In life, it seems what we are striving towards is this:

To be less foolish in life when it comes to our pragmatic decision making, and to become more wise.

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The grand master in chess (and perhaps in life) starts with the end-game, and works his/her way backwards:

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My #1 piece of advice for aspiring photographers:

Start your own self-hosted photography blog (via WordPress.org)

I see an uber-bright future for photographers and photography bloggers for the future — new unlimited heights of creative expression!

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Question —

What fun and interesting things can you discover about yourself or about reality through photography?

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Thought:

With work flow, and almost everything in life… strive to cut out the “middle man” or kinks in the pipe which prevent the directness of what you desire to do, or achieve.

For example, the upside of using the iPhone/iPad lightning to USB connector — to import photos from my Ricoh GR III — photos shot in small JPEG. Photos look great “out of the box” in the RICOH JPEG, and don’t require any further post processing! This is great then it simplifies and streamlines our workflow, because all you gotta do is shoot the photos in jpeg, import them to your device, then directly upload to your WordPress media library to quickly share!

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It seems evident that our de is nosire as photographer-artists is to make beautiful photos. But how do we achieve this? Some thoughts:

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Insight: when we perceive our personal growth and we see our self development augment itself, we are happy. When we see ourselves or perceive ourselves to be degenerating, we are unhappy.

Then the question:

What do we really want a a final end– happiness or self development?

Or are the two things like an interconnected flywheel and yin-yang; both powering the other?

Also perhaps when we perceive that we aren’t growing and developing ourselves into something further and beyond, we become frustrated and that frustration (unhappiness) becomes the spur to motivate us to seek that happiness (self-growth and self-development?)

My hypothesis:

It is self development which we seek, and happiness is the means to that end!

Because when we witness and the self developmental growth becomes factual and true in our eyes, we get a spurt of happiness (serotonin, other hormones and bodily-brain chemicals). Thus in order to feel the happiness, we keep striving for more self growth.

So happiness is the drug which addicts us, and self growth and self development is the true goal and end into itself!

Our desire … to beautify ourselves. This is what drives our desire for fashionable clothes, hair cuts, cars, accessories, shoes, body building yoga and health fitness things, our diet and lifestyle, etc.

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Our desire as artists, or as individuals with very sensitive eyes and visual senses:

We hate the aesthetically ugly in shape, texture, and form … and we desire to banish ugliness from our eyes by either changing our environment (our homes, exterior and interior design, architecture, community, city, climate, and neighborhood).

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Your photos will reveal your own personal politics and world view!

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Technically we don’t get stronger *as* we lift the weight. When we successfully lift a new PR (personal record) in any of our lifts, it is just an acknowledgement of our pre-existing and innate (latent) stength.

Technically we become stronger when we’re eating more meat, and sleeping and recovering and building our muscles through this “post traumatic growth” period. The weight lifting is the trauma trigger to stimulate growth. The “resting” or “recovery” phase is when the real growth is happening. Thus the thought:

Let us remember it is the times when we are resting, recovering, eating, and consuming and sleeping when the “real” growth happens, not when we are just “forcing” ourselves to work more!

Active rest, leisure, and emptying your mind as taking more skill and discipline than just “forcing” yourself to work more!

What we delight in as photographers and visual artists: form!

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Why are music videos so fun (BlackPink)? Because– it seems we humans love the combination of both the visual *and* musical:

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Words of wisdom from homeboy Publilius Syrus on ‘planning’.

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Some pragmatic tips and ideas on how to do a one rep max squat, with no silly belt, knee wraps, steroids, protein powder, pre-workout stuff, creatine, testosterone, crazy genetics etc:

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Of course beyond the obvious cases (like booking flights, or perhaps some work-related things), strive to never schedule a day in advance. This means, with any of your personal, life, health, fitness, art, creativity things … attack every day, day by day as it comes!

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Innovation: your external conditions will never be optimal or best. So given your sub-optimal life conditions right now, what are the levers or triggers you can enable in order to optimize your sub-optimal for the better?

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Since I’ve been getting back into weight lifting, I’m a trillion times more inspired in my art and arts creation. Which makes me think:

Perhaps the core root and primal instinct of us to make art is derived from our physiological, bodily desire to express our physiological joy and well-being?

What Gives us the Impetus to Create?

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Our goal isn’t to make the “best” or the most complex photo. I say it seems more interesting to contemplate what are the most basic and simplest elements of a photograph; to take it back to “first principles” (Aristotle, Physics).

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It seems life is far more fun, interesting and fulfilling when we put ourselves in a situation which allows us to (self-directedly) maximally engage ourselves with either thoughts, ideas, knowledge, wisdom, art, or the act of creation.

