… In school we were taught abstinence, and we were shown all these scary pictures of HIV aids, crabs, STDs STIs, and we were taught that the only 100% way to get safe, and not to die from HIV aids was to just not have sexual intercourse… That even with a condom you were not 100% secure.

Anyways, looking back in hindsight, also being raised Korean American, Roman Catholic, I guess it was good that I never got a girl pregnant, caught a sexually transmitted disease or infection, and that pretty much only had one woman in my life.

I often see all these other guys wasting their lives, chasing women going to Vegas etc. What is the issue? I don’t think they know what they want in life?

Time

I suppose now that I am dumb rich, I don’t really have to concern myself with money anymore. As a consequence; at this point, it all becomes pure interest, pure passion, pure curiosity… An honest drive?

For example, once you got your bitcoins and they keep appreciating at 55% APR, year-over-year, for the next 40 years… And once you’re a bitcoin is now worth $10 trillion by the age of 67… Then, how do you live your life?

Or let me give you a thought: what if I could tell you that with 100% certainty you could have $10 trillion, at the age of 65. But, from the age of 35 until 65… You have to live as if you’re only earning $20,000 a year. Would you do it?

Spartan economics

The reason I don’t trust any of these skinny fat loser economists is because:

None of them have been raised in poverty, most of them come from rich families, trust funds, etc. period
Most of them are in terrible physical shape… Look at Warren Buffett… How fat and old and sickly and weak he looks, how are you still consumes Coca-Cola, McDonald’s hamburgers with the bun etc. Or even worse, look at Bill Gates… Look at his beer belly gut, that can instantly kill your boner (Elon Musk tweet)
Most of them are divorced from real reality, don’t walk 30,000 steps a day.
Both of them have academic appointments somewhere, which means that they have infinite money and resources, irregardless of their opinion, being fed from the fat endowments of Harvard and Yale etc.

Create your own economics

My simple economic idea is never spend money on yourself, never buy yourself anything, besides meat.

And the only money you should think about investing is possibly buying yourself some weightlifting equipment, Titan.fitness and Texas power squat bar, but besides this… Nothing is worth it.

Even in the world of photography, honestly all the cameras suck. Cindy and I plan on making a film this December in Vietnam, and we just ordered a Lumix S9 and a 26 mm f8 manual focusing pancake lens, puppy side this, all the other cameras are destined and doomed to die.

Why?

I think the big problem is any digital camera is like an iPhone… It doesn’t matter if you have the newest iPhone Pro, within two or three years, you’re going to get outdated, until you upgrade to the next thing.

Honestly I’m starting to get iPhone, iPhone Pro fatigue at this point… I’m just going to stick with my iPhone SE until it dies. The only other Apple purchase I would probably make is if my iPad Pro M1 chip 11 inch goes totally kaput, then I will buy the newest iPad Pro with the M4 chip, — never ever ever the loser big one, which Steve Jobs would have thrown into the furnace, if he were still alive.

What do you want to create, make, leave behind after you die?

It seems that my open source, self hosted WordPress.org, long-term vision has really paid off. Why? And also how I deleted loser Instagram in 2017…

In a billion years, I would never have predicted, or even imagined that ChatGPT, searchGPT, DALL-E could be invented… And now that it is here, and working insanely well, I was ahead of the curve, almost 20 years!

For example, ChatGPT already knows how I talk, my writing style, because the 40,000 or so open source blog posts that I put on the Internet, it has learned and trained from my own open source web data, and now, my legacy will probably last forever.

I have been doing some sort of fun experiments, been doing some sort of strategies, having ChatGPT 4o write blog posts in the voice of ERIC KIM, and it works so well… Even I read it and it sounds about 75% me. I am searching that within 20 years, it might sound about 85 or 95% me…

Essentially I am doing my own Turing test… I am trying to find out that if I could fool myself! So far no, but it is starting to get pretty shocking and interesting what it can do.

And also… I think the big problem which a lot of writers creators artist don’t know and understand… They really lack and understanding of what exactly AI, ChatGPT, DALL-E is,,, both from a philosophical perspective, and also a technological perspective…

So maybe… I am so well positioned because I have the blood of a blogger, the area Silicon Valley entrepreneur, Steve Jobs Kanye West and Jay Z in my blood?

Why being ahead of the curve doesn’t really make sense

What people do not understand is being ahead of the curve, is not really a good strategy because being ahead the curve… 10 or 20 years, you’re not going to reap the benefits until far later, and or there is a high likelihood that you might not get any benefit at all.

A very high chance of failure

For example, all these guys who pioneered the early electric cars, gain no benefit from it… Even Marc Tarpeting who actually started Tesla, it doesn’t seem that he actually reaped that much benefit from starting Tesla, and now, after Elon and Marc had a fallout… It seems that more or less, Elon owns Tesla now. Or at least probably has a majority share.

So my honest appraisal is this: perhaps then, the only real reason to start something make some thing or entrepreneur or something it’s because you really care? Like you really care? Without any sort of material wealth or financial social economic advancement opportunities?

Truth be told… I never really knew that being open source was a good financial strategy, until about eight years after the fact. And this is the paradox of unorthodox strategies… when you’re doing it, everyone thinks that you’re batshit insane, until 10 or 20 years later, when it is been confirmed that you were right… It always seems so obvious!

For example, when 1 bitcoin was worth $0.00… It might have been a smart strategy to buy $100 worth of bitcoin. My great regret financially, when my roommate Kevin told me to buy some bitcoin maybe even $100 worth, back in my junior year of college, was that 2008?

Even Satoshi has a quote, it may or may not make sense to get some bitcoin… But if it has a chance that it might take off… It might be a good idea to get some…

And even now, bitcoin almost seems like a no-brainer. The only thing to consider is how to stomach the volatility. This is my very simple strategy:

Buy it and forget it!

Literally use Coinbase to buy your bitcoins, and then when you’re done purchasing it, delete the Coinbase app from your phone, and refuse to ever look at prices… You never want to stare at the face of Medusa. No matter how beautiful she may be!

Like if I told you that the face of Medusa was literally the most attractive face of a woman known to man, ever possible, times 1000, and she had a perfect body all akin to that of a porn star… and she was totally 100% butt naked, all angles… But if you knew that even if you took a peek… You would immediately turn into stone and die… Would you do it? Of course not! You turn on the blinders!

same thing with the sirens… You tie yourself to the mask, and you cover your ears with beeswax! Because you know that even the greatest hero Odysseus cannot control himself!

And I think this is where human wisdom comes in… Knowing your potential pitfalls, and strategizing before hand, that potential bad strategy.

Sample a simple financial tip… Back in Berkeley days, that if I wanted to purchase something above $300 USD… I had to consult Cindy first. Ended up being a very good strategy because I am very bad with money.

What is more precious on the planet than your time focus energy, mind space?

Nothing!
ERIC

Photo Capital

The photographer as capitalist:

Some big ideas:

Incoming!

It looks like I was very wise, the idea of making all my photos open source, full free resolution JPEG images, without any stupid signatures, watermarks, etc.

Open source is the key

Why? What it seems is the secret to winning, is to win long-term.

What that means is on in today’s world, the number one issue is that nobody cares to look at your photos. It even seems difficult now to pay money for people to see your photos! Also in the world of writing, now that I live in Culver City, and I have met a lot of writers, is that the number one critical difficulty is getting anyone to even read your draft!

The new economy?

What I think writers, artist, creators, photographers, videographers etc.… The number one critical thing is having anyone look at your stuff!

Why do you care what Alex Webb or Bruce Gilden thinks of your photos?

Honestly, my honest thought is a lot of photographers who end up doing magnum photos workshops is because they just want the chance of the opportunity to show their photos and their portfolio to a really famous notable photographer, and they secretly want praise admiration confirmation or acknowledgment that their photos are in fact good!

This is where the whole portfolio review thing is a bit of a scam; why do you care what other people think about your photos? Why don’t you just review your own photos, portfolio review yourself?

What Satoki Nagata taught me:

First, care about what you think about your own photos.

Photographers also need to pay their rent

It also seems that a lot of photographers, famous older photographers, do workshops or review photos begrudgingly… In fact, I wonder if Magnum photos actually copied me in doing workshops, and street workshops… because before ERIC KIM, nobody did any street photography workshops, it wasn’t a thing. And therefore whenever I witness anyone who brands a street workshop, certainly they were inspired by ERIC KIM.

ERIC KIM was the first to ever do a street photography workshop, with Thomas Leuthard?

Think JPEG and PDF

Anyways, I still think that JPEG, open source free source, or any sort of file types which are open source are the future.

For example, I think PDF is actually still very underrated. Why? To make a digital portfolio in a PDF, looks legitimate, and is very easy to transport and share! Also, assuming you have an iPhone or an iPad… To AirDrop your photos via PDF to someone else via airdrop is very easy, and also… to just store your PDF portfolios and photos in your iCloud Books library is very good!

Use Apple Books!

Never sell your rights

Own your own intellectual property

The number one critical mistake that anyone, any artist ever does is sell their rights, they often sell their rights to their intellectual property whether it be books, movies cinema, concepts ideas etc., and it seems that in the long run, intellectual property, creative property is the most valuable asset?

Why did they sell the Matrix concept?

For example, the Wachowski’s who I think essentially sold their Matrix concept to Warner Bros. discovery, … maybe they did the wrong trade. The Matrix might be the best concept the last 20 years, if the wochowskis owned the rights to the matrix concept, they would probably be billionaires now. But now, they are nobodies.

Writers

So one critical mistake that a lot of people do in the world of writing, is they try so hard to be successful, and finally they sell their script for let’s say $100,000 or $200,000 or whatever… and then the concept becomes a screaming win, and after they put a down payment on a humble condo, they got nothing.

This is where it is wise to think long-term. I would rather be a long-term billionaire or millionaire, rather than a short term $500,000naie.

Never sell the rights!

I promise, I’m so self conscious

100% of everybody cares about what other people think about them. It is human nature! If you 0% don’t care about what other people think, either you have Asperger’s or autism.

In fact, typically people who get diagnosed with Asperger, or low-key autism, end up becoming the insanely successful entrepreneurs. Why? They don’t care about others, what others think about them etc.!

Even Elon Musk, when he did his Saturday night life gig, said that he was the first person to present, who had Asperger, or at least admitted it!

But anyways, the useful thing to consider is that everybody cares about what other people think about them. And it is a good thing. Because everything is judged based on human sociological comparison and weighing.

So for example we photographers, obviously we care about what other people think about our photos, but why? Towards what ends? And what are we trying to prove to who?

ERIC

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ERIC KIM OPEN SOURCE PHILOSOPHY

Eric Kim’s Open-Source Resources:

1. Street Photography Starter Kit

This comprehensive kit includes several essential resources for street photographers:

“What is Street Photography?” (2.4 GB)
“Black and White” (2.3 GB)
“How to Shoot Street Photography” (2.2 GB)
“Street Portraits 101” (1.9 GB)
More resources on composition, editing, and more.

Download Links
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:4,OPEN SOURCE DOWNLOADS – ERIC KIM

2. Free Open-Source eBooks

Eric Kim offers numerous free eBooks covering a variety of street photography topics:

“100 Lessons from the Masters of Street Photography”
“31 Days to Overcome Your Fear of Shooting Street Photography”
“Street Photography Contact Sheets Volume I & II”

Download eBooks
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:3,FREE Open-Source ERIC KIM Stock Photographs – ERIC KIM

3. Free Online Street Photography Course

A complete online course titled “All the World’s a Stage: Introduction to Street Photography” is available for free. It includes:

Basics of street photography
History and key figures
Aesthetics and shooting techniques

Course Outline and Resources
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:2,Free Open-Source Online Street Photography Course: “All the World’s a Stage: Introduction to Street Photography” – ERIC KIM

4. Free Lightroom Presets

Eric Kim also shares free Lightroom presets to help photographers achieve his signature style:

Black and white presets
Minimalist color presets

Download Lightroom Presets
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:1,OPEN SOURCE – ERIC KIM

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PHOTOGRAPHY ENTREPRENEURSHIP 101

Eric Kim’s Most Influential Entrepreneurship Articles and Quotes

1. How to Think Like an Entrepreneur

This article emphasizes that entrepreneurship is more about mindset than business. Kim highlights the importance of taking risks, embracing failures as learning opportunities, and balancing passion with financial stability.
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:4,ERIC KIM HOW TO THINK LIKE AN ENTREPRENEUR – ERIC KIM

2. The Point of Life is Entrepreneurship?

Kim delves into the idea of entrepreneurship as a lifelong experiment of self-development. He discusses the importance of continuous innovation, risk-taking, and using entrepreneurship as a tool for personal growth.
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:3,The Point of Life is Entrepreneurship? – ERIC KIM

3. Entrepreneurship Quotes

This compilation of quotes showcases Kim’s core beliefs about entrepreneurship, including the virtues of pride, thinking differently, and cross-pollination of interests to foster unique ideas.
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:2,ERIC KIM Entrepreneurship QUOTES – ERIC KIM

4. How I Became So Influential

In this piece, Kim shares his journey to becoming influential, discussing the importance of innovation, embracing dissatisfaction as motivation, and the philosophy of continuous improvement in entrepreneurship.
Source: Eric Kim Photography Blog oai_citation:1,How I became so influential – ERIC KIM

EK BLOG >

Photo Capital

The photographer as capitalist:

Some big ideas:

Incoming!

It looks like I was very wise, the idea of making all my photos open source, full free resolution JPEG images, without any stupid signatures, watermarks, etc.

Open source is the key

Why? What it seems is the secret to winning, is to win long-term.

The new economy?

What I think writers, artist, creators, photographers, videographers etc.… The number one critical thing is having anyone look at your stuff!

Why do you care what Alex Webb or Bruce Gilden thinks of your photos?

This is where the whole portfolio review thing is a bit of a scam; why do you care what other people think about your photos? Why don’t you just review your own photos, portfolio review yourself?

What Satoki Nagata taught me:

First, care about what you think about your own photos.

Photographers also need to pay their rent

ERIC KIM was the first to ever do a street photography workshop, with Thomas Leuthard?

Think JPEG and PDF

Anyways, I still think that JPEG, open source free source, or any sort of file types which are open source are the future.

Use Apple Books!

Never sell your rights

Own your own intellectual property

Why did they sell the Matrix concept?

Writers

This is where it is wise to think long-term. I would rather be a long-term billionaire or millionaire, rather than a short term $500,000naie.

Never sell the rights!

I promise, I’m so self conscious

100% of everybody cares about what other people think about them. It is human nature! If you 0% don’t care about what other people think, either you have Asperger’s or autism.

Even Elon Musk, when he did his Saturday night life gig, said that he was the first person to present, who had Asperger, or at least admitted it!

So for example we photographers, obviously we care about what other people think about our photos, but why? Towards what ends? And what are we trying to prove to who?

ERIC

INSANELY JACKED LEGS

I don’t know why, yesterday I guess I walked a lot with Seneca, now that Seneca is giving heavier and heavier… I guess my leg muscles are continuing to adapt and develop.

Today, waking up… feeling insane vigor and strength in my legs. It feels so good!

Godlike thighs

Currently reading the Emily Wilson translation of the Elliott, and there’s this nice scene in which Ares, the God of war slaps both of his thighs. It was such a great visual, because I know exactly what that feels like!

Why the cult of the upper body?

Assuming that your penis in your balls are connected to your Laura after your body… I have a funny theory that if you actually want to increase your manliness, your testosterone, or dominance… Logical option is to 100% focus on strengthening your legs, 1000X.

For example, in the world of bodybuilding, weightlifting, etc.… When you get to the Mr. Olympia levels, the crème de la crème of weight lifting and bodybuilding, it comes down to your wheels, your legs!

In fact, this is something that I witnessed that almost 100% of the guys at the gym don’t have… Impressive legs!

Remember… When I was still at my old commercial gym, I was doing my normal weightlifting thing, and in the freeway section, there was only one young woman, who randomly asked me “are you a swimmer?” I then said no, why? She said to me “your thighs and legs are massive!” a lot of the other guys at the gym witnessed this, and heard it… I think they were all secretly envious and jealous of me.

start from the bottom up

OK… Another thing that was very interesting is that in the Elliott… Some of the ways that the ancient Greek heroes are described as having insanely strong feet and hands.

A very simple thought to strengthen your feet is to go barefoot as much as humanly possible, or the simple vibram five finger shoes. walk around with a 60 pound weight vest, and also do types of weightlifting which involve lifting barefoot while standing up! This could be a rack pull, deadlift walk, atlas lift, farmer’s carries, etc.

Also, the easiest way to strengthen your hands is by not using these weekly straps, and just using plain old chalk, either the powdery stuff or the liquid chalk, both are good, actually the liquid chalk gives you better grip, – and start training your hands to lift heavy dumbbells, barbell, etc.… If you’re using a barbell, for the heavier weights start to use a mixed grip.

For example, even a simple exercise that I did for a while at my old gym was Farmer’s carries with the 150 pound dumbbells, which were the highest or the most heavy dumbbells at the time. Or when I went to the Gold gym Venice Beach… The famous one I conquer the golden 330 pound dumbbells quite easily; just use chalk, and lift up the dumbbells a single 330 pound dumbbell with two hands. Assuming that you could double lift over four plates five plate six plate seven plates eight plates… to lift up a 330 pound dumbbell, especially if it is in between your legs like a sumo lift position, using both hands, and chalk, is actually pretty easy. For a while I was doing the duck walks with it, just as a form of fun training exercises. Unannounced to me, apparently I went viral twice over when some random people were recording me doing it.

SWAT TRAINING

Kind of a random idea… About adaptation etc.

So, one of my new ideas is this notion of tactical training. For example… I bought this pair of shorts from ten thousand.cc, which are actually not very good they already got ripped at the waistband, but I was certainly suckered by the marketing, because they were branded as “tactical“ shorts.

There’s this really great scene in John Wick, which I plan on re-watching again… In which he goes to the Somalier, and one he is getting strapped up and equipped up… There’s this great dialogue and talking in which the Somalier asks John Wick — what occasion? And when he is making his suit jacket, he asks what kind of material to use, and he says “tactical”– so gangsta! Wick essentially gets a suit jacket made, that has built in Kevlar, and he uses as a mini shield, with his suit jacket when he is doing gunfights etc.
Anyways, I think the whole modern day notion of tactical is very fascinating to me because thinking about king Leonidas and the Spartan 300, the battle of Thermopylae, the hot gates, and also modern day times… What is it that we modern day men lack? War, warfare, battle, Physical valor!

And don’t get at me with these pussy guns. Having a gun makes you a coward. It makes your dick size smaller. I actually would like this alternate universe in which let us say I snapped my fingers, and men, grown men… If we got into arguments or whatever, we could do it like Brad Pitt fight club style… No guns no knives, no weapons, just your bare fists. And you just have two dudes getting a ring, topless, and just battle it out.

Boxing

I actually think boxing is quite virtuous, assuming that both parties are wearing gloves, and a protective helmet thing. Why? I think two men often have a disagreement or inimical feeling towards one another, especially when it comes through high school guys were going through puberty or whatever… Just have them let them box it out seems like a good idea.

For example, even when it comes to these technology Titans like Elon musk and… I would love to see them just get into a boxing match together. To see who has the more valor.

American football

One thing that people do not know about ERIC KIM is that I played American football softball junior year, first playing outside linebacker, then my junior year inside linebacker, starting.

Ever since I was a kid, in Bayside Queens New York, I always wanted to become the strongest, the most dominant, the most monstrous. I was the strongest out of all my friends, and everybody knew it.

Anyways, in high school… I then had interest in trying to do the most mainly sport, which was bar none American football. But funny enough, I almost had no idea the rules of American football, and this is also another funny thing I will teach you:

The real players don’t actually fully know how the game is played.

For example, I played defense, because I like to tackle, and I was a tough mofo. I started off as outside linebacker because I had no experience, and then once I proved to my coaches that I was hard and strong, I became middle linebacker my junior year, starting, would call the plays etc.

KILL!

Anyways, it does put chest on your hair, for example, I remember the first time I ever had to practice doing a kick off, it was probably the most unnatural, fearful thing of all… Essentially You kicked the ball, and it goes down the field… And then a guy on the other side grabs it, and you have two parties, battle armor, sprinting at one another for 100% speed… And when the guy with the ball is trying to penetrate the other side, what he does is he grabs the ball like a child, with two arms protecting it, and then dips his head and his helmet and his body is super super low, and what do you have to do as the other side is to also get super super low, to try to get under him, and then you take on this full on collision, and tackle him.

Two things:

first, this is very unnatural, and insanely frightening. Why? Once again, it is not natural to sprint and another guy in full battle armor, and you in full battle armor, and collide head on. The risk of injury is high, even with protective equipment.

Not only that, it does take a lot of physical courage, and also mental courage. For example, you have to trust your own strength, your own skill, your own valor.

I suppose my only regret is I wish I played varsity football my senior year, but my tennis coach, who I respect is my Mr. Miyagi, coach Greg Lowe discourage me from playing football because he thought it would be a distraction to playing varsity doubles tennis, in which I also played in high school, and was number one on the team.

Anyways, I think it is wise to have kids, boys, men, young men etc. engaging some sort of physical combat, training, wrestling exercises, boxing, whatever.

Why? True manliness, true courage cannot be divorced from physical reality.

For example, certainly mental courage, is very important. And also having the courage to speak your mind, even though the whole world may hate you for it.

Or also the courage about Rosa Parks, sitting in front of the bus, and refusing to get up.

Anyways, I think the big issue in today’s world is we have deferred courage into the realm of video games, and other silly things, which are not connected to embodied physical reality.

I was even thinking about it… Tennis, Chas, sports etc.… Certainly they all take skill, but there is no real physical downside to it.

Only sports have a physical downside may be American football or rugby? But beyond that, all these other sports, they are essentially “grass fairies”? (the way that we football players used to make fun of soccer players)

Retention

A few years ago, I give up watching porn. Why? It Just became a little bit ridiculous to me. And also, interestingly enough… I think in ancient China or Korea or somewhere… There was this interesting ocean is that anytime you eject your semen or Seminole fluid, they call it “energy suicide“, and as a consequence, it totally made sense. no man in his right mind would rub one out real quick, 15 minutes before the big fight. Also, I am pretty certain that half Thor did not rub one out real quick before that lifting his infamous 502 kg dead lift.

I think pornography is fine, and a funny thought…

if you watch porn, but you don’t masturbate to it… And you do not eject your seminal fluid, is it still porn?

Maybe not. Maybe it is just erotic art?

I think there’s nothing wrong with masturbation or whatever. Apparently it is a supernatural. And probably better for a teenage void to masturbate rather than get a random girl pregnant. Or even worse catch a STD or STI.

Anyways, I think the primary thing to consider is your physiology. Even Nietzsche mentions that some of his writing, his critique of a lot of the modern day German youth was that they spent too much time wasting their energy, “spending” on women, etc.

The seed of life

OK, if you get rid of all this Christian Judeo moralistic guilt about sexual intercourse whatever… And just made it really really primal, biological,… Natural, what do you have?

Even the other day, walking along the nature preserve and seeing two monarch butterflies chasing one another in the air.

Or, peacock with his beautiful feathers and plumage, to attract a mate.

To mate, to have children, to produce offspring – this is what all the biology, life is all about. Even if you think about bacteria, fermentation, mold, making kefir cheese whatever, what the bacteria does is very simple; it consumes the lactose sugar protein energy sources, and then it produces offspring. All life, animal life and beyond is all about producing offspring, indefinitely.

I think modern daytimes, the anti-children sentiment is very bizarro. I have some theories.

First, who are the people who are promoting this anti-children nonsense, and all this patently insane ideas that children are the worst thing you do for planet in terms of the carbon footprint or whatever? These are individuals, who have no religion, no values, live in Berkeley California, a lot of them childless old people in their late 50s, mid 60s, 70s… And they are bitter and salty about life, and as a consequence, what they try to do is to the rest of society, with their strange vegan values.

Vegetarian is natural, it has been around since time of Seneca the younger. But it was still associated with weird cults, that is why Seneca stopped being vegetarian because he did not want to be accused of being part of a weird cult which was anti-empire. And in India, being vegetarian has been around forever.

However, I think the reason why it is good to beat people in the flesh, face-to-face, not via the Internet is because you could judge them, based on their age their height their physiology, their physical health, their food consumption behaviors etc.

Figure it out as late as possible, ALAP

I have this motto called ALAP, which stands for as late as possible.

for example, my very simple suggestion is when it comes to weightlifting, fitness, the gym etc.… It is never plan your workout before you enter, once you enter the arena, once you enter the Colosseum… Then figure it out.

The gladiator makes his plans once he enters the arena – Publius Syrus

In modern day times, we have these silly notions of project management, planning, etc. But the reason why it is foolish is because if you think about it from a baye’s theory, bayes statistics — the truly wise and optimal way to do things is you do the action in the moment of, because that is when you have maximum information about everything at hand.

Which essentially what it means is right now, directly in the direct moment, bricolage, taking chances risk taking and making lots of foolish mistakes, but after 99 failed attempts, you get one which is a screaming home run!

> “You still taking advances huh? Me and my niggas we taking real chances uh!” – JAY Z

THE LIFE OF OJ.

What is entrepreneurship?

According to Jeff Bezos, if you already know that something is going to work with 100% certainty before you try it, it is not an experiment.

I think therefore, the ethos of entrepreneurship is paradoxical;

You can study entrepreneurship, study the past, has successes, but what has succeeded in the past may or may not succeed right now or the future.

For example, Warren Buffett is not a good example because he is about 90 years old, and his recipe for success worked 90 years ago, in America, before bitcoin was invented. So knowledge is very context specific, even if you were Warren Buffett and you did the same exact investing strategy in Brazil… You would not succeed.

I think this is where it is so difficult to think carte Blanche, blank slate. why? If it has never been done before, if nobody has ever succeeded doing it… How do you know if it is possible or not?

You cannot make street photography your living

Back in 2009, 2010… when I was first starting off my photography journey, I had zero intention in turning my passion for photography and street photography into my living, even though I wanted to. I was extremely pragmatic: I did not quit my day job, I knew that it was wise to have a steady 9 to 5 job, at least I could pay my rent with 100% certainty.

Fresh out of college at UCLA as an undergraduate, making $40,000 USD a year… The year 2010, working for a company called demand media which has rebranded to the “Leaf group”, my first job was online community manager… And I was able to get an internship there a year prior my senior year at UCLA, all things to Cindy for finally it on an email list server.

Anyways, some simple entrepreneurial advice:

Working from home is a godsend.

I still remember… When it was the year 2010, it was actually my fantasy to be able to work from home! Why? I could just do the minimum amount of work possible, to not get fired, away from my overseers, get all my work done in about two hours, and then I could just spend the rest of my time blogging, which was my passion, doing photography street photography and building up my Empire on the side?

Nowadays they call it a side hustle, which is a pretty good idea.

Pay your rent with your day job, enter the minimum amount of work possible to not get fired, do not seek your promotion or advancement in your career, and devote 99% of your excess energy building up your entrepreneurial enterprise.

The sad truth is 99.9% of entrepreneurial endeavors fail. I was lucky because I have never failed in my life. Everything that I wanted to do and set my mind to it, I succeeded. I think it was about 80% chutzpah and passion and insane drive, and 20% luck and timing.

The first really big street photography boom

Individuals who made their mark include Kaiman Wong, Alamby Leung, Lok Cheung, Charlie Kirk, and ERIC KIM. And Bellamy Hunt of Japancamerahunter.com — buy JCH film!

The Philosophy of Time

Prize your life, this is the only life you got.

The philosophy of time:

The death of film

I think this is something that changes a lot, once you have a kid. Or have a child a young child at home. Suddenly, your time becomes scarce, very very scarce.

For example, in terms of time scarcity… this is so insanely critical. If I gave you a choice… Would you rather spend 30 minutes playing and wrestling around with your kid at the house or at the park… Or would you rather spend your precious 30 minutes answering Emails from childless individuals who don’t really have anything better to do?

Also with film — fine if you don’t have kids — once you get a kid go 100% digital!

True success

I’m starting to think… true success is self ownership, time ownership, essentially… never having anything randomly put on your schedule without your own desire.

For example, I learned that apparently Taylor Swift is signed to Universal Records. Which means she has no control over her time or soul.

Also a very funny thing… apparently Taylor Swift is about my age, she’s born in 1989, I am born in 1988. I find it insanely bizarre that millions of 10-year-old girls know everything about her down to her drive-through food order?

Sign yourself

Anyways… I think some simple filters:

Trust no individual who is signed to anything.

For example, I think a very admirable thing that Kendrick Lamar did was quit top dog entertainment… And create his own record label, PG Lang. I think this is also the wisdom of a Jay-Z… The real idea of taking a real chance is to create your own label, and to avoid getting signed to any record or label… Even if they might wave a $100 million check in front of you. Because if you have to be on tour for the rest of your life like lil Wayne (via Pusha T)… Every single night performing for three hours and night, seven days a week… No sleep and rest… Do you have freedom? No!

This is why Drake is also still a slave!

And I think the foolish thing which people do is they trade their most valuable thing on the planet… Their freedom and self ownership, in exchange for cash, arbitrary notions of “fame“… For the sake of what?

Time and self ownership over money.

What is it that we truly seek?

One of my friends, Bing who I met in Singapore… The guy I am grateful for getting me into crypto bitcoin and digibyte at the time — he said something interesting, very wise guy, saying that what he wanted in life was material desires like a purple Lamborghini, but also… more importantly, getting respect from people.

For example, he said that the primary issue in America is that there is no real notions of respect. For example even very very simply being in Korea, Southeast Asia of Vietnam etc.… On a very basic level, we use honorifics, when it comes to age. Be told, it feels really good! To have a young kid address you in an honorific way, warms your heart!

You never know who is who

Also… I think in America one of the wise things that I’ve learned, just from myself but also echoed in people like NASSIM TALEB is a simple idea:

Treat the janitor, the hygiene sanitation guy, the security guard with more respect than the big boss.

And also… assume that everybody you meet is super super rich and successful and powerful and influential, irregardless of how they may look on the outside. Often times, the richest most powerful people are the most low-key, keep a low profile, and you would never expect it.

Don’t network

But I think the tricky thing is when it comes to human social capital… the whole “it’s not what you know but who you know”– is also a little bit misguided because technically, especially in today’s day and age, I don’t think that networking or knowing influential people is important. All you need is a website, your own self hosted blog, ChatGPT and you’re good!

100% of the time networking is a waste of time.

I got some experience now

Humans are not super great nor efficient. For example just based on my experiences, I’m 36 now… Almost 0 networking events or meeting famous successful people have led to anything substantive. The only things which have led to substantive things were things that I decided to do on my own; like hosting my own workshops, creating and developing and selling my own products engaging people directly with my own email newsletter blog, platform, etc. Everything else has been a waste of time.

Build it yourself.

I think the biggest issues here is that when you are starting off as an entrepreneur… We do things in such a way in which we think it is the proper way. For example, when we think about business and networking… We think what it means is to get to know a bunch of rich successful people, “get your foot in the door” etc. Yet, I have discovered this is a total waste of time.

Your own website and blog is the foot in the digital door!

The way that I was able to build my digital capital my fame my power my influence was very very simple… Essentially learning everything about street photography on my own, and then creating really really insanely in-depth articles, blog posts, pages, information and resources on anything and everything street photography. And the whole time, the whole endeavor of mine was guided by passion, personal interest and curiosity.

Curiosity is antifragile.

Lifting 1,000 pounds

On my personal quest to lift 1000 pounds, which is beyond 10 plates on each side of the barbell, was a personal curiosity:

How far can I take it?

Essentially, my primary curiosity was a curiosity of the limits of my strength, my courage, my ability and potential?

I remember the last time I was weightlifting in Westerly, Rhode Island, and an older guy came up to me and asked “what is the purpose of that? Why are you lifting like that?” I made a joke and I said, first– to augment my ego. But the second more honest answer is I’m just curious how strong I can become.

Why curiosity is so critical

What is curiosity? Curiosity is care, curiosity is what drives us.

You cannot force somebody to be cursed about something that they don’t really care for. You cannot spoon feed or inject curiosity in the soul of somebody, against their own will.

This is why a lot of Asian parents fail, when they try to force their kids to play violin, piano, or chess etc.

Back to time

Time is the ultimate capital, the ultimate desirable non-renewable resource.

Another funny lesson: often the most seemingly bad movies, the ones with poor IMDb reviews are actually the best movies.

For example, the movie “in time” by Justin Timberlake. probably one of the best films of all time, and also, the most underrated. The reason why it is so grand and great of a film is that it creates this metaphor, this philosophical world in which essentially time is money: literally and metaphorically.

For example, the super super rich people have 1000 years on their wrist, and hilariously enough, excuse the pun, but rich people and poor people are separated by “time zones”–

Also in this fictitious universe, real rich people take their time and move really slowly, whereas the poor laborers, are always running, because they are so short on time.

Time inflation

Another funny scene: in the early part of the IN TIME film, when Justin Timberlake is working as a laborer at a factory or whatever, do you have to scan your wrist, imagine like having Apple Pay, your checking account embedded in your wrist, and anytime you wanted to buy a cup of coffee or food or whatever… You would just scan your wrist. And one of the scenes, Justin Timberlake complains “wait… A cup of coffee used to only cost 15 minutes, why is it now costing 30 minutes?” And the guy selling coffee, shrugs his shoulder and says “that’s time inflation!”

Why it is that the only films I care for are dystopic films

The matrix, Blade Runner, and these science fiction fiction, alternate future sociological philosophical films, why? They actually change you!

What is so interesting about science fiction typically it is just a commentary or a societal critique of our real society. And the thing exaggerated, in cinematic ways, or building up a universe, but in fact, it is really true to today’s world.

Anyways, back on the notion of time… Time is labor, money is labor time.

How renting is superior to owning

For example… One of the things I am so grateful about renting, and having the best landlord of all time, is that when something breaks, like our all-in-one washer dryer machine from LG… And the machine doesn’t even turn on anymore, I don’t have to be the one wasting my time driving to Home Depot, trying to fix it, or finding service technicians to fix it, scheduling it etc. Rather, I let the landlord communicate with his own labor task squad, his own maintenance team, to come in and fix it, when we are not home, and I could do better things like go on a hike with Cindy and Seneca, or do something fun!

DIY ain’t virtuous

In America, we have this weird virtue connection with doing the labor yourself. However, there is a differentiation between hateful labor and joyful labor. For example, I would probably prefer to have a mechanic fix my car, even though I could do the labor myself, because now that I have a kid, an hour spent fixing your car could be an hour playing with your kid at the park! Here a time becomes zero sum thing, which means:

If you only have an hour to spare, would you rather it be chatting with somebody random, spending time with somebody you don’t really care for, or doing some sort of labor you don’t really care for, or rather would you rather spend that time to do something more critical you insanely care for?

Only spend time on people you love and care for!

For example, if you had an hour, to listen to the problems of somebody, or, you had an hour to work out, do exercises, and lift weights… What would you choose? And assume you could only do one. Obviously work out!

For me, my only regret in the evening is if I spent the whole day, assuming that I was in good health and strength, not working out? To me, my nonnegotiable thing that I must do every single day, irregardless of whatever is to lift weights, at least once.

Avoid time wasters, even the good ones.

Life before Seneca, life after Seneca

Life BC, life AD — I still think it is hilarious that in America, the way we categorize time is life before Christ, life after Christ.

Life before the christos, the lord the saviour, and life after Jesus.

For me I like to use this analogy for Seneca. Before Seneca was born, I wasted a lot of my time, in coffee shops, kind of superficial relationships, etc. Why? I had so much time to kill!

And also good thing about having kid is that it helps you understand what is truly critical to you or not.

Business is bad

For example, business. Do not forget that the original notion of business was centered around being busy, “busy-ness”–

Even the ancient Romans, otium, neg+otium–

Negotium (business) meant the exact opposite of leisure.

I think often times, people like to just stay busy because when you are busy, you don’t have to think about more important things in life, such as life purpose direction etc. And honestly, I think the reason why I philosophy is so critical for everybody is that if you cannot think philosophically, you’re just wasting your life.

Even Seneca the younger stoic (Seneca’s namesake) on his essay “On the shortness of time”– or the shortness of life… Essentially that you could live a great life, even if it is a short life, as long as you use your time well.

For example, if you had a house with 1000 marble and ivory tables, with matching golden plates, can you take that with you when you die? No!

80 years old and dying

Let us assume that the average human span now, I think it is about 92 years old for men, 94 years old for women. But then again you never know if you’re gonna get cancer or whatever, assume that it is 80 years.

If you knew that you would only live to be 80 years old, with 100% certainty, how would you spend your life, the next 10 years of your life? What would you do, what would you not do?

And also… Thinking about the mortality of our loved ones, our parents, your own mother.

For example, my mom is about to turn 70, and let us assume that she’s going to live to be 80. How would I want to spend the next 10 years in my life with her, or without her?

Certainly I’m happy for her to do stuff like travel, do her artwork, but also, more critically more time with Seneca, myself and Cindy, but more critically for her to spend time with Seneca. Why? There’s going to be a day in which my mom is no longer going to be around, and I would probably hope that Seneca could have some lovely memories with my mom.

Memento mori

I think this is also the thing… many of us live our lives, almost like we are going to live forever. Is that true? Of course not!

And also when you’re younger… Let us even assume that you’re going to live to be 80 years old. What that then means is that you have a long life ahead of you! But once again, what if you are Achilles, and your mom is a goddess, And you are known with 100% certainty that you will die at the age of 40? Then how would you spend your life, how would you not spend your life?

Think Steve Jobs, he died at only age 55?

You might die today

If you have the choice, the difference between memento mori, and memento vivre — the memory of knowing that you will die is more critical than the memory or the thought of knowing how to live.

The angel of life and or death?

What’s the story of why Cindy and I decided to have a kid, Seneca?

After this incident I had a few years ago being held up at gunpoint with me just me and Cindy, before Seneca was born in Mexico City… And fortunately I grabbed Cindy‘s hand and we ran away, and we did not get popped at the back of our head. And in our adrenaline, after the incident… What was my only one regret, Assuming that I have might have died? It was very simple, not having a kid! Then immediately after the incident, we started trying, and then Covid happened, and then we stopped… and then we did a webinar saying that kind of babies and kids were kind of immune to Covid, and then we tried again… And boom, got pregnant within a week!

Anyways… Often it is these life or death encounters which clarify things. After this incident, I had zero thoughts about my wealth, money in the bank etc., or my fame or success or whatever. I literally had zero regrets besides the kid thing.

Don’t die childless.

The greatest joy on the planet

I was thinking this morning, what is something that never loses its novelty factor? Seeing and witnessing your kid grow up!

Also… As a man, by far a 1,000,000,000,000% gratitude thing, having a son, having at least one son, one male, one man, and especially having your first kid being a man!

Why? Speaking from the perspective if you are a man, what every man desires is at least one male heir. Certainly when you see a family with three girls, four girls or five girls, no boys, you know what the family was trying to do.

And also… The whole second kid question… honestly, if for some reason or another, we couldn’t have a second kid, I’d probably be fine because the joy of knowing that at least, our first child was a son!

Anti women?

I think if I think about it very very honestly honestly… If our first child was a girl… I’m sure I would love her 1000%, but secretly at the back of your head, you’re always thinking wishing and wondering and desiring, to have a boy.

So this is my simple thought —

If you and your wife, or partner or whatever or girlfriend, decide to have a second kid, and your first kid is a boy… Don’t push the whole second kid thing.

Also, if I told you that let’s say that your wife decided to have birth to a second kid, and there was a 90% chance that she might die in childbirth… Would you take the risk, assuming that your first kid is already a man? No!

Back to time

Honestly just throw your iPhone to the trash. Something that people don’t understand is that the iPhone is toxic; even reading one weird thing on your phone, watching one weird movie, film, news headline, TikTok video whatever… strange pornography video or picture, can infect your mind, for a few days, randomly in the middle of the day, or even when you’re about to sleep.

Instagram is like liver pancreatic cancer

The reason why I deleted Instagram in around 2017 and no– that ERIC KIM on Instagram is not me– the person that made my @erickimphoto Instagram account was just a faithful follower, was because Instagram started to do bad things to my mind and weird things to my mind. For example I’d be driving, in the suburbs, or the city… And at around noon, while driving, I would get distracted and think to myself “wait… did I uploaded something to Instagram today?” I caught myself thinking this, and I thought “wow, this is bad. I got to get rid of this”. And in 2017, when I had about 65,000 followers, I did probably one of the most courageous and proud things in my life, which was to delete my Instagram.

mental Freedom?

Something my friend Jeffrey Lam tells me about is this notion of mind space, ideas that was not just a timeframe but, a mental space thing.

For example, you could in theory have 12 hours of free time in a day, but as long as a strange thought lingering in your mind, you can never really focus 100%.

I think this is called the Zeignark effect. For example let us say that you read an email that needs to be attended to… And you don’t attend to it or respond to it, and it will percolate on your mind for days, sometimes even weeks, sometimes even months. This is why I avoid my inbox, or my text messages like the plague…

One strange message email or text message or communication thing can distract you for days on end.

Playing cyber defense

I also think the reason why email needs to be fixed is now, it is so easy to fake an email, ChatGPT, with bots, or generative AI, even if the person is good or bad, or even if the bot is malicious or benevolent.

For example, let me give an extreme example, let us say you are Taylor Swift, and everybody on the planet knows your email (taylorswift@gmail.com)– let us say. If you are Taylor Swift, and you literally get 1 million emails a day, would you have the time to either read every single email, or even worse… Respond to it? No? This would be mental suicide! This is why I quit email and all messaging apps Around 2016, 2017, because honestly I was just becoming too famous, too much cognitive load!

Dodge

In the Iliad, when the heroes are killing each other… They do two things, obviously they wear protective armor, like shields, helmets, etc.… But if somebody throws a spear at them, or an arrow, what they do is dodge it.

If you see an incoming spear, you are not a fool, ideally you dodge it, ideally dodging it is more effective than even raising your shield. Why? If a spear hits your shield, there is actually a chance that it might penetrate your shield, and end up either wounding you or killing you.

I wonder if we should apply the same philosophy two things. Like if you see an incoming missile, or a spear or a bullet… You don’t take the chance. Dodge a bullet, rather than testing your bulletproof vest.

“That little vest ain’t gonna do you I shoot from neck up”- JAY Z

The ghost of soulja slim —

SOULJA KIM?

The notion of soldier, like Soulja Boy etc., and interesting thought… The notion of a “soul”, period with the notion of a soldier?

And apparently, if you really really need people from the hood, like Crenshaw, where Nipsey Hussle got killed, the honorific to call somebody worth valor is “soldier”.

Kind of like calling somebody boss or chief. Like Chief Keef

ChIEF KIM! Too many Indians, not enough chiefs!

Anyways, long story short, prize your time. This is the only life you got.

ERIC

Never stop thinking

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And of course whenever in doubt,

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Never forget it is and must be your duty to die!

STOICISM BY KIM >

The Philosophy of Time

Prize your life, this is the only life you got.

The philosophy of time:

The death of film

I think this is something that changes a lot, once you have a kid. Or have a child a young child at home. Suddenly, your time becomes scarce, very very scarce.

Also with film — fine if you don’t have kids — once you get a kid go 100% digital!

True success

I’m starting to think… true success is self ownership, time ownership, essentially… never having anything randomly put on your schedule without your own desire.

For example, I learned that apparently Taylor Swift is signed to Universal Records. Which means she has no control over her time or soul.

Sign yourself

Anyways… I think some simple filters:

Trust no individual who is signed to anything.

This is why Drake is also still a slave!

Time and self ownership over money.

What is it that we truly seek?

You never know who is who

Also… I think in America one of the wise things that I’ve learned, just from myself but also echoed in people like NASSIM TALEB is a simple idea:

Treat the janitor, the hygiene sanitation guy, the security guard with more respect than the big boss.

Don’t network

100% of the time networking is a waste of time.

I got some experience now

Build it yourself.

Your own website and blog is the foot in the digital door!

Curiosity is antifragile.

Lifting 1,000 pounds

On my personal quest to lift 1000 pounds, which is beyond 10 plates on each side of the barbell, was a personal curiosity:

How far can I take it?

Essentially, my primary curiosity was a curiosity of the limits of my strength, my courage, my ability and potential?

Why curiosity is so critical

What is curiosity? Curiosity is care, curiosity is what drives us.

You cannot force somebody to be cursed about something that they don’t really care for. You cannot spoon feed or inject curiosity in the soul of somebody, against their own will.

This is why a lot of Asian parents fail, when they try to force their kids to play violin, piano, or chess etc.

Back to time

Time is the ultimate capital, the ultimate desirable non-renewable resource.

Another funny lesson: often the most seemingly bad movies, the ones with poor IMDb reviews are actually the best movies.

For example, the super super rich people have 1000 years on their wrist, and hilariously enough, excuse the pun, but rich people and poor people are separated by “time zones”–

Also in this fictitious universe, real rich people take their time and move really slowly, whereas the poor laborers, are always running, because they are so short on time.

Time inflation

Why it is that the only films I care for are dystopic films

The matrix, Blade Runner, and these science fiction fiction, alternate future sociological philosophical films, why? They actually change you!

Anyways, back on the notion of time… Time is labor, money is labor time.

How renting is superior to owning

DIY ain’t virtuous

If you only have an hour to spare, would you rather it be chatting with somebody random, spending time with somebody you don’t really care for, or doing some sort of labor you don’t really care for, or rather would you rather spend that time to do something more critical you insanely care for?

Only spend time on people you love and care for!

Avoid time wasters, even the good ones.

Life before Seneca, life after Seneca

Life BC, life AD — I still think it is hilarious that in America, the way we categorize time is life before Christ, life after Christ.

Life before the christos, the lord the saviour, and life after Jesus.

For me I like to use this analogy for Seneca. Before Seneca was born, I wasted a lot of my time, in coffee shops, kind of superficial relationships, etc. Why? I had so much time to kill!

And also good thing about having kid is that it helps you understand what is truly critical to you or not.

Business is bad

For example, business. Do not forget that the original notion of business was centered around being busy, “busy-ness”–

Even the ancient Romans, otium, neg+otium–

Negotium (business) meant the exact opposite of leisure.

For example, if you had a house with 1000 marble and ivory tables, with matching golden plates, can you take that with you when you die? No!

80 years old and dying

If you knew that you would only live to be 80 years old, with 100% certainty, how would you spend your life, the next 10 years of your life? What would you do, what would you not do?

And also… Thinking about the mortality of our loved ones, our parents, your own mother.

For example, my mom is about to turn 70, and let us assume that she’s going to live to be 80. How would I want to spend the next 10 years in my life with her, or without her?

Memento mori

I think this is also the thing… many of us live our lives, almost like we are going to live forever. Is that true? Of course not!

Think Steve Jobs, he died at only age 55?

You might die today

If you have the choice, the difference between memento mori, and memento vivre — the memory of knowing that you will die is more critical than the memory or the thought of knowing how to live.

The angel of life and or death?

What’s the story of why Cindy and I decided to have a kid, Seneca?

Don’t die childless.

The greatest joy on the planet

I was thinking this morning, what is something that never loses its novelty factor? Seeing and witnessing your kid grow up!

Also… As a man, by far a 1,000,000,000,000% gratitude thing, having a son, having at least one son, one male, one man, and especially having your first kid being a man!

Anti women?

So this is my simple thought —

If you and your wife, or partner or whatever or girlfriend, decide to have a second kid, and your first kid is a boy… Don’t push the whole second kid thing.

Back to time

Instagram is like liver pancreatic cancer

mental Freedom?

Something my friend Jeffrey Lam tells me about is this notion of mind space, ideas that was not just a timeframe but, a mental space thing.

For example, you could in theory have 12 hours of free time in a day, but as long as a strange thought lingering in your mind, you can never really focus 100%.

One strange message email or text message or communication thing can distract you for days on end.

Playing cyber defense

Dodge

If you see an incoming spear, you are not a fool, ideally you dodge it, ideally dodging it is more effective than even raising your shield. Why? If it hits your, there is actually a chance that it might penetrate your shield, and end up either wounding you or killing you.

I wonder if we should apply the same philosophy two things. Like if you see an incoming missile, or a beer or a bullet… You don’t take the chance. Dodge a bullet, rather than testing your bulletproof vest.

“That little vest ain’t gonna do you I shoot from neck up”- JY Z

The ghost of soulja slim —

Soulja Kim?

The notion of soldier, like Soulja Boy etc., and interesting thought… The notion of a “soul”, period with the notion of a soldier?

And apparently, if you really really need people from the hood, like Crenshaw, where Nipsey Hussle got killed, the honorific to call somebody worth valor is “soldier”.

Kind of like calling somebody boss or chief. Like Chief Keef

Chief Kim! Too many Indians, not enough chiefs!

Anyways, long story short, prize your time. This is the only life you got.

ERIC

The Philosophy of Time Economics

Prize your life, this is the only life you got.

The economics and philosophy of time:

1. The death of film

I think this is something that changes a lot, once you have a kid. Or have a child a young child at the home. Suddenly, your time becomes scarce, very very scarce.

For example, in terms of times scarcity… This is so insanely critical. If I give you a choice… Would you rather spend 30 minutes playing and wrestling around with your kid at the house or at the park… Or would you rather spend your precious 30 minutes answering Emails from childless individuals who don’t really have anything better to do?

True success

I’m starting to think… True success is self ownership, time ownership, essentially… Never having anything randomly put on your schedule without your own desire.

For example, I learned that apparently Taylor Swift is signed to Universal records. Which means she has no control over her time or soul.

Also a very funny thing… Apparently Taylor Swift is about my age, she’s born in 1989, I am born in 1988. I find it insanely bizarre that millions of 10-year-old girls know everything about her down to her drive-through food order?

Anyways… I think some simple filters:

Trust no individual who is signed to anything.

For example, I think a very admirable thing that Kendrick Lamar did I believe was quit top dog entertainment… And create his own record label, I think it’s called PG Lang. I think this is also the wisdom of a Jay-Z… The real idea of taking a real chance is to create your own label, and to avoid getting signed to any record or label… Even if they might wave a $100 million check in front of you. Because if you have to be on tour for the next nine months of your life… Every single night performing for three hours and night, seven days a week… No sleep and rest… Do you have freedom? No!

What is it that we truly seek?

Also… I think in America one of the wise things that I’ve learned, just from myself but also echo and people like NASSIM TALEB is a simple idea:

Treat the janitor, the hygiene sanitation guy, the security guard with more respect than the big boss.

And also… Assume that everybody you meet is super super rich and successful and powerful and influential, irregardless of how they may look on the outside. Often times, the richest most powerful people are the most low-key, keep a low profile, and you would never expect it.

But I think the tricky thing is when it comes to human social capital… The whole “it’s not what you know but who you know”– is also a little bit misguided because technically, especially in today’s day and age, I don’t think that networking or knowing influential people is important. All you need is a website, your own self hosted blog, ChatGPT and you’re good!

Examples

I think the biggest issues here is that when you are starting an entrepreneur… We do things in such a way in which we think it is the proper way. For example, when we think about business and networking… We think what it means is to get to know a bunch of rich successful people, “get your foot in the door” etc. Yet, I have discovered this is a total waste of time.

The way that I was able to build my digital capital my fame my power my influence was very very simple… Essentially learning everything about street photography on my own, and then creating really really insanely in-depth articles, blog post, pages, information and resources on anything and everything street photography. and the whole time, the whole endeavor of vine was guided by passion, personal interest and curiosity.

Curiosity is antifragile.

Lifting 1,000 pounds

On my personal quest to lift 1000 pounds, which is beyond 10 plates on each side of the barbell, was a personal curiosity:

How far can I take it?

Essentially, my primary curiosity was a curiosity of the limits of my strength, my courage, my ability and potential?

Why curiosity is so critical

What is curiosity? Curiosity is care, curiosity is what drives us.

You cannot force somebody to be cursed about something that they don’t really care for. You cannot spoon feed or inject curiosity in the soul of somebody, against their own will.

This is why a lot of Asian parents fail, when they try to force their kids to play violin, piano, or chess etc.

back to time

Time is ultimate capital, ultimate desirable non-renewable resource.

Another funny lesson: often the most seemingly bad movies, the ones with poor IMDb reviews are actually the best movies.

For example, the movie “in time” by Justin Timberlake. probably one of the best films of all time, and also, the most underrated.
P the reason why it is so grand and great of a film is that it creates this metaphor, this philosophical world in which essentially money is, quite literally.

For example, the super super rich people have 1000 years on their wrist, and hilarious enough, excuse the pun, but rich people and poor people are separated by “time zones”–

Also in this fictitious universe, real rich people take their time and move really slowly, whereas the poor labors, are always running, because they are so short on time.

time inflation

another funny thought: apparently in the early film, when Justin Timberlake is working as a laborer at a factory or whatever, do you have to scan your wrist, imagine like having Apple Pay, your checking account embedded in your wrist, and anytime you wanted to buy a cuppa coffee or food or whatever… You would just scan your wrist. And one of the scenes, Justin Timberlake complains “wait… A cup of coffee only cost 15 minutes, why is it now costing 30 minutes?” and the guy selling coffee, shrugs his shoulder and says “that’s time inflation!”

Why it is that the only films I care for are dystopic films

The matrix, Blade Runner, and these scientific fiction, alternate future sociological philosophical films, why ? They actually change you!

