The Spartan Way

Some radical ideas:

First, beyond purchasing food, paying rent, gasoline or electricity for your car, perhaps a really insanely innovative idea we could do is the radical opposite of what capitalistic society tries to get us to do:

NOT spend money

I think this is a pretty big idea because all of this is centered around spending money.

Only cowards spend money?

“I promise, I’m so self-conscious, you won’t see me outside with at least one of my watches” – Kanye

Certainly it is very very difficult to earn money, but spending money… is very easy.

Let us first consider the fact that the act of spending money, even a chimpanzee or a three-year-old child could do it! Seneca, ever since he was about a year or two old, already knew how to insert a credit card, chip up, or even use the iPhone with Apple Pay to purchase things? Or even simply, handing off Dollar bills to the other person?

So I think the first idea is typically, maybe the best strategy is to teach our kids, and also maybe yourself, not to spend money?

Propaganda

About a month or two ago, we stepped inside at JP Morgan Chase, opening up a checking account for my mom, and they had these little kids activity coloring books, and one of them was like a book on the idea of saving money in your piggy bank whatever.

However, the reason why this was quite bad was because it was still centered around spending money! The idea was you save up your allowance and your money in order to buy that electric scooter you want or something.

Born into consumerism

I mean let us think about it… ever since a kid is born, they are born into captivity by this capitalist consumerist market. Often society parents and people will bemoan the fact that kids are all addicted to games, video games whatever… iPhones, tablets iPad etc., but who is really at fault here? Of course the parents!

The first thing to note or to ask; if the kids are addicted to YouTube or their iPhone or the iPad or Netflix Netflix or YouTube YouTube kids or whatever… are the parents addicted to it? Yes!

Parents — quit media and your iPhone.

In fact, don’t look at the kids, look at the parents! Typically, kids are just mini versions of their parents.

We like to treat our kids the way we wish we were treated as kids

For example, even a funny thing that I realized, seeing my brother-in-law get my nephew Benji all these cool toys on his birthday, essentially it is interesting, my brother-in-law is buying his son toys that he wished he had as a kid. And this is where I respect my brother-in-law so much; he is essentially like a big kid!

I think in fact, the parents who I really care for or trust or admire are the ones who are the most silly, and also playful with their kids! You could see it in a split second at the playground; I only admire the parents on top of structures playing with their kids! Not the disconnected parents, sitting in the shade, sitting on their butt, doing something stupid on their phones.

When you take your kid to the park, lock your iPhone in the glove compartment in the car!

The matrix

So, let us consider the analogy of the matrix. I think the analogy the matrix is very good here because honestly in fact, we are all living in a metaphorical matrix right now.

For example, think about the battery pack. The battery pack is essentially like us toiling away with our physiological energy, brain power mind power soul power etc., in order to power these batteries. And, toiling away so hard, the funny irony; we work so hard and we sacrifice so much of our health and well-being, in order to purchase things which dull away the pain, but actually in fact… these end up making us sicker and weaker?

For example, marijuana and alcohol; the two biggest depressants we got in modern day society. For an individual who is depressed, or lacking vigor or having poor health… adding more marijuana to their life, or adding more alcohol to their life is a positive detriment. Do people not know that both these substances have physiological mental, and a physical effect on the body, which actually dulls your senses? It is almost like putting a condom on your mind and soul!

Does man live to make money, or does money exist to serve man?

OK, the number one foolish mistake we all make; it seems that we live in order to make money, rather than thinking about this critically and knowing and understanding that in fact, the opposite is and should be true; money should exist in order for us to pursue our own personal needs desires and wants!

In fact, the whole cult around money has become pretty ridiculous. The notion of money has become its own godhead, its own cybernetic metaphor and impetus in life.

Minimum viable income

A very radical idea I have is towards this minimum viable income concept. The general idea is you want to reduce your expenses to the bare bare bare bare minimum, and after that you direct all of your energy power and resources towards augmenting your true life desires, your true true goals in life, rather than money for money sake, which is a slave mentality.

Just watch the movie 300; do you want to be one of those Persian slaves, or the traitor who just wanted to be showered in gold coins and penetrating all these drugged out hallucinating women? Of course not!

Drugs are bad

“Pretty girl with white toes, she like to put it in her nose!” – Playboy Carti

Something which is actually a bit shocking to me; I grew up super sober, I maybe smoked marijuana twice in my life, both instances when I was around 25 years old. I didn’t really like it.

The reason why I am so anti-marijuana is because when I was in high school, I saw all my friends who got hooked on it, and it just made them lazy, dumb, and unmotivated. Just like Elon Musk said on the Joe Rogan podcast; “Smoking marijuana is like the exact opposite of drinking a cup of coffee“. And I love coffee.

I don’t know if marijuana is pretty cheap now, or people using these vape pens or these weed pens or whatever. But, why dull your senses? Why not heighten them instead?

“I’m in love with a V dub engine, it dulls my senses” – JAY Z

“Success sucks, why? Too much stress” – JAY Z

Don’t skip leg day

A funny thought; if you want to maximize your manliness, let us consider that your member, and your testicles are connected to the lower half of your body. And also let us consider that your legs are probably at least five times stronger than your upper body. For example, easy to lift 1000 pound with your legs and your shoulders, very very difficult to lift 1000 pounds with only your arms and your upper body.

Or once again, easy to do a 1000 pound atlas lift, difficult to do 1000 pound benchpress, nay impossible?

Legs = Testosterone

So the very very funny idea I have is maybe, if you want to increase your testosterone and your manliness, every day, work out your legs!

In fact, if I could tell you that by exercising your legs every single day, you could increase your testosterone by a factor of 10 X, or become 10 times manly, more confident, stronger, less tired less petite, more cheerful… wouldn’t you do it?

A life beyond women

In fact, I think the primary mistake that men make is that they only work out their upper body because they want to somehow attract women?

My personal theory is that the primary way for a man to attract a woman is through his testosterone levels, his hormonal levels.

For example, the number one compliment I have been getting by both men and women is my tan, especially my foot, five finger tan. And there is also an ongoing theory that increased sunlight and sun exposure and testosterone manliness have a connection.

To boost your testosterone, spend more time in the direct sun!

Tall dark and handsome

For example, the notion of being tall and handsome, is really a good note here. Even other day I met this one friendly mom, and she told me that she was immediately attracted to her personal trainer, a tall dark handsome man with curly hair named Alejandro, and she ended up having a kid with him. It’s funny because the kid doesn’t look like mom at all and even the mom says I only know his kid because I birthed him!

Why do we desire to purchase certain things?

Let me give you an example: I remember when I worked my UCLA undergraduate job, in IT tech-support, and I literally felt like I just spent five hours a day scrolling through Reddit, killing time on the Internet. And I would also spend a lot of time looking at these camera review websites, gear review forms whatever, and ultimately I think the desire was to just spend more time outside making pictures!

The goal is to shoot more!

And I think this is the insidious thing about the whole camera photography complex; the idea is that we lack the freedom and the time to actually go out and make pictures, which is the desired goal… and we think, if somehow, we purchase XYZ camera or XYZ lens, or XYZ accessory… like a carbon fiber tripod or whatever… suddenly we will have more inspiration motivated and opportunity to actually go out to make photos? But is this true? No.

For example, the very very simple advice I have for any photographer is that the best camera is the maximally small compact one, the imagine like John Wick and his pistol. When shit hits the fan, he is not tooting around and automatic weapon, he just relies on his trusty pistol. Think about that one scene in which he is drifting his car door less Camaro, and picks up his pistol, and shoot the bad guys.

If we consider the Ricoh GR camera, it is like our metaphorical pistol. It is both our precision tool, and also, our general purpose tool.

You cannot hide an M-16 in your front right pocket.

Ways in which I spent a lot of time as a kid, as a teenager playing counterstrike, 1.6. The original one.

The funny thing is that video games, and gun violence doesn’t really have anything in common.

For example, to me as a kid, guns weren’t really a big deal; for example, when I was in Boy Scouts, in one of the summer camps, I got both my shotgun and rifle merit badge, the same camp, as well as my archery merit badge!

Kids aren’t dumb; I remember being shocked as maybe a freshman in high school; the Boy Scouts instructor giving a bunch of kids rifles, at the shooting range, teaching us how to use it. I was a bit shocked as a kid, because even as a kid this seemed a bit dangerous. I remember asking the instructor “…Has anyone ever turned one of these guns around and just shot somebody else?” The adult got very serious, looked at me, and told me “Never say things like that.“ So with extreme caution, we never did anything dumb, and I was actually a quite good marksman! I could hit the target from very very far away, and also I was very good at shotput, in which you use a shotgun to shoot a flying disc in the air!

