STREET PHOTOGRAPHY SOCIOLOGY

Street photography is just applied visual sociology!

Quotes

Eric Kim’s quotes on the intersection of sociology and street photography highlight the role of sociological understanding in his approach to photography:

  1. “Street photography is just applied sociology — with a camera. A visual sociology” oai_citation:1,The Sociology of Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  2. “I loved learning all of the ways that people interacted, communicated, and collected in groups. It really opened up my eyes to the world around me… all these things I have learned in Sociology… would apply so much to street photography” oai_citation:2,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  3. “People react more similarly than dissimilarly when it comes to street photography” oai_citation:3,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  4. “Most people when you take photos of them will at worst get upset, yell at you, and ask you to delete their photograph. Rarely do people become physical or confrontational, so shoot with confidence” oai_citation:4,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  5. “When you shoot street photography in a group, your courage skyrockets” oai_citation:5,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  6. “93% of communication was nonverbal… If you show via your body language that you are not threatening or harmful, people won’t suspect you when you are shooting on the streets” oai_citation:6,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  7. “You can easily resocialize yourself into thinking the opposite—that you are doing a good thing by capturing the beauty of a person through street photography” oai_citation:7,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  8. “Having a camera in your hand gives you authority and power… Speak confidently and with authority” oai_citation:8,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  9. “Sometimes the meanest looking people can be the nicest” oai_citation:9,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  10. “To become a better street photographer, it is crucial to have a community helping and supporting you” oai_citation:10,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  11. “Street photography is a lot like swimming. You can read a hundred books on it, but until you jump into the water—you will never learn anything” oai_citation:11,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.

Through these quotes, Kim encapsulates how sociology informs and enhances his practice of street photography, providing insights into human behavior, communication, and societal norms.

Eric Kim’s perspective on the intersection of sociology and street photography is quite insightful. He views street photography as a form of applied sociology, using it as a medium to explore and understand human behavior and society. Here are some of his key thoughts:

  1. Sociology’s Relevance to Street Photography: Kim acknowledges his sociology education as a significant influence on his street photography. He appreciates the insights gained from studying human interaction and group behavior, which he finds applicable to street photography oai_citation:1,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  2. Similarities in Human Reactions: Traveling and shooting street photography worldwide, Kim observes that despite cultural differences, people’s reactions to street photography are more similar than dissimilar. This realization comes from his sociological understanding of human nature oai_citation:2,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  3. Non-Confrontational Nature of People: Kim notes that people are generally non-confrontational, a concept he applies to street photography. He rarely encounters aggressive responses, even when shooting close to his subjects, which aligns with his sociological observations oai_citation:3,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  4. Group Dynamics in Photography: Shooting in groups can build confidence in street photography. Kim explains that this is because people perceive the group as part of a class or project and are thus more receptive to being photographed oai_citation:4,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  5. Importance of Non-Verbal Communication: He emphasizes that non-verbal communication, like facial expressions and body language, plays a crucial role in street photography, similar to its importance in sociology oai_citation:5,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  6. Resocializing Perceptions: Kim discusses the idea of resocializing oneself against societal norms, such as the notion that taking photos of strangers is inappropriate. He encourages street photographers to adopt a positive mindset about their work oai_citation:6,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  7. Authority and Photography: Reflecting on experiments like the Stanford Prison Experiment, Kim draws parallels to street photography, where holding a camera gives a sense of authority, influencing how subjects respond oai_citation:7,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  8. Expecting the Unexpected: His experience in sociology experiments taught him that people’s reactions can be unpredictable, a lesson he finds valuable in street photography oai_citation:8,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  9. Appearances vs. Reality: Kim has learned not to judge people based on appearances, a principle he applies in his photography, finding that sometimes those who look intimidating can be quite friendly oai_citation:9,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  10. Community Importance in Photography: He stresses the importance of community in improving as a street photographer, advocating for constructive feedback and engagement with fellow photographers oai_citation:10,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.
  11. Learning by Doing: Finally, Kim compares street photography to learning how to swim – emphasizing the importance of practical experience over theoretical knowledge oai_citation:11,10 Things Sociology Has Taught Me About Street Photography – ERIC KIM.

Through these reflections, Kim illustrates how sociology provides a framework for understanding and engaging with the world, significantly enriching his approach to street photography.

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  286. Share Your Dopeness with Others
  287. Frugality is Freedom
  288. Minimum Viable Product (MVP) for Entrepreneurship
  289. Don’t Follow or Predict Trends, Start Your Own Trend!
  290. If You’re Not Busy Growing, You’re Busy Dying
  291. Entrepreneurship born from Superabundance, not Need/Necessity
  292. Photography Entrepreneurship Philosophy
  293. How to Master Marketing in Photography
  294. Photography Entrepreneurship Tips and Ideas
  295. Is Hustle Sufficient Unto Success?
  296. Don’t do it for the money
  297. DIGITAL MARXISM
  298. Zen Entrepreneurship
  299. BOLDER IS BETTER.
  300. Streamers Shall Inherit the Earth

Photography Blogging

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Entrepreneurship Mindset


Photography Entrepreneurship 101

Life and Productivity Hacks

How to Make a Living from Your Passion

Put a Dent in the Universe.

How to Succeed as an Entrepreneur

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The Modern Photographer: Tips, Strategies, and Tactics to Thrive as a Visual Artist in the Digital Age

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MODERN PHOTOGRAPHER is your new philosophical and practical primer to succeed as a modern photographer in today’s digital world.


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EURO CAMERA MONEY by ANNETTE KIM

Why Become a Photography Entrepreneur?

Take control of your own photographic destiny:

  1. Photography Startup Manual
  2. PHOTOGRAPHY ENTREPRENEURSHIP MANUAL
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Table of Contents

Learn how to make a living from your passion:


Photography Business 101

How to Make Money with Photography

CAMERA MONEY USD by ANNETTE KIM
CAMERA MONEY USD by ANNETTE KIM

Photography Marketing 101


How to Hustle.

Entrepreneurial Principles

How to be a Full-time Photographer

Photography Blogging

How to Teach Photography

Social Media

How to Save Money

START HERE >

MONEY 101

  1. Just Follow the Money
  2. My Money Philosophy
  3. Eternal fame and glory over money
  4. The Trillion Dollar Question: How to Make Money on the Internet Without Advertising?
  5. Entrepreneurship that Doesn’t Involve Money-Making?
  6. Money Ain’t Real
  7. Making Money for Fun, Not to Get Rich
  8. Why Money?