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Photography is about photographing, documenting and creating images that have to do with human affairs.

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First sent on ERIC KIM NEWSLETTER

Dear friend,

In today’s topsy-turvy world, now is your opportunity as a photographer to shoot and document it.

An interesting insight I had recently:

Political photography IS street photography, which means… if you shoot things which are political, the photos are very interesting and meaningful.

This means:

Don’t allow yourself to become a prisoner of any genre of photography; just strive to make photos which are interesting or entertaining to you.

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Politics pertains to the “polis” (city, as good old Aristotle has taught us). Political photography and street photography seems to be the same thing.

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Not sure what to photograph? Just photograph a full 24 hours in the day of your own life. To document it all— what you wear, what you do, what you eat, what you drink etc. And it isn’t about making a single great photo, but just a series of fun photos to document a simple day in your life, and also as a means in the future to look back at your old photos and to relive the wonderful past memories and experiences you had!

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The purpose of life, art, creativity, entrepreneurship is this:

To always iterate upwards and forwards, to the heights and beyond!

Or like Buzz Lightyear says:

To infinity and beyond!

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There is much we can change in our lives and much we cannot change in our lives. Which makes me think:

In which contexts is it best to literally change the external circumstances of our lives (our environment, home, abode, lifestyle) and when should we change the internal attitude we have towards these certain things?

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A life with photography is soooo much more fun and enjoyable. Why?

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To shoulder press more weight (via dumbbells), do it one handed:

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Life ain’t about pain avoidance. Instead, my thought:

How can we use pain as a stimulus towards making us more active, to do more, and to become more?

Not to make the purpose of our life to maximize our pleasure and to minimize our pain. But rather, to use pain *AND* pleasure in novel ways to empower us to act more, do more, create more, think more, and become more?

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Life is too precious to live in a conservative, defense-based mode. Let us be more active, forward… let us ATTACK!

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What makes a street photographer a street photographer? Not our camera, not our approach and not even our technique. I say street photography is the ethos and the love of being out in public, interacting with others, being out doors and in public spaces, and harvesting the joy of life!

The harder you go, the harder you must also recovery! To force yourself to recover is also an active thing!

We cannot just force endless productivity with no recovery.

Work hard, recover hard.

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Towards an anti-soft and flabby approach to life.

The new motto:

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Our great privilege as photographers, bloggers, vloggers, and digital creators:

There is really no downside to sharing more than ‘necessary’.

Thus I say let us harness this benefit, and just share it all!

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Don’t use money to just buy stuff. Treat yourself like a scientist; use money as a tools for more interesting life experimentation!

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The point of photography: to better engage with the external world, to witness beauty, to highlight beauty, and to *ELEVATE* beauty using our skill as photographers!

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Happiness as a concept as too vague. Better to think about physiological happiness– the physiological thriving, growth, and splendor of the body!

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How to cultivate courage in modern times:

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This is the aesthetic and state/approach we are going for.

Life is not a competition, but there are certainly ways you can gain a competitive advantage compared with others, by identifying your ‘archimedes lever’ (your one thing that you are probably at least 10x better than others in) and focusing on maximizing that.

For me, it is very easy and seamless and requires me almost no effort to blog, shoot YouTube videos, lift weights, shoot photos, write, think, walk, talk to people, etc. Then it seems wise for me to focus on my greatest strengths, and disregard my weaknesses.

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4K video means that the maximum width of the videos are around 4,000 pixels wide (a good width, even to blow up stills and print them).

Why shoot 4K? Well let us consider all these uber mega screens we see at Costco. As time goes on, screens will keep getting bigger, people will spend more and more time at home streaming YouTube and other random things, big screen TV’s will continue to get cheaper, which means:

More and more people will expect and demand 4K video substance!

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Each and every day as a mini lifetime. This means — live today like it were a lifetime in full. Attempt everything your heart desires today … no fear, no regret, all courage!

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A life free of pain isn’t a life worth living. In fact, to confront pain and the chance of pain … this is what makes us truly courageous, otherwise we would only pursue what’s pleasant and basic for us in life!

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In other words:

Don’t shy away from, or shy away from the potential of pain!

ERIC

Exercising to get rid of superfluous energy. Not exercising as a form of virtue-practice.

What is the benefit of exercise? Not to force yourself to sleep only 5 hours, wake up at 4am, and do some insanely intense workout. No— exercise as a form of expelling excess energy, power and force from us. It requires we are well rested, fully recovered and brimming over with physiological energy and force!