Your word is your sword

I think the grand difficulty that we have in modern day life is that we no longer have any avenues for physical valor. The only thing which is commoditized is sports; but the reason why sports is bad is that it is too regimented, too constrained, and lacks any sort of real life application.

As NASSIM TALEB has commented; what some fools think is that somehow… a chess master would somehow be a master in military strategy. While this might make a good movie plot, in real life it is not true.

The reason why I am actually anti-chess, and a lot of these board games or whatever… consider how poor it is for your physiology. Sitting on your butt the whole time, stationary, using your brain. It requires no physical valor, or skin in the game. At worst if you lose the match, maybe you feel bad, but beyond this, there is really no downside to losing. This is also where video games are bad; there is no real life downside.

At least with weightlifting, powerlifting, hypelifting, one rep maxing is interesting is that there is some sort of potential physical downside. If you aren’t focused enough, yeah certainly you hurt yourself. And that is the whole point!

And this is where I found the logic to be so bizarre; when these steroided out guys would be so shocked of how much I would attempt weightlifting at the gym, when I would rack up the barbell with seven plates, eight plates, nine plates, 10 plates, 10 plates and hook another 25 on top, they would always tell me… “Be careful”.

Now that I think about this commentary in retrospect, it is really kind of a weakling cowardly side jab;

I am much bigger than you, and you look smaller than me, and also you are built more lean, and also you are Asian… and therefore I am befuddled how you are so much stronger than me, and I want to inform you how you might hurt yourself.

The best compliment

Even I have heard people talking about me at the gym on the side;

You know… there are some guys who are on steroids who don’t look like they’re on steroids (referring to me)

Anyways, what these wimps don’t realize is that they are staring at an Achilles in the flesh, a demigod; half man half god; born from a mortal father, with a goddess mother.

“I am a god”

I think one of the most radical, gutsy things ever uttered in rap music is the Kanye YEEZUS album, in what he put out the “I am a god” song and album.

Note, he did not say that I am the God, but a god (lower case). Even some random stuff that I started to do research in during Covid times is the whole Jay Electronica, the movement of black African-American guys turning to Allah, the fruit of Islam movement, in which the code word for “ALLAH” (arm, leg, leg, arm, head) the general idea in which all humans are born like gods, born in the image and the likeness of God.

“I know I’m not the most high but I’m on a close high.” KANYE, I AM A GOD, YEEZUS ALBUM

In fact, the only concert I have ever gone to my life was seeing Kanye West live at the Oakland Coliseum, for his YEEZUS Tour. It might have been one of the coolest things I’ve ever witnessed, especially when they put the fake mountain in the fake Jesus to come on stage, and also when Kanye put on the sequin covered facemask, they shot a laser on it, and reflected it all around the dome.

Ethics is the future, not technology

Ethics, worldview, philosophy, your own personal code of ethics, the way you decide to approach life, this is the future, not the loser iPhone Pro, or any of these ridiculous virtual reality headsets.

Very very simple; what we desire is real life real world engagement– we desire the embrace and the sweet smell of a woman, no no no… you don’t want to be having virtual reality sex, with your virtual reality girlfriend, or live with your virtual reality dog, driving around in your virtual reality Lamborghini, getting virtual reality head or whatever… Nobody wants a virtual reality babe.

What or which concepts are absent in the past?

In fact, when you think about ancient Greece, philosophy, the ancient Romans etc.… there is almost no focus on women. Women are absent; they are never mentioned, nor discussed or talked about. Certainly not talked about like commodities in today’s world.

The way that a lot of guys get suckered is this strange logic: if I get super super rich, and drive the Lamborghini or the Ferrari or the big truck or whatever, and I’m super super buff, and I have a six pack, suddenly I will attract all these babes, who will want to have intercourse with me, and I can live a super happy playboy lifestyle for the rest of my life, in pure bliss, without any obligations?

Spartan philosophy

The true Spartan way is almost a polar opposite; the goal is to live a maximally frugal and economical life, have kids and beget children, have at least one son to carry on the family name. And the rest of your life is just focused on military training, combat, to be ready to defend your family, your nation when shit hits the fan.

This is where once again, all this fake ass patriotism stuff annoys me; if you’re on Facebook, looking at Donald Trump memes, watch Fox News or Tucker Carlson, make fun of “libtards”, talk about the alphabet gender spaghetti, you are not a true American. Just keep your mouth shut, enroll in military duty. You have nothing to defend yourself against.

Similarly speaking, we liberals also have this bizarre notion of virtue signaling; if you are a true progressive liberal, don’t even say the “Donald Trump” name — don’t talk about the news or politics or whatever. The simplest thing is to just vote against the other party you don’t believe in, get involved in local city politics, attend some sort of city council meeting, vote on issues you care for. Also don’t use Twitter, which might be about 99.9% bots?

***

Men and women must be trained alike

Only Spartan women can birth Spartan men.

Physical training is both critical for men and women. This is also where it is so impressive that Israeli women are also serve military obligations, I think this is a great idea. Maybe also America, there was some sort of obligatory ROTC training in high school, both for men and women, maybe for junior and senior year… this might be a good idea. Good for virtue, physics, the physical element, physical training, building a sense of camaraderie or kinship between our fellow Americans.

In fact, even though I am a Democrat, I have always voted Democrat, and also I consider myself a liberal, I have had nothing but positive interactions with conservatives, Republicans, people on the right. In fact if anything… right wing people to be more friendly, fun, jovial, and happy. Liberals on the left tend to be dark, morose, and fakely-righteous? I remember accidentally walking into some sort of anti-Joe Biden rally, talked with all the friendly people, and was even offered free hotdogs and free ice cream barbecue from the people there!

The reason why social media and the internet is so toxic is that it villainizes other sides, these metaphorical human beings. But if you actually talk to people face-to-face in the flesh, person-to-person, pure to pure; we are about 90% similar, 10% dissimilar.

Quit the internet, talk to people face to face, 1 on 1, in real life.

Only purchase digital things?

A random thought, maybe the way we could curb all of this superficial consumerism is to only purchase digital things, digital goods, digital things.

Digital money: Bitcoin

Digital books, digital movies– Apple TV shop, iTunes Store, iBooks Store. I actually find that purchasing a film is much better than subscribing to a streaming platform. Why? Skin in the game. When you pay the $10 a month or the $15 a month or whatever for that streaming service, you don’t really value any of the films or TV series on it… watching media on streaming platforms is like a sedative; you watch something not because you want to watch it, or learn from it, but instead, just watch it to distract yourself.

Putting your money where your mouth is

The funny thought is the point of purchasing something isn’t to “support“ the producer, but instead, to have a sense of pride that the thing that you purchased is actually something that you believe in or care in?

For example, I have purchased with my own money all the John Wick movies, all of the matrix movies, and now both of the Dune movies. Typically when we actually purchase something with our own money, it is a sign that we actually really really believe in it.

Also, the reason why you never want to trust anybody who is sponsored by anything, is because typically when you are given free things, or sponsored by something, you don’t actually really believe in it, you just accept the advertising and the sponsorship in order to make money or to feel special.

I bought all my Ricoh and LUMIX cameras with my own real money

For example, in the context of cameras, reviews, sponsorships etc.; only trust a photographer who had actually purchased the things with their hard earned money.

For example, I have done collaborations with Fujifilm before, received free cameras in the past, free lenses etc.… And have also been paid money by then. Also I did some free consulting for them, sharing some good ideas like adding a film grain simulation effect filter to their cameras, which they did, in which now you could add green tier digital JPEG photos with the Fujifilm filter, and select either weak, normal, or strong grain.

I am proud that all the Ricoh cameras that I purchased, none were given to me by free from Ricoh. I purchased them all with my own money.

Also kind of a random thing; I think the whole blogosphere was shocked when I purchased a LUMIX G9 camera — it totally seemed like out of left field, because Panasonic Lumix was on nobody’s radar. And currently, now that all my Ricoh GR cameras are dead, my only camera is the Lumix G9 camera and the 14mm f2.5 pancake lumix lens (only $200!). And the only two cameras I think might be worth considering purchasing in the near future is the new Ricoh HDF cameras, or the new Lumix S9 camera with the pancake manual focusing lens.

Trust?

Ultimately, trust nobody, only yourself.

Also with filters; put more trust in dead people than people who are alive. Why?

The difficult thing with following people who are still alive today is that you don’t know how it all ends. With dead philosophers, artists, innovators, you do.

Also, I think the big differences in the past, there was not a profit motive. An artist or an innovator did not need money, because they had the private patronage of some wealthy family like the Medici’s, Leonardo da Vinci etc.

