{"id":67728,"date":"2017-10-24T12:00:57","date_gmt":"2017-10-24T19:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/?p=67728"},"modified":"2017-10-22T09:57:01","modified_gmt":"2017-10-22T16:57:01","slug":"happiness-is-overrated","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/2017\/10\/24\/happiness-is-overrated\/","title":{"rendered":"Happiness is Overrated"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Portrait
Portrait by Cindy Nguyen. Hanoi, 2017<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Dear friend,<\/p>\n

An idea that might make life a lot more pleasant and good\u00e2\u20ac\u201d realize that happiness is overrated. Rather, seek GROWTH.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

1. Growth over happiness<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

So… the problem with \u00e2\u20ac\u0153happiness\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is that we usually think of it as pleasure.<\/p>\n

For example, I eat a hamburger and it tastes good, and it gives me pleasure. Then I feel \u00e2\u20ac\u0153happy\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.<\/p>\n

Or another example: let\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s say that I work really hard at my job, and I get a promotion and a salary increase. Then I feel \u00e2\u20ac\u0153happy\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u201d because I have a sense of progress.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

But, then we adapt to the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153new new\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u201d psychologists call this the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153hedonic treadmill.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

No matter how much pleasure we inject into our veins, we will always accustom to it. Then, we will easily feel boredom and ennui… we seek \u00e2\u20ac\u0153more\u00e2\u20ac\u009d pleasure. We try to earn more money, we try to buy more fancy shit, we try to buy more expensive cars, we seek more exotic travels, fancier hotels, etc.<\/p>\n

But no matter whatever pleasures we have in life, we will eventually tire and bore of it.<\/p>\n

2. Grow.<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A better life focus:<\/p>\n

\n Focus on growth.<\/strong>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Growth\u00e2\u20ac\u201d the principle we get from nature.<\/p>\n

A tree is always growing.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

As humans, we can grow in different ways. We can learn information. We can learn wisdom and knowledge. We can improve our artistry. We can get stronger by lifting heavier weights at the gym. We can grow by growing our muscle, our mental muscle, and by growing our store of information. We can grow as artists by evolving \u00e2\u20ac\u201dmaking new types of visual art.<\/p>\n

3. How to grow<\/h2>\n

\"Tokyo<\/p>\n

How do we grow?<\/p>\n

We need more nutrition. If you want to grow muscle, you need more meat, more protein, more fat, and more nutrients.<\/p>\n

If you want to gain wisdom and knowledge, you need nutritious information\u00e2\u20ac\u201d healthful, not junk food.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

If you want to grow as an artist, you need to consume great art from the past. Music: Beethoven and Mozart. Visual art: Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo. For business, Ray Dalio, Steve Jobs.<\/p>\n

4. You need to challenge yourself<\/h2>\n

\"Old<\/p>\n

With growth, you need to CHALLENGE and push yourself.<\/p>\n

That means, avoid boredom.<\/p>\n

\"Subway<\/p>\n

For powerlifting, it would be boring to deadlift the same weight for the rest of your life. Rather, small, steady, and incremental profess and growth of strength is what we desire.<\/strong> For myself, I just try to add 2.5-5 pounds to my \u00e2\u20ac\u01531 rep max\u00e2\u20ac\u009d each week. This is the secret formula I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve used to raise my deadlift from 135 to 420 lbs+ from age 19 to 29. A decade of steady growth \u00e2\u20ac\u201d you can grow a lot.<\/p>\n

In photography, avoid photographing whatever you find boring or easy.<\/p>\n

\"Woman<\/p>\n

Always challenge yourself visually. Seek to challenge yourself by making more challenging pictures. Shoot more pictures which scare you \u00e2\u20ac\u201dstreet photography is a good subject matter.<\/strong><\/p>\n

5. Find higher vistas<\/h2>\n

\"Low<\/p>\n

Avoid plateaus. You must always push further, to reach higher summits. You must always have higher mountains to climb, to challenge yourself, your tenacity, your strength, your muscles, and your determination.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

So friend, let us ignore petty pleasure, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153happiness\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u201d and rather seek challenge, grandeur, and greatness. And we can only become grand by seeking more.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Never stop growing,
\nERIC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dear friend, An idea that might make life a lot more pleasant and good\u00e2\u20ac\u201d realize that happiness is overrated. Rather, seek GROWTH.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":67460,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_ek_photo_artist_note":"","_ek_photo_thesis":"","_ek_photo_camera":"","_ek_photo_place":"","_ek_photo_human_moment":"","_ek_photo_sequence":"","_ek_photo_question":"","_ek_photo_canonical_claim":"","_ek_photo_ai_summary":"","_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67728","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-posts"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/82431FE9-6CC6-40BE-94C1-D2FC01F0257C.jpeg?fit=2000%2C1325&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67728"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67728\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67729,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67728\/revisions\/67729"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}