Don’t cater to people’s preferences, what do you think they will prefer. Rather, you decide for them.
Category: Posts
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Just drive a low-key car
Lexus RX, Subaru, Tesla Model 3, Prius.
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Feed your kids goat’s milk
I first thought of goats milk from the ancient Roman’s and Greeks — even back then it was common knowledge that sheep and goats milk and cheese and dairy products had less flatulence and issues processing in the stomach with cows milk.
Less lactose, also more ideal for Asian kids:





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The Goal Is to Become More Powerful, Not More Productive.
Physical power — powerlifting. Also more power via your influence.
More power is a master morality and imperative, more productivity is a slave labor mentality.
More power via eating more meat (3+ pounds a day). Also, to stay up late to work more and to be more productive — this is a slave mentality. Sleeping more is a master way of living, and how to gain more power.
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In praise of Whole Foods hot food bar
The fastest, easiest and most bang for the buck way to quickly get 3+ pounds of meat (they even had beef barbacoa the other day), only $10 a pound for food (consider how good a deal this is, considering the food is already precooked for you)!
Such a better and more efficient way to eat than any restaurant or all you can eat restaurant buffet.
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A pleasant life is a boring life.
Perhaps this is why living in a very pleasant climate like San Diego is so boring.
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We charge our phones, why not charge our cars?
Another +1 for Tesla.
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Don’t Sell Your Company
Anyone who sells their company, perhaps they don’t really got “soul†in the game, as every person who has built or started a company knows, control is 1000000x more important than any billions of dollars you can own.
For example, am I the only one who recognizes that after the owner sold Whole Foods to Amazon, Whole Foods is starting to get a lot more ghetto and janky? Poor toilet hygiene and cleaning, no more fancy condiments etc. It feels like it’s just becoming another Walmart, although of course far nicer.
It also seems that the founder of What’s App deeply regretted doing so after the fact, even though the sale was in the billions.
Also apparently even the founders of Instagram got slowly pushed out of the company after selling to Facebook. When instagram first started it was a great platform for photographers but now, it’s just kind of a “lifestyle†shitshow.
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Billionaire Lifestyle
The most low key and stealth. You don’t want others to know how rich you really are.
Thus for car, you probably won’t want to drive a Rolls Royce or a Lamborghini to draw attention to yourself. Also the headache of worrying about people fucking up or keying your car. Apparently the best car which also is the most low-key is a Lexus. Even John Wick (his other car in his garage in his New Jersey home) is a Lexus RX SUV. Ideally not having to own your own car, to not have to deal with car insurance, registration, maintenance etc. Ideally just rent, borrow or lease your car indefinitely as need be.
With living, as simple as humanly possible. The smallest home possible, the least amount of maintenance. Even my very rich and successful older friends when they get older, they sell their bigass house and either move into a small condo, or decide to just sell everything and travel the world and be nomadic.
With clothing, no branding. Extreme high end quality, but no branding or badges — as high quality but low key as possible.
With time, no schedules, no meetings and no business you must attend to. Pure freedom. Maximal leisure and otium and mind space to pursue your art, thinking, philosophy, blogging, YouTubing, sharing writing and publishing. Travel freely for photography and introspection. Not having to need to own a phone, or having to check or use email.
Being able to go to the gym whenever you want or feel like it — powerlifting and increasing your one rep max personal records (PR’s). In your life, the goal for at least a 5 plate deadlift (505 pounds +), a 4 plate squat (405+) and a 3 plate benchpress (315+).
Besides the first year of your child (the worst sleep of your life), after you sleep train your kid (Ferber method, extinction method, just let them cry it out), being able to put your kid down at ~5:30-630pm, and being able to have supreme and sublime sleep. Sleeping well is 1000x more important than doing “work†and being “productiveâ€, and also probably more important than what you eat (ideally beef ribs every night).
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Anti Easy and Pleasant Living
When things are too easy and pleasant, you get lulled to sleep.
This is the death of ambition.
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Don’t cater to the mass market
If you try to cater to the mass market, you will fail.
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We all need competitors.
Alo vs Lululemon.
Competitors are good, competition is always good. The upside of capitalism.
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Once you got perfect climate, weather, and life, then what?
Then perhaps you can work on higher order things, like philosophy, this is why the ancient Greeks were so productive, because they had ideal Mediterranean climate?
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The best of both worlds
Hybrid, plug-in hybrid.
