Even though the notion of ‘living your best life’ seems like this silly millenial/zillenial notion, it is still a good one. Why?
It focuses on you to maximize you.
The notion we get distracted with is ‘changing the world’. Why not ‘change ourselves’? Or better yet, maximize ourselves, our passion (photography)?
1. Don’t stay home
In life we make the wrong optimization:
We try to make our photography lifestyle fit our work lifestyle.
Rather we should
Have our work fit our photography lifestyle.
Money is overrated (money thoughts). Photography, arts creation is underrated.
Hit the road. Go on a cruise. Travel. Go to Cambodia (Phnom Penh), go to Vietnam (Saigon/Hanoi), or just go on a road trip somewhere close by (JOSHUA TREE, lake arrowhead etc). Hit the road like Sinbad.
The ideal is to die with $0 in your bank account (or crypto wallet). The best strategy in life:
Funnel all of your money and resources to travel, explore, adventure .. and just shoot photos along the way.
2. RICOH GR IIIX
Just buy a Ricoh or Ricoh GR IIIX. I rate the camera as at least 1000x better than any Leica M11, Leica Q2, Fujifilm camera, Digital Medium Format camera, iPhone Pro, etc.
If Henri Cartier-Bresson were alive today, he would shoot with a RICOH GR IIIX (40mm is similar to the 50mm focal length), not a Leica M camera, or any Leica camera.
I just got a new GoPro Hero 10, and really like it. Really fun– at least 1000x more fun than shooting with an iPhone (or even iPhone Pro in ultra wide mode). It makes photoraphy fun again.
As an added plus, Seneca loves it too! He has been getting really good at pushing buttons, and he has been pushing the buttons on top.
Use GoPro to go on more adventures, and document and record your experiences via video (1080p, 60fps, and ultra wide is good).
I find, I love to best quickly review and export my photos, upload them to my blog and just move on. Staying in tandem with your photography seems like a wise option.
5. Create and share
Make your own books (PDF EBOOKS). Share them. Publish, be generous, keep it open source.
Easy.
Use Apple Pages to make an e-book (yeah you can!) or Affinity Publisher, or even design in Apple Keynote/Google Slides and export as PDF.
Stay in tandem with your photography: perhaps it is wise that on a daily basis, you quickly shoot (extra small JPEG, high contrast black and white filter on Ricoh GR IIIX), while also quickly flagging and exporting/uploading your photos to your own blog (wordpress media library) on a daily basis)?
In praise of the new innovations in the Converse all stars (Nike owns converse). Probably some good cross pollination creativity going on here — Nike design aesthetic applied to classic Converse designs.
I spent so much money on this MacBook Pro (13 inch, touchbar) from 2017, and already just 5 years later, it is soooooo slow (even though I bought it maxed out). But the screen is good, and it still works pretty good. But… unfortunately the screen cannot detach.
I suppose if we are constantly nomadic and on the road, a laptop is our only option. But if we are more home-bound, perhaps then having a desktop of sorts is a good idea.
At least I like the idea if that somehow if your desktop gets outdated, you can either upgrade it (depends on what the desktop is), or at least switch out the computer component and you still can hold onto your (‘old’) display and keyboard/trackpad.
Having to spend $2,000 every 5 years doesn’t seem very sustainable to me.
Given that laptops get outdated so quickly, perhaps a more sustainable option is to just keep on buying the newest iPad (with the fastest, best chip). Like the new M-series processors on the iPad Air, iPad Pro, etc.
Greater social challenges, greater challenges in the gym with powerlifting, attempting new personal records.
After having lived in perfect weather and a perfect climate, and after living in Providence Rhode Island, in places with variable weather, I have discovered that in fact, weather is overrated. When the weather is not good, just bundle up. Like the Swedes say, there’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing.
Perhaps the same thing is in life. You create your own happiness by creating your own new challenges. And what it comes down to is whether the challenge is actually interesting to you or not.
Not the product photography in the sense of doing fancy product photos to sell an item, but instead, just photograph the products you engage with every single day.
What if you said Tristan that you were not allowed to buy any car, no matter how cheap or expensive?