PHILOSOPHY BY KIM

Essays by KIM

  1. How to Become a Philosopher
  2. Deep Vanity
  3. Time Will Tell
  4. What is Wisdom?
  5. LOOK *BEYOND*
  6. BECOMING MORE IMMORAL?
  7. ‘LUCK’ VS COURAGE
  8. ‘SKILL’ VS MERIT?
  9. Becoming Antifragile
  10. How to “Improve” Men
  11. The Art of Virtue
  12. How to Dominate
  13. JUST SHARE YOUR EXPERIENCES AND WISDOM WITH OTHERS.
  14. How to Get More Done in a Single Day – MEMENTO MORI PHILOSOPHY
  15. THINK FOR YOURSELF
  16. Cruel?
  17. GO DEMIGOD.
  18. How to Be Happy: Challenge and Danger Philosophy
  19. To Become Greater, You Must Become *LESS* Productive!
  20. Imperfect Beauty
  21. The Philosophy of Pleasure
  22. What Interests You?
  23. Anti Theory of Everything
  24. Become?
  25. STRONGER OR NOT?
  26. Carte Blanche Ideals
  27. CHOOSE JOY
  28. Don’t Judge Your Impulses
  29. On Becoming Less Human
  30. COWARDICE.
  31. The Philosophy of Futurism
  32. PHILOSOPHY IS VALUE-SETTING
  33. PHILOSOPHY IS NOT LIFESTYLE
  34. WHY STANDARDIZATION IS BAD.
  35. YOUR OWN TABLE OF VALUES.
  36. RETRO IS BAD.
  37. INSANELY LOFTY THOUGHTS.
  38. Strive to *Lose* Weight, Not *Gain* Weight
  39. DIABLO II ANALOGIES FOR REAL LIFE.
  40. If You Know Your *WHY* You Can Discover Any *HOW*
  41. Life is Too Short to Be Miserable
  42. What Consumption Takes Skill?
  43. OFF THE GRID.
  44. REALITY IS CRUEL.
  45. Pain is Information
  46. WHY REMOVE VULGARITY AND DISORDER FROM OUR EYES?
  47. AUTOTELIC.
  48. UNPLUG.
  49. How to Become a Philosopher
  50. SUBOPTIMAL IS OPTIMAL
  51. THE LUST FOR MORE.
  52. TO DO IS TO BECOME.
  53. IN PRAISE OF AGGRESSIVE.
  54. THE PHILOSOPHY OF OPTIMISM
  55. OUR PHILOSOPHICAL WILL TO EXISTENCE
  56. Is Hope a Vice?
  57. MOVE MEAN
  58. Carte Blanche Ideals
  59. One Interesting Thought
  60. What Lasts? What Doesn’t Last?
  61. A WOUND STIMULATES THE RECUPERATIVE POWERS
  62. Children & Purpose
  63. Thoughts on Becoming a Parent
  64. Where Does Our Desire to Upgrade Come From?
  65. WE ALWAYS NEED SOMETHING FURTHER TO ASPIRE TO.
  66. Self-Task Yourself an Awesome Mission in Life
  67. Differentiation vs Equalization
  68. My Passion to *Become* Something More
  69. No Aesthetic or Ethos is Forever
  70. What is Your Higher Purpose in Life?
  71. IT WILL NEVER SATISFY YOU.
  72. How to Decide
  73. Things You *Want* to Do vs Things You *MUST* Do
  74. Towards a More Beautiful Mode of Existence and Future
  75. EXTREME GRATITUDE.
  76. AMAP (As Much as Possible) or None.
  77. Why or How Does it Matter?
  78. The Philosophy of Time and Events
  79. How *Not* to Resent
  80. FORWARD LOOKING
  81. DOMAIN FLEXIBILITY.
  82. The Miracle of Human Growth
  83. EXTREME ADAPTATION.
  84. Why Plan?
  85. You Don’t Need to Justify Yourself
  86. The Philosophy of Ego
  87. True vs False Passions
  88. How to Achieve Tranquility
  89. On Making Your Own Philosophy
  90. The Purpose of Life is to Create New Life
  91. Think On!
  92. The Wisdom of Doing Nothing
  93. Congruency
  94. My Thoughts on Meditation
  95. The Philosophy of Purpose
  96. Emulate Yourself
  97. Good Fear, Bad Fear
  98. For the Betterment of Humanity or Just Yourself?
  99. What you *really* believe in and care for is manifested through your actions (or non-actions)
  100. Why Culture is Your Enemy
  101. YOUR EXPERIENCES ARE KING.
  102. LIFE IS INHERENTLY GOOD.
  103. Artistic, Physical, and Philosophical Muscles
  104. All New Experiences are Good Experiences
  105. What is the Purpose of X?
  106. UTILITY.
  107. Philosophy is a Luxury
  108. The Attempt is More Interesting than the Result
  109. Joyfulness vs “Happiness”
  110. Effectiveness Over Happiness
  111. Self Actualization
  112. MAXIMAL ENGAGEMENT
  113. Life & Pain
  114. On Living Every Day with No Regret
  115. Learn as if you’re going to live forever, live as if you’re going to die tomorrow
  116. Live Every Day Like it Were the Last Day of Your Life
  117. Self-Determination
  118. FALSE GRATITUDE vs REAL GRATITUDE
  119. HOW TO LIVE MORE
  120. THE UPSIDE OF TRAGEDY
  121. Satisfaction is a Sucker’s Game
  122. Supreme Repose
  123. WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF LIFE? According to ERIC KIM
  124. STUBBORN, FLEXIBLE
  125. EVERYTHING HAPPENS AS IT *SHOULD* HAVE HAD HAPPENED
  126. Good Addiction, Bad Addiction?
  127. What is the Best Life?
  128. The Philosophy of Thinking
  129. The Philosophy of Conspiracies
  130. Conspiracies
  131. Growth
  132. Skepticism.
  133. What Do You Really Want Out of Life?
  134. Seem or Be?
  135. Learn Through Pain
  136. Respect Yourself
  137. In Praise of Elitism
  138. Why Independent Thinking?
  139. I Will Never Die
  140. Bitter is Better
  141. The Genesis of Nihilism and Existential Dread
  142. The Ethics of Personal Enrichment
  143. Good vs Not Good
  144. Punished by Privilege
  145. Abstinence Over Moderation
  146. Just Leave Others Alone
  147. You Can Only Critique that Which You Truly Understand and Love
  148. ERIC KIM Critique of Metaphysics
  149. Only Trust Philosophers Who Deadlift
  150. Heuristic: If Someone Talks Shit About Others Behind Their Back, Most Likely They’re Also Talking Shit About You Behind Your Back
  151. Virtue is a Privilege
  152. What Are Your Life Goals?
  153. Honesty
  154. Why I’m Anti Moderation
  155. No Spite, No Malice.
  156. Ascending Life or Descending Life?
  157. Double Edged Sword
  158. Ignorance.
  159. Why I Don’t Trust “Nice Guys”
  160. Why You Must Share Your Opinion
  161. Selfish Isn’t Evil
  162. Wisdom is the Goal
  163. YOU ARE KING.
  164. MASTER YOURSELF
  165. What is “Good” for You is Often what is Bad for You
  166. Care.
  167. BITTERSWEET
  168. ONE REP MAX
  169. Morality and Ethics is the Snare
  170. BY HELPING YOURSELF, YOU BEST HELP OTHERS
  171. Insanity is Good.
  172. Think Deep.
  173. PHILOSOPHY IS THE FUTURE.
  174. Open Mind vs Closed Mind
  175. ENTHUSIASM IS GENIUS
  176. Towards a More Critical and Rigorous Line of Thinking
  177. How to Encourage and a Foster Independent and Free Thinking
  178. What is the Purpose of Life?
  179. WHY PHILOSOPHY IS SUPREME.
  180. Elitism.
  181. I Cannot Form an Opinion About Somebody Until I’ve Met Them in the Flesh
  182. ALL GENETICS ARE GOOD GENETICS.
  183. Happiness vs Freedom
  184. The Birth of a Hater
  185. My Way Isn’t the Right Way
  186. Walking as an Existential Thing
  187. Why I’m So Tolerant
  188. Mortal Gods
  189. THE HUMAN SPECIES
  190. Why I’m So Skeptical
  191. Just Follow the Money
  192. Why Selfish?
  193. WHY WE CANNOT BLAME OTHERS
  194. Why Are We So Anti Elitism?
  195. What Actually Interests You?
  196. How to Become Yourself
  197. SELF HATE
  198. Optimistic Fatalism
  199. Death is the Ultimate Creative Constraint
  200. FLUX.
  201. How to Think for Yourself
  202. FLESH
  203. How to Live the Best Life
  204. Why Live a Life Without Regrets?
  205. Why Plato Ruined Art and Aesthetics for Us
  206. Self Respect
  207. Hypocrite vs Contradict
  208. Ideals vs Reality
  209. Spaceship Philosophy
  210. What is Your Ideal Life?
  211. MY EXTREME GRATITUDE TOWARDS LIFE AND BEING ALIVE!
  212. Critique of Utilitarianism
  213. Don’t Treat Others the Way You Want to Be Treated
  214. The Eternal Recurrence of Tragedy and Joy in Life
  215. Elite Asceticism
  216. Why I Don’t Like Numbers
  217. Action and Reaction, Cause and Effect
  218. The Antidote to Nihilism: The Philosophy of Nothingness
  219. ERIC KIM Notes on Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
  220. EXPLOIT CHAOS.
  221. WHY I DON’T BELIEVE IN GENETICS
  222. Self-Wisdom
  223. The Future Belongs to the Fearless
  224. INDIVIDUALISM
  225. Why Live Forever?
  226. THIS TOO WILL PASS.
  227. Why Education?
  228. How to Become Yourself
  229. Things Shouldn’t Go Back to the Way They Used to Be
  230. Why Am I So Cruel?
  231. The Great Joy of Existence
  232. Virtue for the Sake of Virtue
  233. NO DISDAIN.
  234. INTELLIGENT IGNORANCE
  235. A LIFE WITHOUT PAIN, DIFFICULTY OR TRAGEDY ISN’T A LIFE WORTH LIVING
  236. BITTER IS BETTER.
  237. EXPLOIT THE BEST FROM TRAGEDY AND LIFE 
  238. DISREGARD FOR SELF-PRESERVATION
  239. PAIN.
  240. WHAT IF EVERYTHING IS NOT GONNA BE ALRIGHT?
  241. Tomorrow is Never
  242. Life is the Ultimate Creative Constraint
  243. EMBODIED REALITY
  244. BLACK SWAN
  245. THINGS WILL NEVER GO BACK TO THE WAY THEY USED TO BE
  246. What are you *really* afraid of?
  247. HAPPINESS ISN’T THE GOAL
  248. Philosophy is King
  249. Why is Selfish Evil?
  250. YOU’RE CONSTANTLY IN A STATE OF BECOMING
  251. ENTITLEMENT A SIN?
  252. NARCISSISM
  253. BE BRUTALLY HONEST WITH YOURSELF
  254. WHY FREE WILL?
  255. OBEY YOUR OPINION
  256. EGO IS GOOD.
  257. WHY IT IS GOOD TO BE INTO YOURSELF
  258. Seek the Good Pain
  259. Anti-Perfection in Photography, Art, and Life
  260. Can You Become an End into Yourself?
  261. WHY I LIVE
  262. Why I Hate Decline
  263. Why I Eat
  264. Why am I So Positive and Optimistic?
  265. EFFORT IS ENJOYMENT
  266. Never Stop Gaining
  267. TRUST YOURSELF
  268. A Life of Maximal Personal Independence
  269. What Do You Desire to Become?
  270. What Do I Want from Technology?
  271. Stratified Society
  272. Do You Love or Hate Reality?
  273. On the Brian, Body and Mind
  274. I’m Maximally Happy, Now What?
  275. Care over Fame
  276. ACTIVE NIHILISM
  277. Never Stop Subtracting
  278. How to Live a Happier and More Epic Life
  279. A Risker Life is a Better Life
  280. Only Work on Things You Can Imagine Doing for Eternity
  281. How to Maximize Your Happiness
  282. Influence
  283. The Gladiator Makes His Plans once He Enters the Ring
  284. Meditations on Meaning in Life
  285. There is Nothing More Interesting than Human Beings
  286. Is Hope a Vice?
  287. EGO
  288. Why Be Unique?
  289. Happiness is Metabolism Health and Strength
  290. You’re the Hero
  291. Is Productivity a Virtue or Vice?
  292. Why Do We Prize the Rare?
  293. The Joy of Uncertainty
  294. How Should I Best Use My Time and Life?
  295. A Life Without Pain or Suffering Isn’t a Life Worth Living
  296. Free or Unfree?
  297. What Do You Really Care For in Life?
  298. Anti-Satisfaction in Life
  299. Why Think?
  300. The Eternal Return
  301. Only Do What is Best for You!
  302. Truthiness
  303. Why Be Happy?
  304. Permissionless Living
  305. In Praise of Unconventional Wisdom
  306. Become the Change Which You Wish to See in the World
  307. Happiness
  308. Beyond Freedom
  309. Idolize People, Not Stuff
  310. What Makes You Stronger? What Makes You Weaker?
  311. Why Hate?
  312. The Secret of Happiness
  313. You’re Constantly in a State of Becoming
  314. Life is about Choices, Not Obligations
  315. Anti-Nihilism
  316. First, Do What is Best for You.
  317. Live Dynamic
  318. How to Prosper
  319. Is the Point of Life to Be Satisfied?
  320. SUPREME EFFORT OF WILL.
  321. How to Become more Idealistic
  322. Thrivival 101
  323. Create Yourself
  324. Non-Small
  325. Inspiration
  326. How to Live a Heroic Life: Dare the Heights!
  327. Human Augmentation
  328. Prune
  329. Happiness: Do What You Want to Do (And Don’t Do What You Don’t Want to Do)
  330. Avoid Vain (Empty) Pursuits in Life
  331. Modern Slavery
  332. Kill the Leeches
  333. Wisdom Augmentation
  334. Why We Need Friction in Life
  335. Straight Line Philosophy
  336. What’s Your End-Game in Life?
  337. Create Your Own Happiness Today
  338. Desire Both Pain and Pleasure in Life
  339. Try the Impossible
  340. SELF-RESPECT
  341. Anti-Social Extrovert
  342. Never Blame Anybody But Yourself
  343. Human Flourishing
  344. Simpler, Not Better.
  345. How to be Free
  346. Embrace the Extremes
  347. Cultivate Your Own Culture
  348. COURAGE.
  349. Thrivival
  350. Inner Power
  351. How to Live a Purposeful Life
  352. My Definition of Happiness
  353. Why Change is Good
  354. Why Work?
  355. How to Live the Happiest Possible Life
  356. The Two-Pronged Approach to Maximize Joy in Your Life
  357. You Always Have Another Option!
  358. INFINITISM
  359. Never Stop!
  360. What is Your Self-Directed Purpose in Life?
  361. Live Today Like it Were Your Last
  362. Do You Photograph to Live, or Live to Photograph?
  363. ARTIST-PHILOSOPHER
  364. Live Life to the Fullest!
  365. In Praise of Selfishness
  366. Why You Must Be a YAY-SAYER to Succeed in Entrepreneurship and Life
  367. Why I Love Walking
  368. Live Life Like a Video Game!
  369. Simple Luxuries in Life
  370. Treat Your Life Like a Fun Experiment!
  371. Only Prove it to Yourself
  372. You Don’t Always Need to Feel Joyful to Live a Fulfilling and Meaningful Life
  373. Life is Too Short to Be Bored!
  374. Money Cannot Destroy Boredom
  375. How to Find Inspiration in Life
  376. Why You Must Ignore Haters to Succeed and Win in Life
  377. An Active Life is a Happy Life
  378. My Simple Joys in Life
  379. Never Stop Striving
  380. How to Motivate Yourself in Life
  381. How to Be Optimistic in Life
  382. How to Dictate Your Purpose in Life
  383. In Praise of a Dynamic Life
  384. PURPOSE.
  385. How to Enjoy Life
  386. Photography Therapy
  387. How to Conquer Regret
  388. Take Your Play Very Seriously.
  389. How to Prosper
  390. Memento Vivere
  391. Destroy in Order to CREATE
  392. Trust Your Body More Than Your Mind
  393. Make Photos to Make Meaning in Your Life
  394. Seek Knowledge, Not Information
  395. The Purpose of Human Life
  396. How to Overcome Impedence
  397. Why I Love Death
  398. How to Be Centered in the Eternal Now
  399. How to Be Happy
  400. Why Do You Care What Others Think of You?
  401. Why I’m Happy
  402. Why?
  403. Why I’m So Prolific
  404. How to Reduce LAG in Life

Masters of Philosophy »

Personal Philosophy »

Stoicism »

Zen Philosophy »

Life Lessons »

Learn more: Start Here >


STOICISM 101

Vlog

Become invincible:

