My grim and personal thought:

I don’t think COVID will ever go ‘away’.

What I mean is this:

1. Creating a vaccine will take *waaaay* longer than we expect it to.
2. When the vaccine actually is available, it will be very hard to get it.
3. Even if we get the vaccine, it won’t be 100% “fool-proof”.
4. Even if you get the vaccine, there will probably be a bunch of bozos who are ‘covid-deniers’ who will not comply. Then think — would you send your kids to school with other parents who don’t believe in COVID?

Thus my practical thought is this:

Don’t delay living … live now.

Because COVID ain’t gonna go anywhere anytime soon. We have Covid-19 (it started in 2019). What if there is a Covid-20? (mutates in 2020) or a Covid-21, or Covid-22, or something even 10x *WORSE* than covid happens?

Live now.

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Face masks will become a fact of life. Some ideas:

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Good fat: fat in meat (saturated fat and cholesterol as good for you). The fattier the meat, the better.

Bad fat: body adipose tissue fat. Excess fat-flesh (adipose tissue) is bad. Also bad fat is any cooking oil fats derived synthetically — margarine, vegetable oils as mostly bad for you. Perhaps the only non-meat oils to trust is what has existed a long time (olive oils in Ancient Greece, and sesame seed oil in Asia and China).

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If your goal is to work more, here is how to do it:

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Movement is the goal. To move the human mass. Movement should better be thought of as “motivation”— the initial motive force that gets us humans moving and going!

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Here are all my open-source videos (thus far):

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Happiness simply as a means to an end, not the end in itself.

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In life as long as you simply follow what you’re interested or passionate about, how can you not succeed? My whole life whenever I’ve pursued something I’m genuinely and passionately interested in, I’ve always succeeded. I’ve always found inner motivation and power to pursue it. But whenever I’ve pursued things others told me that I “should” do, I failed.

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The privileged are often the most nihilistic, empty, apathetic, depressed, filled with existential dread, addicted to drugs and alcohol and carnal pleasures, and with no meaning, purpose or direction in life.

Nikola Tesla strove to create innovations and technologies to help people have the easiest life possible. But question— once we have an easy life, then what? What do we want to do with our easy life? And is this even something to be desired?

I say — an easy life is a boring life. I advocate for a simple life, but a challenging, difficult and interesting life is far preferable! If anything, a simpler life encourages a more creatively productive life which is good!

I say the goal:

Entrepreneurship — risk taking to do new dope shit, that doesn’t necessarily have to lead to money making, but doing something truly great, worth while, fun, interesting and grand.

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Better to buy (and eat tons of delicious lamb) than buy a Lamborghini.

Or also:

Better to workout a lot, and eat a lot of lamb (flesh meat, bloody high in saturated fat and cholesterol) and look like a greek god (transforming your body into a Lamborghini) than to be fat and just buy a Lamborghini.

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Facts:

I don’t think I’ve ever read a comment online (or even in real life) which has personally benefitted me — whether it be a positive one or negative one. No great ideas are created via committee. Avoid the trap of trying to placate others. Have extreme faith in yourself, your own ideas, and propagate them widely:

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How did Trump win? Easy; the liberal media gave him probably $1 trillion dollars worth of free marketing and advertising.

Humans aren’t rational or objective. We are emotional beings. This means:

As as long you’re in the media spotlight, you will win.

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Towards a ‘via negativa‘ notion of productivity:

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Question:

Is it ethical for a person to become financially wealthy as a consequence of their political, racial, or socio-economic stance and theories?

I think not.

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Do we control our hormones, or do our hormones control us?

Do you write out of need and want, or out of uber-abundance and physical health and vigor?

Ignore anyone who believes in some sort of classless, or hierarchy-free utopia. Utopia actually literally means “no+place” (ou, [not] + topos, [place]). Even the closest notion we got is elysium (where the fallen heroic heroes go after death)— but this also implies some sort of heroism on their part.

In praise of beta. The new macOS (all of them) are soooooo beautiful!!! I always test the newest betaOS’s for Apple, to see the bleeding edge. macOS is the future. Shout-out to the Apple team, you absolutely killed it!!!

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By photographing what you eat, you show who you are:

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When you read anything always ask yourself:

What key information is NOT being presented here?

For example, why DOESN’T Karl Marx’s personal Wikipedia page have any criticisms or critiques about him?

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Or in other words:

Never do anything online (or offline, in real life) that you wouldn’t be comfortable the whole world knowing about you, your opinions or what you say and what you’ve done.

The internet archive, way back machine, and now taking screenshots. It’s soooo easy to uncover hidden dirt— even people modifying their own Wikipedia pages (or having friends or colleagues do it for them).

You can only truly critique people you truly love and understand.

Now we street photographers … we got ultimate skin in the game. Now going out and shooting street photography is a real risk. But that is what makes it fun and interesting, and requires our courage and bravery?

