THOUGHTS

PDF

ERIC KIM NEWS

ERIC-KIM-AI-CHATGPT-ART-DALL-E-3-GENERATIVE-ART-

Don’t be left behind: ERIC KIM NEWS >

EK MIND STREAM.

THOUGHTS

ART PHOTO BOOKS

SUITS

MODERN PHOTOGRAPHER

DOWNLOAD FREE // PDF DOWNLOAD // MIRROR

STOICISM

Introduction-to-Stoicism-14 Download

Delve into the mind of EK:

BOOKS

THE PHOTOGRAPHER

NEW CHATGPT BOTS

Crypto

ERIC KIM CHATGPT BOTS

STREET PHOTOGRAPHY STARTER KIT

Open source:

What is Street Photography? (2.4gb) / Download
Black and White (2.3gb) / Download
How to Shoot Street Photography (2.2gb) / Download
Street Portraits 101 (1.9gb) / Download
Conquer Your Fears (430mb) / Download
Composition (460mb) / Download
Masters (107mb) / Download
Editing and Post-Processing (1.3gb) / Download
Photography Projects (1.4gb) / Download
Motivation (3.7gb) / Download

View all >

PHOTOLOSOPHY

What can you become as a photographer-visual artist?

DOWNLOAD FULL COURSE (7.4GB)

See the full course here.

STOICISM 101

Introduction-to-Stoicism-PDF Download

STOIC VLOG

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

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.
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.
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.
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:

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.
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.
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

FIN

Become invincible:

The Stoic Masters

Learn from the master stoics:

See all philosophy >

PHILOSOPHY BY KIM

ZEN OF ERIC PDF Download

IDEAS BY KIM

Masters of Philosophy »

Personal Philosophy »

Stoicism »

Zen Philosophy »

Life Lessons »

Learn more: Start Here >

Entrepreneurship by KIM

Change and do, and build or do things differently … based on what you believe the ideal world *should* look like:

Think for Yourself.

FREEDOM

Never stop innovating.

Entrepreneurship Mindset

Put a Dent in the Universe.

CINEMA BY ERIC KIM

CINEMA BY KIM

Cinema and film as a great stimulus, aid and teacher for photographers and visual artists alike.

Cinematography and life lessons:

Cinema and Film Reviews

Space Films

Cinema and philosophy

GODFATHER

Gangster Films

ACTION FILMS

CITIZEN KANE:

Articles on Cinema

Why Photographers Should Study Cinema

Great Cinema

January 17, 2024

Ancient.

Thinking more ancient

Doda; defense of the ancients, actually a really good idea entitled because perhaps when it comes to the military, the philosophical concept should be centered around defense, not offense.

For example, ancient Spartans. They were all about defense, defending their city state from outside intervention. For the most part, this part just wanted to be left alone.

This is where politics, international politics, culture and the culture wars is so weird;

Just leave them alone!

For example, if somebody wants to be LGBTQ, whatever; why do you care? Just leave them alone!

I suppose they’re a big issue at hand is when you want to be left alone, and you talk and interact in society a certain way, and then other people don’t leave you alone.

For example, let us say that I refer to a person as, boy, girl, man, woman, whatever; I don’t think anybody should “correct” me; shouldn’t they leave me alone and just let me talk the way I want to talk?

Similarly speaking, if somebody is talking a certain way and I don’t like it… I don’t go and “correct” them– I just ignored, turn away, walk away, and just focus on myself?

Social justice warriors are on both sides

What the right, the conservatives, the alt right doesn’t understand is actually, they are also being a “social justice warrior”; they believe in some sort of righteous Christian God-fearing nation, and as a consequence, they don’t want the LGBTQ people to perform a certain way?

Leave the gays alone!

Also, there seems to be a lot of criticism, this ridiculous Fox News talk of “alphabet soup”. But once again, if someone wants to be a man woman or trans or whatever… Why do you care?

Why thinking ancient is good

I think the big issue in today’s world is a lot of these modern day notions are feeble at best. For example, even though I am a huge fan of Kanye West, listening to some of his interview with Lex Fridman, reading some of the transcript etc.… I think the issue is that Kanye thinks too modernly; using modern analogies like “downloading as much information as I can“, the reason why this is a bad analogy is that we are still stuck in uncritical modes of thinking, which are connected to technology. Technology for the most part is bad, as even the ancients didn’t really care for technology that much.

Technology, tekhne– technician, these were the craftsman, the art creators of the ancient Greek past; for the most part, they were seen as middle-class. The people on top — if we think about ancient Sparta, the Sparta nobility were part soldier warriors, this Spartan hop lights, I suppose you had king Leonidas, who was also on the front lines of battle, putting his own personal life at risk to defend Sparta.

Apparently back in the day, when it came to war and conquest, thinking about Alexander the great etc.… You had to put your own personal life at risk, at stake, if you partook in war.

an interesting idea that Naseem Taleb had was if a certain US military general or politician wanted to go to war, the requirement is that you need at least one blood can to be on the front lines of battle, and as a way, you have some sort of indirect skin in the game.

For example, let us say that we reminded ourselves, the past 10 or 20 years; when all this nonsense about weapons a mess destruction, and apparently the guy who popularized the whole “world is flat “concept, might have indirectly convinced the American public to go to war.

Now that I am a pater — and I have a son, Seneca at almost 3 years old… Let us assume that he grows up and becomes 18 years old or 21 years old, would I be comfortable having him suit up in army combat apparel, give him a gun, and have him fight a census war overseas, simply to regain oil power? No.

Similarly speaking, I think the only legitimate form of war and battle is one about defense. For example, let us say that we went in an alternate time universe, and somehow, the German Nazis invaded the shores of Los Angeles and whatever, and that we had to suit up, arm up, And defend the shores of Long Beach, the Los Angeles airport whatever. Then I would actually not think about it twice; grab a gun or whatever, and defend the shores of American soil from outside enemies.

I think the big issue is that America, people don’t seem to realize that we are the bad guys. Truth be told, all the stuff about Palestine, Gaza, the Gaza strip, and Israel is the red hearing; the big bad guy here is America, American military interventionalism, essentially more or less, the Israel state was created partly by American intervention, because we wanted to secure some sort of military power and influence in the region.

I see a lot of these signs nowadays for “free Palestine“, and some American public hating on Israel, etc. But once again, just read the department of defense website, even the governor general of the US military, I think Lieutenant Austin, quoted and said “we have an ironclad commitment to Israel“. if anything, perhaps we should consider Israel as a new colony of America; just like how South Korea can be considered a military outpost of the United States as well, to protect American interest from North Korea, China, etc.

Who’s on top?

in ancient Greek times, the trend was to avoid anything that had to do with politics, and even war; and instead, the focus was to focus on philosophy. This is an interesting strategy because ultimately, philosophers, and their philosophical thoughts have lasted, whereas Military generals, politicians have not.

For example, everyone knows Aristotle, Plato, Socrates etc. Yet Napoleon has fallen out of vogue, even Alexander the great is not as renowned as he should be.

Technology innovators?

One very underrated tech figure is ERIC Schmidt, the ex Google CEO who built it up into what it is today. Nobody talks about him nor does it seem that anyone cares about him. It is interesting because in fact, ERIC Schmidt has authored many books, the story of Google and beyond; but once again, nobody really knows who he is nor cares for him.

Also Larry Ellison, nobody really knows who he is nor does anyone care. Even Richard Branson, for people my generation nobody really cares for him.