  1. Introduction to Stoicism
  2. STOIC FLEX.
  3. Becoming Spartan
  4. MAKE IT ENTERTAINING FOR YOURSELF!
  5. Stoic Aesthetics?
  6. The Philosophy of Ugliness
  7. Bad Stoicism
  8. Stoicism 2.0
  9. Becoming Stoic
  10. LEMONADE.
  11. Why Arguments and Confrontations Are Good
  12. “I’m Over It”
  13. How to Deal With Miserable People
  14. How to Become a Stoic
  15. How to Ignore
  16. Pretend like you didn’t hear them
  17. Bad Stoic Strategies
  18. The Stoic Way of Dealing With Unpleasant or Miserable People
  19. HOW TO BECOME A STOIC
  20. Stoicism Stunts Our Power?
  21. Stoicism is Mental Resistance Training
  22. STOIC STRATEGIES.
  23. How to Become Fearless
  24. Extreme Stoicism
  25. Ethics are Aesthetic
  26. Indifference to Pain or Suffering
  27. When is Stoicism Good? When is Stoicism Bad?
  28. Why Others Criticize or Insult You
  29. True Difficulty
  30. What if Covid Never Goes Away?
  31. SUPER STOIC
  32. Anti-Hedonism
  33. HOW TO CONQUER FEAR
  34. ANTI FEAR
  35. It is the Duty of the Strong to Help the Weak
  36. The Goal is to Become Stronger
  37. HYPER STOICISM
  38. HYPER HERO
  39. TRANSFORM EVERY DOWNSIDE INTO AN UPSIDE
  40. STOICISM x Child’s Mind
  41. The Art of Manly Virtue
  42. Resistance Makes Us Stronger!
  43. DON’T LIVE IN FEAR
  44. Emotions are Good
  45. Conquer Your Anger
  46. BLACK EAGLE
  47. DIFFICULTY AWAKENS YOUR INNER-GENIUS.
  48. STOICISM IS ARMOR FOR THE MIND
  49. The Spartan-Stoic Lifestyle
  50. How I Conquered Fear
  51. HOW TO CURE FEAR.
  52. LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL.
  53. The Upside of Poverty
  54. How I Became Me
  55. THE WILL TO POWER, OR THE WILL TO FEAR?
  56. ATTACK REALITY
  57. Living *THROUGH* History
  58. How to Fear Less
  59. Fear is the Ultimate Contagious Disease
  60. STOICISM FOR DUMMIES
  61. Don’t Be Scared!
  62. WHAT CAN YOU CONTROL, WHAT CAN YOU NOT CONTROL?
  63. HOW YOU CAN CONQUER FEAR
  64. YOU’RE STRONGER THAN YOU THINK YOU ARE.
  65. EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED
  66. WHY AREN’T THINGS WORSE?
  67. My Philosophy on Masculinity
  68. A Riskier Life is a Better Life #philosophy #stoicism
  69. How to Creatively Flourish in Life
  70. Introduction to Stoicism
  71. How to Become Stronger
  72. How to Conquer Depression With Photography
  73. What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger
  74. How to Respect Yourself
  75. How to Believe in Yourself
  76. How to Steer Fear
  77. How to Conquer Pessimism
  78. How to Conquer Anxiety
  79. How to Overcome Your Fear of People
  80. How to Be Optimistic
  81. Why I Don’t Take My Anger Seriously
  82. HOW TO BECOME MORE POWERFUL
  83. POSITIVITY.
  84. HOW TO BECOME SUPERHUMAN
  85. How to Give a Fuck Less
  86. ALL IN.
  87. Why I Cut My Dad Out of My Life.
  88. Your iPhone Only Has 5% Battery Left.
  89. How not to give a FUCK about your REPUTATION
  90. WHAT IS A HUMAN?
  91. HAPPINESS.
  92. The Regret Minimization Framework in Photography and Life
  93. How to Be a HERO
  94. Conquer Your Fears by Making Fear Your Slave
  95. Rule Circumstances; Don’t Let Your Circumstances Rule You
  96. How to Love Yourself
  97. How to Turn Shit into Gold
  98. Your Parents Fuck You Up
  99. Immortality
  100. What Kills You Makes You Stronger
  101. How to Be Patient
  102. How to Conquer Anger
  103. How to Bounce Back in Life
  104. How to Overcome Resistance
  105. Nothing Unlimited is Good; Nothing Good is Unlimited
  106. You Have No Limits
  107. Can 1’s and 0’s Hurt You?
  108. The Envious Moment is Flying Now
  109. Tomorrow We’ll Sail the Wide Seas Again
  110. How to Forgive Others
  111. Focus on Your Actions, Not the Results
  112. Everything Will Be Alright
  113. How to Be a Stoic Street Photographer
  114. How to Be a Spartan Photographer
  115. How to Overcome Your Fears in Life
  116. How to Stop Worrying in Life
  117. How to Use Photography as Self-Therapy
  118. How to Free Your Soul From Disturbance
  119. 3 Stoic Techniques that Can Help You Gain Tranquility
  120. Can People Weaker than You Hurt You?
  121. Does a Doctor Get Angry at a Crazy Patient?
  122. Own Nothing

The Stoic Masters

Learn from the master stoics:

See all philosophy >

The Philosophy of Happiness

Happiness thoughts:

  1. What Will Make You Happier?
    BOLD LIVING.
  2. HAPPINESS IS ALWAYS ASPIRING FOR MORE.
  3. How to Boost Your Mood
  4. How to Maximize Your Happiness
  5. Life Without Photography is Not a Life Worth Living
  6. 10 Tips to Be Happier and More Loving in Life
  7. How to Find Happiness in Your Photography
  8. How to Find Satisfaction in Your Photography
  9. 30 Tips to Conquer G.A.S. (Gear Acquisition Syndrome)
  10. 55 Tips to Be Happier in Life
  11. On the Shortness of Life
  12. Small is Beautiful
  13. Photography (and Life) is About Subtraction, Not Addition
  14. Why Envy Any Other Photographer?
  15. How to Be Happy in All Circumstances
  16. Desire the Life You Already Have
  17. Should You Shoot if You Don’t Want To?
  18. Live a Life of Leisure
  19. Good Enough
  20. 28 Lessons I’ve Learned From Life
  21. 27 Lessons I’ve Learned About Photography and Life
  22. 26 Lessons Life Has Taught Me About Street Photography
  23. Desire
  24. Good Enough
  25. Things I Am Grateful For
  26. How to Die Without Regrets
  27. 12 Scientifically Proven Ways to Have More Happiness in Street Photography
  28. Having No Choices is the Ultimate Freedom
  29. How to Be Grateful For What You Have

ETHICS by KIM

Your own personal code of ethics:

  1. Stubborn Geniuses
  2. Avoid Misery
  3. What We Hate
  4. HOW I DEAL WITH RACISM
  5. How to Become a Great Man
  6. BETTER TO FOLLOW YOUR GUT AND BE WRONG THAN DISOBEY YOUR GUT AND BE RIGHT
  7. “I CAN’T BE FUCKED.”
  8. Carte Blanche Ethics
  9. Toxic People
  10. Why Are We So Into Other People
  11. Just focus on yourself and your own life
  12. Perfect morals and ethics is following your own gut
    WHY ETIQUETTE?
  13. NO BLAME, JUST CAUSE AND EFFECT.
  14. Ignorance Takes Courage
  15. TREAT OTHERS CARTE BLANCHE
  16. Don’t give people what they want or what you *think* they want, give them what you think they *should* have.
  17. Anti Small
  18. Disdain or Admiration?
  19. Beware Those With Good Intentions
  20. STUBBORN x FLEXIBLE
  21. ETHICS ARE VIA NEGATIVA
  22. OBEDIENCE & DISCIPLINE
  23. The Motive of Criticism
  24. Ethics are Social
  25. Anti Role Models
  26. What is Greed?
  27. On Having the Courage to Make Your Own Decisions
  28. How *NOT* to Get Duped or Suckered
  29. Why Help Others?
  30. The Duty of the Strong
  31. Why I’m So Intolerant Towards Intolerance
  32. The Ethics of Criticizing Others
  33. Consult Your Own Conscience
  34. The Ethics of Shit Talking
  35. The Ethics of Personal Enrichment
  36. I’m Easily Distracted
  37. On Forming Your Own Opinion
  38. ERIC KIM Philosophy of Tolerance
  39. Tolerance
  40. Aesthetics are Ethics
  41. Morality and Ethics

DESIGN THOUGHTS

hand red black macro ERIC KIM
  1. INSANELY LIGHTWEIGHT
  2. MORE AGGRESSIVE DESIGN
  3. COMPROMISE DESIGN.
  4. ‘WASTEFUL’?
  5. Tight vs Loose
  6. Thick vs Thin
  7. Why Lamborghini is No Longer Interesting to Me
  8. DESIGN PHILOSOPHY IS AN ETHOS.
  9. LESS SURFACE AREA.
  10. ANTI IN-BETWEEN
  11. CLASSIC/TIMELESS IS BORING.
  12. Photographers are Designers
  13. Why Perfect?
  14. Beautiful but Boring
  15. AGGRESSIVE DESIGN.
  16. DESIGN IS KING.
  17. WHY DESIGN?
  18. THE RAGING BULL.
  19. BARE BONES.
  20. The Best Car for Thinking
  21. Zen Aesthetics
  22. Why Minimalism?
  23. SPARTAN DESIGN.
  24. Generic Design
  25. An Elite Aesthetic
  26. Not Hateful Design
  27. New Forward Facing Design vs Retrospective and Nostalgic Design
  28. Depressing Design vs Uplifting Design
  29. The Best Design Towards What Ends?
  30. Exciting or Boring Design?
  31. On Design & Photography
  32. A Designer Desires to Design and Create Things!
  33. Delightful Technology and Design
  34. Dynamic Aesthetics
  35. Design vs Brand Prestige
  36. Classic Proportions, Modern Design
  37. Why Does Design Matter?
  38. The Best Design
  39. MUSCULAR DESIGN.
  40. Camera Design
  41. Watch Design

SOCIOLOGY by KIM

Red selfie crimson ERIC KIM icon
  1. Sociology vs Philosophy?
  2. SOCIAL DOMINANCE THEORY
  3. FLAT SOCIETY
  4. National vs Individual Pride
  5. Dystopia is a Utopia
  6. A NEW SOCIETY.
  7. THE DEEP INDIVIDUAL.
  8. Why is It So Hard for Us To Follow Our Gut and Instinct?
  9. Sociology of Comparison
  10. Mimetic Desires
  11. Interest in Humans or Objects?
  12. Social Stochastic Resonance
  13. How to Live Bravely in Today’s Brave New World and Society
  14. Arousal
  15. Is Humanity on the Decline?
  16. Social Innovations
  17. Society *Shouldn’t* Be Fair
  18. Why Society Doesn’t Want Free Thinkers and Free Livers
  19. Our New Soft Society
  20. HARD SOCIETY

Sociological Theory


Photography and Sociology

MOTIVATION BY KIM

Become more:

  1. PHOTOGRAPHY INSPIRATION IDEAS
  2. Setbacks are a motivator, a turbocharger
  3. THERE IS SO MUCH OF THE WORLD TO PHOTOGRAPH!
  4. The Philosophy of Optimism
  5. What Slows You Down?
  6. Meta Editing
  7. Move Mass
  8. What’s “Cool”?
  9. No In-Between
  10. Independent Aspirations
  11. COMPULSION.
  12. *BEYOND* PERFECT.
  13. BUY BOOKS WHEN YOU WANT TO BUY GEAR.
  14. How to Make More Photos
  15. JUST MAKE MORE PHOTOS.
  16. MY DESIRE TO CAPTURE IT ALL.
  17. VISUAL DETOX.
  18. Photography is Our Addiction
  19. A BILLION PHOTOS
  20. THE MOTIVATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER.
  21. CURIOUS.
  22. PROVOKE.
  23. How to Do More Photography
  24. PRACTICE.
  25. TURBOCHARGE YOURSELF, TURBOCHARGE OTHERS.
  26. LIFE IS ALL UPSIDE, NO DOWNSIDE.
  27. PHOTO TURBO THOUGHTS
  28. No Such Thing as Good or Bad; Simply Stimulating or Not Stimulating
  29. The Best Genre is No Genre
  30. The Key to Photographic Motivation
  31. Pacifying Media, Motivational Media
  32. Our Hunger for New Experiences
  33. Mental Motivation
  34. ALL ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY.
  35. The Photographer as Creator
  36. Create *BEYOND* Yourself
  37. Let Your Curiosity Drive Your Photography
  38. LOVE YOUR PHOTOS.
  39. Abstract Monochrome Photography
  40. SHOOT WITHOUT THINKING.
  41. Just Have Fun With Photography
  42. Wu-Wei Effortless Motivation
  43. CONSISTENCY x NOVELTY
  44. Easily Bored?
  45. Face Photography
  46. How to Become More Self-Motivated in Your Photography
  47. YOUR OWN PHOTOS ARE THE BEST PHOTOS.
  48. On Sharing Your Favorite Photos
  49. UBERABUNDANCE.
  50. Peak Photographic Productivity
  51. When to Review Your Photos
  52. Serotonin and Photos
  53. The Photos You Have Yet Shot are Your Most Important Photos
  54. 3 Tips How to Master Photography
  55. Do You Like Your Own Photos?
  56. The Beauty of Mundane, Everyday Moments
  57. Reasons Why to Be Optimistic About the Future
  58. A Photography-Full Future
  59. The More You Shoot, the Better
  60. How Many Photos Should You Shoot Everyday?
  61. Why Do We Love Motion?
  62. Now is Your Chance to Shoot History in the Making
  63. Photo by Photo
  64. How and Why Photography Remains So Interesting to Me
  65. How to Conquer Your Inner Photographic Critic
  66. Thoughts on HDR Photography
  67. New Year, New Photos
  68. Why Exhibit Your Photos?
  69. Photography is Visual Poetry
  70. What’s the Purpose of Art?
  71. Why Do We Photographers Have Such a Hard Time Staying Inspired and Motivated?
  72. On Becoming a More Optimistic Photographer
  73. Philosophy of Weather
  74. How to Become a More Optimistic Photographer and Human
  75. You Are a Creative Photographer
  76. JUST SHARE YOUR ARTISTIC PROCESS WITH OTHERS.
  77. What Motivates Me to Shoot?
  78. How to Maximize Yourself to the Fullest
  79. HOW TO MOVE AND MOTIVATE PEOPLE
  80. Autotelic Photography
  81. The more I go out and photograph the world, the more interesting and beautiful the world becomes
  82. Why Photographers Have Such Low Self-Esteem
  83. ERIC KIM MOTIVATION
  84. Why Am I So Unmotivated?
  85. EVERY DAY IS A NEW DAY
  86. WHY ARE YOU SO UNMOTIVATED?
  87. Movement is Motivation
  88. How to Motivate Myself to Make New Photos
  89. Never Stop Optimizing
  90. How to Help and Motivate Others
  91. Feed On Your Own Photos; Let Them Nourish You!
  92. Competition is for Suckers
  93. A Future Without Travel
  94. How Google Can Improve Your Photography
  95. DEVELOP YOURSELF.
  96. NEVER STOP MOVING!
  97. How I Self-Motivate Myself
  98. Every Day the Sun is Birthed Anew
  99. A Life Without Photography Isn’t a Life Worth Living
  100. WIN.
  101. 8 Practical Photography Assignments for You
  102. Tabula Rasa, Blank Slate, Carte Blanche
  103. RELENTLESS
  104. LIFE IS THE ULTIMATE RPG
  105. HYPER VIGOR
  106. FRESH AIR PHOTOS
  107. WHO IS GONNA THRIVE IN TODAY’S BRAVE NEW WORLD?
  108. ARTISTIC OPTIMISM
  109. PASSION, not Discipline
  110. Better Bad Photos than No Photos
  111. The Empowering Feeling of Failure
  112. To Be Human is to Move
  113. Enjoy the Process
  114. Better Bad Photos than No Photos
  115. Why Keep Making New Art and Photos, Indefinitely?
  116. Photography Motivation: What if There is Nothing Interesting to Photograph?
  117. Move First, Motivation Later
  118. Motivation Follows the Action
  119. In Praise of Heroes
  120. 5 Tips How to Boost Your Creativity
  121. How to Have Inspiration to Take Photos in the Suburbs
  122. Anything that Motivates You to Move is Good!
  123. The Productive Photographer is the Happiest Photographer!
  124. Make Today Count!
  125. How to Break Through Photographer’s Block
  126. The Joyful Photographer
  127. The Dancing Photographer
  128. The Kaizen Process of Gradual Self-Improvement in Photography
  129. It is Your Duty to Make Beautiful Pictures!
  130. Making Pictures IS Happiness!
  131. NO EXCUSES.
  132. The Pomodoro Photography Technique
  133. The ABC of Photography
  134. Just Shoot It.
  135. How to Change the World With Photography
  136. How to Find Inspiration in Photography and Life
  137. How to Overcome Resistance
  138. Create Against the Past
  139. How I Motivate Myself to Make Photos
  140. Wear Your Camera Like a Necklace or Bracelet
  141. Have Your Photos Come to You
  142. How to Level Up in Your Photography
  143. How Not to Give a Fuck of What Others Think of You
  144. How to Overcome Procrastination in Your Photography
  145. How to Reinspire Your Photography
  146. What is Your Mission in Photography and Life?
  147. How to Overcome Photographer’s Block
  148. Be a Photographer Now
  149. How to Overcome Boredom with Photography
  150. Never Stop Growing as a Photographer
  151. Why Do You Need “Inspiration” to Shoot?
  152. Just Shoot.
  153. 5 Things to Do If You’ve Lost Your Passion for Photography
  154. How to Have Unshakeable Confidence in Yourself
  155. Don’t Give Up On Your Dream
  156. Don’t Waste Your Potential
  157. Unlock Your Potential
  158. Empower Others With Your Photography
  159. Why You Shouldn’t Follow Your Passion in Photography

See all articles >

STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 101

walking woman umbrella crimson red
  1. How to Become More Stealth in Street Photography
  2. HOW TO BECOME A BETTER STREET PHOTOGRAPHER
  3. Street Photography Mastery
  4. How I Became the Greatest Street Photographer Alive
  5. Antifragile Photography
  6. How to Conquer Your Fears in Street Photography
  7. INSANELY AUDACIOUS AND BOLD
  8. 5 Simple Street Photography Techniques
  9. STREET PHOTOGRAPHER.
  10. The Street Photographer Ideal
  11. 50 Street Photography Tips, Techniques and Ideas
  12. Street Photography Values
  13. STREET PHOTOGRAPHY DOESN’T NEED TO HAVE PEOPLE IN IT.
  14. Why Street Photography is So Great
  15. WHY BECOME A STREET PHOTOGRAPHER?
  16. Society Photography, Not “Street” Photography
  17. How to Street Photography
  18. STREET PHOTOGRAPHY OPTIONALITY.
  19. 10 Street Photography Tips
  20. The Street Photographer as the Apex Photographer
  21. Street Photography & Adrenaline
  22. STREETTOGS STARTING GUIDE
  23. 50 Street Photography Tips by ERIC KIM
  24. What I Wish I Knew If I Started Street Photography All Over Again
  25. Photograph like it’s not a big deal
  26. Suburb Street Photography
  27. What is Our Personal Motivation Behind Street Photography?
  28. WHY I’M SO PASSIONATE ABOUT STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
  29. Personal Street Photography
  30. STREET PHOTOGRAPHY AS A PRACTICE.
  31. Pandemic Street Photography
  32. AIRPORT STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
  33. How to Shoot Street Photography Right Now
  34. Towards a More Independent Street Photography Approach
  35. How Street Photography Improves Your Life
  36. How to Tell Stories in Your Street Photos
  37. Face Street Photography
  38. How to Start Shooting Street Photography
  39. How to Shoot Street Photography During a Pandemic
  40. 7 Street Photography Assignment Ideas

STREET PHOTOGRAPHY STARTER KIT

street photography starter kit by ERIC KIM

Master street photography with STREET PHOTOGRAPHY STARTER KIT.


STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 101

Hearts. Hollywood, 2011 #flash

If you’re new to street photography, start here:


Brave New Street Photography

Street Photographs

ERIC KIM layers hong kong
  1. How to Shoot Street Photography with Dads and Kids
  2. HOW I BECAME SUCH A GREAT STREET PHOTOGRAPHER
  3. Use Quarantine as an Opportunity to Pick up Film Photography
  4. Hong Kong Street Photography by ERIC KIM

Street Photography Philosophy

Street Photography Articles


Street Photography Techniques



Street Photography Ideas


Street Photography Composition Techniques


STREET NOTES.

Push yourself out of your comfort zone with STREET NOTES: Mobile Edition.

STREET NOTES PAPER EDITION ON AMAZON >


LEARN FROM THE MASTERS OF STREET PHOTOGRAPHY

Timeless wisdom from the masters of street photography.

Learn more about MASTERS >


FUNDAMENTALS OF STREET PHOTOGRAPHY

Street Photography Inspiration


Beginner Street Photography Articles

Get started in street photography:

Definitions in Street Photography

How to Shoot Street Photography

Street Photography Equipment

See all equipment articles >

How to Conquer Your Fears in Street Photography

See all articles to conquer your fears >


Intermediate Street Photography Articles

Take your street photography to the next level:


Advanced Street Photography Articles

Find deeper meaning in your street photography:


Street Photography Tips & Technique

Learn how to shoot on the streets:

See all street photography tips and techniques >

Street Photography Guides

In-depth guides on street photography:

Street Photography Equipment

The best equipment for street photography:

See all equipment articles >

Street Photography Editing and Workflow

How to Start a Street Photography Project


Learn From the Masters of Street Photography

“He without a past has no future.”

Start here:

  1. Why Study the Masters of Photography?
  2. Great Female Master Photographers
  3. Cheat Sheet of the Masters of Photography
  4. 100 Lessons From the Masters of Street Photography
  5. Beginner’s Guide to the Masters of Street Photography
  6. Download All Articles >

The Masters of Photography

Classics never die:


Free Downloads

See all free downloads >

Free Street Photography Books

Distilled information on street photography:

For more resources on photography, Start Here >

Entrepreneurship by KIM

Become the change which you desire to see manifested in the world!

Become you.