Anyways, back on the notion of time… Time is labor, money is labor time.

For example… One of the things I am so grateful about renting, and having the best landlord of all time, is that when something breaks, like our all-in-one washer dryer machine from LG… And the machine doesn’t even turn on anymore, I don’t have to be the ones Wasting my time driving to Home Depot, trying to fix it, or finding service technicians to fix it, scheduling it etc. Rather, I let the landlord communicate with his own labor task squad, his own maintenance team, to come in and fix it, when we are not home, and I could do better things like go on a hike with Cindy and Seneca, or do something fun!

In America, we have this weird virtue connection with doing the labor yourself. However, there is a differentiation between hateful labor and joyful labor. For example, I would probably prefer to have a mechanic fix my car, even though I could do the labor myself, because now that I have a kid, an hour spent fixing your car could be an hour playing with your kid at the park! Here a time becomes zero som, which means

If you only have an hour to spare, would you rather it be chatting with somebody random, or spending time with somebody you don’t really care for, or doing some sort of labor you don’t really care for, or rather would you rather spend that time to do something more critical you insanely care for?

For example, if you had an hour, to listen to the problems of somebody, or, you had an hour to work out exercises, and lift weights… What would you choose? And assume you could only do one. Obviously work out!

Life before Seneca, life after Seneca

Life BC, life AD — I still think it is hilarious that in America, the way we categorize time is life before Christ, life after Christ.

Life before the christos, the lord the saviour, and life after Jesus.

For me I like to use this analogy for Seneca. Before Seneca was born, I wasted a lot of my time, had coffee shops, kind of superficial relationships, etc. Why? I had so much time to kill!

And also good thing about having kid is that it helps you understand what is truly critical to you or not.

For example, business. Do not forget that the original notion of business was centered around being busy, “busy-ness”–

Even the ancient Romans, otium, neg+otium–

Negotium (business) meant the exact opposite of leisure.

Even Seneca the younger stoic (Seneca’s namesake) on his essay “On the shortness of time”– or the short of life… Essentially that you could live a great life, even if it is a short life, as long as you use your time well.

For example, if you had a house with 1000 marble and ivory tables, with matching golden plates, can you take that with you when you die? No!

If you knew that you would only live to be 80 years old, with 100% certainty, how would you spend your life, the next 10 years of your life? What would you do, what would you not do?

And also… Thinking about the mortality of our loved ones, our parents, your own mother.

For example, my mom is about to turn 70, and let us assume that she’s going to live to be 80. How would I want to spend the next 10 years in my life with her, or without her?

I think this is also the thing… Of us live our lives, almost like we are going to live forever. Is that true? Of course not!

Memento mori

If you have the choice, the difference between memento mori, and memento vivre — the memory of knowing that you will die is more critical than the memory or the thought of knowing how to live.

I think meaningful ways, and also after this incident I had a few years ago being held up at gunpoint with me just me and Cindy, before Seneca was born… And fortunately I grab Cindy‘s hand and we ran away, and we did not get popped at the back of our head. And in our adrenaline, after the incident… What was my only one regret, Assuming that I have might have died? It was very simple, not having a kid! Then immediately after the incident, we started trying, and then Covidhappened, and then we stopped… and then we did a webinar saying that kind of babies and kids were kind of immune to Covid, and then we tried again… And boom, got pregnant within a week!

The greatest joy on the planet

I was thinking this morning, what is something that never loses its novelty factor? Seeing and witnessing your kid grow up!

Also… As a man, by far a 1,000,000,000,000% gratitude thing, having a son, having at least one son, one male, one man, and especially having your first kid being a man!

Anti women?

So this is my simple thought —

If you and your wife, or partner or whatever or girlfriend, decide to have a second kid, and your first kid is a boy… Don’t push the whole second kid thing.

Back to time

Honestly just throw your iPhone to the trash. Something that people don’t understand is that the iPhone is toxic; even reading one weird thing on your phone, one weird movie, film, news headline, TikTok video whatever… Strange pornography video or picture, can infect your mind, For a few days, randomly in the middle of the day, or even when you’re about to sleep.

The reason why I deleted Instagram in around 2017 and no– that ERIC KIM on Instagram is not me– the person that made my @erickimphoto Instagram account was just a faithful follower, why is it started to do bad things to my mind and weird things to my mind. For example I’d be driving, in the suburbs, or the city… And at around noon, while driving, I would get distracted and think to myself “wait… did I uploaded something to Instagram today?” I caught myself thinking this, and I thought “wow, this is bad. I got to get rid of this”. And in 2017, when I had about 65,000 followers, I did probably one of the most courageous and proud things in my life, which was to delete my Instagram.

mental Freedom?

Something my friend Jeffrey Lam tells me about is this notion of mind space, ideas that was not just a timeframe but, a mental space thing.

For example, you could in theory have 12 hours of free time in a day, but as long as a strange thought is lingering in your mind, you can never really focus 100%.

I think this is called the Zeignark effect, for example let us say that you read an email that needs to be attended to… And you don’t attend to it or respond to it, and it will plate your mind for days, sometimes even weeks, sometimes even months. This is why I avoid my inbox, or my text messages like the plague…

One strange message email or text message or communication thing can distract you for days on end.

Playing cyber defense

For example, let me give an extreme example, let us say you are Taylor Swift, and everybody on the planet knows your email (taylorswift@gmail.com)– let us say. if you are Taylor Swift, and you literally get 1 million emails a day, would you have the time to either read every single email, or even worse… Respond to it? No? This would be mental suicide! This is why I quit email and all messaging apps Around 2016, 2017, because honestly I was just becoming too famous, too much cognitive load!

Dodge

“That little vest ain’t gonna do you I shoot from neck up”- JY Z

The ghost of soulja slim —

Soulja Kim?

The notion of soldier, like Soulja Boy etc., and interesting thought… The notion of a “soul”, period with the notion of a soldier?

And apparently, if you really really need people from the hood, like Crenshaw, where Nipsey Hussle got killed, the honorific to call somebody worth valor is “soldier”.

Kind of like calling somebody boss or chief. Like Chief Keef

Chief Kim! Too many Indians, not enough chiefs!

Anyways, long story short, prize your time. This is the only life you got.

ERIC

Pure Thoughts

What is a pure thought? I thought that comes to you, first thing you do when you wake up… Without any sort of external stimulus weather reading, listening, looking.

I’ve heard this advice before… That when you go to sleep… Charge your phone in your living room, as far away from your bedroom as possible. Better yet, just turn it off completely, or also, just keep it in your backpack. And actually let it die a little bit and drain the battery of it… iPhone sucks, is overrated, and bad for your health and life.

Also… Throw your TV smart TV into the trash. If you really want to watch a movie film cinema etc.… I think the best way to do it is to just download it to your iPad Pro, and just watch it outside! Alfresco style!

For example, here in Culver City and beyond… There has been a lot of events about watching movies in the park, watching movies outside… Even the antiquated notion of the drive-through movie theater is a very interesting idea; I think media has consumed outside, outdoors etc.

For example, pro tip for parents… If your kid wants to play games on the iPad, play with your iPhone or whatever… Make it a rule that they are only allowed to do it when they are outside of the house! For example at the park, the local playground, the local nature center, etc.

This is my tactic; any time that Seneco wants to do programming on the iPad with swift playgrounds, or play poly bridge 2, or a racing game… The rule is we have to go outside, go to the Culver City steps or downtown, and then I let him play there. 80% of the time he forgets… And ends up just running around instead.

Bizarre media habits of adults

OK, taking it a step further:

First, OK something I never understood was owning a television?

First, if you want to watch something, why not just watch it on your laptop or better yet… An iPad Pro?

I thought we were advanced techies? Why would a techie own a television?

Video games?

Video game is fine for teenagers, and children… Not men or grown adults.

Why would you be playing PlayStation, or a PC game or steam… If you are over the age of 18?

Rule: adult over the age of 18 should play video games.

Video games are essentially a good refuge for kids who grow up without parental figures. Or they grow up in the hood, I’m playing video games is safer than gangbanging.

But besides this… Video games are not becoming of us.

Becoming a real man

So the pure thought I had this morning was there’s notion of becoming a real man.

What are my ideals?

First, a stoic manly, spartan ethos approach and aesthetic. We are not cowards, slaves.

The best thing to read is the Iliad, Emily Wilson translation. The best and the quickest and the easiest way to put hair on your chest.

Ignore modern day media

All modern day media is bad. Why? Because media is so hyper nowadays… Things are becoming more and more bizarre.

Things are bizarre, there are no longer any divisions or boundaries, everybody gets a gold medal, everyone gets a participation sticker, everyone is made mediocre. For example, when it comes to the body, bodily physique etc.… Do not be a fool. There is obviously a clear hierarchy here. And it is not a matter of objective or subjective… Both of these are not useful philosophical ideas. Besides physics, there’s nothing objective on the planet. And subjectivity is a modern day concept which is tired.

Achilles or Hector

I think the two best role models for us is Achilles and Hector. The two Apex fighters warriors and men of antiquity, no and forever.

I actually find the Iliad to be so pure, so honest, maybe the only book worth reading. This and the Odyssey. Once I am done reading the Iliad translation by Emily Wilson, I will read the odyssey translation by her as well.

Anyways, my first thought is there is no such thing as valor without real valor, real physical valor and strength. Even the notion “valere” or “vale”, which was essentially a signature like saying “best” at the end of an email, essentially it meant “be strong!”

All strength is good, all weakness is bad. It doesn’t matter what your domain is, we all seek strength, we all hate weakness.

And certainly, you could interpret strength and weakness for yourself. But whether it be physical, mental, physiological, artistic aesthetic etc — strength, power, durability is supremely desired.

Therefore, as a man, your first duty is towards strength, power, strengthening.

Things which strengthen you, things which don’t

I think one of the grand clarifying things about having a child is when it comes to time and focus and mind space and zen.

For example, even before the birth of Seneca, I barely had enough time, mind space for myself. Now after the birth of Seneca, my time is really really insanely limited, and also nonrenewable.

For example, I only have so many bucks to give, and anything which does not promote my thinking or Seneca, is time wasted.

Let us assume that you caught your good 10 hours of sleep, and even talking to somebody who is full of misery, unhappiness etc.… They are strange negative thoughts will infect you in a bad way. If you were in full health and full figure… Unfortunately The toxicity of unwell people will positively harm you. And then it becomes a feedback loop… The second you are in a bad mood, it affects the mood of your wife, your kids, etc.

Being cruel is virtuous

I wonder if we want to become grander, we must also become more cruel.

For example, the second that I realize that my dad was bad news for Cindy, and that Cindy did not feel safe around my dad, it was a very easy cut.

And also, the number one benefit of stoicism is being able to conquer all of your past trauma, and not only that… Using that past trauma almost like clay, strapping it onto your body to make you bigger stronger, buffer, more indomitable.

This is why I think so much of modern day therapy is bad; it opens up and reopens up too many bad wounds, for example… Let us say that you fell, you scraped your knee, and it takes about a week for your skin to reheat itself. Would you then take a knife, And scalp pull it back again, promoting the cut and bleeding again?! You just leave it alone, and you do not agitate if any further!

Or, let us say that your whole life you were just drinking dirty sewer water, a metaphor for a toxic family or upbringing. Let us say you finally leave that environment, and now you could drink Fiji clean water, do you then out of virtue, go back to the toxic place and environment, and start drinking sewer water again, just to prove something? No!

The wisdom of Dr. Dre… You get out of the hood, and you stay out of the hood! You don’t go back to the hood to “prove yourself”.

In fact this whole notion of approving yourself, I find it to be insanely bizarre.

For example Achilles is 100% confident and certain in his strength valor and power. And everyone knows it. And it isn’t his ethos to go to battle just to prove how dominant he is.. He only goes back to fighting when he wants to get revenge on Hector, but besides this… Achilles wanted to retire from fighting.

Even if you took all the wealth on the Earth and multiplied it by 100,000… It is not worth your human mortal life.

For example, would you accept $1 trillion, if you had a 99.9% mortality rate chance, in the next three months? Obviously no!

Human life, a long happy life along healthy life is the most desired thing on the planet. Even the ancient Greeks and good old Homer knew this.

So why are we trying to trade our health our strength and our well-being for money?

An interesting nuance with Americans versus Koreans,

Koreans seek success as a moralistic imperative. Koreans, South Korean… They don’t really care for money… Money is simply a reflection of a Confucian literati type of success.
In America, money, US dollars is the ultimate mark of success. It seems in America… We valorize money for the sake of money. We don’t actually want anything else, we just want the money.

In the American case, we want money because we think that the money will make us happy or happier? The simple mathematical equation, a simple vector: more moneys, more happiness.

For Koreans, it is more a matter of respect. The general idea is that the more money you have, the more respect you’ll get from others.

Funny enough Americans I don’t think we really care for respect, we just want money and happiness.

Koreans want respect, respect from others, their peers etc.… I don’t even think Koreans want happiness. Koreans just want respect.

Why does this matter

How To Become Famous

The philosophy of famous and fame

I think a critical thing to consider is that fame and money or not the same thing or equatable. Nor is it desirable to link the two.

For sample, it seems that the foolish mistake people make is that they think of fame as a conduit for wealth. But technically… The easiest way to become wealthy or make a bunch of money is to get a job in cyber security, become a lawyer or a doctor, or even work in sanitation and hygiene, doing a “dirty job“, which could easily net you a lot of money, easily $200,000 a year.

So then the question is … What is it that people seek, and why?

Everyone wants to be happy

First, it seems that what people really seek is not fame or money… But happiness. And people think of it like a simple scalar vector equation:

as I increase my numbers, as I increase my monies, as I increase my fame, my follower number is whatever… This positive increase will be positively equated with more positive happiness.

What is this true? No!

I’ll example… Let us say that you’re the most famous person on the planet, your Brad Pitt or whatever, and your beautiful wife Angelina Jolie divorces you, you become a strange from your seven children, and nobody wants to call you or interact with you anymore.

Or even think about Russell Simmons, the former music producer who was revealed that he sexually abused all of these women, and maybe raped them or drug them or something weird, apparently his not in jail, even though he probably should, and now… He is Gained at least 15 pounds of fat, lives by himself in a mansion in New Jersey, and nobody talks to him anymore. Even though he might have $100 million in his Bank of America checking account, he is probably not happy.

The sorcery of happiness

I think the big issue here is we try to metricate happiness.
Once again, I think people hear lack some sort of critical understanding… We think of happiness like ones and zeros, commas and dollars, numbers etc.

But some critical issues here, first we don’t realize that 99% of social media and follower numbers are just bots. I think if you waived a magical wand, in order to delete all the bots on the Internet, it would reduce the Internet population or the follower numbers by 99.9%.

I’ll give you example… Let us say that you see a famous person on the Internet with 1 billion followers. I bet you that 999 million of those are just bots.

Social media inflation

Nobody ever thinks about this, but, I don’t think anyone has ever made the connection between monetary inflation and social media inflation.

Let us consider that it literally cost zero dollars to make a bot on the Internet. For less than a nickel, you could easily spin up 1 billion bots on Facebook Instagram Instagram Instagram Snapchat TikTok and you could create fake views, comments, likes, follower numbers etc.

Most people are not critical and foolish. For example, obviously if you showed me your Instagram and you had 1 billion followers, in my mind I would just think well “this person is very famous and successful and rich whatever.” But once again… What if the person spent only about $2000 to get all those fake bot followers? and hoodwink corporations to give them money and free products, because they could show off these fake followers?

Issues

Even if you are a social media influencer, you’re actually not making that much money. Let us say that you have 10 million followers or 100 million followers, and I asked you to promote its product to your phone, they might only give you about $5000 or maybe even $10,000… Which is not that much money, if you think that you could make more money in cyber security penetration testing.

Then, it seems that what people then do is they desire to make their passion their living, and they think that social media is the way. It is not.

My simple ideas only only need 300 hard-core, Spartan fans on the planet… Hopefully very committed, and also wealthy. It is more profitable to have people give you $100,000, rather than trying to get 1 million people to give you a nickel.

True fans true followers

I cannot really speak for other people, but I could speak for myself, from the position of being a fan.

Who am I a fan of? Kanye West, Jay Z, electronica, Kendrick Lamar, Zack Snyder, and the like.

What makes me a true fan? Even though I could easily pirate their stuff for free, I decide to pay my real money for it, because for me… There is a sense of pride or ownership, or I just want to signal to myself that I really care for it.

Also, it becomes a sense of pride and also a filter– you never know whether you really care for something until you have made a monetary investment in it… Or a financial penalty, because money talks , money is skin in the game .

I said no the Super Bowl

Other side… You’ll only know the true values of the creator or the artist, based on the money they do not accept.

the difficult thing is that it does not easily discernible from a follower perspective… Knowing what your beloved creator decides to reject.

Often people will just throw money at you. and typically only fools reject free money. But then… Fools are often wise.

Often we true fools have true conviction . For example, probably one of the proudest things of my life is rejecting a book offer to publish my beloved 100 masters learn from the masters of photography book, I think I might have rejected about $10,000 USD, because I wanted it to be open and free. Probably one of the happiest and most proud moments of my life. Especially now that I am a bitcoin millionaire, and money doesn’t really matter that much to me anymore.

I think this is also where it is intelligent to stick to your guns and your own values, thinking about the long-term. The only regrets we make in life is when we compromise our values, for the promise of social or economic gain.

People are not stupid. Anyone and everyone can smell intent. For example, if you’re being nice to somebody just because you want an opportunity from them, or a potential financial payoff… They could smell it from half a mile away. However if you are being genuine, truly genuine… people know. And also, once you become part of a community or a city or a polis,. word spreads.

For example, One of my friends and mentors, Charlie Kirk, said something very nice to me a long time ago… That he would often defend me in public or private on the Internet, saying that I have never said anything bad about anybody ever.

And also… Now that I have enough experience under my belt, at the age of 36, starting my street photograph everything when I was only 21 years old… Wow, 15 years in the game, is this:

You can only trust people who have defended you, and now — your kids!

Defense, to defend, probably the most critical thing here.

For example, reading the Iliad, when your best friend or fellow hero or champion dies on the battlefield… What do you do? You protect and defend their body, to prevent the other side from stealing their body and stripping their armor.

I think the hard thing is it is impossible to know whether somebody has defended you or not, whether in real life or in private… Until shit hits the fan.

Funny

I find a very funny disconnect between lived embodied reality versus the ways in which people engage with film media video games etc.

I’ll give you example… One of my favorite fighting games or video games as a teenager growing up was tech, me and all my best friends would always play it, trying to warm up one another… Bryan Fury was my character.

The funny thing with video games, video game characters, is that it is a true reflection of your own personal ethos for yourself. For example, the character Brian fury, I think he’s a cyborg… But regardless, he is insanely jacked, shirtless, topless, and in my opinion, by far the most dominant fighter, at least in terms of muscularity And physique.

So essentially, when I look at Brian fury, I look at myself.

And then you think about video games in general, how bizarre it is that you have a bunch of nerves, either insanely twig like and skinny, and nerdy, or, super fat and nerdy, or maybe skinny fat? Anyways, sitting down on their butts, sitting on a couch, with a PlayStation controller in their hands, And play the fighting games in which they are beating the crap out of other virtual players, and if you look at the video game characters, they are essentially insanely jacked, and all look like demigods.

For example just look at the Tekken 8 lineup in terms of characters. Do I any of them look like the average American to you?

Also, in terms of physique… Do any of the fighters, whether a man or woman, look like the real average human being today?

Superhero films

Can you imagine a skinny fat marvel superhero? No. Yeah look at all the people who go watch the movies… A bunch of like the fat people from the wall-E movie, really fat, essentially just waddling around… Coca-Cola in hand, and stuffing themselves with type two diabetes, and watching superheroes be great?

Once again… Isn’t the goal to look like the superhero, or become the superhero?

As deadly as ares

Noisy shouts

Low lives

Observing traffic behavior, on foot… It seems that a lot of people who honk at you to hurry up, these guys are low lives? You could obviously tell that they are lower, poor, working class, and a lot of them… Our driving cell phone in hand?

And sometimes they often honk at people, to hurry up and turn right… When there is clearly a sign that says no turn on right?

So the problem is… If you’re in front and somebody is honking at you from behind… What do you do?

The problem is when somebody is honking at you from behind, there is not a way you could honk back at them, it is almost like imagine like you’re in battle… And someone tries to spear you from behind? And you cannot defend yourself?

Ideal thing would be to have a horn which is actually mounted on the back of your car, on the trunk… Which honks opposite; or have some sort of really really bright headlights or high beams, in the back of your car, which could shoot bright light and blind the assholes that are honking at you from behind.

Money & Physics: Monetary Physics

OK I think I finally got it figured out; money is potential energy, when you actually put it to work, and enact force upon it… money then becomes kinetic energy?

Don’t hate me because I have more money than you!

Bitcoin is the first and only true hard money on the planet, therefore… If I have more bitcoin than you, and I have not spent it… That means I am richer than you, I have more money than you

I think which has boggled my mind for a very long time is money. The philosophy of money, economic theory, practical economic theory, etc.

For me, I have zero interest in theoretical notions of money. To me, money is practical, and also, thinking about physics, monetary physics is useful.

I should have majored in physics?

Apparently, in the early days of sociology, they called it “social physics”

For example, I remember in high school… Surprisingly my favorite class was my honors physics class, I think I might’ve got B- in it or something… Our teacher I think he graduated from Stanford or Caltech or something… Super genius guy, at Castro Valley high, and I loved physics because it was science and math made practical, fun, and real!

I still will never forget, we did this experiment, in which we built this catapult, and actually used real physics math, to calculate the dropping projectile, and a shooting kinetic projectile, and after a few sessions of class, after we did all the math, and we shot it… It truly did collide mid air! It was magical!

Movement is magical

What is the greatest tragedy in today’s world? When your movement is restricted, thwarted.

As an example, what is it that we all hate in Los Angeles? Traffic! I think it is literally one of the first English words that Seneca learned by heart.

For example, consider how cruel it is to force adults and humans to drive in their automobile car, stuck in traffic for about an hour one way, and then going into a depressing office building, indoors, lack of natural light… And force an individual to remain stationary, not moving, in front of a cubicle a desk, an open concept thing; doesn’t matter if you’re sitting or standing or even using a treadmill… It is like you are a glorified hamster on glorified hamster wheel!

Injecting money into your legs

Living in Culver City LA about 10 months now… What is the ultimate way that you could rank yourself? By what neighborhood you live in!

Funny nuances, the second that you meet somebody outside of Culver City, who discovers that you actually live in Culver City, and how much more expensive your rent is than theirs, the attitude of people change.

For example, $3200 a month for two bedroom one bath Culver City, versus only $1800 for one bedroom, maybe in Palms or Overland.

Anyways, what I find personally interesting is thinking about the basic privilege of walking. In Los Angeles, the ultimate and Apex privileged is how much you could walk a day… The insanely rich and successful people that have met in LA, I can judge by how beautiful in bronze there are suntan skin is, how much time to spend outdoors, and how many steps they could put in a day!

In fact, you could probably separate people into two camps; people who stand and walk for a living, and people who are outside for a living, versus office slaves who have to be stuck inside a glass cube cage all day. Would you rather be a spartan, or a bubble boy? Or in Blade Runner that one girl who is forced to live in that little ecosystem chamber cell, because she likes immunity to the real world?

What is happiness

To me happiness is walking. Having the privilege to all, having the strength to walk, you never really realize how grateful you are to walk, until you see a loved one in a wheelchair, otherwise healthy, because of type two diabetes and sciatica.

Or, I’ll never forget when I ruptured my tendon either in my ankle or my knee playing basketball in college, being stuck in crutches for almost 6 months, the worst.

Injuries

I’ve had many injuries of the years, fortunately never broke a bone in my life. Maybe it’s because I ate so much meat as a kid, and drink so much milk as a kid.

Anyways, I am really into this notion of healing, and not that the new Deadpool Wolverine films out… The theory and philosophy of healing, superhero powers etc.

I was watching an interview with Michael Saylor, which he talks about superhero theory, and the very very funny idea is the thought that the ultimate superpower is actually immortality, being invincible, like you cannot die. Because it would be very very simple, you just take a machine gun, step into the room and kill everybody, or you could just walk into a room with a nuke, nuke everybody, and everybody else dies but you.

Anyways, what I find so fascinating about wolverine, is that his mutant superpower is healing, and also… The fact that he has a skeleton made out of adamantine, but the nuance is every single time he takes out his claws, it literally causes him pain, wolverine is not immune to pain, he feels pain greatly; it’s just that he cannot die from the pain.

So imagine a life, in which you are practically invincible, you cannot be killed… But, you feel pain like a typical normal human being, would you take this trade?

Money

Taking it back to money, what is money, why is this significant, what does it mean?

Recalling before I join finances with Cindy, the work was simple: you work hard, you earn money, and then you spend it. As a consequence, before marrying Cindy, I don’t think I ever saved more than $500, or thousand dollars, because I would spend the money as quickly as I earned it!

My justification was that I was “investing”, the general idea is that the purpose of money is that you earn it, you invested, you spend it… To continue the cycle all over again indefinitely.

However, one which was never instilled in me was the ethos of saving. The more radical ideas that you work hard, you earn money, but you never spend it… You either put in the market, buy bitcoin, buy real estate, buy property etc. Essentially, you earn income, continue to drive your 2010 Prius, forever, never eat out, never buy new things, never buy a loser iPhone pro, etc. and also you never eat out at a loser restaurant, you quit alcohol and you never pay for $20 cocktails, you never smoke weed, you never go to a festival, you don’t go to concerts, you don’t blow your money at Vegas.

How I learned this

One thing I’m grateful for is that my dad was a chronic gambler, he would always gamble away the rent money, go off to Reno in the middle of the night, not come back for a week… Empty-handed. Even as a teenage kid, working really really hard as a boy at the sushi restaurant my mom worked at, maybe saving about $3000 USD in cash, and my dad saying that there was a business opportunity in LA, and that he needed the money… And then me giving that money to my dad, hoping that he would actually invest it to change his life, but once again… Him coming back, empty-handed.

I suppose I am lucky that I was a stoic ever since I was a kid, my adamantine soul & carcass — this is how I became so tough as a kid. Anyways, it first taught me the virtues of not being foolish with money, and learning firsthandley… gambling was a positive evil.

Energy conservation

Matter is not created nor destroyed, and assuming that there is a connection between Madrin and energy… Maybe the best way to think about money is monetary energy, human capital, solidified into ones and zeros.

For example, I think the true use of money is not really materials, but human labor. For example, when you pay somebody $20 for an overpriced sandwich, you’re not really paying for the materials… The materials for your sandwich might cost you only about a dollar or two, but to get a human hand to assemble the sandwich is what causes or cost a lot of money?

So I think when we pay for stuff, but we are really paying for is labor. Paying for human labor, and also space?

For example, when you’re wasting money at a gym membership… What you are paying for is the privilege of being around other human beings, kind of like a private club, and also the privilege of using the equipment and space.

I think this is where building your own home gym is so disruptive… it kind of changes everything.

For example, reoccurring costs is the killer here.

Depending on where you live, the prices of a gym membership can vary. When I was back in Orange County, crunch fitness was super cheap… I think like $30 a month? Practically free. But when you come here to LA… It looks like the average gym membership is about $120, even $200 a month? Even if you do the simple math… If you spent $200 a month in weightlifting equipment for yourself… Every month 200 bucks… This would be a better use of your money. Because when you purchased the equipment, it is your property, and has infinite potential.

Property

Life is a game of monopoly, go outside and cop yourself some property — MIGOS

Historically, Nas seem to laugh also mirrors this… Most of wealth creation was from owning property. For example, if your dad bought property in Palos Verdes, 100 years ago… You would inherit a lot of wealth.

Or those funny stories in which your great great grandfather, once upon a time purchased property in San Francisco for about five acorns, and now it is worth $5 billion… Similar story.

I think this is gonna be a similar thing with bitcoin, right now a bitcoin is worth about $55,000 a bitcoin… And 100 years, will be worth $21 million a bitcoin. And then 300 years from now, I wouldn’t be surprised if one bitcoin will be worth $1 trillion or something.

Generational wealth is the key

I think the big problem in today’s world is the cult of the individual. There has been a new modern day death to the family structure, the general ideas you never want to have kids.

Having a kid is very eye-opening in a good way. Why? Once you have a kid… Technically this augments your power. Assuming “The will to power”– the will to having children, many kids, is also the will to power. Why? When you have kids, multiple kids, you augment your power.

In the past, the general idea was children was like free labor. For example, we had a farm, having 10 kids would be useful in terms of managing the family farm. Even now, my brother-in-law and their family, having four boys for grown men… Tons of free intellectual and labor capital. They are currently building up a fine art gallery, And having intelligence and the human labor of for grown adults is great.

The logic

Assuming that you want to become super rich, but never have any kids… It is almost like shooting your semen into a black hole. When you’re dead, that sucks.

I think if you’re 90 years old on your deathbed, and you have no heirs, no children no grandchildren, no great grandchildren, the ultimate tragedy.

Body Pride vs body shame?

An interesting observation that I’ve made in the past; why is it that you’re allowed to flex your car, but not flex your body?

Even bodybuilders… Whenever they flex, they do it with a tint of shame?

Certainly there is a hierarchy of bodies, more desirable bodies, less desirable bodies.

Generics is fake

A big intervention: genetics is fake. Certainly there are genetic things like height, facial morphological features, etc.

For example, if both of your parents are 4 feet tall, probably unlikely you’re going to be 7 feet tall. But your parents are 7 feet tall, unlike you’ll be 4 feet tall.

Obviously people from different genetic heritages look different. But, if we think about the plasticity of human gene expression — obviously there is a lot we can stretch!

Racism 2.0

For example, I don’t really think there is such a thing as muscular strength geneticism. For example, I think the reason why there is so much African-Americans and Caucasians in sports is because there is higher steroid use amongst them… vs Asians who have a culture of studying.

However, even now, I’m starting to see this change. I’m seeing a lot of Asian guys, dipping into steroids, and they are insanely jacked. And I think the difference between the media and the real world is that the observation I met is when you go to the gym, a lot of the African-American guys are actually pretty skinny, typically guys with the most mass or not the African-American black guys, but the Caucasian white guys– and once again… Steroid use amongst the white Caucasian population is very high, just watch the documentary on the bell Brothers, 2/3 of them taking steroids. If you ever grew up to an Arnold Schwarzenegger or Rambo Sylvester Stallone film… You see the glorification of steroids. Also baseball, wrestling etc.

I only trust Prius drivers

A new thought: who is the real rich people or the real smart people? The Prius drivers! For example, I’ll never forget… At the $150 million mansion in Holmby Hills, seeing a white Prius pull out of the driveway!

And also, real rich families… all of the kids just drive Ford fusions? And even a major Tesla investor that I know, with over $100 million worth of Tesla stock, his family has base level model 3’s?

Therefore, my great intelligence is not seeing stuff on… Would rather, how real rich people behave. Especially how they don’t waste their money.

Why are rich people so cheap

This is also another hilarious irony; real rich people are actually very frugal. The hilarious irony:

You’re so rich… Why don’t you spend money to buy that Lamborghini?

The reason why they are rich because they did not buy the loser Lamborghini, but bought a Honda Civic instead!

Also… The irony that people tell me:

ERIC, why don’t you eat some of the cake?

I tell them, “Because I don’t want to get fat.”

And then they tell me:

But you’re so skinny!

And then I laugh and I tell them– “The reason I am so skinny is because I don’t eat cake!” Haha.

And this is the great paradox, if you really want to become rich, like have a lot of money… The true goal is simple: Spartan living.

NOT.

You not like them!

I’m cut from a different cloth, forged from steel not clay!

Marble

One thing I’m really into is marble. You cannot fake it. Even the fake marble stuff, although aesthetically pretty nice, there is always an uncanny valley in which you could tell us something that is fake, which makes you feel uneasy.

For example, fake wood trim, especially in cars, I hate this. I think this is why I would never purchase any Tesla automobile with a fake wooden dash– pure ugliness. Here I am very happy that the new Tesla model three car, especially in black, they have made the dash, a lovely monochromatic thing.

In Japanese aesthetics and woodworking, there is a general notion of honesty of materials; if something is plastic, don’t try to pretend that the plastic is something else! Just let it be plastic!

Don’t try to make some thing into something that is not!

Maybe also, the metaphor to humans is, if you are cut from a different cloth, if you are a different material… don’t try to transmute yourself into being something you are not!

For example, if you are bronze, no matter how hard you try… You cannot become gold! And the virtues of bronze is it is relentless, and brings black death. And Achilles preferred bronze over gold — bronze makes better weapons and armor. Gold is only for looking pretty on the battlefield, Looking like little girls, who die promptly.

My primary sociological intervention is your personality characteristics, no matter how bad or immoral they may seem… our virtues should be amplified, rather than tamed or changed.

For example, for myself, I was always the ratchet, loud, high energy personality– an ego and a head bigger than life, always wanting to be the center of attention. I think society try to squeeze me into being something different, more decipherable, more predictable, etc. I think from the get-go, my personality was always more adapted to entertainment focused, media personality stuff, rather than just being another quiet programming worker bee. In fact, now that Silicon Valley is effectively dead, I am so happy I did not study computer science or programming, and just become another drone at Apple, Amazon Facebook or Google, rather, I transformed my primary passion, blogging into my living.

Am I the first millionaire blogger? Maybe. Certainly the first millionaire street photographer, or the first millionaire street photography blogger!

New analogies

I think a big issue is when we try to copy a design, something which has succeeded in the past, rather than giving it a cart launch, fresh from scratch approach.

For example, I’m a huge fan of the Fujifilm cameras, but the big critical design issue is that with the Fujifilm X100 series cameras, they try to make it look like a Leica M rangefinder camera!

Panasonic lumix is the way

Perhaps a more intelligent idea and thought, is like the new Lumix S9 camera, in which Panasonic Lumix had the intelligent idea:

If we pared down a camera, an interchangeable lens camera, a body, and made a maximally small compact and easy to use… what would it look like?

Et voila! The first really really small, good interchangeable lens full frame camera! I think the grandeur of Panasonic LUMIX is they are smart —

First, essentially borrowing her technologies, in lending her talent to Leica Camera AG. And I think also, Panasonic Lumix gained good insight from the German Leica engineers.
Let us consider the Leica Q, essentially it is like a Panasonic Lumix camera on steroids.
In terms of longevity, it seems that overtime, the most robust cameras, which have lasted are the Lumix cameras. For example, the Lumix G9 camera that I got in Japan around 2017 2018, is still chugging along fine today!

Let us not be suckered, durability is the number one critical thing on the planet.

Durable humans, durable bodies

One of my curiosities is watching all these bodybuilding films, because I was sucker by all this stuff, back in the day when I was a teenage kid, trying to get super jacked and muscular etc. I probably spent hundreds of dollars on protein powder and muscle milk as a kid, Money which was probably better spent on buying stocks etc.

Something that people don’t know is that I only picked up for you when I was about 18 years old, as a high school senior graduation present before going to college, and technically I was blogging ever since I was in high school, I recall my first “Xanga” blog — and also building my own website blog my sophomore junior year in high school.

I started blogging around 2 years before I started shooting photos.

I suppose looking back, timing was good. Blogging was still in its infancy, and also, photography and street photography was still nascent– the early days.

Anyways, the funny thing with timing is that the timing of things is always most beneficial to you during your own generation in years.

For example, Seneca at 3 1/2 years old, already knows what bitcoin is! And when he was about 2 1/2, he was already creating images on DALL-E, we made a lot of funny bitcoin school buses, even before he could barely talk!

I think this is the reason why entrepreneurship and innovation is tricky; the principles change, the ideas change, the methods and techniques change. And we always need to give it a first principles, carte blanche approach.

The American way

Perhaps the first true approach is to do a blank sheet, a clean sheet, a carte blanche approach. A white paper, a blank white paper approach.

For example, the reason why cyber truck is the best thing of all time is that Elon and his head designer, rather than just taking that Ford F150 and trying to make it look like a Tesla car, they just literally thought the whole thing from scratch, and thought:

If we designed a truck ,,, TODAY,,, with the apex of all materials and technologies, what would it look like? And also what design elements would it not have?

I think this is also where bitcoin is so innovative; rather than just thinking about how currency worked in the past, isn’t the more intelligent thing to leverage the Internet, computer, math, and modern day cryptography, to create a new type of “imaginary” money (all money is imaginary)?

I think studying history is useful, don’t just blindly give fellatio to the past. Often the past was far worse.

For example, anybody who over romanticizes vinyl records, classic cars, or even film photography… I think it’s signals insecurity in oneself, And what they do is they see some sort of godhead or legitimacy from the past.

Also the thing with film photography, which people get suckered by that because most people cannot do it, it is seen as more valuable! But just because the photo is showing on films not making more virtuous or interesting.

This is where the photography world, film photography, art photography world is ridiculous; it is a bunch of insecure people trying to circle jerk off one other, to augment a bunch of insecure egos? to justify how you wasted $250,000 on a foolish private arts education, assuming your family is not a billionaire?

Any education or higher education in which you have to go into debt to do it is never worth it.

Back to ideas at hand

Once again, the intelligence of a clean slate approach; with practically everything…

If we could hard reset the whole world of bodybuilding, weightlifting, and fitness… What would it look like?
if we erased everything about the past, and truly designed a car for the year 2024 and beyond… What would it look like?
ChatGPT and bitcoin is already here and is certainly the future… how should we rethink or reimagine the whole K-12 education system?

Searchgpt

I would say the future of education is simply critical thinking… Just let the kids use unlimited ChatGPT, the paid premium one in the classroom and beyond, and the true goal of the future is how to be critical or how to judge and assess the veracity of things that you find on ChatGPT or Google.

Impact, I have not used Google for almost a month now, my new experiment is just used ChatGPT whenever I am curious about something, and it is a quadrillion times superior in every single shape shape and form.

The last bastion of hope for Google is maybe YouTube — but even the big issue is once chatGPT video, sora comes out… and you could have ChatGPT produce infinite media, for a nickel, and also, you do not have to pay the creator… then what?

Also pornography; I have not opened up the terrible Pandora’s box of ChatGPT,DALL-E, virtual reality AI generated pornography… Or hentai or whatever… But certainly it seems that the hilarious irony that pornography might be more ethical; no humans are harmed, either mentally spiritually morally ethically… The only weirdos are the guys who may be created, and consume it, or… Release their seminal fluid to it?

And also… Come on… How many single tech dies, who spent $4000 on Apple Vision Pro have used it at least once to try out virtual reality pornography? No shame or issues here… But certainly, it makes you rethink and reconsider the whole thing.

What is the purpose of humans?

On a very very basic level… Reading the new translation of the Iliad by Emily Wilson is very very useful, because the telos was very simple then; you wanted to find a beautiful wife, and have kids! No weird modern day hedonist playboy who wanted to stay single forever kind of notion. No loser George Clooney type.

Let us not forget that Hugh Hefner, who invented the whole playboy idea, was an impotent man, a twig of a man, who was just injecting Viagra to his penis all day? Not a sign of virility.

So first, my simple intervention is that the purpose of humans is to produce beautiful offspring. And to find yourself a beautiful mate, a beautiful wife.

The future for your kids

Every parent wants a more glorious future for their children! This is the impetus of every new immigrants to America and beyond. The Chinese and the Koreans, and also even the Vietnamese call America, the beautiful country!

Ngoi my~

Mee-gook

Mee-gwwuh

China means the center country, like the center of the universe. But America is the beautiful one.

Doesn’t everyone want beauty?

Men

Man, what is it that we seek? A beautiful wife, a maximally beautiful wife, the most beautiful wife of all time, within our means, to produce the maximally beautiful, maximally powerful and superior children?

And if you think about it… Man we are not so different from Peacock; we do different societal behaviors and norms, certain meeting dances and calls, in order to attract that made, once again, hoping to marry her, and have beautiful children with her?

Hector, also had a son. And I think Achilles, if he had the chance would also desire a son.

Each and every man desires at least one male heir.

Breeds of dogs & breeds of humans?

One of the greatest things about the planet is genetic diversity. If you lived in the planet without any genetic diversity, it would be the most miserable planet of all time.

Let us consider all the diversity there is, in terms of food, animals, climates, plants bugs etc.

The funny thing is that on one hand we promote diversity, but on the other hand, we shun it.

Be different! No… not like THAT!

Everyone looks different in the same way?

I remember in high school… The weird goth emo kids who would wear all black, even in the hot summer, I don’t understand how they were able to wear black hoodies in the summertime at school, and it seems that they all would shop at hot topic.

And also, kids who are into skateboarding… Why did they all look to see? Why have I never seen a kid into skateboarding who just wore Lululemon tights?

The good thing is, there is a blurring of everything, you could literally be anything you want to be. And nobody cares. I think this is a very good thing.

However the new ones; I think the notion of being different be predicated on assessing others, and then literally trying to be different, but rather, trying to critically assess who you are, and then, just focus on your own personality.

For example, a sociological curiosity I’ve always had is how much of our personality is genetic or biological versus societal? Now that Seneca is 3 1/2, I have a partially good answer.

Based on my observation, considering that also, I’ve literally almost been with Seneca 24 7, since he was born… I think one personality is maybe 65% of the equation, and the rest of it is socialized.

For example, Seneca in terms of his personality is very unlike me. He is more reserved, critical, and I think wiser. I am a little bit too foolish, too loud, too trusting. I think his personality is a carbon clone of Cindy.

The nuance is that a lot of the things that I’ve been teaching him, is kind of like a social technology, like giving people high-fives, fist bumps, etc. Also, the fact that we are essentially outside all day, not in some sort of grid system.

Cyber Beach, beach school?

Beach school? Kids would be a lot happier?

Ethics?

Something which is not allowed to be talked about… we could talk about breeds of dogs, but not humans.

OK… let us apply a line of thinking to dogs, different breeds of dogs. For example, certainly a canine or pitbull would be a much better and ferocious fighter than a pug or a hotdog wiener dog.

But the funny thing is I think all breeds of dogs could procreate with one another, irregardless of breed?

Genetic differences

Certainly with human beings, there are some families which are naturally taller, some families which are naturally shorter. And certainly there has been some sort of genetic diversification on the planet and beyond, especially when it comes a different parts of the planet.

For example, in certain places certain humans have more bodily hair, possibly to dissipate the heat. For example, the physiology of somebody from ancient Greece would probably be a lot different from somebody from Sweden.

Other places, we adapt to gain darker pigments to fight off the sun. It makes sense, if your family genetic heritage is from sub-Saharan Africa, logically the human body will produce more pigment to fight off the sun then if your genetic heritage was from northern Sweden, in which during the winter time you might only get 30 minutes of sun.

Why others are confused by me

I’m starting to feel more and more… maybe other people, they’re just a different breed than me. For example, I think of myself kind of like a canine, a K9 attack police dog, and everyone else is just a wiener dog? Or annoying poodles?

And so then… when other people try to punk me around, I have zero tolerance for it.

For example, let us say that you were a ferocious fighting dog, and there’s a random annoying poodle that starts barking at you! Or tries to bully you around? How would you respond? Obviously you would just want the damn poodle to shut up!

Or I am the Gerardos, everyone else is like a Diglett or a Magikarp?

Thinking about Achilles

In my mind, I see myself like an Achilles. I see myself like the most handsome, powerful, dominant, ultra being out there. And perhaps it is precisely my oversized ego is where I get my power.

I think there are a lot of sissy philosophers and thinkers who somehow think that ego is a bad thing. I think this is not the case. Your ego is almost like your balls and your testicles… would you castrate yourself because sometimes it makes you too angry– having big balls and a lot of testosterone is almost like overpower.

For example, we think about Dragon Ball Z, Goku going super Saiyan etc.… Obviously you want the golden flaming flowing hair, and the ultra power of going super Saiyan! But let us say that with the ability to go super Saiyan, there were also some downsides like sometimes you cannot tolerate the power? Would you sacrifice it? Of course not!

Niagara Falls would make a great bitcoin mining rig

Kind of like a raging river, Niagara Falls; would the point be to simply cut it off … or wouldn’t a more intelligent strategy to be to harness it like putting a water electricity damn thing on it, harness the hydropower, not to cut it off?

And this is my critique about modern day times, it seems like a lot of people are trying to do is to castrate the source, rather than channel that energy for positive constructive good things!

Don’t castrate yourself!

For example, the ego should be something augmented, amplified and magnified, but also concurrent channeled in such a way which could be empowering and useful for others?

How?

So can we use the ego in a constructive or positive way?

First, a non-competitive spirit… just compliment everybody you see! Even if somebody is taller, more good looking, handsomer, richer, more successful, buffer than you! When you see somebody with a great physique, the correct strategy is to compliment them and acknowledge them!

Second, to harness and channel your ego and your energy and your physiological power towards writing, producing text, making videos, podcasts etc.… Sharing ideas, irregardless of how unethical they may seem.

If anything… I’m starting to think more and more, the only interesting ideas are the unethical ones. Or the ones which are shunned by mainstream modern day society.

To me, the only good ideas are the bad ones. When an idea seems right, and it seems to make sense, typically it is bad and or wrong.

Follow your values

When it comes to values, there is no right or wrong, there are simply authentic to yourself, or not.

For example, my values and beliefs in open source, entrepreneurship, and empowerment through photography are true. Why? I grew up poor, single working mom waiting tables at Japanese sushi restaurant for nearly 20 years, and also almost went homeless twice. A lot of your own personal narrative forms who you are.

As a consequence, I think the idea is not too shroud who you are, your own personality etc., but rather to magnify it!

Magnify your personality!

For example, I’m a very inquisitive, curious person, and I’d like to chop it up! I like to be friendly!

Funny enough… I try to be friendly to everybody, but people who are standoffish, or bizarro, they react to me in very bizarre ways. But should I suddenly shut down my friendly personality because other guy is a cowardly poodle? No!

ERIC KIM PICTURES ENTERTAINMENT

Ever since I was a kid, what was my great gift? Being a great entertainer! I am literally the most entertaining person that I know, I’ve only met maybe two people in the flesh who outperformed me.

Maybe it is a form of social conquest, trolling around, having fun etc.! Maybe it is that I seek to be the biggest dick in the room?

But it’s supposed to question is, why do I care? Why do I care to be the biggest dick in the room?

Not sure? Maybe the desire to dominate is in my DNA?

How I became the street photographer

Whether you like it or not, all street photographers, especially young ones are disciples of ERIC KIM. How and why? I essentially created a metaphorical Bible or textbook or encyclopedia and ultimate resource for anything revolving around street photography. Why?

100 lessons from the masters of street photography

It was always my number one goal to be the number one street photographer on Google, to become number one in street photography. As a consequence, my laser like eyes and focus was insanely simple; do everything I could do to become number one on Google for street photography. And the strategy was very very simple, create the most in-depth articles blog posts and information for everything street photography! It took me nearly a decade, but I did it! After that, other domains to conquer.

But the funny thing is in today’s world… certainly Google is relevant, but now that ChatGPT is coming out with their own search engine, which is in my opinion at least 1000 X more intelligent, google should be scared, very scared.

What is the future?

Obviously it will be ChatGPT and AI, open AI.

Let us consider… AI and cars. Besides the vanity object, the ideal is for your car to be 100% self driving, and this is where Tesla is a great bet; one should think of Tesla like artificial intelligence company with wheels.

Because the truth is, if you compare the ride quality of any Tesla car and any Toyota, the Toyota is superior and almost every single shape and form, besides speed. A Tesla is very very uncomfortable, the springs are too harsh, the ride quality is inferior to even my 2010 Prius!

For example, if you wanted a car with the ultimate ride comfort, you would probably purchase a Lexus vehicle, or maybe a Mercedes?

Even though I love Tesla and Elon Musk to death, the cars feel pretty cheap. If you wanted the best car, probably get a Lexus LS.

Autopilot is the killer feature

But anyways, the really intelligent strategy is to purchase the cheapest base level Tesla car, with the most basic options, and just purchase auto pilot. I think auto pilot for about $8000 is the best deal of all time; it is like having your own personal driving slave that doesn’t need to be fed, paid, never gets tired, is always ready.

Even the new Google pixel that comes with the new pro Gemini AI… If your life runs on Gmail, it is kind of the game changer.

If you can’t beat them join them

Even Apple is lagging behind in artificial intelligence, the new Apple Intelligence looks pretty lame. Super smart that the Apple team decided to integrate with open AI to integrate ChatGPT into her services; if you can’t beat them, join them.

Rather than Apple trying to create a ChatGPT copycat, simply to integrate or offer ChatGPT services on the iPhone is the smart way.

I guess Google has had a bit of a headstart; she was in the AI game for a very long time. And this is where Google to pivot to focus on AI is a good idea.

So what will be the purpose of humans now?

In a brave New World of ChatGPT, AI etc.… What is the purpose or the significance of humans?

The first step is to transfer all of the tedious tasks from humans to ChatGPT. Or AI.

For example, the greatest innovation of TurboTax is having that new AI that automatically has you categorize all of your expenses. Oh my god, this was literally the most hateful thing about doing my taxes, having to categorize all of my different deductions. But now, what would otherwise take me about eight hours, takes me about eight seconds when you connect TurboTax with your bank accounts.

I love TurboTax!

And this is where the future of things become interesting; all these things in the past which we had to do inefficiently slowly and begrudgingly… we should just let AI do it, and we humans do more meaningful things.

Slave Work, Master Work?

I think this is the future; let AI be the new slave, and you, the flesh bound human being, you do the human creative work!

The ultimate disruption

ChatGPT is one quadrillion times more productive than you. This is a big deal. Why?

What that means is that the purpose of us humans is not productivity. We can finally unchain ourselves from the leashes of this ridiculous notion of productivity.

How do the gods of mount Olympus live?

The gods, who live at ease.

You fools, the point of life is not to give fellatio to hard things, hard lives, etc. We should be like Zeus, with the mighty thunderbolt, the gods lived in supreme ease.

This is also the funny thing is that when a lot of people retire, make a bunch of money or whatever they are lost… they don’t know how to embrace or live a life of ease; they’re still trying to grind their nose against the grinder, because for their whole life, that is what their life was?

I would say emulate the gods of the Iliad, ancient Greece. Read the new Iliad translation by Emily Wilson, I purchased it in the iBooks store, reading on my iPad Pro and I love it!

Ethos

I suppose that the primary thing here to consider is the ethos of human humanity, reasons of living etc.

I think for too long, the whole ethos of humanity was to maximize productivity, income income earning potential, money and capital and capitalism etc.… but once again, if bitcoin, AI and ChatGPT can do it better than you, by 1 billion fold,,, what is your new life ethos?

Risk free returns

Assuming that you’re a big contractor, and you’re building a new skyscraper or commercial real estate or whatever, what is the goal? To create income producing property, and to eventually cop a profit?

However the great issue here is the cost to capital; the startup costs and the initial investment is too high! As a consequence, let us say that you invested $1 billion to build this new commercial real estate… You eventually have to find all these tenants to sign a lease, occupy it, pay the lease or the rent, and maybe in 20 or 30 years you can make a positive profit?

Assuming that bitcoin is digital capital, digital land, digital real estate… The cost of capital is practically zero, you just have to sit and vest, I can almost guarantee you that you have a 0% risk over 30 years. And I can almost guarantee you with 100% clarity that bitcoin will go up in the next 30 years.

I also like the notion of bitcoin being digital real estate because nobody checks their home price on Zillow 10 times a day, reacting to short term increases or decreases or volatility.

Why is bitcoin so volatile?

It is a feature, not a bug!

First, you could trade bitcoin 24/7, 365, every millisecond.
Let us consider how insane this is… It is the year 2024, we live in the future, and traditional markets are closed on the weekends? This is 1 trillion times bizarre.

Assuming that the real world was like a science fiction film… Can you Which economic trading doesn’t happen on the weekends?

So this is why bitcoin is so volatile and always goes up and down, almost randomly because it is always trading! I wonder if the volatility of other assets and stocks are a lot less because simply you can’t trade it on the weekends.

Flesh future

I’m pretty sure that almost 99.9% of men, assuming that they have an iPhone, probably watches porn every single day, almost 100% certain at least once a week or once a month etc. Or better yet, if you want to see whether your friend watches porn or not, ask to see his laptop, and to see whether they have a torrenting or VPN application installed on their MacBook laptop– utorrent, Trasmission etc.

Or, if they have the brave browser on their phone, Google Chrome incognito etc.

Almost every single person I know who works in tech, knows how to program or code whatever, all use pirate bay.

Anyways, once again another bizarre thing; one would never watch pornography which is centered around ideas, souls, personalities, etc. It is always the flesh, the human body!

Why did it in modern day times, we are trying to deny the human body, and trying to promote instead, one’s “personality” and “mind” and “soul”– ?

Build your body

Become a body – builder ,,, obviously without the steroids!

ERIC

All injected hormones are bad hormones

Unless you have cancer, HIV aids, and is literally a life or death thing.

Things to learn

I think for myself, I have a passion for learning. Why?

First, lot of things about life and society are confusing to me; for example, a recent thing I learned about the Z boys, in the drought during the 1970s caused everyone to not have water in their pool, so these kids who would just jump fences and skateboard in the empty pools of people in Venice Beach or whatever… this is where the pipe, skateboarding thing came from?

Also from a random Jay-Z interview that I learned… why is it that in hip-hop culture, guys would wear beanies, baggy jeans, and wear Timberland cold weather work boots? I think he said that it was for drug dealing, in the cold New York winter… And also probably would bag your pants you could hide a gun.