Who has remained relevant? Steve Jobs. Even Jony Ive — i’m a huge fan of him, but nobody really knows who he is anymore nor cares for him. The same thing goes with Steve Wozniak; it seems that the Japanese are crazy about him but once again, no 18-year-old or 12-year-old today knows who he is. Nor cares.

True influentials?

Every 12-year-old kid or 16-year-old kid or a 18-year-old kid nowadays, highschoolers in college students, of course everybody knows who Kanye West is. Same goes with Elon musk. Or at least Tesla cars.

Jeff Bezos, not so much.

So the question is how do certain individuals become so embedded in the public consciousness of certain individuals and age groups, while others don’t?

My first thought is there are some individuals who care too much for money, traditional modes of success, etc. For example I put zero faith in anybody who mentions Napoleon Hill or Steve Covey or anybody who mentions effective habits about something… Or secrets to success, or think and grow rich? None of them is wise.

What do they look like in real life, how tall are they? What is their bodily physique? How does their voice sound?

I was randomly doing some research about Zac Efron, and apparently in real life he is only 5 foot eight? Something people don’t know about me is that I am actually quite tall, around 5 foot 10 1/2, 511, or 181 or 182 cm. of course I am over exaggerating my height, maybe by 5%

The reason why I find this so critical is this:

just go on Amazon prime video and watch the old footage of Napoleon Hill, in his office, he looks like a loser old, emaciated, skeletal looking figure, who is once again to focused on this modern day notion of “success“. Success as the modern day notion, we should just get rid of the concept altogether.

January 14, 2024

Vibram Five 5 Fingers EL-X Model Durability Issues

January 14, 2024

OFF THE GRID

The philosophy of being off the grid, or the grid itself is a fascinating one. First, the grid is just a metaphor. The grid, essentially imagine like a geometric box, cubes, shapes etc. For example grid gridlock traffic, traffic is a grid, one of the great upsides of walking is that it is multi directional; you could decide to walk on the sidewalk, Walk close to the curb, walk in the bike lane, enter stores etc. Funny; nobody really talks about how awesome it is to walk, the upsides of walking, the idea that when you’re walking you could be on the directional; once can you weave around the sidewalk, go up and down the curb, different elevations and directions, and also turn around whenever you want. The problem with the car is that you are stuck in a singular plane; you can only drive forward, stay in the lane, turn when you’re told to turn etc.

Therefore, the first ideas this: to walk, walking is at least 1 billion times superior to driving, doesn’t matter if you have a Ferrari or a Lamborghini or whatever, etc.

The second thought, it looks like having a membership, a gym membership, any sort of membership is bad. Why? I believe perhaps the issue at hand is that you are still confined to a box, a cube, another form of metaphorical grid. For example, the day I toured an equinox, and I was curious, and honestly, it is very overrated. Only thing they really have going for them is that they have hammer strength squat racks and power wigs, but you could find that at any golds gym or even crunch fitness. For the plates, iron grip is the best, but beyond that… The barbell sucked. It is cool to see that they have some trap bars, but don’t people know, you could buy your own barbell which quality is at at least 1 trillion times better?

For example, equinox uses iron grip barbell; it feels like cotton candy, so cheap. My Texas power squat bar feels at least 1 billion times superior in terms of overall quality.

Off the grid thinking

I don’t know if I am different or exceptional or perhaps I am more similar than dissimilar to other people, but at least for myself I’ve discovered, I am insanely extremely easily distracted.

For example, the only time where and when I could really think is when I am in airplane mode. That is, when I’m just walking out and about on my iPad, iPad Pro without an Internet Wi-Fi connection. This is also why really really long international flights are good for thinking, because when you are devoid of an Internet connection and distractions, it is finally a good opportunity to start to think.

In fact, one of the ex founders of the company I used to work for, demand media, which later was rebranded into the “leaf” group, Byron Reese, he actually told me when I was 21 years old that one of his passions was riding, and he would actually intentionally go on really really really long international flights without Wi-Fi connection in order to get good writing done. I think it is true; it is funny because in today’s world, a lot of these flights now have Wi-Fi, but still the good thing is that in mostly sucks. Therefore my suggestion is simple; even if you have option, don’t use Wi-Fi on a plane, doesn’t matter whether domestic or international. In fact, the privilege of being able to go on a long international flight or domestic flight is via negative Idea that you cannot be connected to the Internet.

Once again, the new privilege is being disconnected, to be without an Internet connection etc.

My formative years of thinking

Around 2017 I consider the peak of my philosophical goal thinking and inquiry. Why? First, from the period of around 2016 to 2017 to a little bit of 2018, Cindy and I were pretty much off the grid. I got rid of my phone, turned off my phone number and phone plan, and when we are living in Vietnam, we were just either Renting a tiny studio apartment, in Hanoi for only $320 USD a month, all gas electricity plumbing water and gigabit Internet included, totally brand new apartment built from the bottom up, brand new furnishings, uploading, even this infrared heater thing in the bathroom, all furniture included. And we will just eat out every single day, even all you can eat Korean BBQ for one person was maybe around seven dollars USD, And an espresso at my favorite local coffee shops in Hanoi or maybe around 10,000 Vietnamese dong, around 22,000 Vietnamese dong is worth one dollar, so essentially a cup of coffee or espresso is less than $.50.

Also, when we were just living in Saigon in one of the hotels there, maybe paying $20 USD a night, for a really nice hotel, across the park, Le Van Tam park, and our life was insanely simple; we would wake up, Cindy would have some breakfast upstairs, I would get some eggs, to store for later, we will just grab a Uber or grab taxi to the archives for Cindy, she would do her research, I would just plug myself inside a coffee shop and do some reading writing research and thinking, we would reconnaissance later , have an early dinner at the mall at around four to five p.m. , chill and hang out , talk , go back to our hotel , maybe around eight p.m. , and just go to sleep.

The reason why this was such an interesting life workflow was that when you’re living in a hotel, you literally cannot buy anything or accumulate anything. First of all, there is literally nowhere to put it, our hotel room was tiny. It just fit a bed, a single bed that both Cindy and I slept on, maybe it was a full-size mattress or a small queen, a tiny dresser where Cindy could do make up or I could have my evening “eggs snack”, eating around 6 to 8 hard boiled eggs as a post dinner supplement, and literally no storage, we would just wash our clothes in the shower every single day and hang dry it, life was very very straightforward.

Now back in the states, life becomes a little bit weird. One of the big problems about life in America is that there is too much stuff, too many possessions, too many opportunities to purchase things. As a consequence our storage units, our lockers, our Garages, closets, end up filling with so much stuff.

For example, I am probably the most minimalistic person that I know, and still… I have an own so much shit! I have random clothes from maybe 5 to 7 years ago that I still got in Costco Kirkland trash bags, randomly toss haphazardly in the closet, summit our new apartment at some in storage at Cindy‘s mom‘s house, and also all this old camera equipment and other stuff in random bags.

What is the big issue here?

The biggest issue of living in America is there are too many distractions. I include distractions like TV, movies, shows, things to buy, it looks like in LA, the reason why everyone is so broke is that they either squander their money on cars, Eating out, alcohol, clothing and fashion, find overpriced to make up at Sephora, silly gym memberships at equinox, I think an equinox gym membership is maybe close to $400 USD a month? As a consequence, people are living paycheck to paycheck, or even worse; racking up their credit card bills.

How do you become less broke?

