Schizophrenia: Having a “schism” or a split in your mind. I think I might have “low-key” schizophrenia. When I write, I am no longer me (ERIC KIM). I feel as if when I write I can speak as an authority … sort of like a voice beyond me. Certainly I am grounded to reality and…
The trend I see happening to men: Softer, more fat (more adipose tissue on men above 10%). Less consumption of meat. More trends towards “plant based” diets, or “meat in moderation”, or “only lean meats like chicken breast”, or “only red meat once in a while”, or trends towards vegetarianism or veganism. And on the…
A realization while living abroad in Vietnam and Japan for around 2 years: We in America have too much stuff… stuff as codified as “matter”. The reason I’m an elitist minimalist is because I prefer less stuff and matter. I prefer having less stuff to manage. I prefer less bulk, less weight. I don’t like…
The bad trend: Rather than following and listening to our own design aesthetics, we are always so quick to kowtow and bow down to the design trends and aesthetics of others. For example, the “matte black” aesthetic has become quite in vogue now. But when I was a kid and teenager, I always thought it…
A bad trend in design: You cannot open it, you cannot fuck with it, you cannot fix it (yourself), you cannot modify or change it. This is due to the genius and tyranny of Steve Jobs (much to the distress of Steve Wozniak). Wozniak wanted to create Apple devices which could be changed, modified, and…
My belief: There are no “problems” in the world to be “fixed” (this implies there are ‘broken’ things in the world or that somehow people are ‘broken’ or need to be ‘fixed’). Instead I believe life is most fun and interesting when we work on epic challenges which we consider interesting, curious, and fun to…
A day in the life of ERIC KIM. My fun workflow: Shoot all videos on RICOH GR III in cross process filter mode, 1080p, 60fps. Import all .mov videos to folder on MacBook laptop. Drag all .mov RICOH GR III videos into iMovie Delete sound, add BEATS by KIM Export as video, and upload to…
Is it truly your own personal moral and ethical imperative to help others?
Is it the duty of the strong to help the weak? I think so.
When others are critical of me, they judge me, or they criticize me … I don’t mind so much. I just hate it when people insult me or harass me. For the most part, I enjoy my zen-like zone, focus, and peace of mind to think deep thoughts, to think turbo thoughts, and to pursue…
To be judged is fine. However to insult is bad. Then for us our ethics should be: Judge others with love and sincerity. But don’t insult them. Certainly not behind their back *nor* to their face!
The closest link to the word ‘think‘ comes from the Proto-Indo-European ‘*teng-‘ which means to think, to know, and to feel. Some thoughts: First of all, why think? What is the critical importance of thinking? Two — is it useful to think for thinking sake? There — how can we think more? My ideas:
I am totally for people who decide to go vegetarian or vegan for ethical reasons or religious reasons … but for physiological or ‘health‘ reasons … this seems nonsense.
A further inquiry on why we think laziness is a vice:
To be ‘critical’ comes from the Ancient Greek ‘kritikos‘ which literally means “to judge”. Thus when it comes to any knowledge, informations, opinions or ideas… go to the source (primary documents, not human-centipede secondary documents) and judge for yourself.
We all go ga-ga over how to get more followers, likes, blah blah blah. But how come we never ask: *WHY* share your photos? Some of my thoughts:
Simple reasons: First of all, I like having the control. The control what goes into my food and what weird crap *DOESN’T* get put into my food. For example with restaurants my biggest problems include: I can never eat enough meat to feed myself (the other night I ate 1.5 pounds of steak and 5…
Towards a critique of the false narrative that human nature is to be ‘lazy’:
The best ideas: You wake up, and you already have an idea you want to write about. The problem of modern society: We wake up, and we are spurred by external promptings (checking our email, text messages, social media messages, news, etc). Solution: When you get home, turn off your phone totally off. When you…
There is no difference between watching the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) or “professional wrestling” and politics. If you don’t think that wrestling is real, then you should also accept politics also ain’t real.
Seneca — the ultimate doer-and philosopher.
Why I hate the supplement industry with a passion:
My critique of competition: It “low-key” coerces you into cheating in order to win the prizes which are honored by society. Or in other words: If you can cheat and get away with it… why wouldn’t you cheat?