Black timbs all on your couch again!

Also… The reason for the Lamborghini scissor doors on the Lamborghini Countach, was originated by the fact that the early models of the Lamborghini, because the reversing ability was too dangerous, they invented the scissor door mechanism so you could put up the scissor doors, and reverse your car, without hitting it! But now that we have reverse cameras and stuff etc.… there’s really no more reason to have scissor doors anymore.

So maybe, the next Lamborghini you buy… forgo the scissor doors!

Don’t trust fashion

Also why is it that yoga leggings became a fashion trend for women in LA? Simple… You never know when you want to do yoga, so the optimal strategy is to just always wear yoga leggings, so you could jump into class whenever you want to!

Also, I think a lot of the fashion trends for gay guys were simply a signaling thing; let us say I am gay and I am not sure whether you are gay or not… Therefore I would adopt a certain fashion style, talking style, or bodily gesticulation ideas so I could signal that I am gay and you’re also gay.

Code words.

Documentaries

Pumping iron, the classic documentary with Arnold I think it’s on Amazon prime TV?
Stronger better faster, documentary about steroids, watch it on Apple TV+ just pay the 10 bucks
The legendary Z boys documentary of skateboarding

What to experiment with?

There is literally no downside to fasting or intermittent fasting. About 90% of modern day metabolic diseases can essentially be fixed by fasting. Type two diabetes, type three diabetes (Alzheimer’s), obesity, exhaustion, etc.

My simple suggestion: stop eating breakfast and lunch, and if you’re hungry just drink some water, black coffee with nothing in it, or green tea.

What is the best time to break your fast? Treat it like Ramadan… Only ever eat after the sun goes down. This makes for a dynamic workflow; because certainly the sun changes during the winter or the summer.

Also, assuming that it is not against your religion… I also recommend everyone to do 100% carnivore diet, and besides meat, red meat, goat lamb beef, pork is also good (achilles roasted a hog to feed his guests), bone marrow, beef ribs, backbone, etc. for greens just eat arugula, kale, watercress.

Quit sugar

Quit all sugar, the real stuff that fake stuff, even the fake “good” sugar.

There is no biological reason you need to consume fruit, fruit is just candy with a good conscience.

Also start vegetables, it is just poverty food; people would eat starchy vegetables or rice or white rice to avoid dying.

Also a theory… Perhaps the reason why in Asia white rice was so prized was if the rice was white… It was a hygiene thing; you knew that there was not any maggots, or insect in it, or things which could cause you to get sick and die.

60 pound weight vest

Titan.fitness , and just walk around all day! Just buy a cheap sun hat on Amazon for 10 bucks, and sun block up!

Also, I believe every single man, each and every single man should own at least one great barbell. Buy the Texas power squat bar, if I did it all over again I would buy the monsters Squat bar!

IPad Pro

I think Apple should do a commercial with me, just using the iPad Pro, no case no pencil (eric@erickim.com)–

I’ve become an icon in Culver City, I’m the dude who just walks around all day, with his iPad Pro. Most people have never seen me even use an iPhone.

Voice dictation is the future, there is no reason to text message or use your thumbs in the year 2024, the only reason people don’t use voice dictation is that they feel it is socially weird? But why should you care?

This is where the next new wave of innovation is simply conquering social expectations, social fears. Allow yourself to be aberrant and different.

What to read

The bitcoin standard
The Iliad by Emily Wilson
The Odyssey by Emily Wilson

JUST FIX IT, JUST MOD IT.

Some capital thoughts:

OK, it seems that what a lot of us seek is maybe fulfilling a curiosity gap, purchasing something because we think it will boost our happiness, etc. But is this ever the case?

No!

At the age of 36, I’ve achieved all my life goals, pretty much purchased everything I’ve ever really wanted, and this is my big lesson:

No matter how good the stuff you purchase, sooner or later, you will quickly tire and bore of it.

Perhaps it is human nature. And this is how we were hardwired.

However, I think the pernicious effect of consumerism and maybe capitalism is that we have this false belief, this false reality that purchasing XYZ will make us “happy”, or give us everlasting bliss.

Or, that having ex amount of income or money in the bank or whatever will make us “happy“, or give us a feeling of security?

Male vs Female capital

This is what I generally observed; through money in capital, women seek a sense of security, belonging, or to be appreciated or desired?

For example, if you look at all these sexy girls on Instagram or whatever… Or women who spend too much money on clothes, what is it that basic? Acceptance, to be perceived as beautiful, to be desired or desirable.

Also it seems that with women, the desire of purchasing a home, a single-family home a condo whatever, is a sense of security.

For men, it seems that we think of as a form of power, power augmentation, and maybe what we conflate is power with happiness?

What if… power and happiness were not the same thing? But different?

What if the fact was in order to become more powerful, you had to become more unhappy? Or conversely… That the most people were actually the least powerful?

Question; would you rather be the unhappy dragon, or the happy cow?

How to switch things up

My neighbor, successful Silicon Valley, google employee, about my age, single, no kids, not yet married, has a girlfriend, seems that he just treated out his old Audi S3 sport for a Porsche 718 sport. And it is funny… Although the engine or the exhaust of the Porsche sounds way cooler, in terms of aesthetics, not much of a difference.

Actually, the more I look at the Porsche 718, the more I hate the design. The rear end of it looks terrible! and assuming that you’re a normal human being who always parks their car nose in, butt out, what that means is almost 100% of the time, you’re going to be staring at your car from behind.

My personal thought is the best designed Porsche car from behind is certainly the Porsche 911 with the singular blade light. And it also seems that the new Porsche 911, which I think might have a hybrid in it, has a more aesthetic looking tailpipe design.

Anyways, the problem with design is as good as the design is, it will never less. For example, even my film Leica MP, black paint, fully mechanical, mechanical perfection, with the Leica 35mm f2 Summicron Lens — yeah it is super nice, and essentially the design is perfect ; it is probably the perfect design because it is 100% mechanical, you don’t need a battery for it to take pictures, or operate. The only battery thing in it is the light meter, which is insanely useful. The film Leica M-A does not have a light meter, which almost seems more like a aesthetic exercise, not a practical one. Having a built-in light meter is insanely useful.

Make it as simple as possible, but not simpler.

This is why I still think that the film like a MP camera is the most best, the most supreme, because you don’t want to be taking the light meter out of the camera, very much how Rico foolishly got rid of the built-in flash. The Ricoh GR II with the built-in integrated flash is still probably the best one, I think about all the great photos I saw with it, using the built-in flash. The Ricoh GR III/X also insanely great, but still… It seems that the wise optimization is making a little bit bigger, and put back in the flash, rather than just trying to make it super super small, but getting rid of an insanely useful thing, like the built-in flash.

Kind of like if you’re a man, and you’re trying to “lose weight”, and you decide to chop off your penis in your balls in order to “lose” a pound. Not a good idea.

Simple ideas

I think what we humans have a joy in is change over time, or before and afters.

For example, who is happier? The guy who starts off with the salary at $40,000 a year, and gets a pay raise to $80,000 a year? Or to the guy who makes $1 billion a year, and then his income is reduced to only $10 million a year? Obviously the person in the second scenario is in the far superior economic financial position, but will probably feel miser miserable compared to the guy with a more modest income, who had a massive jump!

And this is also the funny thing… It is all relative! For example, when I was in college, $3000, $5000, $7000, $10,000, were an unfathomably big number to me. But now, I’m chasing 1.2 million, 2.5 million, $10 million and beyond.

Also, I guess it’s good that I’ve built a more stoic mindset when it comes to money, for example, if I randomly see my bitcoin balance dip $200,000 or $300,000 down, it doesn’t really bother me that much, whereas in the past, even seeing my money go down $500 or $1000 dollars was like being kicked in the balls.

Wise economics

Very very simple, if you want shits and giggles, never buy anything, either rent it, test drive it, maybe even leasing it might be a better idea. Why? Instead of dropping $80,000 on a brand new car, to just lease it for two or three years, and get it out of your system, might be a better bet than Pissing away all that money that you could otherwise put into bitcoin, and have it 1000X from here.

Also, I think one of the joys I have on living very very close to two car dealerships is that I always walk by the cars, and the funny joy is I don’t really feel like I have the need to actually own it; because I could just look at it, it feels like I metaphorically own it!

For example for a while there was a cyber truck here, and I will look at it every single day, and even the cyber truck, as much as I love it, I eventually bored of it. Even now, I used to be super super excited when I would see a cyber truck on the road, And now, even though it brings a small to my face, it doesn’t bring me the insane excitement that it did before.

All

I think this applies to cars women, your bank account account balance balance etc.

No matter how good grand perfect or whatever… Sooner or later you will bore of it.

For example, in regards to women… No matter how beautiful the woman is, sooner or later, assuming that you only got with the woman only for her beauties… Assuming that you just wanted to bet her indefinitely, I could almost guarantee you 100% that After a few fun nights, you will tire and bore.

Same thing with owning that Lamborghini; I actually had the realization, now that the Hurucan and the Aventador has been outdated and replaced… None of the new Lamborghinis have any appeal to me, practically zero. What I then realize is the whole time, I didn’t really care for the Lamborghini so much, as for what it stood for, ultimately the only reason why Lamborghini was cool in the first place was because of Kanye West. And as much as people like to ignore, all modern day rappers are all disciples of Kanye West. Even Travis Scott, who was the most raging success, was discovered by Kanye and promoted by Kanye.

Even apparently Adidas,,, who apparently asked their contract with Kanye because of Kanye‘s controversial “antisemetic” remarks, they are now selling his Yeezy sneakers at a 70% discount! it shows that I guess then Adidas… They are a bunch of scumbags, and they don’t really support anti antisemitism, – if they really really cared, they would just throw all of the unsold Yeezy supplies into the furnace, because it would be unethical to in for a profit. So ultimately, guys, all corporations and companies, and publicly treated companies have no morals and ethics, why? if Adidas truly truly did support the Jewish community and if Adidas was truly anti-Kanye West for his anti-Semitism they would never ever ever continue to sellthe Yeezy sneakers, even to sell off the unsold supply. The ethical thing would have been to either burn or shred the unsold Yeezy supply.

How to switch it up

Very very simple thoughts: first, before selling your car or trading it in for something new, just wash your car, and wax it! Also a very very simple modification you could do to your car is to purchase some Matt Black paint primer, rust oleum, or a shiny glass black paint, and just spray paint your rims either a mat black, gloss black, or satin black.

Also ironically, the best mod you could do is removal! For example, just buy some goo gone, and the debadge your car, get rid of all the emblems! This is what I did to the 2010 Prius that I inherited, and aesthetically I love it so much more without the emblems!

Also if you have an old car, get rid of the tent. You know sometimes the older cars when you have the low quality tent, in the tent becomes purple and starts to bubble? Yeah I get rid of that. Also that you really do have a race car or sports car, if you wanted to go faster, get rid of the power steering, air conditioning, And also the radio. And if you really really wanted to be a race car, get rid of all the sound deadening, interior stuff, rear seats, etc. And you could tidy up your engine bay just clean it up!

If you want a very very simple modification, just purchase some 3M matte black vinyl wrap, and just wrap your car! To wrap your car is very easy, it is just like a big sticker! My suggestion is just do it over some accents and small parts, not the whole car. Why? Even if you purchased the best car wrap on the planet, and have it installed by the best person on the planet, you take care of it with the best sprays cleaning supplies and products, and always keep apart in the garage whatever… Lifetime on these things are maybe 3 to 7 years tops?

And this is where I’m still a bigger fan of real automotive paint; assuming that you take care of care of a good paint job it might last maybe 20 years? Even 30 years? Assuming also it is a white paint job? And also don’t be a fool; black paint, even the best black paint never lasts, even if you have the best Mercedes car, or BMW or Lexus, sooner you will get the paint scratches, and when it is 100° in LA, you’re going to wish that you did not have that car. And if you do a simple physics test; let us say you live in Arizona or Las Vegas, if you have a black car in the dark sun it will probably not last you 20 or 30 years.

Then I suppose the question is how long do we want these things to last anyways? Do we really want them to last forever, or are we secretly waiting for it to break, either intentionally or unintentionally, to give us an excuse to “upgrade”?

Upgrading is a scam

Some low-key unethical behaviors from Apple; she wants you to trade in your old iPhone, at an 80% loss, to upgrade to her newest most mediocre device, which will also probably be outdated in a year or two?

Typically what I see a lot of people do is that they will find a reason to “upgrade” their phone by giving their old phone to their sibling, parents, etc.… But once again guys, this is a very foolish decision.

My simple thought is the only purpose of an iPhone is for FaceTime and Google maps. This, the iPhone is really quite a mediocre device. 1000,000,000,000 times better to have a iPad Pro, if you really want to be productive.

In fact, what is the modern Day iPhone Pro? Not a camera, if you really cared for photography you would purchase a standalone digital camera. If you really wanted to increase your productivity you would just buy an 11 inch iPad Pro. Maybe the iPhone, iPhone Pro, is just a mobile pornography device or perhaps a mobile distraction device?

True happiness

My recipe for happiness is simple; sleep 8 to 12 hours a night, walk 30,000 steps a day, maximum time outside all day, never be stuck in doors, to play with your child with full vigor, to lift weights at least once in the day, to have a loving family, too fast all day and to only break your fast right before it is time to sleep, and to essentially have strength vicar and power all day long!

“Heem”

In Korean, there’s this notion of “heem”– which just means vigor or strength.

Also, the notion of getting sick, like the common cold “gam-gee” is meaning that you lost your “gi” (the Chinese call it your “chi”).

The significance of it is that when you catch a common cold, it essentially you lose your strength, your power.

To me, the only thing I hate in the world is feeling tired, exhausted, weak, without vigor. And even a simple thought; I think for a lot of men, the goals to get super super buff, super jacked, insanely muscular arms, whatever… Or to hit a certain inches for your biceps, your arms, to hit certain numbers for your lifts, to hit a certain weight, to hit a certain body fat percentage, whatever… But ultimately, the most critical thing here is having insane vigor, audacity, strength, and power! Physiological power. Nothing else matters.

This is where that takes away from your physiological is bad. For example, would you eject your seminal fluid, immediately before attempting to lift 1000 pounds? Probably not.

Also — no boxer would smoke weed, consume alcohol, taking any drugs or downers, immediately before the big fight! Even something I’m not sure… I don’t even think a boxer would drink coffee right before the fight? Why? Even something I discovered with public speaking, the worst thing you could do is to consume caffeine or an upper or a downer right before a big speech. Better to just drink a bunch of water and do it sober. Why? I’ve had an espresso before giving a public talk, or doing a workshop, or drinking coffee before workshop… And once I actually get into action, I become too stimulated, too much adrenaline.

Apparently there are a lot of musicians, orchestra people, people in the band or whatever who all take these muscle relaxants, or these downers, or calming drugs before getting on stage to deal with stage anxiety… But this is also a bad idea because it will make you a bit slower, and you will lose your edge.

Water is best.

What if everything you believed in was false?

After watching the bigger stronger faster documentary on steroids, very eye-opening. Everyone is on some sort of steroid or drug! Even jetfighter, in the Air Force, “go pills”– they take it like candy! Also, an interesting history of science book and medicine, “Blitzed”– outlined how the panzer Blitzkrieg nazi tank operators, were essentially all high on cocaine and meth, in order to drive their tanks straight for three days without food rest or stopping. Even apparently, Adolf Hitler was high on all these drugs, and even had his own private doctor prescribe him all these anti anxiety pills and medicines —

And you see this in show business all the time — all of these super successful media personalities end up overdosing on heroin cocaine, or end up committing suicide? Anthony Bourdain, Robin Williams?

All media is bad.

This apparently happens a lot to child actors, think of Degrassi Drake — i’m sure being part of the whole whole factory of Nickelodeon at such a young age, was probably traumatizing. I would not be surprised if the truth was even the rapper Drake was sexually abused as a child.

This is where it is wise to assume that all show business is evil; never let your kids get into it, not for any sum of money or fame!

Facts

Let us do some simple mathematics, calculations, and thought experiments: let us say that for living, you depend on YouTube advertising. And you want to maximize your views your clicks, your walk-throughs, etc.… Certainly it will be your best interest to create things which are maximally controversial, Crazy, insane, as well as bad.

Also this is where we could consider Instagram for young girls almost like child pornography; if you are a young teenage girl, or even in your 20s, what maximizes views clicks followers etc.? Obviously things which are more sexual in nature. Very very creepy, let us see your daughter is on Instagram, and you have single 50 or 60-year-old men calling her watching her videos, looking at her pictures, certainly you will not like that.

Physique is overrated

I’m starting to think, perhaps physique is overrated.

Why? Men and women who chase physique, will sooner or later do weird stuff.

For example — men who see physique will eventually start injecting their butt holes with steroids. Women who seek physique will eventually start injecting their lips, their faces, also their butts.

Why do we care for physique so much?

Curious question… Why is it that we seek physique so much?

Physique is the same thing like the exterior of your car, “All show, no go”.

I think my theory is that appearances physique is marketable. For example, let us say you have a sports car, and you have done no exterior modifications, and you have a “sleeper” car.

Now a lot of people, they would spend all their money to modify the exterior of their car. Why? Because it is the only thing that will help you get likes on social media. Also, when you are on the road, it is the only thing that people could see.

But the reason why when I was really into modifying my car, I only cared for engine mods was because when you’re driving your car, you could only feel the “butt dyno”– for example, change over time, let us say you install a new short ram intake, headers, exhaust etc.… You will feel a difference in performance, but if you do some sort of exterior modification, you cannot enjoy it while you are inside your car driving.

The correct strategy

I think in life, the best and the most correct strategy is it is better to take a $2000 sports car, and slowly modify it, rather than already purchase a $100,000 vehicle. If your end objective is to maximize your pleasure happiness, and fun, this is the best bet.

For example, don’t buy the loser Porsche 911 convertible, just buy an old Mazda Miata, 1990– 5 speed, manual, no air conditioning no power steering – and feel free to thrash it around as you like!

This is why I’m so happy with the 2010 Prius I got; I feel zero recompense on spray painting the rims, changing it up, and fucking around with it!

I suppose this is where the upside of cheap and free is; for example if you really wanted to become a fashion designer, just buy some insanely cheap clothes or free clothes, and take some heavy duty scissors and cut off the sleeves, make it a crop top whatever. Even apparently nowadays, the trend is jean shorts, ”jorts”– which is very very easy to do if you just took your old jeans and just cut off the legs!

Fashion?

Fashion means how you make yourself.

Facere– to make.

The simple bifurcation of fashion:

With clothing and fashion, are you trying to highlight your beauty, or hide your ugliness?

For example, it seems that the whole genius of LA girls just wearing leggings all the time, especially when they just wear white leggings, is for them to show off all their body parts, legally.

If you’re a man, legally you do not need to wear a shirt when you’re out in public. So if your man, spend zero money on T-shirts, shirts, etc. I think the best thing to wear is a tank top, assuming you have to be somewhere indoors or whatever… But a simple thing you could just do is just take your old T-shirt, and just cut off the sleeves!

Crop top it?

Even a simple idea; I see women do this all the time, is wearing a crop top, showing off their belly and belly button.

A simple thing you could do as a man is to to make your own crop top! It seemed that when I was a teenager growing up, everyone was so anti-gay, only gay guys were crop tops, to signal that they were gay. But now, You could do anything you want!

If anything, more interesting for a straight guy with a kid to be wearing a crop top in public, obviously signaling he is not gay — assuming that the kid is biologically his, assuming that she has a wife,

Even something funny and disruptive I did at my old gym, was when I was about to lift a really really heavy, I would roll up my shirt, and expose my belly button, and even my nipples, and nobody ever said anything! And I think some guys at the gym might’ve thought I was gay, but then when I would chop it up with the women at the gym, they would be confused?

The best life

It is my personal belief that the best life involves and revolves around being outside all day, walking around all day, on your two feet all day, without having to sit down or be indoors

And also, what is heaven on earth? A happy family!

Assuming you’re trying to maximize your happiness joy and pleasure in life, the obvious strategy is to have at least one kid. Ideally two; ideally a boy and a girl, in order to maximize and augment your human experiences. Certainly raising a boy and a girl is different.

NOT THE SAME BREED?

I’m not like them

Some random funny thoughts:

Breeds of dogs & breeds of humans?

OK… let us apply a line of thinking to dogs, different breeds of dogs. For example, certainly a canine or pitbull would be a much better and ferocious fighter than a pug or a hotdog wiener dog.

But the funny thing is I think all breeds of dogs could pro generate with one another, irregardless of breed?

Also certainly with human beings, there are some families which are naturally taller, some families which are naturally shorter. And certainly there has been some sort of genetic diversification on the planet and beyond, especially when it comes a different parts of the planet.

For example, certain places certain humans have more bodily hair, possibly to dissipate the heat. Other places, darker pigments to fight off the sun. It makes sense, if your family genetic heritage is from sub-Saharan Africa, logically the human body will produce more pigment to fight off the sun then if your genetic heritage was from northern Sweden, in which during the winter time you might only get 30 minutes of sun.

Why others are confused by me

And so then… when other people try to punk me around, I have zero tolerance for it.

Thinking about Achilles

In my mind, I see myself like an Achilles. I see myself like the most handsome, powerful, dominant, ultra being out there. And perhaps it is precisely my oversized ego is where I get my power.

Niagara Falls would make a great bitcoin mining rig

And this is my critique about modern day times, it seems like a lot of people are trying to do is to castrate the source, rather than channel that energy for positive constructive good things!

Don’t castrate yourself!

For example, the ego should be something augmented, amplified and magnified, but also concurrent channeled in such a way which could be empowering and useful for others?

How?

So can we use the ego in a constructive or positive way?

If anything… I’m starting to think more and more, the only interesting ideas are the unethical ones. Or the ones which are shunned by mainstream modern day society.

To me, the only good ideas are the bad ones. When an idea seems right, and it seems to make sense, typically it is bad and or wrong.

Follow your values

When it comes to values, there is no right or wrong, there are simply authentic to yourself, or not.

As a consequence, I think the idea is not too shroud who you are, your own personality etc., but rather to magnify it!

Magnify your personality!

For example, I’m a very inquisitive, curious person, and I’d like to chop it up! I like to be friendly!

ERIC KIM PICTURES ENTERTAINMENT

Ever since I was a kid, what was my great gift? Being a great entertainer! I am literally the most entertaining person that I know, I’ve only met maybe two people in the flesh who outperformed me.

Maybe it is a form of social conquest, trolling around, having fun etc.! Maybe it is that I seek to be the biggest dick in the room?

But it’s supposed to question is, why do I care? Why do I care to be the biggest dick in the room?

Not sure? Maybe the desire to dominate is in my DNA?

How I became the street photographer

100 lessons from the masters of street photography

What is the future?

Obviously it will be ChatGPT and AI, open AI.

For example, if you wanted a car with the ultimate ride comfort, you would probably purchase a Lexus vehicle, or maybe a Mercedes?

Even though I love Tesla and Elon Musk to death, the cars feel pretty cheap. If you wanted the best car, probably get a Lexus LS.

Autopilot is the killer feature

Even the new Google pixel that comes with the new pro Gemini AI… If your life runs on Gmail, it is kind of the game changer.

If you can’t beat them join them

Rather than Apple trying to create a ChatGPT copycat, simply to integrate or offer ChatGPT services on the iPhone is the smart way.

I guess Google has had a bit of a headstart; she was in the AI game for a very long time. And this is where Google to pivot to focus on AI is a good idea.

So what will be the purpose of humans now?

In a brave New World of ChatGPT, AI etc.… What is the purpose or the significance of humans?

The first step is to transfer all of the tedious tasks from humans to ChatGPT. Or AI.

I love TurboTax!

Slave Work, Master Work?

I think this is the future; let AI be the new slave, and you, the flesh bound human being, you do the human creative work!

The ultimate disruption

ChatGPT is one quadrillion times more productive than you. This is a big deal. Why?

What that means is that the purpose of us humans is not productivity. We can finally unchain ourselves from the leashes of this ridiculous notion of productivity.

How do the gods of mount Olympus live?

The gods, who live at ease.

You fools, the point of life is not to give fellatio to hard things, hard lives, etc. We should be like Zeus, with the mighty thunderbolt, the gods lived in supreme ease.

I would say emulate the gods of the Iliad, ancient Greece. Read the new Iliad translation by Emily Wilson, I purchased it in the iBooks store, reading on my iPad Pro and I love it!

Ethos

I suppose that the primary thing here to consider is the ethos of human humanity, reasons of living etc.

Risk free returns

I also like the notion of bitcoin being digital real estate because nobody checks their home price on Zillow 10 times a day, reacting to short term increases or decreases or volatility.

Why is bitcoin so volatile?

It is a feature, not a bug!

Assuming that the real world was like a science fiction film… Can you Which economic trading doesn’t happen on the weekends?

Flesh future

Or, if they have the brave browser on their phone, Google Chrome incognito etc.

Almost every single person I know who works in tech, knows how to program or code whatever, all use pirate bay.

Anyways, once again another bizarre thing; one would never watch pornography which is centered around ideas, souls, personalities, etc. It is always the flesh, the human body!

Why did it in modern day times, we are trying to deny the human body, and trying to promote instead, one’s “personality” and “mind” and “soul”– ?

Build your body

Become a body – builder ,,, obviously without the steroids!

ERIC

All injected hormones are bad hormones

Unless you have cancer, HIV aids, and is literally a life or death thing.

NOT THE SAME BREED?

Some random funny thoughts:

OK… Let us apply to dogs, different breeds of dogs. For example, certainly a canine or pitbull would be a much better and ferocious fighter than a pug or a hotdog wiener dog.

But the funny thing is I think all breeds of dogs could pro generate with one another, irregardless of breed?

I’m starting to feel more and more… Maybe other people, they’re just a different breed than me. For example, I think of myself kind of like a canine, a K9 attack police dog, and everyone else is just a wiener dog? Or annoying poodles?

And so then… When other people try to punk me around, I have zero tolerance for it.

Thinking about Achilles

In my mind, I see myself like an Achilles. I see myself like the most handsome, powerful, dominant, ultra being out there. And perhaps it is precisely my oversized ego is where I get my power.

Kind of like a raging river, Niagara Falls; with the point be to simply cut it off … or wouldn’t a more intelligent strategy to be to harness it like putting a water electricity damn thing on it, harness the hydropower, not to cut it off?

And this is my critique about modern day times, it seems like a lot of people are trying to do is to castrate the source, rather than channel that energy for positive constructive good things!

For example, the ego should be something augmented, amplified and magnified, but also concurrent channeled in such a way which could be empowering and useful for others?

how?

So can we use the ego in a constructive or positive way?

First, a non-competitive spirit… Just complement everybody you see! Even if somebody is taller, more good looking, handsomer, richer, more successful, buffer than you! When you see somebody with a great physique, the correct strategy is to compliment them and acknowledge them!

Second, two harness and channel your ego and your energy and your physiological power towards riding, producing text, making videos, podcasts etc.… Sharing ideas, irregardless of how unethical they may seem.

If anything… I’m starting to think more and more, the only interesting ideas are the unethical ones. Or the ones which are shunned by mainstream modern day society.

To me, the only good ideas are the bad ones. When an idea seems right, and it seems to make sense, typically it is bad and or wrong.

Follow your values

When it comes to values, there is no written wrong, there are simply authentic to yourself, or not.

For example, my values and beliefs in open source, entrepreneurship, impartment through photography are true. Why? I grew up poor, single working mom waiting tables at Japanese sushi restaurant for nearly 20 years, and also almost went homeless twice. A lot of your own personal narrative forms who you are.

As a consequence, I think the idea is not too shroud who you are, your own personality etc., but rather to magnify it!

For example, I’m a very inquisitive, curious person, and I’d like to chop it up! I like to be friendly!

Funny enough… I tried to be friendly to everybody, but people who are standoffish, or bizarro, they react to me in very bizarre ways. But should I suddenly shut down my friendly personality because other guy is a cowardly poodle? No!

ERIC KIM PICTURES ENTERTAINMENT

Ever since I was a kid, what was my great gift? Being a great entertainer! I am literally the most entertaining person that I know, I’ve only met maybe two people in the flesh who outperformed me.

Maybe it is a form of social conquest, trolling around, having fun etc.! Maybe it is that I seek to be the biggest dick in the room?

But it’s supposed to question is, why do I care? Why do I care to be the biggest dick in the room?

Not sure? Maybe the desire to dominate is in my DNA?

How I became the street photographer

Whether you like it or not, I’ll stream the photographer, especially young ones are disciples of ERIC KIM. How and why? I essentially created a metaphorical Bible or textbook or encyclopedia and ultimate resource for anything revolving around street photography. Why?

It was always my number one goal to be the number one street photographer on Google, to become number one in street photography. As a consequence, my laser like eyes and focus was insanely simple; do everything I could to become number one on Google for street photography. And the strategy was very very simple, create the most in-depth articles blog posts and information for everything street photography! It took me nearly a decade, but I did it! After that, other domains to conquer.

What is the future?

Obviously it will be ChatGPT and AI, open AI.

For example, if you wanted a car with the ultimate ride comfort, you would probably purchase a Lexus vehicle, or maybe a Mercedes?

Even the new Google pixel that comes with the new pro Gemini AI… If your life runs on Gmail, it is kind of the game changer.

Rather than Apple trying to create a ChatGPT copycat, simply to integrate or offer ChatGPT services on the iPhone is the smart way.

I guess Google has had a bit of a headstart; she was in the AI game for a very long time. And this is where Google to pivot to focus on AI is a good idea.

so what will be the purpose of humans now?

In a brave New World of ChatGPT, AI etc.… What is the purpose or the significance of humans?

the first step is to transfer all of the tedious tasks from humans to ChatGPT. Or AI.

And this is where the future of things become interesting; all these things in the past which we had to do inefficiently slowly and begrudgingly… we should just let AI do it, and we humans do more meaningful things.

Slave Work, Master Work?

I think this is the future; let AI be the new slave, and you, the flesh bound human being, you do the human creative work!

The ultimate disruption

ChatGPT is one quadrillion times more productive than you. This is a big deal. Why?

What that means is that the purpose of us humans is not productivity. We can finally unchain ourselves from the leashes of this ridiculous notion of productivity.

How do the gods of mount Olympus live?

The gods, who live at ease.

You fools, the point of life is not to give fellatio to hard things, hard lives, etc. We should be like Zeus, with the mighty thunderbolt, the gods lived in supreme ease.

I would say emulate the gods of the Iliad, ancient Greece. Read the new Iliad translation by Emily Wilson, I purchased it in the iBooks store, reading on my iPad Pro and I love it!

Ethos

I suppose that the primary thing here to consider is the ethos of human humanity, reasons of living etc.

I think for too long, the whole ethos of humanity was to maximize productivity, income income earning potential, money and capital and capitalism etc.… But once again, if bitcoin, AI and ChatGPT can do it better than you, by 1 billion fold,,, what is your new life ethos?

Risk free returns

However the great issue here is the cost to capital; the startup costs and the initial investment is too high! As a consequence, let us say that you invested $1 billion to build this new commercial real estate… You eventually have to find all these tenants to sign a lease, occupy it, pay the lease or the rent, and maybe in 20 or 30 years you can make a positive profit?

I also like the notion of bitcoin being digital real estate because nobody checks their home price on Zillow 10 times a day, reacting to short term increases or decreases or volatility.

Why is bitcoin so volatile?

It is a feature, not a bug!

Assuming that the real world was like a science fiction film… Can you Which economic trading doesn’t happen on the weekends?

Flesh future

Or, if they have the brave browser on their phone, Google Chrome incognito etc.

Almost every single person I know who works in tech, knows how to program or code whatever, all use pirate bay.

Anyways, once again another bizarre thing; one would never watch pornography which is centered around ideas, souls, personalities, etc. It is always the flesh, the human body!

Why did it in modern day times, we are trying to deny the human body, and trying to promote instead, one’s “personality” and “mind” and “soul”– ?

Black & White

Add more extreme contrast to your life:

Man is black, woman is white?

Increasing contrast?

I’m starting to think that if we apply the black-and-white art photography aesthetic to real life, maybe the idea of “preserving the midtones“ is a bit boring.

The general notion of crushing the blacks is when you’re processing or post processing your photos, you dragged the black slider all the way to 100, and you also crank up the contrast to 100.

Aesthetically, I think this makes for much more striking and interesting images.

First, midtones are boring. Almost universally, the more you increase the contrast of something or the photos, the better.

For example, even when we design our homes. What is the best way to design a home? Very very simple, use white and black accents.

For example in my eyes, the ideal home exterior paint color is not a matte black, but rather, a pure clean white, with black trimming.

Also, with cars… I think we’ve discovered is the apex is both a shiny white with shiny black accents — gloss, not matte.

I think matte, matte black, the whole matte aesthetic is centered around jet stealth fighters, which desire to escape enemy detection. So typically when you try to matte black your car and murder it out… aesthetic you’re going for stealth bomber, or jet fighter aesthetic?

But the irony that I find… nobody would ever matte black or murder out their Prius, to escape detection from the police or the other party. We typically do it to our sports cars, our Teslas, etc.

Put the strange inconsistency I see here is on one hand, we want to be seen and to show up, on the other hand, we want to be fake low-key, and be “humble”?

Bitch be humble?

A few years back, the song HUMBLE by Kendrick Lamar went triple maxi viral. It was the most viral song of all time, maybe even more viral than the recent “They Not Like Us” song.

The song was very bizarre to me. Because I’m not sure what Kendrick was really trying to say. Two interpretations —

First, he is calling the counterparty a bitch, and telling them to sit down and be humble because I am so much greater than you
Or, trying to remind everybody to be humble in general.

But the weird inconsistency in modern day life is we are centered around Christian Jesus ethics, or some sort of quaker Protestant morality which is centered around notion of humility, being humble, close to the ground etc. This is why you will never ever ever meet a rich person in America called themselves rich, they will call themselves “fortunate“, or “lucky”.

Also another bizarre thing in the world of bodybuilding… you almost never ever ever see bodybuilders proud to flex unabashedly, like Arnold in the documentary Pumping Iron, back in the day. It is very uncommon for you to see self-confident men at the gym, working out topless, in booty shorts, 3 inch short shorts, flexing their muscles in the mirror, not trying to hide it etc.

The big issue with the typical bodybuilder is that they are trying to become dominant, but be humble about it? Really weird?

Lord Achilles

I am currently reading the Iliad by Emily Wilson, I am always always happy to see a new translation or a fresh take on the classic.

Anyways, also an interesting thought… I like the idea of reading a female woman translate the most manly literature of all time. I think the problem when I was talking to my friend Kelly, is that traditionally in the past, it was a bunch of impotent old men who would translate great classics like the Iliad or the Odyssey, using their own fake impotent machismo, to translate it.

For example, a lot of the misogyny, misogynistic language from 100 years ago or so, was actually very inaccurate.

Anyways, something worth noting is how artful, succinct, beautiful, and unlike English ancient Greek was. In fact, I definitely want to get Seneca on the classics, get him into Latin and ancient Greek, and mathematics like NASSIM TALEB recommended.

If you think about it long enough, what are the least harmful majors which exist? Classics, math, physics.

Classics is almost like the superior form of sociology, physical theory, it is the pillar of the humanities. Either classics or history.

Math, it will never hurt nobody. There are simple binary rules of math, it is either right or wrong, but then again the problem with a lot of mathematicians math teachers or people who are too into math, they seek some sort of rationality behind real life, society and people… but the true wise man knows that humans are not mathematical equations, ones and zeros. Humans are messy, even the Ancient Greek gods — they are all flawed! They are a bunch of petty, incestuous, sibling rivalry, family drama folks.

What to focus on?

My friend Anton (congrats on your new kid!) told me something interesting… it was his general observation that individuals like me, who diversified themselves, and did not just focus on street photography were the ones that succeeded, and won in the long run.

For example, I bemoan the death of digitalrev it was literally the best thing since Top Gear for photography and street photography. But also here, I think the cautionary tale of digital rev is critical, because whenever you build an empire on a foreign platform, it is like building your castle in a marsh or quicksand.

Even something which shocked me ,,, the infamous video of me shooting street photography in Hong Kong with Kaiman Wong, I think was either taken down or deleted by digital rev? Really weird, I guess it was too controversial?

Anyways, once again, I think the rational thing is whenever you post something, know that it is built on a cotton candy foundation, whether it be Facebook Instagram YouTube TikTok etc.… Even Twitter… Know that it is destined to die.

I even heard some kids at the mall yesterday talk about myspace, so funny… nobody has any idea what that is. Or xanga, Friendster, live journal?

Sooner or later whenever you build something on a foreign platform, two things are inevitable to happen; either your account will eventually get deleted, taken down, blacklisted, grey listed, banned shadow banned real banned, or just made obsolete.

Neopan 1600

Some suggestions to Fujifilm:

First – make a new filter, call it extreme monochrome. The general idea is that you want to make a black-and-white filter so hardcore, so extreme, it will blow the Ricoh GR strong monochrome out of the water!

I really love the Fujifilm cameras, for the color filters, before some reason, they really lack a good black-and-white filter mode. The acros filter on it sucks.

A simple idea: make a neopan black and white film simulation, and make it extreme high contrast, like neopan 1600! Or like the effect of taking neopan 400, and pushing it two stops to 1600!

Right now, the only real competition to Fujifilm is Ricoh Pentax. And it seems that Leica is dying a slow death.

First, it seems that the Leica Q is only cash cow keeping Leica alive. Also, it seems that Leica is desperate to maintain her clutches on her film film photography heritage, resurrecting the Leica M6, the like etc.

But I think the critical issue here is that in someways, what the Germans do is kind of like kaizen; they take the existing model, and they just keep iterating it, making the new version maybe 3% better… There is never a 100% revolutionary new product, like what Elon did with cybertruck etc.

Once again, the glory of cybertruck is that when it is on the road, it is literally impossible to ignore! You could pretend like you didn’t see it, but you did see it! And if you did not see it, definitely your 3 1/2 year-old kid will see it!

And this is where I am still Tesla and Elon… As long as the kids love it, the future is bright!

Even Lamborghini… It isn’t cool anymore. And nobody even knows what a Ferrari is.

I think things will go bananas when Tesla puts out a mini cyber truck, imagine a Tesla model Y, but a baby cyber truck version?

The best car is the car not yet innovated invented or released.

I’ve always loved cars, car culture etc. I feel bad for anybody whoever purchases any brand new car, because the sad reality is that it will become obsolete in a matter of months or years?

For example, all of these guys who bought a Lamborghini Urus, only to have the new version come out, or even guys who bought the Lamborghini Huracan, with a new one that just came out?

Or even the guys who bought the Aventador… All these rappers from five or 10 years ago… Now that the new Revuelto is out, their Aventador is made obsolete?

You fools!

“I pity the fool?”

A random sidenote… It seems that the most constructive way to approach life is through compassion, empathy, maybe even pity.

For example, whenever there are people that I am suspicious of, they are on my bad side, and then finally, I see them without a hat on, without sunglasses, in direct light, and I see how sickly or unwell they are – the first feeling is extreme compassion. Like I find myself to be the fool — there is somebody that I vilified, or made into a bad guy, or somebody that I created a totem for my general hate or despise… And then I see how unhealthy they are, and then I realize,…

Wait,,, this whole time, when I am painting this guy as a bad guy, and then I truly see you and witness that in fact, they are just a poor miserable soul, slowly dying… Why was I so negative towards that person?

Something I learned about living in LA… everyone here has problems. For example, a lot of women, their husband is cheating on them, and they know what, but don’t want to admit it. Even Jay Z… Probably still 100% cheating on Beyoncé… Why?

And all these assholes who honk at you in the road… spending a lot of time out of a car, just walking around now, observing traffic politics, if you actually get a really good look at the driver, they are either miserable looking Uber drivers, food delivery people, or just very very unwell sickly looking people, insanely poor health, who may be just want to get home because they were stuck in traffic for two hours?

When to be compassionate, when not to be a pushover?

It seems that the primary issue here is the strange bifurcation of ethics. First, we are taught to forgive, turn the other cheek etc., but then you have all these assholes honking at you from behind. So in this case, what are you supposed to do, take it up the ass, because you’re afraid that they might have a gun and shoot you? Or the other person may commit road rage, and do something dangerous?

I think the issue here is why should you live your life in fear that some asshole some pussy coward might have a gun, and pop you?

Obviously, I do not want to get shot by some random coward, because I have my son to live for. But still… Isn’t the real role of a man to stand up for his child, and to never ever ever see your father get pistol whipped around?

Stand up

I think this is also where manly masculine ethics are different than feminine ones. For example, if you see some asshole smoking in the park, and you’re there with your kid… Obviously the correct strategy is to tell them to please stop smoking. I have a new line that I’m experimenting with–

“No smoking,,, pleeeease!”

For example, two assholes in front of the Apple campus on Washington in Culver City… Apple 10, 8777 Washington — One fat guy wearing some sort of blue Greek food T-shirt, I think he might be an Apple employee… I was walking with Seneca down Washington, on the Apple side, and this asshole is smoking Indignantly on the side, blowing his secondhand smoke all the way down the block.

I came up to him, and I said, no smoking… pleeeease

And this asshole has audacity to tell me that “I’m on my break…” And then I stopped, looked at him and eyes, and I said, “that’s why I said please”. He had no response, his jaw dropped. And like an asshole he kept smoking.

Anyways, fortunately there was some security guards down the block, and I asked them to tell the guy to stop smoking. Maybe next time this happens, I’ll just record him or take a picture of him on my iPhone, shame him.

Extreme ethics

I think the big issue is in today’s world, ain’t nobody have a backbone or ethics anymore.

In actually… The big issue here is that it seems at 99.9% of people just become passive aggressive, and never confront– we are a non-confrontational society, yet we hide behind our cars and honk at people? Because we are shielded from recompense?

For example, I think this is also where people become keyboard warriors… You would never talk smack about me face-to-face, because you will see how much stronger, taller, more charismatic, and dominant I am than you. In fact, some of the things that I’ve discovered after meeting some of my “haters“– were in fact, they were my greatest lovers! The biggest issue here was actually… Unrequited hate or love.

What is worse, unrequited hate or unrequited love?

Once again, some bizarre inconsistencies here; I’ve never hated anybody. Why? Because I’m not that interested in anybody else, nor do I really desire the affection of somebody else that much?

And also, the reason why a lot of men become misogynists, and hate women is because of unrequited love. Then the unrequited love becomes hate.

Everything starts off as love, then evolves to hate?

An alternate theory; maybe hate is just a more exaggerated or extreme version of love?

Super facts

The internet is a toxic place. Don’t let your kids go on it.

Why? I even have this kind of shocking memory, when I was a 12-year-old kid in Bayside Queens, New York. I was connected to the Internet, AOL 3.0, on my 38.8 K modem… and I was randomly in this chat room, and then I was chatting with this guy, who then instant messaged me, (IM) via AOL instant messenger, AIM, and then eventually started to say weird stuff like pedophile stuff like it feels really good to get your dick sucked by another guy?

Anyways, obviously I got super scared and just banned him.

And I think the issue is in today’s world, I think the safe strategy in assumption is that 100% of people on the internet are just malicious bots. And it’s starting to get scary… If you could program a bot to be malicious, and to create more malicious bots, ad infinitum — shit starts to get scary.

For example, Michael Saylor was talking about how whenever he tweets something, and somebody responds to it in a very malicious way… almost 100% it was a bot! And actually the big problem then is there are real life human beings having back-and-forth inflamed debates with these malicious bots.

Think about it… Let us say that you are interacting with someone on Twitter, and you have no idea that it is a bot you assume it is real person… Who is going to win in the long run? Obviously the bot!

Adding friction to the digital and cyber world

Bitcoin is virtuous

As time goes on, I’m starting to think of bitcoin like a more ethical idea.

For example, Michael Saylor has an incredibly genius idea of fixing all of this toxicity on the internet, just adding a little bit of monetary, bitcoin or Satoshi friction;

For example, if it cost $10 worth of US dollars, or satoshis to create an account on Twitter or some social media account, then, overnight practically 100% of the malicious bots will be made obsolete or deleted from the platform.

Why? Right now it cost only a nickel to spin up 100,000 bots, to troll your worst enemy on Twitter. But, if it cost $10 a bot, it cost you $1 million to cyber bully somebody, you probably wouldn’t… because it is too expensive and you don’t hate them that much.

I think it is Chris Rock or Chris Tucker who had this funny comedy bit about making bullets super expensive. Then the ideas that if you really really hate somebody, and let us say that one bullet is worth $100,000, then if you really want to kill them, or even with multiple bullets, you might think twice.

Financial friction and consequences is a good idea

Maybe the greatest use of money is physical friction, monetary friction, consequences.

Fines work, monetary penalties, like getting $500 traffic tickets for turning red on a red light and not stopping. This has certainly changed my driving behavior.

So I suppose the critical intelligent thing to consider is want to make things free, and want to make things cost money, to direct human behavior.

For good behavior, make it free.

For bad behavior, make it very expensive.

ERIC

Funny experiments

Some very very simple things to consider:

First, make things expensive, don’t make them free.

For example, let us say that you dip into the pr0n– but you don’t want to do it anymore, for whatever reason. Maybe make it a thing that if you want to watch it, you have to go to an adult DVD store, and pay $20 bucks to buy the CD or whatever.

Or, for activities… I think often signing up and paying for an activity is a good idea because it creates sense of ownership, responsibility, or follow through. Or commitment.

For example, perhaps the intelligence of paying money for a trainer or a personal trainer is that you you know that if you don’t show up there is a fiscal penalty.

But the new ones is you don’t want to breed fake virtuosity for the sake of fake virtuosity.

For example, there is this weird notion in American culture that pain and suffering and overcoming is virtuous. No. Fools!

Exercise workout or whatever is not virtuous, it is something that you do because it is fun enjoyable and something that you like!

For example, would you bribe your kid money to play at the playground? No! So why do this for yourself?

What now?

Upload your best photos to arsbeta.com —
Start your own self hosted blog via WordPress.org and bluehost.com
Think humanity!

ERIC

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Black & White

On adding more contrast to your life:

Man is black, woman is white?

Increasing contrast?

I’m starting to think that if we apply the black-and-white art photography aesthetic to real life, maybe the idea of “preserving the midtones“ is a bit boring.

The general notion of crushing the blacks is when you’re processing or post processing your photos, you dragged the black slider all the way to 100, and you also crank up the contrast to 100.

Aesthetically, I think this makes for much more striking and interesting images.

First, midtones are boring. almost universally, the more you increase the contrast of something or the photos, the better.

For example, even when we design our homes. What is the best way to design a home? Very very simple, use white and black accents.

For example, my eyes, the ideal home exterior pin color is not a matte black, but rather, a pure clean white, with black trimming.

Also, with cars… I think we’ve discovered is the Apex is both a shiny white with shiny black accents — gloss, not matte.

I think Matt, Matt Black, the whole met aesthetic is centered around jet stealth fighters, which desire to escape enemy detection. So typically when you try to Matt Black your car and murder it out… Aesthetic you’re going for stealth bomber, or jet fighter aesthetic?

But the irony that I find… Nobody would ever matte black or murder out their Prius, to escape detection from the police or the other party. We typically do it to our sports cars, our Teslas, etc.

Put the strange inconsistency I see here is on one hand, we want to be seen and to show up, on the other hand, we want to be fake low-key, and be “humble”?

Bitch be humble?

A few years back, the song HUMBLE by Kendrick Lamar went triple maxi viral. Like it was the most viral song of all time, maybe even more viral than the recent “They Not Like Us” song.

The song was very bizarre to me. Because I’m not sure what Kendrick was really trying to say. Two interpretations —

First, he is calling the counterpart a bitch, and telling them to sit down and be humble because I am so much greater than you
Or, trying to remind everybody to be humble in general.

But the weird inconsistency in modern day life is we are centered around Christian Jesus ethics, or some sort of quaker artist morality which is centered around notion of humility, being humble, close to the floor etc. This is why you will never ever ever meet a rich person in America called themselves rich, they will call themselves “fortunate“, or “lucky”.

Also another bizarre thing in the world of bodybuilding… You almost never ever ever see bodybuilders proud to flex on the bash Lee, like Arnold in the documentary pumping iron, back in the day. It is very uncommon for you to see self-confident men at the gym, working out topless, in booty shorts, 3 inch short shorts, flexing their muscles in the mirror, not trying to hide it etc.

The big issue with the typical bodybuilder is that they are trying to become dominant, but be humble about it? Really weird?

Lord Achilles

I am currently reading the Iliad by Emily Wilson, I am always always happy to see a new translation or a fresh take on the classic.

Anyways, also an interesting thought… I like the idea of reading a female woman probably the most manly literature of all time. I think the problem when I was talking to my friend Kelly, is that traditionally in the past, it was a bunch of impotent old men who would translate great classics like the Iliad or the odyssey, using their own Fake impotent machismo, translate it.

For example, a lot of the misogyny, misogynistic language from 100 years ago or so, was actually very inaccurate.

Anyways, something worth noting is how artful, succinct, beautiful, and unlike English ancient Greek was. In fact, I definitely want to get Seneca on the Classics, get him into Latin and ancient Greek, and mathematics like NASSIM TALEB recommended.

If you think about it long enough, what are the least harmful majors which exist? Classics, math, physics.

Classics is almost like the superior form of sociology, physical theory, it is the pillar of the humanities. Either classics or history.

Math, it will never hurt nobody. There are simple binary rules of math, it is either right or wrong, but then again the problem with a lot of mathematicians math teachers or people who are two into math, they seek some sort of rationality behind real life, society and people… But the true wise man knows that humans are not mathematical equations, ones and zeros. Humans are messy, even the Ancient Greek gods — they are all flawed! They are a bunch of petty, incestuous, sibling rivalry, family drama folks.

What to focus on?

Anyways, once again, I think the rational thing is whenever you post something, built something on a cotton candy foundation, whether it be Facebook Instagram YouTube TikTok etc.… Even Twitter… Know that it is destined to die.

I even heard some kids at the mall yesterday talk about myspace, so funny… nobody has any idea what that is. Or xanga, Friendster, live journal?

Neopan 1600

Some suggestions to Fujifilm:

I really love the Fujifilm cameras, for the color filters, before some reason, they really lack a good black-and-white filter mode. The acros filter on it sucks.

A simple idea: make a neopan black and white film simulation, and make it extreme high contrast, like neopan 1600! Or like the effect of taking Neilan 400, and pushing it two stops to 1600!

Right now, the only real competition to Fujifilm is Ricoh Pentax. And it seems that Leica is dying a slow death.

Once again, the glory of cyber truck is that when it is on the road, it is literally impossible to work! You could pretend like you didn’t see it, but you did see it! And if you did not see it, definitely your 3 1/2 year-old kid will see it!

And this is where I am still Tesla and Elon… As long as the kids love it, the future is bright!

Even Lamborghini… It isn’t cool anymore. And nobody even knows what a Ferrari is.

I think things go bananas when Tesla puts out a mini cyber truck, imagine a Tesla model Y, but a baby cyber truck version?

The best car is the car not yet innovated invented or released.

I’ve always loved cars, car culture etc. I feel bad for anybody whoever purchases any brand new car, because the sad reality is that it will become obsolete in a matter of months or years?

For example, all of these guys who bought a Lamborghini Urus, only to have the new version come out, or even guys who bought the Lamborghini Huracan, with a new one that just came out?

Or even the guys who bought the Aventador… All these rappers from five or 10 years ago… Now that the new Revuelto is out, their Aventador is made obsolete?

You fools!

“I pity the fool?”

A random sidenote… It seems that the most constructive way to approach life is through compassion, empathy, maybe even pity.

Wait,,, this whole time, when I am painting this guy as a bad guy, and then I truly see you and witness that in fact, they are just a poor miserable soul, slowly dying… Why was I so negative towards that person?

And all these assholes who honk at you in the road… spending a lot of time out of a car, just walking around now, observing traffic politics, if you actually get a really good look at the driver, they are either miserable looking Uber drivers, food delivery people, or just very very unwell sickly looking people, very overfat, insanely poor health, who may be just want to get home because they were stuck in traffic for two hours?

When to be compassionate, when not to be a pushover?

It seems that the primary issue here is the strange bifurcation of ethics. first, we are taught to forgive, turn the other cheek etc., but then you have all these assholes honking at you from behind. So in this case, what are you supposed to do, take it up the ass, because you’re afraid that they might have a gun and shoot you? Or commit road rage, and do something dangerous?

I think the issue here is why should you live your life in fear that some asshole some pussy coward might have a gun, and pop you?

Stand up

“No smoking,,, pleeeease!”

For example, two assholes in front of the Apple campus on Washington in Culver City… One guy wearing some sort of Greek food T-shirt, I think he might be an apple employee… I was walking with Seneca down Washington, on the apple side, and this asshole is smoking Indignantly on the side, blowing his secondhand smoke all the way down the block.

I came up to him, and I said, no smoking… pleeeease

anyways, fortunately there was some security guards down the block, and I asked them to tell the guy to stop smoking. Maybe next time this happens, I’ll just record him or take a picture of him on my iPhone, shame him.

Extreme ethics

I think the big issue is in today’s world, ain’t nobody have a backbone or ethics anymore.

In actually… The big issue here is that it seems at 99.9% of people just become passive aggressive, and never confront, we are a non-confrontational society, yet we hide behind our cars and honk at people? Because we are shielded from recompense?