Simple ideas include paying everything in all cash, because you better have a sense of your spending habits, when you got physical paper cash money, it seems more real, and also you feel more pain when actually buying stuff. For example can you imagine going to the local ATM where the bank, withdrawing $1000 USD of hundred dollar bills or $20 bills or $50 bills, I’m going to the Apple Store and paying for an iPhone in all cash? Probably not. But if you put on your credit card, you don’t really think about it twice.

Debit cards?

There are certain things that I think in two days world, you cannot even purchase it with cash even if you wanted to. I think this includes airline fares, flights. And I’m also sure with Airbnb, Uber, other transit related things, you gotta use some sort of visa credit card or debit card.

At least the good thing about using a debit card is that with debit cards, you’re technically using money that you already got. I feel that credit cards are such fucking scam – they tempt you with all these “rewards, “cashback“, but the reason why it is a scam is that ultimately, the “cashback” you get from these purchases are nominal, and I wonder if in the long-term it actually nudges you into spending more money, more money on things, which equals a net negative for you.

So why does this all matter?

Well, I think the reason why it matters is because ultimately, everyone strives for happiness, and I think people believe that the secret to happiness is rooted in money. But, this is not true. Money is simply a tool, tool to get people to do stuff for you.

For example, where is Tru wealth created? Through constructing, building stuff. For example, ultimately you need labor, skilled labor, or unskilled labor in order to build stuff. This includes buildings, architecture, museums, roads and infrastructure, etc.

For example, look at all these insanely epic new buildings being built, for example the new Lacma, bankrolled by David Geffen, or even the new George Lucas museum, museum of the narrative arts.

Would actually find very interesting is that these two Titans, David Geffen as well as George Lucas, both of them actually made their fortune in media, cinema, movies, and “entertainment”.

For example David Gethin, he is the one who essentially “platformed“ all of these notorious and successful singers, artist, blink-182, black-eyed peas etc.… People don’t understand that David Geffin, through Geffen records, produced a lot of the superstars.

Fill up my cup… mazeltov!

Mazeltov, it’s a celebration bitches! – JAY Z

What people don’t seem to understand is that media, music has such a strong allure and influence on us.

“I’ll be looking flashy in my Mercedes-Benz”- (I’m coming up so you better get this party started!”

Things I know, or things I don’t know; how much of modern day music culture and movies has an influence on our purchasing behaviors, or desires?

For example, one of the most formative songs in my childhood growing up was the VANS song by “the pack”. I am 35 years old, born in 1988, and I was raised and grew up in a very formative time in the bay area, Alameda, Oakland, East Oakland, the Bay Area movement, stupid dumb and hyphy, yellow bus retarded, E-40, Mac Dre, Keak da Sneak etc.

Essentially, a lot of these artists, both modern day, and old school, the general idea was a very democratic one; anyone and everyone could become cool simply if they had “I bang in my white TEE”– the basic idea that being cool and dressing well was open to all; all you needed was a simple white T-shirt, something you could easily pick up at any footlocker, I think I remember buying 10 white T-shirts for only $10 or something, and blue jeans, preferably dark denim.

The reason why the VANS song was so influential to me was multi fold: first and foremost, at the time, only weird skateboard kids or vans snickers, not black kids or any kids from the African-American population, and hip-hop. It wasn’t interesting time because to be a “skater”, was only for white kids, punk rock kids, which was not yet mainstream nor cool. But came out this very innovative song and concept that in fact, you could be black, African-American, into hip-hop music and rap, and still somehow wear vans sneakers, and skateboard?

“Real niggas wear these VANS…” – The Pack

“Stop buying those Nikes”

Nike sneakers were very interesting to me as a kid growing up because first and foremost they were so expensive. As a kid, the cheapest pair of Nike sneakers I think was maybe $80? For a kid that was a lot of money. Instead, I preferred to buy Adidas sneakers, there was a deal I remember at footlocker, a typical Adidas sneaker was maybe $60, but if you bought two Adidas sneakers, or any of the sneakers listed, you could buy two for $100, which equal only $49 a sneaker. This is how I started collecting sneakers as a kid, specifically Adidas sneakers, the château, as well as the case Swiss classic tennis shoe; when I was in high school, and also middle school, just having a simple pair of all white case Swiss tennis shoes were in. And once again this was great because they were quite affordable, you could buy two pairs of them for only 100 bucks, which was $49 a sneaker.

Weird things nowadays, why is it that in two days world, 2024, almost 20 years later, sneakers are more expensive than they were in the past? Wouldn’t you think that with industrialization, advancements and technology and whatever, that shoes should be cheaper, not more expensive?

For example, is still befuddles me how and why people would spend $200 on a loser Adidas ultra boost shoe, the only reason Adidas became cool was because of Kanye West, yet everyone still likes to hit on him. And also, spending $700 on a Balenciaga Knitted shoe, which also only became popular because of rap music, Cardi B, etc.? And also let us not forget that Demna, Kanye West, their collaboration is actually what made Balenciaga cool as well.

Also, Kanye West is the one who made Kim Kardashian so famous, and also, I think he actually did help Taylor Swift become somewhat famous as well.

“I made that bitch famous, not really but somewhat famous!” – Kanye Famous outtake song

In 2017, I downloaded a unreleased version of the life of Pablo, I think I found it somewhere on Google, Reddit, which was just hosted on Google Drive, which included a bunch of outtake songs, not the final versions of a lot of his iconic songs on the album “the life of Pablo“. One of them which I found fascinating was the one quoted.

***

Why think off the grid?

The reason why I like this idea and notion of “off the grid” thinking is that it is more fun, interesting, creative, and advancing.

Even Nietzsche in one of his books wrote that in order 41 to advance their thinking, one needed some sort of pseudo metaphorical monastic life, in which one had to do a “strict refusal of letters”. Back in the day, we can consider “letters” the same thing as email.

In fact if you really think about it, email, which stands for electronic male, and what is sent in the mail? Letters.

I think the reason why there is so much weird modern day angst about email and letters is that we treated with the same gravity and gravitas as handwritten letters. I think this is bad. Let us bifurcate the two; make real letters long form, written by hand and personal, And let email be more like text messaging. Ideally voice dictated, or even AI generated?

I even like this idea that when you open up your inbox, you could create this funny Gmail email app, or plug-in that every time you actually load up and open up an email in your inbox, the client will automatically populate “confirming receipt of your email, I will get back to you later… And funny, even if you never get back to them… At least you acknowledged receipt of it?

Getting rid of the tedium of every day life.

The purpose of life and living is to live more, not to be behelden to all of these hateful tasks.

For example, not negotiable things like paying your bills and utilities, paying your taxes, etc. But beyond this, a lot of our “obligations”, are not real obligations. Rather, it seems like “busy working “, like all of this BS work you had to do in K-12 education, which both you and the teacher knew was busy work.

Otium vs Negotium

OTM is the Latin Roman notion of leisure. Even the ancient Greeks knew well; the true apex was this virtuous, creative leisure, a life of learning thinking philosophy and advancement.

Even for the ancient Romans, like the stoic sage Seneca, everyone knew that business was a hateful thing, everyone wanted to get rid of their duties, even Seneca and one of his letters is talking to his friend Lucilius, saying that he should stop playing for political office, stop having to manage the price of bushels of wheat etc.

Seneca says, “retire now!”

It doesn’t matter how much you plow the Earth, still, you will be a slave to something!

**

January 13, 2024

THE PHILOSOPHY OF THINKING

The best way to change the world, reality everything is first, with thought. Your ideas, you were thinking etc.

How do I start thinking?