Independently wealthy with Bitcoin

So I’m starting to think more and more… maybe the best true way to be a true artist, visionary, thinker, innovator entrepreneur is to independently make money somewhere, and don’t have to rely on advertising or sponsorships or brands to support your lifestyle.

I would put more faith in the photographer or the weightlifter who makes his living investing in bitcoin, rather than somebody who is always spamming you with advertisements on YouTube or podcasts.

In fact, are there any podcasts which exist which don’t have any advertising? Besides my own?

ERIC KIM PODCAST >

Why bitcoin is the future

Bitcoins, satoshis– this is finally the solution to these annoying online advertisements.

Maybe the true Spartan only cares for in bitcoin and satoshis, but never spends it or touches it, but just keeps accumulating it.

Bitcoin is like our shield – our economic shield and our hedge against the uncertain future.

ARMOR UP!
ERIC

Economic theory

I always thought that economics was stupid, honestly, truth be told, I think when you look at all this fake mathematics behind economic theory, it is all fake, the new hocus-pocus witchcraft, and the number one critical thing I learned about studying statistics both in high school and in college is that statistics is fake metrics that could be gamed however you want.

Therefore, put zero faith in statistics. Better talk to a real human being, face-to-face, person to person, instead of engaging in ridiculous debates on the internet, which again is filled by 99.9% ChatGPT powered bots.

Once once again, if I waived a magic wand, and I revealed to you that in fact, all of the negative comments you read in your life on the internet, these trolls who said mean things to you, if you actually found out that they were all just artificial intelligent ChatGPT bots the whole time… how would you feel? Wouldn’t you feel better?

The next generation of comments on the internet

Several years ago, I had the wisdom to just disable all and delete all comments on my website and blog etc. and also disabling them on YouTube etc. Why? For the most part, comments are useless. Even the positive ones!

When people say nice things about you in the comments, the reason why you could be bad is that it becomes a shackle; you keep publishing stuff that gets good feedback, and as a consequence, you end up staying the same instead of being innovative.

For example, when Bob Dylan went electric; he probably polarized 90% of his fanbase– they booed him off stage (his core audience, his real fans!). Also, everyone likes the old Kanye West in the college dropout album… but I like the new Kanye, I like the new carnival, the newest version of an artist is always the best.

A funny contradiction; everyone always wants the newest iPhone, the newest Tesla, whatever… But everyone wants the older artist, the older music, the older version of a certain thinker? If we stay consistent here, shouldn’t we prefer the new philosophy or the new thoughts or the new approach of an artist or a musician or a thinker versus their old self?

For example, everyone seems to prefer the old ERIC KIM, the old EK, but this is when I was still addicted to Facebook, using an android phone, and I still had my 9 to 5 job.

Sometimes, for myself, I miss my old Vietnam self; but in fact, my best self is my now self with Seneca! Also, sometimes I miss my old ERIC KIM gym self, the HYPELIFTING self, but when I think critically about it, I am 1000 times happier with my new bitcoin self, my new off the grid self, my new walk 10,000 steps a day in the direct Los Angeles sun self.

Then I think the biggest nugget of wisdom:

Prefer the you self right now, not the past self?

Kill your old self!

ERIC

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New books, new media?

Now that everything is becoming so hyper, once again, think about the past.

The Iliad, the Matrix, the 300, John Wick, keep it simple, keep it succinct. I’m very very skeptical of anything new, whether they be new movies, new series, new films etc.

Even this past generation, the last 10 years, the only innovative film created was the John Wick series, nothing else. Even though I was also enthusiastic about the new Mandalorian series, eventually after the first season, it all goes downhill.

With Marvel movies, I think the only good ones was before Disney bought it, for example the original Iron Man, the original Captain America etc.

Why? The problem with Disney is that it is trying to maximize its profits, let us consider it is a publicly treated company, and as a result, the logic is to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Whenever anything is created for the masses, it is bad.

Once again, would you prefer to drive the McLaren, with the butterfly doors, or would you prefer to drive the Toyota Corolla?

Forward the ideas

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Always start new:

START HERE

The Spartan Way

Some radical ideas:

NOT spend money

I think this is a pretty big idea because all of this is centered around spending money.

Only cowards spend money?

“I promise, I’m so self-conscious, you won’t see me outside with at least one of my watches” – Kanye

Certainly it is very very difficult to earn money, but spending money… is very easy.

So I think the first idea is typically, maybe the best strategy is to teach our kids, and also maybe yourself, not to spend money?

Propaganda

Born into consumerism

The first thing to note or to ask; if the kids are addicted to YouTube or their iPhone or the iPad or Netflix Netflix or YouTube YouTube kids or whatever… are the parents addicted to it? Yes!

Parents — quit media and your iPhone.

In fact, don’t look at the kids, look at the parents! Typically, kids are just mini versions of their parents.

We like to treat our kids the way we wish we were treated as kids

When you take your kid to the park, lock your iPhone in the glove compartment in the car!

The matrix

So, let us consider the analogy of the matrix. I think the analogy the matrix is very good here because honestly in fact, we are all living in a metaphorical matrix right now.

Does man live to make money, or does money exist to serve man?

In fact, the whole cult around money has become pretty ridiculous. The notion of money has become its own godhead, its own cybernetic metaphor and impetus in life.

Minimum viable income

Drugs are bad

“Pretty girl with white toes, she like to put it in her nose!” – Playboy Carti

Something which is actually a bit shocking to me; I grew up super sober, I maybe smoked marijuana twice in my life, both instances when I was around 25 years old. I didn’t really like it.

I don’t know if marijuana is pretty cheap now, or people using these vape pens or these weed pens or whatever. But, why dull your senses? Why not heighten them instead?

“I’m in love with a V dub engine, it dulls my senses” – JAY Z

“Success sucks, why? Too much stress” – JAY Z

Don’t skip leg day

Or once again, easy to do a 1000 pound atlas lift, difficult to do 1000 pound benchpress, nay impossible?

Legs = Testosterone

So the very very funny idea I have is maybe, if you want to increase your testosterone and your manliness, every day, work out your legs!

A life beyond women

In fact, I think the primary mistake that men make is that they only work out their upper body because they want to somehow attract women?

My personal theory is that the primary way for a man to attract a woman is through his testosterone levels, his hormonal levels.

To boost your testosterone, spend more time in the direct sun!

Tall dark and handsome

Why do we desire to purchase certain things?

The goal is to shoot more!

If we consider the Ricoh GR camera, it is like our metaphorical pistol. It is both our precision tool, and also, our general purpose tool.

You cannot hide an M-16 in your front right pocket.

Ways in which I spent a lot of time as a kid, as a teenager playing counterstrike, 1.6. The original one.

The funny thing is that video games, and gun violence doesn’t really have anything in common.

Your word is your sword

Now that I think about this commentary in retrospect, it is really kind of a weakling cowardly side jab;

I am much bigger than you, and you look smaller than me, and also you are built more lean, and also you are Asian… and therefore I am befuddled how you are so much stronger than me, and I want to inform you how you might hurt yourself.

The best compliment

Even I have heard people talking about me at the gym on the side;

You know… there are some guys who are on steroids who don’t look like they’re on steroids (referring to me)

Anyways, what these wimps don’t realize is that they are staring at an Achilles in the flesh, a demigod; half man half god; born from a mortal father, with a goddess mother.

“I am a god”

I think one of the most radical, gutsy things ever uttered in rap music is the Kanye YEEZUS album, in what he put out the “I am a god” song and album.

“I know I’m not the most high but I’m on a close high.” KANYE, I AM A GOD, YEEZUS ALBUM

Ethics is the future, not technology

What or which concepts are absent in the past?

Spartan philosophy

***

Men and women must be trained alike

Only Spartan women can birth Spartan men.

Quit the internet, talk to people face to face, 1 on 1, in real life.

Only purchase digital things?

A random thought, maybe the way we could curb all of this superficial consumerism is to only purchase digital things, digital goods, digital things.

Digital money: Bitcoin

Putting your money where your mouth is

I bought all my Ricoh and LUMIX cameras with my own real money

For example, in the context of cameras, reviews, sponsorships etc.; only trust a photographer who had actually purchased the things with their hard earned money.

I am proud that all the Ricoh cameras that I purchased, none were given to me by free from Ricoh. I purchased them all with my own money.

Trust?

Ultimately, trust nobody, only yourself.

Also with filters; put more trust in dead people than people who are alive. Why?

The difficult thing with following people who are still alive today is that you don’t know how it all ends. With dead philosophers, artists, innovators, you do.

Independently wealthy with Bitcoin

I would put more faith in the photographer or the weightlifter who makes his living investing in bitcoin, rather than somebody who is always spamming you with advertisements on YouTube or podcasts.