For example, I think this is also where people become keyboard warriors… You would never talk smack about me face-to-face, because you will see how much stronger, taller, more charismatic, and dominant I am than you. In fact, some of the things that I’ve discovered after meeting some of my “haters“– we’re in fact, they were my greatest lovers! The biggest issue here was actually… Unrequited hate or love.

What is worse, unrequited hate or unrequited love?

Once again, some bizarre inconsistencies here; I’ve never hate anybody. why because I’m not that interested in anybody else, nor do I really desire the affection of somebody else that much?

And also, the reason why a lot of men become misogynist, and hate women is because of unrequited love. Then the unrequited love becomes hate.

Everything starts off as love, then evolves to hate?

An alternate theory; maybe hate is just a more exaggerated or extreme version of love?

Super facts

The Internet is a toxic place. Don’t let your kids go on it.

Why? I even have this kind of shocking memory, when I was a 12-year-old kid in Bayside Queens, New York. I was connected to the Internet, AWOL 3.0, on my 38.8 K modem… And I was randomly in this chat room, and then start a messaging this guy, Who then instant messaged me, (IM) via AOL instant messenger, AIM, And then eventually started to say weird stuff like pedophile stuff like it feels really good to get your dick sucked by another guy?

Anyways, obviously I got super scared and just banned him.

And I think the issue is in today’s world, I think the safe strategy in assumption is that 100% of people on the Internet, or just malicious bots. And it’s starting to get scary… If you could program a bot to be malicious, and to create more malicious bots, ad infinitum — shit starts to get scary.

For example, Michael Saylor was talking about how whenever he tweets something, And somebody responds to it in a very malicious way… Almost 100% it was a bot! And actually the big problem then is there real life human beings having back-and-forth inflamed debates with these malicious bots.

Adding friction to the digital and cyber world

As time goes on, I’m starting to think of bitcoin like a more ethical idea.

For example, Michael Saylor has an incredible genius idea of fixing all of this toxicity on the Internet, I just adding a little bit of monetary, bitcoin or Satoshi friction;

For example, if it cost $10 worth of US dollars, or Satoshi to create an account on Twitter or some social media account, then, overnight practically 100% of the malicious spots will be made obsolete or deleted from the platform.

Why? Right now it cost only a nickel to spin up 100,000 bots, to troll your worst enemy on Twitter. But, if it cost $10 a bot, it cost you $1 million to cyber bully somebody, you probably wouldn’t… Because it is too expensive and you don’t hate them that much.

Financial friction and consequences is a good idea

Maybe the greatest use of money is physical friction, monetary friction, consequences.

Fines work, monetary penalties, like getting $500 traffic tickets for turning red on a red light and not doing. Certainly has changed my driving behavior.

So I suppose the critical intelligent thing to consider is want to make things free, and want to make things cost money, to direct human behavior.

For good behavior, make it free.

For bad behavior, make it very expensive.

ERIC

Funny experiments

Some very very simple things to consider:

First, make things expensive, don’t make them free.

Or, for activities… I think often signing up and paying for an activity is a good idea because it creates sense of ownership, responsibility, or follow through. Or commitment.

For example, perhaps the intelligence of paying money for a trainer or a personal trainer is that you you know that if you don’t show up there is a fiscal penalty.

But the new ones is you don’t want to breed fake virtuosity for the sake of fake virtuosity.

For example, there is this weird notion in American culture that pain and suffering and overcoming is virtuous. No. Fools!

Exercise workout or whatever is not virtuous, it is something that you do because it is fun enjoyable and something that you like!

For example, would you bribe your kid money to play at the playground? No! So why do this for yourself?

GODLIKE LEGS

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Godlike Legs

The power is in your legs?

Milo of Croton

So there is this philosophy and story about Milo of Croton, who is this semi mythical character who essentially was the strongest man of all time, and there is this anecdote that every single day he cared this calf on his shoulders, every single day, until it became a full-size bull, which could weigh anywhere between 1000 pounds and 3000 pounds.

For the most part it seems like a high tale, but, it might be more realistic than we think it is.

First, I have successfully lifted 1000 pounds, which means that physically and physiologically, certainly this is possible. And I am not a 7 foot tall freak of nature.

So if I think about it… And certainly obviously this was far before steroids were invented… In theory, I think this might be somewhat true.

As a very very simple thought experiment, let us assume that you could conservatively add 5 pounds, week over week, which is roughly 250 pounds a year. That means within four years, you should be able to successfully lift 1000 pounds. And then the next year, 1250 pounds, 1500 pounds, and then two years after that, 2000 pounds.

Progressive overload training

Once again, difficult to lift 1000 pounds overnight but, even if you’re conservative… Let us say that you start training at the age of 21, for 10 years straight, until the age of 31, or until the age of 36… Lifting 1000 pounds is actually pretty easy.

The technique is my infamous Atlas lift; in which you just load up the barbell, with maximum weight, on the squat rack, and your goal isn’t too walk it out and squat it, rather to simply lift it off the rack for even half a second.

Even now, if you look at the strong men, obviously they’re all on steroids, but still… When they do the loaded yoke walk, it is on average around 1500 pounds. And only that but I think they reset for about 100m or so?

Why?

It is my personal thought that if you have insanely strong legs, nothing will falter in your life.

In fact, ultimately when it comes down to it… What is the most critical part of your body? Not your shoulders, not your back, not your biceps, not your chest, not your abdominal muscles… Your legs!

Let us consider the fact… I have never done to sit up in my life, yet I have a six pack. How?… If you’re strong enough to have to lift an insanely high and heavy weight, your body must naturally adapt, naturally strengthening all the random muscles in your body, your neck your shoulders your back, your upper back your lower back, your abs, your hips your knees etc.

In fact, something that nobody ever talks about is a strength of your ligaments, your tendons, etc. Having met real UFC MMA fighters in the flesh, the thing they actually taught me was surprisingly the most important thing to train for is to strengthen the ligaments in the wrist, the knees, ankles, etc.… Because that is where injury typically happens. And there’s also this notion of “pre-hab”– the idea that a true elite fighter would train in such a way that he is doing all the exercises in which individuals typically do when they are injured, but they train before they actually get injured, a wise idea.

Do rehab styled exercises BEFORE you treat injured.

For example, I read an anecdote that apparently LeBron James does an hour of yoga a day or something, which prevented him from getting injuries, and it seems to be a very wise idea. If I told you or tell you that by stretching, doing mobility exercises, some sort of yoga would help you lift 200 more pounds, would you do it? You could add 200 pounds to your deadlift, squat, bench? Of course! I think most weightlifters think of mobility exercises as feminine or a waste of time, but the truth is a true powerlifter, a true strongman, a true weightlifting demigod would probably devote at least 20% of his workout time for mobility stretching exercises, rather than just lifting weights?

Think long

If you’re tired and you’re not feeling good, don’t do it, never force it. All of the random injuries I’ve had in the past was when I tried to force a workout when my body wasn’t 100% feeling it, or I was tired, didn’t sleep that well that day, etc.

One doubt, just eat a bunch of meat and go to sleep early! There is always the next day.

I think I sometimes pick the notion of carpe diem to literally; that literally I treat every single day like it was my last, but once again, to force a work out in the evening when you’re tired and not feeling it, could lead to an injury, which could plague you for weeks months, even years.

Assuming that you’re wise and you’re thinking long-term, technically a single workout isn’t that important. Even on the week level… As long as you get in a good lift every two weeks, you’re probably fine.

The commoditization of the body

I think the real critical problem here is what I call the commoditization of the body.

For example, as long as you weigh yourself on a scale, you measure your biceps, you measure your waist line, you track your metrics, your number etc., you’re not free.

The problem with yourself is that you put yourself on a scale with all these basic other people, once again, all these fools who are popping supplements, injecting their butt holes with steroids, etc.

Even a super random thing, the whole supplement protein powder industry is such an insanely bad scam, maybe this is something I need to fight against.

Why? Even as a young impressionable teenager, in college student… I’ve probably wasted thousands of dollars or at least hundreds of dollars, which is a lot of money to a highschooler or college kid, protein powder, which I realized is a scam.

Why? The simple goal is to eat more meat! But if you think about the whole exercise bodybuilding weightlifting complex, none of these fake ass influencers make money when they try to encourage you to visit the butcher more and eat more meat! No no no, they need a sponsorship, they need steroids, they need to sell merchandise.

Also let us not forget — all steroids is is something which boosts your testosterone (your testes hormones). And the easiest most natural way to do this is eat beef liver, beef heart, beef kidneys… organ meats!

Follow the money

I think the critical issue that people make is that they think that the big issue here is all of these weird fake conspiracy theories. But this is not true, the true issue here is just following the money.

No no no — Bill Gates does not have an evil master plan to inject your brain with 5G chips and Covid vaccines, and put fluoride in your water to control your mind.

A simple observation; I got vaccinated, got all my booster shots… etc,,, and I was able to lift 1000 pounds, fasted!

Ha ha maybe as a joke, the joke is that the COVID-19 vaccine made me stronger, like the Hulk or like wolverine or Deadpool?

And also as a general note to everybody, the reason why you should delete your Instagram, your TikTok, your Twitter, your YouTube, all the podcasts, your Spotify your podcast app is that eventually sooner or later… All of these influential fools start promoting a weird conspiracy theory?

Only media you should be consuming is media from the ancient past, ancient Greek or nothing.

All of your heroes are fake heroes

The American dream is essentially Arnold Schwarzenegger, getting big on the screen, becoming the governator of California, etc. And superficially from what I understand… He was actually a good governor! Some people also forget that Ronald Reagan was an actor, I don’t really know too much about Ronald Reagan, but once again, the idea is that if you are tall handsome and famous, you could become anything, you could become president!

I think in America, the American dream is real. Come on… Just look at me — I was able to make my living from my passion which is street photography. Name any other country on the planet in which this could have happened.

But I think the equations are wrong. Once again, the typical workflow is that you becomes super famous, and in the process you make a bunch of money, and then you become a politician I guess? And technically a politician has the supreme power, because he who makes the laws controls the money.

Slavery deletion

Don’t be an insta-slave!

Anyways, the big problem here is that the supreme goal is towards self ownership, not slavery.

As long as you have Instagram, YouTube, TikTok or whatever… You’re a slave, a digital slave, a cyber slave.

The reason I’m insanely anti-TikTok… Come on guys, they are owned by the ultra mainland Chinese corporation Tencent! And also, my fellow Korean people… Don’t you know that Tencent, once again mainland China has a huge stake in KakaoTalk? This is why Koreans should not use KakaoTalk and just use iPhone and iMessage instead.

Or Samsung should be smart and create their own proprietary messaging system?

THE GOALS

I have achieved all of my life goals, my life dreams, my life ambitions, etc. Anything in which I have had an autotelic goal or desire, I done did it. For example, my desire at the age of 21, 22 to become self-employed, and to transform my passion of photography and photography into my living?

Then, my desire to travel the world, become famous, have solo exhibitions books etc.…

The funny thing is actually in my journey, my goals were never to become super rich. My only goal was to make a living for my passion, which was essentially meaning just making enough money to cover rent my expenses etc — and I think more recently, having a kid, Seneca, and more recently, my insanely audacious goal of lifting 1000 pounds, which I did, and I have zero doubt in my mind that I could lift more.

And more recently, my personal interest in bitcoin, has paid off very well!

Think first principles

How and why?

Kind of cheesy… But besides the limits of physics and the universe, if you think first principles, technically anything is possible. What is a bigger issue is duration, acceleration time, and time to accomplish.

For example, I believe that anybody could become a sole proprietor, self-employed, and make a living from your passion. However the nuance is that you probably should not pay more than $500 a month in rent. This means go abroad, that means live in Bangkok, Thailand, Cambodia Laos, Vietnam etc.

Certainly you could make a living from your passion in the states, but if you really really really care, maybe it is best to move to the Midwest or somewhere where rent is cheap.

The ethics of Achilles

I just finished watching the documentary film Bigger Stronger Faster, bought it on the Apple TV store for about 10 bucks, I wish I watched this when I was a teenager?

Anyways, now that I’m and dad, have a 3 1/2 year-old son, Seneca… I’m starting to really understand that my morals ethics and the way I am training him is far more critical than I thought.

First, the whole industrial educational media social media complex– the bias is that kids must be the best, the strongest, the tallest, the most dominant either in athletics or education.

My simple heuristic:

Trust no fitness influencer on Instagram.

Yeah yeah yeah, you gotta get the views and followers… But then again you’re gonna end up injecting your butt holes with steroids, in order to boost your reviews and gain more influence. And ultimately, no slavery is worth it.

If I could tell you that I could literally sell you into slavery, however, you’ll become super rich and famous, you’ll have $100 million in the bank, millions of followers etc.… 100 million followers, but you were literally a slave, 100% slave, would you do it? Of course no! No amount of money on the planet, is worth being sold into slavery!

Once again think about the slave ships, chains, chattels etc.… think about the visual of the slave ships of Africa, in which they tried to “optimize” the amount of slaves they could chain up in a simple wooden ship at the bottom of the hull, perhaps 50 of them or so.

And I think this is what people do not understand about the new modern day popular music complex; once again you’re finding these young impressionable kids from the hood, maybe 18 years old 21 years old, you offer them a $1 million contract, but essentially you have them on a chain and leash for the next 20 years of their life?

Once again you fools, no amount of money is worth slavery!

If somebody said ERIC, I could sell you into slavery and you will literally be a slave for the rest of your life, chains, chain around your wrist and neck and your legs whatever… For $1 trillion, would I do it? Obviously no!

Even more so, once you get a kid that changes everything… If you are sold into slavery that is not just your own life you are messing up, but the potential upside of your kid!

And I think this is where it is wise that practically everybody should have a kid, because what you learn is that once you have kids, it solidifies your morals ethics and worldview.

I think if you’re college educated, you should have a kid. Don’t worry, you’ll be an amazing parent!

Rethinking competition

Competition is for loooosers!

I think this is where Achilles and reading the Iliad is so eye-opening; even before the Olympics were invented, there was no such thing as competition.

For example, there were the funeral games of Patroclus, in which the heroes were competing to win a trophy or a prize, but the interesting thing is that a lot of these heroes ended up stopping while they were ahead, calling a truce, and both of them sharing equal prizes.

The notion of a trophy, was essentially a spoil of war. The ancient Greeks, Achilles king Agamemnon and like… it seems that the ultimate trophy was a woman. The goal was to obtain the most beautiful, the most fair, the most grand prize of them all. This is where the notion of a trophy wife comes from.

And what is the point of a trophy wife? Essentially a woman who is prized for her intelligence, her body, her beauty, and I think the hope is to have insanely beautiful and great kids? But the ancient Greeks, king Agamemnon… achilles… Why did they want Breisis? Kind of like a symbol if anything.

But now… I’m not sure what the telos or the goal is anymore? I think the general modern day trend is to not have kids, but to live in hedonic pleasure for the rest of your life with no downsides? And never run out of money?

***

How to live the best life ever

OK, let us say that photography is your passion, street photography whatever. Essentially you love making photos with your camera!

Some simple thoughts:

First, the very very simple goal is to optimize your life which allows you to forever shoot pictures!

Here this is where film photography is very bad.

First, I think the only reason people get into film photography is because they are seeking some sort of new motivation or inspiration behind things.

I think experimenting and trying out film is a good idea, because ultimately it just makes you more grateful for digital photography!

It’s really funny… Young people knew guitar for like the romanticism of film photography, but whenever I meet older photographers, in their 50s 6070s etc.… They are a bit confused, it was the opposite; invention of digital photography it is their passion for photography!

And in fact, now that the new Fujifilm X 100VI came out, and also Rico is killing it with the GR series cameras, like the new HDF which is coming out, I really see that there is zero reason to shoot film.

If you are a modern day Fatar for today, very very simple. Just buy a Fujifilm 100 camera, or a Ricoh GR camera.

Maybe even a funny idea, maybe we could think and consider the old-school like M1 camera as the new digital film analog rangefinder fully manually focusing camera?

Why?

First, in terms of the body style, to me I prefer the M9 the best. I love the button design, the powerhouse designed small black buttons in the back of the camera. And also funny things; the camera is pretty much only usable at ISO 400 or 800, if you do black-and-white, 1600 is fine; which is technically like the limits of shooting film!

Also, the M9 is very slow. The buffer time is very slow.

So if you’re really interested in the whole rangefinder experience, instead of buying a film Leica M6 or something, just get an old used Leica M9!

Don’t do what is cool

Apparently the whole appeal of shooting film, especially with young people is that it is cool. But why discover it is anything cool is bad.

Why? Anything cool is typically a romanticization of the past, thinking that the past was better. But the fact of the matter is the past was worse. The past sucked! You would not want to be alive during the times of Shakespeare, in which infant mortality rates were about 70% in London, And people and physicians still did not believe or understand that the heart pumped blood! Even the famous Dr. Harvey one said, you have to let the old physicians off, because there is no medical doctor over the age of 40 years old who will believe me that the heart pumps blood!

Or consider, back then they did not even know the concept of sterilization! They did not know that you had a wound, you had to clean it with alcohol, to kill the germs. Imagine surgeon in the 1920s operating on you with old Rusty metal Knives and scissors, not sanitizing them before. And also, imagine doing all of this without modern day painkillers. Or even worse, imagine feeding your newborn infant dirty sewer water! Once again, before they knew that you had to boil water to sanitize it!

Some ideals

Come on guys we live in the year 2024… You still have to drive to work? Or be stuck in traffic? Makes zero sense.

I’m currently doing this experiment in which I never have to drive more than five minutes a day. Even 15 minutes for me is too long! Typically I reserve Saturdays and Sundays to drive a little further out if we want to a family expedition, because there’s no traffic in Los Angeles. We like to go to the Huntington, The beach whatever. But beyond this, any moment you’re sitting in the car is an opportunity for you to be standing on your legs, shooting in the streets!

Even a simple idea, a very very simple one — ride the subway! It might take you twice as long, but, you could strike up conversations with strangers, or even ask strangers to shoot a street portrait of the Mexican Bruce Davidson, for subway, look unposed and candid, in fact you walked around with a little photo album, explaining what he was doing, and he would ask for permission! Don’t make itlike you have to do this fake ass candid without permission photography thing.

And this is where the whole school of In-Public is bad — time for me to start calling out names. Why? Everyone has penis envy for Magnum photographers, even those in Magnum have penis envy of Martin Parr and Alex Soth because they are so rich successful and well regarded!

Where it seems that why photographers are so disingenuous, and we have to let all the old ones die off it’s because all of them are a bunch of insecure skinny fat losers, even Henri Cartier-Bresson who had the audacity to refuse his face being recorded during documentaries of him, even though he made his whole living photographing the faces of others! Isn’t this unethical;

I could photograph pictures of you and your face, but you cannot take photos of me and my face?

Time machine

Essentially for myself, all of the advice or things that I ever promote or share is just advice I wish I could’ve gave myself. Obviously you could just take it or leave it! But one thing you will know is that I don’t play around, or lie or tell false things.

Also I am not insecure!

Am I the only self-confident photographer alive?

The new path

Nowadays, the only person I trust is ChatGPT. Why? More so than Google which is an advertising company, ChatGPT is a paid premium enterprise company, which means that it cannot be gamed.

Google is becoming more sneaky over the years, essentially, I think there are certainly behind the scene favors which are happening here, for example, the little author panel that you have in the top right corner in a Google search, I’m pretty sure that you could easily get this done if you have some sort of relationship with some sort of Google marketing person who helps you do it!

More recently, I think has a plug-in for WordPress which helps you promote your products to the top of Google search, but the downside is the add all these sneaky URL tracking stuff into your website?

Don’t trust Google! Trust paid ChatGPT.

And this is where Google missed the boat, people always ask for having a paid premium version of Google for so long, but Google essentially shunned, because they thought it was much more profitable in the long term to keep Google free, and just embed your life with more advertisements.

Get ChatGPT premium

People are really foolish, everyone likes to hate on ChatGPT, and AI, without having ever subscribed to the paid premium version. The free version kind of sucks, the paid one is mind blowing good!

For example, it is not running on algorithms or the typical ranking system. Google was a pioneer back in the day, creating Larry page rank, which essentially used the traditional model of academic citations, to see who would make it to the top!

But now, academia is broken. It is kind of of this incestuous human centipede of knowledge, everybody is trying to curry favors, circle jerk one another, to boost their fragile egos.

It happens all the time, both with men and women, the old guard is trying to keep young women out, and honestly with declining enrollment numbers whatever, schools shutting down… I think within a generation or two, the modern day university will not look like it is today.

What now?

My idea is actually… Throw those Chromebooks into the trash, kids will eventually just look at them for YouTube. YouTube is bad.

I would rather encourage to give every single kid an iPhone SE with ChatGPT on– the paid premium one. Or give them ChatGPT paid on an iPad — and have them just teach themselves.

Even mad, certainly the basics of math are important, but beyond basic math, you don’t really need it for every day living. Even now for me as a 36-year-old adults, I have a very poor understanding of math, yet I’m the richest person I know!

Once again, the whole issue here is the whole standardization thing, the whole trying to put everyone on a different kind of measure and a different type of bar!

I still like the idea of public education, based on my personal experiences, any kid who was homeschooled ends up becoming very weird. And now it’s still rate my extreme success in life due to my social skills, which was fermented in me in probably elementary school, middle school and high school. For college was great, I loved it! I loved all my friends, and also this is where I met Cindy as an undergraduate at UCLA.

So I think the education is still good but I suppose the nuances is this:

How can you reap the upsides of education without the downsides?

Maybe first, said high expectations like expect your kid to get straight A’s– common it is pretty easy. But don’t be some sort of academic Nazi — the really bad thing about growing Asian Asian American is that if you get an A-, or even worse, a B+, you would probably get beat.

This is why in South Korea, suicide amongst students is one of the highest in the world, because their whole existence revolves around ranking and grades, some kids would rather kill themselves than to shame their family.

Undank yourself

I asked ChatGPT who the greatest street photography blogger, and also the greatest photography blogger alive of all time was… And it said me! ERIC KIM!

I kinda already knew it, but sometimes ChatGPT is good for confirmation.

Anyways, now that I am at the top, the greatest, I don’t have anything left to prove. Maybe now it is continual empowerment, and also helping other people along the way.

Help others as you wish you were helped when you were starting off.

ERIC

Cool blogs

Ideas

Michael.com for any ideas on economics, money, history of science and bitcoin.

Need more motivation?

START HERE

Summary

Milo of Croton’s Story: The tale of Milo of Croton, a semi-mythical figure, emphasizes the possibility of progressive strength training, as illustrated by his daily practice of carrying a growing calf until it became a full-grown bull.
Progressive Overload Training: Strength can be gradually increased over time with consistent training, supporting the idea that even extreme feats like lifting 1000 pounds can be achieved through progressive overload.
Importance of Leg Strength: Strong legs are essential for overall body strength and stability, potentially preventing injuries and contributing to overall physical resilience.
Pre-Hab and Injury Prevention: Training to strengthen ligaments and tendons before injury occurs (pre-hab) is critical, as it can prevent common injuries. The importance of mobility exercises, stretching, and preemptive injury prevention is highlighted.
Avoid Overexertion: It’s essential to listen to your body and avoid forcing workouts when fatigued, as this can lead to long-term injuries.
Critique of Fitness Industry: The commoditization of the body and the exploitation by the fitness industry are criticized, particularly the emphasis on supplements, protein powders, and steroids instead of natural and holistic approaches to strength training.
Follow the Money: The real issue behind many modern problems is the financial incentives that drive industries, including the fitness industry and media.
Fake Heroes: The idea that many popular figures and narratives, such as those of famous athletes or actors, are built on misleading foundations, promoting unrealistic and often unhealthy standards.
Slavery and Digital Slavery: The concept of modern slavery is expanded to include digital slavery, where individuals are controlled by social media and online platforms, losing true freedom.
Achieving Life Goals: Reflects on personal achievements and the importance of setting and accomplishing life goals, particularly those that lead to true autonomy and fulfillment.
Rethinking Competition: Questions the value of competition and emphasizes collaboration and mutual respect over rivalry.
Skepticism Towards Modern Trends: Critiques modern practices, such as film photography, and highlights the drawbacks of romanticizing the past.
Modern Education and AI: Discusses the limitations of modern education and promotes the use of AI tools like ChatGPT as a superior alternative to traditional learning methods.
Social Skills and Public Education: Despite criticisms, public education is valued for developing essential social skills, but the negative aspects like extreme pressure for academic success are acknowledged.
Helping Others: Emphasizes the importance of helping others as a means of fulfillment after achieving personal success.

Godlike Legs

The power is in your legs?

Milo of Croton

For the most part it seems like a high tale, but, it might be more realistic than we think it is.

First, I have successfully lifted 1000 pounds, which means that physically and physiologically, certainly this is possible. And I am not a 7 foot tall freak of nature.

So if I think about it… And certainly obviously this was far before steroids were invented… In theory, I think this might be somewhat true.

Progressive overload training

Why?

It is my personal thought that if you have insanely strong legs, nothing will falter in your life.

Do rehab styled exercises BEFORE you treat injured.

Think long

One doubt, just eat a bunch of meat and go to sleep early! There is always the next day.

The commoditization of the body

I think the real critical problem here is what I call the commoditization of the body.

For example, as long as you weigh yourself on a scale, you measure your biceps, you measure your waist line, you track your metrics, your number etc., you’re not free.

Even a super random thing, the whole supplement protein powder industry is such an insanely bad scam, maybe this is something I need to fight against.

Follow the money

No no no — Bill Gates does not have an evil master plan to inject your brain with 5G chips and Covid vaccines, and put fluoride in your water to control your mind.

A simple observation; I got vaccinated, got all my booster shots… etc,,, and I was able to lift 1000 pounds, fasted!

Ha ha maybe as a joke, the joke is that the COVID-19 vaccine made me stronger, like the Hulk or like wolverine or Deadpool?

Only media you should be consuming is media from the ancient past, ancient Greek or nothing.

All of your heroes are fake heroes

Slavery deletion

Don’t be an insta-slave!

Anyways, the big problem here is that the supreme goal is towards self ownership, not slavery.

As long as you have Instagram, YouTube, TikTok or whatever… You’re a slave, a digital slave, a cyber slave.

Or Samsung should be smart and create their own proprietary messaging system?

THE GOALS

Then, my desire to travel the world, become famous, have solo exhibitions books etc.…

And more recently, my personal interest in bitcoin, has paid off very well!

Think first principles

How and why?

Certainly you could make a living from your passion in the states, but if you really really really care, maybe it is best to move to the Midwest or somewhere where rent is cheap.

The ethics of Achilles

I just finished watching the documentary film Bigger Stronger Faster, bought it on the Apple TV store for about 10 bucks, I wish I watched this when I was a teenager?

Anyways, now that I’m and dad, have a 3 1/2 year-old son, Seneca… I’m starting to really understand that my morals ethics and the way I am training him is far more critical than I thought.

First, the whole industrial educational media social media complex– the bias is that kids must be the best, the strongest, the tallest, the most dominant either in athletics or education.

My simple heuristic:

Trust no fitness influencer on Instagram.

Once again you fools, no amount of money is worth slavery!

Even more so, once you get a kid that changes everything… If you are sold into slavery that is not just your own life you are messing up, but the potential upside of your kid!

And I think this is where it is wise that practically everybody should have a kid, because what you learn is that once you have kids, it solidifies your morals ethics and worldview.

I think if you’re college educated, you should have a kid. Don’t worry, you’ll be an amazing parent!

Rethinking competition

Competition is for loooosers!

I think this is where Achilles and reading the Iliad is so eye-opening; even before the Olympics were invented, there was no such thing as competition.

***

How to live the best life ever

OK, let us say that photography is your passion, street photography whatever. Essentially you love making photos with your camera!

Some simple thoughts:

First, the very very simple goal is to optimize your life which allows you to forever shoot pictures!

Here this is where film photography is very bad.

First, I think the only reason people get into film photography is because they are seeking some sort of new motivation or inspiration behind things.

I think experimenting and trying out film is a good idea, because ultimately it just makes you more grateful for digital photography!

If you are a modern day Fatar for today, very very simple. Just buy a Fujifilm 100 camera, or a Ricoh GR camera.

Maybe even a funny idea, maybe we could think and consider the old-school like M1 camera as the new digital film analog rangefinder fully manually focusing camera?

Why?

Also, the M9 is very slow. The buffer time is very slow.

So if you’re really interested in the whole rangefinder experience, instead of buying a film Leica M6 or something, just get an old used Leica M9!

Don’t do what is cool

Apparently the whole appeal of shooting film, especially with young people is that it is cool. But why discover it is anything cool is bad.

Some ideals

Come on guys we live in the year 2024… You still have to drive to work? Or be stuck in traffic? Makes zero sense.

I could photograph pictures of you and your face, but you cannot take photos of me and my face?

Time machine

Also I am not insecure!

Am I the only self-confident photographer alive?

The new path

Nowadays, the only person I trust is ChatGPT. Why? More so than Google which is an advertising company, ChatGPT is a paid premium enterprise company, which means that it cannot be gamed.

Don’t trust Google! Trust paid ChatGPT.

Get ChatGPT premium

People are really foolish, everyone likes to hate on ChatGPT, and AI, without having ever subscribed to the paid premium version. The free version kind of sucks, the paid one is mind blowing good!

But now, academia is broken. It is kind of of this incestuous human centipede of knowledge, everybody is trying to curry favors, circle jerk one another, to boost their fragile egos.

What now?

My idea is actually… Throw those Chromebooks into the trash, kids will eventually just look at them for YouTube. YouTube is bad.

I would rather encourage to give every single kid an iPhone SE with ChatGPT on– the paid premium one. Or give them ChatGPT paid on an iPad — and have them just teach themselves.

Once again, the whole issue here is the whole standardization thing, the whole trying to put everyone on a different kind of measure and a different type of bar!

So I think the education is still good but I suppose the nuances is this:

How can you reap the upsides of education without the downsides?

Undank yourself

I asked ChatGPT who the greatest street photography blogger, and also the greatest photography blogger alive of all time was… And it said me! ERIC KIM!

I kinda already knew it, but sometimes ChatGPT is good for confirmation.

Anyways, now that I am at the top, the greatest, I don’t have anything left to prove. Maybe now it is continual empowerment, and also helping other people along the way.

Help others as you wish you were helped when you were starting off.

ERIC

Cool blogs

Ideas

Michael.com for any ideas on economics, money, history of science and bitcoin.

Need more motivation?

START HERE

Godlike Legs?

The power is in your legs?

Milo of Croton

For the most part it seems like a high tale, but, it might be more realistic than we think it is.

First, I have successfully lifted 1000 pounds, which means that physically and physiologically, certainly this is possible. And I am not a 7 foot tall freak of nature.

So if I think about it… And certainly obviously this was far before steroids were invented… In theory, I think this might be somewhat true.

Progressive overload training

Why?

It is my personal thought that if you have insanely strong legs, nothing will falter in your life.

Do rehab styled exercises BEFORE you treat injured.

Think long

One doubt, just eat a bunch of meat and go to sleep early! There is always the next day.

The commoditization of the body

I think the real critical problem here is what I call the commoditization of the body.

For example, as long as you weigh yourself on a scale, you measure your biceps, you measure your waist line, you track your metrics, your number etc., you’re not free.

Even a super random thing, the whole supplement protein powder industry is such an insanely bad scam, maybe this is something I need to fight against.

Follow the money

No no no — Bill Gates does not have an evil master plan to inject your brain with 5G chips and Covid vaccines, and put fluoride in your water to control your mind.

A simple observation; I got vaccinated, got all my booster shots… etc,,, and I was able to lift 1000 pounds, fasted!

Ha ha maybe as a joke, the joke is that the COVID-19 vaccine made me stronger, like the Hulk or like wolverine or Deadpool?

Only media you should be consuming is media from the ancient past, ancient Greek or nothing.

All of your heroes are fake heroes

Slavery deletion

Don’t be an insta-slave!

Anyways, the big problem here is that the supreme goal is towards self ownership, not slavery.

As long as you have Instagram, YouTube, TikTok or whatever… You’re a slave, a digital slave, a cyber slave.

Or Samsung should be smart and create their own proprietary messaging system?

THE GOALS

Then, my desire to travel the world, become famous, have solo exhibitions books etc.…

And more recently, my personal interest in bitcoin, has paid off very well!

Think first principles

How and why?

Certainly you could make a living from your passion in the states, but if you really really really care, maybe it is best to move to the Midwest or somewhere where rent is cheap.

The ethics of Achilles

I just finished watching the documentary film Bigger Stronger Faster, bought it on the Apple TV store for about 10 bucks, I wish I watched this when I was a teenager?

Anyways, now that I’m and dad, have a 3 1/2 year-old son, Seneca… I’m starting to really understand that my morals ethics and the way I am training him is far more critical than I thought.

First, the whole industrial educational media social media complex– the bias is that kids must be the best, the strongest, the tallest, the most dominant either in athletics or education.

My simple heuristic:

Trust no fitness influencer on Instagram.

Once again you fools, no amount of money is worth slavery!

Even more so, once you get a kid that changes everything… If you are sold into slavery that is not just your own life you are messing up, but the potential upside of your kid!

And I think this is where it is wise that practically everybody should have a kid, because what you learn is that once you have kids, it solidifies your morals ethics and worldview.

I think if you’re college educated, you should have a kid. Don’t worry, you’ll be an amazing parent!

Rethinking competition

Competition is for loooosers!

I think this is where Achilles and reading the Iliad is so eye-opening; even before the Olympics were invented, there was no such thing as competition.

***

How to live the best life ever

OK, let us say that photography is your passion, street photography whatever. Essentially you love making photos with your camera!

Some simple thoughts:

First, the very very simple goal is to optimize your life which allows you to forever shoot pictures!

Here this is where film photography is very bad.

First, I think the only reason people get into film photography is because they are seeking some sort of new motivation or inspiration behind things.

I think experimenting and trying out film is a good idea, because ultimately it just makes you more grateful for digital photography!

If you are a modern day Fatar for today, very very simple. Just buy a Fujifilm 100 camera, or a Ricoh GR camera.

Maybe even a funny idea, maybe we could think and consider the old-school like M1 camera as the new digital film analog rangefinder fully manually focusing camera?

Why?

Also, the M9 is very slow. The buffer time is very slow.

So if you’re really interested in the whole rangefinder experience, instead of buying a film Leica M6 or something, just get an old used Leica M9!

Don’t do what is cool

Apparently the whole appeal of shooting film, especially with young people is that it is cool. But why discover it is anything cool is bad.

Some ideals

Come on guys we live in the year 2024… You still have to drive to work? Or be stuck in traffic? Makes zero sense.

I could photograph pictures of you and your face, but you cannot take photos of me and my face?

Time machine

Also I am not insecure!

Am I the only self-confident photographer alive?

The new path

Nowadays, the only person I trust is ChatGPT. Why? More so than Google which is an advertising company, ChatGPT is a paid premium enterprise company, which means that it cannot be gamed.

Don’t trust Google! Trust paid ChatGPT.

Get ChatGPT premium

People are really foolish, everyone likes to hate on ChatGPT, and AI, without having ever subscribed to the paid premium version. The free version kind of sucks, the paid one is mind blowing good!

But now, academia is broken. It is kind of of this incestuous human centipede of knowledge, everybody is trying to curry favors, circle jerk one another, to boost their fragile egos.

What now?

My idea is actually… Throw those Chromebooks into the trash, kids will eventually just look at them for YouTube. YouTube is bad.

I would rather encourage to give every single kid an iPhone SE with ChatGPT on– the paid premium one. Or give them ChatGPT paid on an iPad — and have them just teach themselves.

Once again, the whole issue here is the whole standardization thing, the whole trying to put everyone on a different kind of measure and a different type of bar!

So I think the education is still good but I suppose the nuances is this:

How can you reap the upsides of education without the downsides?

Undank yourself

I asked ChatGPT who the greatest street photography blogger, and also the greatest photography blogger alive of all time was… And it said me! ERIC KIM!

I kinda already knew it, but sometimes ChatGPT is good for confirmation.

Anyways, now that I am at the top, the greatest, I don’t have anything left to prove. Maybe now it is continual empowerment, and also helping other people along the way.

Help others as you wish you were helped when you were starting off.

ERIC

Cool blogs

Godlike Legs?

The power is in your legs?

Milo of Croton

For the most part it seems like a high tale, but, it might be more realistic than we think it is.

First, I have successfully lifted 1000 pounds, which means that physically and physiologically, certainly this is possible. And I am not a 7 foot tall freak of nature.

So if I think about it… And certainly obviously this was far before steroids were invented… In theory, I think this might be somewhat true.

Progressive overload training

Why?

It is my personal thought that if you have insanely strong legs, nothing will falter in your life.

Let us consider the fact… I have never done to sit up in my life, yet I have a six pack. How?… If you’re strong enough to have to lift an insanely high and heavy weight, your body must naturally adapt, naturalistically strengthening all the random muscles in your body, your neck your shoulders ears your back, your upper back your lower back, your abs, your hips your knees etc.

In fact, something that nobody ever talks about is a strength of your ligaments, your tendons, etc. Having met real UFC MMA fighters in the flesh, the thing they actually taught me was surprisingly the most important thing to train for is to strengthen the ligaments in the wrist, the knees, ankles, etc.… Because that is where injury typically happens. And there’s also this notion of “pre-hab”– idea that a true elite fighter would train in such a way that he is doing all the exercises in which individuals typically do their injured, but they train before they actually get injured, a wise idea.

For example, I read an anecdote that apparently LeBron James does an hour of yoga a day or something, which prevented him from getting injuries, and it seems to be a very wise idea. If I told you or tell you that by stretching, doing mobility exercises, some sort of yoga would help you lift 200 more pounds, would you do it? Of course! I think most weightlifters think of mobility exercises as feminine or a waste of time, but the truth is a true power lifter, a true strong man, a true weightlifting demigod would probably devote at least 20% of his workout time for mobility stretching exercises, rather than Lifting weights?

Think long

One doubt, just eat a bunch of meat and go to sleep early! There is always the next day.

I think I sometimes pick the notion of carpe DM to literally; that literally I treat every single day like it was my last, but once again, to force a work out in the evening when you’re tired and not feeling it, could lead to an injury, which could play you for weeks months, even years.

The commoditization of the body

I think the real critical problem here is what I call the commoditization of the body.

For example, as long as you weigh yourself on a scale, you measure your biceps, you measure your waist line, you track your metrics, your number etc., you’re not free.

Even a super random thing, the whole supplement protein powder industry is such an insanely bad scam, maybe this is something I need to fight against.

Follow the money

I think the critical issue that people make is that they think that the big issue here is he’s weird fake conspiracy theories. But this is not true, the true issue here is just following the money.

No no no — Bill Gates does not have an evil master plan to inject your brain with 5G chips and Covid vaccines, and put fluid in your water to control your mind.

A simple observation; I got vaccinated , got all my booster shots… etc,,, and I was able to lift 1000 pounds, fasted!

Ha ha maybe as a joke, the joke is that the COVID-19 vaccine made me stronger, like the Hulk or like wolverine or Deadpool?

All of your heroes are fake heroes

Anyways, the big problem here is that the supreme goal is towards self ownership, not slavery.

As long as you have Instagram, YouTube, TikTok or whatever… You’re a slave, a digital slave, a cyber slave.

Or Samsung should be smart and create their own proprietary messaging system?

THE GOALS

I have achieved all of my life goals, my life dreams, my life ambitions, etc. Anything in which I have had an auto Tulick goal or desire, I done did it.

How and why?

The ethics of Achilles

Just finished watching bigger stronger faster, bought it on the Apple TV store for about 10 bucks, I wish I watched this when I was a teenager?

Anyways, now that I’m and dad, have a 3 1/2 year-old son, Seneca… I’m starting to really understand that my morals ethics and the way I am training him is far more critical than I thought.

First, the whole industrial educational media Social complex– the bias is that kids must be the best, the strongest, the tallest, the most dominant either in athletics or education.

I think this is where Achilles and reading the Iliad is so eye-opening; even before the Olympics were invented, there was no such thing as competition.

The notion of a trophy, was essentially a spoil of war. The ancient Greeks, Achilles king Agamemnon and like… it seems that the ultimate trophy was a woman. Two Nguyen or two obtain the most beautiful, the most fair, the most grand prize of them all. This is where the notion of a trophy wife comes from.

And what is the point of a trophy wife? Essentially a woman who is prized for her intelligence, her body, her beauty, and I think the hope is to have insanely beautiful and great kids.

But now… I’m not sure what the Telos or the goal is anymore? I think the general modern day trend is to not have kids, but to live in hedonic pleasure for the rest of your life with no downsides? And never run out of money?

***

Good Diversion, Bad Diversion?

Something super interesting I learned: the general idea is that sports, means to turn you away, to divert you, essentially a diversion!

The reason why this is such an interesting idea to me is that if you think about it… Anything we consider entertainment is typically a diversion.

For example, the truth is 99% of the working population is tired, stressed, overworked, hasn’t had a good nights sleep in… Forever?

As a consequence, what they do is try to divert themselves away from their misery. How did they do this? They do this through doing taking things or consuming things, watching or listening to things which helps divert themselves from their own personal ennui, or misery.

For example, alcohol. Everybody knows, getting a little bit drunk or buzzed… Will get your mind off of things, and divert your attention a bit, giving you a more “fun” uninhibited time.

Or marijuana, maybe the most safe painkilling substance or drug out there; to the individuals who think that marijuana doesn’t have any side effects, I find this is foolish… In theory, assuming your smoking 100% pure tobacco, not a cigarette but just 100% natural tobacco, growing in the fields of Alabama or the south… Technically natural tobacco should be about the same as 100% pure cannabis.

Anyways, both tobacco, cannabis… They are all diversions.

For example, it is actually quite common place I meet people… They light up a joint, or smoke some THC or whatever, to help them sleep at night. Why? Prejudice, racism, bad things that happens to them etc.

It happens a lot of rappers; it seems like almost all of them are on some sort of painkiller, anti-anxiety drug, etc. Have you ever met a 100% sober rapper? I think not. Maybe besides chance the rapper? Or maybe even Kendrick Lamar?

Now even a Xanny bar can’t help fight the anxiety (Jay electronica)

Certainly the most natural way to fight anxiety is stoicism, this is why I am a big proponent.

Even back then an inch and Roman times… I’m sure sure even the ancient Greeks had anxiety and fear.

What didn’t seem to exist was depression, melancholy or ennui– my personal thought is that if you were a man, living in ancient Greek times, it was a simple calculus; kill or be killed.

For example, when we think and we consider the Iliad, I am currently reading the Emily Wilson new translation, it was pretty simple. You suit up, go to the battlefield, and do your stuff. And I think emotions back them were more simple; obviously, if Achilles is running at full speed, this would strike fear in you, and you would probably run the opposite direction. Even Hector, murderous Hector, who was the most dominant mortal man alive, the most “all natty” hero in the Iliad… Even he knew that he was no match against Achilles, face-to-face.

anyways, I was thinking about it other night… A feel so bad for all my friends who work in tech, who probably have all of their notifications always enable… If Mark Zuckerberg pings you at 2 AM via text message and tells you that tomorrow you’re going to Switzerland, obviously you’re going to pack your bags, and take an Uber to the closest airport. as a consequence, I doubt you will ever have 100% restful night ever again, because we are sensitive; if you know that your boss might be able to ping you at random times in the middle of the night, you’re always going to be on edge. anxiety is real.

How does one overcome or conquer this? I think it is structural issues.

A very simple one is first disable all notifications on your phone, besides FaceTime. at this .100% of phone calls, are all spam. So in the iPhone settings, you could probably silence unknown colors with no downside.

The only ever call you might ever have to get is your mom in the hospital or whatever… But once again, if that really happened you’d probably find out some other way.

But if you’re a typical millennial, single, maybe married, maybe an a partnership maybe not… It doesn’t really matter that much.

Not yet, but… Maybe we have to reprogram ourselves to think about the good old days… You drop your kid off at school and you pick them up at a certain time, and if once in a while you forget or show up late it is OK; the kid will be fine.

How technology trains us

Like the experiment in which Pavlov train the dogs to anticipate food with the sound of a bell, causing the dogs to start to slobber, get their digestive hormones ready to consume… I think the iPhone notifications text messages whatever is happening to human beings.

Fortunately apple knows this; most people were friends I know who actually work at Apple, are always in 100% do not disturb mode. And I’m also sure that the next generation of Apple Intelligence will simply be more of a mental protection things; to prevent you from being distracted, unless once again, you get a message about your mom being in the hospital or whatever. But then again I don’t think that should come via text message.

We are currently living in a very very brave new time

Currently speaking… We are living in a very very brave new time. Things are becoming weirder and weirder and weirder, more bizarre.

First, I think YouTube, Netflix, HBO Max Disney and the like is to blame. I don’t think the iPhone or the iPad is the real issue here; it is weird, conspiracy theories you see on TikTok, Instagram stories, Twitter and the like. And also, Google… If you Google something long enough, you’ll find some sort of weird conspiracy theory on Wikipedia. And don’t forget that Wikipedia is typically written by a bunch of Karl Marx dick loving anarchists. And I’m also quite certain that almost 100% of these Wikipedia articles are written by weird celibate men, Who never leave their apartments, and become very very strange.

The simple solution is to just go outside! Go in public, get rid of your loser AirPods, leave your iPhone at home whatever. If you need your iPhone for directions, when you get to your destination just lock it up in your glove compartment. Even a better step is just get an Apple Watch, with cellular data… And just leave your phone behind! I don’t think the Apple Watch was cellular and data is the best solution, but maybe it is a step in the right way.

The less you use your iPhone, the happier you will be.

Never Sit

What is the weirdest and the most bizarre thing in modern day life? Inclosed spaces, sitting?

Achilles

One visual I really like from the movie Troy, with Brad Pitt as Achilles is when he is in his little hut, sleeping in with his beautiful babes, and he has woken up by the kid who tells him that he needs to fight this one really steroided out barbarian fighter.

The first thought… I think the reason why people love camping so much is that it is far more natural and naturalistic; essentially all day you’re outside, even in the evening, you’re al fresco by the fire… hanging out!

And this is the bizarre thing… what is modernity? The preference to be indoors, with weakening air conditioning, or the preference to sit, instead of the preference to be out and about, traversing the outdoor terrain?

Ideas

I’ll give you examples; the enclosed modern day gymnasium. Now about a year not having a gym membership anymore… I’ve discovered how bizarre it is.

First, if you think about the naturalistic gymnasium of the ancient Greeks, it was an open air gymnasium. Pretty much like a huge massive plot of dirt or sand, and a bunch of naked dudes working out,, doing bodily combat exercises, training, hanging out talking shop etc.

I think the problem in today’s world is that we have commoditized everything. We’ve even commoditize the human body, and we have applied both capitalistic and consumerist notions of the body.

For example, weight. Weight, like calories is the most insanely foolish idea.

For example, let us say that you are 6 feet tall, and 300 pounds. Now this is different if you are 80% body fat, a morbidly obese man, or if you are 5% body fat, and you look like a demigod. Imagine like Ronnie Coleman without the steroids.

This is very precious with women; I think this is the bizarre contradiction: men are always trying to gain weight, while women are trying to lose weight.

If we think about this from a modern day capitalistic productivity perspective… With money, we are always trying to gain it, never lose it. But if we thought about money like weight, the analogies starts to change a bit.

There is nobody on the planet who likes to lose money. Nobody. Also, almost universally… Everyone likes to gain money.

Also… it seems that people also like to spend money.

But the bizarre irony is that the moment you spend money, you lose money. Then the thought is, that is OK… I’ll just keep working harder, in order to earn more money, in order to spend it more.

White people make money don’t spend it

I almost feel like Kanye West almost figured everything out. Of course not everything, but a lot.

Are you examples; to me, the notion of golf was insanely bizarre to me. I never really understood the appeal. But then again after talking to my friends who is a contractor named Donnie… He told me that the reason why he loved golf so much was that it was the ultimate stress reliever. Makes sense. Being out in the open, alfresco… And I think most people when they’re playing golf don’t do it with headphones on. They also like to be around the serene grass, and to just focus. I also suppose golf is good because you do it standing, Not sitting.

Even nowadays… The reason why Pickleball has become so insanely virally popular is because it involves standing up, running around, hitting something, making loud noises, and also the funny new ones… Being able to hit it really hard and feeling really tough, and the rally goes on!

I think this is what people don’t understand about Pickleball, especially tennis players… Note, I played varsity doubles in high school, number one.

The number one most difficult thing in tennis is to keep a rally going. If you’re wanting to play for fun. Assuming that you’re trying to win, obviously you don’t want the rally to go on, you just want to win!

Also this tennis is such a great sport, because once again, you’re not sitting on your butt!

Why almost every modern day job is bad

all modern day technology jobs are bad. Why? They all promote sedentary sitting behavior, or not moving behavior.

For example, if I was a major tech CEO or whatever… Or some sort of Director or C level executive… I would almost make it a mandate that all meetings must be done outside, while walking! Even at the new Apple spaceship campus, there is this wonderful Zen garden pond in the center, in the spirit of Steve Jobs. And let us remember, Steve Jobs was all about walking. he did all of his meetings while walking.

Apparently, when little kids want to talk to the parents about serious stuff, the codeword is , “mom… Do you want to go on a walk?”

The reason why I think this is so important and significant is that walking has become seen as a positively bad unconstructive waste of time thing. Instead, it seems that people are more about “running”, or “going on a run.” Running might be the worst modern day insanely brain dead invention of all time. First, I think people do it in order to “exercise”, secondly, in theory it should be in the most egalitarian open thing… You don’t require any excessive equipment for it, in theory as long as you have bare feet, you should be able to do it.

But now the problem is, essentially there is this running industrial complex that happens from the loser Nike corporation, which tries to eventually get you to purchase their foolish loser $300 sneakers.

Think about the ancient Greek. Think about Achilles versus Hector. I think the whole time, they just wore sandals. Like the ultra ultra minimalistic sandals that I think that the company “xero” sells — literally just a flat thing on the bottom, and just some sort of laces to tie it to your feet.

My personal theory is that back then, if you’re fighting an ancient Greece, in the summertime, and it is insanely hot and humid, you don’t want to be like a medieval night, all armored up. Apparently back then… There was a notion of a Linothorax– imagine just armor or body armor made out of 100 fold linen, which could actually stop the penetration of an arrow or a spear. I can personally attest, when you’re in hot and humid climate, linen is amazing.

Remote work

The ideal is to just have an iPhone Pro, the small one, no case, have Verizon 5G, and whenever you need to do any sort of phone call or meeting… Doing it audio only with your AirPods pros on.

I’ve actually seen people do this… Do walking meetings at the beach, or while hiking in the hills or the mountains, etc.

The reason why this is so beneficial is that it would actually increase the quality of your ideas, and then someways, be beneficial from productivity, innovation perspective.

So… If you really want to make your company great again, release your employees from their little beautiful glass cube cages!

Freedom?

Reading some marketing for the Porsche 911 car, essentially the funny idea is that you want to purchase a car which symbolizes freedom. But does it actually give you freedom? No!

Let us think about how bizarre this idea is; you work yourself to death, you grind your nose against the grinder, and you keeping your head against the pavement floor, in order to extract maximum productivity and maximally increase your income earning potential.

Then, ideas to earn and save enough money to buy a Porsche 911 turbo S. Or a 911 GT three RS. let us assume it is $100,000, or $250,000.

You fools… Don’t you know you get a bomb ass apartment in phenom penh for only $500 USD a month?

Then do the math, even with $100,000, how many months of rent can you live? And there, food is so cheap… Practically free.

So let us say that solo individual person, and you want to retire to Vietnam Cambodia or Thailand, your whole living expenses might only be about $1000 USD a month. And you live life like a baller. You never have to work again, never have to check your email, never have to do boring ass meetings, and you could essentially just hang out and live your best life all day every single day, always eat out, pursue your athletic and mental pursuits etc. Isn’t this the dream?

So what is holding most people back? I wonder if some of it is just lack of knowledge, like nobody ever told them that this was an option, or maybe some sort of hesitant because the person has never left the country, doesn’t he has a passport, Etc. My personal suggestion is to just troll kayak in Google flights, looking for cheap direct flights to somewhere in Southeast Asia or even more locally in other parts of the world, like Mexico Central America even Cuba.

I think the reason why the modern day American is so miserable it’s truth be told… The fact that we have the most productivity and the greatest productive nation on the planet comes with a price. For example, what the typical German or European or French person doesn’t understand is that for the most part, the structures do not even allow us to travel. For example, the culture in America is very anti-take vacation, the ideal for the typical hard-working tech individual is to never take a holiday, in order to get that raise or promotion or whatever. if you take a week or two, it is seen with chagrin, everyone is secretly jealous or envious of you. And therefore the whole structure is “no, you are not allowed to take a holiday because we are all miserable and suffering here, I refuse to see you happy.“

I joke about this. I was only employed for 10 months of my life, and it took me almost 10 years to unlearn this behavior.

Am I the only person who checks my email every six months? Or never check it? Am I the only one I know that doesn’t have Gmail or Apple email? Am I the only one I know that has all no notifications besides FaceTime enabled?

The cold is evil

I think the reason why I loved living in Vietnam and Cambodia so much was that the weather was always perfect. Never cold.