First, start walking in order to think.

I find this to be such an interesting idea because what we typically believe is that for some reason, we think we could just use our mental power or “willpower”, to stimulate our thought and thinking?

However this is not true. Thought, thinking, thoughts only arise in us in the process of walking and moving around.

Physiologically speaking, the only thing that really exists is our body. Our body as in our cranium, caput, head, brain, eyes, ears, chest and legs and hips, feet, arms, the blood in our bodies, the electrical impulses in our body etc.

The mind doesn’t exist

The “mind“ is just a fiction. All of the mental ailments we get are simply an offshoot of bodily, physiological issues.

For example, any mental health is simply a body health issue.

For example, anyone with chronic migraines, headaches, tension headaches, etc.… I think the origin of these issues is bodily, skeletal, muscle. If your chain to a desk all day, staring at zoom for eight hours a day, not moving around much, certainly there will be unnatural attention in your neck your jaw and your spine, and because that is all connected to your head and your brain, it might be a trigger for headaches and migraines.

Solutions then include yoga, hot yoga, massages, acupuncture etc. And no, don’t do chiropractors, it is the world’s biggest scam.

The upside of acupuncture?

Trippy told, acupuncture is a pseudoscience which means all of these nonsensical notions of “meridians” are not critical. However what is interesting is that it works.

Having done acupuncture with Cindy a bunch of times, especially when we were in Providence Rhode Island, half of the benefit of doing acupuncture is that you just take a nap, lie down and do nothing, don’t use your phone or listen to anything, just lie down, in the heated room, with a heated blanket, a chance to do nothing. It is difficult to do anything if you have a bunch of needles sticking into you.

Also, I have a theory about acupuncture is that it is almost like hormesis; I know that in terms of my bodily physiological response, when people stick those acupuncture needles in certain parts of my legs and my body, I can actually feel my muscles twitching and release. My theory is that a very very small “harm”, is actually stimulating to our bodies? Just like coffee, coffee is a poison, but in certain doses, the poison is a stimulus to us.

The great man is stimulated by poison.

Why does thinking matter?

Something I have had a difficult time finding or discovering is a critical line of inquiry in regards to thinking, thought, the philosophy of thinking.

Why think, what does it mean to think, why does it matter?

First and foremost, thoughts govern the planet. For example, almost everything in life and in the world, is predicated on notions of thought and thinking. No thoughts, no future.

For example, it looks like Tesla is about to conquer the planet. The new redesign Tesla model 3 is mind blowing. They made the steering wheel more beautiful, they made the interior design supply me beautiful; an integrated curve, Steve Jobs and Jony Ive would be proud!

Also I think that ambient lighting thing inside the car is super cool. Some people might think it is gimmicky, but I think it is awesome! I remember when I first saw the integrated lighting dash board thing in some Mercedes cars, and I think there is something to be said about light, light therapy; colors affect our mood. Is it James Turrel who does the light art stuff?

For example, anyone who says that colors don’t matter is a fool. Would you want the interior of your house to have bright red walls? Probably not if you don’t want to scream bloody murder inside your home.

Or, for people who say that color don’t matter, would you want to wear an all green outfit, with bright pink fuchsia accents and shoes? Probably not.

Cars run the planet?

Still in 2024, I am still shocked; it looks like cars run the planet. What this means is that it seemed that maybe 60% of our economic activity is around producing cars, selling cars, buying cars, design cars etc.

For example I look at Hyundai, it is insane… also the new Genesis Berlinetta concept car — also, the new Hyundai Grandeur and AZERA— like a futuristic Rolls-Royce for the future!

Genesis X

ART

The other day, it was free! The LACMA, LA Center for modern art, had this really insanely epic art exhibition, imagine like Legos and hot wheels on steroids; it was titled metropolis II, and imagine like a K-NEX erector set, 1100 custom designed mini matchbox hot wheel cars, with this perpetual machine moving all of the cars in traffic and buses and rails, stacked on top of one another. Conjured ideas of that old-school 1920s metropolis film, in the future where everything is that, flying cars etc. or also, a vision of a utopic-dystopic science-fiction future, kind of like Blade Runner, or that one futuristic movie that Bruce Willis was in.

Cinema by KIM

I love this exhibit so much because it’s stimulated my mind, and also, Seneca’s mind was blown! I think I rated as the best art exhibit of all time. I could probably watch it for hours, and not get bored.

If you’re in LA, Southern California whatever, I think it is a critical experience you must go to in person. Also what makes it a great exhibit is that it can be enjoyed by both children and adults, all ages. It is essentially a microcosm of cities, urban living, traffic and cars. The ultimate takeaway point:

We all think we are so unique and individual, and special, based on superficial things whether we drive an orange sports car or whatever, but in fact, we are all just the same! A bunch of lemmings!

Sociology is great

So I was born in 1988, and I attended UCLA as an undergraduate, I started in 2006, graduated 2010. I wish I got into Bitcoin earlier in 2009, when my roommate Kevin told me about it, I think when he first saw it on Reddit. He said that we should both put about 100 bucks into it and see what happened. I shrugged my shoulders and said “Meh — nah, probably a scam”. If I do the math, 100 bucks, I think at the time somebody spent 20,000 bitcoin to buy a pizza on Domino’s or whatever, the infamous $500 million pizza, basically… What would 100 bucks times a penny be? How many Bitcoin could that have purchased me? And what would it be worth today?

In life it is fine to make a mistake, and make a regret. But not twice. This is why and why I’m going back into bitcoin. Join the 10+ bitcoin club!

No twice regrets.

Anyways back to sociology, I think the reason why I think it is such a phenomenal framework to understand the world and society is that I think all of this is just a sociological phenomenon. Society, capital, capitalism, living lifestyle whatever… I think about 80% or 85% of it is based on certain sociological principles.

Also, to understand the market, economics, I think it is all sociology. To understand human fear, scams, fraud etc.

Also, I think studying sociology has made me unlearn a lot of the BS. To quote Karl Popper, via NASSIM TALEB– the idea of falsification, subtraction, or the general idea that in order to become more wise, you just gotta subtract delete or get rid of foolishness, nonsense.

For example, conspiracy theories. Only fools believe in them. Even if they are real, it doesn’t even really matter.

Therefore a great advancement in ourselves our thinking etc. is subtracting deleting or getting rid of weird conspiracy theories from your brain and your mind.

Pro tip: kit ChatGPT app on your iPhone iPad, and don’t be a cheapo; subscribe to the paid premium edition only 20 bucks a month, and start doing these type of searches:

Common misconceptions about XYZ

Or

Help me debunk some conspiracy theories about XYZ

For example, common misconceptions about Catholicism, Judaism, Islam etc. Or the Quran.

Or help me debunk theories that Jewish people run the world blah blah blah. Or that Hitler, according to operation paperclip, was in fact never killed or captured, but ended up being shipped to Antarctica to live in a bunker, where he really died.

My overall critique about Google the Internet YouTube, podcast, etc.… Essentially all these fools who think they are so wise… Strange fellows like Alex Jones, even people on the left or the right or the middle or the right, alt left, and anarchists all of them… All of them are fools.

My simple tip or heuristic is this: trust no man or women on YouTube, Google, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, podcast, etc. Especially if it is supported by advertising or them trying to sell their own products.

In fact, I think the interesting thing is when you actually make your money your fortune from some other random independent thing. For example now, I’m currently building my Empire Fortune and crypto, cryptocurrency. Therefore as a consequence, I have 100% free reign and freedom and independence to just talk about whatever is on my mind, irregardless of whatever.