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It seems we all love video games. I’m a huuuge fan of Marcin and what he did with Witcher and now the new Cyberpunk game (looks awesome). However, seeing all this stuff makes me think and believe:

Certainly real life (embodied, flesh-based reality) is the best life.

We play in video games characters who are insanely buff, muscular, and adrenaline junkies. But why are we so timid and cowardly in real life? This is my fun and thrill in street photography — it is like the ultimate real life First Person Shooter (FPS). And I think this is why my street photography Gopro POV videos were so popular.

Let’s say all the conspiracy theories or whatever is true. You discover the truth or truth(s) about everything — then what? What is the positive utility of knowing the truth, or knowing truth(s)?

My thought:

Perhaps the utility is to just encourage others to think for themselves and not get easily suckered or deceived.

To guide others to not be taken advantage of, and to NOT become pawns for the advancement of others and their personal agendas. This is why I mostly steer clear of politics and the media — everyone is in it for the money, personal advancement, fame, or hubris.

Or better yet:

Don’t trust anyone on social media.

Why? Simple:

As long as your self-esteem, money, reputation, social standing, or financial livelihood depends on social media (Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, whatever) … people will always distort themselves (their opinion, their physique, take steroids-testosterone-weird-chemicals), etc.

In fact if your livelihood is dependent on social media, it actually seems illogical to *NOT* “cheat”.

Credit to Daniel Kunitz (New Frontier Fitness) who first wrote about this notion of ‘Workout Porn’ in his book “Lift“). The notion of workout porn is fascinating — it is essentially sometimes we like to watch other people workout more than we like to workout ourselves. But what if workout porn was a good stimulus to get us to workout? Shout out to CT FLETCHER as well as Calum Von MOGER.

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No need to atone for yourself, your privilege, your birth, whatever. You never asked your parents to be born … so why atone?

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I believe it is self-evident that America is unequal. Yet I still believe in the American dream. Why? With inequality comes opportunity.

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You cannot buy happiness, but you can buy productivity. Some things (all Amazon affiliate links which means if you buy anything on these links via below, I get around a 5-7% kick-back):

1. Coffee. Wink coffee (light roast) is great. I just grind it at home with either my mini stainless steel Porlex grinder (thanks Jun) or just using a random Nutribullet grinder (I do not believe in these stupidly expensive fancy coffee grinders). I also am a huuuuge advocate for the Clever Coffee Dripper (Cindy and I bought ours in Vietnam 3 years ago, traveled the world with it, and still use it [several times a day] here in the states). Clever is great — best hybrid between pour-over and the thickness of espresso. I drink lots of black coffee (no milk, no cream, no sugar, no silly almond or other pseudo-milk things) and water during the day to maximize my creative productivity.
2. 100% cocoa powder: I like the ‘Viva Natural’ 100% cocoa powder (no sugar) to give me a mid-day boost. I drink it just with boiling hot water. It acts as another good creative stimulant to me.
3. Matcha green powder: This stuff is very strong and potent. MatchaDNA seems to work well, and just a tiny bit of it (like seriously a very little amount) gives me a strong buzz. Careful with this stuff; I once drank too much powder, and I got really nauseous. The good thing with matcha green tea — L-Theanine + caffeine (good buzz).

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My honest appraisal:

Facebook is a ‘net positive’ for society, but Instagram is a ‘net negative’ to society.

Why?

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Why I bought Bitcoin (BTC) and Digibyte (DGB) and think cryptocurrency (and other forms of crypto, like digital ledgers) are the future for photographers and this brave new digital economy:

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There are 3.5 billion smartphone users in the world which means:

There are 3.5 BILLION photographers in the world!

A great entrepreneurial opportunity ripe for you!

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How to become #1 in a given category on YouTube, which is the world’s second-most visited website (after Google). In other words:

1. Google is the world’s #1 search engine
2. YouTube is the world’s #2 search engine

If you master YouTube *AND* Google, you are golden. This is how to do it:

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How to become happy:

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To me, the apex success is simple:

Do what you love, and *NOT* be homeless.

In other words, consider this a quick and easy guide to (quickly) become a self-employed photographer. The goal is to make a living *NOT* a killing with photography:

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I am convinced:

If your goal in life is to have apex happiness, you *CANNOT* be employed by a boss.

Or in other words:

For apex happiness in life, you must become self-employed.

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My body is something I am trying to build and sculpt. My body-building is also an edifice, and an art-work:

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Sociology — the workings of society. What will the sociology of the future look like? A glimpse:

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Society can only function (well) if we got people who obey, follow orders, etc. A society (anarchy) with no functioning government, and all these beast-like humans cannot function. Thus society does soft coercion to get us to follow rules for the sake of the collective.

Thought:

Modern society as a Christian society … in which the collective is more important than the individual?

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With energy, physics and people … do they generate energy or suck away and parasite energy?