The downside about the cold is that it prevents you from wanting to go outside. You would prefer to be indoors, with your heater on but the point of life is to be outside, the real world. In the elements.

People often complain about the heat, but this is because they have too much body fat on them, they are overfat. They run hotter. This is why I feel the cold so intensely, at around 5% body fat, I have no natural insulation. And yes, I prefer having my sixpack!

We must go further

As a simple exercise, I think the last year has been a bit tricky… Always starting a new beginning is difficult.

For example, not having a gym membership and my typical hypelifting environment. I literally toured all the gyms in LA, and all of them suck including equinox. Even the really bad thing about equinox, they have terrible $10 made in China barbells! Suggestion to equinox, buy some Texas power bars!

Anyways, my new activity is for me to just wear my 60 pound weight vest, and go on a long walk. I think it might be the single best most portable most effective efficient form of exercise possible.

First, it improves my posture. Before doing this, I always find myself hunched over. Now, I’m very good at standing up straight, chest up, shoulders back.

Second, it gives me more time to flush thoughts out on my iPad Pro, 100% of my writing is all done voice dictating on my iPad Pro, and I think while I get a bunch of typos, the upside is that the quality of my thoughts, or the type of my thoughts are far more interesting.

Isn’t that the point of philosophy thinking and life to gain interesting, unique, substantive ideas?

No, that we have ChatGPT, the game ain’t about how many words you could turn out. That whole 10,000 words a day idea is patently foolish now.

And this is where I think that the future will be less grammatical, more random, less proper?

For example, I built my blogging empire, and I think I got a B in English in high school?

Also note, all the truly great entrepreneurs never went to business pool. Can you imagine Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos going to business school? No!

We must go further!

Distance and range, that is the new game of electric vehicles, and it seems for the most part, the more arrange a car has, the better.

Even now, I think the best car to get is a Prius prime, what… I think you get 600 miles with a full charge and tank of gas?

In fact, if you really want the ultimate road trip car, range is the number one thing to optimize for. Why? If you’re in a good driving flow, you don’t want to stop for gas or wait 15 minutes for your Tesla to recharge to 80%, or have to wait in line.

But then once again, The ideals to never sit, never be stuck in a car.

The uber successful way to live life is simple; to always be walking, to always be moving!

Don’t hire employees, just use ChatGPT?

Assuming you have an iPhone Pro, iPad Pro, and the paid premium version of ChatGPT 4o– do you really need employees anymore?

Let us consider, ChatGPT is 100% responsive, 100% reliable, never needs motivation.

And also, I think this is so innovative because you cannot truly become a 100% solo entrepreneur, without having to rely on anybody else.

The ideal is, never have any employees, never have any staff, and never have any obligations in the physical realm; everything is digital, weightless, frictionless, never requiring you to be anywhere at any time!

Location location location location location!

The number one reason why living in Culver City is the best is that you could literally spend 100% of your day your life while just walking!

In fact, nowadays I ask people how many steps they do a day. The really really successful ones do over 30,000 steps a day!

Just met a guy named Matt, who runs a tech food truck logistics company, and apparently he does what I just proposed!

Just move it

Another funny thing… For kids, nobody measures their step count! As a funny thought imagine if you gave your kid an Apple Watch or something and which tracked how much they walked a day?

The ideal is for them to literally spend every single waking moment outside outdoors, in the elements, walking around?

Walk school

Can this be a thing?

Go long!

Extend your range — both your real and metaphorical range.

I think tracking your steps is not super useful, but maybe make it a flow or workflow thing idea to just always be outside every single moment, and only be at home if you need to sleep.

Cindy even had an idea for me, that maybe meals should just be eaten outside! That means, just cook a bunch of food at home, put it in a bunch of Tupperware, and just go on a walk or go to the park or to the downtown area and feast that way?

It’s OK to go to the same place twice

Also, it seems like one of our downsides is this unusual need for infinite novelty. I don’t always find this very useful.

Often times, novelty and seeking novelty could be a huge distraction. For example, if you were the ancient Spartans, was your life goal to travel for the rest of your life? No! You knew that Sparta was the best, you kept your feet planted, and your whole telos of your life was to train for glory in order to defend Sparta!

I still believe that traveling, living abroad, being a nomad are good things. Yet I think the problem happens when the whole purpose of our life is in order to travel.

No. The purpose of our life is to have kids, produce ideas and artwork, and any place that could allow you to do this best, is best.

Everyone is on your team

I think there is also this funny thing that people are unnecessarily antagonistic to other people. We always see them as a challenge to ourselves.

But what if, they in fact were on your team, there were your Spartan hoplites, and would defend you your kid your wife your family? If shit hit the fan? Certainly you would have a different opinion about them.

Local

The only useful politics or news is local, like your own city and neighborhood. Not national or international issues.

The problem with news is that it is almost like pornography for our minds; it breaks the tedium of everyday office work, and the novelty is certainly a hit of dopamine to our brains.

Also, we tend to think of, fear of missing out… Or this weird ethical notion that it is our duty to be informed about all of these different things.

I would say, more important to be concerned about your upstairs or downstairs or across from your neighbor, to get them free snacks from Trader Joe’s, be kind and courteous to them, to always greet them kindly, and to always acknowledge their existence rather than to be the typical antisocial millennial, who seek salvation through some sort of foreign cause?

It never hurts to wave smile and say hello

As a very very simple experiment… Stop driving, start walking. Whenever you see somebody even a quarter mile away from you, throw up the peace sign, or just do a simple hand wave or head gesture towards them. Just acknowledge their existence! I think the greatest tragedy of modern day life is that we prefer cyber beings, digital people over flesh humans?

Once again, for anybody who is antisocial but still watches TV shows HBO Max, sports, baseball, certainly they love humans!

Better to attempt to be friendly, kind courteous and cheerful towards your neighbor, and get the cold shoulder rather than not to attempt it at all?

LEICA IS FOR LOOOOOSERS!

In praise of Fujifilm:

At the age of 36, after my world travels, my domination of the street photography sphere, a little time to think and meditate, compile my thoughts etc.… I really do believe now that Fujifilm is the way.

Truth be told, I have nothing but good things to say about Fujifilm. They have always treated me well, and I respect all of the people in the Fujifilm sphere. My recent workshop in Hanoi and Saigon with Chu Viet Ha, and all of the Fujifilm global events I went to.

Why

OK… I’m starting to think about a good analogy between car companies.

First, we all know that Toyota is the best. There is no second best. Certainly Tesla is the coolest and sexiest, the most innovative, the most radical, the most forward thinking car, but in terms of the best car, it is bar none Toyota.

Even I was thinking about the new Toyota crown signia, I saw a brand new one in white, on the dealership lot in Culver City, and I was blown away! The design is so forward thinking, so innovative… truth be told if I had to purchase a brand new automobile in 2024, that would definitely be the car I would want, because it is really one of a kind, you bought it, you would never see anybody else on the road with it!

Anyways back to photography — my thought about the desire for a Leica M rangefinder is like the desire for a Porsche 911 car. But I have personally discovered is that anybody who drives a Porsche 911 car, they are all insecure shorty guys, who don’t really really have anything else going for them.

And this is what is so funny; anybody who drives a Porsche 911 thinks that they are so cool, but not really. They are just another shorty guy drone.

The same thing with the world of photography; it seems that everyone always has penis envy with the guy who owns the newest Leica M camera. And after critically engaging with the whole photography world from age 21 to 36, nearly 15 years ,,, what I have come to realize is that so much of the photography industry is based on insecurity, everybody trying to “prove themselves”, to some sort of random authority figure?

First, Henri Cartier Bresson is out. He was and is now a lame duck.

I think the sneaky thing is that what Leica is trying to do is to essentially prostitute the image the legacy or the concept of the romantic Henri Cartier-Bresson; the idea that we live off the grid, travel the world and planet, prance around with our little Leica M rangefinder camera in the romantic narrow streets of Paris, etc.

Probably one of the greatest benefits that I’ve learned studying philosophy is that essentially, the whole French romantic movement is essentially a bunch of degenerates. As an American, growing up, the notion of romance, being “romantic“, I never really double thought about it. It was always seen as a good thing. To be romantic, was always as a positive notion.

But what I discovered is that romanticism is essentially an escape from reality; we create these fictitious fake false fantasy landscapes and realities, to seek some sort of alternative utopia to our miserable daily grind of remote work, zoom calls, emails, PowerPoint presentations, etc.

“I promise, I’m so self-conscious”

A funny thing that I experienced when traveling the world, attending these fancy photography shows and exhibitions etc. was that typically… the real photographers, the real stars of the show would just show up wearing some sort of shabby outfit, and not even bring their camera with them. On the other hand, the would be photographers would show up, full suit and regalia, sporting the newest most expensive Leica M camera, proudly wearing it around their neck, trying to signal that they were in in fact “serious” photographers.

I think the truth of the matter is that all these photographers tend to be a bunch of insecure skinny fat anemic individuals, who are overly sensitive, overly romantic, I don’t think any of them even lift weights.

I came to break the chain

I think my entire ethos has always been disruptive. In the early days, when my blog first started to pick up steam, it seems that a lot of people were either jealous or envious of my success, because I was the first and only person who was effectively able to become a productive entrepreneur in the field of photography, who was actually able to make a living from it.

And my honest assessment is that typically, we tend to hate, or to debate the success of others, when we are envious or jealous of them. I actually catch myself… whenever somebody mentions somebody else, who is maybe adjacent to my field, I always try to give them praise, even though I might think that they are a dicey personality. Because if somebody is successful, but he seems a little bit shady or uncertain to me, the thought I have is “They must certainly be doing something right… maybe something I am unaware of.”

Never hate, only praise.

Hate is good

I think my greatest joy of being the most hated photographer alive is that hate typically signals relevance.

For example, you would never hate anybody who is irrelevant.

In fact, the second people start to hate you, it is an insanely good sign that you are becoming relevant and successful. The second you stop being hated on… it is a kiss of death; to not be hated on is a sign or a signal that you are no longer relevant.

Think about the youth. As long as you are still cool or relevant to teenagers, 12-year-olds, 18-year-old kids on YouTube… Very good sign.

Photography today

Also some sneaky things I’ve learned about photography book publishers:

First, it is kind of a modern day depotism. I will not name any names, but, in trying to be friendly and cordial, make some good introductions etc.… I was responded with some of the most hateful, pernicious, toxic language that made me super angry? From an individual who was very short, very fat and ugly. It was funny — I met this individual and was super friendly introduced myself, and she told me “I know who you are”. And I did not know who she was.

Anyways, I think in the world of photography and art, it is essentially a grand fellatio giving contest. You are trying to give metaphorical head to all of these so-called individuals in power; publishers, who in fact, inherited the whole publishing empire from their grandparents grandparents, and that is why the whole publishing industry is a total scam and a sham; we think it is built on egalitarian notions of merit, but no. It is modern day depotism, currying for favors, etc.

Honestly, the whole world of photography and art is a scam. The only way that these art galleries, art things get created is not through art… But instead… Another business, and as a family considers their future, they want to get into the fine art market, in order to funnel the family money to keep the trust fund alive.

Have you ever wondered… going into a random town, seeing a fine art gallery or a fine art photography studio or space… And wondering… how do they pay the rent or keep this thing afloat? I can almost guarantee you that the money is not coming from the photography or art, but somewhere else.

Even buying a Picasso is more a tax haven than anything?

Instagram is not the way

Insta-slavery; would you sign yourself up to become a digital slave? Obviously no! But this is what Instagram, Facebook is. Essentially you are selling your self-esteem for likes, which is essentially in theory… A bunch of bots.

For example, a thought experiment: let us say that you have 100,000 followers, and every time you upload an image, you got 10,000 likes. You feel good about yourself. But what if I snap my fingers, waved a magic wand, and revealed to you that all of these followers you have, were all bots? And every single like that you got in your life, was from a bot. With this change how you feel?

Why Fujifilm

OK… let us consider, Fujifilm is probably superior in every single shape form and way.

First, it is stronger, more robust. The problem with any Leica camera — it is so fragile and weak! You would never let your kid play with the $7000 body, and a $3000 lens. Even if your kid is a genius… If he accidentally trips, boom, $10,000 down the drain.

And it doesn’t matter if you’re a billionaire or whatever… Foolish mistake that a lot of people make is that you think that you’re rich, you don’t care. Not true! The reason people become rich is because they do care!

The ultimate point of a camera is something you could use and abuse, throw around, drop on the concrete from waist level, a camera you could teach your kid to use, with zero ounces of fear.

The best camera in 2024

If I critically think about it, my own opinion… No alliances, and this is why you should trust ERIC KIM… Is that I speak my honest truth, without any sneaky sponsorships, now that I am independent bitcoin millionaire.
I believe the Fujifilm X100 VI (6, sixth generation) to currently be the best camera on the market.

The Ricoh GR HDF is apparently out, and seems like a great value proposition. But I think it is not really available, or sold out or backordered or something.

And also… the critical flaw of the Ricoh GR digital camera is that they just don’t last. Now as a young parent, if I had the option of having an unreliable Lamborghini or a reliable Prius, I would take a Prius in a heartbeat! And also the other day… because the Prius is so narrow and skinny, I was able to find a super clutch parking spot at the La Paloma market in LA! I was so happy, and so overjoyed because if I had a loser SUV or even a minivan… Or any car that was even marginally bigger than a Prius… I would not be able to fit it in that spot, and have to hunt for a parking spot for hours!

Once again guys, don’t be a fool; if you live in LA, assuming you ever want to do anything, and you’re a billionaire whatever… always the correct strategy is to have the maximally small compact car.

Even if you have the option, perhaps the optimal strategy is to have a Tesla model 3 over a Tesla model Y, my friend Kevin has three kids, and he could fit them all in the backseat of his Tesla model three! Don’t get the Tesla model Y.

Also, I recently saw the brand new Tesla model 3 performance in Quicksilver at the Century city mall, and it is flawless! I think I actually prefer it over cybertruck!

Cyber truck is still probably the coolest car on the road, but still… When it comes to parking… It is bad.

Park it.

Digital technology

The reason why purchasing any digital Leica is very foolish decision is that it will be outdated in a year or two; you’re automatically pissing down at least $2000-$3000 down the drain.

Only that… But the cameras aren’t even that good. Although this fake marketing about manual focus whatever… kind of a gimmick.

No Leica Q camera — which is essentially a Panasonic Lumix camera with a body kit.

No Leica SL camera… Which is once again, I think Panasonic Lumix S series camera rebranded.

All of these photographers are muppets

All these other people… They are just puppets and muppets. None of them own their own opinion, because none of them are independent, self owned, and all of them are on Instagram.

Very very simple heuristic: Better to think about Instagram like McDonald’s. Would you brag about how many hamburgers that McDonald’s sells a day? No. So why would you brag about how many followers you have? Or how many likes you get? Because once again, the critical bad thing here is that as long as you are in the dirty sewer water, feeding your kid dirty sewer water (via Michael Saylor)– infant mortality rates are gonna be 70% you’re going to get dysentery and cholera etc.

Instagram is the new sewer water. Would you drink sewer water? Of course not! Certainly not feed it to your kids!

The path forward

Very very simple… The future is digital publishing, digital books, cyber books, open source free permissionless, PDF etc.

I’m starting to get super annoyed, come on… why are you hiding your books behind a pay wall. There is no downside to make it open, free, direct download, open source, open access etc.

Don’t be a fool… money and success are not equated… which means just because you sell your stuff for a lot of money doesn’t mean that you’re more successful.

What is true success as a photographer? To be self owned, self independent, not to have an Instagram, to have a self hosted website and blog, a self hosted email newsletter (sendy.co), to shoot small JPEG, to shoot all day every day… Without thinking twice.

Infinite motivation on EK BLOG

Start Here

Forward the power!

Upload your best photos to arsbeta.com, delete your Instagram if you need a friend with inspiration, for this to them!

And also note… All of these email newsletters are always open source; feel free to copy and paste this anywhere, translate it to your language on Google translate or ChatGPT etc.

Spread the love!

EK NEWS >

Now what?

Stop buying those Leicas– real streettogs shoot with Ricoh or Fujifilm!

Leica is for loooooosers! (besides the film ones)

ERIC

STOICISM 101 >

This book shall never die

Free ebook for life– feel free to download, copy, remix it or translate it to anyone!

100 Lessons From The Masters Of Street Photography

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SLEEP IS KEY.

If I have to go on any promotional cruise or tour to promote the most critical idea, it is your sleep.

Sleep is like natural steroids, and also being a parent… For your kid to sleep well is the number one greatest blessing in the universe.

Or even better yet… Even you as an adult, for you to sleep well, might be the number one most important thing for you to optimize. Not your work your productivity your income your ability to stack ones and zeros; no, very very simple… Your ability to sleep well.

Ideas

The first big idea is only have coffee and caffeine first thing you wake up. I’ve been experimenting with this the last six months two year, with great results.

When I first wake up, I take my cold shower, I use my electric shaver to shave… Brush my teeth etc., head over the kitchen, and start pounding espresso. At this point I don’t even even count anymore, I just keep drinking espresso until I start to feel hyped and amped up.

And then I look outside of my apartment window, to see whether the sun has come out or not. Starting to rise, then I finish my coffee and water, and just head out.

Then I go to my 60 pound weight vest, strap it on, and start walking around town with my iPad Pro! The best way to start your day, every day.

What causes you to sleep poorly?

True poverty, a real poor person… It doesn’t matter if you’re making $10 million a year… If you sleep poorly, none of it is worth it. None of the babes, the cars, the wealth.

First, all drugs are bad for your sleep. No no no, alcohol does not help you fall asleep, and not only that… It doesn’t matter what type of alcohol you consume, it will disrupt your REM sleep cycle patterns. And no no no — a glass of red wine over dinner every night is not good for you.

Also, marijuana is not good for sleep. It may help you fall asleep, but it won’t help you stay asleep — it all once again, give you weird dreams, and disrupt your otherwise healthy sleep patterns.

Also, media anything with flashing screens and light. Even a new thing I’ve been trying to do, to encourage our whole family to sleep earlier… When it is around 6:30 or 7 PM… I just try not to turn on the lights. Because artificial light, encourages you to stay up and do “productive things”.

Productivity is for slaves, sleep is for the gods!

“How did you sleep?”

Now, my new way to greet my friends around town is asking them how they slept. Often you can just see it on their faces! When people look super super tired… I asked them how they slept last night.

New thing I’ve been experimenting is when I go to sleep, I’ve been playing a little bit with the air conditioner heating thing in my bedroom, changing the temperature. For a while I was doing 74°, which was actually a little bit too cold, I would wake up in the middle of the night little bit cold. I just switched it to 76° last night, and I felt much better! Even waking up today, I feel 1 billion times better.

Optimize your sleep

Don’t optimize for your productivity, optimize for your sleep.

My simple suggestion; unsubscribe from all those stupid TV shows media stuff.

Don’t take the dope!

Honestly, I’m starting to think that media TV shows films even music or podcasts is the new dope.

For example, I live right next to the headquarters of HBO Max, Warner Bros. discovery, and it is funny… It is a pretty depressing looking building, and the whole place has such low energy, and also, when going to their corporate website, WBD.com — take a look at the corporate governance structure. And then look at all their brands. I think they own almost like 50 streaming or TV or media platforms? And then the thought…

Do all these random executives have the time or opportunity to watch all these shows?

If anything… I think a lot of these companies are quite smart; just sell media is the new dope. The new soma, —

Let us consider, what does watching something on Netflix or HBO Max do for you? It relaxes you calms you, takes your mind off of work and things… You become best friends with all these random people and shows, etc.

Also kind of bad; anime, these shows that on for thousands of episodes, making a generation of really socially awkward kids? Who seek refuge and friendship through these anime series?

Anyways, my number one greatest privilege of Seneca is via negativa — his whole life he has never watched anything on YouTube, I don’t even have the YouTube app installed on my phone. He has never watched a movie, besides maybe the first 15 minutes of the Lego Batman movie which we borrowed as a DVD from the LA Public library, no stupid Disney or Marvel films, etc. He is currently eating about 1/ third of a pound of a Angus burger beef patty a day, like a beast boy, outstripping any other kids in his age range, in terms of height, smartness, muscle mass, playfulness and joy!

iPad is not bad

First, never get your kid a stupid Amazon prime tablet. It is almost like giving your kids the cheapest high fructose corn syrup possible.

iPad Pro or nothing.

A big thing I believe in is don’t let your kid play with stupid subpar devices. Even Seneca knows how to use the touchpad on my MacBook Pro!

Kids are not dumb.

The standard in which you raise them, is the standard in which they will rise.

For example, if you treat your kid like a genius kid, and you said the highest standards for them, and you do it with love and attention… Your kid will become a genius. It is a self fulfilling prophecy.

But, if you feed your kids Cheerios, Capri Sun, digital heroin (YouTube YouTube kids, Disney+, Bluey etc.)– your child will become subpar.

And it is very simple here; it actually saves you money!

Also… Never buy them any toys. Whether you like it or not, they will just get toys to them by osmosis through friends and family, birthdays etc. Or you could just get some secondhand free toys from the Facebook buy nothing group.

Also, one of the critical downsides I discovered about toys is the extreme annoyance of having to maintain and manage it. What that means is that let it say that your kid has all these toys and plays with it… Sooner or later you’re gonna be the one who has to clean it up! Because I hate cleaning up stuff, easiest thing just don’t give your kid the toys.

The best entertainment for your kid is taking them to the public downtown Square, letting them run around, high five and fist bump the security guards, just take them to a local park playground, take them on a hike, even more productive taking them to the mall and not buying anything! Seneca loves the Century City mall and playing with all the new Tesla cars, stopping by the LEGO store etc.

Why media is bad

First, none of it is grounded in reality. Second, I think there is something toxic about movies films cinema etc.… It makes you more and more disconnected from reality, and also, it is cowardly.

It’s funny whenever I look at my antisocial Los Angeles male single neighbors, with dogs, and I see them behind their closed blinds, they’re just watching stupid HBO Max shows, or watching baseball, or whatever.

Typically with media, it reveals what you are truly interested in.

Tell me what you watch, and I will tell you who you are.

For myself, things I have watched in the past have shaped me in very productive ways. for example the philosophy of the matrix, very very formative as a kid, I think our first watched the matrix and neither elementary school or middle school? You could age yourself or timestamp yourself if you remember your friends or kids in school all doing the bullet time bullet dodging thing.

Also, surprisingly these Netflix bodybuilding documentaries, essentially revealing to me that 100% of bodybuilders are on steroids or some sort of weird drugs.

Why it is productive to have kids

I think alive, you should never have to force yourself to do anything. Things just happen naturally, like the Taoist “wu Wei” notion.

For example, when I was in middle school in high school, I played a ton of video games. However, once I got to college and I had a part-time job and I had to study etc.… More or less I quit playing video games called turkey, not because I wanted to be virtuous or anything… I literally had no time or opportunity. I couldn’t even play video games if I wanted to, and naturally overtime it just lost interest for me. Even a few years ago, I tried to “get back into” playing video games, and it was just not interesting. I think this is also where I quit porn, it just became a little bit boring for me;

Anyways, when you have a kid, you won’t have the time nor will you want to have the time to watch media. it is zero sum. For example, if you have the option of watching some lame three hour movie, or an hour TV show, or spend that time to run around and play with your kid… What will you choose? Obviously spend time with your kid!

I think for the average person will have to work, once again your time is even more limited. I have the privileges that I literally have an open schedule, all day every day, which for me, my privilege is to literally spend 100% time with Seneca, Besides the mornings which belong to me, when he is still sleeping like a champ.

Ideas to sleep better

First, let us say you finish work or you get home or whatever, the first thing you do is you turn off your iPhone, all the way off, and you put it in a drawer. I think for myself, if I have a phone in my pocket or an easily accessible spot, I’m going to be tempted to Use it.

For example, it is obvious; let it say that you’re trying to lose fat, and then your cupboard you know you have a bunch of cookies. Obviously you’re going to eat the cookies! The easiest thing is to just throw it on the trash, or give it away.

Disable all shows

It’s funny… Now in the year 2024, we’ve seen the rise and fall of E readers and Kindle. Even though I am a huge proponent of digital books, reading PDF books on your iPad etc.… The downside is when you are using a Kindle or a reader or an iPad or whatever, or your iPhone… You’re going to get distracted by something and want to click on something. or get interrupted by a notification.

Perhaps the reason why printed books are is that they are dumb, and often they just put you to sleep. The kid in New York, I remember when I was living in Bayside Queens, when I was around maybe 11 years old, I would just read myself books to sleep. I recall very vividly… I would just choose a book tuck myself in, read, and slowly, feel my eyeballs droop, and then slowly but surely, I would fall asleep in the book with naturally fall to my side.

Even now, the reason why kids books are such a great industry is that the routine is typically, we parents read our kids books before they sleep. And the reason why printed book are good; the idea of reading a bedtime story to your kid or tablet or a screen or device is insanity; it will keep your kid up! And the goal for parents, we just want our kids to fall asleep!

In this regard, children and adults are not that different.

Time outside

Certainly everybody has a different life, life circumstance etc. But there is still many things in your locus of control.

Let us assume you have to go to the office, I simple suggestion and workflow is when you finish work, just go to the gym and work out! But if there’s too much traffic and the gym is too crowded or whatever… Either sign up for less crowded gym, or, just build your own gym at home! You got options; you could even do it in your house, your apartment, your garage, your parking spot outside whatever.

Even in LA, the Baldwin Hills scenic overlook is a great spot for a lot of people to go and exercise, all they do is just walk up but not the hill, which is great exercise! Or even a simple thing, get a 60 pound weight vest, and every single day after work, just drive there and go on a hike!

Or just sleep?

Also my suggestion is with caffeine and coffee whatever… Only consume it first thing in the morning, not even midday! If you are tired midday, just take a nap! Imagine like your body is a Tesla supercharger vehicle; all you need is 15 minutes to get you to 80%!

Or, if you have to work, just go to your car, roll down the seat, and take a nap! And when you’re taking a nap, once again, turn your phone all the way off and just put in your glove compartment.

It can wait until tomorrow

All of us are working ourselves to the ground, to meet these stupid arbitrary deadlines, like slaves. As a result we pull all nighters etc.

Even now that I think about it… One of the most pernicious things we are taught in college is to cram for the final exam. I’m starting to become more and more anti-university in disregards; now that we have ChatGPT and access to the Internet, what is the point of University besides technical training… Certainly going to college makes sense if you want to become an engineer, a scientist, design spaceships and airplanes, become a doctor or a surgeon etc. But for the soft sciences, or the humanities… You don’t need to go.

And also, a lot of people think they have to go to college to get a job. But now that you could earn $20 an hour flipping burgers at McDonald’s… What is your incentive?

A new society?

We are currently in a brave new time.

There is this cult of work, the cult of being indoors, etc.

The new true privilege is just be outside, and walk, walk around all day! To be indoors all day is a slave like mentality.

And the weird thing… We are becoming trained to prefer the indoors–

For example, one of the things I’m the most grateful about Boy Scouts is the bias to be outside. Even though we would have weekly meetings indoors, the true goal was to be outside — outdoors. And the funny thing, when we really think about the etymology here, what does it mean to be “outdoors? Super simple; out of the door. Not the place which is enclosed by a door.

My privilege

My Spartan privilege is that Seneca never had the misery of having to be inside a daycare, a childcare center, or even these fake “Montessori” schools.

And if you think about it… If you were the true ultimate billionaire millionaire whatever, the goal isn’t for you to be super super rich, and keep working and being productive and making money, and sending your kid to some random person to raise your kid. Isn’t the goal to be super super rich so you don’t have to put your kid into school?

And this is the hilarious irony; we treat our children like economic goods. We think it is more effective that we try to spend our money to put our kids into daycare in order for us to work, in order to pay for the daycare. But the true ideal is to be able to quit your job or not work, in order to take care of your kid 24/7.

Do most parents not prefer to spend 100% of their time with their kids?

I think this is also where the cult of individualism is bad; I think nowadays when I observe, most people would actually not prefer to spend that much time with their kids. I think they like to spend some time with their kids, but not all their time with their kids.

For myself, I would prefer to spend all day with Seneca. The only nuance is I like having the mornings to do a morning walk, workout, etc.… but besides that, to be with Seneca all day every day is my greatest joy.

Should I make my own school?

I have a funny vision for a school; the basic idea is that all these kids, will be the ultimate free range kids, never forced to be indoors all day. Which is insanely depressing. And also poor for their health.

In fact, one of the things that I’ve discovered my friends have misery with is that they are always sick, their kids are always sick, because childcare centers, schools, even Montessori centers are just like breeding grounds for sickness and disease.

And also, the pernicious economic; apparently will still send their kids to school, or a daycare, even if the kid is coughing and sick; incentive in the motive is they don’t want to have to take care of their kid when they have all this work to do.

Avoid sick people

Nietzsche said something interesting in his unpublished manuscript, The Will To Power. What he said was for a future society, the irony is not for us to spend resources and devotion to tending to the sick, the unwell etc.… Rather, to create a greater divide and chasm between the healthy and the sick.

Your first critical task is to take care of your child, your son, your wife etc. To have to care for other peoples kids, or “society“ in the generalized sense, makes no sense.

How was Marcus Aurelius raised?

Private tutors. Or a single private tutor?

If you were the emperor, you’re not putting your child or son in a basic ass school. Even Aristotle was the private tutor of Alexander the great.

So if you’re a child, if you consider your child the chosen one, or insanely great, certainly you would not subject your child to some basic ass education.

even Marcus Aurelius, in his meditations talks about the gratitude he has towards his private tutors, and his father.

I suppose the difficulty here is that certainly we want our children to become great. But even Marcus Aurelius.,. his own son became a degenerate. So I suppose the optimization here is if you have the greatest blessing that your first kid was a son, you devote all resources to prime him to be 100% the best.

More than 1 kid?

I’ve always had a vision of having two kids, our first kid being a boy or a son… And having a younger sister. Just like me and my sister Anna who I love to death. Even though I have unconditional love and devotion to my mom, nowadays, I’ve been finding a natural propensity to engage more with my sister, through regular FaceTime calls, spending time together, and also having the privilege of Seneca to spend time with her.

Because we have to think about the future in the future generations. While our parents are critical, they are not the most important thing. Our children are, as well as our siblings, especially if they have incoming children as well.

Your kids, your siblings kids, the future?

I feel bad for all these people who end up having dogs not children … Sooner or later, your dog is going to die. Before you. You cannot leave behind your wealth to a dog.

I think this is fine, it is totally fine that some people don’t wanna have kids whatever. But when people give me that propaganda or that insane foolishness that kids are bad for the planet, nobody ever says that dogs are bad for the planet and society.

Let us consider all the harm that dogs do on the planet; the primary one is that the defecate everywhere, and even though 99% of owners are good and clean it up, the one percent of random dog poo on the streets makes it all not worth it.

Anti dogs?

What is one thing you’re not allowed to say nowadays? “I hate dogs”. It is almost like saying I hate Asians or Korean people. Although it is seems to be OK to hate on loud and rich mainland Chinese tourists.

Back to sleep

The weird thing in today’s world, is that our ideal is to become a robot. A robot that doesn’t need to sleep, and just be productive all day?

Very bizarre.

Let us consider, just read the Iliad… After a long day of hard work and warfare and combat… Both sides retire, feast on oxen, and all go to sleep. even the gods, every single night, they retired to their immortal beds, and go to sleep!

Can you imagine, if Zeus, before going to sleep, stressed out but some sort of worked deadline, and drink caffeine or coffee or Red Bull to do an all nighter to finish some sort of meaningless task? No!

Also, the ancient greets, and even in times of battle, it seem like it was an unwritten rule that when the sunset, everyone would just lie down their arms, and then stop fighting, and just feast! There is even some stories of some soldiers, on opposite size, when the sun would go down, they will go down to the other side, and party with the other side?

War, warfare is meaningless

Nobody likes war, nobody likes fighting, nobody likes killing, and nobody wants to be killed.

Even in the Iliad… Both sides wanted the war to be over. And it could have been over, if one of the goddesses didn’t pick up Paris in the middle of the fight.

This is an interesting thing… Apparently in ancient times, there was this thing that if there was some sort of war, with no one inside, there would be the simple thing; you take your best fighter, I take my best fighter, we let them battle to the death, and then we just let it end!

Even in the movie Troy –one of the opening scenes in which Achilles squares off, 1v1 against that one bald steroid giant. The fight should’ve been over there and then…

The problem nowadays?

Propaganda from the media, on both sides, the middle, all of it is bad and toxic.

We tend to vilify this amorphus other; for example, we liberals and Democrats pink Donald Trump as Hitler 2.0, and right wing conservatives as a bunch of insane neo-Nazis with guns etc. And then the right vilifies left for being a bunch of “libtards” who care about the alphabet soup and LGBTQ rights, and that were messing up our children etc.

But the thing that we do not do is engage ourselves, mano a mano, face-to-face, to another human being and have an intelligent talk.

I’ve met all human beings, radical progressive right left center mid left mid right etc.… And honestly, at all end of the day, we all want the same thing! We want love, we want to be loved, we want to be happy! Who doesn’t?

This is where it is wise to put away your phones, nowadays the iPhone is ultimate weapon. The weapon against your mind and your soul.

What else?

I think this is pretty radical. Because it up ends the whole ethos a modern day capitalism and consumerism.

Let us notice this weird equation; you work yourself to death, to make money and more money… And use that money to do the pain through sex drugs traveling, EDM festivals, whatever. And then you continue the cycle, until you end up destroying your body your mind your soul etc.

What is the purpose of a single individual human being?

The very simple one: have a child, at least one, maybe two, maybe more if you have the chance.

Nowadays, my new measure of wealth is whenever I meet people, seeing how many children they got, how many sons, how many grandchildren etc.

And it is not even a money thing; if you can make your own football team or your own soccer team with all your kids, isn’t this the ultimate joy?

How many kids is enough?

If you think about the ultimate expression of understanding humanity, ideally you would have at least one son and one daughter, in order to test and understand your social logical and biological theories about life and humanity.

I think the issue here is that a lot of philosophers philosophies about human nature, without having children’s themselves. What does that means is that their philosophy is fake, not grounded in reality or lived experiences.

For example, men, who do not have at least one son to bear their name… A tragedy.

Think ancient Sparta

What I find so fascinating is that Sparta was a real place, real men real people — and the movie 300 was actually quite historical; a lot of the quotes are directly from the history books!

And also, the simple philosophies behind it:

1. Keep a nation nation state small, and have men defend it, with their own shield and sword

They do not create aggression on other nations states, or metal in the behaviors or the politics of other nations. You just want to be kept alone, you don’t want to bother nobody else, but conversely… You don’t want to be bothered.

Don’t be bothered by others, but also do not allow other people to bother you.

Military discipline

A lot of these new modern day podcasts and ideas on how to be a macho man I find a little bit lacking. A lot of people turn the notion of discipline to be this weird Christian self sacrificial thing. I don’t.

What does it mean to be “disciplined”? It is to be simple, direct, not distracted. Not making the modus operandi of your life purchasing new things, whether there be cars homes real estate, single-family homes condos, articles of clothing, Teslas, iPhone pros etc.

And actually… where bitcoin has given me some spartan discipline; it has actually made me more frugal, more simple, more reticent to spending money.

Why? I will follow all access cash on hand to purchasing more bitcoin indefinitely. I would even prefer to funnel an additional $10 into bitcoin, rather than buying some loser article of clothing.

And actually… If you really did think about being greedy, being a Scrooge, or be addicted to money and wealth… The goal is to make money don’t spend it. This is why the true capitalist should actually look more Spartan in nature; using all of their excess cash reserves for investing in buying bitcoin, never spending any money on a brand new car, $50,000 into bitcoin is 1 trillion times better than buying any new loser vehicle. Even if you’re a billionaire… The goal isn’t to buy a McLaren, a Lamborghini, a Ferrari whatever… It is to just buy more bitcoin! Even if you’re already a billionaire, rather than putting $1 million into a Bugatti, you buy $1 million more bitcoin! Super simple!

Hedonism is the enemy

Hedonism, hedonic pleasure through your penis, your vagina, your clitoris, your butt hole, your mouth your hands, your skin your body etc. Or your mind, your soul, your nose your ears your head your brain whatever.

Certainly pleasure is a good thing; but I think the problem is when we make pleasure maximization our sole life goal, this is insanely foolish. Thus all these millennials who just want to travel to Japan, eat Omakase sushi, not be tied down by children etc. and if you were really smart, you would not want to be tied down by a dog, which requires a lot of maintenance when you travel, putting your dog into a hotel is very expensive, almost $80 a night!

How many millennials regretted adopting their dog during Covid, now that they have another life form to take care of until they die?

The future?

The future life, the future of humanity… Isn’t this the goal?

ERIC

How to Become a Millionaire Blogger

Some honest thoughts:

1. Insane Spartan frugality

This is what people do not understand or get; technically, if you want to become a millionaire, the goal is actually to never spend any money. Just like Kanye said, “White people make money don’t spend it – but I’d rather buy 80 gold chains and go ignant (ignorant)”.

What that means is don’t buy the Tesla, don’t buy the single-family home, don’t buy the condo, don’t buy these stupid overpriced clothing, don’t buy random stuff at Costco.

What that then means is cancel anything which requires a subscription, and funnel all that money into bitcoin. If you could take that $10 a month, that you’re pissing away into the toilet into Netflix Netflix Hulu Disney+ HBO Max etc.… Or even Spotify… And you could put that into bitcoin? Assuming that bitcoin will 10,000x from here ,,, that $10 a month will become 100 a month, 1000 month, or $10,000 a month.

If I told you with 100% certainty that the Spotify you pay $10 a month, when the future be worth $10,000 a month… Wouldn’t the rational thing to do is to unsubscribe from it and buy bitcoin instead? Obviously!

2. Why bitcoin is hope and optimism

I think the simple reason why bitcoin is hope and optimism is because the potential that bitcoin could be worth $21 million a bitcoin or whatever. Or if I give you the simple thought that bitcoin will go up, year over year, 25%, compounded interest forever… And you simply plug that into ChatGPT to create you a future graph, wouldn’t you invest your money differently?

Or even more extreme… If I told you with 100% certainty that bitcoin would go up 55% year over here, for the next 500 years… Wouldn’t you use your money differently? Or not use your money differently?

3. Having kids

The funny irony is that having kids is actually not expensive. Literally almost 100% of kids stuff you get for free from friends and family, or the Facebook by nothing group. I think the only concern that people have is having to put your kids into daycare, or childcare, which can get expensive.

I don’t think anybody should ever have to pay for childcare. This is where if you have grandparent help, grandma or grandfather on either side… Ideally all of them, all the time, this is the key.

Let us consider, if you’re married, in theory you should have a grandfather and a grandmother on both sides, for grandparents. Even if some people have passed, often you will have at least one or two grandmothers who are more than willing to take care of your kid full-time.

4. Free or nothing

Let us think about it now, at this point clothing is essentially free. If you have to pay money, even $10 to purchase something, it is simply too expensive. Just get it for free. Once again the Facebook group, or even ask friends or family members if you have extra clothes that they don’t wear anymore whether they could give it to you.

I think the real secret to success and riches is to get everything for free! For example, all these celebrities etc.… I don’t think they have ever spent their own money on buying an iPhone, a Samsung phone or whatever. Apparently even Lil Wayne would get Samsung phones for free!

And also cars… I think the logical strategy is to never spend any money to buy a car, ideally you would just get it for free! You might be able to get a free car from a family member who wants to dump it or traded in or whatever, and just fix it up and drive it! Or other successful people that have met, you just buy the car at a car auction, in which you buy some thing at an extreme discount.

5. Never buy new

Anybody who purchases any new vehicle, is a 100% fool. Even if you bought a Tesla model three performance, for about $60,000.05 years ago… That car is not only worth about 20 or $25,000. This is the exact opposite of rich, this is a surefire recipe on getting poor.

6. Tax intelligence

My definition of what it means to be a citizen is superior taxes. Yet the intelligent thing is to try to not do anything which can incur capital gains taxes.

This means you buy your bitcoin, and theory, you hold onto it forever… And you just keep accumulating it, rather than selling it, which is a capital gains tax, or even sending it to people, I think in America if you send bitcoin to other people you have to pay some sort of tax.

Also, the intelligence of being a soul provider, is that you could pretty much file almost anything as a tax deduction! But, to simply purchase things in order to log it as a tax deduction is also a foolish idea.

The supreme idea is to just live insanely frugally!

7. There is no second best

Better to be number one in a very small niche, then to be number two in a big one.

So whatever business or thing you pursue, ensure that you are number one. Or don’t bother at all?

The Immortal Man

You cannot change the universe or the planet, but you could direct yourself the opposite way to become beyond man, the ubermensch ideal:

Thoughts on immortality:

Masculine or Feminine?

Masculino o feminino —

Men who are into tending plants, a feminine trait.

The notion of being masculine, let us think about this.

First, let us consider a Achilles. What was Achilles? The apex of manliness, the most supreme, dominant, powerful, let us not forget that he was a demigod in the flesh.

First, let us consider how he was so dominant on the battlefield. Ultimately when it comes to the apex or valor, it comes down to combat, physical combat, none of this shooting guns shit. Why are guns for cowards?

Asymmetric warfare.

For example, any 400 pound obese loser can shoot you and kill you with a gun. Imagine fitting him with armor, a shield, and a spear… And put them in man-to-man, PVP, player versus player, 1v1 combat — versus an Achilles; assuming that he is 6 foot tall, handsome, around 160 pounds with pure muscle, 5% bodyfat and a 6 pack. Who would win?

Why does this matter?

Currently, it seems that at least with men, modern day capitalism, is all kind of a big dick measuring contest. Instead of measuring how many inches your penis has, what people try to do is measure their metaphorical capital by how many dollars or commas or zeros trails them.

But, let us consider some extreme examples. If you were a 4 foot man, obese, but with a 20 inch penis, would anyone care? No!

Being a “stud”

Apparently, at least with horses… A stud is a type of horse which is prime for breeding. And now with myself… I’m starting to feel like a stud. Whenever I walk around town, now I have women checking me out. Even when I am alone with my 60 pound weighted vest on!

And also, let us consider… What women seeks is a mate. Ideally tall dark and handsome.

Even a nuance; I actually think naturalistically… A woman is less attracted to wealth, more attracted to a man’s height, attractiveness, muscularity, etc? A woman who marries a 4 foot tall billionaire man… Very bizarre.

IMMORTAL

Mortal, it means you will die. All of us, born on the planet are mortals.

When do we think about the immortals, an ancient Greek mythology, essentially it means somebody who cannot die. The gods who live on Mount Olympus, or people who got locked up by Zeus, these were the immortals.

I had some thoughts about economic immortality, but also a new thought about fitness in general or life in general, being a man… As I have advanced in maturity, I truly do feel wiser.

What’s the point?

For example, the purpose of muscularity, health, etc is simple; not to be the buffest guy at the gym. In fact some insider information that I personally got was apparently, there are some weightlifters who try to dirty bulk, and get really really buff, maybe while taking steroids or whatever, and they get really really fat, end up doing a cutting phase by taking Adderall, forcing themselves not to eat food in order to lean up. True story!

Don’t trust the buff shorty (bald) guys

Also, a funny telltale sign I’ve discovered is when you meet guys who are short, really short, but insanely buff… maybe bald or balding, maybe with a beard, often a lot of these guys are taking steroids?

Why or how do you know?

Because the nuance is that as a man, no matter how rich or smart we are, we cannot add inches to our height, not even with steroids. However, you could add inches to your chest, your arms, by taking steroids. And I feel bad for these shorty guys, they will forever feel inadequate because of their short height. Even Jeff Bezos, I think he is only 5‘7“ tall? And Kanye is maybe 5‘6” tall? I think Kendrick Lamar is 5 feet 2 inches tall, and also a lot of these rappers are really short. Only tall rappers include Jay Z, I think he is 6‘2“ tall. Elon Musk is tall, I think he is over 6 feet tall.

Even a lot of action stars are pretty short. I think Tom Cruise is only 5’3” tall, even Arnold Schwarzenegger who seems like a giant onscreen is only 6 feet tall! About my height.

Vin Diesel is pretty short, maybe 5‘8“ tall? I’m quite certain he took a lot of steroids to get those massive arms, this is also why he is bald (steroid usage often leads to male balding or baldness)

Why does this matter?

Whether we like it or not, we always judge and weigh ourselves in comparison to others. This is the number one thing I learned from thinking sociologically; to be human is to judge, to weigh, to compare, to measure. We do this with height, how many inches your penis is, ones and zeros you got in your bank account, how many followers you got, how many ones and zeros you got in your bank account, how many bitcoin you own, how many inches your arms and biceps are, how much you could deadlift squat and bench press, etc.

How did we measure men before rulers and scales?

But this is where being a man in modern-day times is bizarre; we have weights and measures to compare ourselves with other men. But once again in the past, this wasn’t a concept. There would be no skinny fat loser pulling out a tape measure, or a scale to see how much Achilles weighed, his body fat composition, how tall he was, his dick size whatever. No, it was very simple, the question;

Is there, or was there, or can there be any man who could kill Achilles on the battlefield?

And we all know the answer is no. Hector even knows this. Hector is no fool, he knows that Achilles is the superior fighter, after all, Achilles is demigod; half man, half god. His mom was a goddess, his father a mere mortal. Hector is 100% mortal and human. Not a fair chance.

Even a thing that is impressive about Achilles, he even takes on the gods! Not even Ares can kill or take on Achilles?

And this is where the notion of immortality becomes fascinating to me; Achilles is demigod, 50% God, 50% mortal, means that he could be killed. And he does die.

How can you imagine, an immortal god like Ares taking on Achilles, 1v1– and losing? This is an insanely grand idea:

A partly mortal man can take on a god, and win.

Lowercase god

So in modern day times, we have this Judeo Christian God, the god of Moses, the monolithic god. This is God with the capital G, who is the ultimate supreme being.

This is where I think studying ancient Greek mythology is fascinating; there were many gods! And they were just like you and me, they quarrel with their wives, sibling rivalry, mayhem and mischief, they would get angry, get spiteful, want revenge, would succumb to lust and desire, play favorites, troll around, go to sleep, have sex etc.

This is where the notion of a single God is oppressive; if there is a single supreme God, who controls everything, who is 0% human, what are we mere mortals to do?

This is where theology is interesting, the idea that God consubstantiated with Jesus, became man, to help us mirror immortals, this is quite an innovative idea. That uppercase God would take human form, to help humanity. I suppose this is where Catholic or Christian Theology is a bit useful; at least you could imitate Jesus! Who was 100% man, and also 100% capital God?

Goals

So obviously we take no drugs, we don’t consume alcohol, we don’t smoke weed, our only drugs include nice sunshine, the beach, the mountains, physical activity, tapwater and black coffee. No sugars no starches, no fake foods. We only consume beef oxen and cattle; we leave the plants for cows.

Becoming immoral

I think the first grand advance is becoming immoral. That means looking at all the modern day ethics morals etc., and upending all of them. Disrupting normalcy, disrupting ethics, disrupting morality.

I hesitate to say the word religion; because religion is something else. Religion is not morals and ethics, is rather a racial, geographic based power-complex; each and every region on the planet has a different religion which emerges, based on different needs of people.

For example, Moses was in fact a historical figure. A real human being. I think the best way to think about things is all the stories of him parting the Red Sea, superhuman acts, are best interpreted as metaphors. I think the only historical text on Moses is from the Roman historian Tacitus, I think Tacitus to be a good historian because not only does he praise the military prowess of the people of Judea, but he sees things the more analytical lens.

Obviously, all history is flooded. But if we think about the history of the Peloponnesian war, probably the best historical text that we have, or the histories, essentially Herodotus and the like wrote history not to have some sort of objective documentation of what happened, because back then there wasn’t somebody with a video camera to record the whole thing, but rather, it is based on allegory, ethics, morality, and virtues. And it all tends to be anti-tyranny, towards the democracy. The ancient Athenian way.

Democracy as an experiment

I do not consider myself a libertarian, I still see myself as a cold blooded, red white and blue Democrat. I believe in democracy. Even if it is wrong.

The only thing you’re not allowed to do is incite violence, physical violence. Even hate, hate speech, I think technically legally you’re allowed to do so, but just keep it to yourself, keep it inside your own ranch, if you have something not nice to say don’t say it at all.

And also do not forget the fact that once upon a time, your family was also an immigrant, or trying to escape persecution from the British, and seeking a new life with more freedom and opportunity. Even the Chinese call America the beautiful country.

Mainland Chinese people would prefer to live in America

The big issue here is capital controls. Mainland Chinese, rich mainland Chinese, truth be told they want to take their wealth out of Beijing, out of Shanghai, and take it to America if they could. They all send their kids to American schools– they all want to send their kids to Harvard, Yale, even a UCLA or maybe even UC Berkeley.

I think if you think about it… If you think on a long enough time scale, surely but slowly, I think all power wealth and money will be concentrated in America.

Why? China is too polluted. I think mainland China is currently having a problem; all of these rich mainland Chinese oligarchs are pumping coal, producing as quickly as they can, in order to quickly get rich, and then send their kids to a more beautiful location, for example the appeal of a Vancouver; surrounded but nothing with trees, nature. Even Chip Wilson, the founder of Lululemon said that Vancouver is the perfect place to be, and also the reason why Lululemon was invented there, it could have not happened on any other city on the planet.

Culver City is our new Kyoto! (in LA)

For myself is an American, I currently believe LA, specifically Culver City to be the perfect place to be. Why? It is the only place which is actually walkable in all of Los Angeles, and also, the only place in all of Los Angeles that have seen a city having a dedicated graffiti removal team; my daily walk, one of the best telling things I discovered was there was some sort of sticker art on this one pole for a very long time, and finally, I actually saw that the Culver City public services department cleaned it up, scraped it off! Where else is this possible in any of Los Angeles?

Also, the new Apple headquarters on Washington street in Culver City. They are currently in the midst of expanding it, and building a super mega campus. This ain’t gonna go away for a long time.

Even though Apple is not as innovative as it is before, at least for our lifetime, I am certain that we will all still be using iPhones, not some loser Pixel or Samsung phone.

And I think Apple has been wise, we have all become subscribed to the Apple ecosystem and financial services; Apple has effectively become its own bank and security system; we have all of our passwords saved to iCloud, and paying with Apple Pay is 1 trillion times easier than any other competitor. And once you could pay with bitcoin from your iPhone, with touch or Face ID… Apple will truly take over the planet.

Touch ID or Face ID and your Bitcoin wallet for iPhone

Back to you

What can one man do, what can a single human being do? A lot!

Simple things; every time you see a kid, smile and wave at the kid! There’s a saying, whenever you smile at a child, the universe smiles back at you!

Pedophiles don’t really exist

I think a very very bad thing which has been promoted by social media, mainstream news is a fear of pedophilia. Especially with child predators, men.

Now being a dad, with a three year-old four month-year-old son… honestly I think we have 0% to be fearful of pedophiles, the only real thing to be afraid of is distracted drivers, texting while driving, or even these electric scooters and electric bikes, if you’re distracted on your iPhone for even half a second, and one of these things whiz by at full speed and hit your kid, it actually might kill your kid.

Avoid potential fatal things for your kid.

For example, once again, I think 100% focus should be just be insanely careful when you are crossing the street with your kid, or with cars running red lights, or even driving while high! I’ve already seen two people smoking marijuana while driving cars stuck in traffic, Very scary.

Having at least one son, having kids

Let us think about the simple biological truth: if for some reason tomorrow, all human beings on the planet, all 8 billion of us decided to not have kids, with a generation or two we would all die off.

Certainly, the first goal, especially being a man is to have at least one male; at least one son to carry on the family name.

Or, have at least one kid, doesn’t matter whether boy or girl. Ideally more.

For example, one of my neighbors, super friendly 70-year-old Chinese American lady, has two daughters, about my age, 34 and 37, and both of them, no serious relationship, not married and certainly no children. I feel bad for my neighbor; probabilistically, she might never have any grandchildren, even with two daughters! Maybe Seneca could just be her metaphorical grandkid.

The greatest tragedy is to die without any grandchildren? Or even worse no kids?

What is the purpose of grandparents?

Grandparents are key.

I think the simple purpose of grandparents is to take care of the grandkids! In America, we have bastardized this notion; and this is where things become very inefficient for the modern day American.

People say that daycare, having kids is expensive; not really, if you have a grandma or grandpa, ideally both around!

Is your whole family lives together, in one house or complex, and the grandparents take care of the young children, while their parents are working or doing something else.

The problem is the world has shifted towards hedonism; for example, hedonic pleasure through traveling, backpacking, seeing the world, eating good food, socializing, etc. Certainly these are all good things, but I don’t think they should be the telos of a grandparent– the ultimate telos of grandparent is to take care of the grandchildren, to instill them with wisdom, love, abilities!

And the truth is, all grandchildren universally adore their grandparents, especially the grandmother! Even now, as a 36 year-old man, I have nothing but affection for my grandma! I’m a lot more distant with my grandfather on my mom’s side, and my grandfather on my dad side passed when I was only two years old, so I have zero memories of him. But even Cindy, she has great memories of her grandfather, and I think this is a great thing!

Lineage

Ultimately, what is the point of life? I think it has to deal with lineage. Essentially, you just don’t want the family line to die off!

Ideally, the family lineage lasts forever! The purpose or the point isn’t your personal immortality — it is the immortality of your family bloodline! Thinking about your kids kids kids.