In fact, are there any podcasts which exist which don’t have any advertising? Besides my own?

Why bitcoin is the future

Bitcoins, Satoshis– this is finally the solution to these annoying online advertisements.

Maybe the true Spartan only cares for in bitcoin and Satoshi, but never spends it or touches it, but just keeps accumulating it.

Bitcoin is like our shield – our economic shield and our hedge against the uncertain future.

ARMOR UP!
ERIC

Economic theory

Always thought that economics was stupid, honestly, truth be told, I think when you look at all this fake mathematics behind theory, it is all fake, the new hocus-pocus witchcraft, and the number one critical thing I learned about studying statistics both in high school and in college is that statistics is fake metrics that could be gamed however you want.

Therefore, put zero faith in statistics. Better talk to a real human being, face-to-face, person to person, instead of engaging in ridiculous debates on the Internet, which again is filled by 99.9% ChatGPT powered bots.

Once once again, if I waived a magic wand, and I revealed to you that in fact, all of the negative comments you write in your life on the Internet, these trolls who said mean things to you, if you actually found out that they were all just artificial intelligent ChatGPT bots the whole time… Wouldn’t you feel better?

The next generation of comments on the Internet

Maybe the only way we could truly verify whether somebody who is leaving a comment is a real human being or not is to institute the orange check icon, that the individual spent maybe $10 worth of bitcoin or Satoshi’s to verify their humanity. Several years ago, I had the wisdom to just disable all and delete all comments on my website and blog etc. and also disabling them on YouTube etc. Why? For the most part, comments are useless. Even the positive ones!

For example, when Bob Dylan went electric; he probably polarized 90% of his fanbase. Also, everyone likes the old Kanye West in the college dropout album… But I like the new Kanye, I like the new carnival, the newest version of an artist is always the best. A funny contradiction; everyone always wants the newest iPhone, the newest Tesla, whatever… But everyone wants the older artist, the older music, the older version of a certain thinker? If we stay consistent here, shouldn’t we prefer the new philosophy or the new thoughts or the new approach of an artist or a musician or a thinker versus their old self?

For example, everyone seems to prefer the old ERIC KIM, the old EK, but this is when I was still addicted to Facebook, using an android phone, and I still had my 95 job.

Then I think the biggest nugget of wisdom:

Prefer the you self right now, not the past self?

Kill your old self!

ERIC

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New books, new media?

Now that everything is becoming so hyper, once again, think about the past.

The Iliad, the Matrix, the 300, John Wick, Tippet simple, keep it succinct. I’m very very skeptical of anything new, whether they be new movies, new series, new films etc.

With Marvel movies, I think the only good ones was before Disney bought it, for example the original Iron Man, the original Captain America etc.

Once again, would you prefer to drive the McLaren, with the butterfly doors, or would you prefer to drive the Toyota Corolla?

Spartan Economics

The Spartan Investor

We knew Spartans, we will inherit the earth.

Some thoughts about investing;

First, I’ve always been interested in passionate about investing, ever since I was in high school. I still remember my high school science math teacher, Dr. Ahmed, reverse told me about mutual funds back in high school, and told me this unorthodox strategy that I should claim being emancipated minor, Being able to borrow some money, in essentially, use that money to invest in an aggressive mutual fund. And this was junior year of high school, I think I was 16.

Somehow I did get my hands on some money, maybe like $1000? Or $1200, or $1600? Anyways, somehow I was able to create an investing account when I was 16, my junior year, and I invested in the one thing that I knew was very important, adobe, which made Photoshop, which I knew was very important because I pirated Photoshop as a kid, and I used it to create all of my images on my computer. I also invested some money into a mutual fund, and even the course of maybe two years, I saw the value of my stock in my mutual fund holding go up? I think I might have realized a $600 or $800 gain, and I was overjoyed!

Fast-forward a bit, into college… I realize when I was in college I was able to take out some student loans, and I use some of that money to invest in the market, while I was still in school, my sophomore year. I suppose I was 19 at the time?

Anyways, very stressful; I will check market prices, on my laptop, note this was before the iPhone existed, and it was very stressful. I would see the price go up a little little bit, and I was overjoyed, full of euphoria, and then I would see the price go down, and I would feel my stomach shrink.

Anyways, from the age of 19, I had to learn how to control my emotions, something part of my early stoic training. And also, getting into trading penny stocks my senior year, in which I accidentally misread the financials for an oil company, that when I thought they were making a profit, they were actually losing money because they would put the financials in parentheses, which I did not know at the time meant to loss. so I suppose my knowledge was good, but I miss read the information, and therefore I saw my life savings of maybe $3200 go to zero. As a 20, 21 year old, this is horrific.

Anyways, I still think I had some good intelligence. I remember during the subprime mortgage meltdown, I saw the price of Ford go almost to five dollars a share, and I saw blockbuster about to go bankrupt. I knew that Ford was a good long-term investment because I knew that Ford would recover in the long-term, and also I knew that blockbuster would go to zero because Netflix was the future. I think the only problem at the time was at the time I didn’t have any access to, as I think I already lost all my money.

Skin in the game

So this is a big thing; being an armchair investor versus being a real Spartan investor, somebody with skin in the game, with their own personal money in the game.

for example, I think being a personal private investor, investing your own harder money is critical here; because that was your soul time energy over many hard hard years of your life.

For example, I think about the decade plus in which I taught workshops, I worked hard to do much research, all the thousands of dollars I spent on Photobooks, writing reviews articles blog posts, videos, etc.… Writing books, making presets giving it away for free etc — essentially the best way to think about money is it is your time force energy energy life soul energy imputed into some sort of concrete things; let us say that it is solidified into a single US dollar.

However the biggest issue here is that Fiat currency, the US dollar, is like an iPhone battery. That slowly but surely, it slowly drains and loses charge.

For example, everybody knows that if you take an iPhone or a laptop, and you just let us sit on your desk for a month without charging it, it will naturally die, even if it was turned 100% off.

Also a problem with batteries and recharging; if you permanently keep it charging all the time, I think also the battery loses the ability to retain charge, and the maximum capacity of the battery loses charges as well.

For example, my 2017 MacBook Pro, 13 inch touch bar space gray, which I bought for about $2000 maxed out refurbished at the time… I think the battery of it only last about five or 10 minutes now before shutting off.

I also heard the same thing with Tesla cars — if you just let it sit, and don’t charge it every single day… Slowly it will lose charge. I suppose this is the upside of having a gasoline powered car, is that oil and petroleum will just sit there, and will not lose charge. Surely there are other things you still gotta worry about like the battery, but still… For the most part oil and gas is more stable than an electric battery and charge.

Anyways, I think the general impetus behind investing is a bit misguided. I think in the past, and also maybe the general idea that people had is “I will invest this amount of money in order for me to gain a return, in order for me to purchase XYZ in the future. For example children are taught of a peaky, you save your allowance and your birthday money in it, so one day in the near future, you could buy a scooter or something.

Butwhat if… We Spartans know that toys are bad? In fact, some things I learned about toys, in raising Seneca:

Superficially legal seem like a good idea, but eventually, Legos are bad. Why? As a parent you got to clean up their mess, and also… When the kid grows up sooner or later you’ll just donate the Legos to another family. The ideal and optimal strategy then is to just play with Legos at the local library on the brick building day, and just leave it there, and go back home.
For Seneca’s entire life, I’ve only bought him two toy cars; I think two Lamborghinis, the small hot wheels style. I think we already lost them.
Almost by osmosis, kids, whether you like it or not, or gain all of these free toys by orbit. For example when they visit their grandma’s home, or play with cousins or whatever… They will pick up random toy cars here and there. Therefore, the simple ideas that you never have to purchase kids any toys, they will naturally get toys from friends and family, on their birthday holidays etc., even if you are a “anti toy household”.

Are toys bad?

I think so.

Essentially the purpose of a toy for the most part, is some sort of thing to distract your kids while you as a parent to do something else.

And also, the problem and issue with toys is that it doesn’t make them anymore physically strong or capable.

When it comes down to it, the best things to prioritize for your kid is their physical strength, height, muscle mass, ability to climb stuff, run around, be out in nature, go on hikes, have a nice tan for actually being in the sun, Ability to pick up heavy stuff and throw them, etc. Even one of the things I’m very proud of is ever since Seneca was very young, he would be really good at throwing rocks into bodies of water!

Weapons & armor & shields

If we think about the ancient Spartans, what were their possessions? Simple: their spear and shield, even their sword was kind of more of an accessory piece.

Also, I think according to Pluto, or some of the ancient historians, there are funny quotes like “why are spartan swords so short?” Spartan response: “So we could get close to the enemy”.