***

Off the grid thinking

To me the grid is an interesting metaphor for a lot of things. The grid could be standard conventional thinking, “rules” and regulations, a lot of of the modern day BS.

I think primarily my superpower in life is my ability to disdain ignore and find ridiculous all of these “rules”. In fact, at least in real life, I don’t think I’ve ever met anybody as interesting as myself. The only other interesting people I think, or maybe Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, Kanye West. To me actually they are very relatable.

The photographer philosopher

Come on… It is 2024, you’re still on Instagram? To me Instagram is like eating McDonald’s hamburgers. Not proper.

Also, I’m still a bit confused… why don’t more people photographers just start their own private websites and blogs? And no no no, do not use squarespace it sucks. Also fun dirty secret, maybe about four or five years ago I got an email from Squarespace, saying that if I converted my whole website and blogging into Squarespace they would give me $15,000 or something. It was the easiest no I ever said in my life. Honestly speaking, I don’t even think I do it for $1 million? Unless there is something the updated which is really good. Maybe I would do it for 100 million?

To somebody who says they cannot be bought out by money, you’re just not offering them enough money (TALEB)

To me the reason why I find the photography so critical is that ultimately we are visual creatures. What sells cars? Design. Design marketing, the idealized concept of something.

Design is God.

Mind blown

Once again the new Tesla model 3, I think it actually looks 500 times cooler than any other Tesla car out there. And I’m glad that I am a late adopter, and I was not one of these unfortunates who bought an early model Tesla model model 3 or any other Tesla car. In fact, a lot of the Tesla cars are already starting to look dated. For example the original Tesla model S is outdated, even the slightly newer Tesla model S cars, that don’t have the yoke steering look very outdated. I feel bad for those people who spent a lot of money on the infamous Tesla P 100 D, to only see it dated by the plaid. And now, I’m pretty certain that sooner or later the plate is going to be replaced and outdated by something else too.

Or even another basic thing; people who bought the Tesla model 3 in the early days, with the chrome trim.

Even the Tesla model X, the newer versions look far better. And have a unique color.

What design is truly critical in a car?

To me the most important thing in a car is the steering wheel, because you look at it all the time, then the interior and dashboard, and also the back of the car. And also specifically the door side driver side entrance, and also the rear left passenger side door, where I get in and out and load Seneca into his car seat and the car.

Technically the front of the car is not that important, because if you park in a spot like a normal person, you never look at the front of the car. You almost ever look at the back of it.

Also in terms of the car, the steering wheel is the most critical thing because he used it all the time. To me for a Tesla car, either yolk steering or nothing. Even the new Tesla model three the steering wheel looks really cool. Also the new cybertruck the new steering wheel looks very cool.

Also a subtle thing I learned when researching Ferrari, doing the 3-D modeling tours of inside the car, it is actually very interesting to me that the Ferrari logo is a bright yellow background with the prancing horse in black. Having that emblem on the steering wheel inspires confidence.

Maybe this is why Ferrari is superior to Lamborghini; technically if you think about it, the Lamborghini is just a very expensive Volkswagen Passat. The Lamborghini Urus is just an expensive Volkswagen Touareg.

The Ferrari is interesting because it is still to a certain extent, a purebred. Ferrari is Ferrari, owned by Ferrari, not some other weird parent company. And also I think it is good that Ferrari is its own stock ticker - RACE. Typically I never trust a thing which is just a subsidiary of another thing.

Sharing your thoughts

A simple way to live life, and to make an impact or whatever is to just share your thoughts. It is funny because people say all this ridiculous things like “That is just your opinion!” The best response: “Of course it is my opinion! That’s why I said it!” Opinion, opine, just means to think.

This is where philosophy is very useful: people think that there are certain notions of “facts“, especially in the realm of statistics, but probably the most useful thing of studying sociology, is understanding that statistics is just a scam. I learned from Cindy (cindyanguyen.com), in her book and dissertation, that the notion of statistics comes from the state. The general idea is that statistics was a measuring tool invented by the state in order to track measure progress, something that the French colonists and colonial administrators did when colonizing Vietnam and her other territories, and also, what the Chinese communists did under Mao Zedong, and also the Vietnamese communists also did. The general idea was this:

In order to track the legitimacy of something and the progress of something (let us not forget that the notion of “progress“ is a feeble modern day notion)– is that we gotta track the growth of something in numbers.

Do you remember in BRAVE NEW WORLD, when in the beginning of the book they talk about how they were able to distill human birth human children in test tubes then said — Progress.

So therefore let us not forget, the notion of “progress“ is not a distinct one. It is a modern one.

Numbers are boring

I don’t trust nobody who either has some sort of loser Apple Watch, Fitbit tracker, has Instagram, or applies any metrics to their life. The only metric I find useful is maybe increasing your one repetition maximum in your weightlifting, simply as a measure to know that you’re increasing the weight. But besides that, things which are bad include weighing yourself on the scale, because you don’t know how much of that is body fat adipose tissue, how much of that is skeletal muscle mass, and even other things that people don’t talk about… how much of that weight is bones, sinews, blood and water?

A simple New Year’s resolution is this year, throw your scale in the trash, donate it or whatever, and never weigh yourself.

Both men and women are foolish: they track weight as a measure of their self-worth. But, the goal is to increase skeletal muscle mass, and decrease body adipose fat tissue. This is something that scale cannot do, the closest thing is either a fat caliper, or just look at yourself in the mirror. Pinch your belly fat, or look at the fat in your face, or, you want to get rid of the infamous fat rolls in the back of your neck. Something that I see that Kanye West has.

“It is simple: if it jiggles, it is fat.”- Arnold S

Why are we no longer permitted to be independent interesting thinkers?

It is weird, in today’s world, in America at least… we truly do have the greatest system for independent thinking and thought. Here unlike other countries, you will not get jailed for sharing your opinion. Even the most politically liberal or advanced countries in the world pale in comparison to America.

The problem though here is that all sides, all parties, all individuals are “nudged“ either into the left or the right, even this notion of being apolitical or being an anarchist or whatever is also just another lemming sheep mentality.

Or another words, put zero faith in anybody who watches any news, doesn’t matter if it is NPR, Fox News, Al Jazeera whatever. The simple heuristic is this: if it is being funded by advertising, Google Adsense revenue, it is not to be consumed.

Only trust things that you are spending your real money on. This means, stop using Google. Google is a “free” service, and the way they make money is by sensationalism and banner advertising. Even nowadays I’m stopping to use Google Maps, having those annoying square advertisements that pop up when I’m driving, I almost feel like that is borderline unethical. Why? It distracts me from driving, I wonder if it will lead me to getting into a car accident one day? Google, whoever did that I google, Google Maps team whatever… Shame on you.

Apple Maps is the inferior product, but at least it is not supported by advertising. Get rid of Google maps use Apple Maps instead.

No more Android, Samsung etc.

First, focus on your health physiology exercise and physiological well-being and everything else will follow

The quality of your thoughts are simply an offshoot of the quality of your bodily physiological health.

For example just think; if you only sleep 30 minutes a night, for days or weeks on end, what do you think will be the quality of your thoughts? Optimistic joyful and happy? Or weird, morose, dark?

Or other thoughts, imagine like you’re in heroin addict, or hooked on some sort of meth. What will be the quality of your thoughts?

This is why I trust no thinker or individual who partakes in drugs, alcohol and weed. Although both are quite mainstream now. Why?