Don’t mention things you don’t like

Don’t get free marketing or free PR or free publicity to things you don’t like.

If you really hate Donald Trump, don’t say nothing, just vote for Kamala Harris, or the other side.

When will you hate something, or vocalize when you hate something, we actually secretly like it?

Why else would we complain or vocalize it?

New moral rule: whenever we hate some thing or dislike something, we stay silent. More manly to pause, and emit silence than say something evil.

A real man?

A true mensch?

What is an “uber”-mensch? My ideal, my vision is to be beyond man. To not be a mere mortal, even though we are mortal.

For example, we mortal men, we lose our shit, we get angry, we yell, we get violent, we get aggressive, etc. Maybe the goal or the path is to not see yourself as a human — maybe the best thing is to not allow yourself any human emotions– the stoic way.

“Human, all too human”

It is obvious that we are all human, and that we all have human emotions. But then, the simplest innovation we can make as an individual is to be anti-human, anti-man?

Maybe going opposite or doing the opposite?

For example, when you are angry, be kind instead? Or even the funny reverse; when you want to be kind, show fake anger instead?

There are still are many innovations we can make in ethics guys!

ERIC

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The Immortal Man

You cannot change the universe or the planet, but you could direct yourself the opposite way to become beyond man, the ubermensch ideal:

Thoughts on immortality:

Masculine or Feminine?

Masculino o feminino —

Men who are into tending plants, a feminine trait.

The notion of being masculine, let us think about this.

First, let us consider a Achilles. What was Achilles? The Apex of Manley is, the most supreme, dominant, powerful, that is not forget that he was a demigod in the flesh.

First, let us consider how he was so dominant on the battlefield. Ultimately when it comes to the Apex of valor, it comes down to combat, physical combat, none of this shooting guns shit. Why are guns for cowards?

Asymmetric warfare.

Why does this matter?

But, let us consider some extreme examples. If you were a 4 foot man, obese, but with a 20 inch penis, would anyone care? No!

Being a “stud”

And also, let us consider… What women seeks is a mate. Ideally tall dark and handsome.

IMMORTAL

Mortal, it means you will die. All of us, born on the planet are mortals.

I had some thoughts about economic immortality, but also a new thought about fitness in general or life in general, being a man… As I have advanced in maturity, I truly do feel wiser.

For example, the purpose of muscularity, health, bigger is simple; not to be the buffest guy at the gym, in fact some insider information that I personally got was apparently, there are some weightlifters who try to dirty bulk, and get really really buff, maybe while taking steroids or whatever, and they get really really fat, end up doing a cutting phase by taking Adderall, forcing themselves not to eat food in order to lean up. true story!

Also, a funny telltale sign I’ve discovered is when you meet guys for short, really short, but insanely buff… Maybe bald maybe not, maybe with a beard, often a lot of these guys are taking steroids? Why or how do you know? Because the nuance is that a man, no matter how rich or smart we are, we cannot add inches to our height, not even with steroids. However, you could add inches to your chest, your arms, by taking steroids. And I feel bad for these Shorty guys, They will forever feel inadequate because of their short height. Even Jeff Bezos, I think he is only 5‘7“ tall? And Kanye is maybe 5‘6” tall? I think Kendrick Lamar is 5 feet 2 inches tall, and also a lot of these rappers are really short. Only tall rappers include Jay Z, I think he is 6‘2“ tall. Elon Musk is tall, I think he is over 6 feet tall.

Even a lot of action stars are pretty short. I think Tom Cruise is only 5’3” tall, even Arnold Schwarzenegger who seems like a giant onscreen is only 6 feet tall! About my height.

Vin Diesel is pretty short, maybe 5‘8“ tall? I’m quite certain he took a lot of steroids to get those massive arms, this is why he is bald.

Why does this matter?

Whether we like it or not, we always charge ourselves in comparison to others. This is the number one thing I learned from thinking social logically; to be human is to judge, to weigh, to compare, to measure. we do this with height, how many inches your penises, ones and zeros you got in your bank account, how many followers you got, how many ones and zeros you got in your bank account, how many bitcoin you own, how many inches your arms and biceps are, how much you could dead lift squat and bench press, etc.

But this is where being a man in modern day times is bizarre; we have weights and measures to compare our cells with other men. But once again in the past, this wasn’t a concept. There would be no skinny fat loser pulling out a tape measure, or a scale to see how much Achilles weighed, his body fat composition, how tall he was, his dick size whatever. no, it was very simple, the question;

Is there, or was there, or can there be any man who could kill Achilles on the battlefield?

And we all know the answer is no. Hector even knows this. Hector is no fool, he knows that Achilles is the superior fighter, after all, Achilles is demigod; half man, half God. His mom was a goddess, his father Amir mortal. Hector is 100% mortal and human. Not a fair chance.

Even a thing that is impressive about Achilles, he even takes on the gods! Not even Mars can kill or take on Achilles?

And this is where the notion of immortality becomes fascinating to me; Achilles is demigod, 50% God, 50% mortal, means that he could be killed. And he does die.

How can you imagine, an immortal god like Area taking on Achilles, 1v1– and losing? This is an insanely grand idea:

Partly mortal mind can take on a god, and win.

Lowercase god

So in modern day times, we have this Judeo Christian God, the God of Moses, the monolithic god. This is God with the capital G, who is the ultimate supreme being.

This is where I think studying ancient Greek mythology is fascinating; there were many gods! And they were just like you and me, the quarrel with their wives, sibling rivalry, mayhem and mischief, they would get angry, get spiteful, want revenge, would succumb to lust and desire, play favorites, troll around, go to sleep, have sex etc.

This is where the notion of a single God is oppressive; if there is a single supreme God, who controls everything, who is 0% human, what are we mere mortals to do?

This is where theology is interesting, the idea that God substantiated with Jesus, became man, to help us mirror immortals, this is quite an innovative idea. That uppercase God would take human form, to help humanity. I suppose this is where Catholic or Christian Theology is a bit useful; at least you could imitate Jesus! Who was 100% man, and also 100% capital God?

Goals

Becoming immoral

I think the first grand advance is becoming immoral. That means looking at all the modern day ethics morals etc., and up ending all of them. Disrupting normalcy, disrupting ethics, disrupting morality.

I hesitate to say the word religion; because religion is something else. Religion is not morals and ethics, is rather a racial, geographic based power complex; each and every region on the planet has a different religion which emerges, based on different needs of people.

For example, Moses was in fact a historical figure. A real human being. I think the best way to think about things is all the stories of him parting the Red Sea, superhuman acts, are best interpreted as metaphors. I think the only historical text on Moses is from the Roman historian Tacitus, fine to be a good historian because not only does he praise the military prowess of the people of Judea, but he sees things the more analytical lens.

democracy as an experiment

I do not consider myself a libertarian, I still see myself as a cold blooded, red white and blue Democrat. I believe in democracy. Even if it is wrong.

I have always voted Democrat my whole life, but I have nothing against anybody else. I don’t care if you are Republican right left middle center conservative moderate crazy whatever, you have the right, assuming you pay taxes, your own opinion, and to your own vote! The only thing you’re not allowed to do is inside violence, physical violence. Even hate, hate speech, I think technically legally you’re allowed to do so, but just keep it to yourself, keep it inside your own ranch, you have something nice to say don’t say it at all. And also do not forget the fact that once upon a Time, your family was also an immigrant, or trying to escape persecution from the British, and seeking a new life with more freedom and opportunity. Even the Chinese call America the beautiful country.

Mainland Chinese people would prefer to live in America

The big issue here is Controls. Mainland Chinese, Richmond land Chinese, should be told they want to take their wealth out of Beijing, out of Shanghai, and take it to America if they could. They all send their kids to school, they want to send their kids to Harvard, Yale, even a UCLA or maybe even UC Berkeley.

I think if you think about it… If you think on a long enough time scale, surely but slowly, I think all power wealth and money will be concentrated in America.

Why? China is too polluted. I think mainland China is currently having a problem; all of these rich mainland Chinese oligarchs are pumping coal, producing as quickly as they can, in order to quickly get rich, and then send their kids to a more beautiful Location, for example the appeal of a Vancouver; surrounded but nothing with trees, nature. Even Chip Wilson, the founder of Lululemon said that Vancouver is the perfect place to be, and also the reason why Lululemon was invented there, it could have not happened on any other city on the planet.

For myself is an American, I currently believe LA, specifically Culver City to be the perfect place to be. Why? It is the only place which is actually walkable and all of Los Angeles, and also, the only place in all of Los Angeles that have seen a city having a dedicated graffiti removal team; my daily walk, one of the best telling things I discovered was there was some sort of sticker art on this one to for a very long time, and finally, I actually saw that the Culver City public services department cleaned it up, scraped it off! Where else is this possible in any of Los Angeles?

Also, the new Apple headquarters on Washington. They are currently in the midst of expanding it, and building a super mega campus. This ain’t gonna go away for a long time.

Even though Apple is not as innovative as it is before, at least for our lifetime, I am certain that we will all still be using iPhones, not some loser pixel or Samsung phone.

And I think Apple has been wise, we have all become subscribed to the Apple ecosystem and financial services; Apple has effectively become its own bank and security system; we have all of our password saved to iCloud, and paying with Apple Pay is 1 trillion times easier than any other competitor. And once you could pay with bitcoin from your iPhone, with touch or Face ID… Apple will truly take over the planet.

Back to you

What can one man do, what can a single human being do? A lot!

Simple things; every time you see a kid, small and wave at the kid! There’s a saying, whenever you smile at a child, the universe smells back at you!

Pedophiles don’t really exist

I think a very very bad thing which has been promoted by social media, mainstream news is a fear of pedophilia. Especially with child predators, men.

Now being a dad, with a three year-old four month-year-old son… Honestly I think we have 0% to be fearful of pedophiles, the only real thing to be afraid of is distracted drivers, texting while driving, or even these electric scooters and electric bikes, if you’re distracted on your iPhone for even half a second, and one of these things whiz by at full speed and hit your kid, it actually might kill your kid.

Avoid potential fatal things for your kid

For example, once again, I think 100% focus should be just be insanely careful when you are crossing the street with your kid, or for cars running red lights, or even driving while high! I’ve already seen two people smoking marijuana while driving cars stuck in traffic, Very scary.

Having at least one son, having kids

Certainly, the first goal, especially being a man is to have at least one male; at least one son to carry on the family name.

Or, have at least one kid, doesn’t matter whether boy or girl. Ideally more.

For example, one of my neighbors, super friendly 70-year-old Chinese American lady, has two daughters, about my age, 34 and 37, and both of them, no serious relationship, not married and certainly no children. I feel bad for my neighbor; ballistically, she might never have any grandchildren, even with two daughters! Maybe Seneca could just be her metaphorical grandkid.

What is the purpose of grandparents?

I think a simple purpose of grandparents is to take care of the grandkids! In America, we have bastardized this ocean; and this is where things become very inefficient for the modern day American.

People say that daycare, having kids is expensive; not really, if you have a grandma or grandpa, ideally both around!

Is your whole family lives together, in one house or complex, and the grandparents take care of the young children, while their parents are working or doing something else.

The problem is the world has shifted towards hedonism; for example, hedonic pleasure through traveling, backpacking, seeing the world, eating good food, socializing, etc. Certainly these are all good things, but I don’t think they should be the telos of a grandparent– ultimate tell us of grandparent is to take care of the grandchildren, to instill them with wisdom, love, abilities!

And the truth is, all grandchildren universally adore their grandparents, especially the grandmother! Even now, as a 30 six-year-old man, I have nothing but affection for my grandma! I’m a lot more distant with my grandfather on my mom side, and my grandfather on my dad side passed when I was only two years old, so I have zero memories of him. But even Cindy, she has great memories of her grandfather, and I think this is a great thing!

Lineage

Ultimately, what is the point of life? I think it has to deal with lineage. Essentially, you just don’t want the family line to die off!

Ideally, the family lineage last forever! The purpose or the point isn’t your personal immortality — it is the immortality of your family bloodline! Thinking about your kids kids kids.

Don’t mention things you don’t like

Don’t get free marketing or free PR or free publicity to things you don’t like.

If you really hate Donald Trump, don’t say nothing, just vote for Kamala Harris, or the other side.

When will you hate something, or vocalize when you hate something, we actually secretly like it?

Why else would we complain or vocalize it?

New moral rule: whenever we hate some thing or dislike something, we stay silent. More manly to pause, and emit silence than say something evil.

A real man?

A true mensch?

What is an “uber”-mensch? My ideal, my vision is to be beyond man. To not be a mere mortal, even though we are mortal.

“Human, all too human”

It is obvious that we are all human, and that we all have human emotions. But then, the simplest innovation we can make as an individual is to be anti-human, anti-man?

Maybe going opposite or doing the opposite?

For example, when you are angry, be kind instead? Or even the funny reverse; when you want to be kind, show fake anger instead?

There are still are many innovations we can make in ethics guys!

ERIC

Economic Immortality

Some more thoughts about economics, and you:

Economic immortality

I think why this is such an important thing to think about and consider is that when it comes to money and economics, this affects any single and every single human being on the planet, all 8 billion of us.

There is no society on the planet that does not rely upon money in order for us to pay rent, purchase food, pay for electricity and Wi-Fi etc.

Now I think the bizarre carrot and stick we are fed in America is to get super super rich, in order to purchase certain things. For example, to one day be able to purchase a Lamborghini, Ferrari, whatever.

But the issue here is thinking about maintenance cost, and the productive half-life of something.

So for example, let’s just say you buy the new Porsche Lamborghini or Ferrari whatever, I think initially… It will bring you a huge wave of exhilaration and excitement! Maybe the same feeling of the excitement of being able to bed and insanely beautiful woman!

But… The second that you bet her, and you blow your load, boom time to go to sleep. And let us say that you are with this insanely beautiful supermodel babe days weeks months and years… It seems that this playboy man, eventually his enthusiasm may change.

I think thing with beauty, in the context of vehicles homes cars women etc.… Man is ever fickle, he always seeks novelty.

Now the unsustainable model is this guy just keeps working himself to death, attempting to stack his billions on billions, kind of like the Jay Z model, in order to purchase all these things he desires.

“I bought every V12 engine, I wish I could take it back to the beginning.” – JAY Z, THE LIFE OF OJ

In this line from the life of OJ, I find it a really fascinating thought… he says he has already amassed enough wealth to purchase every single automobile car with a V12 engine. So when he says that he wants to take it back to the beginning… What does he mean to say? Does he mean to say that he wishes that he didn’t waste all that money on all these V12 engine vehicles, and had invested that money instead? Or, he wishes that he could take it back to the beginning before he was super rich and successful, in order for him to feel hungry and scrappy again like he was in the beginning? Or maybe both — a double entendre — what rappers are masters at?

Regardless, there are some fools who seek biological life immortality, these weirdos and Silicon Valley guys who want to live 100,000 years or whatever by uploading their consciousness to the cloud whatever. I personally find this to be a very poor poor idea, and also very bizarre… I found a lot of men who does actually do this, practically no women. Maybe women are more wise; they know that if they become 300 years old or whatever… No amount of plastic surgery, Botox, fillers, or cosmetic aesthetic surgery or whatever could make them forever look like a sexy 26-year-old babe or something. In fact, being here in LA, I see this a lot… Women, who are still beautiful and sexy, but beyond their prime… Maybe in their mid 40s, 50s, 60s… Who might have had Botox or some sort of facial surgery somewhere in the past… And it doesn’t age well…

I’ve also noticed this issue with any sort of facial injections or Botox or plastic surgery; especially with Koreans, Korean women, and now even Korean men! If you see them in the flesh, in the dark sunlight… It really does look like plastic, and all that white stuff looks caked on… a little bit frightening almost like the joker?

This is why you should never judge anybody until you have met them in the flesh, face to face, standing next to them, in the direct sunlight, outside. There’s only so much you could take behind an iPhone camera and selfie mode, with nice indoor lighting.

Better for economic immortality, and be Spartan… than to live like a Persian slave?

What is the ultimate asset that you have? Your attention, your time, your focus. If you wake up, with your iPhone charging next to you, and the first thing you do is check your email… You are a slave. Or, if by not taking your email you can get fired… You are also a digital slave.

Or, if you cannot delete your Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube channel, Twitter without economic impoverishment… you are not free.

What is economic immorality?

I think the general idea is for your capital to outlive you. That as time goes on, your pile of capital continues to accumulate indefinitely, kind of like a tree that ever grows taller and taller overtime, gradually but surely, and continues to expand her branches and leaves… Sprouting new seeds, propagating herself etc.

The reason why I like this metaphor is that the funny thought is perhaps we human beings… We’re not that different from trees. What we seek is dominance! Apparently in the rainforest… Only the tallest trees, that can outgrow the competition, and get to the highest height, can capture the sunlight, which allows it to produce seeds. If you’re in the rainforest, And you’re not tall enough, and you cannot access sunlight… You’re not going to produce any seeds.

Is the reason people don’t want to have kids because they’re not rich enough?

I don’t think so. I think part of it is a strange brainwashing from these tree hugging childless liberals who seek to help serve “the planet”, over humanity.

For example, the bizarre thought that having kids is bad “for the planet”… this is one of the most weird thoughts of all time… The question:

Are kids made for the planet… Or is the planet made for kids?

You fools! Don’t you know, if suddenly every single human being on the planet stopped producing children, stopped having kids… Though within a generation or two the entire human race would go extinct?

If you had the scenario… What would you prefer–

1. The death of humanity

You are supreme dictator of the planet, and you force sterilize every single human being on the planet, which makes it impossible for any single human to give birth to a new child, and therefore it is guaranteed that no more children will be produced on the planet.

As a consequence, you have “saved” the planet and the earth and the environment – but within a generation or two, let us say 200 years, every single human being on the planet parishes, and the human race goes extinct. Then would you be happy?

2. “Carbon footprint”?

It is certain that humans burning coal and creating emissions is doing something to the planet, it is certainly changing it, my friend calls it “global weirding”. Weather patterns are becoming more and more weird. But the idea that one day the planet will become in inhabitable is false. I believe is that more and more extremes will happen; maybe in Los Angeles, the summers will keep getting hotter and hotter, maybe eventually making it to the point that it is not uncommon to have whether in the 90s, mid 90s, even the hundreds, or the low hundreds kind of like Arizona or Nevada. And then in the winter, getting really really cold, like the 30s or something. Or maybe even the 20s?

I suppose here is we’re buying beachfront property is a desire or a strategy for some people, like purchasing property in Santa Monica, Venice, Venice Beach, Miami Beach etc. Even in Orange County, Newport Beach or Dana Point is the most highly sought after. Why? Maybe if in the next 50 years, the planet will keep getting hotter, then being closer to the water and feeling the ocean breeze might be a good thing.

Certainly if the planet gets really really cold, this is also very very bad, but I suppose here is where humans are better adapted, if it is like 20° or 30° in LA, it sucks but at least you could buy a Canada goose jacket. If it is 120°, Like in Saudi Arabia or Dubai… At this point, is it literally impossible to just leave the house? Without air conditioning?

Simple ideas

If you think about thermodynamics, the simple strategy is to prevent heat loss. For example, if you think about the human body, technically we actually have enough heat in our body to keep us warm wherever we are or go.

So if we apply thermo dynamic principles to money and finances, the similar principal applies: the goal is to prevent yourself from heat loss, or economic energy loss, or money loss, or financial loss.

A simple one is delete or unsubscribe from all of your subscriptions. All of your media streaming music services, your gym memberships etc. Get rid of Spotify.

Also as a simple filter, consume no media which is advertising supported, this includes Joe Rogan, or your favorite media personalities. Why, err regardless of how much you love them, as long as they are getting paid a check, to promote some sort of service or product, they and you are not 100% free.

In fact, even advice for people like Tim Ferriss, of who I am a big fan… Tim, you’re original, why don’t you just privately finance your podcast and books, you don’t have anything left to prove to anybody? You have already achieved all of the success you really need, Just give it away for free, without annoying advertisements, and just do a pro bono because it is your passion?

Creating new media hosting platforms

OK something insanely annoying… My video press.com account, prevents me from uploading videos anymore. Maybe I’ll just start posting it myself, and providing direct links instead?

I suppose this is where it is useful that I got into the Internet in the 90s and the early 2000s… I have good knowledge about FTPs, and online storage. And websites.

I met a lot of aspiring filmmakers and creators, who still don’t have their own self hosted website, are they fools?

Simple:

Ionos.com or bluehost.com, and just sign up for the cheapest self hosted server plan, which gives you access to your own FTP server, in which you could directly upload your own video files or whatever, and provide direct download links for people.
Use WordPress.org we’re only trust open source things. Why? Open source lasts longer; because typically when people create open source stuff, they do it because it is their passion not because there is a financial motive. Therefore as a consequence, it typically lasts.

It is not guaranteed that a passion project will last, we have good duration, but, perhaps the true indicator is this:

If you were offered a financial incentive or motivation to publish somethunf with a publisher, but you refused and you gave it away for free instead… you are true.

100 Lessons From The Masters Of Street Photography — this will last forever.

Why bitcoin will last forever

Even if you think about this, ultimate generous act; to create something invent something, anonymously, to give it away for free and then disappear forever… Isn’t this the ultimate generous act?

Satoshi did this. It is probably doubtful that he is Japanese, his English is too good. Probably after some Caucasian American man, slightly anti-establishment, anti-beings, a programming whiz, really believed in this. Kind of like the founder of Linux, etc.

This is where you should never put any faith in any sort of corporation, product, security, or crypto crypto acid which has had a general founder. Why? When the founder dies, and there is no more vision… The whole thing will probably go under.

Steve Jobs vision was to create a company imputed with so much creative passion that it would outlive him. It seems like he has won here. Procreate wasn’t invented or created yet when Steve Jobs was alive, and if you think about it… The true ultimate vision of Steve Jobs was to create iPad, no stupid stylist, no stupid keyboard. This is why if you are a true fanboy, a true acolyte of Steve Jobs, what you would do is just use the 11 inch iPad Pro, no stupid accessories. You are a true innovator this way.

A true and grand man with real vision?

To become a true visionary is to see beyond well, monetization, even your own financial well-being. A true visionary doesn’t really care for money; Elon Musk doesn’t care about money, Jeff Bezos doesn’t, Peter Thiel doesn’t, Steve Jobs didn’t.

Maybe this is where we have to ask Jay Z and Kanye from our economic minds; I think the pernicious thing in the African-American community is around money. Why? It makes sense; even in America, talking to my friend Ray.. racism is still alive and well, and I don’t think it’s necessarily gotten any better. Certainly there is more access, there is no more legal laws which prohibit a certain race a person to purchase property, but still, people are still going to be racist towards you towards the pigment of your skin, your morphology, your genetic heritage etc., assuming that you are not Anglo-Saxon protestant Caucasian man in America.

Even Jewish people, they are not white. They are closet white, or “white passing“, — as long as America never elect or votes for a Jewish American president, Jewish people in Jewish businessmen will always be at a disadvantage, lower on the totem pole.

Even a Donald Trump… Certainly he is not Christian or religious or whatever… But he is certainly not Jewish.

Even Catholics, Catholicism… Besides John F. Kennedy, Catholicism and being Catholic is still the weird sub-sect.

so what are we to do?

First, stop the heat loss, stop the oxygen loss, stop the bleeding! The most critical thing to consider in regards to economic policy for yourself, is to stop all debt, stop bleeding, and don’t leverage any debt or bad things!

Mortgages?

If you live in California, the taxes will bleed your dry. Even if you live somewhere like Florida, which has a lower tax jurisdiction, there are still taxes!

Which means, with property, you never really own the property, you simply have a lease from the government to borrow it. Do you have more privileges like building stuff on top of it, but still, as long as you have to pay a forever home owner city tax, you don’t really own it.

Perhaps this is where people get tempted by certain things like clothing or cars, if you purchase it in all cash, technically you do own it.

Avoid the indoors like the plague

A lot of people coughing now, indoors. Maybe then the wise ideas to avoid indoors like the play, kind of like early Covid days. And also, maybe starting to become wise again to wear a facemask when going anywhere indoors?

–> always live life like it is COVID?

Because the issue here is not even catching Covid is just getting sick! I don’t want to catch the common cold; which has no vaccine.

Every day is different

Each and every day is different… Never planned the night before. Just do what you feel like morning of.

Bitcoin is digital cash

I think Satoshi wrote this in the bitcoin white paper, and also this is interesting because the notion of cash, because the simple ideas with a home or property or whatever… Either 100% all cash offer or nothing.

If you have to finance it, just keep stacking your money until you do it all cash.

But also the issue… If you think like a real investor, and you think about 10, 100 X, 1000 X gains… There’s almost nothing worth purchasing.

For example, at this point I could technically purchase anything I want. As long as it is less than $1 million. But the thing is… There’s nothing worth purchasing, nothing I value purchasing considering if my bitcoin can 10x, 100x, 1000x or even 10,000x from here.

Never spend money on yourself only others

Besides purchasing some weightlifting equipment from Titan.fitness from my remaining PayPal balance, I haven’t spent money on anything perhaps the last year?

I think the big thing is not because I’m doing it out of a sense of virtuality, but instead, ethos is that there is just nothing worth it?

And also, I’m starting to understand that I like the idea of things rather than actually owning it. Even my friend Don Dillon told me this about his Porsche 911 GT3: maybe we like the idea of something more than actually owning it.

This is where I love marketing, marketing materials, marketing copy images videos etc.; it is also inspirational, motivational, and interesting to me! For example, I do not wish even my worst enemy to own a Ferrari, the maintenance costs on these things are insane; at least a Lamborghini is just an Audi or a Volkswagen with a body kit; so if you’re going to fix your Lamborghini Huracan V10 engine… You could presumably use Volkswagen or Audi parts. But with Ferrari… You’re screwed. Do you want to fix your suspension, or your engine? Say goodbye to $200,000. And even if you’re super rich… Even a billionaire… To spend $200,000 to fix your car is always going to be annoying. And will irk you in a bad way.

“Finance”?

So studying some etymology for the word finance, the general idea is that finance literally means to hold someone at ransom?

Very bad apparently, 99.99% of people finance their homes, which means that they take out a 30 year mortgage or whatever. And also even worse, apparently talking to some guys at the Toyota dealership, most people also finance their cars. This is horrible idea for many reasons:

First, if you’re going to take any APR that is above 0%, you’re in the red. Even 1.99% APR… That is lost money.
If you have to do a down payment on a car, and finance it, that is money you could’ve put into bitcoin, and 1000x’d — a $5M mistake, assuming that the average down payment on a car is $5000 USD.

Even more foolish is to Lisa vehicles; because once again, after three years you have to give it back! So you have literally pissed your money down the drain.

How to know whether people are really rich or not rich?

If they have not paid off the mortgage on the house in full, then they are not rich.
If they drive a Tesla, they are not rich
If they have a job they are not rich

Richness, is absence. The absence of having to have a job, the absence of having to “work“.

Does it matter?

I’m more critical thing to consider, which is even beyond my personal scope: does it matter?

For example, why do you care to see or know how rich somebody is, in comparison to you?

I don’t think it really matters.

Maybe it comes out of a sense of insecurity; do you have to always weigh yourself according to others, maybe it is simply lack of self-esteem? And also, is this a socialized thing?

Because for example, if you were Achilles, you would not care about how rich somebody wasn’t comparison to you. I’ll Achilles was weary of just conquering towns for the sake of king Agamemnon. He just wanted to take Breisis his prize, and just retire to his fertile lands. And of course, after Hector kills Patroclus, on accident, thinking that it was Achilles… Achilles’ sole objective was to enact revenge by killing Hector. He had no use for golden tripods, more cattle in the like. Even the whole period of time in which he is trying to get his revenge, he actually forces his self not to eat– and of course the gods infuse him with ambrosia so he won’t starve to death, but still technically… he is technically “intermittent fasting“ the whole time.

Live like Achilles

Maybe the secret to economic immortality is to just live like Achilles. Your only joy is through combat, physical valor, strength, muscle.

My very very simple suggestion is quit your gym membership cancel your gym membership, and use that money to buy your own barbell and weights. If you want to do it super cheap, just purchase a sandbag, and buy some cheap place and from Home Depot, only about five dollars for a 50 pound bag.

Also, armor. 60 pound weight vest from Titan.fitness.

And then, your joy is just maximum time outside, in the direct elements, training, for life.

ERIC

Unplug.

I’m impressed; is your 2024… And the matrix, the notion of the matrix is still a great one! Maybe the film matrix is anti-fragile from as time goes on, the film actually becomes better and more pertinent to modern day life, rather than irrelevant.

Also, I think this is also where Blade Runner will age well, because now that we have the new ChatGPT 4o (paid premium)– with the ability to have natural voice conversations, even trying it out in Korean, the Korean voice sounds so real!

Anyways, the general thought I have is maybe the future elite kids, will have the privilege of not using AI, not using ChatGPT etc.

K-12?

OK, if you want to live in America well, there are basic things you gotta learn, like how to read right, basic arithmetic math etc.

So then if you think about the whole schooling system, what is the point of it?

First, maybe the point is socialization, learning how to play well with other kids, and ride with other humans etc. And then maybe it is these fun extracurricular activities like sports etc. Or arts, music etc. Or it is just a free babysitting daycare that you could pull your kids out, in order for you to do other stuff while your kids are in school.

I think the best strategy to approach is assume that every single kid will have access to an iPhone pro, with the paid premium version of ChatGPT. If this is the case… Maybe some sort of real world training is useful.

For example, I ChatGPT really good at doing tedious things, even one of the best things in TurboTax recently is having tax connect to your bank account and credit card, and it automatically files all of your expenses, according to category. I used to have to do this manually, and it was so insanely tedious, this is what I actually hated most about doing taxes. Now, it is super easy!

Also, tea is good at simple rhyme, or it is like a targeted Google or Wikipedia search, that doesn’t require you to look at advertisements. In fact my suggestion is anytime you want to google something, just first ChatGPT it.

Also, the reason why I find ChatGPT should be such an amazing great thing is that it doesn’t take you down rabbit holes, like Wikipedia or Google. In fact, I love hyperlink, but often hyperlinks are a huge distraction, that take you down these bizarre rabbit holes. if you spend enough time on Wikipedia, sooner or later you’ll come across any conspiracy theory, the similar thing that happens on Google search or YouTube.

Get rid of Google, YouTube, Wikipedia

Obviously ChatGPT is flawed, but still, because it is a paid premium product, at least there is not a problematic financial incentive at play; the incentive of open AI and ChatGPT is to create the best possible product, to best assist humans and humanity, and it hopes that everyone will subscribe to their paid model for $20 a month, which is a real and a good sustainable business model.

Compare this with Google, which I think when it comes down to it is an unethical company. Why? 99% of the revenue is through paid search, or display advertisements, or YouTube ads or whatever. And therefore the financial incentive for creators is to create things which have maximum Machach factor, in order to maximize eyeball exposure, which tends to be around extremes in terms of human fears, concerns, doubts, Things that make people angry.

In fact, the notion of “injustice “porn; when you spend enough time on Twitter Instagram Facebook TikTok podcast whatever… Sooner or later you will feel unjust about something and it will make you angry!

Anger is a great monetization strategy

Good Businesses, Bad Businesses

Good businesses are digital; that exist on the Internet, you don’t have to pay rent, storage fees, monthly building mortgage payments, land leases etc.

For example, when I was starting off, in street photography… Started my blog etc.… Even up until now my server fee for my blog might be about 100 bucks, 200 bucks a month. But compare this to having to sign a lease on the building in which you are being held into the property, and you have to pay that lease indefinitely! Seems like a poor idea.

I think in the world of finance, art, there is this romanticization of the Parisian artist, with his private studio, his private bookstore or café… Etc. They should hear is a scale ability issue, and also, issue that you have to attend to the property!

For example, the problem is in regards to having to be there, maintain the toilets, etc.

For a moment, I was considering opening out my own gym, but then I realized, the headache of having to always be there, or higher staff, maintain the toiletsetc. A trillion headaches.

The laws of physics

Currently, Amazon is the goat. There is no other business as dominant, impressive, and all encompassing than Amazon. If you want any sort of physical good, Amazon is almost always your best pet, especially if you have Amazon prime. Why? Speed. To get your products delivered to you, within a day, two days, or the day of same day… Speed wins.

But the funny thing is even for me, Amazon is too slow. When I want to buy something, I want to purchase it immediately, right now! So this is where I like to walk into the store and purchase something, because I like the immediate effect of something being instantaneous. Perhaps for me, there is a greater joy in instant, rather than even waiting a few hours.

Digital goods?

OK the biggest issue here is that there is still no such thing as a digital good. For example, e-books, digital products are not really digital… In the scarcity notion.

For example, let us say that I sell an e-book for $10. Follower may purchase it because they desire to support me, want immediate access to it, or cannot find a free version online. But beyond this… The second which you download a PDF file, you could replicate it indefinitely! If you download a PDF file of something, or even a EPUB file of an e-book, you could replicate it 1 million times, send it to 1 million of your friends online, etc.

Non-replicable?

The closest thing we have so far is the notion of a non-fungible thing… NFT. For example, having some sort of proof on the block chain, backed by Ethereum which “proves” that you are indeed, the true “owner“ of something. But even for me as a bitcoin and crypto enthusiast, I have almost 0 interest in an NFT. Why? I don’t care for the ownership something… Or example if you made an NFT art of something, I could just screenshot it, and hold onto the image. don’t care whether I own it or not, I just like looking at the image!

Where Bitcoin becomes such a fascinating value proposition is that you cannot replicated, even if you wanted to. Why? Proof of work, the idea that you must expend energy in order to mind a bitcoin, like putting human laborers to work for a bar of gold etc.

The foolish thing that people say is that bitcoin is bad for the environment or the planet or whatever… But they do not talk about how bad for the planet is to mine gold, Mine diamonds, precious metals for jewelry etc.

For example, if you’re a woman or man saying that bitcoin is bad for the planet. Yet you have ever purchased or received any gold object or jewelry, or if you want iPhone… Or a laptop or whatever… Or an automobile car… That’s bad for the planet!

Even worse, gold, diamonds, etc.… Depends on slave labor. Even apparently to produce your lovely sneakers, whether they be Adidas Nike, cloud on whatever… There are some close to slavery like working conditions, somewhere in Indonesia Vietnam, to make your lovely athletic apparel. Same thing goes with Lululemon; All the brands.

There is no such thing as ethical fashion, ethical clothing, ethical iPhones or iPhone pros, ethical make up whatever.

Women vs men

When it comes down to it… Woman seeks to beautify herself, either with her thoughts, her words, her clothing her dress, her literature, her artworks etc.

What does man seek? Man seek dominance, power, influence, women.

The way that we our desired goals through capitalism or consumerism is through purchasing, purchasing power.

For a man, what is the significance of purchasing property or single-family home? The purpose is to build a citadel, build a fortress, a castle, a point of defense, a TROY, etc. Therefore the appeal of prosperous men who desire to purchase property on top of a hill or a mountain, overlooking his fiefdom, feeling high and mighty etc.

I think for a woman, the purpose of property, purchasing a home has to be more around a feeling of security.

Being honest?

I think one of the most pernicious modern day lines of thinking has deal with the fact that somehow… Sexual differences don’t matter. It does matter if you are a man or a woman, whether you have testes or ovaries.

Why? If you have any menstrual cycle or hormonal cycle, certainly this will be very different than if you’re a man, with testicles, and you have greater sports aggression due to heightened cortisol or adrenaline levels.

For example, you would never put the top male UFC fighter against the top female UFC fighter. Why? This would simply be unethical and slaughter.

However, the top UFC female fighter certainly probably destroyed 99.9% of the male population. But if you took the top UFC female fighter versus the top UFC male fighter, no chance. I’m not sure… But even if you took the top female UFC fighter, versus even a middle male UFC fighter, or even a bottom tier male UFC fighter… I think the man would always win. This is why you never see Roger Federer versus Serena or Venus Williams, and this is why you will never see LeBron James versus any women’s NBA player.

Also, in the context of weightlifting, powerlifting, or strongman competitions; even if you took all the steroids in the world, I don’t think you will ever see a 501 kg lift from a woman. Or even see a woman lift 1000 pounds? Certainly not 2000 pounds.

gender versus sex

Gender is whatever you want. It is fluid. In this sense, to be a transgender or whatever is fine; ever since I was a kid, the notion of a tomboy, a drag queen, whatever is not a big deal. Even Kanye West putting on the pink polo… I remember in middle school high school, one of the cool African-American guys, sporting a pink polo, it was so shocking to everybody because pink was seen as only for women, but he did so confidently and everyone thought he was awesome.

Even now with Seneca, pink is his favorite color! And so is mine! I have this pink Brooks brother sweater I love which I always get compliments on, and also this cool pink bomber jacket ISSE , which I found for free in this donation pile, which I love. Other day one of the Toyota dealership guys thought Seneca was a girl because he wore pink shoes, which threw him off.

Certain colors are socialized, also, behaviors and the way you decide to dress, this is all fluid! I’ve been seeing a lot of men, with facial hair, 3 o’clock shadows, dressing in skirts or dresses whatever. And that is fine. even this one person at one of our favorite fried chicken takeout places, has facial hair, but the voice sounds like a girl, but the facial features look masculine… I have no idea. But typically, if you have facial hair, or a beard… You’re a man.

I love the alphabet soup!

It don’t matter what you is, And also, I don’t know why people care what you are either. If you’re a man and you want to wear a sports bra, a crop top, a bikini, a skirt or dress, whatever… Why does it matter?

Also, I think the first rule is to just leave other people alone. If other people want to dress however they want, or act or talk the way they want to, or have sex or intercourse the way they want to, why do you care?

I think perhaps for me, the only annoying thing is when it comes to gender pronouns. If you have a beard, if you’re 7 foot tall with facial hair, I’m not going to call you a woman.

If you’re 6 foot seven, and you have a beard, and you want me to call you a woman, I will not. And this is where I find things nonsensical; it is not a hate crime to call somebody what they biologically are.

Even the funny thing… To call somebody “bro” nowadays is not even gendered. I even see young elementary or middle school kids calling their moms “bro” or “bruh”.

Back at the line of thought

So let us take a via negativa approach: start off by axing and eliminating all the bad business ideas.

Based in the physical world, in which you have to pay rent, a mortgage, reoccurring physical space expenses.
High risk businesses, latest realize that the simple statistics here, never put yourself into a fragile position.

Day jobs are good

When I first started my blog, I had zero intention or thought that it would be commercially viable. My personal thought was that actually, to make money through photography was impossible. The only way I was able to make it work was part by chance, part by luck, part with hard work and hustle.

But the greatest benefit was I didn’t have any stress to monetize it. Why? I still have my day job, earning $40,000 a year in 2010 2011, so at least I could cover my rent, and basic expenses.

This is why my number one advice for any entrepreneur is the goal is not to get super rich from your passion, the goal is simply to be able to sustain yourself in a Spartan level and degree ; doing the absolute minimum, paying rent, and purchasing meat and coffee.

Spartan entrepreneurship

If you study any super super successful entrepreneur, Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos in the light … They all started super scrappy. Steve Jobs would just subsist on beans and rice, and filled the apple computer with Steve Wozniak, in his parents garage, with down jackets on, and space heaters. Elon Musk, in the early days, shared a single computer with his brother, and also, would just shower at the local YMCA, and I think he fed himself on two dollars a day on just spaghetti and hotdogs.

Also, Jeff Bezos; him just personally driving his beat up Honda accord to the local post office, to deliver books. Also the early days he would create tables for his workers, simple doors that he would buy at Home Depot.

So I think the primary mistake that a lot of these aspiring entrepreneurs make is that they think that somehow need a lot of funding, or a lot of money.

The truth is… Entrepreneurship is Spartan; essentially, assume that you have zero resources, zero money, zero startup capital, and all you have is access to the Internet, your brain, and earning enough money to just pay for your website server bill.

Once again… The way that you leverage yourself 1 trillion X is to just start your own self hosted website, Ionos.com or bluehost.com with WordPress.org

And the simple way to propagate yourself is through free marketing, through free YouTube videos, free podcast, free files, etc. The path forward is through indirect monetization; you cannot make a sustainable living simply from advertising. You have to provide some sort of service or product.

Promotion?

Also, maybe you could indirectly get rich by promoting stuff, like for example… You become super famous for something, and let us say that you own a lot of bitcoin, maybe simply to educate people about bitcoin, the virtues, might be indirectly good for you; because you build a trust with your audience in an unrelated field, and you could use that as a platform to promote bitcoin or whatever… And as a consequence, your Bitcoin value goes up?

Everyone knows ERIC KIM as the street photographer, philosopher, Stoic Spartan, now weightlifter and muscular guy, but bitcoin is a new identity.

The ethics of personal gain

Ethical question: if you own bitcoin, a lot, and you tell everybody that you own bitcoin, and you are vested in it, you have at least $1 million of your wealth in it… Is it at the culture promote it, assuming that when you’re promoted, the value of your own personal bitcoin may go up to $10 million $100 million or $1 billion?

Yes. Why? You got skin in the game! I would say it is unethical to promote something that you’re not vested in; for example very very unethical for these early crypto influencers to promote FTX, when they in fact by themselves did not host their own assets on FTX, or that they did not purchase any FTX with their own tokens.

Even a bad thing that I saw with chain-link; they recently had a hackathon, and I think the offered like $100,000 worth of prizes. But shouldn’t the ethical thing be instead, to offer prizes with chain-link, not US dollars?

Michael Saylor

The reason why I really love Michael Saylor is that the whole time, in all of his 100+ interviews, he never once promotes his own company, or tells people to buy it. instead, he tells people to buy the bitcoin itself, not shares in his company.

Some people think, wait, isn’t it bad for Michael Saylor to promote bitcoin if you will indirectly monetize from it? No! Because he has risk and exposure.

It would be unethical if he was promoting Ethereum, if he was given a $10 million check from Vitalik, but did not actually purchase any Ethereum himself.

And also, this is where all these corporations are evil; for example even Disney… Who owns Marvel, I see these Coca-Cola cans and bottles, with superheroes plastered all over it? Burn it down!

Also, unethical marketing, with beer and alcohol companies; name one athlete who drinks a beer or drinks vodka or Mezcal or tequila before playing a game. Zero.

Or, think about the ethics of a Toyota dealer who would prefer to drive an AMG wagon over a Toyota.

Or, a Lamborghini dealer selling Lamborghinis, but in private, he drives a Tesla instead.

This is where money in the game, soul in the game matters; assuming that money is just economic energy, when you have economic energy and something, your opinion is true.

For example, if the evil Philip Morris company offered you $1 trillion to say that smoking cigarettes what’s good for your health, would you do it? Of course not.

Trust nobody who uses advertising

I put zero faith in anybody who relies on advertising revenue, sponsorships, to make a living. Why? First and foremost ,,, I recall that there were some early crypto influencers or bitcoin guys who promoted Gemini as a trading platform, and that they trusted it and used it themselves etc. But now… Is it still around? Not certain.

The only reason I used Coinbase was at the time, it had the best aesthetic branding, simplicity, and was super easy. I suppose my benefit was before I bought bitcoin, I spent many years thinking about it, philosophizing about economics, field currency etc.… Rather than listening to any of these YouTube videos or podcasts.

Streaming slaves

Any artist who is dependent on streams, number of streams, is a slave.

Once again, if you want to appeal to the lowest common denominator, you just give everyone a sweetened Starbucks Frappuccino beverage, with five pumps of caramel and agave sugar and almond milk on top. Or coconut milk, or oat milk.

Also, you give all the kids kids, have them watch paw patrol, Bluey, Disney+, Disney films etc.

Also let us consider that 99.9% the population still watches television, TV shows, Netflix, HBO Max etc.

Trust nobody with a subscription to any media streaming service.

So now what?

My very simple thought is think local, think your own local city, city politics rather than international or international politics.

For example, I don’t really care what’s gonna happen this upcoming election cycle — I’m about 99.9% certain Donald Trump is going to win, even though I vote for Kamala Harris.

Be the change in which you wish to see in the world, and don’t do things that you don’t like

For example, I hate it when people honked at me, and therefore I will never never honk at people, unless it might be a life or death situation.

I don’t like when people act low-key racist to me; so maybe I’ll try my best to not be low-key racist to other people.

Also, smile to strangers and wave at them! it literally cost you nothing, and that worse, they frown at you back, or ignore you. I would say this:

Better to risk a kind hello smile and peace sign, and get ignored or snuffed, rather than not attempt it at all!

Be magnanimous, be the great man!

ERIC

Pettiness, jealousy and envy are only for weak men.

Just think, “what would John Wick do“? Or what would King Leonidas do?

Immutable.

IMPERATIVES

Imperative? What are your personal imperatives in life?

Ethics and morals of this present and future

So some big thoughts I’ve been having lately; about imperatives, ethical and moral imperatives, thinking about what to do in life, what not to do in life, etc.

True imperatives is something that stirs you from within, something which you are not forced to do by anybody, but rather, it is “autotelic”; it feels like it is your own moral self impelled reason to do something, for the sake of it, not for the sake of virtue or whatever.

Where we go wrong

One of the things that I disdain about modern day education, is too much of it has to deal with morals and ethics. Yes yes yes, traditional K-12 education we have to learn basic things like how to write read basic rules of grammar etc.

Also, simple math, science, physics, fundamentals.

Yet beyond this — what is all this nonsense we are taught in schools? I think too much time is wasted in school teaching students how to shut up, be quiet, listen and obey to the teacher, and to kowtow to authority figures. In fact, if you critically assess the whole K through 12 industrial educational complex, it has to deal with suppression, authoritarianism:

I am the teacher, you are the student, I am superior and more dominant than you, do not challenge me.

What is the point of K-12 education anyways?

First, free babysitting, or a free place to put your kids while you have to work your job, to pay the bills and rent/mortgage etc.

Second, not all parents, but some… I don’t think a lot of parents would actually prefer to be with their kids 24/7. I find this insanely bizarre.

Certainly everyone has the right to live their lives however they want, but I suppose this is just a class thing:

Let the basic parents be basic, our goal is to be supreme.

Why be basic?

This is where things become fun; everyone seeks some sort of individuality, moral or ethical supremacy, yet, people tend to trend towards being basic?

For example, the average person drinks Coca-Cola or sweetened beverages, whether 0 cal or real sugar or agave sugar or whatever, the average American is overfat, the average American man watches pornography in private, the average person eats McDonald’s, eats three square meals a day, finances their car and has a monthly car payment, has a mortgage, walks less than 1000 steps a day, spends an hour commuting to work, or five hours a day on zoom, uses Google Chrome, reads the news, is on Facebook Instagram or Google news, watches YouTube, allows their kids to watch YouTube or YouTube YouTube kids etc.

Once again… Do you want to drive the Toyota Corolla, or the matte Black cyber truck?

“I’m the number one idea supplier!”

I think for myself, my number one passion skill, and talent is ideas. I never run out of them! In fact, as time goes on, my penchant for ideas is intensifying. I credit this to the fact that this is the most I’ve ever walked in my life, every morning I wake up, pound my espressos, toss on my 60 pound weight vest, and I go on my daily morning walk, in which I walk with my iPad Pro, voice dictate my thoughts, and come up with lots of ideas.

Ideation

The ideas are in your legs!

There is talk about “creative ideation“ in Silicon Valley, the basic idea is this–

How do you come up with creative ideas?

My major critique is too many of these artists are too effeminate, weak, overly sensitive, lack access to sunlight and the great outdoors, super pale in the skin and lacks a tan, never goes out, never leaves their home apartment studio or cafe, doesn’t lift weights, or exercise, eats mostly “a plant-based diet” (trust no thinker who is mostly plant-based), and seeks their moral supremacy in their artwork through how obscure, strange, or anti-they are.

True art is not anti

The reason why a lot of thinkers and artists are very superficial is that they seek their uniqueness simply through being anti-.

It is extremely easy to be anti-. Easy to be anti-mainstream, anti-capitalist, anti-government whatever. In fact, I believe that it takes more more courage to be pro government, pro capitalism, pro consumerism etc.

And also, when it comes down to it, we are actually all far more similar than dissimilar. We all have to use the toilet, we all have friends family members and loved ones, we all have good memories and bad, we all similar ends, and have similar goals.

The major problem here is that we tend to vilify one another, and over-exaggerate our differences, rather than trying to intensify our similarities.

How are they similar?

For example, when it comes to material or consumerism, we try to intensify how these things are different rather than similar.

But wouldn’t the wiser path be to consider, how these things are more similar than dissimilar?

For example, we all speak the English language, anybody who speaks English or understands English is 80% more similar to you than dissimilar to you.

We all care for money, whether we like to admit it or not.

We heterosexual men, we all care for beautiful women, we all have certain sexual preferences etc.

And also, everybody likes to be happy! Even good old Aristotle said how happiness might be one of the only human good in which we seek it for the sake of it; I don’t know anybody who doesn’t see happiness or who doesn’t like to be happy?

Why divide?

Here, the bad guys are not politicians, or even nation states, I really think that the bad guys here is the media, the news etc. Why do they care so much to differentiate us all, and to divide us all? The simple idea is that it is more profitable. The more division, the more you incite hate and anger, the more advertising clicks and revenue you get.

Hate is profitable

The simplest way to become happier is via negativa:

Quit the news!

What is the news? Anger porn, hate porn!

For example, the more you incite hate, violence, moral justice, moral virtuosity whatever… you stoke more advertising revenue!

Google is the bad guy?

This is where Google knows that it is in a bad position; they are desperate to indefinitely increase their revenue, advertising revenue, and how do they do this? They do this by inserting ads, sneakily into every part of your existence. The ad advertising in your Google Chrome newsfeed, the ad advertising inside your Google maps, I won’t be surprised if one day the ad advertisements within your Gmail in the future.

Also, Facebook, Instagram, the Meta corporation: once again, any business or company or corporation, tech company that earns revenue through advertising is unethical; the only way they could earn money is through stoking fear, uncertainty, doubt, racism, classism, etc.

Donald Trump is profitable for Google and Facebook and Twitter (X)

Let us consider, what is going to get more advertising clicks, Donald Trump saying something racist or sexist, or a story of a friendly boy helping a grandma across the street?

Duh!

Music

Also my critique on music, modern day music etc.; the very very simple thought is this:

> Don’t trust any music which is dependent by any publishing label.

Very very simple here guys, any musician, who is signed to any label… They are like puppets, the publishing label is like a ventriloquist.

“She going to take it up the ass like a ventriloquist!” – Ye, Carnival

For example, when you see all these rappers, talking about money clothes hoes, Lamborghinis chains etc., how do you know that they’re not just a muppet? With a hand up their ass, forcing them to just say whatever?

Music to trust?

Certain songs, albums which I find fascinating is in which an artist or musician is already independently wealthy, like Kanye when he still had his Adidas deal with his sneaker YEEZY brand,,, the albums he put out I think, are probably much more honest because he was already a billionaire, through his sneakers, and the music that he put out, he just really wanted to put it out because of the sake of it?

Indirect monetization

Or, another masterpiece; “a Written testimony“ by Jay Electronica, and Jay Z. Here, Jay Z is already rich, he don’t need to make music to make money. And this is where Jay Z actually throws down the gauntlet, and takes out all the big arms, and says:

“Time for me to actually rap well”.

And this is where I find the whole Jay Z the real Jay Z; the master vocalist, the master rapper, the sweetest flower. And also Jay Electronica, Jay Z almost becomes a patron saint for Jay electronica, allowing Jay electronica to also shine, because when you already have monetary backing from an independently wealthy person, the artwork creates doesn’t have to monetize itself.

For example, this is the Sistine chapel; imagine how subpar the Sistine chapel would be if Michelangelo needed to somehow monetize it?

Also, all the great artworks by Leonardo da Vinci, innovations etc.; because Leonardo da Vinci had the backing from the Medicis, he was able to just focus on his random thoughts and personal interests… Which allowed him to make great innovations!

Cool hair?

How to become more handsome, more beautiful, sexier? Very simple: via negativa!

For example, don’t use a loser baseball cap! I personally hate wearing a baseball cap, I’ve only been having to put it on because the sun is so strong, and giving me sunburn on my forehead and my nose, even putting on SPF 60 sunblock.

I still think that the best haircut to have is the Brad Pitt fury haircut; just get a wireless Wahl hair cutter clipper on Amazon, and just shave the sides to a zero, and let the top grow out and bang!

And then just get some “eco” olive oil hair gel on Amazon, and slick it back!

Better to have a Lamborghini haircut than to drive the loser Lamborghini

That is consider, the second that you dropped $250,000 on a Lamborghini, that is money which is instantly evaporated from your bank account! And the problem is… You feel cool in your car when you’re driving it, and people are checking out, but the second that you park it, and you walk around in public… Nobody has any idea that you drive a Lamborghini, unless you’re insecure individual who has to wear a Lamborghini hat, to try to signal to people that you drive a Lamborghini.

But the thing is… the second you step into the gym, walk around in a public place, go to the local coffee shop, go to the local bookstore, ride the subway, go to a public event, go hiking, go to the mall etc.… Nobody has any idea what you drive!

So the funny thought; could you spend that $250,000, and purchase something that you could permanently bolt onto your body?

This is where I think bitcoin is so wise; the second you spend $250,000 on a Lamborghini, the value of your Lamborghini will slowly depreciate overtime, you will slowly bleed yourself to death, and also, to pay for insurance, maintenance will bleed you dry.