In other words, if you’re still tired in the morning sleep more and sleep until you literally don’t want to stay in bed anymore, and you’d prefer to get up and do stuff. And during the day if you’re exhausted, just take a nap!

What is the difference between humans and machines?

Humans are biological beings which require sleep, rest and recovery. The strange bias is ever since Taylorism, consumerism and Capitalism, and now the cult of productivity means:

The new virtue for humans is to become more machine-like (machines don’t require sleep, recovery … just some fuel and oil).

The problem then:

Sleep, recovery, rest and leisure and free time is seen as a vice.

But we must become anti Benjamin Franklin. What some people call sloth and laziness, we see the virtues of leisure, otium and the empty mental space necessary to self develop ourselves into something further. In other words:

More virtuous to sleep more, go to bed earlier, not try to “force” productivity out of yourself if you’re exhausted, and even not forcing yourself to workout or go to the gym if your body is exhausted and needs sleep and recovery.

In fact, we just prioritize our rest, recovery and sleep as our prime virtue in today’s insanely busy and crazy world.

Why weren’t slaves, servants, mechanics and farmers of Ancient Greece *not* allowed to go to the gumasium? Why were only free men, citizens and the aristocracy allowed to visit and utilize the gymnasium?

Is there some deeper and more philosophical and social/physical insights we have yet discovered about the gym, and the culture of the ancient gymnasium which makes us free men, noble, and virtuous?

According to slave mentality, the more productive, stressed out, exhausted, sleep deprived, busy, scheduled one is, the more virtuous one is.

The more I think and contemplate on photography, the more I believe it as a tool to augment human joy and happiness.

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I have a poor memory and often forget all the things I’ve done, seen, witnessed and achieved in the month prior. Then the thought:

Review your photos month by month, as a means of ‘double dipping’ your life experiences, joys and achievements!

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What is the first reason *why* we make photos?

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Floor bench press as ‘safer’ than traditional bench press, allows you to press more (you have better contact with the floor, and also lower range of motion). Still gives you a great adrenaline pump, great activation in your triceps, chest, glutes, back, and thighs.

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Become the creative visionary you idealize in yourself.

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Minimum viable product. Minimize the bulk to the minimum. No superfluous elements. Decrease size and weight and bulk (like the new iPhone Mini), or RICOH GRIII, but increase the quality, craftsmanship and strength.

Also note carbon fiber, merino wool, alpaca, down goose feather jackets, and smaller but more premium luxury apartment mini homes.

In other words, the future is simple, minimalist, expensive and luxury:

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My joy for the gym and powerlifting and physical culture– the physiological joy, rush, and adrenaline rush with attempting a new “one rep max“– discovering and testing what our current limits are. To push ourself to the maximum and not buckle– ultimate antifragility!

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Don’t do it for “the culture”, for “the gram”, or even “for science”. Do it sinply for your self!

Not just sexual arousal, but it seems that if we want to feel more engaged with life, we need to do things which engage and arouse us more.

Mihaly C talks about this in his “flow” philosophy — we must seek the optimal human state which is a state of flow in which we are maximally aroused and focused on our task at hand without being overwhelmed!

For example, I get a huge jolt of energy from social arousal. I get more engaged and aroused when I’m around other human beings. This is why I love social life and social living, and I hate staying at home.

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An effective way to think about and approach life.

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Simple ideas:

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What will be the future photographic work flows? Perhaps a hybrid of Google Photos, Apple photos, Dropbox or your own media library in your own blog.

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Not making money directly from your art work, but indirectly.

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Profits not for the sake of profit, but profit as a means to continually channel into new research and development (BOSE), new innovations, new great products (Apple), or new ways to make our lives more convenient (Amazon)?

The primary new form of innovation in photography will happen via innovation in photography technique and approach. Some thoughts:

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What are the best forms of pleasure? Good old Aristotle instructs us to seek pleasure in itself in philosophy. I say let us seek pleasure in what we can control:

1. Going to the gym and getting a good pump, lift and workout
2. Pleasure in reading, studying philosophy
3. Writing, thinking, making art, photographing
4. Going on a nice walk or drive
5. Thinking big.

If you want to be ‘happier’ in life, more powerful, more productive, have more creative turbo thoughts, build a more beautiful physique and more, it seems simple: powerlifting is the way.

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What do you do with your life once you got “financial independence”/“financial freedom”? Simple thought:

Focus on philosophy and art.

That means spend much of your time and energy thinking, reading, writing, walking, lifting weights and writing and publishing and sharing your thoughts! Art and philosophy — a great and noble goal and end game!

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Buffer in the context of more buffer in space, time, energy, resources and planning.