A lot of people are alcoholics, and a lot of people also apparently do a lot of writing and production of music and artwork when they’re drunk, which is bad. Even Kanye West, he is a low-key alcoholic on and off, I think he said all the anti-Jewish stuff when he was drunk. And on Twitter. Being drunk and on Twitter at the same time or Facebook, not a good idea.

Also weed– weed is so mainstream now, it is not really seen as a big deal. But I also think it is foolish that some people think that weed has no effect on your thinking. Even Kendrick Lamar, his only vice is maybe Froot Loops and Captain crunch cereal.

“You let the meds talk I let my soul talk ayy!” – Kendrick

The reason why we should not trust any artists, rappers, musicians or whatever who are addicted to drugs any type of drugs, and yes, weed marijuana is drug… their thinking will not be pure. Their thinking will be too overly saturated with the weird effect of drugs, anti-depressants, uppers and downers whatever.

Even Elon Musk, I rate him highly, but if you read the Walter Isaacson biography on him, he will discover that he drinks too much alcohol late at night, and just drinks Red Bull to stay awake. Not good.

Sober thinkers?

Heavyweight since 1988 — my best man Justin Lee

Am I the only millennial I know who doesn’t drink alcohol or smoke weed or take drugs? And have never been to a concert, EDM thing, etc.?

The only concert ever went to in my life was by myself, to a Yeezus concert at the Oakland Coliseum, Kanye performing live. The coolest thing of all time.

How alcohol is strange

A very weird trend I have discovered is this weird trend: get a bunch of tattoos, drink a bunch of craft beer, wear sunglasses and some sort of trucker hat, wear flannel, drive some sort of big truck or whatever, and to make the purpose of your life to just drink exotic craft beer?

To quote Chip Wilson, founder of Lululemon, did you go to his personal website and look at his about section, he said he was never into watching sports and drinking beer because it just made you stupid and fat and lazy.

Even the ancient Roman and Greek philosophers thought it was a bad idea to drink wine, too much wine. The Greek Dionysian
God Baccaus was the God of wine drunkenness and the dark. he was the original Satyr; essentially imagine these weird goblins with goat horns. Or imagine the original “furry“.

Don’t trust alcoholic, drug addicted thinkers, artists, producers whatever.

No more Pollock, Basquiat etc.

Thoughts and money?

Is the purpose or end goal is to increase the quality of your thoughts, the productivity of your thoughts in order to become richer, to earn more money? No.

I think the ultimate goal is to become wiser, more critical in order to become more powerful. Power is simple.

Some tools to get you thinking

I have an intervening thought: in order to stimulate your mind, you first gotta stimulate your body. That means, extremely heavy weightlifting to get your blood and your mind flowing.

A very simple one is purchased weightlifting equipment on the internet (Titan.fitness), just work out at home, in your backyard front lawn, even you’re off the grid parking lot in the back of your apartment which I am doing right now.

The very very simple thoughts to exercise and fitness is do exercises and lifts which promote standing. Or walking. Upright exercises. This includes Farmer’s carries, dead lift walk, squat walk, Atlas lift etc. Also, heavy sandbag carries, just order the 400 pound heavy sandbag on roguefitness.com or on Amazon or titan.fitness

Ultimately the exercises need to aid you in your entrepreneurial thinking and your motivation

The big issue at hand is a lot of these exercises at the gym and in traditional mainstream media has to deal with some sort of sitting or pressing motion. For example bench press, floor press, dump press, decline, seated military press, seated dumbbell press etc. But the critical flaw of these exercises is that they are all done while sedentary or lying on your back. And the big downside of this is that it doesn’t promote your walking or your posture, which might be the two most critical things.

Having a big chest doesn’t really make sense?

I also thought to myself, what is it that causes the most amount of injuries? Any sort of pressing motion. Once again, bench press, shoulder press military press etc. There is almost virtually no injury that happens with any lifting motion, caring motion, or walking motion.

99.9% of injuries I have witnessed at the gym, other guys including myself typically has to deal with the benchpress, which I think should just be eliminated.

Suggestions

I know a lot of guys who have had injuries, back injuries, upper back lower back spine whatever injuries, from dead lift or other traditional forms of weightlifting. I say:

No more deadlift, only rack pull.

The easiest way to do rack pulls, or any sort of elevated lifting walking exercises is using some sort of power rack, squat rack, or even getting some cinderblocks from Home Depot. Essentially if you’re tall, elevating the barbell off the floor.

Also one big thing that I’ve discovered, the great upside of not going to the gym anymore is that I’ve been exercising more in the authentic and honest way; I’m not lifting weights anymore to impress other people, I’m just there to use weightlifting as a philosophical tool to think better, to think stronger etc.

Ultimately I believe that the goal of weightlifting and all of these exercises is to become stronger, more courageous and more audacious in order to aid you in your entrepreneurial ventures.

Once again, if we think about all this from a socioeconomic perspective, entrepreneurship is the end goal.

So what is the point of philosophy and thinking anyways?

The end goal of philosophy thinking etc is not to make money, but rather, to excel and exceed in life. Also happiness. Everyone wants to become happy, or happier, even Aristotle says happiness is the only thing that men seek for the sake of itself.

People always think that having more money will make them more happy, but this is not true. Often having more money can make you more miserable, as often having more money causes more stress anxiety etc.

Who will watch the watchmen? – Juvenal

The anxieties of a billionaire

For example, let us say that you had $100 million in your Coinbase account, your bitcoin wallet whatever. You will probably end up using some sort of super secure password to lock and secure your assets. But the stress and the anxiety and the fear of having your phone stolen, your identity stolen etc. is even larger. And also the richer you get, the more you become a target to theft, identity theft, real life theft, even physical violence thread. Never forget the story of when Kim Kardashian tweeted where she was at, in Paris, and abruptly got held up at gunpoint from two mast robbers, demanding her jewelry and her pearl necklaces and diamonds, otherwise they would shoot her.

“What do you want me to do, drive around in a bulletproof car and with some tints”? – Kanye

For example, the one story of a guy who has maybe $200 million worth of bitcoin in a super secure crypto wallet, but he made the password to complicated that he already has two failed attempts, and on the third attempt, if he messes it up, he will lose his bitcoin forever?

And this is actually the funny irony: often times when we try to make things too secure, we actually end up fucking over ourselves.

This is where I am still all about having simple passwords which are easy to remember, rather than using a third-party password app, because even though these third-party password apps are good, often there are always thinking issues. A good intervention actually is the new Apple secure strong password thing, but still… iCloud doesn’t always work seamlessly. Therefore for your truly critical things, Having some sort of practical strong that you could remember is good.

More security, less freedom?

I think this is where the ethos of being I still Spartan warrior demigod is that it seems that the richer more successful more famous you become, the more security you end up getting, personal security guards bodyguards whatever… And as a consequence, you end up having less freedom in your life?

For example, I was randomly doing research on David Geffen, and apparently during the Covid pandemic he was just hanging out on his $10 billion yacht, chilling out. Apparently a lot of people were envious about this, but truth be told… I would prefer 1 million times more to be walking out in the real world, off the grid, rather than being stuck on a boat? Because even if you are in the worlds best boat, still, You cannot walk for three hours straight and not get bored.

Living on land is better than living on the sea.

Empty your mind

The best way to empty your mind is to delete Instagram, delete Twitter, even delete email in Gmail from your phone. Delete YouTube podcasts etc.