The exact opposite; the bitcoin could always be with you, in your iPhone or in the cloud, and overtime, it does the exact opposite; it appreciates. There is no insurance, maintenance fees, laws of physics holding it back. It will just keep accumulating value, over time, forever.

CRYPTO BY KIM

Lose fat

If we consider fat like a biological battery, the genius is this:

If you have any margin of adipose tissue aka fat on your body… That is your metaphorical biological battery, your body is not like a gasoline powered car; you don’t need to put gas into it in order to drive.

Maybe it is better that, to think about your body like a Tesla, or an electric car, and the biological fat you have on your body is like the battery pack!

So for example, let us say that you are 6 foot tall, and you weigh 200 pounds, and you have a lot of body fat on you. Or let us say you don’t have a six pack.

Then I could estimate, perhaps 160 pounds of muscle, and 40 pounds of it might be body fat, adipose tissue. And how long can 40 pounds of adipose tissue last you? Probably at least 100,000 miles!

This is where metabolic disease, or metabolic dysfunction happens; you already have all this body fat on you, yet you still think you have to keep eating, in order to sustain your life?

No! Just start fasting! Fasting if you are over fat, fat, “overweight” or whatever — has zero consequences, zero side effects, and doesn’t cost you anything. The suggestion for people to start fasting is genius because it doesn’t require any equipment, any subscription, or any amount of money, and also technically… fasting or to fast doesn’t require you to do anything – to cook, prepare food, and eat it, or even ordering takeout from your phone, we’re ordering food is a positive action, simply choosing not to eat doesn’t require you to do anything!

Fasting is great for lazy people!

And technically, if you’re super super lazy, the genius of fasting is that it is the ultimate intelligent lazy person thing to do! Stop cooking, stop buying food, stop ordering food on your phone… You could just do nothing!

Posture

Something that I realize for myself, is that the whole time, I think I’ve had extremely poor posture. Always kind of hunched over, you see this happen to a lot of tech workers. My result is from too much time on the laptop, too much time standing or sitting, etc. Even if you have a standing desk or treadmill desk, it is bad for your posture. Why? The axis and the plane is only single directional — we tend to hunch forward, or if you think about a treadmill desk, you only walk forward.

The ideal, which I’ve been experimenting and doing myself, is simple:

Don’t use an iPhone, all iPhones are bad
Use an iPad Pro, the 11 inch, without a loser keyboard case or pencil
For jotting down thoughts, walking around, in the direct sun, using the voice dictation built into the iOS, the little microphone button in the bottom left corner
Just walking around town

Why this could be so revolutionary

“Trust no thought that doesn’t come to you while you are walking outside in the great outdoors!” – Nietzsche

I think one of my new modern day adaptations which is good is that whenever I sit, even for five minutes, my back and my lower back immediately starts to feel pain. As a consequence, I must stand up, walk around, be mobile.

All of these fools, what they try to do instead is to just figure out a better table or desk or chair setup; in order to cause them to not have any sort of back pain. But the real idea should be

Get rid of the table, don’t use any tables, no desk, no sitting desk, no standing desk, no treadmill desks
Get rid of the chairs, no chairs. Chairs are for slaves

Anti chairs

What is the most unnatural position for a human being to be in? To sit.

Technically, a human being should be standing, or walking around, or, if a human being is tired, a human being should be lying on their back, sleeping or taking a nap.

Either stand and walk around, or lie down on your back.

And this is where I’m starting to think… All chairs are bad. Being a pilot of a fighter jet, you’re still sitting on your butt on a chair. Or if you’re in the Lamborghini or McLaren… You’re just in a chair.

Wheel – chair?

The greatest tragedy, for a man, is to be beholden to a wheelchair, simply to navigate.

Also, I think the reason why people want you to sit down, take a seat, is typically, when you have other sit down, you are putting people in a more submissive person than you.

For example, even when you go to church or mass… And there is part of mass or church in which everyone has to sit down, the priest stands up and then give their speech. You never see a priest giving a homily while sitting.

Chairs?

Even a simple thing, when I am eating food, I prefer to stand! In fact, one of my ongoing theories is if you’re a competitive eater or whatever, or if you want to digest better, it is better to eat while standing, rather than sitting. Why? When you’re standing, I think technically your intestines or your digestion is in better physiological form.

Jobs which allow you to be outside, walk around, stand all day?

Apparently, meeting some guys at the local Toyota dealership, very impressive, one of the guys showed me their step counter on their phone, and showed me that on average, he walked about 20,000 steps a day! Very impressive.

Also, my old friend Jimmy the mailman, USPS worker, told me that on average he walked at least 40,000 steps a day?

Outside is the ultimate freedom

Also, apparently a job that I never considered was being a park ranger, in which technically you’re almost like a police officer, you have a gun, but your job is to create some sort of security at the national parks?

I was thinking about it, even a military duty… I feel bad for all the Navy officers and this men who had to just be stuck in aircraft carrier, or in these cramped indoor domiciles all day?

Or even astronauts, I think the number one issue that most astronauts face is not having the freedom to move around, being stuck in the same old place?

This is where visions of the future astronaut is interesting when it has to deal with gravity, water, swimming in a pool etc.

If you were an astronaut, or stuck in a spaceship, assuming you could produce some sort of artificial gravity, being able to lift weights, swim in the water seems like a good idea! And also, artificial sunlight.

Innovate for the sake of what?

Michael Saylor has a good idea; that is simple life goal or a path is to upgrade the human race. I like this.

Because sooner or later… after years of studying philosophy, going off the grid, etc.… I think the philosopher innovator simply wants to serve human kind, benefit humankind, etc.

And I think this is the nice thing about humanity, the false commentary we get is that humans are naturally selfish, I don’t think so. I think naturally humans are actually very selfless, we think about the collective, the clan, and I think there is natural altruism within ourselves!

Why? A single human being by himself is useless. There is no human being that could collectively hunt cook procure resources, and do everything by himself, or herself. We all need each other.

Even for myself, I am so grateful for society, I’m glad that I don’t have to grow my own cattle, produce my own firewood, produce my own petroleum for my car, we have to figure out advanced technologies to create my own Internet.

The best way to scale yourself

It seems that a simple strategy is to embrace websites, blogs, the web, digital, cyberspace, maybe having a podcast, a video podcast, a YouTube channel, a self hosted email newsletter, your own self hosted blog etc.

Why? Because in theory, let us say that you publish a free PDF e-book on something… A single individual could downloaded it 1000 times, send it to 1000 of their friends, and 1000 of their friends could send it to another thousand of their friends.

Or, in theory, a single blog post could be read 1 billion times,, shared saved and downloaded etc.

Plain text

I’ve been having this annoying issue where I can no longer upload videos to my videopress.com, to my wordpress.org blog. I’m not 100% sure what’s the issue, but I don’t want to put forth the effort to fix it. I’m just like “fuck it”– no more videos.

I think also the biggest issue with videos is that it is not easily transportable, the file sizes are far too large, even assuming that you have a gigabit fiber Internet connection. And unfortunately 99.99% of the planet is running on some sort of super rudimentary, super slow, super low and bandwidth Internet.

And as a consequence, the reason why I really like text, markdown, simple blog post with text is that it is the ultimate portable thing. You could just copy and paste the whole thing into ChatGPT, or to Google translate, whatever.

Even now, whenever I send out an email newsletter, I always make it a point to export all the text as a simple text based PDF, and I attach it, because if anyone wants to download it and read it later, share it with friends or family or whatever, it is so easy!

And in fact, the reason why I really like the idea of a PDF is that it is a digital book. Technically, a book only needs to have at least two pages, for it to be book.

Don’t put any faith in all these oversensitive emo book nerds, who gave fellatio to the hardcover, printed book.

The future of books?

The truth is 99.99% of books could just be really long blog posts.

But, why do they overinflate these boring ass books? Simple: to make money! It is difficult to monetize a single blog post, easy to take a 300 page book, hardcover it, and sell it for 40 bucks.

And the truth is, 99.99% of modern day books published within the last 10 years are not worth reading.

The only modern day books that have read, which has had any consequence on me the last 10 years published was books by NASSIM TALEB, Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, zero to one by Peter Thiel. That is pretty much it.

As a consequence, this is where using the Internet archive, project Gutenberg for books is so wise; typically if a book is out of copyright, at least it has the test of time which might mean that it has a higher likelihood of being good.

For example economies, to study ancient books on economics, rather than any modern day ones.

For example, economics by Aristotle, or on money by Fernandinho Galliani.

Ancient media?

Maybe only watch movies which are at least 10 years old, or 20 years old, or 30 years old? Or even older than that?

And also the wisdom of reading ancient literature, anything by homer, the Iliad the Odyssey – even Virgil is no good. Virgil is too modern, the Aeneid was really boring.

Think Greek

Even in ancient Greek times, the commentary was that the Greeks were already in a position of decline. For example, even homer in the Iliad talks about how the modern day Greeks of his time were already degenerate. Or weak.

The reason why I like reading ancient literature is that it is so simple, so blunt, so great, yet so poetic and elegant. For example when you read the Iliad, thinking about “the dark beaked ships” does 1 billion times more for your creative imagination than any modern day boring book, and also do not trust the French writers, like Balzac they were all a bunch of degenerates addicted to drugs, smoking, narcotics etc.

Only trust sober artists.

Even Nietzsche was very anti alcohol, meth, and “uppers”– opiates of his time, etc.

The Spartan Street photographer

My new idea.

ERIC

The Multi modal approach?

A simple approach is when you create things and ideas, do a multimodal approach; audio, visual, text… Do it all!

Creative ways to lower expenses?

My new pursuit is via negativia– my Spartan economic approach.

First, don’t waste money at a car wash, which can get pretty expensive… Just hose it down and wash it yourself!

Second, unsubscribe from everything which has a recurring expense. This means all streaming services, all music platforms, etc.

Get rid of Disney+, Netflix, Spotify, HBO Max etc.

Also, if you’re clever enough, cancel or get rid of your gym membership. On killing multiple birds with one stone:

No more reoccurring expenses, which in theory, last indefinitely
Opportunity cost, time saved not having to commute.
Also, time saved in regards to not having to find parking, waiting for the squat rack etc.
I also have an ongoing period that exercising in the great outdoors is far beneficial for your health, outside, even when it is very cold… Is better for your physiology than doing it indoors, which is just a breeding ground for Covid!

Anti COVID lifestyle?

How quickly we forget about Covid… Even now, there is currently a spike in Covid, which has me very nervous and anxious; I cannot afford to get sick, or catch Covid.

I’ve been taking Seneca to these great free events… But even playing with some of these kids, Lego camp, brick building etc.… All these activities are indoors! With no windows open or no ventilation on!

Maybe I’m going to recenter myself, and avoid all indoor places like the plague, as much as humanly possible.

Even another pragmatic reason to stop going to the gym or cancel your gym membership, even a 1% chance of getting sick, or catching Covid from some sort of anti-VAXxer?

Your kid?

Maybe I’ll start my own Montessori?

Issues:

If, your kid is forced to be inside a classroom all day… With all these other sick coughing kids, maybe none of it is worth it?
Also, these modern day kids, with all these weird media preferences, are a bad influence?

Certainly you cannot shield your kids forever, but if I think about it… the only good thing I got out of school K-12 is socialization skills, my friends etc. But still… now is a 36-year-old adult, I only truly care for two of my childhood friends, Grace and Justin, and also my college roommate Kevin. Besides this, I don’t really consider anyone else my friend.

When somebody calls you “my friend“… you’re not.

Only invest in the best

The best or nothing!

ERIC

“Imma let you finish”

“Role models”?

All role models are flawed. Besides you.

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IMPERATIVES

Posture is the future?

Imperative? What is your personal imperatives in life?

So some big thoughts I’ve been having lately; about imperatives, ethical and moral imperatives, thinking about what to do in life, what not to do in life, etc.

Unemployed is something that stirs you from within, something which you are not forced to do by anybody, but rather, it is “autotelic”; it feels like it is your own moral self impelled reason to do something, for the city of it, not for the sake of virtue or whatever.

Where we go wrong

One of the things that I Deas about modern day education, is too much of a has to deal with morals and ethics. Yes yes yes, traditional K-12 education we have to learn basic things like how to write read basic rules of grammar etc.

Also, simple math, science, physics, fundamentals.

I am the teacher, you are the student, I am superior and more dominant than you, do not challenge me.

What is the point of K-12 education anyways?

First, free babysitting, or a free place to put your kids while you have to work your job, to pay the bills and rent.

Second, not all parents, but some… I don’t think a lot of parents would actually prefer to be with their kids 24/7. I find this insanely bizarre.

Certainly everyone has the right to live their lives however they want, but I suppose this is just a class thing:

Let the basic parents be basic, our goal is to be supreme.

Why be basic?

This is where things become fun; everyone seeks some sort of individuality, moral or ethical supremacy, yet, people tend to trend towards being basic?

For example, the average person drinks Coca-Cola or sweetened beverages, whether 0 cal or real sugar or agave sugar or whatever, the average American is over fat, the average American man watches pornography in private, the average person eats McDonald’s, eats three square meals a day, finances their car and has a monthly car payment, has a mortgage, walks less than 1000 steps a day, spends an hour commuting to work, or five hours a day on zoom, uses Google Chrome, read the news, is on Facebook Instagram or Google news, watches YouTube, allows their kids to watch YouTube or YouTube YouTube kids etc.

Once again… Do you want to drive the Toyota Corolla, or the matte Black cyber truck?

“I’m the number one idea supplier!”

I think for myself, my number one passion skill, and talent is ideas. I never run out of them! In fact, as time goes on, my penchant for ideas is intensifying. I quit this to the fact that this is the most I’ve ever walked in my life, every morning I wake up, pound my espressos, toss on my 60 pound weight vest, and I go on my daily morning walk, in which I walk with my iPad Pro, voice dictate my thoughts, and come up with lots of ideas.

Ideation

The ideas are in your legs!

There is talk about “creative ideation“ in Silicon Valley, the basic idea is this–

How do you come up with creative ideas?

My major critique is too many of these artists are too effeminate, weak, overly sensitive, black access to sunlight and the great outdoors, super pale in the skin and lacks a tan, never goes out, never leaves their home apartment studio or cafe, doesn’t lift weights, or exercise, eats mostly “a plant-based diet” (trust no thinker who is mostly plant-based), and seeks their moral supremacy in their artwork through how obscure, strange, or anti-they are.

True art is not anti

The reason why a lot of thinkers and artists are very superficial is that they seek their uniqueness simply through being anti-.

And also, when it comes down to it, we are actually all far more similar than dissimilar. We all have to use the toilet, we all have friends family members and loved ones, we all have good memories and bad, we all similar ends, and have similar goals.

The major problem here is that we tend to vilify one another, and over-exaggerate our differences, rather than trying to intensify our similarities.

How are they similar?

For example, when it comes to material or consumerism, we try to intensify how these things are different rather than similar.

But wouldn’t the wiser path be to consider, how these things are more similar than dissimilar?

For example, we all speak the English language, anybody who speaks English or understands English is 80% more similar to you than dissimilar to you.

We all care for money, whether we like to admit it or not.

We meant, we all care for beautiful women, we all have certain sexual preferences etc.

And also, everybody likes to be happy! Even good old Aristotle said how happiness might be one of the only human good in which we seek it for the sick of it; I don’t know anybody who doesn’t see happiness or who doesn’t like to be happy?

Why divide?

Here, the bad guys are not politicians, or even nation states, I really think that the bad guys here is the media, the news etc. Why do they care so much to differentiate us all, and to divide us all? The simple idea is that it is more profitable. The more division, the more you insight, the more advertising clicks and revenue you get.

Hate is profitable

The simplest way to become happier is via negativa:

Quit the news!

What is the news? Anger porn, hate porn!

for example, the more you insight hate, violence, moral justice, moral virtuosity whatever… You stoke more advertising revenue!

This is where Google knows that it isn’t a bad position; there are desperate to indefinitely increase their revenue, advertising revenue, and how do they do this? They do this by inserting ads, sneakily into every part of your existence. The ad advertising in your Google Chrome newsfeed, the ad advertising Inside your Google maps, I won’t be surprised if one day the ad advertisements within your Gmail in the future.

Also, Facebook, Instagram, the meta-corporation: once again, any business or company or corporation, tech company that earns revenue through advertising is unethical; the only way they could earn money is through stoking fear, uncertainty, doubt, racism, classism, etc.

Let us consider, what is going to get more advertising clicks, Donald Trump saying something racist or sexist, or a story of a friendly boy helping a grandma across the street?

Duh!

Music

Also critique on music, modern day music etc.; the very very simple thought is this:

> Don’t trust any music which is dependent by any publishing label.

Very very simple here guys, any musician, who is assigned to any label… They are like puppets, the publishing label is like a ventriloquist.

“She going to take it up the ass like a ventriloquist!” – Ye, Carnival

For example, when you see all these rappers, talking about money clothes hoes, Lamborghinis chains etc., how do you know that they’re not just a Muppet? With a hand up their ass, forcing them to just say whatever?

Music to trust?

Or, another masterpiece; “a Written testimony“ by Jay Electronica, and Jay Z. Here, Jay Z is already rich, he don’t need to make music to make money. And this is where Jay Z actually throws down his cotton, and takes out all the big arms, and says:

“Time for me to actually rap well”.

And this is where I find the whole Jay Z the real Jay Z; the master vocalist, the master rapper, the sweetest flower. And also Jay Electronica, Jay Z almost becomes a patron saint for Jay electronica, allowing Jay electronica to also shine, because when you already have monetary backing from an independently wealthy person, the artwork creates doesn’t have to monetize itself.

For example, this is the Sistine chapel; imagine how subpar the Sistine chapel would be if Michelangelo needed to somehow monetize it?

Also, all the great artwork by Leonardo da Vinci, innovations etc.; because Leonardo da Vinci had the backing from the Medici, he was able to just focus on his random thoughts and personal interest… Which allowed him to make great innovations!

Cool hair?

How to become more handsome, more beautiful, sexier? Very simple: via negativa!

And then just get some “eco” olive oil hair gel on Amazon, and slick it back!

Better to have a Lamborghini haircut than to drive the loser Lamborghini

That is consider, the second that you dropped $250,000 on a Lamborghini, that is money which is instantly evaporated from your bank account! And the problem is… You feel cool in your car when you’re driving it, and people are checking out, but the second that you Park it, and you walk around in public… Nobody has any idea that you drive a Lamborghini, unless you’re insecure individual who has to wear a Lamborghini hat, to try to signal to people that you drive a Lamborghini.

But the thing is… The second step into the gym, walk around in a public place, go to the local coffee shop, go to the local bookstore, ride the subway, go to a public event, go hiking, go to the mall etc.… Nobody has any idea what you drive!

So the funny thoughts; could you spend that $250,000, and purchase something that you could permanently bolt onto your body?

This is where I think bitcoin is so wise; the second you spent $250,000 on a Lamborghini, the value of your Lamborghini will slowly depreciate overtime, you will slowly bleed yourself to death, and also, to pay for insurance, maintenance will bleed dry.

Lose fat

If we consider fat like a biological battery, the genius is this:

if you have any margin of adipose tissue AK fat on your body… That is your metaphorical biological battery, your body is not like a gasoline powered car; you don’t need to put gas into it in order to drive.

Maybe it is better that, to think about your body like a Tesla, or an electric car, and the biological fat you have on your body is like the battery pack!

So for example, let us say that you are 6 foot tall, and you weigh 200 pounds, and you definitely have body fat on you. Or let us say you don’t have a six pack.

Then I could estimate, perhaps 160 pounds of muscle, and 40 pounds of it might be body fat, adipose tissue. And how long can 40 pounds of adipose tissue last you? Probably at least 100,000 miles!

This is where metabolic disease, or metabolic dysfunction have been; you already have all this body fat on you, yet you still think you have to keep eating, in order to sustain your life?

No! Just start fasting! Fasting if you are over fat, fat, “overweight” or whatever — has zero consequences, zero side effects, and doesn’t cost you anything. The suggestion for people to start fasting is genius because it doesn’t require any equipment, any subscription, or any amount of money, and also technically… Fasting or too fast doesn’t require you to do anything – to cook, pork food, and eat it, or even ordering takeout from your phone, we’re ordering food is a positive action, simply choosing not to eat doesn’t require you to do anything!

Posture

Something that I realize for myself, is that the whole time, I think I’ve had extremely poor posture. Always kind of hunched over, you see this happened to a lot of tech workers. My result is from too much time on the laptop, too much time standing or sitting, etc. Even if you have a standing desk or treadmill desk, for your posture. Why? The axis and the plane is only single directional — we tend to hunch forward, or if you think about a treadmill desk, you only walk forward.

The ideal, which I’ve been experimenting and doing myself, is simple:

Don’t use an iPhone, all iPhones are bad
Use an iPad Pro, the 11 inch, without a loser keyboard case or pencil
For jotting down thoughts, walking around, in the direct sun, using the voice dictation built into the iOS, the little microphone button in the bottom left corner
Just walking around town

Why this could be so revolutionary

“Trust no thought that doesn’t come to you while you are walking outside in the great outdoors!” – Nietzsche

All of these fools, what they try to do instead is to just figure out a better table or desk or chair setup; in order to cause them to not have any sort of back pain. But the real idea should be

Get rid of the table, don’t use any tables, no desk, no sitting desk, no standing desk, no treadmill desks
Get rid of the chairs, no chairs. Chairs are for slaves

Anti chairs

What is the most unnatural position for a human being to be in? To sit.

Technically, a human being should be standing, or walking around, or, if a human being is tired, a human being should be lying on their back, sleeping or taking a nap.

Either stand and walk around, or lie down on your back.

And this is where I’m starting to think… All chairs are bad. Being a pilot of a fighter jet, you’re still sitting on your butt on a chair. Or if you’re in the Lamborghini or McLaren… You’re just in a chair.

Wheel – chair?

The greatest tragedy, for a man, is to be beholden to a wheelchair, simply to navigate.

Also, I think the reason why people want you to sit down, take a seat, is typically, when you have other sit down, you are putting people in a more submissive person than you.

Chairs?

Jobs which allow you to be outside, walk around, stand all day?

Also, my old friend Jimmy the mailman, USPS worker, told me that on average he walked at least 40,000 steps a day?

I was thinking about it, even a military duty… I feel bad for all the Navy officers and this men who had to just be stuck in aircraft carrier, or in these cramped indoor domiciles all day?

Or even astronauts, I think the number one issue that most astronauts face is not having the freedom to move around, being stuck in the same old place?

This is aware visions of future astronaut is interesting when it has to deal with gravity, water, swimming in a pool etc.

Innovate for the sake of what?

Michael Saylor has a good idea; that is simple life goal or a path is to upgrade the human race. I like this.

Because sooner or later… After years of studying philosophy, going off the grid, etc.… I think her philosopher innovator simply wants to serve human kind, benefit humankind, etc.

why? A single human being by himself is useless. There is no human being that could collectively hunt cook procure resources, and do everything by himself, or herself. We all need each other.

Even for myself, I am so grateful for society, I’m glad that I don’t have to grow my own cattle, produce my own firewood, Produce my own petroleum for my car, we have to figure out advanced technologies to create my own Internet.

The best way to scale yourself

Why? Because in theory, let us say that you publish a free PDF e-book on something… A single individual could downloaded 1000 times, send it to 1000 of their friends, and 1000 of their friends could send it to another thousand of their friends.

Or, in theory, a single blog post could be read 1 billion times,, shared saved and downloaded etc.

Plain text

I’ve been having this annoying issue where I can no longer upload videos to my video press.com, wordpress.org blog. I’m not 100% sure what’s the issue, but I don’t want to put forth the effort to fix it. I’m just like “fuck it”– no more videos.

And in fact, the reason why I really like the idea of a PDF is that it is a digital book. Technically, a book only needs to have at least two pages, for it to be book.

Don’t put any faith in all these oversensitive emo book nerds, who gave fellatio to the hardcover, printed book.

The future of books?

The truth is 99.99% of books could just be really long blog posts.

But, why do they overinflate these boring ass books? Simple: make money! Difficult to monetize a single blog post, easy to take a 300 page book, hardcover it, and sell it for 40 bucks.

And the truth is, 99.99% of modern day books published within the last 10 years are not worth reading.

For example economies, to study ancient books and economies, rather than any modern day ones.

For example, economics by Aristotle, or on money by Fernandinho Galliani.

Ancient media?

Maybe only watch movies which are at least 10 years old, or 20 years old, or 30 years old? Or even older than that?

And also the wisdom of reading ancient literature, anything by homer, the Iliad the Odyssey – even Virgil is no good. Virgil is too modern, the Aeneid was really boring.

Think Greek

The reason why I like reading ancient literature is that it is so simple, so blunt, so great, yet so poetic and elegant. For example when you read the Eliott, thinking about “the dark beaked ships” does 1 billion times more for your creative imagination than any modern day boring book, and also do not trust the French writers, like Balzac they were all a bunch of degenerates addicted to drugs, smoking, narcotics etc.

Only trust sober artists.

Even Nietzsche was very anti alcohol, meth, and “uppers”– opiates of his time, etc.

The Spartan Street photographer

My new idea.

ERIC

The Multi modal approach?

A simple approach is when you create things and ideas, do a multimodal approach; audio, visual, text… Do it all!

Creative ways to lower expenses?

My new pursuit is via negativia– my Spartan economic approach.

First, don’t waste money at a car wash, which can get pretty expensive… Just hose it down and wash it yourself!

Second, unsubscribe from everything which has a recurring expense. This means all streaming services, all music platforms, etc.

Get rid of Disney+, Netflix, Spotify, HBO Max etc.

Also, if you’re clever enough, cancel or get rid of your gym membership. On killing multiple birds with one stone:

No more reoccurring expenses, which in theory, last indefinitely
Opportunity cost, time saved not having to commute.
Also, time saved in regards to not having to find parking, waiting for the squat rack etc.
I also have an ongoing period that exercising in the great outdoors is far beneficial for your health, outside, even when it is very cold… Is better for your physiology than doing it indoors, which is just a breeding ground for Covid!

Anti COVID lifestyle?

How quickly we forget about Covid… Even now, there is currently a spike in Covid, which has me very nervous and anxious; I cannot afford to get sick, or catch Covid.

I’ve been taking Seneca to these great free events… But even playing with some of these kids, camp, brick building etc.… All these activities are indoors! With no windows open or no ventilation on!

Maybe I’m going to recenter myself, and avoid all indoor places like the plague, as much as humanly possible.

Even another pragmatic reason to stop going to the gym or cancel your gym membership, even a one percent chance of getting sick, or catching Covid from some sort of anti-VAXxer?

Your kid?

Maybe I’ll start my own Montessori?

Issues:

If, your kid is forced to be inside a classroom all day… With all these other sick coughing kids, maybe none of it is worth it?
Also, these modern day kids, with all these weird media preferences, are a bad influence?

Certainly you cannot shield your kids forever, but if I think about it… Only good thing I got out of school K-12 is socialization skills, my friends etc. But still… Now is a 36-year-old adult, I only truly care for two of my childhood friends, Grace and Justin, and also my college roommate Kevin. Besides this, I don’t really consider anyone else my friend.

When somebody calls you “my friend “… you’re not.

Only invest in the best

The best or nothing!

ERIC

“Imma let you finish”

“Role models”?

All role models are flawed. Besides you.

Man is the strongest

IMPOSSIBLE TO DESTROY EVEN IF YOU TRIED?

Or better yet, systems which becomes stronger after you attempt to destroy it?

My boxer briefs?

So at our current apartment, we have one of these funny all in one washer units, made by LG, in which the value proposition is really fascinating: typically, historically, the apartment unit we are renting, doesn’t have much room for a washer and dryer, as two separate units. As a consequence, our current landlord had the genius idea of installing these all in one units, which are great because it allows for us to have a washer and dryer in unit, instead of having to use one of those communal laundry things.

In LA, having an in unit washer and dryer might be the most critical thing.

Even one of the grand downsides of a lot of homes, condominium in LA is you still have to use some sort of communal coin laundry, which is a major pain in the ass, especially once you have kids!

Anyways, the way that this washer and dryer works is fascinating, it first washes it, and then it dries the clothes at extremely high heat. However one of the grand downsides is that it destroys your clothes.

For example, last summer, I made a bunch of clothes, I designed and created two silk tank tops, which have now been destroyed by my all in one washer and dryer, and also the linen tank top that I have created, or also starting to slowly fall apart. And almost all of my merino wool clothes have been torn to shreds.

Often when you purchase certain clothing, often there is a sign on it that you have to delicately wash them, maybe hand wash them, air dry them, whatever. Or have it dry cleaned at a local dry cleaner.

But when it comes down to it… sooner or later you’re just gonna get lazy and just throw it all on the washing machine. Ain’t nobody have time for delicate washing of your clothes, especially if you’re a man.

Anyways, as a result, I call it the durability test; ain’t no clothes worth having, if you cannot throw it in that washer and dryer 1000 times, without having it fall apart to shreds.

For example, do not purchase any clothes from tenthousand.cc – I purchased with my own money these “tactical“ shorts, which were supposed to be indestructible, but already, after even a month or so, there are falling apart at the stitching scene in the waistband! Terrible.

Also, even though outlier.nyc fine merino wool t-shirts might be the best T-shirt on the planet, after all several years about going through about five of them, once again all eventually sooner or later getting destroyed in the washing machine, I no longer recommend them. Why? Once again the durability test; sooner or later it will rip apart to shreds, through typical wear and tear.

Ain’t nobody got time for this!

I also visited the family home the other day, and currently my brother-in-law and sister-in-law are on vacation, which means that their cars are sitting down in the the driveway for about two weeks, and it looks like my brother-in-law John had the wisdom to keep one of the cars charging, the 4 runner, with one of those electrical outlet battery charging packs, because I think with certain cars, if you don’t turn on the car every once in a while, if you just let a car sit to Dorman for a month or so, the battery dies.

Also I’m not 100% sure, but apparently the same thing happens with electric cars; if your Tesla is at 100% charge, and you go on holiday for six months, and you come back… Your Tesla might be dead?

I’m not 100% sure, but if you had a Prius or hybrid vehicle, you had a full tank of gas, you left the country for a year, would your car still start up? Not sure.

The best vs the most durable

The other day I was with Seneca, at the local Pickleball court, the mini tennis court, and I was playing and teaching him how to play tennis, and throwing around the football etc., and Seneca wanted to bring over my satchel bag, but I forgot to clip it in, so when he dragged it over, the food container, my Lumix G9 camera, and the key fell out. Seneca said “Uh oh”– and quickly put the things back in, and I realize that he had dropped the LUMIX G9 camera on the hardcourt. I picked it up, it, and realized that it was just fine!

The reason why this is such a big deal is that the thing is built like a tank! I’ve probably dropped it on the floor, even on the concrete from waist level, maybe three or four times, and the thing keeps going!

Lamborghini came out with the Hurucan Sterrato– which at first I thought was a very bizarre chimera —

Isn’t the point of a Lamborghini to be this sleek, typical road vehicle, all shiny and glossy and stuff?

Then if you look at the Lamborghini Huracan sterrato — in military green, the value proposition is fascinating; they lifted it off the floor a little bit higher, to give it greater ground clearance (I find this very innovative, because it looks like the trend of super sports cars, or even the tuner community is to slam your car as low to the ground as humanly possible, to the point that your butt is dragging), and it looks like they armored it up, kind of like an armored vehicle. Essentially, if a Lamborghini were to go to war, and needed steroids or whatever, it would be the sterrato.

Evyn about a month or so, in the Culver City arts district I saw a Porsche 911 the car, which is the Abu Dhabi, off Roading desert Porsche 911; which is intended to be taken off Roading. As a consequence, They also did similar modifications to it, making it a bit taller, putting on beef your tires, roof rack etc.

Anyways, I saw driving down the street, and I had all this luggage on top of it, I thought it was super cool!

Lift your Prius?

If life were a video game, I might do something similar to my Prius. Give it some steroid fender flares, make it look like an armored vehicle. Give it a stainless steel exoskeleton, like a cyber truck, a single blade horizontal tail light, maybe lifted, make it look bulletproof.

And also, one of my great joys about walking around town with my 60 pound weight fest, is not only does it improve my posture, forces me to stand up taller, and move around more (the interesting thing is when you’re wearing a 60 pound weight, to stand static, to stand and not move, it actually causes you pain)– to keep moving, to keep walking, to keep shifting your weight around, doesn’t cause any pain.

In fact, I think it is actually better for you physiologically to just go on a leisurely paced walk, with your 60 pound weight vest, for a mile, rather than run at a medium high intensity or even a high intensity for 10 miles.
In fact, the whole value proposition of running is insanely bizarre. I think people do it because they think it is good “exercise”? Or that they want to “burn calories“?

If this is the case, just drop them with a 60 pound weight vest, and see how they will fare?

Walking is sexier and more manly.

Once again, can you imagine the elite Spartan 300, prancing around town like sick gazelle? Nope. Rather, they’re just chilling, in their Spartan bikinis, tall, proud, chest up, with their crimson leather capes, glorious six packs and all.

Bodies are the future

What is the purpose of a human body, of sex, sexual desire? To have children! The reason why I find all this modern day millennial stuff so superficial is that none of it is around getting married having children etc.

If anything, all of these miserable emo losers have started a war against children, against families, against the marriage.

What is the purpose of biological, including the life of a human being? Super simple; having progeny– replicating yourself! Whenever you look at any sort of biological organism on the planet, even algae; or yogurt cultures, the living strategy is simple: consume resources, consume nutrition, and grow bigger, in whatever shape or form or manner which is most conducive to you.

For mammals, that is to have a totally separate child, which is a lot more startup energy, but has greater long-term benefits.

do you want to be old, alone, no children or grandchildren, when you are 80 years old inside a nursing facility?

I think the greatest things about philosophy, studying philosophy thinking about philosophy etc. is very simple; think of the way backwards, memento Mori, about the last stages of your life, looking back.

Nobody who is eight years old, senile, Alzheimer’s, wishes that they earned more money became more famous or bedded more babes. They wished they had kids, grandchildren, something that would outlast them. You cannot leave anything behind to your dog.

And no, your dog will not outlast you.

Digital durability

What is the hardest thing on the planet? Bitcoin. No matter how hard you try, you cannot destroy it. Even if you took all of the Amazon web services servers, all the Google servers on the planet, and tried to attack the network, you would fail. Even if you had $100 trillion worth of capital, and you tried to attack the bitcoin network, you still would fail.

Once again you have to think at least 300 years from now. What will last 300 years from now? Your children’s children’s children, your kids kids kids. You want your genealogy your lineage to last in theory indefinitely. I think this is the logic of having lots of kids; even if you have two kids, there might be a chance neither of them ever get married, never have kids, and when you are starting to 70 years old, and they are still not married, almost in their 40s, you start to get a bit concerned.

For your Instagram your TikTok account be around 300 years from now? Certainly not. Maybe your YouTube account might; has not been taken down by Google.

I am certain that Google will be around 300 years from now, because at this point honestly, Google is the Internet. also, unfortunately we will still be using e-mail 300 years from now, sending an email to Mars or whatever. And we might still have Gmail.

Maybe the exoskeleton of your cyber truck might still be around 300 years from now, but whether the battery pack or system will still work 300 years from now is a bit dubious;

Will humans still be using fossil fuels 300 years from now? Probably not.

If it ain’t broken, if it hasn’t broke yet… Good sign.

We humans make the foolish mistake of always wanting to upgrade the newest technology the newest homes etc. for example, very doubtful that your iPhone Pro will last 300 years from now.

Also, any sort of fashion trend you embrace in regards to clothes or whatever, this will also not last.

I think theoretically, there is a way that your website can last 300 years from now. I think the overall workflow is to have your payment for your website hosting to be linked to your bitcoin wallet, and just have it set up that indefinitely, your Web hosting fee will withdraw automatically from your bitcoin wallet. in theory this is already possible with Coinbase, and the Coinbase debit Visa card; it is my personal ambition for my website and blog to last at least 300 years!

Censorship proof, censorship resistant?

A random note and thought on nations. What is the best nation? The best civilization in nation is the one that has been around the longest! For example, China; China has been around forever; because I suppose the Chinese dynasty is intelligent enough to think thousands of years ahead; and also the way that the society is structured is that Individual doesn’t matter that much; it is all for the glory of the Chinese empire!

America is funny case– we are certainly the Apex nation state on the planet, by at least 10 X, but we thrive on individualism. But anyways, capitalism isn’t going away anytime soon; certainly there will still be people gambling on the spaceship shuttle casino, on the way to Mars, and there will still be these ridiculous shopping centers on the spaceship, kind of like that space movie with Chris Pratt.

Once again, anybody who is anti-capitalism who owns an iPhone or an iPhone Pro, who uses the Internet, has a Gmail account, has ever watched YouTube, Twitter, Went on a hike, traveled to Japan, been to Paris, etc.; don’t you fools know that this is all due to the glory of capitalism?

Or, ever ordered a coffee at a local café, or red books at a book library, purchase organic foods, gone to a farmers market whatever… This is all capitalism.

Capitalist

I have this notion of Spartan capitalism, in which perhaps the capital, the capital we accumulate and we build is not superficial things, but ourselves, our bodies, our mind etc.

The simple rule here is to think at least 300 years ahead:

Have as many kids as humanly possible
Produce media books literature texts etc. which you think will still be useful 300 years from now
Try to build platforms and things which will last 300 years from now like Amazon, Google, Facebook etc.
Be so insanely frugal that you could live your life to the max without having to “work” for the next 300 years
Don’t invest in or build upon things that won’t be around 300 years from now.

Tesla

I’m pretty bullish that Tesla will be around 300 years from now. Why? if we colonize Mars, and we set up solar panels, probably we will be able to drive the cyber truck around Mars.

Also, maybe we will still be using petroleum 300 years and now, but I’m pretty bullish and thinking that 300 years from now, the battery technology, the charging technology, as well as solar power technology will be so good, there will be no more need for petroleum. Bad news for the Middle East.

Also, I think 300 years from now… I think this notion of communism will just be swept under the rug. Even nation states like China will become more like oligarchies, in which a few rich powerful individuals, or like the new feudalism, individual rich families will control things.

My personal prediction is 300 years from now, Korea will almost become like the new America for Asia– southeast Asians, Vietnamese people etc., in search of a better life will immigrate to South Korea. And also, I think 300 years from now, North Korea will eventually be usurped by South Korea, kind of like how Ho Chi Minh unified the north and the south of Vietnam.

Very certain that America will be around 300 years from now. Maybe Israel will be around 300 years from now, I think much of the Middle East will be a mess; Beirut Lebanon will still be around (the Phoenix), turkey or at least Istanbul will still be around, Paris and New York City will still be around.

Maybe will happen is that these great cities will still be around, like Tokyo, but the borders will become more fluid, or different?

Let us consider, zoning laws are always being changed, either by politicians or companies. Even here in Culver City, there’s this new movement for predicting the next 20 years, and they are proposing new zoning laws. My low-key suspicion is that Apple is trying to create more commercial Real estate, as the new Apple headquarters for media and entertainment is now Culver City.

In fact, I’m sure that Los Angeles will be around 300 years from now, probably a lot hotter, maybe more polluted. People will still be streaming Netflix shows 300 years from now, I think there will still be some sort of iPhone notion around; 300 years from now we will not be walking around with vision pros; even 300 years from now, nobody likes the feeling of anything on their heads, or their eyeballs.

no virtual reality contact lenses, these are a pain in the butt. And I also think that most people will opt not to do an elective surgery to implant a Neuro computer chip inside your brains; maybe this will only be done to labor workers, the new peasants, digital serfs etc.

Maybe 300 years from now, the new digital overlords will all be digital free; still sending their kids to schools with wooden toys, no devices etc., while the rest of these kids in the hood and in south central are still being spoonfed YouTube and Chromebooks?

Last

300 years or nothing baby!
ERIC

TIME

Time is the ultimate instructor, and reveals all things.

For example, do you know who your true friends are, based on time. If you have been friends with somebody, or have kept in contact with somebody for over a decade, or two… It is a signal that you truly care for them.

Also, durability, things which last, people which last. Artist, Art and ideas which last.

And also, often it takes a really long time to just figure things out. For example, I truly believe that it takes one at least two years upon moving to a new place that you figure out how to truly live there well.

For example, I think the optimal duration to live somewhere is at least two years, before you decide to Lillypad and lily frog off onto somewhere else.

For example, it took at least two years while living in Providence Rhode Island, to figure out how to live their virtuously, making new friends, knowing where to go, building a sense of community etc.

Also, living with Cindy‘s family, her mom‘s house, the family house in the suburbs of Orange County. Took us a while experimenting with a bunch of stuff before we figure it out exercise and fitness related and living related things; for example Cindy discovering hot yoga there, And rediscovering my local gym, buying my Texas power squat bar etc.

I’m close to almost a year and living in Culver City, here in LA, and I’m starting to think and feel that I am actually starting to kind of figure things out. For example, I’m starting to understand a little bit better traffic patterns in Los Angeles, essentially you never want to leave your house after 3 PM, you never want to be in a car Ideally after 2 PM.

I think this is why the Geo location in which you live is so critical, especially in the desirable city like Los Angeles. Why? It seems like the optimal strategy in life is to optimize things in such a way that in theory, you never want to be in a car for more than five minutes a day.

I’m so lucky here in Culver City; I Culver City, especially the arts district in the downtown area, at least 100% or 100 out of 100 in terms of walkability. And also the great thing, if you just want to go on a local hike, go to the mountains, go to higher elevation it is only a three minute drive or so.

Anti cars

First and foremost, I love cars, so does Seneca. We love the design, the concepts, and more recently, at the age of three years, four months old, he has started to understand that race cars uses stick shift, And he is interested in it, even the civic type R which has a stick shift.

The other day, super funny kind and random, met a guy named Jason who owns a 720 S McLaren, I think his job is being a car hunter, His vanity license plate says “CARHUNTER” I think — but anyways, chatted with him a bit, and he said “Does your kid want to sit inside my car? And I said of course!” so Jason pulls up the butterfly doors in his $350,000 car, and Seneca hops in, sits inside the cool bucket seats, with the orange stitching and seat belts, plays with the steering wheel – so cool!

But the funny thing, later that day I asked him whether he liked the McLaren, and he said no. I asked him why? He then told me that he didn’t like it because it only had buttons! That it was not a stick shift! Mind blown:

If a race car or a sports car doesn’t have a stick shift, it is not a race car or a sports car, or at least it is not interesting?

The thing which is actually really funny is that people will just tell you that there is really no more reason left for stick shift, because technically paddle shifting or automatic transmissions are actually superior faster etc. But then again, the argument could also be said about butterfly doors, scissor doors, suicide doors, billionaire doors etc.; there’s really no functional use for it anymore.

The Lamborghini Countach, the reason why it had scissor doors or the reason why it was invented was because the way it was designed, it was too difficult to see behind you while reversing, so before denting your $500,000 car, the driver would actually pull up the scissor doors, look behind them, while slowly reversing.

Now that all the cars have reversing cameras, there is really no reason to have Lamborghini doors anymore. It is all for show!

And that is OK, but shouldn’t we also make the same analysis that similarly speaking, a manual transmission is also foreshow? And that is OK?

Show boat

In America, we have this very very bizarre and strange notion; on one hand, we idolize money wealth, people who make a lot of money etc. Essentially people who make a lot of money are more powerful than you, more successful than you, and also, superior to you.

From moralistic perspective we know this is not true. And also it is not always a desired thing.

For example, some of these jobs, like being an extreme plumber, the smell is so horrendous when cleaning out sewage, even being 10 feet away from a really really bad smelling sewer pipe, I almost feel like throwing up. I would not take that job for being paid $100 million a year.

Also, I think this is a good logical case against prostitution; whether you prostitute your mind your body your soul, your butt hole whatever;

No amount of money is worth it.

“Everyone has to make a living”

This is obvious. There are certain non-negotiables in life like paying the rent, find groceries etc. However, much in life is optional. And I think this is where wisdom knowledge experience, or thinking unorthodox is wise.

For example, I think the number one critical foolish mistake people make is cars, their automobile, etc.

If you want to be a rational human being, it really really seems that the optimal car here is a used Toyota Prius. I recommend the 2010 model up to the 2015 model, which in my mind, has the best design, the most “JDM” (Japanese domestic market, tuner); design, and also, the car has just been on the road forever. The generation before that, the first generation Prius I think looks too bubbly, I hate the design. But I think the 2010 model, has it spot on.

Even another funny nuance, something I never really thought about; trunk space. I think the new new Prius looks super cool, if you see it from the back it looks like a Porsche 911 with the horizontal blade tail light. However, the trunk on it is tiny! My sister-in-law Jennifer bought a brand new one, and when I opened up the trunk, I was shocked! It looks like at least 40% smaller in terms of trunk space compared with the 2010 Prius? I suppose this is the trade off that you make in trying to make it more like a fastback coupe design.

iPhone Pro is only for poor people

How do you know whether somebody is successful or not? Simple– real successful people only use the cheapest iPhones; for example, iPhone SE, or iPhone mini.

It is insane, I see a lot of these working class families, poor working class families, the parents have iPhone pros, often the kids have it too. And the big problem here is that not 100% sure, but I assume that most people don’t buy the iPhone Pro all in cash, they either finance it, or maybe get suckered into some sort of expensive Contract, or something… In those people perpetually stay in poverty.

What is the best way to stay in poverty?

Have a car payment or a lease payment for the rest of your life
Always buy the newest iPhone pro for the rest of your life
Drink alcohol, smoke weed, do drugs, go out, go to the club, go to Vegas, go to festivals
Stay subscribe to all of these streaming services, which is also bleeding you dry!

How did George Washington die?

George Washington was essentially bled to death by his physicians. And let us note, that his personal doctors of the time we’re like imagine having the most reputable Harvard or Stanford doctors, treating you.

During that time, when there was a pseudo scientific notion of humor, blood blood leading, bad blood or whatever… The idea was you have to open up a vein or an artery or something, skillfully let out a portion of “bad blood”, and that your ailment would go away… Even for a long time Koreans believe the same thing, if you were sick, You would use a needle a sterilize needle to pin prick your finger, let out a little bit of “bad blood “, and then, your sickness will go away. We all know this is not true, and because of this pseudoscience, George Washington died.

Also other things; my best friends Steve Jobs. I think in the early stages of his cancer, I think he had liver cancer or pancreatic cancer, he was into all these strange fruitarian, nonsense, in which the general idea was you could somehow starve away the cancer cells by consuming nothing but fruit juice? If they just zapped him with the chemo earlier, he might have actually lived!

Anyways, the first thing you want to do is stop the bleeding. Stop the energy loss!

I’ll give you another example, heating and insulation. For example, during the Los Angeles winter, it actually gets surprisingly cold. And the best way that we were able to stay warm inside the house was to just put up the wind draft insulation thing! We discovered that there was a bad draft coming into the home, from the front door. So even though the house was nice and toasty, it would eventually become really really cold because All the hot air would leave the front door, and all this cold air would come rushing in.

So instead of just blasting the heat 24/7, we did the more effective thing of buying the wind blocker thing on Amazon, installing the heat retention gap insulation stuff on the front door, and then magically, passively, our place retained about at least 40% more heat!

Retain the heat!

I remember the kid when I discovered how jackets worked, I was a bit shocked. I remember as a kid, I always believed that when you put on a jacket, the jacket added heat to your body. But then what I realized was in fact, all the jacket does is retain the heat that your body already has! Mind blown.

And also, now that is getting really really hot, another funny thing I discovered; actually, when it is very very hot, the easiest way to stay cool is actually to just take off your shirt, and wear minimal clothing! Why? The human body is actually very very well adapted; the hair follicles on our skin do an excellent job of dissipating heat. so when it is really really hot, assuming you have sunblock on or whatever… Optimal strategy to stay cool is just takeoff your shirt! This is what they do in Vietnam all the time and it is not a big deal.

Shorts, and your shirt off!

In America, we still have this bizarre Victorian relationship with our body. The reason why it is so hypocritical is that first, American media glorifies the human body. We all want to look like a marvel superhero, with a six pack, huge bulging biceps with veins and all etc.

The women all want to look like the Baywatch babes; happy, Sunkissed skin, happy smiling, juicy cleavage, firm yet plump butt etc.

But the problem is, I’m starting to realize more and more, I can’t believe I only discovered this at the age of 36 is that most of these people are all artificial!

For example, being here in LA, I’m starting to understand or spot better when women get plastic surgery done to their face! And the workflow is simple; if people have done to their face, it is not uncommon for them to have done their chest or their butt.

For women, first look at the face! Then judge everything afterwards.

And also for men, I’m also starting to see… If you see a guy who looks buff, maybe he has tribal tattoos or something, but is also really really red, like unnaturally red, it is typically a signal that they are on steroids or some sort of weird testosterone and boosting thing, because apparently Steroids overheats your body, and as a result your body turns really red. And also you lose hair. This is why whenever you see a guy who is bald, but with a really really long beard, and is super buff, maybe into CrossFit… Perhaps a signal that they are on steroids.

So then what do you do? You ignore all that! Just focus on yourself, it is impossible to know with 100% certain whether other people take steroids or not; yet, it is easy to know 100% certainty whether you takes steroids or not. And also what plastic surgery you did or didn’t do.

Seeking beauty?

Currently I think we are going through a strange time, I called the uglificarion movement. There is now a new cult of ugly. Ugly clothes, ugly hair, ugly bodies, ugly facial hair etc.

It is prevalent both in men and women.

For men, this seems to be the ironic stereotype — even Seneca gets confused by one of our neighbors.

For men, it is too either get some sort of ugly facial hair beard thing, or to be a clean cut and have an ugly Hitler mustache? And then somehow cover up your eyeballs wearing really really dark tennis sunglasses, and some sort of hat or trucker hat?

“Unrealistic”?

the new learned helplessness:

The idea is, learned helplessness?

I think they did some sort of social logical experiment in the past in which they were just keep zapping a poor dog with electrical impulses, and the dog would keep shouting back, yelping back in pain. But after repeat exposures, no the dog would no longer react, Just slide down there helpless. I think they also did a similar experiment with prison inmates or as a torture device; that they would take these prisoners, and just keep electrocuting them, or torturing them for information or whatever, and the torturers would have a kick out of torturing the prisoners, because obviously when you torture somebody, they rile back in pain. But after a while if you do it long enough, the prisoner will no longer react. They will just curl up in a ball, and even though you keep zapping them, it no longer becomes fun for the prison guard. And even after a certain point, the prison guard feels kind of bad about it, and then eventually just goes away.

What is the number one culprit? Everyone thinks it is social media, but actually I think it’s just the news in general. A combination of the iPhone always connected to the Internet, and the ideas that you are constantly injecting your soul with high fructose corn syrup and type two diabetes for the soul, which is news.

All news is toxic. And social media, let us Facebook, is also very toxic because think about how insidious this is; monetize human suffering.

For example, I found out the other day, that somebody we knew in college, very loosely, has three kids, is about my age 36 years old, and is apparently in the last stage of stomach cancer and is going to indefinitely die in the next three months? if you read that, of course this is going to mess up your heartstrings! And affect you for the rest of the day, certainly for long period of time. And then consider, after you read that news, in your newsfeed you see some sort of advertisement for a superficial something?

Evyn apparently now, the millennials the zillenials the generation Z is starting to fight back against Instagram, if you look at the Instagram app in the App Store, read all the negative reviews. They are even trying to do this thing like creating private stories, just for your close friends and family? But as long as they put advertisements anywhere in the Instagram app, it is bad.

Maybe there is something unethical about monetizing human relationships, social relationships, human emotions, and also our sense of well-being?

Even my radical things; for the most part, just disable all the notifications on your phone, besides FaceTime. Stop using text messaging. It is bad.

Also a nuance; on the iPhone go to the settings in the phone app, and disable or silence phone calls from unknown callers, a good way to avoid spam.

Then make FaceTime your ultimate filters; if somebody decides to FaceTime you, it is a sign and the signal that they are your real friend.

In fact, I consider FaceTime to be the most underrated app of all time. It is pure magic!

If I told you as a kid, that you would one day be able to use your phone, and do a video teleconference phone call, with a phone that fits in your front pocket, wouldn’t you think that was magic?

It seems that we have devolved backwards; even though we have the ability for FaceTime, we prefer to text messages instead? What is this the 90s?

The path forward

Distill

I think NASSIM TALEB quotes some sort of aphorism or saying, which goes something like “The ruthless jaws of time shall devour and only leave behind the strong”.

Even when you think about some of these amazing structures of the past, the buildings and the monuments and the architecture which have remained is typically a signal that the architecture of the thing is strong; if the shape of a pyramid lasted thousands of years, time tested it, and shows in fact that a pyramid is a strong and robust design.

This is why even studying art and design, studying the past is a good idea. Why? Really really really great art of the past, this will last. I think 99.99% of the modern art of today, which has to be “explained” to you by some sort of constipated skinny fat loser with Thick spectacles, has less merit.

Even in the bitcoin standard, which is surprisingly 95% a book about the history of money and economics, the author saif critiques modern art,“ somebody who says that effectively all modern art is based on irony, and some sort of bad joke?

Also I would comment the same thing about modern day photography; it is all far too emo, disconnected, ugly, ironic, and boring. Even my teacher Constantine Manos said “big and boring. “ Like printing out a really really big photograph or painting or artwork, and framing it really really big. “But ultimately if it is boring, just making a bigger doesn’t make it more beautiful.