  1. Why Doesn’t Anything Satisfy Me?
  2. ZERO FINANCIAL CONCERNS
  3. How to Gain Ascendancy
  4. Business vs Entrepreneurship?
  5. TAKE REAL CHANCES
  6. Making Money as a Hobby
  7. The Best Exercises for Entrepreneurs
  8. INCOME VS EXPENSES MONEY LIFESTYLE PHILOSOPHY
  9. Entrepreneurship is the privilege of being able to attempt something new
  10. How to Become More Influential
  11. The Point of Life is Entrepreneurship?
  12. How to Think Like an Entrepreneur
  13. Become the Outlier
  14. Self Reliance
  15. How to Extend Your Reach
  16. NEWS: How to Think Like an Entrepreneur
  17. PVP (Player vs Player)
  18. How I became so influential
  19. WE LOVE THE *SENSATION* OF RISK-TAKING
  20. WHY HIGH PROFIT MARGINS?
  21. INNOVATION THOUGHTS
  22. OVERCONFIDENCE IS GOOD.
  23. GARAGE ENTREPRENEURSHIP
  24. PERHAPS IT IS GOOD TO BE “DELUSIONAL”
  25. USE YOUR WEALTH TO BUY STUFF, OR TO BUILD AND INNOVATE STUFF?
  26. HOW TO THRIVE
  27. Target Demographic
  28. Ambition Over Happiness
  29. Anti Collaboration
  30. The Will to Economy
  31. Why New?
  32. CHOOSE ADRENALINE.
  33. No Looking Back.
  34. 1000x Different
  35. BECOME SPENDTHRIFT
  36. THE BENEFIT OF JUST ONE.
  37. EXTREME INNOVATION.
  38. Practicality is Boring
  39. BECOME YOUR OWN STANDARD.
  40. NEVER STOP ITERATING.
  41. CONDENSE.
  42. Take Lots of Small Financial Risks
  43. Control Over Convenience
  44. Why Are Chinese Companies So Innovative?
  45. INSANELY DIFFERENT.
  46. Why Doesn’t Anything Ever Satisfy Me?
  47. THE GREAT PASSION.
  48. Perhaps Dissatisfaction is Good
  49. ONE REP MAX.
  50. WHAT DO YOU *REALLY* WANT IN LIFE?
  51. LIFE IS ABOUT STRIVING FOR MORE.
  52. NEVER STOP LINKING.
  53. THE GREATEST.
  54. WHAT A TIME TO BE ALIVE!
  55. THE BEST IS YET TO COME.
  56. ERIC KIM CRITIQUE OF ROMANTICISM
  57. COMPLACENCY.
  58. JUST BUY IT.
  59. ALL ABOUT YOU.
  60. MOVE THE WORLD
  61. Boring or Not Boring?
  62. What if Your Past Self were Inferior to Your Present Self?
  63. THE PHILOSOPHY OF PROGRESS
  64. CULTURE IS YOUR ENEMY.
  65. Difficulty & Interest
  66. The Will to Expansion
  67. What is Work?
  68. SOUL IN THE GAME.
  69. JUST START IT.
  70. Not Boring
  71. PRIDE IN YOUR OWN NAME / BRAND
  72. AS MUCH AS YOU CAN TOLERATE.
  73. Speed is Paramount
  74. TAKE IT BACK TO THE BEGINNING.
  75. A Life With No Risk Taking is *NOT* a Life Worth Living
  76. Dissatisfaction is Good
  77. GREATER STRENGTH, GREATER CHALLENGES.
  78. In Praise of the New
  79. Uncorrupted Desires
  80. You Cannot Fake Passion
  81. SELF-OVERGOING
  82. FORM YOURSELF.
  83. Personal Entrepreneurship
  84. RELENTLESS.
  85. PUT YOUR NAME ON IT.
  86. A Life of Expansion
  87. SELF-ENTREPRENEURSHIP
  88. YOU ARE THE EXCEPTION.
  89. Use Your Life as an Experiment to Self-Develop Yourself to Heights Never Seen Before
  90. Invest in New Developments
  91. Investing Towards What End?
  92. The 90%/10% Principle in Entrepreneurship
  93. Speed Wins
  94. The Philosophy of Happiness
  95. When to Over-Estimate, When to Under-Estimate?
  96. Never Stop Iterating
  97. Money as a Tool for Life and Artistic Experimentation
  98. Less But More Premium
  99. Mainstream vs Low-Key Success
  100. Why Dissatisfaction is Good
  101. SEEK YOUR OWN PERSONAL MAXIMAL BENEFIT INSTEAD OF COMPLAINING
  102. Manifest Your Destiny
  103. Is it Best to *Not* Communicate Your Inner Thoughts or Ideas With Others?
  104. CREATE THINGS YOU WISH TO SEE MANIFESTED IN THE WORLD
  105. How to Do More Work
  106. CONTROL.
  107. Competition is for Losers
  108. Change.
  109. Your Competitive Advantage with Insanely Fast Wifi and High Speed Internet
  110. Pseudo Individualism
  111. Natural Internal Promoting vs External Promptings

Think for Yourself.

  1. Survival vs Thrivival
  2. Become Rich
  3. SECRETS.
  4. Why it is Better to Beg for Forgiveness than Ask for Permission
  5. Thinking About the Past Prevents You From Thinking About the Future
  6. How to Predict the Future
  7. Tools of Mass Distraction
  8. So What?

FREEDOM


Never stop innovating.


Entrepreneurship Mindset


Put a Dent in the Universe.

Introduction to Stoicism 

Something I have been meaning to write or create or do is like some sort of book, ebook, pamphlet, or introductory primer to stoicism. I really think that stoicism is probably one of the most useful and philosophical models to live normal every day real life. Yet, I haven’t really found a good instructional guide on it, especially when I was self teaching it to myself.

Consider this a practical primer, cutting through the BS:


What does stoicism mean? 

Stoicism, stoic, the stoa in ancient Greece– essentially the stoa was like some sort of portico, patio, pillar, outside, essentially a spot where guys would just hang out, talk shop, talk philosophy, etc.  

I think about the show “Hey Arnold” in which I was raised with… the notion of “stoop kid“, the notion of a stoop is that in a lot of cities, especially the east coast in New York, you have this little stoop or porch, stairs that go outside your front door… and you could just hang out there, engage in social and neighborhood life etc.

The new stoa? 

One of my happiest moments was when I was living in Providence Rhode Island, and then COVID-19 hit. Everything was closed, besides the park. I can still go to the park, hang out, workout, do chin ups– I learned how to do muscle ups, more bodyweight calisthenics stuff, and also… I had a lot of fun with this “rock toss“ challenge and workout… in the middle of the park was a huge ass rock and huge ass stone, and every single day I would go there pick it up, and then eventually work out with it; throwing it around for fun, doing overhead presses with it, clean and jerks, squats, and eventually I would just throw it around for fun. Funny enough it might have been the most fit I was in my life… this was the true “functional” fitness.

The inspiration — Hector lifting an insanely massive stone (barely 2 strong men could lift it)… using it to break down the door of the ships of the other side.

Open air, open sun concept

Anyways, the reason why that period of covid was so good is that it was in the middle of beautiful Providence Rhode Island summer, so nice and bright and warm and lovely… and one of the good things was going to the park was like an open forum, a new anatheum for a lot of really cool guys to come, hang out, talk shop, go topless and shirtless, workout and hang out.

I met some really interesting people during that period of time. I met some guys who were really cool. For example, one guy I met was in the US military Navy, I think he was training to be a Navy seal or Delta force or something. Another guy in some sort of ROTC training, another cool guy from the hood, and also I would say I probably met half a dozen friendly drug dealers there. And of course a lot of people who believed in conspiracy theories; really friendly, a little weird, but overall good guys.

Anyways, one of the biggest benefits of hanging out at that outdoor park, open air, nothing but green grass, the beautiful sun and the fitness equipment was that I think having this sort of open air environment is actually very conducive to socializing, thinking and thought, and pro social behavior. My theory about a lot of modern day antisocial behavior has to do with the structures which enclose us. For example, almost universally most guys at the gym are extremely antisocial. Why? My theory is that because most gyms have closed, cramped narrow ceilings, and do not have access to natural light, or outside space.

Cramped indoor spaces promote antisocial behavior.

The only good gym I went to which was interesting was the golds gym in Venice, which has this really big outdoor workout area. I think this is much more natural and more fun and better; to be able to work out directly outside outdoors, with your shirt off.

Who is this philosophy for?

Stoics, stoicism — it was originally I think codified by this guy named Zeno, and over time he picked up some followers. Essentially the whole thing happened organically; Zeno would first share his thinking on philosophy ethics and pragmatic ways to deal with other people and the downsides of life, he built a following, and then his followers would propagate the thoughts and start their own little schools of thoughts, their own little stoic clubs.

What is “real” stoicism?

Would I like about stoicism is how loosey goosey it is. It is kind of like zen, or taoism… it is not really quantified as a religion, or a strict moral order. In fact, a lot of the ancients stoics would meditate on random stuff like cosmology, natural sciences like Seneca, how volcanoes worked or whatever. I think nowadays in today’s world, we focus primarily on the pragmatic side; how to deal with fear, uncertainty, downsides etc.

So how did I discover stoicism?

I think I might’ve first learned about stoicism from Nassim Taleb and his ANTIFRAGILE book. I was curious, and my curiosity went to deep. To quote NASSIM TALEB and the Venetian saying “The ocean goes deeper, the deeper you wade into it.”

I literally consumed every single book I could find on stoicism, even the obscure ones. Funny enough, a lot of the stoic thinkers tried to claim other philosophers as being stoic, like Seneca did with Diogenes the cynic. 

Cynic, cynicism, actually comes from the word canine, the dog. Diogenes was considered the “dog” philosopher, first used as a pejorative, but ultimately Diogenes reappropriated that title for fun! He saw dogs as tough, almost like wild wolves, rather than seeing them as a negative thing.

Even Achilles when he was raging against king Agamemnon, he called him “dog faced“ as a heaping insult.

Who is worth reading?

First, Seneca. Seneca the younger, his dad was called Seneca the elder.

In fact, this is such a big deal because Cindy and I named our first son, Seneca, directly after the stoic philosopher. This is true soul in the game; if you name your kid after your favorite philosopher, certainly it is a sign that you really liked that philosopher, or found them impactful.

The reason why I really like Seneca the stoic philosopher is because he had real connections to real reality. What that means is he wasn’t just on the sidelines; he actually existed in the real world, engaged in real politics, was even advisor to the emperor Nero, the bad one, who eventually low-key coerced Seneca to commit suicide, in a manly, dignified manner.

I think this was because maybe… there was actually a plan to overthrow Nero, and essentially Nero found out. 

What makes Seneca so good?

I really like Seneca because his writing is accessible, practical and pragmatic, and interesting.

A lot of thinkers tend to lack connections to real reality, I have no tolerance for boring philosophers to talk about metaphysics, which is things which are not physical. Like thoughts ideas, the universe, electricity and energy, strange phenomenon and conspiracy theories on ghosts, “energy” whatever.

For a long time, I would hear the term “metaphysics” being thrown around, and I had zero idea what it actually meant. 

Meta– on top of. Or nestled within.

Physics — the physical, physical phenomenon like gravity, first principles.

The reason why metaphysics philosophers tend to be a bunch of losers is that they are all weak and anemic, nerds or geeks or weaklings who seem to have some sort of physiological degeneracy, which encourages them to opine or talk or think about impractical things, superficial things.

Personally speaking, I think philosophy must be practical. 

Practical, praxis, practice — to do!

The Spartan, Zen Stoic, demigod ideal

I have a very funny ideal; the general idea is that your body looks like a demigod, and your physiology is out of control. The general idea is one must be tall, strong, highly muscular, low body fat percentage, I’m not exactly sure what my body fat percentage is, but maybe it’s around 5%.

Also, physical fitness is critical to any stoic. My ideal is to walk 50 miles a day, eat 20 pounds of meat like Milo of Croton a day. And also, abstinence from silly things like media, alcohol, drugs, marijuana etc.

Trust no thinker who does drugs!

Even our best friend Nietzsche said that coffee was bad, because it would make people dark and gloomy. He encouraged 100% cocoa powder instead. 

You let the drugs talk I let my soul talk ayy! – Kendrick Lamar

Simple technique:

First, look at a picture or a portrait or a full body shot, ideally topless of the artist, philosopher or thinker or individual… then judge their thoughts later.

Why? My theory is this: the thoughts of an individual is hugely affected by their bodily physiology.

For example, an extreme example: if somebody is locked inside a solitary confinement cell, and not permitted to go outside for years, but, he had a pen and pad and would jot down some thoughts… Would be the quality of these thoughts? Certainly dark and morose.

Why does stoicism matter? 

In today’s world, why does it matter, what is the significance of stoicism, etc.?

First and foremost, I think we are living in a troubling time, especially with the advent of modern day internet based media and advertising. I think 99% of what is propagated on the internet is fear mongering, and what is hate? Hate is just fear.

The first thought on stoicism is that it is just fear conquering. What I discovered about street photography, is that 99% of it is conquering your fears. Conquering your fears of upsetting other people, getting in some sort of verbal or physical altercation etc. In fact my bread and butter workshop is my conquering your fears and street photography workshop, the workshop which is still interesting to me even after a decade.

Why is this so important? I think it is rooted in almost everything; conquering your fears is rooted in entrepreneurship, innovation, risktaking and real life.

Even my speculation in crypto. 99.9% of crypto speculation is just balls. Having the balls to make big bets, and when things go south, knowing how to master your emotions.

A simple extra I have is this: just imagine it will all go down to zero.

It was useful because when I was in college, my sophomore year I got really into trading stocks, and I eventually lost my whole life savings, maybe around $3500 USD, and some bad penny stock which I actually misread the financials… the whole time I thought the company was making a profit, but actually it was taking a loss. I actually didn’t know that if profits are written in parentheses, it means a loss.