Also, one of the most critical things about being a spartan was your shield; the reason why the hunchback was not allowed to fight along the spartan army was because he could not raise his shield, and the critical thing about being a spartan was the ability to defend the man next to you.

Even when you consider the final duel or fight between Achilles and Hector, I think it comes down to throwing spears, at a distance, and having the other party defend themselves with their shield.

Helmets were also critical because there were many times in which having the right shield actually defended you from death.

Defense?

So my first Spartan economic thought is that the purpose of money is more of an economic shield, barrier, buffer, or armor to prevent you from working like a slave.

The purpose of money isn’t to buy stuff, purchase a home, buy super things, purchase a vehicle etc.… But rather, via negativa; for you not to work.

As long as you got a job, a boss, a steady paycheck… You are not free.

Also, as long as you got a mortgage on your home, payments on your car, and any sort of debt or obligations… Once again you are also not free.

All debt is bad debt

More recently I thought I’ve been towing with is in regards to the notion of debt; for example what some institutional investors do is take on debt to purchase things, property, bitcoin like Michael Saylor and micro strategy, in order to purchase more assets, in the promise that it will grow in the future.

I’m starting to think, maybe could work for the corporations, institutions etc.… But maybe this kind of leverage is not a good idea for us private investors, because it could cause dumb, and also cause you to lose your freedom.

The goal

NOT have a job
NOT have debt
NOT be employed by anyone else besides you (sole, sole proprietor — number of employees is 0– you are your only employee).

Creating your own new Sparta

What is very interesting about Sparta, Kim Leonidas etc.… Is that the point wasn’t to enslave millions and billions of people, rather, it was to think about committing to your own local population… For example, maybe the Spartan populations was only 10,000 Spartans? And they had about 50,000 helots till the land?

A big thought: it seems that the modern day individual loves to complain critique and hate on everything, hit on global policies, politics, individuals, music, media, iPhones and social media, whatever. Whenever people talk about global warming, carbon levels, carbon footprint whatever… Typically I see a lot of these people are either single, maybe they own a dog, certainly children and kids.

In fact, the lamest thought that kids contribute most to the carbon footprint of the planet… My ongoing theory is that these people are just humanity haters; just want to take their dog to the grave with them?

Who knows, perhaps your kid, or some other kid who is born today is going to be the one who solves pollution on the planet; who creates a solar power pan all that is 1 billion times more effective, or invent some sort of nuclear power vision Energy generator that could fit in your back pocket?

Anyways, my simple thought is rather than complaining and critiquing about society whatever… More effective to just become the change in which you wish to see manifested in the world, and also a big thing; have kids! Your own micro society, create your own cultural values, and insanely Spartan, stoic and staunch about it.

For example, I think giving presents and buying toys for kids on their birthday is ridiculous. I believe rather than experiences, tight. Therefore for my niece Amelia and Benji, I don’t think I’ve ever bought them any toys on their birthday or on any holidays. What I do instead is take them rockclimbing with me and Cindy, and also when I’m just with them… I just play with them! I leave my Phone in my glove compartment of my car, and I just run around with them!

I remember Amelia saying a year or two ago saying “I miss Samchon ERIC,… Because he is the only one who plays with me”…

How to raise your kids

I think in today’s world of hedonism and indulgence, the thought is to raise, train, and breed your kid to be craters, in invaders, Spartan Stoics, with maximum physical capability, 100% carnivore died, with extreme vigor, play and joyfulness.

For example, would you give your kid heroin? Certainly not. Then don’t shove kids in front of their face, or Disney+ or whatever when you just want them to stop crying. Let them confront their own emotions, explain things to them, let them cry it out; give them a kiss on their forehead if they fell on their head, and the big thing; don’t let any other loser adults punk your kid around.

In fact, I’m starting to think more and more… Perhaps I should become more aggressive, more of an asshole parent. For example, I’ve been on a bit of a rampage in which to not smoke in public places, when I’m with Seneca. Even though they might give me a dirty look, or even if I might feel bad about it… This is what a true Spartan would do. Essentially you take the brunt of badness, bad emotions whatever… And defend your kid, defend your wife, defend your family.

When to attack?

Also, I think America could learn a thing or two about Sparta; for the most part, think America should just stop meddling in the business of other nations, other nation states, even if we want to maintain some sort of world peace for the interest of America.

For example, America needs to stop waging positive war. The only good use of military is defense. America needs to be well positioned in such a way that if anyone attacks us, we could defend ourselves. But I think ethically, America should not wage preemptive attacks on other nations and other nation states, in order for us to be like Machiavelli’s prince; the idea that often to defend oneself, you have to preemptively attack.

I think this is also the thing that is so ridiculous about gun ownership in America, all these loser notions of “self-defense “. Everyone always wants a gun on them, because they are afraid of being shot or being attacked. And I think some people shoot another person preemptively, because they fear their life is in danger danger or whatever.

But, the law is, you are never allowed to shoot first. The only time you pull out your gun or whatever and start shooting is one the other person has already shot you, or has already shot something in the environment.

Maybe the only new ones is if that person has gunpoint to your kid or whatever… Then you headshot him in the head. But besides this, don’t be a pussy.

The stoic Spartan investing strategy

Lib Spartan. Essentially somebody who glorifies themselves under their own human body, their own physical strength, just think about how your muscles, your shoulders your back and your traps are.

No dogs, no cats, no animals. Only children.

Ensure that you have at least one son to continue the family name.

Perhaps foolishness is a virtue?

I’m also starting to think, being mad, being a madman is a virtue. Anybody who focused is too much on security, safety, prudence and rationality is a wimp.

Good for your wife, do it for your family, be a true mensch.

Throw your cares and concerns into the tailwind, burn all your bridges, burn your ships behind you, don’t look back. Only forward.

what type of money would Spartans prefer?

Historically, the ancient Spartans would abolish money. Because they know that money corrupts.

I think one of the earliest Spartan legislators, Lycurgus, essentially made the law in which he converted all money into huge stone, which were essentially impossible, maybe it was made of iron etc. made accumulation of wealth so cumbersome, people eventually stopped chasing wealth for the sake of it.

Mandatory military duty?

I was always an anti-military, but now as an adult… I’m starting to see the virtues.

For example, in South Korea, all men are required to do a mandatory two year military service, even StarCraft players and BTS members are not exempt.

The good thing about this, as well as Singapore… It built a sense of nationhood and camaraderie between men. Even one of my friends, Andrew, a professor I think he did some sort of part-time Navy officer reserve training when he was getting his PhD… And he said something like “I think if there was some sort of military duty amongst Americans, there would be a lot less divide and conflict”. I also agree.

Probably the most anti-racist training that I ever got in high school was accidentally; playing high school American football. Essentially, I was thrown in all rainbows of races; African-American, Latino, southeast Asian, east Asian, Caucasian etc. There was a strong sense of brotherhood, and everybody supported one another. And for the most part, we put aside all of our differences and our cliques.

For example, I remember some of the white guys who are hefty lineman, I think they were into Cowboys and rodeos and wearing cowboy hats whatever, and African-American kids would just hang out with other African-Americans at school, and the southeast Asians were also part of their own crew etc., all my friends were Korean American, or east Asian… But when we all played football together, did practice, play games etc.… We would all sing the same ridiculous songs on the school bus, breaking Windows, etc.

Also, a very formative thing that I did was Boy Scouts; becoming an Eagle Scout, etc. Also here… All notions of race, religion whatever was erased; I remember that my scoutmaster was Jewish Jewish American, and his two sons were all in scouts with me would wear the little Hat, and I never knew what it really was, but I never really hated on it.

And also, I remember the Levee brothers; also two boisterous Jewish American kids, Ariel and Jamie, And once again, I didn’t even even know what antisemitism was until I went to college?

Anyways, my grand vision is that being American should be more of a nationality, more of a nation state thing, rather than a racial thing.

For example, the genius of Rome, was that as long as you paid taxes, you were Roman. It didn’t matter if you were from Spain, like Seneca the younger, who I named my own son after, Seneca was not a Spaniard — he was a Roman.

Also, I have more in common with Kendrick Lamar grew up to E-40, then I ever did with any Korean person I met in South Korea.

Also some funny nuances; I have far more connections with somebody I meet up in the bay area, in the 90s, doesn’t matter if there are Latino or black or whatever…

Even Southern California, LA South Koreans; they are different from me.

As long as you grew up to underground rap, the Bay Area high E-40 movement, if you know who Keak da sneak is, if you know how to go stupid dumb and hyphy yellow bus retarded, if you over owned a pair of all white case Swiss tennis shoes in high school, and just wore white T-shirts and dark blue denim, and never owned a pair of shorts until you’re late 20s… Then you are with me.