The return to joy, happiness, gayness

Better to be a gay monster than a sentimental bore; Fernando Galliani.

What is the best personality? I say this; be loud, gay, boisterous, outspoken, ratchet, with a booming voice. Don’t talk quiet, don’t be soft, don’t be cautious; this is just social slavery. Let us consider, why is it that the rule in libraries is to be quiet, submissive, “serious“? This is the way that you enslave and control a population. Just look at 99.9% of Japanese society; this is how the emperor was able to get the Japanese people to suicide and, for the sake of the emperor or the Japanese empire? Not rational.

So what now?

You don’t have to do anything, you don’t have to positively do anything or act. Do the opposite, disreact, don’t react.

Also, what is the exact opposite of spending money on something? Don’t spend money. A simple rule; before buying something, wait at least three months before deciding to buy something. Or better yet, even if you have half a second, half a millisecond hesitation before purchasing something, don’t buy it. Buy it. Why? Obvious decisions are obvious obvious, critical decisions are done in a split section without thinking.

In fact, maybe the modern day is that we think that positively thinking is superior than gut action and gut reactions?

All or nothing

Once again — barbell it! 100% or nothing.

With weightlifting, one repetition maximum. Better to just one time, attempt or lift the heaviest way you possibly can, once, rather than doing tedious repetitions.

Also, maybe the same thing with clothing, maybe in your day today, daily living circumstance, dress naked or like a barbarian, and when you go to a wedding, ensure that you are by far the most stylish, and the most dressed up person. Also. When you go to church, suit up! Wear your dress shirts, your blazer jacket.

Also now, now that the sun is becoming super strong in LA, and I’d like to be topless all day, but even for me, the sun is almost becoming a little too strong. When it is too too strong, best to just wear a long sleeve, just put on a long sleeve cover up your arms and your neck etc. Maybe even get some long pants?

The irony —

In the summertime, now that is super hot… and the sun is super strong, I’m gravitating towards covering up, long sleeves and long pants, whereas in the winter time, I’m actually trying to do the exact opposite, and get maximum sun exposure?

I suppose this is where some sort of intelligence or adaptation or being in tune with your environment habitat and climate is critical; your body knows best!

For example, nobody, even if they had 100 SPF sunblock, would want to be in Abu Dhabi, in the deserts, being 100% naked. Look at the outfits of the fremen in the Dune movies; if you live in some sort of desert spot, or in the desert, like Los Angeles… The logic is simple; armor up!

Even in the second Dune movie, when Paul Atriedes goes maximum beast mode, he is 100% covered up, the only thing you could see is his eyeballs. Full face mask on, head covering and everything!

Sun power

Some simple thoughts:

No sunglasses. You don’t need it.
If the sun is super super strong, if you live in Arizona or Las Vegas or whatever, then the logic is to maximally cover up with a really really wide brimmed hat, covering your face and the back of your neck, really really long sleeved shirts and pants.
Don’t be a moron with an all black car in Los Angeles. You are not Batman. White is best. White girl white!
Better to be outdoors, in a public park or at a public square, chilling in the shade, than being stuck indoors! The big thing I’m starting to discover is that when I am inside the house, at home, it’s slowly zaps away all of my energy. Physiologically I’m not sure why this happens, but I hate it. Honestly speaking, my only passion and desire in life, and always be hyper hyper in terms of energy. All else is fine.

What zaps away your energy?

I just ran a quick errand, driving to Westwood the other day, and there wasn’t that much traffic on the 405, maybe only about 20 minutes there, 20 minutes back, and while I think it was fine, because in my mind I think I like driving or I’m a good driver or whatever, the biggest issue here is Any time spent in the car is a positively bad one!

Now, I’m starting to look at the 405 like the Armageddon. Or “carmaggedon”. when we watch post apocalyptic dystopic films like mad Max or whatever, that is the 405 freeway, it is even horrendous in medium traffic. It is my personal hell.

Even a day or two after braving the 405, I still feel some sort of PTSD.

I’m starting to think even more and more… Opportunity cost. Driving anywhere for 20 minutes, even for a very very good event, it just might not be worth it. Why? Maybe you gain more intelligence wisdom and experience simply walking around for 20 minutes, And 20 minutes back, 40 minutes is 1 trillion times better than being stuck in a car for 40 minutes.

And I think this is the true wisdom of living a grand life in Los Angeles; once again, the deal is to never drive. After that, never drive more than five minutes a day. Trust me, your body mind and soul will thank me.

Then, why does this become such a radical notion? Simple; if you’re true desired I’ll come is to never spend any time in a car, whether you’re driving or whatever… Then, I just saved you $1 million. Why? Don’t be the old fat Type two diabetes man driving the Bugatti, or the balding man driving the Porsche 911; be a real man, drive a Prius.

Hybrid is the way

Hybrid kids, mixed race kids are better, more genetic diversity stronger, more attractive. Seneca being half Korean half Vietnamese. The funny thing, Koreans are super racist, especially towards mixed race kids; yet they all know, Seneca is super handsome! And they all look at Cindy and they all comment on how beautiful she is!

Even my friend Josh White, he has a kid, half Canadian half Korean, she is so beautiful! Much more beautiful than these inbred Korean kids.

Thoughts for Korea and Japan

Super simple; if you don’t want your population to die off, if you want to be around for another 300 years, open up your borders! Come on and think about it… Lisa from BLACKPINK is 100% Thai from Thailand! And everybody knows that she is the best member, the prettiest, most stylish, and the most skilled! And the funny thing; nobody ever doubts her Korean. What that means is Korean, is starting to become more of a nationality rather than a race thing.

For example, let us say that you are 100% Vietnamese, but your family is from the north or in Hanoi, which is closer to China, which means you look more east Asian Chinese rather than southern Vietnam, which shares more borders with Cambodia Laos and Thailand. let us assume that you were born and raised in Korea, and you are 100% fluent in Korean the cultural mannerisms etc.… I don’t think anyone would ever doubt your Koreanness.

At least the good thing with Korea, Koreans are very open-minded. The Japanese are very very close minded, and will be unto their detriment. Why? With the current birth rate being at least close to zero in Japan, in 300 years, when you got no more Japanese human beings left, what will happen to Japan?

The Spartan Way

Some radical ideas:

First, beyond purchasing food, paying rent, gasoline or electricity for your car, perhaps a really insanely innovative idea we could do is the radical opposite of what capitalistic society tries to get us to do:

NOT spend money

I think this is a pretty big idea because all of this is centered around spending money.

Only cowards spend money?

“I promise, I’m so self-conscious, you won’t see me outside with at least one of my watches” – Kanye

Certainly it is very very difficult to earn money, but spending money… is very easy.

Let us first consider the fact that the act of spending money, even a chimpanzee or a three-year-old child could do it! Seneca, ever since he was about a year or two old, already knew how to insert a credit card, chip up, or even use the iPhone with Apple Pay to purchase things? Or even simply, handing off Dollar bills to the other person?

So I think the first idea is typically, maybe the best strategy is to teach our kids, and also maybe yourself, not to spend money?

Propaganda

About a month or two ago, we stepped inside at JP Morgan Chase, opening up a checking account for my mom, and they had these little kids activity coloring books, and one of them was like a book on the idea of saving money in your piggy bank whatever.

However, the reason why this was quite bad was because it was still centered around spending money! The idea was you save up your allowance and your money in order to buy that electric scooter you want or something.

Born into consumerism

I mean let us think about it… ever since a kid is born, they are born into captivity by this capitalist consumerist market. Often society parents and people will bemoan the fact that kids are all addicted to games, video games whatever… iPhones, tablets iPad etc., but who is really at fault here? Of course the parents!

The first thing to note or to ask; if the kids are addicted to YouTube or their iPhone or the iPad or Netflix Netflix or YouTube YouTube kids or whatever… are the parents addicted to it? Yes!

Parents — quit media and your iPhone.

In fact, don’t look at the kids, look at the parents! Typically, kids are just mini versions of their parents.

We like to treat our kids the way we wish we were treated as kids

For example, even a funny thing that I realized, seeing my brother-in-law get my nephew Benji all these cool toys on his birthday, essentially it is interesting, my brother-in-law is buying his son toys that he wished he had as a kid. And this is where I respect my brother-in-law so much; he is essentially like a big kid!

I think in fact, the parents who I really care for or trust or admire are the ones who are the most silly, and also playful with their kids! You could see it in a split second at the playground; I only admire the parents on top of structures playing with their kids! Not the disconnected parents, sitting in the shade, sitting on their butt, doing something stupid on their phones.

When you take your kid to the park, lock your iPhone in the glove compartment in the car!

The matrix

So, let us consider the analogy of the matrix. I think the analogy the matrix is very good here because honestly in fact, we are all living in a metaphorical matrix right now.

For example, think about the battery pack. The battery pack is essentially like us toiling away with our physiological energy, brain power mind power soul power etc., in order to power these batteries. And, toiling away so hard, the funny irony; we work so hard and we sacrifice so much of our health and well-being, in order to purchase things which dull away the pain, but actually in fact… these end up making us sicker and weaker?

For example, marijuana and alcohol; the two biggest depressants we got in modern day society. For an individual who is depressed, or lacking vigor or having poor health… adding more marijuana to their life, or adding more alcohol to their life is a positive detriment. Do people not know that both these substances have physiological mental, and a physical effect on the body, which actually dulls your senses? It is almost like putting a condom on your mind and soul!

Does man live to make money, or does money exist to serve man?

OK, the number one foolish mistake we all make; it seems that we live in order to make money, rather than thinking about this critically and knowing and understanding that in fact, the opposite is and should be true; money should exist in order for us to pursue our own personal needs desires and wants!

In fact, the whole cult around money has become pretty ridiculous. The notion of money has become its own godhead, its own cybernetic metaphor and impetus in life.

Minimum viable income

A very radical idea I have is towards this minimum viable income concept. The general idea is you want to reduce your expenses to the bare bare bare bare minimum, and after that you direct all of your energy power and resources towards augmenting your true life desires, your true true goals in life, rather than money for money sake, which is a slave mentality.

Just watch the movie 300; do you want to be one of those Persian slaves, or the traitor who just wanted to be showered in gold coins and penetrating all these drugged out hallucinating women? Of course not!

Drugs are bad

“Pretty girl with white toes, she like to put it in her nose!” – Playboy Carti

Something which is actually a bit shocking to me; I grew up super sober, I maybe smoked marijuana twice in my life, both instances when I was around 25 years old. I didn’t really like it.

The reason why I am so anti-marijuana is because when I was in high school, I saw all my friends who got hooked on it, and it just made them lazy, dumb, and unmotivated. Just like Elon Musk said on the Joe Rogan podcast; “Smoking marijuana is like the exact opposite of drinking a cup of coffee“. And I love coffee.

I don’t know if marijuana is pretty cheap now, or people using these vape pens or these weed pens or whatever. But, why dull your senses? Why not heighten them instead?

“I’m in love with a V dub engine, it dulls my senses” – JAY Z

“Success sucks, why? Too much stress” – JAY Z

Don’t skip leg day

A funny thought; if you want to maximize your manliness, let us consider that your member, and your testicles are connected to the lower half of your body. And also let us consider that your legs are probably at least five times stronger than your upper body. For example, easy to lift 1000 pound with your legs and your shoulders, very very difficult to lift 1000 pounds with only your arms and your upper body.

Or once again, easy to do a 1000 pound atlas lift, difficult to do 1000 pound benchpress, nay impossible?

Legs = Testosterone

So the very very funny idea I have is maybe, if you want to increase your testosterone and your manliness, every day, work out your legs!

In fact, if I could tell you that by exercising your legs every single day, you could increase your testosterone by a factor of 10 X, or become 10 times manly, more confident, stronger, less tired less petite, more cheerful… wouldn’t you do it?

A life beyond women

In fact, I think the primary mistake that men make is that they only work out their upper body because they want to somehow attract women?

My personal theory is that the primary way for a man to attract a woman is through his testosterone levels, his hormonal levels.

For example, the number one compliment I have been getting by both men and women is my tan, especially my foot, five finger tan. And there is also an ongoing theory that increased sunlight and sun exposure and testosterone manliness have a connection.

To boost your testosterone, spend more time in the direct sun!

Tall dark and handsome

For example, the notion of being tall and handsome, is really a good note here. Even other day I met this one friendly mom, and she told me that she was immediately attracted to her personal trainer, a tall dark handsome man with curly hair named Alejandro, and she ended up having a kid with him. It’s funny because the kid doesn’t look like mom at all and even the mom says I only know his kid because I birthed him!

Why do we desire to purchase certain things?

Let me give you an example: I remember when I worked my UCLA undergraduate job, in IT tech-support, and I literally felt like I just spent five hours a day scrolling through Reddit, killing time on the Internet. And I would also spend a lot of time looking at these camera review websites, gear review forms whatever, and ultimately I think the desire was to just spend more time outside making pictures!

The goal is to shoot more!

And I think this is the insidious thing about the whole camera photography complex; the idea is that we lack the freedom and the time to actually go out and make pictures, which is the desired goal… and we think, if somehow, we purchase XYZ camera or XYZ lens, or XYZ accessory… like a carbon fiber tripod or whatever… suddenly we will have more inspiration motivated and opportunity to actually go out to make photos? But is this true? No.

For example, the very very simple advice I have for any photographer is that the best camera is the maximally small compact one, the imagine like John Wick and his pistol. When shit hits the fan, he is not tooting around and automatic weapon, he just relies on his trusty pistol. Think about that one scene in which he is drifting his car door less Camaro, and picks up his pistol, and shoot the bad guys.

If we consider the Ricoh GR camera, it is like our metaphorical pistol. It is both our precision tool, and also, our general purpose tool.

You cannot hide an M-16 in your front right pocket.

Ways in which I spent a lot of time as a kid, as a teenager playing counterstrike, 1.6. The original one.

The funny thing is that video games, and gun violence doesn’t really have anything in common.

For example, to me as a kid, guns weren’t really a big deal; for example, when I was in Boy Scouts, in one of the summer camps, I got both my shotgun and rifle merit badge, the same camp, as well as my archery merit badge!

Kids aren’t dumb; I remember being shocked as maybe a freshman in high school; the Boy Scouts instructor giving a bunch of kids rifles, at the shooting range, teaching us how to use it. I was a bit shocked as a kid, because even as a kid this seemed a bit dangerous. I remember asking the instructor “…Has anyone ever turned one of these guns around and just shot somebody else?” The adult got very serious, looked at me, and told me “Never say things like that.“ So with extreme caution, we never did anything dumb, and I was actually a quite good marksman! I could hit the target from very very far away, and also I was very good at shotput, in which you use a shotgun to shoot a flying disc in the air!

Your word is your sword

I think the grand difficulty that we have in modern day life is that we no longer have any avenues for physical valor. The only thing which is commoditized is sports; but the reason why sports is bad is that it is too regimented, too constrained, and lacks any sort of real life application.

As NASSIM TALEB has commented; what some fools think is that somehow… a chess master would somehow be a master in military strategy. While this might make a good movie plot, in real life it is not true.

The reason why I am actually anti-chess, and a lot of these board games or whatever… consider how poor it is for your physiology. Sitting on your butt the whole time, stationary, using your brain. It requires no physical valor, or skin in the game. At worst if you lose the match, maybe you feel bad, but beyond this, there is really no downside to losing. This is also where video games are bad; there is no real life downside.

At least with weightlifting, powerlifting, hypelifting, one rep maxing is interesting is that there is some sort of potential physical downside. If you aren’t focused enough, yeah certainly you hurt yourself. And that is the whole point!

And this is where I found the logic to be so bizarre; when these steroided out guys would be so shocked of how much I would attempt weightlifting at the gym, when I would rack up the barbell with seven plates, eight plates, nine plates, 10 plates, 10 plates and hook another 25 on top, they would always tell me… “Be careful”.

Now that I think about this commentary in retrospect, it is really kind of a weakling cowardly side jab;

I am much bigger than you, and you look smaller than me, and also you are built more lean, and also you are Asian… and therefore I am befuddled how you are so much stronger than me, and I want to inform you how you might hurt yourself.

The best compliment

Even I have heard people talking about me at the gym on the side;

You know… there are some guys who are on steroids who don’t look like they’re on steroids (referring to me)

Anyways, what these wimps don’t realize is that they are staring at an Achilles in the flesh, a demigod; half man half god; born from a mortal father, with a goddess mother.

“I am a god”

I think one of the most radical, gutsy things ever uttered in rap music is the Kanye YEEZUS album, in what he put out the “I am a god” song and album.

Note, he did not say that I am the God, but a god (lower case). Even some random stuff that I started to do research in during Covid times is the whole Jay Electronica, the movement of black African-American guys turning to Allah, the fruit of Islam movement, in which the code word for “ALLAH” (arm, leg, leg, arm, head) the general idea in which all humans are born like gods, born in the image and the likeness of God.

“I know I’m not the most high but I’m on a close high.” KANYE, I AM A GOD, YEEZUS ALBUM

In fact, the only concert I have ever gone to my life was seeing Kanye West live at the Oakland Coliseum, for his YEEZUS Tour. It might have been one of the coolest things I’ve ever witnessed, especially when they put the fake mountain in the fake Jesus to come on stage, and also when Kanye put on the sequin covered facemask, they shot a laser on it, and reflected it all around the dome.

Ethics is the future, not technology

Ethics, worldview, philosophy, your own personal code of ethics, the way you decide to approach life, this is the future, not the loser iPhone Pro, or any of these ridiculous virtual reality headsets.

Very very simple; what we desire is real life real world engagement– we desire the embrace and the sweet smell of a woman, no no no… you don’t want to be having virtual reality sex, with your virtual reality girlfriend, or live with your virtual reality dog, driving around in your virtual reality Lamborghini, getting virtual reality head or whatever… Nobody wants a virtual reality babe.

What or which concepts are absent in the past?

In fact, when you think about ancient Greece, philosophy, the ancient Romans etc.… there is almost no focus on women. Women are absent; they are never mentioned, nor discussed or talked about. Certainly not talked about like commodities in today’s world.

The way that a lot of guys get suckered is this strange logic: if I get super super rich, and drive the Lamborghini or the Ferrari or the big truck or whatever, and I’m super super buff, and I have a six pack, suddenly I will attract all these babes, who will want to have intercourse with me, and I can live a super happy playboy lifestyle for the rest of my life, in pure bliss, without any obligations?

Spartan philosophy

The true Spartan way is almost a polar opposite; the goal is to live a maximally frugal and economical life, have kids and beget children, have at least one son to carry on the family name. And the rest of your life is just focused on military training, combat, to be ready to defend your family, your nation when shit hits the fan.

This is where once again, all this fake ass patriotism stuff annoys me; if you’re on Facebook, looking at Donald Trump memes, watch Fox News or Tucker Carlson, make fun of “libtards”, talk about the alphabet gender spaghetti, you are not a true American. Just keep your mouth shut, enroll in military duty. You have nothing to defend yourself against.

Similarly speaking, we liberals also have this bizarre notion of virtue signaling; if you are a true progressive liberal, don’t even say the “Donald Trump” name — don’t talk about the news or politics or whatever. The simplest thing is to just vote against the other party you don’t believe in, get involved in local city politics, attend some sort of city council meeting, vote on issues you care for. Also don’t use Twitter, which might be about 99.9% bots?

***

Men and women must be trained alike

Only Spartan women can birth Spartan men.

Physical training is both critical for men and women. This is also where it is so impressive that Israeli women are also serve military obligations, I think this is a great idea. Maybe also America, there was some sort of obligatory ROTC training in high school, both for men and women, maybe for junior and senior year… this might be a good idea. Good for virtue, physics, the physical element, physical training, building a sense of camaraderie or kinship between our fellow Americans.

In fact, even though I am a Democrat, I have always voted Democrat, and also I consider myself a liberal, I have had nothing but positive interactions with conservatives, Republicans, people on the right. In fact if anything… right wing people to be more friendly, fun, jovial, and happy. Liberals on the left tend to be dark, morose, and fakely-righteous? I remember accidentally walking into some sort of anti-Joe Biden rally, talked with all the friendly people, and was even offered free hotdogs and free ice cream barbecue from the people there!

The reason why social media and the internet is so toxic is that it villainizes other sides, these metaphorical human beings. But if you actually talk to people face-to-face in the flesh, person-to-person, pure to pure; we are about 90% similar, 10% dissimilar.

Quit the internet, talk to people face to face, 1 on 1, in real life.

Only purchase digital things?

A random thought, maybe the way we could curb all of this superficial consumerism is to only purchase digital things, digital goods, digital things.

Digital money: Bitcoin

Digital books, digital movies– Apple TV shop, iTunes Store, iBooks Store. I actually find that purchasing a film is much better than subscribing to a streaming platform. Why? Skin in the game. When you pay the $10 a month or the $15 a month or whatever for that streaming service, you don’t really value any of the films or TV series on it… watching media on streaming platforms is like a sedative; you watch something not because you want to watch it, or learn from it, but instead, just watch it to distract yourself.

Putting your money where your mouth is

The funny thought is the point of purchasing something isn’t to “support“ the producer, but instead, to have a sense of pride that the thing that you purchased is actually something that you believe in or care in?

For example, I have purchased with my own money all the John Wick movies, all of the matrix movies, and now both of the Dune movies. Typically when we actually purchase something with our own money, it is a sign that we actually really really believe in it.

Also, the reason why you never want to trust anybody who is sponsored by anything, is because typically when you are given free things, or sponsored by something, you don’t actually really believe in it, you just accept the advertising and the sponsorship in order to make money or to feel special.

I bought all my Ricoh and LUMIX cameras with my own real money

For example, in the context of cameras, reviews, sponsorships etc.; only trust a photographer who had actually purchased the things with their hard earned money.

For example, I have done collaborations with Fujifilm before, received free cameras in the past, free lenses etc.… And have also been paid money by then. Also I did some free consulting for them, sharing some good ideas like adding a film grain simulation effect filter to their cameras, which they did, in which now you could add green tier digital JPEG photos with the Fujifilm filter, and select either weak, normal, or strong grain.

I am proud that all the Ricoh cameras that I purchased, none were given to me by free from Ricoh. I purchased them all with my own money.

Also kind of a random thing; I think the whole blogosphere was shocked when I purchased a LUMIX G9 camera — it totally seemed like out of left field, because Panasonic Lumix was on nobody’s radar. And currently, now that all my Ricoh GR cameras are dead, my only camera is the Lumix G9 camera and the 14mm f2.5 pancake lumix lens (only $200!). And the only two cameras I think might be worth considering purchasing in the near future is the new Ricoh HDF cameras, or the new Lumix S9 camera with the pancake manual focusing lens.

Trust?

Ultimately, trust nobody, only yourself.

Also with filters; put more trust in dead people than people who are alive. Why?

The difficult thing with following people who are still alive today is that you don’t know how it all ends. With dead philosophers, artists, innovators, you do.

Also, I think the big differences in the past, there was not a profit motive. An artist or an innovator did not need money, because they had the private patronage of some wealthy family like the Medici’s, Leonardo da Vinci etc.

Independently wealthy with Bitcoin

So I’m starting to think more and more… maybe the best true way to be a true artist, visionary, thinker, innovator entrepreneur is to independently make money somewhere, and don’t have to rely on advertising or sponsorships or brands to support your lifestyle.

I would put more faith in the photographer or the weightlifter who makes his living investing in bitcoin, rather than somebody who is always spamming you with advertisements on YouTube or podcasts.

In fact, are there any podcasts which exist which don’t have any advertising? Besides my own?

ERIC KIM PODCAST >

Why bitcoin is the future

Bitcoins, satoshis– this is finally the solution to these annoying online advertisements.

Maybe the true Spartan only cares for in bitcoin and satoshis, but never spends it or touches it, but just keeps accumulating it.

Bitcoin is like our shield – our economic shield and our hedge against the uncertain future.

ARMOR UP!
ERIC

Economic theory

I always thought that economics was stupid, honestly, truth be told, I think when you look at all this fake mathematics behind economic theory, it is all fake, the new hocus-pocus witchcraft, and the number one critical thing I learned about studying statistics both in high school and in college is that statistics is fake metrics that could be gamed however you want.

Therefore, put zero faith in statistics. Better talk to a real human being, face-to-face, person to person, instead of engaging in ridiculous debates on the internet, which again is filled by 99.9% ChatGPT powered bots.

Once once again, if I waived a magic wand, and I revealed to you that in fact, all of the negative comments you read in your life on the internet, these trolls who said mean things to you, if you actually found out that they were all just artificial intelligent ChatGPT bots the whole time… how would you feel? Wouldn’t you feel better?

The next generation of comments on the internet

Several years ago, I had the wisdom to just disable all and delete all comments on my website and blog etc. and also disabling them on YouTube etc. Why? For the most part, comments are useless. Even the positive ones!

When people say nice things about you in the comments, the reason why you could be bad is that it becomes a shackle; you keep publishing stuff that gets good feedback, and as a consequence, you end up staying the same instead of being innovative.

For example, when Bob Dylan went electric; he probably polarized 90% of his fanbase– they booed him off stage (his core audience, his real fans!). Also, everyone likes the old Kanye West in the college dropout album… but I like the new Kanye, I like the new carnival, the newest version of an artist is always the best.

A funny contradiction; everyone always wants the newest iPhone, the newest Tesla, whatever… But everyone wants the older artist, the older music, the older version of a certain thinker? If we stay consistent here, shouldn’t we prefer the new philosophy or the new thoughts or the new approach of an artist or a musician or a thinker versus their old self?

For example, everyone seems to prefer the old ERIC KIM, the old EK, but this is when I was still addicted to Facebook, using an android phone, and I still had my 9 to 5 job.

Sometimes, for myself, I miss my old Vietnam self; but in fact, my best self is my now self with Seneca! Also, sometimes I miss my old ERIC KIM gym self, the HYPELIFTING self, but when I think critically about it, I am 1000 times happier with my new bitcoin self, my new off the grid self, my new walk 10,000 steps a day in the direct Los Angeles sun self.

Then I think the biggest nugget of wisdom:

Prefer the you self right now, not the past self?

Kill your old self!

ERIC

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New books, new media?

Now that everything is becoming so hyper, once again, think about the past.

The Iliad, the Matrix, the 300, John Wick, keep it simple, keep it succinct. I’m very very skeptical of anything new, whether they be new movies, new series, new films etc.

Even this past generation, the last 10 years, the only innovative film created was the John Wick series, nothing else. Even though I was also enthusiastic about the new Mandalorian series, eventually after the first season, it all goes downhill.

With Marvel movies, I think the only good ones was before Disney bought it, for example the original Iron Man, the original Captain America etc.

Why? The problem with Disney is that it is trying to maximize its profits, let us consider it is a publicly treated company, and as a result, the logic is to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Whenever anything is created for the masses, it is bad.

Once again, would you prefer to drive the McLaren, with the butterfly doors, or would you prefer to drive the Toyota Corolla?

Forward the ideas

EK MIND SUPPLY >

Always start new:

START HERE

The Spartan Way

Some radical ideas:

NOT spend money

I think this is a pretty big idea because all of this is centered around spending money.

Only cowards spend money?

“I promise, I’m so self-conscious, you won’t see me outside with at least one of my watches” – Kanye

Certainly it is very very difficult to earn money, but spending money… is very easy.

So I think the first idea is typically, maybe the best strategy is to teach our kids, and also maybe yourself, not to spend money?

Propaganda

Born into consumerism

The first thing to note or to ask; if the kids are addicted to YouTube or their iPhone or the iPad or Netflix Netflix or YouTube YouTube kids or whatever… are the parents addicted to it? Yes!

Parents — quit media and your iPhone.

In fact, don’t look at the kids, look at the parents! Typically, kids are just mini versions of their parents.

We like to treat our kids the way we wish we were treated as kids

When you take your kid to the park, lock your iPhone in the glove compartment in the car!

The matrix

So, let us consider the analogy of the matrix. I think the analogy the matrix is very good here because honestly in fact, we are all living in a metaphorical matrix right now.

Does man live to make money, or does money exist to serve man?

In fact, the whole cult around money has become pretty ridiculous. The notion of money has become its own godhead, its own cybernetic metaphor and impetus in life.

Minimum viable income

Drugs are bad

“Pretty girl with white toes, she like to put it in her nose!” – Playboy Carti

Something which is actually a bit shocking to me; I grew up super sober, I maybe smoked marijuana twice in my life, both instances when I was around 25 years old. I didn’t really like it.

I don’t know if marijuana is pretty cheap now, or people using these vape pens or these weed pens or whatever. But, why dull your senses? Why not heighten them instead?

“I’m in love with a V dub engine, it dulls my senses” – JAY Z

“Success sucks, why? Too much stress” – JAY Z

Don’t skip leg day

Or once again, easy to do a 1000 pound atlas lift, difficult to do 1000 pound benchpress, nay impossible?

Legs = Testosterone

So the very very funny idea I have is maybe, if you want to increase your testosterone and your manliness, every day, work out your legs!

A life beyond women

In fact, I think the primary mistake that men make is that they only work out their upper body because they want to somehow attract women?

My personal theory is that the primary way for a man to attract a woman is through his testosterone levels, his hormonal levels.

To boost your testosterone, spend more time in the direct sun!

Tall dark and handsome

Why do we desire to purchase certain things?

The goal is to shoot more!

If we consider the Ricoh GR camera, it is like our metaphorical pistol. It is both our precision tool, and also, our general purpose tool.

You cannot hide an M-16 in your front right pocket.

Ways in which I spent a lot of time as a kid, as a teenager playing counterstrike, 1.6. The original one.

The funny thing is that video games, and gun violence doesn’t really have anything in common.

Your word is your sword

Now that I think about this commentary in retrospect, it is really kind of a weakling cowardly side jab;

I am much bigger than you, and you look smaller than me, and also you are built more lean, and also you are Asian… and therefore I am befuddled how you are so much stronger than me, and I want to inform you how you might hurt yourself.

The best compliment

Even I have heard people talking about me at the gym on the side;

You know… there are some guys who are on steroids who don’t look like they’re on steroids (referring to me)

Anyways, what these wimps don’t realize is that they are staring at an Achilles in the flesh, a demigod; half man half god; born from a mortal father, with a goddess mother.

“I am a god”

I think one of the most radical, gutsy things ever uttered in rap music is the Kanye YEEZUS album, in what he put out the “I am a god” song and album.

“I know I’m not the most high but I’m on a close high.” KANYE, I AM A GOD, YEEZUS ALBUM

Ethics is the future, not technology

What or which concepts are absent in the past?

Spartan philosophy

***

Men and women must be trained alike

Only Spartan women can birth Spartan men.

Quit the internet, talk to people face to face, 1 on 1, in real life.

Only purchase digital things?

A random thought, maybe the way we could curb all of this superficial consumerism is to only purchase digital things, digital goods, digital things.

Digital money: Bitcoin

Putting your money where your mouth is

I bought all my Ricoh and LUMIX cameras with my own real money

For example, in the context of cameras, reviews, sponsorships etc.; only trust a photographer who had actually purchased the things with their hard earned money.

I am proud that all the Ricoh cameras that I purchased, none were given to me by free from Ricoh. I purchased them all with my own money.

Trust?

Ultimately, trust nobody, only yourself.

Also with filters; put more trust in dead people than people who are alive. Why?

The difficult thing with following people who are still alive today is that you don’t know how it all ends. With dead philosophers, artists, innovators, you do.

Independently wealthy with Bitcoin

I would put more faith in the photographer or the weightlifter who makes his living investing in bitcoin, rather than somebody who is always spamming you with advertisements on YouTube or podcasts.

In fact, are there any podcasts which exist which don’t have any advertising? Besides my own?

Why bitcoin is the future

Bitcoins, Satoshis– this is finally the solution to these annoying online advertisements.

Maybe the true Spartan only cares for in bitcoin and Satoshi, but never spends it or touches it, but just keeps accumulating it.

Bitcoin is like our shield – our economic shield and our hedge against the uncertain future.

ARMOR UP!
ERIC

Economic theory

Always thought that economics was stupid, honestly, truth be told, I think when you look at all this fake mathematics behind theory, it is all fake, the new hocus-pocus witchcraft, and the number one critical thing I learned about studying statistics both in high school and in college is that statistics is fake metrics that could be gamed however you want.

Therefore, put zero faith in statistics. Better talk to a real human being, face-to-face, person to person, instead of engaging in ridiculous debates on the Internet, which again is filled by 99.9% ChatGPT powered bots.

Once once again, if I waived a magic wand, and I revealed to you that in fact, all of the negative comments you write in your life on the Internet, these trolls who said mean things to you, if you actually found out that they were all just artificial intelligent ChatGPT bots the whole time… Wouldn’t you feel better?

The next generation of comments on the Internet

Maybe the only way we could truly verify whether somebody who is leaving a comment is a real human being or not is to institute the orange check icon, that the individual spent maybe $10 worth of bitcoin or Satoshi’s to verify their humanity. Several years ago, I had the wisdom to just disable all and delete all comments on my website and blog etc. and also disabling them on YouTube etc. Why? For the most part, comments are useless. Even the positive ones!

For example, when Bob Dylan went electric; he probably polarized 90% of his fanbase. Also, everyone likes the old Kanye West in the college dropout album… But I like the new Kanye, I like the new carnival, the newest version of an artist is always the best. A funny contradiction; everyone always wants the newest iPhone, the newest Tesla, whatever… But everyone wants the older artist, the older music, the older version of a certain thinker? If we stay consistent here, shouldn’t we prefer the new philosophy or the new thoughts or the new approach of an artist or a musician or a thinker versus their old self?

For example, everyone seems to prefer the old ERIC KIM, the old EK, but this is when I was still addicted to Facebook, using an android phone, and I still had my 95 job.

Then I think the biggest nugget of wisdom:

Prefer the you self right now, not the past self?

Kill your old self!

ERIC

EK PHOTO SUPPLY

PRODUCTS BY KIM >

EK WORKSHOPS

Become a new you:

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DOWNTOWN LA, NOV 16 2024
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ALL EXPERIENCES >

New books, new media?

Now that everything is becoming so hyper, once again, think about the past.

The Iliad, the Matrix, the 300, John Wick, Tippet simple, keep it succinct. I’m very very skeptical of anything new, whether they be new movies, new series, new films etc.

With Marvel movies, I think the only good ones was before Disney bought it, for example the original Iron Man, the original Captain America etc.

Once again, would you prefer to drive the McLaren, with the butterfly doors, or would you prefer to drive the Toyota Corolla?

Digital is The Future

Digital goods, digital products

–> proof of work digital goods which cannot be replicated?

There is currently a idea of NFTs, which stands for non-fungible tokens. The idea is creating a digital artwork or digital product which can be sold, in which an individual can prove their own ownership.

I suppose my thought, in regards to bitcoin, which isn’t entirely fascinating is that it is truly the first digital money. That cannot be replicated, you cannot fake it, because the proof of work network is so energy intensive, you cannot make something out of nothing.

I suppose the reason why proof of work is so critical here, and what a lot of these foolish pseudo environmentalist don’t understand is that if something doesn’t require energy to produce, whether human labor, material production, etc.… Then, it has no value.

For example, being born in 1988, and witnessing all of this digital rights stuff, protections against digital copying, as well as anti-digital piracy.

As a kid, growing up, obviously I have no money, because I don’t work yet… The logic never seemed to make sense to me:

if I download this video game book or movie or album which is digital… I don’t do any harm unto you.

But then the owner or the publisher or the business might say

“Well… It cost me a ton of money for me to produce this thing, and you are a morally evil and bad person because you are stealing this, because you might have paid $20 for this CD, if you did not pirate it.”

But the logic doesn’t make sense for a kid, because if you are a kid, there is no option to; because you don’t have any money, you wouldn’t have purchased it in the first place anyways! I suppose it is different as an adult once you got money… But still, I think for anybody who is in tech, IT, obviously we all have taunting software, we all know pirate bay, we all know how to turn on the VPN and cover our tracks, and download stuff etc.

I think even at this point in 2024… Truth be told pirates something is actually more cumbersome. It takes more time, you are at the risk of viruses and cyber attacks etc.… But I suppose the great convenience here you have access to the direct files.

For example, I have no problem paying $10 or $20 or whatever for you, Kendrick Lamar album, Jay Z album whatever, however, my primary annoyance is that let us say that I pay $10 on the iTunes Store or Apple Music to buy a new CD. But, I can only access it on my Apple iOS device! What if I want the files directly, to remix them, chop it up in GarageBand, or just use it as background audio for my photography slideshows? Then I am stuck.

Selling digital products

I suppose hear the issue is, you could still sell digital products, whether they be digital e-books, digital PDF files, digital zip files, digital music files, whatever. But still, the only reason people actually pay money to purchase these digital products online is because they either believe and desire to support the creator, or they want access to it, or they cannot easily google and find it free online.

So I suppose, the real question here is how can we create a digital good? In which when you purchase a digital something, it actually does really have value? That you cannot replicated, not out of an ethical thing, but a physics based approach?

For example, with digital products, is it possible to solve the double spending problem?

This is the primary phenomenal innovation of bitcoin; you cannot copy of bitcoin or replicated, like you can do as an MP3 file of Beethoven’s fifth Symphony. Or an e-book,.pub file, or PDF file of the Iliad.

I think this is why I believe in open source so much; because it seems like the ethical, rational thing to do. My philosophy has always been simple:

Do unto to others as you would like others to do onto you.

For example I like free stuff, free files, free videos, and I hate these goddamn advertisements, is annoying banner pop-up ads, and I hate having to subscribe for some sort of email newsletter in order to download something I want access to.

Therefore as a result, in all of my personal endeavors, I try to make it as easy and direct for people to access my videos, photos, files, e-books whatever with direct links either or directly from my own website blog server, Google Drive links, dropbox links etc.

Once again, how can we create a new digital good on the Internet? Which can either be purchased with US dollars, or satoshis or bitcoin?

***

Books

I’ll give you a good example with books; a book is a physical object, something you could hold in your hand. I cannot snap my fingers and then magically duplicate it into a thousand more books.

I think the reason why books, printed books have value because we know that there was work and energy and labor and materials necessary to produce the thing: the physical pages, the ink, the binding, the packaging, the genius of the writer and illustrator, etc. And also we humans we still have a passion for tangible things; I think most people would prefer owning a physical book in hardcover for drama put it on their shelf, and think that it has value, rather than paying $30 for an e-book of the same sort.

Why ebooks

With ebooks electric book, maybe we should just call them digital books… The reason why nobody likes to pay that much money for it because we are not stupid. We know that of course, it cost money and effort and time and energy for the writer to write the book, get it edited, proofread, distributed whatever… But we know that the marginal cost of having it downloaded, is practically zero. Therefore the rational human being would think to themselves: I know that it cost effort in time for the author to write the book, but if I download it as an e-book, it should be cheaper than the hardcover.

For example, let us say I want to purchase a new translation of the Iliad, for $30. but let us say that I started reading it, and I hate how heavy and cumbersome it is.

Then let us say that I just want to buy it in the iBooks store, if that is the case… I expect it to cost less than $30, because I know that I don’t have to purchase the materials for the hardcover book. I might expect it to cost like $10, $9.99 or whatever.

Fiat money is a scam?

Currently the biggest issue we have is what the US dollar, essentially the Fed can just keep printing more of it! Then in someways, this is not too different than somebody pirating MP3 files for your favorite artist. They can keep inflating the digital supply of something, there is no hard cap.

I suppose the reason why the notion of cap is critical here is that it obeys the laws of physics! For example once again, if I have a physical book, there is a law of conservation of energy, I cannot snap my fingers and reproduce it with zero cost. Of course I could use energy and resources to print and publish more books, but once again, Hard caps, gravity, friction, the law of conservation of energy applies.

Think Bitcoin

If you believe in physics, first principles, and you are not a fool, bitcoin is for you! Why? Even Fernandinho Galliani in his treatise “On Money” said that true money has a hard cap, a limited supply. He talks about why gold is money, because of its scarcity. however, he also knew that if you increase the supply of something, like when the conquistadors discovered tons and tons of gold in the New World, then he realized that the value of gold then plummets.

Because bitcoin has a hard cap of 21 million coins, and none will ever be produced ever again, for the next hundred thousand years, what that means then is it is finally, the first scarce desirable good commodity or thing on the planet or the universe.

Once again, the reason why is so valued is because most people think of it as scarce, which is true, but it is not a true scarcity in so far much as they are still mining gold today, and still discovery new gold mines across the planet, Gold mines we did not know existed in the past!

So in theory, if you put 1 million workers to work, and employed thousands of geologist, and then let’s say you magically said that 1 ounce of gold was worth now $1 million, certainly we would discover more gold and produce more gold! But also consequently, when we discover more gold and we put it on the market, then the value of gold will plummet.

Karl Menger on monopolies

What Carl Manger says in his book the principles of economics, a section that is very very fascinating, a short section is on monopolies. Even then, he knew that there were certain industries that created artificial monopolies, by creating things into an artificial scarcity, for example diamond producers, and restricting the ability or the supply of Diamonds to enter the market, artificially.

Also in luxury goods, one of my good friend Stephanie who worked in the luxury goods market, also told me that a lot of these luxury fashion houses, when they produce too much of a luxury bag, throw it in the furnace and destroy it. Why? If you have too much real Louis Vuitton and Gucci bags on the market, it will become less valuable. Therefore it becomes more profitable to just take the unsold goods, and just incinerate it in a furnace!

So what now?

Just some general thoughts on life:

First, I am so insanely grateful for all of my world travels, my world campaigning, all of my accomplishments or whatever. Yet, the accomplish of begetting Seneca is 1 million fold more than any other thing I have achieved or accomplished in my life.

Certainly the work in the labor of actually carrying the baby, and birthing the baby, and breast-feeding the baby and your child is all on the woman. So then what is the role of the man? To create structures in which your partner or wife desires to beget a child with you.

In praise of kids

A lot of these ridiculous things like desiring to purchase a Lamborghini, a Porsche, a Porsche 911, a Porsche 911 GT three RS, a Bugatti or whatever… I think these tend to be fantasies or pipe dreams for people who are childless, don’t have a kid yet, or have no intentions on having kids.

The walking dead

Now, when I see people and I meet people who are childless, and have no intention on having kids, to me they are like the walking dead.

Then, the whole impetus of their life is towards hedonism; maximization of sensory pleasures whether it be visual — such as traveling to Japan and seeing all the cool stuff, or like eating good food, omakase sushi in Japan, indulging themselves in art, travel, exploration, creating art and ideas, writing books, being “cultural”– or maybe backpacking with their dog or whatever… These people had zero interest to me. Why? They are the walking dead. They shall die and they shall have no living legacy.

Hedonism and kids?

Technically, the ultimate hedonic pleasure you can gain is actually from your kids! Your kid is the most wonderful, evolving growing, entertaining beautiful joyful thing!

For example, almost every single day, Seneca at the age of three years and four months, I am starting to see his language acquisition skills excel rate at a phenomenal rate! And I am so insanely proud because I see the things that I have taught him, and it sticks!

For example, my deep pride and joy that ever since he was born, only spoke to him in Korean, and now, he speaks almost 90% Korean fluently!

Also, when I look at his shape physique and form, the buff kid of all time, I am so insanely proud of him because he is also, the most physically dominant, tall handsome strong intelligent kid of all time.

I am also so proud because whenever I meet other parents, parents or teachers who work with kids, and they honestly remark that Seneca is tall, I feel so insanely proud! People telling me that I am such a great dad, doing a good job parenting, deep sense of joy.

Also, contrary to popular knowledge, having a child actually makes you more adventurous! For example, ever since Seneca was born, and now that he is getting older, I am being exposed to so many new wonderful activities and things, things I wouldn’t have never partook in before he was born! For example, exploring all these awesome science centers, becoming a kid again! Also, rediscovering the Lego Batman movie, other joyful things etc.

So actually the irony is if you want to maximize your hedonism in life, your happiness your joy your fun, don’t get the stupid dog, have a kid instead!

Keanu Reeves needs to have a kid

For example, there’s also this weird bias that it is cool, more macho, more manly and masculine to be a forever bachelor. No. Only degenerates think this way.

once again, think king Leonidas and his son; have at least one male heir to continue your legacy.

The digital transformation of everything

So random thing is Seneca and I have been on Los Angeles Public library tour, hitting up all the local libraries, all these great free community events etc.

Something Seneca has been really into lately, is finding and discovering DVDs, especially the LEGO movie, and the LEGO Batman movie, which I find is so insanely funny and great, we need a little bit more humor in our lives.

In fact, maybe the reason why the Lego Batman movie is so genius is that it is insanely fun, playful, irreverent, humorous, self-referential, and actually feels more realistic ironically enough?

Anyways, some new thoughts on films; don’t watch any movies that you otherwise wouldn’t be happy with your kid, and also… Maybe in fact the best movies are kids movies?

And also; maybe the best films the only the good ones are the humorous ones, the comedic ones!

For example, why hasn’t a film like Zoolander come out recently? I still remember the notion of “Fragile” (Fra-geee-lleh) or on the Simpsons — “Boo-Uurns!”.

My critique about two days mostly hyper emotional emo world is that there is no more humor. Everything needs to be dark, Marose, emo, self-flagellation.

In fact, what is the main problem of Genzie, millennials, everyone in this generation? The young youth?

The issue is that everything is hyper; hyper sensationalized, hyper media.

My simple tip for us incoming parents — some hard rules:

Never ever ever ever ever kid an iPhone or a smart phone. If you need to track them or call them or whatever… Just give them one of those Apple AirTags and attach it to them, or just buy them a phone. Yes you could just buy the phone on Amazon supercheap, and tossing in a Sim card. in fact I would even say the best dumb phone is the only one that could make phone calls only, no LCD screen. I find texting to be one of the most ineffective ways of human communication, and also hugely depersonalizing.
No electronics inside the home: I have a new rule with Seneca, if he wants to play games on the iPad, whether it be poly bridge, racing games (GRID AUTOSPORT, the paid one), pocket city, roller coaster tycoon classic, etc — I just tell him that he is only allowed to play it outside! So I toss the iPad in the backpack, we go on a walk, we go to some sort of social public space, and then I let him play there, and typically the funny thing is by the time we get to the public outside space… He doesn’t want to play the game, and instead he’ll just run around instead!
Maybe with movies films media etc. also, only let them watch it outdoors? Like if they want to watch a movie, have them only watch it at the local nature center or park, also funny thing; maybe the future will be more analog, this will be our new privilege. For example, Buy a USB-C DVD player for your MacBook laptop, as we don’t have DVD players anymore, and if your kid wants to watch a movie, just check it out from your local library? Adding some sort of friction in today’s digital world is a good idea; having Disney+ or HBO Max or Netflix or YouTube or whatever… With so much streaming movies shows and entertainment possible… It is almost like giving your kid a firehose of high fructose corn syrup laced with type two diabetes for kids. Parents will often be alone; well it is so hard… And it is true! But I think we’re having a new sense of elitism is good; let us consider that 99.99% of Americans are obese, morbidly obese, etc. Just because everyone else is shoving donuts into their mouth, and getting fat, doesn’t mean you should either.

Digital property?

Every few thousands of years, comes a major paradigm shift which changes everything.

We are so insanely to be alive right now in 2024; two massive paradigm shifts happening at the same time: artificial intelligence (open ai, ChatGPT), and Bitcoin.

Also, I think a very fascinating innovation I’ve discovered is that to rebrand something, or to reimagine something, or to re-understand something is also a huge innovation.

For example, the critical insight by Michael Saylor is thinking and considering that bitcoin is not a cryptocurrency, but digital property.

The reason why Michael Saylor’s idea of Bitcoin being digital property is such a grand insight is that in the crypto world ,,, 99% of our efforts are being wasted on the fact that everyone wants to replace the US dollar or replace the entire visa network with their own cryptocurrency or alt coin or etc.

Not going to happen.

I think for high velocity payments, like buying a cup of coffee coffee or a shot of espresso at your local coffee shop, going to Whole Foods Trader Joe’s or Costco, Amazon fresh whatever… having high velocity money like your Visa credit card, or Apple Pay on your phone is actually much more convenient. And then we barbell this; bitcoin then is our digital property, low velocity. If you think of bitcoin like owning property on the upper East side of Manhattan New York City, the ideas you keep it forever in the family, and you pass it down to your kids kids kids. And the strategy is simple;

Never sell the property.

You borrow money against it, maybe you rented out, you try your best to maintain it, upkeep it, pay the property taxes etc. But you never sell the property.

I also suppose the same idea is in line with bitcoin, if we reimagined it as digital property.

One day, you will be able to rent out your bitcoin, like imagine if you were a landlord, renting out your property to millennials.

Or, imagining that it could be like a digital hotel of the future; renting it out, hour by hour, day by day, week by week, or maybe even minute by minute, to whoever wants to be there.

Then, essentially we could become like the new digital slumlord; we just sit on our bitcoin forever, collecting rents and money, and we could just chill at the beach, chill at the pool, etc.

Now what?

If you take things further, I think really long-term etc.… ultimate goal is durability as an artist, a creative a thinker etc.

Think peer to peer

I think the problem in today’s world is because of iPhones, social media, entertainment, Netflix YouTube whatever… We engage with human beings only through media, while sitting on our butts, without any real risk.

My simple thought is always:

Better to risk a friendly social interaction and get rejected, rather than not attempted it at all.

Simple thoughts: get rid of those losers sunglasses, those dark tennis sunglasses, throw your noise canceling headphones in the trash, and when you are out and about, “raw dog it”– no sunglasses, because sunglasses are for cowards. You will not get eyeball cancer. If the sun is too bright just get a baseball cap, or some sort of visor to protect your eyeballs from the sun.

Also, no headphones. No AirPods AirPods pros, whatever.

I think the critical issue here is that when you have AirPods, noise canceling headphones, AirPods pros on in your ears, or whatever your plug like Bluetooth device, the issue is that you block out 99.99% of the positive stimulation from the environment.

For example, I believe our sense of hearing is actually more acute and more primal than our eyes. For example, if you’re driving around Los Angeles, you will hear the siren of a firetruck before you see the flashing lights.

The reason why I hate Tomkin in LA so much, and I consider it extreme bad manners is that whenever people honk, there is always a fight or flight physiological response from us. as a result, I’ve been going on a bit of a social justice rampage, whenever people honk, especially when they honk because the person did not drive immediately .1 ms after the light turns green, I give them a sharp that’s there, or I roll down my window, I stick down my hand, and I tell them to calm down. the hand jester for calm down is just put your calm down, and just motion it downwards. No need to give people the middle finger, I think some sort of shame , public shaming is a good idea.

Also, smokers. Am going to go harder now, 100 X harder. To shame people for smoking in public. I’m just going to pretend like I’m a cop, I’ll tell people not to smoke when I have my weight vest on, because I look like a undercover cop or swat team or whatever. or, moving forward I’m going to do an experiment, whenever I am at a stoplight, and I see people texting on their phone at the stop sign, I’m just going to pretend like I’m CP and then make eye contact with them and tell them to keep their eyes on the road. Nowadays in Los Angeles and beyond people shielded by their cars and their tents, and their sunglasses, and they feel like they are abated for any sort of social responsibility. Even worse, people smoking marijuana while driving. I’ve seen this twice in Los Angeles so far. Rather than complaining, I’m going to do some sort of low-key Vigilante Justice, kind of like Batman. Batman, Batman not in the dark Maroso Way, but can you imagine a playful humorous and joyful Batman? My alter ego is like the Lego Batman, the Lego Bruce Wayne.

No more compassion. I think the problem of people in Los Angeles, especially when they use their vehicles like cowards, is that they black some sort of exposure to the real world. No skin in the game.

Moving forward, I’m just gonna imagine like I am the super cop, the local city cop, CHP officer etc.

Better to preemptively serve justice and be wrong… Rather than be a bystander or don’t do anything?

When I was a kid, I wish that more blue collar job ideas were offered to me, like becoming a firefighter or a cop, CHP officer or whatever… I might have even enjoyed doing some sort of low-key form of ROTC as a highschooler?

For example, even Seneca… He loves firefighters, firetrucks, police cars, police, police SUV cars etc. And of course he loves the cyber truck, he also likes it with a matte Black wrap.

In fact, getting a cyber truck, a cyber beast with a mat black wrap, and getting the black and yellow license plate… This is your metaphorical at mobile? If you think about the Christopher Nolan mobile, essentially it is like a matte Black military vehicle tank — rather than some sort of sissy, or even muscle car.

The Batmobile in the most recent the Batman movie, with the emo Batman, was also interesting because the Batmobile was also kind of like some sort of muscle car on steroids.

Even nowadays with vehicles, are you surprising to me, I am starting to get more into trucks, even even the new Toyota Land Cruiser looks super cool?

Once again, if you think about Carl Menger and Austrian economics, one of the great ideas from Carl is that he talks about how our preferences change overtime; for example that which has utility or interest to us as a child, a mature man, or an old man is all different!

I think maybe it is cultural; I was born in 1988, born Asian American Korean American… And to have Asian pride was to drive some sort of Japanese car, lower it, pimp it out, and race it? Essentially like the early fast and the furious movies, Tokyo drift etc.

I suppose this is where media is bad; any sort of media you watch and integrate into your soul as a child, has a deep impact on you.

For example, a really stupid thing I saw as an adult the other day — week three young boys, maybe around seven years old, all playing in the sandpit together, doin

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