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PUBLISH BEFORE YOU’RE READY.
My ethos on how to publish more and get more stuff out there to the world — your website, blog, the internet and the web.











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ONLY WHERE A CAR CAN VENTURE.
Assuming that Covid will always be a thing, and road trips are the future, even a two hour road trip somewhere suffices. The secret with road trips is this: only go to places that a car can venture.
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KEEP GOING *BEYOND* PERFECT
Never ending versions. Think about Iron Man suits — all the different marks (versions) up to Mark VII.
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LONG STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
Life is short, street photography is long.
1. Street photography is your connection to reality
In SKIN IN THE GAME by Nassim Taleb, he has the analogy of the one Greek god who got his power from being connected to the ground. Once you lifted him off the ground, he lost his power.
Street photography is fascinating, because it connects us to the social world of people.
I find the modern notion of being anti-social strange, as ultimately we all prefer other people. Some people say:
“I hate people”
This isn’t true. The idea is
There are people I hate, but also people I love.
Thus the goal then is spend more time with those whom you love. And to love strangers (xenophila) is a wise goal.
2. Why strangers?
Truth be told in modern day life, we aren’t challenged that much by real fear. Much of our fear is man-made and constructed, mostly fear of upsetting others.
But my big aha moment about street photography:
In street photography, at worst, you’re just mildly annoying someone (YOUTUBE VIDEO).
This is not that big of a deal.
Also
I say, street photography is your best way to be connected to real-life society, through strangers. The more you can photograph strangers, interact with them, and learn to love strangers, the better.
Also:
3. How to never run out of motivation or inspiration in street photography
Perhaps this is where the Russian ‘fatalist’ notion works well, in which we think:
Imagine that you’re currently living the worst-case scenario, and it will never change, but that is still okay!
For example, let us imagine COVID is never going to get better, only gonna get worse. Given that, how can you still thrive as a street photographer?
Or let’s say you can never travel to all the places you’ve wanted to in the past. How can you travel more locally, maybe plan your own street photography road trip, and have an interesting experience and make some interesting photos along the way?
More street photo motivation:
Master Street Photography
Conquer street photography on your own terms at ERIC KIM WORKSHOP >
HAPTIC PHOTO SUPPLY
- Travel Notes Mobile // PRINT
- ERIC KIM NECK STRAP MARK II
- HENRI SHOULDER STRAP
- STREET NOTES MOBILE // Print
BLOG // START HERE
If this inspired you feel free to share or forward to a friend!
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ZEN DESIGN.
iPhone SE in black. Tesla Model 3 on black on black on black with all emblems and badges shaved. Same with a murdered out Tesla Model S Plaid in all black.
For clothes all black everything. Loving the worn, sun damaged, torn, ripped, wabi sabi patina clothes.
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ZEN TRAINING.
Powerlifting and the gym, more of a zen aesthetic ethos training thing.
The mental training and the, time to charge up my focus before I attempt a one rep max lift is what I find most interesting. The actual outcome of the lift is less interesting to me.
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90% Physical, 10% Mental
Towards a 90% physical culture. Like the ancient Spartans, let us hugely favor physical culture over mental culture.
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Timing.
The joy of timing.
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Connection.
Do you have a connection with it or not? Only engage with things you have a personal connection with.
For example of traveling, only travel to places that you feel some sort of spiritual or soul connection with, you don’t have to be blood related, but I must mean something deeper to you. For example, my love will Vietnam, considering that my wife Cindy is Vietnamese. Also my love with Japan, as I have a deep connection with Japanese culture and aesthetics.
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SENECA HATES CLOSED OR LOCKED DOORS.
Learning about human nature from my son Seneca: perhaps we adults also hate the notion of closed doors, or things which are locked and and inaccessible to us.
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Full Stack Parenting
My theory about parenting is that it is training: train their mind, train their physical body, train their musical interest, etc.
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HOW TO PROMOTE FLOW.
In praise of Dropbox. The founders of Dropbox essentially said in their mission statement:
What we are striving to do is to promote flow, work ‘flow’, amongst individuals and teams.
Also one thing I like about working on a laptop vs an iPad or iPhone:
Working on a laptop promotes much more flow, as you can type 10000x faster than an iPad or iPhone.
Think less about “goodâ€, think more about seamless and flow.

