Even if you became a billionaire or a trillionaire, you were not allowed to buy the Porsche, the Tesla, the Lamborghini, the Bentley, the Rolls-Royce, etc.
Instead, you were only allowed to rent cars, Uber, or just borrow a car.
I am very bearish on the future of fiat currency in America. If I received a salary, and just worked a normal job, I will just funnel all of my salary into cryptocurrency.
I see the screenshot as the new form of ‘meta-art’. That is —
When you screenshot something, it is like you’re shooting a photo of it … but it is a ‘meta’ photo of something.
Because if you think about it, when you photograph something, you elevate it, you honor it. By screenshotting something, you signal its importance.
Something I did was in ‘the devil is in the details‘, I just looked through my WordPress library of all my photos labeled ‘screenshot’, and just made a little mini gallery and series of all the photos I screenshotted the details I found interesting in my photos. Perhaps you can do the same and upload it to your own blog.
2. Rust, patina, beautiful decay
I also consider photography to be my painting. What this means is that I LOVE seeing rust, patina, decay, and other ‘wabi sabi’ details (wabi sabi means something becomes more beautiful as it ages).
This gives us much creative leeway as photographers, because it means that we can approach photography abstractly. Photography ceases to be about clarity — it becomes more about emotion, mood, and your soul you impute into your photos.
Shoot more photos (macro, high contrast black and white) or just photos in general which highlight and focus shapes, forms, tones, rust, textures, grit and grain.
3. Study all forms of design
Car design, architecture, home design, shoe/sneaker design, any type of design.
Sketches are good. By sketching your compositions you better understand them, and can better imbue these lessons into your brain, so you can see them when you’re out shooting.
No carbs, sugar, starches, dairy, or fake dairy substitutes, etc. Also no starchy vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, etc. Also no nuts (even the ‘good’ nuts like almonds– very starchy).
Some thing which interests me is the tactics of everyday life. That is, following a strict routine and plan is a bad one. Why? If you’re actually intelligent and tactical, it is more wise to iterate based on every single scenario.
For example, I had this grand master plan of taking Seneca to the park, and then some other places. But then I had to go to the bathroom, And Seneca actually looked very sleepy, so it was actually more strategic and tactical for me to just go back home, nap him in his own bed, and for me to use the restroom at home. And then because I had about an hour to spare, because Seneca was asleep, I just decided to go to the gym.
And then when I was at the gym, I planned on deadlifting 405 pounds. But after doing a single rep of 365, I knew that my body wasn’t feeling it, so I just re-racked the weights, and I might just attempt it in another few days in the future.
1. Obey your body
A simple life strategy is to obey your body. That is, your body is 1000x times wiser than your ‘mind’, and other heuristics and philosophical tactics.
2. Don’t stick to any master plan
You never know until you do it, until you’re in the moment. Be tactical and strategic — just follow your gut. No clock, no rules.
3. What do you desire to accomplish?
Another very simple thought:
Think about what your end-goal is.
For me when it comes to child rearing, I desire for Seneca to become the most physically intelligent boy of all time. I don’t see him as a baby– I see him as a small man in training. Thus my tactics for him tend to be more Spartan, cold and hard, rather than ‘babying’ him.
4. Nutrition and sleep
Quite possibly the most essential thing is nutrition and sleep. They recognize this for children and babies, but why not adults?
The ideal nutrition: meat. Lots of fatty, highly saturated, high in cholesterol meat. Meat as a steroid (cholesterol as a steroid). Any foods which get your testosterone up are good.
Beef ribs, bone marrow, beef neck bone, beef liver, eggs, etc.
Even Seneca, in some funny ways I turned him into a ‘carnivore kid’ or a ‘keto baby’. Even in the early days, when he first started to eat ‘solid’ (non-puree foods), I started to feed him bone marrow as early as humanly possible (he loved it). I got the bone marrow idea from the Iliad– apparently either Hector of Achilles was fed bone marrow as a child.
5. Never compromise your personal morals and ethics
The law can be gamed. However you cannot game or play your own inner code of ethics and morals.
My new aspiration: maximize my physical fitness, my physiological strength, endurance, and my propensity for enjoying time outdoors, ideally in the direct sun.