It was funny because my initial start as an investor was back in high school, I bought some Adobe stock when I was a high school junior, and also some mutual funds, which both went up after about 4-5 years.

Also I remember in elementary school computer class, when I was in the sixth grade in Bayside Queens, there was some sort of stock stimulation trading game, and actually it was funny… the kids who made the most money and were the most successful just put 100% of everything into Apple, note this is when we were only 12 years old, and I was born in 1988.

Stoicism and capitalism?

Funny enough, it seems that stoicism actually plays well with capitalism. Why? According to modern day capitalist thinking, the best way to approach life is to be objective, strong, stoic, unemotional, logical and rational.

Also, with modern day media there is so much fear mongering in the news, about some sort of global armageddon, global financial ruin, etc. I call it “fear porn”.

Therefore stoicism as a mindset is useful to think and position your mind in such a way that you could consider that life is all upside, no downside.

In fact, if I could summarize stoicism in one sentence, it is that life is all upside, no downside. Inspired by NASSIM TALEB.

Sex and Stoicism

So, is stoicism useful to you if you’re a man or a woman? Does it matter?

The good thing is I think it could apply to both sexes. Conquering sexism and social pressures is useful if you’re woman, and also if you’re a man.

Also, gender is social. Lot of the expectations set on us by society is socialized and gamed to a certain degree.

Stoic strategies 

First, we got to unchain ourselves from modern day ethics and morality. I believe that all modern day philosophy and thinking and ethics and religion is bad.

For example, the notion of turning the other cheek is a patently bad one. Why did Jesus turn his cheek? It is because he lacked on army.

Also, philosophically I think we should put no trust in Socrates. I thought which has puzzled me for a long time was this “Why was Socrates so ugly?

Monster in face, monster in soul.

I think Socrates was a degenerate, and he lacked any sort of real power. Therefore he turned logic and rationality into his terrorizing weapon (via Nietzsche). Back in the day, you didn’t need logic or rationality to have things your way, you simply was able to dictate that which you wanted to pause it, because you had a military force behind you. Just think about Machiavelli and IL PRINCIPE– the reality of being a mercurial prince, king, and military leader is hard, stoic, “immoral”. But ultimately it all comes down to war, conquest, the military.

Trust nobody who uses rationality or logic as their tyrannizing weapon. 

In fact, I believe that all should have the body and strength of some sort of super soldier. Essentially look like all the guys from the movie 300, this is our ideal.

Demigod physique. 

What has helped me

  1. Allow yourself to be a bad, immortal, “evil” person. When you decide to adopt an unorthodox way of thinking and living, you’re going to rub some feathers the wrong way. And truth be told, even if you act in a strange vibrant way… At worse you’re only “mildly” annoying other people.
  2. For good inspirations, I think the best stoic writers and thinkers include Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius and also the humor of the cynic philosopher Diogenes. I would even posit the idea that one could consider Alexander the Great as a stoic. Why? When you’re trying to create an empire, and you always have your life on the line, certainly this takes a stoic mindset. Also, let us think and consider that Alexander the Great had a copy of the Iliad by his bedstand, it was the only book he traveled with during his military tours.
  3. Imagine the worst possible case scenario, and backtrack: Apparently even NASSIM TALEB would do this when he was a trader; every single day when he would go to his trading desk, he would assume that his investments would all go to zero, and if that wasn’t the case every single day, it was just upside. Therefore for myself, I just think to myself very simple; imagine like I got zero dollars, zero money, and literally all I need is meat, a Wi-Fi connection and I’m good. 
  4. Live like a poor person: The notion of “debasing“ the coin or the currency is the general idea that you are not a coward in regards to money. The best way to think about money is like a social tool; I think money is actually just codified labor. If you want people to clean bathrooms, run the cashiers stand, you have to promise them money. Even Seneca said the upsides of simulated poverty; essentially living like a poor person, or even a homeless person when you don’t need to… is the ultimate position to be in. Why? True freedom of spirit and soul; as a philosopher thinker writer or whatever… you cannot be “canceled”, because there is nothing to cancel. As long as you could pay your rent, buy meat at Costco, and publish your thoughts to your own self hosted website blog, and pay your server fee, you have 100% freedom. And also, still… America is the best place to be because there is true freedom of speech and expression, you don’t want to be a trillionaire but not be able to say what’s really on your mind. And I think this is the big issue with entertainers, actors, media people… as long as you’re signed to a contract, you don’t run your own production company, or, you’re still a slave to money… you’re not really going to see what’s really on your mind. Why is it that the Rock cannot say anything bad about China, or Tibet? Because he is still enslaved by the media corporation. New slaves by Kanye West.

And this is the true courage of Kanye West; he literally put everything on the line, and even lost his spouse and I think maybe his kids? All for the sake of revealing inequities. 

“I throw these Maybach keys fucking c’est la vie! I know that we the new slaves.”- Ye


Stoic training

The fun thing about stoicism is that you could just make it up as you go, devise your own strategies and whatever.

“Fucking c’est la vie!” My favorite Kanye West line.

Essentially the general idea is that in life, one should not take things too seriously. Laughter is golden, I forget the philosopher who was called the laughing philosopher… Democritus?; better to laugh about the follies of human beings rather than to be dark and morose about it.

Also, thoughts from the Odyssey; if you look far enough  into the future, everything becomes comedic and hilarious.

So when you’re in some sort of bad situation, just think to yourself “Perhaps one day, 20 or 30 years from now… I will look back at this and just laugh!” It will just be humorous.

Honestly, laughter, and kind of being able to joke about things might be the best way to live life and deal with setbacks. 

Modern day ailments

Problems in modern day life:

  1. Too much time spent indoors, not enough time out in the sun. Perhaps it is better to be out outside all day, and joyful, even with the risk of getting skin cancer or whatever… rather than to be indoors, scared, weak and anemic. Differences between if you’re a man or a woman, but still… the most beautiful skin has a sunkissed, olive color tone; the true privilege is having a full body tan. 
  2. Get chatGPT, the paid premium one. And use the image generation AI art tool DALL-E. People pay therapists to just speak their mind, and get some sort of sounding board. I actually think it’s much better to chat with AI instead; because it will not judge you, and ultimately what is a therapist anyways? A therapist is just a mirror, a sounding board for you to verbalize and flesh out your thoughts. Often when we talk about our problems, 90% of the issues go away because once we verbalize it, we feel much better about ourselves. The next thing I’m going to do is build some sort of therapy bot. 
  3. Not enough walking: I have never met anybody who walks 30,000 steps a day and is depressed. Even my friend Jimmy, who works as a US postal worker delivering the mail, he walks around 30,000 steps a day and is always bright cherry and jovial. I think this is also where people who hike a lot or walk a lot in nature are so happy; when you’re able to walk around a lot, and zen out… you just feel much better. My simple suggestion is when you go on a hike or a walk in nature or even in the city… leave your phone at home, or locked inside your glove compartment, and don’t bring any headphones or speakers or Apple watches or whatever. Just bring along your camera, and enjoy. My personal ideal is the bear lifestyle; walking 50 miles a day. 

Real stoics don’t call themselves Stoics?

A funny thing I have learned is that when you call something something, it isn’t that.

For example, if someone calls something a “luxury car”, it ain’t. For example, a true modern day luxury car is maybe a Tesla, but Tesla never calls itself a luxury car. Also the ultimate luxury technology company is probably Apple… but Apple is very intelligent and not calling themselves a luxury brand.

A pro tip is when it comes to websites, read the alternative text, the header text, the stuff that shows up in the tab of your browser window. If the website, the automotive retailer tries to market themselves as a “luxury” brand, typically it is actually a sign that it isn’t a luxury brand it isn’t luxury brand.

Thought: what are some good examples of true luxury brands which don’t overly calls itself luxury? 

In someways, we can think and consider stoicism as our new luxury. In fact, having luxury, luxury of mind and soul… and luxury of freedom of speech, isn’t this the ultimate luxury?

When somebody asked Diogenes the cynic; “What is the best human good”? He said “Freedom of speech, speaking your mind, having the power to see whatever is on your mind.”

In fact, my current joy is becoming more and more free talking, and free riding. What that means is this; I’m ain’t going to censor myself no more, even if I might be politically incorrect insensitive or whatever. 

Also, I would prefer to speak my mind and seriously hurt the feelings of others, rather than soften it for the sake of the other person. 

Similarly speaking, when people call themselves “influencers”, they are not influencers.

Stoicism as a technique and tool, not the end

Ultimately I think we should think of stoicism just like having another tool inside our tool kit. For example, if you’re a chef, you’re going to have different knives for different purposes. If you’re going to cut a big piece of meat, you probably want a big ass meat cutting knife, not something you would use to slice an apple with. Similarly speaking, if you’re going to scoop out the insides of an avocado, better to use a spoon rather than using a fork, or a knife. 

I think the problem is when some people get too into stoicism (I prefer writing stoicism with a lowercase), they think that everything needs to be consistent, and must fit into this nice little neat box of what is considered “stoicism“. This is a bad line of thinking… let us consider that Marcus Aurelius never even mentioned stoicism in his writings, his collections of thoughts, which we moderns call THE MEDITATIONS… it was just essentially his personal diary, to help him conquer his own personal fears and thoughts, I don’t think he ever intended it to be published publicly. I think he just wrote it to himself as self therapy. And I think the only stoic philosopher he even mentions is maybe Epictetus.

The future of stoicism?

For myself, I just come out with certain to work out thoughts and techniques because it helps me, and when I find these tricks or techniques or secret hacks or cheat codes… My passion is to simply share it with others. 

And ultimately, things are ever in flux and evolving and changing and adapting.

For example, I’ve discovered the quality of my thinking is different when I am in Culver City Los Angeles, compared to being in the boring suburbs of Orange County.

Also depending on my social environments… my stoic thoughts are different when I am in a gym, vs just working out by myself in my parking spot in the back of my apartment.

Also, the quality of my thoughts is different when living with family members or other people versus just living with myself Cindy and Seneca.

Stoicism is all about living with other people

Assuming you’re not growing your own vegetables and living in the middle of nowhere… you probably have some interaction with other human beings. As long as you have an iPhone, an Android phone, a smartphone, a 4G or 5G internet connection, wifi, a laptop, have to buy groceries somewhere… you’re still going to have to interact with other human beings.

And this is good. There is no other greater joy than other human beings.

In fact, modern-day society is strange because in someways, the ethos is to be antisocial and to be cowardly. But in fact, the best way to think about things is that real life is interaction with other human beings, and social conquest. One can imagine a lot of modern day entrepreneurship as simply a big dick swinging contest. He who is the most masculine confident tall and strong and stoic shall win.

More ideas

Assume that everyone is mentally insane: Have you ever been out in public, and you see some sort of crackhead or strange homeless person who acts radically, smells terrible, and is obviously mentally ill? Do you hate them for it? When they say something weird to you… do you take it personally? No. Why? They are crazy. Perhaps we should just adopt this stoic mindset towards other people; some people are actually physiologically ill, mentally unwell… don’t trust the opinion of nobody.

A lot of people are trying to actually deal with their own inner demons: For example, becoming the successful photographer and street photographer I am today… I’ve dealt with some individuals who would say anonymous bad things about me, and later I found out that their mom just died or something. I cannot imagine what it feels like losing a mother… therefore if somebody spew some hate on me because something bad happened to them, I’m not gonna take it personally.

Self-flagellation: I think a lot of people who are sick, mentally or physiologically self flagellate themselves. Essentially the way that they deal with other people or themselves is some sort of metaphorical self-flagellation.

For example… you know those strange individuals who have the whip and whip themselves, and inflict pain on themselves? I think some people do this metaphorically to themselves and others.

You just want to stay away from them.

Why so scared?

My personal theory on fear is that a lot of it is tied to morality and ethics. I think the general idea is not necessarily that we are afraid of anything… I think the true fear is that we’re afraid that we are some sort of bad evil unethical immoral person.