Even music, modern day music. Even in music somebody is trying to sell you something. Maybe we should go back to the ancients, the ancient music, the ancient arts. Listen to dead composers, Beethoven and Mozart etc. Why? They’re not trying to sell you Lamborghinis or other nonsense.

For example, as a kid growing up, no kids, nobody in my friend group ever aspire to have a Ferrari or a Lamborghini or a Porsche car whatever. Think the only modern day trend to desire these cars are predicated on what rappers say.

Or other things, do you remember when it was really popular to get “dubz” on your car? Which are essentially 20 inch chrome rims, with spinners attached? Then it was 21 inch rims, 22 inch rims, 30 inch rims whatever. Now the trend is actually going opposite? A lot of these overlanding vehicles, taught to me by my brother-in-law John Narciso one of the head designers at Black rhino and wheel pros is actually, the new trend is for the actual rims to become smaller, and the tires bigger. And more lifted off the floor. And as John told me, Overlanding vehicles are the new rice rockets.

Zen the fuck out (Big Sean)

Rather than adding obligations to your life, seem to remove or delete or subtract obligations from your life. This means, don’t take on more work, more contracts, more obligations. Rather seek to subtract all obligations to close to zero, even with the promise of a lot of money.

In fact I almost feel that is easier and better and more straightforward to make the big bucks speculating in cryptocurrency, crypto, and the market rather than just seeking some sort of consulting gigs.

What am I betting on?

For me, the big advancements I perceive in the future include AI, crypto, chainlink, bitcoin, openAI and Microsoft, ChatGPT and beyond.

What am I anti-? I am short Apple, Google. If you look at Google Bard, the Google ChatGPT competitor, it is at least 100,000x times worse than chatGPT 4. For example I asked Google Bard who ERIC KIM was, and it said that I was a landscape and travel photographer? Terrible.

Why does the future matter?

To me, technology and the future is all about optimism, happiness and joy. If we want brighter more glorious future, we need optimism. The hope of a beautiful future, blue skies, clear skies, lots of sunshine, pure joy.

ERIC

Random thoughts

I just toured equinox, and was very unimpressed. It is like an LA fitness with a better conscience. Also you know it is not a good gym because the barbells suck.

This is how and why I discovered, ultimately, perhaps the most critical thing with weightlifting is the quality of the barbell. Texas power bar squat bar, or if possible, get the monster squat bar. This is something that will outlast you, and also maybe something you could end up passing down to your children?

My greatest joy and proud moment will be the moment in which Seneca will be able to lift my Texas power squat bar!

I almost died, maybe Cindy and Seneca also almost died?

A random story; the other day, now that LA is actually starting to get pretty cold during the winter time, we decided to try to figure out how to turn on the gas furnace heater thing. It is this “cozy” brand, the machine looked at least 20 years old, but we thought that it would be a good idea because our apartment could get pretty cold late at night, and especially early in the morning, considering that I’ve been waking up at weird times like 3 AM, 3:15 AM, 3:30 AM, sometimes a bit later like 4:30 AM, 4:45 AM, or 5 AM.

Anyways, we lit the gas furnace thing, the pilot light whatever and it seem to work OK, but the other day when I woke up at 3:30 AM, and turned on the gas furnace thing, I just went in to take a shower, in order to warm up the apartment while I was taking a shower. My hope and expectation was the moment I would get out of the shower, I would be greeted by a lovely warm apartment.

Then what happened next was the carbon monoxide poisoning alarm thing started screaming, which abruptly woke up Cindy and Seneca, at 3:45 AM. I rushed out of the shower, and smelled all this toxic gas in the air. We rushed to open up the windows, I turned off the heater thing, and also quickly tried to turn off the pilot light in the gas heater machine.

Anyways long story short, we ended up being OK, but still… The super scary thing was that in fact let us say that we did not change the battery for the carbon monoxide poisoning thing. Also as a pro tip, you should definitely change it right now, just order the weird battery on Amazon. It might save your life, the life of your kids and your wife.

A lot of people never change the carbon monoxide poisoning alarm battery thing. Imagine a worst-case scenario if I had accidentally kept on the gas heater thing overnight, which is actually quite common, Cindy Seneca and I would have all died in the middle of our sleep. Therefore after this fucking crazy thing, I feel like I got a second chance at life.

Or even worse, the thought that what if, I had accidentally left on the gas, the carbon monoxide poisoning alarm thing wasn’t set up correctly, and I just left the apartment for my typical walk? That I come back home to a Seneca in the Cindy Who both died peacefully in their sleep?

Anyways, thinking about it… The simple thought is to swallow all the vermin, and chew on the glass shards to avoid saying doing anything bad or harmful, especially to your wife.

Is stoicism for men or for women, or both?

Stoicism is certainly a philosophy which is beneficial to everybody. But for me, I think ultimately, perhaps stoicism is more tailored for men, a masculine philosophy?

For example, if you’re married or in a serious relationship, a thought is that you as a man, should put on your metaphorical bulletproof vest, and take all the hits. Take all the splash damage, you’re strong enough for it. Assuming that your health points your HP is at 100%, the abuse the verbal abuse from others might only kick you down to 80%. Just think of yourself like a level 99 paladin from Diablo II; you got your legendary armor, your legendary helmet, greaves, body armor, shield, and also you have some healing potions. Apply this mentality to yourself.

This is where I really like this Diablo II analogy to real life; playing Diablo II as a kid was very influential on me. Maybe it is a good idea that we apply this video game analogy to real life.

Now what?

Currently I am living in Culver City, which I consider the closest thing to Paradise in Los Angeles. And as a consequence, I am at the epicenter of screenland.

Everyone thinks Hollywood is where all of the action is, but they are wrong. It is Culver City. For example, Amazon prime, Amazon prime studios, Jeff Bezos and Amazon… All of it is produced at the Culver Studios, which is owned by Michael Hackman, And the lot is huge. I walked by it, around it, and it looks like it is at least the size of 10 football fields.

Also, the culver theater, the little cute movie theater next-door, is actually owned by Amazon, Amazon prime, Amazon prime studios, Mr. Jeff Bezos.

Even Apple, Apple TV+ or whatever… They are becoming the new finance years for all of these epic movies. For example the new killers of the flower moon film with Leonardo DiCaprio was being rolled by Apple. The same thing goes with the new released Ridley Scott Napoleon film.

Make your own media studio and films?

I’ve been randomly doing some research about David Geffen, he is probably the most successful and important figure in both the movie media and entertainment industry. I think his net worth is $10 billion? And nobody knows who he is or what he looks like?

Anyways, the reason why I think he is such a critical figure is that he made his fortune through movies, movie production, DreamWorks, Shrek etc.

Sony is here too

Also, Sony pictures, yes, the same Sony company that makes cameras and TVs and stuff. They own the whole Spider-Man franchise. Both the animated one and I think the other ones? And also the video games?

The gym is boring?

I got a free three day trial pass at equinox, and several things I find interesting: first and foremost, there is a lot of people who go there. Like, a lot. And, I think they charge $350 a month for membership. Seems like a good moneymaking institution.

Why do people like equinox? Everyone criticizes and critiques how it is so expensive, but, the reality of the matter is that I should load of people have a membership. If you just do some basic math, let us say that equinox has 500 members or so, Maybe 2000 members, all paying $350 a month, that is a lot of money. I wonder if each institution brings in close to $1 million a month just in membership revenue?