Why I am anti-competition and sharing the truth and fact: If you compete in anything … you must ‘cheat’.
The best thoughts are random, unfiltered and raw:
I am a huuuuuge proponent of ‘short and sinister’ workouts. Keep the workout short, intense, and interesting. Don’t spend too much time working out, following a boring rep-scheme, or whatever. Treat working out more like dynamic movement and play:
If the goal is to make more dynamic compositions then it seems that making *un-balanced* compositions are superior to ‘balanced‘ compositions.
One of my greatest skills in life: Social skills. Specifically — how to interact and engage with strangers. Some ideas:
We are being distracted to death which prevents us from asking the simple (yet essential) question: What do I really want out of life?
The best life: Maximal freedom of speech, activity and thought. What should we atone for most? Self-censoring ourselves … lacking the courage to say what is *really* on our mind:
We are so obsessed with technological innovations … why no love or interest towards social innovations (sociology)?
Why do some people soooo badly want the conspiracy theories to be true? Because it gives them some sort of comfort knowing that they can scapegoat someone else (Peter Thiel, Rene Girard ‘mimetic theory‘) for their own suffering, pain, and existential dread:
What does it mean to live a ‘better’ life, or to ‘improve’ your life?
Something which is dead in today’s modern society and mode of thinking — the hacker ethos, or the hacker technique or mode of thinking. The heuristic: Would you rather buy a brand new Lamborghini or get a project car and transform it into a beast? Or, Would you rather buy a brand new iPhone Pro…
“Hate engendering fear” (from Juvenal, “The Satires”)
Revealed and “true”preferences vs false narrative.
Some conspiracies are true, some are false. Why do some people really want the conspiracy theories to be true?
My theory: When it comes to human matters, it is 80% nature and 20% nurture. Towards a “Pareto”power-law ratio towards human nature. And note, this is coming from a sociologist (ERIC KIM).
A view into what I eat, and why I eat: My Diet Philosophy My personal goal is simple: Increase muscle mass (skeletal muscle mass) indefinitely (although slow pace) and maintain my body fat percentage quite low (around 10%). Therefore I follow a ‘via negativa’ diet: No starches No carbs No vegetables (I only eat bitter…
In striving to always simplify my workflow and streamline it, I found a new one: Use MacOS finder (in gallery view) and quickly go through your photos with the arrow keys, and simply drag and drop your favorite JPEG photos into your WordPress Media Library.
You must first love your body before you begin to love yourself. Also — Your body *IS* YOU! Also: No matter how rich or powerful you are, you can never transform your body to be anything else but what it is. Also: I have never met any person who loves their body, face, or look.
We all want to become beautiful or more beautiful. What does this mean and how do we do it? Some thoughts:
A big epiphany about style, photography and art: First figure out what your own real life personality is like, *THEN* figure out how to make photos or how to approach photos to best fit your photographic style. For example, I don’t really care to edit too closely when it comes to my writing and thinking…
To survive is basic. It is impossible *NOT* to survive in today’s soft new world. If you follow orders, pay attention, are studious, do well in tests, listen to the boss, you will inevitably climb the social and corporate ladder, make more money, have kids, buy the house and Lexus, whatever. But to me ……
What is technology good for? Simple — not to “improve” our lives, but as a tool to augment our own innate human abilities. For example: Writing as a tool to better explicate your thoughts or what’s on your mind. In praise of iAwriter Blogging as a new communication form to stream your thoughts, ideas, and…
The more muscle, the better:
Respect— respicio meaning “to look at someone, how to regard another”. “Specio” as how to see someone— same word as “spectate” or “spectacles”. Before we expect others to look at us a certain way, we must first start by respecting ourselves. To respect yourself means: Look at yourself in the mirror and see yourself as…
We tend to think of greed as synonymous with “evil”. But the word greed simply means hunger. But isn’t hunger good? Stay hungry, stay foolish (Steve Jobs via Whole Earth Catalogue). The closer word for greed in Latin is “avarice” (avarus) which means “to desire and to long for.” Isn’t it then good to have…
How to conquer regret or remorse (“buyers remorse” or life remorse). Remorse as meaning a “bite back” (remordeo) from your conscience.