For example in street photography, the general ethical thought is that it is immoral to take a photo of somebody without their permission, because there is some sort of it inherent evil behind it. Is this true? No. Taking photos and not really a big deal.

Why do people make such a big deal out of small things?

I think it is because some people are just overly sensitive, which once again comes from some sort of physiological weakness.

For example, if you’re a weightlifter who could lift 1000 pounds, assuming you’re not taking any steroids or anything… are small things going to bother you? No. But let us assume that you are a skinny fat man, all you do is drink alcohol and smoke marijuana and watch Netflix, and you spent too much time on Reddit… you are 40% body fat, and have never lifted in your life. And also your testosterone is low and you never go outside. Certainly the quality of your thoughts is going to be different than if you’re a happy gay monster, lifting weights outside in the direct sun, laughing and having fun. 

In fact, I’ve actually personally discovered that the reason why a lot of people hate me is because I am so happy jovial and gay. They are secretly suspicious or envious of me? 

Weather and mood

Probably one of my worst experiences was this jarring transition; I was super happy insanely happy being in Vietnam in 2017; with a beautiful weather, the beautiful light, the happy people the great amenities etc.… and then that winter Cindy and I went to Europe, in Marseille Berlin and Prague, and maybe London… seriously the worst winter of my life. Why? I wonder if so much miserable feelings and thoughts simply comes from the darkness and lack of light. a lot of Europe is actually quite miserable; dark, unhygienic, morose.

Even Nietzsche had a thought about Schopenhauer; How much of these emo European philosophers came from the fact that it was just complaining about the cold weather in Germany etc.?

For myself, my ideal weather is Southeast Asia; I love being in Phnom Penh Cambodia, Vietnam etc. In the states, am I the only one who loves living in Los Angeles? Dr. Dre and Kendrick Lamar said that LA was the best for women weed and weather… I would definitely say the biggest upside of living in Los Angeles is the light, the sunlight. It actually does get quite cold here, but usually most reliably even in December during the winter time, the sun will always come up. As long as there is bright sunny light, I will be happy. And I think maybe for myself, considering that I am a photographer, and photography means painting with light… light for me is critical.

I also wonder how much of it is a physiological thing and a genetic trait; for example I could even recall being a young child, and my mom telling me that the most critical thing in finding a home or an apartment was light and natural light. Even now… 90% of my happiness comes from being able to have access to natural light, ideally floor to ceiling windows facing directly the sun, having some sort of modern temperature regulated apartment and home. Even living in our tiny studio minimalistic luxury apartment in Providence Rhode Island, where it was always 75° warm and cozy, and not frigid and damp and cold and dark and humid… I was always good. But moving to an older house, where it always felt damp and cold… this literally lowered my happiness by 1000%.

Therefore, if you’re feeling miserable sad or whatever… I say spend three months living in Hanoi or Saigon in Vietnam, or go to Phnom Penh Cambodia. I wonder if 90% of peoples misery is simply due to the weather.

Stoic assignments

”Better to be a gay monster than a sentimental bore!” – Fernandino Galliani, via Nietzsche

My stoic ideal is somebody who is happy, gay, smiling, no headphones or AirPods on, no sunglasses on, no hat, no facial hair, no baggy oversized clothing, no tint in their car. Somebody who makes great eye contact, laughs, stands up upright, jokes, and fools around. Like an overgrown child.

Also, lift weights at least once every day, ideally in the direct sun. Just buy some weightlifting equipment on Titan.fitness, I like the farmers carry handles, the Olympic loadable dumbbell, and also the Texas power squat bar. Just buy some cheap weights, and or buy a heavy 400 pound sandbag, and just have fun throwing it around.

True stoics are masculine

A true stoic should look something like Hercules or Achilles. Or like ERIC KIM; I have the aesthetic and the physique of Brad Pitt in FIGHT CLUB except with a lot more muscle. Like my friend Soren says, the Adonis physique and proportions.

A real stoic is sexy

I think a real stoic is sexy, happy and fun. Who doesn’t take life too seriously; and think of everything like a fun game. A real stoic would be joyful and cheery like three-year-old child without any adulteration from the outside world.

Why do adults become so dark and morose?

I don’t like talking with or hanging out with adults, uninteresting.

At what point or age do people become so emo?

Typically, highschoolers are very optimistic. Even college students. But I think at least in maybe college in high school nowadays… the bad trend is towards “over concern”, about the world the planet ethics animals etc.

I find a lot of this thinking superficial, performative, and uncritical. I think “animal rights“, “saving the planet” is this new pseudo world religion; which is just capitalism 3.0. I find the whole pet industry the whole dog industry to be insanely bizarre, and I trust nobody who talks about “saving the planet“ who owns an iPhone, owns any sort of car, or has an Amazon prime subscription. Certainly not any vegans.

A real stoic is a carnivore 

Animals are animals. They are lower on the hierarchy and totem pole on earth. Man is the apex predator, the apex bully and the apex tyrant.

Should we care for animals or “animal rights”? No. Animals are our slaves.

If you consider even dogs and pets… they are essentially our emotional slaves. People talk a lot about the virtuosity of dogs being loyal or whatever… and giving you unconditional love. This seems like some sort of emotional slavery.

The only dogs I respect are some sort of canine dogs, some sort of attack or defense dogs, or hunting dogs. For example, John Wick 3; Halle Barry and her dogs. An animal should either be a weapon, or nothing.

Why do people care about animals so much?

Essentially it looks like men no longer have a backbone. No more spine.

I trust nobody who owns a dog.

Let us not forget; they call it dog ownership, or “owning a pet”. There is no more concept of “human ownership, or “owning a human.”

End goals 

What is the end goal of humanity? To me it is towards entrepreneurship, innovation, art and aesthetics, philosophy etc. Design.

Stoicism should be considered a tool which could aid you in these things.

For example, I think 99% of entrepreneurship is courage. Stoicism could help you with that.

I also think with design, great design is also 99% courage, having the courage to attempt something that won’t sell or be received well… stoicism is all about practical courage. The only designers with courage include Steve Jobs, Jony Ive, Elon Musk, Kanye West. 

Also, weightlifting. To attempt to lift a certain weight you have never attempted before takes great courage. For example, me atlas lifting 1000 pounds; that is 10 plates and a 25 on each side, this is true stoic training. Why? The fear of injury is what holds most people back; if you had successfully conquered this fear and not injured yourself, this is pure stoic bliss.


The physical

I think the only and the only proper way to lift weights is one repetition maximum training. That is; what is the maximum amount of weight you’re able to successfully lift or move, even half an inch?

To me, the courage is the success. Even if you had the courage to attempt it… that is what is considered success. 

Simple exercises to do include the atlas lift, innovated by ERIC KIM, or a one repetition max rack pull.

Or, a high trap bar deadlift, heavy Farmer’s walks, or heavy sandbag carries. Or even a simple thing you could do is go to the park or to the local nature center, find the biggest rock there and just see if you could pick it up.

Now what?

If you’re interested in stoicism, and have had some interesting thoughts on stoicism, one of the most noble things you could do is start your own blog. I think blogs are 1000 times more effective than publishing some sort of static printed book; I think the problem in today’s world is that everyone is seeking some sort of legitimacy by being picked up by some sort of legitimate publisher and getting “published“, and seeing your printed book at Barnes & Noble whatever.

I say it is better to be open source, free and permissionless, decentralized. Just publish your thoughts and book as a free PDF, and just host it on dropbox, Google Drive, or your own web server. Share the link freely, and also just publish the raw text as a big blog post. 

Even Sam Bankman-Fried wisely thought; 99.9% of books could just be summarized as big blog posts.

Don’t trust any modern day published book which isn’t free, because… there is some sort of hidden clout chasing somewhere. 

Even one of the worst compromises that led to the demise of Ray Dalio was the fact that he took his Principles book, which was essentially a free ebook PDF on his website, and then took it off, because I think he got a book deal with Simon and Schuster. After he did that, he lost my respect.

If you’re already independently wealthy, and you don’t crowd source your self-esteem… why would you need to externally validate yourself by getting some sort of constipated publisher and annoying editor?

Editors are bad.

Now what?

Start your own blog and start blogging your own thoughts on stoic philosophy, and even start a YouTube channel and start vlogging on it. My generalized thought is simple: if your thought your idea your blog post your video or whatever could even impact the life of one other human being on planet earth… it is worth it.

ERIC


What is the secret to the maximum amount of happiness in life? The maximum amount of danger. (Nietzsche).

ERIC


Why Doesn’t Anyone Have American Pride Anymore?

Why is it that people prefer to buy a Lamborghini or Ferrari over a Shelby Cobra? 

Simple heuristic:

Don’t trust nobody who owns, or bought a foreign car; this includes BMW, Mercedes, Audi, AMG, Lamborghini Volkswagen, Ferrari, Land Rover, Range Rover, anything produced by the Volkswagen group or Tata group, Porsche, etc.

The funny thing is it seems in today’s world, having a Toyota or a Honda is almost like having an American car?

Simple rule:

If you want to be a true American, if you want a sports utility SUV car, just by a Ford Explorer ST, which is essentially a cop car. 

If you want some sort of sports muscle car, ultimate flex… Buy some sort of Ford Mustang Shelby Cobra car, or even… the Ford GT. I think Brad Pitt owns one. Mustang GTD

Buy FORD

Anti-American sentiment?

In America, if you only care about money, I don’t think you’re a true American. What does a real American care for? Diversity, access, democracy, egalitarian values, and meritocracy which means the goods you are delivered is based on merit, hierarchy and ranking.

The diversity myth? 

Apparently when Peter Thiel was an undergraduate in college he wrote a book called The Diversity Myth… I think he wrote it when he was at Stanford as an undergraduate, something about how too much focus on diversity is bad. I haven’t read the book, but I think what it means is that trying to do things like affirmative action in his eyes is bad.

My personal thought is it is obvious; obviously if you have a kid from the hood, a kid from Compton, certainly his or her GPA or SAT score is not going to be as good as a kid who went to some sort of elite private school in Beverly Hills. Therefore there needs to be dynamic weighing here.

For example, if you’re the Valevictorian or the top #1 student in a ghetto school… your application to college should be weighed higher than a kid who went to an elite private school, who is only the top 100.

Therefore it isn’t necessarily “affirmative action”, but rather, wisdom in evaluating someone’s social economic status as part of their application.

Diversity should not be forced

Certainly diversity is good, but it is not good when you try to force it.

For example, trying to force more gender equality or racial equality when it isn’t really warranted seems like a bad idea.

This is where the philosophical thing matters; we must ask ourselves and consider… does it really even matter in the first place? If so, why?

Guns?

Discovering a gun at my sister’s wedding.

Being an American or a true American has nothing to do with gun ownership. I’m not anti-guns per se; I did Boy Scouts and shot a rifle and a shotgun, got both my merit badges and also an archery merit badge when I was a high schooler.

I think the strange notion is that somehow… if you own a gun, or have a gun somewhere at home or whatever… it makes you more manly? (It does not).

Jewish people are super wise

I wonder… Is it that people hate Jewish people because they’re so smart wise and good with money?

Also, I don’t really trust any Christians, or God-fearing people especially in the news and mainstream media, even underground media etc.

For example, I really enjoyed the Kanye interview on info wars, but the guy who hosts the show… seems like a strange guy. Anybody who takes the Bible literally is not to be trusted.

How did Jewish people become so successful? Simple: they make money don’t spend it.

Also, I think Jewish people, that is consider how much trials and tribulations and anti-Jewish sentiment and bad things happened to them throughout their whole existence. If they were able to survive it all, probably a good sign.

America is more Jewish than you think 

One of the funniest things that my friend Daniel Schaeffer told me he was… “I’m Jew…ish”.

I might be wrong here, but I think that there is a huge list of really really famous and influential Jewish people in America, which include I think, Gal Gadot, Joseph Levitt, Scarlett Johansson, Jerry Seinfeld, Larry David etc.

Also, Steven Spielberg, Kirk Douglas (changed his last name to blend into Hollywood), a lot of really famous people in Hollywood.

Also I think John Stewart, he changed his last name.