Anyways, I think the reason why a lot of these gyms and fitness places are so popular is that a lot of people don’t really know what to do at the gym, and the reason they like to do a class or course is that they show up, and just do something. I think a lot of people lack the knowledge of how to exercise, or maybe the lack some sort of critical philosophy behind the purpose of exercise? And as a result, they just like being told what to do. However for myself, it is antithetical to my nature. I am 100% tolerant to everyone and everything, the only thing that invokes my fury is when people tell me what to do and what not to do.

Never trust a fitness person who cannot lift more than you.

Now that I have achieved my 1,000 pound atlas lift, ain’t nobody can tell me what to do. Nobody has the balls, the chutzpah, the guts to do what I have done. Or even attempt it.

Actually if I really think about it, in the whole world of fitness, the whole planet and internet; am I the one with the most courage, audacity? Even the gold gym Venice Beach, which I already conquered, is supposed to be the bastion and apex of weightlifting on the planet, but even there… all these guys were taking steroids… they’re actually not that strong?

Am I the strongest, non-steroid person on the planet?

New Year’s fitness resolutions

Very simple ones: get a pair of Vibram five finger shoes, honestly the only reason people don’t wear them is that they look weird. But, the true act of manly courage is to wear your Vibram five fingers probably in publicly, and ironically enough… more recently, I’ve actually got more compliments on my Vibram five finger shoes than I ever did with any of my cool Nike sneakers?

The reason why I find Vibram five finger shoes so critical is that honestly, I wonder if 99.9% of foot pain, knee pain, back pain, and hip pain is simply because people are not going barefoot. Technically the best pair of shoes would just be some sort of reinforced, waterproof socks. The Vibram five fingers is not perfect, but it comes pretty close.

The best argument I have for using the five finger toe shoes is this: you know all these stupid shoes with these very thick souls, they are essentially like condoms for your feet. And our feet are just like our hands, but on the other side. In fact, I have a theory that our feet actually might have more intelligence than our hands. Have you ever tried to text message during the winter time with gloves on? Imagine doing that with your shoes.

Also a funny thought; you know all these stupid HOKA shoes, or Adidas ultraboost shoes, with 3 inches of foam on the sole… Can you imagine having sex with a 3 inch thick condom?

Start your own self hosted blog

Everybody is always telling me the virtues of buying a house, a single-family home, owning property, owning your own house whatever. But, I personally think this is some sort of suckers game. Why? Even if you own the property, and you paid it in all cash, you still have to pay property taxes, home insurance and other maintenance things, which could actually cost you close to $3500 a month, the same price as rent!

As of now, especially considering the fiasco that I had with the gas burner furnace thing; I have almost close to zero interest in ever buying a house, single-family house, maybe even a condominium? Why? For me, my true passion and ambition is to live off the grid, to adventure, to explore, and have nothing in my way?

Is your home your slave, or are you a slave to your home?

As long as you think you have to renovate something whether your kitchen, open up a wall, etc.… you are not free.

How to start your own self hosted blog

Ionos.com or bluehost.com and install wordpress.org. I no longer recommend wordpress.com, ever since they somehow deleted my old wordpress.com account, because of some strange policy I violated which I’m not even sure what I did?

People always talk about land ownership, real estate ownership whatever, why doesn’t anybody ever talk about digital content website platform ownership? And no no no, squarespace is bad. You are still a slave to their platform.

Essentially the simple heuristic to know whether you own your platform or not is whether or not you could access the FTP server, via filezilla or any FTP management tool. Whether you could self post your own media files, your own dropbox.

Why?

The two most critical things in the planet include your time, and also your freedom. Most people don’t have access to either.

Anybody who has to be stuck in a car, doesn’t matter if you’re driving all a or Lamborghini, you’re still a slave.

Then, the goal is to unchain yourself from all obligations, all metaphorical grids.

Self-employment is the way. Sole proprietorship.

EK

START, BOOKS, WORKSHOPS, PRODUCTS

Things to do

Try experimenting with really really insanely hot scalding showers or baths — insanely hot water until you feel like you’re being boiled alive is a good idea! Or just join a LA FITNESS, CRUNCH FITNESS, or any random commercial gym and hit the hot sauna at least once a day, maybe twice a day?
Get a Costco membership: The most interesting thing I learned is that Costco doesn’t actually make a profit off of their products, only the memberships. As a consequence, everything you buy at Costco is truly at-cost. Buy meat, red meat; the wagyu ground beef is great, only around 5.70USD a pound, or the lamb leg roast imported from New Zealand (only $5.50 a pound).
Get chatgpt plus, paid premium only $20 a month. Make art works on DALL-E, and also,,, experiment with chatgpt 4; a billion times better than the free chatgpt 3.5.

Then, post your findings to your own blog, or upload your best photos to arsbeta.com

More fire incoming!

Forward the fire

EK NEWS >

He with the most audacity is the happiest!

ERIC

January 12, 2024

Blog

THOUGHTS

PDF

THOUGHTS

ART PHOTO BOOKS

MODERN PHOTOGRAPHER

STOICISM

BOOKS

NEW CHATGPT BOTS

Crypto

Introduction to Stoicism ￼

What does stoicism mean? ￼￼

The new stoa? ￼￼

Open air, open sun concept

Who is this philosophy for?

What is “real” stoicism?

So how did I discover stoicism?

Who is worth reading?

What makes Seneca so good?

The Spartan, Zen Stoic, demigod ideal

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

Why does stoicism matter? ￼

Stoicism and capitalism?

Sex and Stoicism

Stoic strategies ￼￼￼

What has helped me

Stoic training

Modern day ailments

Real stoics don’t call themselves Stoics?

Stoicism as a technique and tool, not the end

The future of stoicism?

Stoicism is all about living with other people

More ideas

Why so scared?

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

Weather and mood

Stoic assignments

True stoics are masculine

A real stoic is sexy

Why do adults become so dark and morose?

A real stoic is a carnivore ￼￼￼￼￼￼￼

Why do people care about animals so much?

End goals ￼

The physical

Now what?

Now what?

The Stoic Masters

Think for Yourself.

FREEDOM

Entrepreneurship Mindset

Put a Dent in the Universe.

CINEMA BY ERIC KIM

Cinema and Film Reviews

Space Films

Cinema and philosophy

GODFATHER

Gangster Films

ACTION FILMS

CITIZEN KANE:

Articles on Cinema

Great Cinema

Thinking more ancient

Social justice warriors are on both sides

Why thinking ancient is good

Who’s on top?

Technology innovators?

True influentials?

What do they look like in real life, how tall are they? What is their bodily physique? How does their voice sound?

Off the grid thinking

My formative years of thinking

￼What is the big issue here? ￼￼￼￼

How do you become less broke?

Debit cards?

So why does this all matter? ￼

Fill up my ￼￼￼￼cup… mazeltov!

“Real niggas wear these VANS…” – The Pack

Why think off the grid?

Getting rid of the tedium of every day life. ￼￼￼￼

Otium vs Negotium

How do I start thinking? ￼￼

Introduction to Stoicism

What does stoicism mean?

The new stoa?

Why does stoicism matter?

Stoic strategies

A real stoic is a carnivore

End goals

What is the big issue here?

So why does this all matter?

Fill up my cup… mazeltov!

Getting rid of the tedium of every day life.

How do I start thinking?

The mind doesn’t exist

Why does thinking matter?

What design is truly critical in a car?

Ultimately the exercises need to aid you in your entrepreneurial thinking and your motivation

Having a big chest doesn’t really make sense?

The anxieties of a billionaire

Is stoicism for men or for women, or both?

Make your own media studio and films?

Why?