John Wick would like bitcoin

A very interesting scene, and also in the universe of John Wick; it is a world beyond money. For example, in the universe of John Wick, money is just like these gold coins, which are used to gain access, trade favors, clean up messy dead bodies, to protect or guard things, or for people to take a hit at somebody.

For example, when John Wick wants to get into the secret club, he has to insert a single golden coin, very much like putting a coin in some sort of arcade machine.

Also, when John Wick is first seeking revenge in the first film, and he opens up his war chest… It is all guns ammo and gold coins. No US dollars, no Fiat currency.

Why bitcoin is the way

I recently sold all of my Tesla stock, and purchased micro strategy stock instead (MSTR). Why? Some convincing arguments from michael saylor:

first, product cycles. Certainly for the most part, purchasing Apple stock is a good idea, however, who knows if the iPhone 35 pro will be any good?

Also, CEO; let it say that one day, Elon Musk totally left Tesla. And no longer had any affiliations with Tesla. If this were the case, Tesla would not be worth anything.

I think the genius about bitcoin is that it is a religion. Satoshi, is essentially this metaphorical Jesus speaker, the savior, and he disappears forever. With any other crypto asset, Ethereum and Vitalik or even chainlink and Sergey; as long as you have a central spokesperson, a CEO, a president or a leader, a charismatic individual… You will not last.

For example, one of the very interesting things that I learn from my political sociology class at UCLA as an undergraduate with Mark Jepsen was that nations or nation states that are led by charismatic individuals don’t last. Once the leader dies off, there is no longer any vision.

For example the genius of America, is that even if we have a few bad apples, the whole thing will still chug along OK. Let us consider that after Mao Zedong died, after Ho Chi Minh died, both mainland China and Vietnam has slowly and surely started to delve into capitalism… The dominant world system.

In fact, that is consider that seems that 80% of the Chinese economy is still dependent on America. And essentially, the CNY, is pegged to the US dollar; because there are capital controls in order from the Chinese government, in Chinese mainland Chinese individuals cannot take their wealth out of the country, especially when they prefer to buy property and live in Vancouver Canada instead… It is a strong signal that duh , America’s on top.

Even though if you had currency is weak, America is still the strongest Fiat currency on the planet. I recently talked to a woman who just got her green card from Beirut Lebanon, and she told me that the whole lira thing is a mess; that people prefer to just hold and trade US dollars instead.

Even when I visited Cuba, even though they have the local Cuban dollar currency, still at end of the day, things are priced in US dollars.

After the US dollar, all other currencies, nobody wants them. Nobody wants the euro, too much chaos in Europe. Nobody wants the pound, Britain’s isolationist policies make it the next Japan, they will still stagger on but will slowly become irrelevant, nobody wants a Korean won — their population is dying off, and it seems that the greatest market for new Hyundai cars are actually in the states, nobody wants the Japanese yen, once again their birth rate is practically zero now. Nobody wants Chinese yuan — I don’t know any non-Chinese person who would prefer using WeChat, we pay, or a Huawei phone.

As long as rich mainland Chinese people prefer to use an iPhone Pro over a Huawei phone, America will always be on top.

Election cycle predictions

I’m voting for our Kamala Harris, because she has more aligned with my ethical beliefs, even though she will lose. I’m almost 99.99% certain that Donald Trump win.

The good news is that Donald Trump is very pro bitcoin, bitcoin mining etc.; so after Donald Trump gets elected, after the dust settles… Your bitcoin value will blossom.

Even if bitcoin and crypto goes through another bear market, which eventually it will… Still, the US economy will be stronger under Donald Trump than Kamala Harris.

If anything, of Joe Biden stepping down and having Kamala Harris rotten instead is like the final hail Mary – and I have played enough high school football to know that Hail Mary’s never work 99.999% of the time. The only time a Hail Mary will work in an American football game is almost never; you only hear about it when you watch random TV clips, or YouTube videos, but I think the chance of a Hail Mary working is practically zero.

So what is in your locus of control?

So I think the big thing to note here is that the stoic way is simple:

What is in your locus of control, what isn’t?

Politics, climate change, dual politics, etc. are not in your control.

What is in your control? Your own individual behaviors, what you write about to friends family and on the Internet, whether you decide to use social media or not, your own individual actions, and also… Your own individual non-action; what you decide not to do.

For example, it seems that the words you refrain from, what you decide not to say, is more telling than what you decide to say.

Another stoic strategy; when you hear something which is very puzzling to you, restrain responding immediately… It works 99.9% of the time.

silence is golden, speaking intelligently is silver.

Nobody wants silver.

Just focus on one thing?

Spartans only focused on one thing; freedom.

The lame thing about America is you have a bunch of these fake ass patriots, waving Trump flags, we have never done any military service. Freedom is not free, or live free or die.

The general ethos is that it is true… Freedom is not free. But what is the opposite of free? Skin and soul in the game; actually being on the front lines of something.

For example, I have a simple rule; you’re not allowed to talk about freedom or whatever or is some sort of fake ass patriot chest thumping flag waving coward, if you have never served military duty, or at least have done Boy Scouts and know how to properly fold a flag!

Also, if you really want to be conservative or Republican or whatever, the simple news is don’t watch Fox News, or any news.

Could be told, both sides are foolish. The left the right the center the moderates whatever… You gotta think like an individual. This means removing all news from your brain, all news which is run on advertising is toxic.

I have another big idea news agencies, website individual bloggers, magazines etc. except payments in bitcoin and Satoshi, no advertising.

The truth is as long as something is supported by advertising, the low-key bias will be to make it more sensationalist, less connected with reality, in order to get more eyeballs in order to make more advertising dollars.

Are there any newsies which do not run on advertising? No.

As a consequence, trust no news but yourself.

Where to get your news?

ironically enough, maybe the best place to get your news is through intentional propaganda government portals, like going to the official US military defense.gov website, because you could smell the propaganda more critically.

Propaganda, propaganda, propagate just means to spread something. The French use the word propaganda, not in the evil way as we Americans think, propaganda just means to spread something.

and once again, realize that all is toxic, all news is bad. Injecting news into your brain and soul is almost like injecting type two diabetes into a healthy individual.

News is like type two diabetes for your soul.

Spartan theory?

To sum up, the spartan way simple: live like a spartan, like the hungry wolf, invest all of your money and earnings and into bitcoin, have at least one kid, derive your pleasure enjoy another human beings, conversation, love and charity, through physical activity exercise, Risky weightlifting, being outside in nature the greet outdoors, and think exposure;

Unless you got real exposure to something, you aren’t permitted to say nothing.

ERIC

Don’t opine about something you’re not invested in

Put your money where your mouth is, or don’t put your mouth where your money is not.

***

Film club

Required watching for any aspiring Spartan Stoic is all of the John Wick movies, the movie 300, the matrix movie, maybe Blade Runner? I prefer the second one.

EK BOOK CLUB

The sayings of Spartans, just Google it. Also, all of the books have Seneca, all of his letters. Also the meditations by Marcus Aurelius, and honestly all of the stoic thinkers are good.

Nietzsche, all of his books.

NASSIM TALEB– all of his books.

Interview, podcast club

All of the interviews and podcasts in YouTube series by Michael Saylor , michael.com, or hope.com

Economic theory

All economic theory is bad. The best is to just read the Iliad, think about the ancient Greeks about their life before money was invented.

Bitcoin Prophet

OK, now that the bitcoin ETF, the spot ETF has been approved… truth be told, I don’t think there is really any more risk in regards to bitcoin, owning bitcoin, or the like.

1. Before, it was really really hard to acquire and buy bitcoin

For me, acquiring bitcoin in around 2017 2018, I suppose around four or five years ago, the only practical option was using something like Coinbase, beautiful user interface and experience, to buy my bitcoins. At first I think I bought bitcoin around 6000 or $7000 a bitcoin… around $25,000 worth of it.

Even today, the thing that is really insanely annoying is that making wire transactions to purchase more bitcoin has been horrific. Simple wire transfers of around $120,000, I had to go into the bank at least three times, sign a bunch of things, Talk to real life being tellers, and then having to be stuck on the phone for an hour or two talking to some outsourced customer support labor and the Philippines or Manila, and then having to call back another week later, figuring out why my damn wire transfer had not gone through yet.

The more street for workaround has been using the built-in plaid integration with Coinbase, purchasing daily maximum of $50,000 USD worth of bitcoin at a time. every time I do this it is insanely anger-fying, because when I have the right opportunity to buy, because I have this lame restriction put on me, I lose opportunities and I also lose the ability to purchase more bitcoins.