Some thoughts:

1. Physiological thriving: Going to bed at 8-9pm, and waking up (naturally) without alarm clock.
2. Intermittent fasting during the day. Breaking your fast with a very delicious meat-forward meal.
3. Creative productivity: To always have inspiration and motivation to make more and new art works.
4. High muscle mass (skeletal muscle mass) and low body fat percentage (low adipose tissue). Ideal bodyfat percentage is ~10% for men, ~20% for women.
5. Lots of sunlight. Walking around a lot, outdoors with fresh air. Having some randomness and chance in your day. *NOT* following any form of schedule.
6. Some form of physical activity or exercise.

In praise of a ‘poor‘ or ‘ghetto‘ lifestyle:

My personal goal and quest:

How can we maximize our human potential with as little money as possible?

Basic thoughts:

1. Eat super-cheap industrial meats. 99 cents a pound for pork loin shoulder roast. You can buy beef for $2.99 a pound (ground beef). Or even buy cheap cuts of steak. Chicken leg quarters (the best taste) can even be bought around 99 cents a pound to $1.29 a pound. The secret is to go to ‘ghetto’ grocery stores. Yeah yeah we all know organic non-GMO stuff is best, but whatever. I’m for industrial meat.
2. Workout wherever, whenever. Certainly the peak happiness in life is not attainable without muscle (having high muscle mass and low body fat). Also we delight in movement. Thus just get a cheap-ass gym membership, or workout at the park, in the streets, or at home. ‘Necessity is the mother of all invention’!

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I am my selfie.

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A realization:

If you really want to share the *experience* of eating out or whatever, video is faaaar better than (boring) still photos.

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The challenge a lot of us photographers face:

How can I discover intrinsic motivation to go out and make new photos?

Some thoughts:

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The brave new world of (future) living:

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How is apex productivity possible? My thoughts:

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Towards a new conception of live, work, play. The ideal:

Live somewhere hella cheap, and derive your income from elsewhere.

An insider view to my home gym workouts:

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No real identity, no real opinion:

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Or in other words:

Yes, your opinion is valuable!

Consider all these people who are at home, alone, bored, anxious, or dealing with existential dread. You can be the person who uplifts, motivates and empowers them!

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To schedule is less wise. Better to takes a ‘Bayes‘ approach — a combination of tinkering with your schedule, going with the flow, following your gut (and legs) and not putting yourself into a ‘Procrustean bed‘ of a (boring and rigid) schedule.

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We all love video games. But … life (real life, embodied reality) is *THE* best video game!

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My theories:

1. I am really good on the keyboard and computer (I have all the epic hotkeys for MacOS on my MacBook Pro laptop), and I also can type 150 words per minute.
2. I am fearless, I say everything and don’t self-censor myself
3. I have high muscle mass and low bodyfat, which means perhaps … I have more metabolic energy to create?
4. I drink a lot of water and black coffee during the day and I also do intermittent fasting. I also get to bed early (8-9pm-ish). Perhaps this helps me become more productive?

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If you cannot market yourself, you will not be able to stand out or succeed:

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My thought:

There are a lot of anonymous letters being published on issues x, y, z and people are afraid of losing their jobs or whatever.

But … if one has a *true* belief in a certain cause, or truly cares … one would *NOT* do it anonymously.

Or in other words:

Put no faith into anonymously published things.

Why? Either:

1. The anonymous letter is fake (the letter writer is pretending to be someone who they actually are not)
2. They are virtue-signaling their thoughts without real ‘skin in the game’ (Nassim Taleb), and thus their opinion has lesser worth.

Certainly if your opinion is like a life-or-death scenario (if you’re from North Korea or so), then anonymity is good. But if you’re just afraid of losing your job, economic livelihood … put your face and the name in the game.

As a kid who grew up to video games, I am a huge critic. My thoughts and experiences:

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On the internet there is truly no downside to sharing ‘too much’. In fact, the more you share, the better:

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Theory:

Having more muscle mass leads to more productivity (read “The Problem of Increasing Human Energy” essay by Nikola Tesla)

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The best camera (by far) is RICOH GR III. Why? Simple:

1. Smallest size (the biggest bang for the buck possible). Like a McLaren.
2. Best JPEG images. Best cross process JPEG filter (love the orange-cyan vibes like a Transformers Michael Bay film) as well as the high-contrast monochrome.

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The simplest workflow is the best workflow. Some thoughts:

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When I blog and have a certain idea I want to hyperlink, I will create a *NEW* blog post outlining the idea, and keep the ball rolling!

Everyone is a great photographer now, but not everyone is a great marketer:

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Avoid a lot of modern thinkers and writers. Why? Low-key they are spiteful people full of hatred, malice, and petty envy-jealousy. They want a reason *why* they are so miserable, and they blame others.

“Bad”is not the opposite of “good”. I would say “not good”is a more accurate antithesis of “good”.

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The future of photography: AI (artificial intelligence), machine learning, computational photography and more:

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If you want to do a ‘phone-forward’ approach to photography, get Google Pixel, not iPhone:

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