Reduce friction in your life in order to maximize what you truly desire to do.
Simple ideas:
Wear the same outfit everyday: All black everything. All merino wool everything. Same pair of shoes everyday. One less thing to worry about. (Steve Jobs same turtleneck, and Mark Z with same grey shirt).
Simpler is better. Use the absolute simples tool for the task possible. For blogging, just use your phone or iPad. For writing, just use IA WRITER and Markdown to keep your ideas and words flowing.
JPEG: Simplify your photographic workflow. Just shoot JPEG, to speed up and expedite your photographic workflow. JPEG > RAW.
At the gym, stick to simple workouts. Deadlift, squat, dumbbell press, chin-ups.
For cooking, keep it simple. I find that eggs are the ultimate food. Super cheap to buy, easy to store, and cook super fast. I usually will eat 10-12 whole eggs (yes, with the yolks too), everyday at around 8pm.
When I don’t walk around all day, leave the house all day, or have the opportunity to engage in any physical activity– my brain, mind, and soul gets strange. But the second I leave the house, walk around the block a few times, go lift weights at the gym, commute and hang out somewhere, my mental issues dissipate.
Which makes me wonder:
What if much of our “mental” issues were rooted in the physiological (pertaining to our physical body)?
A good incentive to giving constructive critiques on arsbeta.com
The more critiques you give to others, the better you understand your own photos, and gain better understanding how you can improve in YOUR OWN photography.
Optimal simplicity in order to maximize what is important to us.
Simplify our photo equipment (RICOH GR III in JPEG x iPad x Apple Photos) to quickly and effectively look through our photos, to quickly select the photos we consider meaningful to us, and to quickly share the photos with others (on your own website/blog).
Simplify our lifestyle and daily schedule. Less time commuting, more time creating.
Simpler foods— less indigestion, more strengthening for our bodies (simple meats and eggs). Simple coffee (all black), and just water. Maximal strength, extreme frugality in sustaining ourselves.
I think some of us artists strive to make artworks which are ‘eternal’, and ‘timeless’.
But it is my belief that nothing should last forever. If our artworks were eternal and never decayed and were never forgotten– future generations probably wouldn’t have the opportunity to create new things.
Wouldn’t it be horrible if there was a future in which no photographer was allowed to create art-works better than Henri Cartier-Bresson? Or better than Picasso? Or better than the great artists of the past?
I just gave a talk at Google on the topic of becoming ‘Creative Everyday’ [pdf download link to Slides], and wanted to change the definition of “creativity” from the notion of “artistic innovation” to the propensity to create lots of things.
Therefore as a photographer, you are more ‘creative’ if you create more (new) photos!
When we think of “creative photographyâ€, we typically mean to say “artistically innovativeâ€.
But who is the judge whether a certain photograph is “artistically innovative� And is artistic innovation in photography what we desire? Or is it better to just make good, deep, and meaningful photos and disregard “artistic innovation†in our photography?
No anti aliasing filter, JPEG— super epic. As my friend Jun says, “physics don’t lie†(bigger sensor generally = better image quality/aesthetics for photos).
What if the best thing you could do for yourself and humanity is to create the most epic art-works you are capable of?
For example, don’t think of yourself as a photographer. Think of yourself as an artist. As an artist, it seems that our only duty in life is to create the most epic art-works we are capable of.
When I first started working my first 9-5 job, I desired deeply to become self-employed.
Why? I desired freedom! To show up everyday at an office at an arbitrary time, to leave everyday at an arbitrary time, and to do this from Monday-Friday seemed hyper-bizarre to me.
I thought to myself: We are living in the most modern and technological society. Why do we still need to show up to an office and put in a 40+ hour work-week?
I desired to become self-employed to escape this technological slavery. But what happens once you are self-employed, no longer need to wake up by a certain time, no longer need to attend meetings, no longer need to sleep at a certain time, no longer need to “work” during the day if you don’t want to?
This is my grand thought:
To become self-employed as a necessary step or a pre-requisite to attempt to do and create really great things.
If your passion is photography and you desire to monetize your passion and if you have the opportunity to get a free education, I encourage you to go to business school (instead of photography or art school).
But this is a huge thing:
Never go to school if you’re going to go into debt.
If you can do work-study, get scholarships, do it. Never ever ever go into debt, even for the most seemingly “great” opportunities. Debt is the devil; perhaps even worse.
I will optimize my life to live in accordance to myself. To optimize my life which is best for me. To optimize my life to not put unnecessary stress on myself (only positive stress, ‘eustress‘). To live more like a child– playfully, to challenge myself, and to live life to the fullest.
To ignore conventional wisdom. To discover the wisdom which works best for myself.
I want to go beyond the notion of ‘creativity’ as this “innate ability to make novel connections and to think differently”, into thinking about creativity as frequency and power of creating new art-works.
You make photos, you make illustrations, you make videos, you make music. You derive artistic stimulus from all sources: from listening to music, from films, from dance, from exercise, from philosophy — from anything!
To develop to the fullest extent– grow more variegated. Consider a tree. You have a singular trunk, but your roots grow deeper into the soil, and your branches continue to multiply, and grow higher and higher (while growing wider).
Strive to master MANY artistic domains in life!
Furthermore, strive to engage all forms of knowledge. Science, art, humanities– it is all good!
All arts which inspire and stimulate you are good!
And above all; focus on artistic creation, and your own artistic productivity!
One of the best silicon-valley thought concepts is the idea of the ‘MVP’ (minimum viable product). It is anti-perfection. It is PRO-quick iteration, and just getting it out there!
I think if we all lived more ‘MVP’-minded, we would be more creatively productive, confident, and happier!
What is the motive force which induces us to photograph?
Some ideas:
Desire to immortalize a moment. Great joy and thanksgiving towards reality.
Desire to create visual art works. Photography as faster and more efficient than painting or drawing.
Desire to play. Photography as fun visual gymnastics if shapes, colors, forms, compositions. To photograph is like playing a musical instrument.
Desire to share our perspective and viewpoint with others. To signal and educate others what we consider beautiful. The photographer as the value judge of beauty.