I think a simple strategy what you could do is just Google it, famous Jewish people who changed their last names or famous Jewish people in the media.

I think even Lenny Kravitz is Jewish?

Apparently there is “Jewish” sounding last names, anything related to Gold or Goldsmith, because a lot of Jewish people were once gold merchants back in the day, or anything with “itzh” or “Horowitz” etc… “itz”. Ben Horowitz.

Also a lot of really mainstream American words are actually Yiddish! For example, “chutzpah”, “schlep”, “schmuck”, etc. 

I didn’t know… But my friend Janae told me “I’m such a bad Jewish American, I had no idea that Seinfeld was a TV show about Jewish American culture”. I then responded, in shock, “It is??”

It doesn’t really matter

I have a theory that everyone is looking for some sort of scapegoat. My personal thought on why people believe in conspiracy theories is because nobody likes to think that they themselves are the cause of their own pain suffering etc., and they think of it like some sort of virtuous task and duty to uncover all the “evils” or “injustices” in the world.

For example, I’ve actually met a lot of Palestinian Americans who fall victim to conspiracy theories. Why? To psychoanalyze; they have been seriously fucked over. Even the whole conflict right now in the Gaza Strip, it really does seem that the Palestinians are the victims here. Israel, funded by the American government in military, America is really the bad guy here. 

Even China; China is not a threat. When I was in Phnom Penh Cambodia, I would keep reading these newspapers on how mainland China would complain that they only have one military base somewhere in Africa, whereas America has thousands. As long as Americas military powder is 1000X that of everyone else in the world, America is fine. 

Even Russia, not a threat. I think people just like to paint Putin as the devil, because once again, people like having some sort of devil figure, some sort of Adolf Hitler to see as the enemy.

Ideas?

In South Korea if you’re a man, you’re required to have at least 2-3 years of military duty. I think it’s a good idea if America did the same. Or if they instituted more ROTC programs in high school, optional.

And also, I think having some sort of part-time army reserve officer military training programs for normal civilians like myself is a good idea. Even my friend Andrew, became a part-time naval officer, more for pride. Harvard undergraduate graduate, professor now.

Apparently Westpoint is a really good institution. Maybe if Seneca gets a full ride there I will send him there. 

So what?

I think people are actually low-key praying and wishing for some sort of global armageddon. Why? Once again, a lot of people who are miserable in life want to see the world go into shambles. 

I am highly dubious of a World War III, or some sort of true international military demise. Why? Rich mainland Chinese oligarchs don’t want nobody to take their Rolls-Royce, or their mansions in Vancouver Canada.

Also, Americans like their consumerism, and capitalism.

Whether America likes it or not, it seems that they are in bed with China. As long as Apple still produces iPhones in China, ultimately… economically we will not see any real antagonism between both countries.

Economics is the new world religion

Money, capital, economics is the new world religion. Everybody globally… the only thing that people seem to really care for is to continue to self richen themselves. 

As a consequence, I think we will see a decline in military intervention and deaths, and other bad world issues.

People want to see the ones and zeros and commas increase in their bank account, not more deaths and casualties.

So what should we really be concerned about?

Simple things: 

  1. Pollution: nobody wants to be a billionaire in Beijing or Shanghai, the pollution and the air there is so toxic.
  2. Health diet and fitness: this trend towards “plant based” diets is a bad one, all this vegan nonsense is bad for the planet. Maybe more sustainable animal, beef or lamb production is a good idea. For example at Erwhon I discovered this new “ancestral blend“ — FORCE OF NATURE ground beef which is made with 100% grass fed ground beef, and beef liver and heart actually grinded it in; it is the new only thing that I’m feeding Seneca, it is his natural steroids. Let us not forget that organ meets, beef liver is a natural steroid, the more cholesterol you consume, the stronger you will become and the more testosterone will go up. So a novel thought; addressing the issue of food waste, particularly with beef kettle and cows in America; consume more of the scrap meat. Beef tongue, heart, head, liver, intestine etc.
  3. Media? My personal belief is that the real bad guys here is the media and advertising corporations; let us not forget that Google is an advertising company. Same thing goes with Facebook. And let us not forget that Google owns YouTube, and Facebook also owns Instagram. The reason why online advertising companies are so bad is that media thrives on the sensational, anger, fear, and all of these base human emotions. My personal thought is a lot of racial antagonism is actually stirred up by the media which is run on advertising. For example, it seems that the new clickbait is anything to do with “anti-Semitic“, or “anti-Semitism“; both on the Jewish, African-American front, and mainstream media, a lot of which is run by Jewish families. The more people who click “anti-Semitic” new stories and see more Google AdSense advertisements, the more money that Google makes. Also Facebook, Instagram, the more sensational things are posted, the higher the advertising revenue for them. 

Why I am uncancellable

I am already independently rich and wealthy from my savings and cryptocurrency, and I also live like a poor person, which means that I’m making more money than I could spend it. Because I don’t even like spending money in the first place.

In fact, besides myself and maybe NASSIM TALEB… I don’t think I really know any other free thinkers? Everyone is either hooked to some sort of algorithm, social media platform, YouTube… or podcast… no freedom. This is where I don’t really put any trust in anything that Tim Ferriss says, or even Joe Rogan, because they are run by advertisers.

Who not to trust? Anybody and everybody on YouTube, or has any sort of podcast which is supported by advertisers.

So how can you make money?

Maybe it is a good idea to make money elsewhere, for example, I think I’ve made more money in cryptocurrency speculation than I have in my whole decade plus of teaching photography workshops.

Also selling products is a good idea  because… especially if it is your own products, have more faith and leather than information. HAPTIC INDUSTRIES — in the world of AI and artificial information, having physical leather products is a good idea because it will outlast you. HENRI x ERIC KIM STRAPS.

ART?

Ultimately after you’ve made your trillions of dollars, what is it that people really care for? Art.

How many Jackson Pollocks, Basqiats, or Picassos do you own? 

Art collection

It is wise to understand a Ferrari as an art object, not as a car. Just go to the Peterson automotive museum and go into the vault; these cars are art objects.

Art is the main disruptor here; this is where I am so into [AI art](). Maybe I will do some AI art workshops in the near future.

EricKim.ai


Now what?

Trust ChatGPT more than you trust Google or weird Internet conspiracy website forums. Also, delete Reddit and stop using Reddit; I legit think it is the worst thing for humanity, perhaps even worse than pornography.

Quit reddit, not porn.

In fact, maybe it is best to just think about pornography like entertainment. Men who watch sports, drink alcohol or smoke weed, without having actually ever played the sport, sports is like some sort of domestication of the modern day human, a modern day pornography for men. At least sexual pornography is a positive motivator, drinking beer, eating french fries and watching football if you have never played football yourself in real life… seems worse.

Even basketball; my simple heuristic is if you decide to watch basketball, maybe one should play real life basketball at least once a week.


Assignments

  1. Start your own blog. Ionos.com or bluehost.com and install WordPress.org
  2. Subscribe to ChatGPT plus, start creating your own AI generated art via DALL-E 3. Post on your own blog or arsbeta.com — I want ARS to also be a home for not just photos, but AI generated art. 
  3. Make your own ChatGPT bot, once you have subscribed to the premium model. For example, I re-created the Y app on ChatGPT, it is great. 
  4. Fitness: Buy weightlifting equipment on titan.fitness– and start lifting weights in your own parking lot garage. I recently picked up the Titan fitness Farmer’s carry handles, I like them, and also maybe the best 500 bucks I’ve ever spent in my life was the Texas power bar squat bar, my most prized possession.  Lift weights every day at least once, maybe even twice a day; the upside of doing it in your own backyard, your own parking lot is that you will just save a lot of time. If you want ghetto squat rack or rack, just go to Home Depot and buy cinderblocks. I was able to stack three cinder blocks on top of one another, and I have been able to successfully rack pull over seven plates with it. Cross leg deadlift good idea.
  5. Maybe dabble in crypto? Just get a Coinbase account, link it with your traditional bank, I think everyone should own at least one bitcoin. Personally I just swapped or traded or converted nine of my bitcoin into chainlink (20,800 chainlink)– my personal prediction is within the next three years to five years, it should be above $50 a link, maybe even 100 or 200 bucks a link. Currently speaking I am anti-Ethereum; it is just too complicated and complex. Then also now that they are offering Ethereum for enterprise (private ethereum)… A bad sign. Also try bitcoin babe.
  6. Organ meats? Everyone says that eating meat, red meat is bad for the planet blah blah blah. But what about organ meats? Nobody really says anything bad about organ meats, beef liver, beef heart, beef intestine, beef kidney. As a fun experiment just try out 100% organ meat diet; the true demigod diet. Also bone marrow. Just pick up organ meats at Whole Foods in the frozen freezer, they sell 100% grass fed frozen beef liver and beef heart and beef kidney there, even beef tongue. Or just go to the local Halal market, the local market and get it there.

Now what?

EXPERIENCE EK— unlock your true potential.


HAPTIC HOLIDAYS!

As a special holiday promo: order over $300 USD at the HAPTIC SHOP, and get a free 3x set of ERIC KIM OMAKASE COFFEE (three bags designed to awaken your creative senses). While supplies last.

HAPTIC SHOP >


Experiments

  1. Try to troll AI and ChatGPT for; once you get the paid version, see how far you could push it until you invoke some sort of content moderation issue,
  2. Have ChatGPT disprove some sort of strange conspiracy theories. In fact, I think the biggest benefit of ChatGPT is that it doesn’t get suckered by conspiracy theories.
  3. Actually, ChatGPT is pretty factual. For example, just ask whether George Floyd was in a pornography film (he was). ChatGPT answers truthfully. 

Now what?

Going on a hike. Leave your phone in the car and just enjoy a nice walking nature, just walk slowly. Do it in vibram five finger shoes or even barefoot. 

Order some weight lifting equipment on titan.fitness and have fun at home.

FaceTime a loved one. The best gift to give somebody is just a simple phone call!


What do you want for Christmas this year?

  1. Ask somebody to gift you a gym membership, or even a yoga, CorePower membership. Investing in your health is perhaps the best thing you could do as a gift.
  2. In terms of gyms, I really like crunch fitness, LA fitness is OK, or whatever commercial gym is close by. Even golds gym is good.
  3. Costco gift cards; to buy more meat.
  4. Ask somebody for airline fare; to go fly somewhere and travel somewhere for the holidays. 
  5. Vibram 5 finger shoesELX KNIT.
  6. Texas power bar squat bar
  7. 400 pound roguefitness.com sand bag
  8. Money to purchase a website hosting domain
  9. iPad Pro (small one)

What else?

Infinite ideas on the ERIC KIM BLOG: Some new thoughts:

  1. It is better to rent in an insanely great neighborhood and location then to even own a $5 million home in a good location
  2. Physiology hack: take insanely hot baths at home, at the verge of boiling your skin. Very refreshing.
  3. Drink robusta coffee, not arabica. Even Costco sells the Deathwish coffee now, which I assume is robusta coffee. Otherwise get ERIC KIM 100% fine robusta coffee. 
  4. The best clothing to wear in winter is down, merino wool, cashmere. Layer up!
  5. Milo of croton ate 20 pounds of meat a day, let us use that as our benchmark.
  6. A life goal: read the Iliad by Homer front to back. Just download free PDFs online, and keep looking for a good translation until you find one that you like.

Book list

  1. Invent and wander by Jeff Bezos
  2. Zero to one by Peter Thiel
  3. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, also the new Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson 
  4. Going Infinite – Michael Lewis. Also flash boys.

START HERE

  1. Books
  2. Products
  3. Downloads

Forward the thoughts

If this part even one interesting thought within you, feel free to forward to a friend!

ERIC KIM NEWS >


#savemoney collective

The new life goal should be to save money, not to waste it.

Instead of wasting money, better to use that money towards buying meat at Costco, weightlifting equipment, plates and bars and barbells, iron etc. Physical fitness is the ultimate luxury.


Stay lit!

ERIC KIM BLOG

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