For example, when I wanted to buy bitcoin when it was low, when it dipped down a bunch, because the wire transfer took me about a week or two, I think finally when the money was available, or finally when the purchase went through, bitcoin up at least $10,000 a bitcoin, which means that I was able to purchase few bitcoins than I wanted to.

Anyways, I’m so grateful that the technology even exist in the first place for me to purchase bitcoins at all. Sometimes I limit at the fact that me and my friend Kevin do not buy $100 worth of bitcoin, back in 2009, when my roommate Kevin told me about the bitcoin pizza incident. I will never forget how I shrugged my shoulders, and I said we should not, because I thought it was a scam. I think if we had bought hundred dollars worth of bitcoin the time, both of us would have owned thousands if not 10 and thousands of bitcoins, making both of us hundred millionaires, or potentially maybe even billionaires.

2. It is never too late

So I think the main issue that we have is we always lament the fact that we are “too late”. This applies to almost everything in life, finding a life partner, getting married, having kids, getting into shape and doing fitness, investing whatever.

But, as I speak these words, it is still early! Apple has not yet integrated bitcoin support into their iOS or iPhone, once Apple does this, the price of bitcoin will explode.

3. Do you remember blockbuster?

One thing that I’ve learned in life, it is easier to predict what will fail, rather than what will succeed.

For example, I think I’m really lucky that I was born in 1988, because I recall life before the Internet, in life after the Internet. And also the Internet came out around a formative time for me, when I was living in New York, and I got my first computer with AOL 3.0, a 38.8k dial up modem, I think when I was around 11 years old. Maybe the fourth or fifth grade?

Anyways, back in the day, I recall how we used to go to Blockbuster to rent VHS tapes to watch movies. I remember in college, when I got really into investing in stocks and stuff, blockbuster was still a publicly traded company. I remember my roommate Kevin, our freshman year, having a Netflix subscription when they still use to send DVDs in the mail. I knew with great certainty that blockbuster would go bankrupt and go under, and I wanted to short blockbuster stock, but I had no idea how to do it. my prediction was right. Blockbuster went bankrupt, I could’ve made a good profit had I done this.

Or on the other hand, if I had invested in that in college, in 2007 or 2008, this would have also been good.

Anyways the big pot was dematerialization. The fact that in my short life, I have already seen the transition from the materialized world of going in person to choose a blockbuster VHS tape, to rent or borrow or to watch, I actually used to do this with video games too… It actually made a lot of sense, Instead of paying $50 for the Nintendo 64 video game, which I would eventually beat, I rented for only like five or $10, and then try to beat it really fast, so economically as a kid, it made a lot of sense.

4. YouTube premium

I really random thing that my mom has been getting into lately has been tai chi, Cindy’s mom got my mom into it. It has been great every morning my mom has been practicing it, but no matter how many blockers I tried to install, google is smart enough to figure out how to disable the ad blockers.

I suppose the genius of getting a YouTube premium family plan, whether it is $20 a month or whatever, then intelligence is you think about it… It might be the new most important utility that we got.

Even random things, like me preparing to change the oil in my 2010 Prius, watching YouTube videos on how to do it, is 1 trillion times better than written tutorials.

Even whenever I talk about house construction or maintenance or whatever, all the handyman I know tell me to just watch it on YouTube.

So if you think about the economics of it, assuming that having a studio membership for Pilates or yoga $200 a month, and technically you could just stream it on YouTube for $20 a month, economically it is extremely intelligent.

Anyways what is very interesting about the whole YouTube premium thing that is how it has dematerialized so many different things.

And this is what I think is the genius of bitcoin, it has the materialized money. Yes bitcoin is money, even as time goes on I put less than less faith on field paper currency. To me it is like cotton candy.

5. Money philosophy

So I just finished watching the whole Michael Saylor series on money, and I feel like I just got a new PS in economics, economic theory, as well as corporate finance and accounting.

The main takeaways are the following:

a) Inflation

The basic idea is because the money creation rate in America and beyond is expanding 7 to 10% a year, because the price of minimum wage keeps going up, out of thin air, this is what drives inflation, or another words, the price of everything going up.

For example, I’ll never forget this moment; when me and Seneca bought our typical single burger patty, just the patty nothing else, just a month ago for $1.50 at Patty, it going up over 90 to $2.50 just for a single patty! This was because minimum wage was raised from $16 an hour to $20 USD an hour.

The reason why this decision was bad is because honestly, it just seems like a political ploy, for politicians to get elected or reelected. The reason why this is a scam is this:

I want to get elected, and I promise you that I will raise your minimum wage. Vote for me!

And then, the real after effects of inflation is going to happen when I am out of office.

b) History of money

Some of this is a rehashing of Michael Saylor quoting the book, the bitcoin standard, which I find really fascinating not because of the whole bitcoin thing, but about the history of money.

Long story short, bitcoin might be the best money and asset because it is infinitely durable and will last forever, because it is so intensive to create it has value, it has a hard cap of 21 million bitcoins, which will be certain even 1000 years from now, And also… it is money perfected.

6. My thoughts

I am very very happy and grateful that I did not study economics formally. I’m sure that I would have fallen into the same pitfalls as a lot of these loser economic peoples who has never done business in the real world.

I’ll give you examples; when I went to UCLA as an undergraduate, we didn’t have a formal business major, only a Hybrid business – economics major. Out of all the people that knew who studied business economics, none of them became entrepreneurs, self-employed, none of them started their own companies, none of them worked for themselves, and none of them became successful. They all ended up just becoming low or mid-level managers at some company, probably clocking in the typical $80,000 thousand dollars a year to $120,000 a year salary.

In fact, what made me so successful in my realm of Farsi, entrepreneurship, etc.… It totally up ended any traditional economic theories. For example my open source vision; it would probably had been deemed as heresy by any traditional school of economic thought.

Also as a side thing; I am very very happy that I did not study photography formally, and I am also grateful that I did not go to art school. Why? Once again, you get stuck in these loser ways of thinking, these incestuous ways of thinking about photography and the art world is quite filthy.

Anyways, as a general thought, true innovation and entrepreneurship comes from expertise domain expertise outside of that certain domain. For example, let us note that flight was invented by the weight brothers, who I believe were actually bicycle mechanics.

I feel that I am well positioned to talk about money, economics, economic theory because I grew up poor, single mom working minimum wage jobs, also, becoming a successful self-employed sole proprietor, having zero debt, and applying my economic theories to real life.

Also, I am also moderately booksmart, and my wife has a PhD. And then helping Cindy get her PhD, I feel like I got a PhD.

And also other things which I have done which I consider very intelligent: I have never spent more than $2500 USD on a car, in my whole life, from age 15 to at age 36.

1991 Nissan Sentra XE (5 speed, manual transmission, $1000)
1991 Nissan Sentra SE-R (5 speed, manual transmission $1500 USD)
1990 Mazda Miata, five speed manual transmission, no air conditioning no power steering, $2500 USD
2002 Subaru outback, five speed manual transmission, $800 USD
Current, 2010 Prius, free. ($0.00)– free 99

I put zero faith in any individual who has ever purchased any brand new car. It is a true signal that they are economically a fool.

Doesn’t matter if you bought the new Tesla or whatever, all fools.

7. Why does this all matter?

Whether you like it or not, our whole life revolves around money.

There are certain things which are negotiable, certain things which are not negotiable.

Nonnegotiable include paying rent, gas and electricity, Wi-Fi, food, coffee etc.

Negotiable things include purchasing any sort of clothing, eating out, drink alcohol or smoking marijuana or doing drugs, cars, purchasing a home or property etc.

Also, unfortunately I think 99.9% of the photography industry is predicated around purchasing your cameras, lenses, accessories etc. Was the first to start the anti-gear movement, by books not gear, and being the first to really make the Ricoh GR camera mainstream?

Bitcoin as Religion

A thought and observation: perhaps bitcoin is the best investment because it is the new religion.

For example, that is consider that in modern day times, capital, capitalism, money is the new religion. Let us consider how much we sacrifice in our lives in order to accumulate more money, more capital, and we deify money above all.

For example, one self-worth is based on their capital worth. Their net worth is based on how much property they own, the amount of stock they own, bonds, CDs, investments, appreciating assets, power and influence etc.

However perhaps the problem about all of this is that money and things becomes the new carrot and stick.

For example, I’m a huge fan of cyber truck, cars in general, but the savvy investor and real rich person will always think:

Why spend $100,000 on a car, when I could invest that money into something else, and my money, instead of bleeding it?

For example, no matter how expensive your car is, it will always be a depreciating asset.

For example, even if you have a rare Ferrari or Porsche or whatever, the maintenance and upkeep cost for it are horrendous. Even if the market value of your car goes up overtime, maybe at your breaking even, most likely you’re actually bleeding money because of all the expensive parts maintenance cost, labor, having to run your car every once in a while, keep it clean etc. And therefore these trophy assets become toxic assets, negative liabilities:

You’re bleeding a slow death, your like a bathtub with a half working stopper, you have to keep filling up the water to just keep it even.

Stop the bleeding?

Apparently the first thing that you learn in medical emergencies is first, stop the bleeding. As long as the person doesn’t bleed to death, what that means is even if they suffer broken bones or whatever, with enough time healing and recovery they will be OK, but once a person has lost a critical amount of blood, they’re dead forever.

Going back to money in general, I look at all these people, and they’re all slowly bleeding themselves to death, being hooked on drugs and methamphetamines and painkillers and other weird things in order to just keep self flagellating themselves to produce.

Money as religion?

I wonder if in someways, we could actually think about the modern day government as almost some sort of religion. Consider taxes, it is like tithing.

Death & taxes are the only two certain things in life.

Cash rules everything around me

A few weeks ago, the priest that my Korean Catholic Church did something very very funny, for Mother’s Day, during his homily, took out $100 bill, and said that he would give it to the mother at church with the most amount of children, which was five kids.

Everyone left in good spirits, because it almost felt slightly sacrilegious for a priest to talk about money, or bust out money, or even present money as a good thing.

However, the truth is all these institutions, churches etc. all rely on donations. A church cannot survive without donors, nor can your local pickle ball club.

Messiah figure?

Something which is actually really baked into Christian Catholic, Judeo Christian ethics morality and storytelling is the notion of a savior, Messiah figure. Most likely crucified, or sacrifices their life for some greater cause. This is a common trope ever since Greek notions of Dionysus, maybe Egyptian notions of life after death, or whatever.

Basically the idea is one individual, one man, comes to save humanity or whatever. And he must sacrifice his life in order to give immortal life to everybody else.

So in the case of bitcoin, this becomes really really fascinating because Satoshi was a metaphorical messiah figure, who ended up disappearing into thin air, a picture perfect ending.

I think maybe Banksky is similar; somebody to essentially troll and reveal the ridiculousness of the art world, through his anonymity.

Death & immortality

The other day my mom Cindy and Seneca we all went to the Broad Museum in downtown LA, insanely epic! Then infinity room is totally worth it, and the whole space is an architectural marvel and masterpiece. It makes me so proud to be a Los Angeles citizen.

Anyways, we stumbled onto this one room, and I was shocked… I saw the famous skull painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat, one of my favorite paintings of all time. I said really loud, in shock “wait… Is that real?” a friendly fancy looking York artist appreciating woman to my right, laughed, and said, yes it is! I was more shocked that we had in Los Angeles, instead of it being in New York or New York City, which I imagined it should be.

Anyways, I really appreciate it, but my mom was horrified. She said something really funny that the artwork and paintings of Jean-Michel Basquiat was “disturbing”. I said that was true, because he was addicted to heroin cocaine and all these other weird drugs, and eventually died because of a drug overdose.

My sister Annette something interesting, which was that the theory is if Bard didn’t die so early, he probably would have eventually been demoted, from the art world, because of his overreliance on drugs, partying, and like in order to produce artwork. Any sort of art which is produced based on an artist being overly reliant on drugs alcohol, etc. is degenerate bad art. Even Jackson Pollock, he was notoriously an alcoholic, and the truth that a lot of art critics and collectors try to hide and obfuscate is the fact that he died because he was drinking and driving, under the influence. We should mark then Jackson Pollock as a bad one; sure he killed himself, but what if while drunk and under the influence of alcohol while driving, he killed a little kid running in the road, or even worse, a full car full of other human beings?

Limits & value

Anyways, my personal take on why Jean-Michel Basquiat ended up becoming so famous was he died early, and even my sister said that because he died so early, his stock of paintings is limited, and no more will ever be produced. This is what makes them so valuable.

This is where bitcoin gets so fasting, because everybody on the planet knows that only 21 million bitcoin will ever ever ever be produced in eternity.

This is a big deal because with traditional fiat currency, the government could keep printing cotton candy paper fiat money currency forever.

In fact, about a week ago, after tipping my masseuse a $20 bill, and I knew that I had to go to the ATM to withdraw more cash money currency, in case of emergency or tips or whatever, I paused and stopped, the thought:

Whenever I pull out paper currency or cash money, eventually it all eventually disappears, and have to keep refilling my wallet with more paper currency.

And this is actually the funny thing about holding paper currency and cash money; simply by having it on you, you will end up losing it. Why? To put a $20 bill in the church basket, to give it to a friendly waiter, to use it on silly things, etc.

So I suppose the tricky thing is this:

All of this, capital accumulation etc.… for the sake of what?

Kids

So the first thought I have is the prime obvious one: if you want to have the supreme amount of happiness in life, the true meaning and joy in life, I think you gotta have at least one kid. Two, maybe 2.2 kids to re-populate the planet or whatever.

I think we’re going through a weird time, in which capital, capitalism is running a milk. Which means that I think the reason why a lot of people don’t wanna have kids anymore is because in some funny way it seems anti-capitalistic.

For example, if you’re a woman, and you get married, become a stay at home mom no longer work… Who is going to buy all of this Louis Vuitton clothing and whatever? Let us consider the capitalist dream is a single working career woman… All of this disposable cash and income they have to buy Subarus, Mercedes, Porsches, designer handbags, etc.

Certainly there is still a big industry for people who sell kids stuff, but this is a super tiny market compared to the market for the average consumer.

Why this is a big deal

For myself personally speaking, I would not be shocked if we see a $1 million bitcoin, a $3 million bitcoin, maybe even a $10 million bitcoin or $50 million bitcoin price our lifetime. I still remember very vividly as a kid, being in becoming a millionaire was The dream! But now… Even if you’re a millionaire, it might buy you a mediocre condo in LA, the new ethos is being a billionaire.

Also, I will not be shocked if within a few years or decades we will see Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos or somebody become the worlds first trillionaire.

Spending money?

Certainly there are things that we must spend money on. Spending money on rent, food, gas, etc. Alao certain truisms I’ve discovered while living in Los Angeles is that owning a car is better than owning no car in Los Angeles, even if you live in a walking paradise like Culver City.

However, in terms of practicality, owning a 2010 Prius might be the superior option and decision then owning any Tesla car, any gas or electric vehicle.

People slowly bleeding themselves to death?

Now that gas prices are universally five dollars a gallon and above, I am very very certain we will never see us ever again at three dollars a gallon, two dollars a gallon, etc. Once the price goes up, it will never go back down to what they used to.

For example, minimum wage for fast food workers went from $16 an hour to $20 an hour, which means the rest of the economy must adjust to this new $20 an hour benchmark. I’ve been talking to a lot of fast food workers, laborers, security guards, people at Shake shack etc. and I wondered to myself and asked them:

“Isn’t the optimal strategy for everyone to just get a job at McDonald’s and earn $20 an hour?”

One of the security guards at the Huntington Gardens and library laughed and said “That is true… But then you gotta work at McDonalds!”

The smell of money?

Apparently as a plumber, you can easily make a salary of $120,000, $200,000, $250,000 a year. But, the downside is you have to smell the horrendous smell of human excrement, and sewage in general for the rest of your life.

To me, no amount of money is worth that.

Also I saw an advertisement on the 405 or La Cienega that apparently starting salary for a CHP California highway police officer is $120,000 a year! Once again, not worth it.

People often make the wrong decision in life, choosing the bad job in order to get a higher salary. Even hearing to young Asian American 20 something-year-olds at the Huntington Gardens: a nerdy skinny Asian American guy, saying that he did not want to get a job at Amazon, but, he was tempted because the salary was so good… At least $200,000 a year!

The problem is this:

$200,000 a year ain’t what it used to to be.

So what should we do about all this?

if you own an iPhone or a smart phone, we are all implicated in this capitalist system. So the question is this:

How do we maximize the upside of living in a capitalist society, while clipping the downsides?

1. Intelligent living

The first very pragmatic one is living intelligently. Being moneywise.

A very simple one is stopping the bleeding.

How do we bleed money? We bleed money by All of these stupid subscription services. They are all bad, mass unsubscribe to all of them.

This includes your Disney+, Hulu, YouTube premium, Spotify, deliver services apps, Netflix, hbo max, etc.

My simple thought is this:

There has never been a streaming TV series which has ever been created which is worth it.

Only good things which have been produced our movies and cinema, so if there is really really really a movie or something you want to watch, just pay money and watch it in the theater, or purchase it on Apple TV+.

Also let us consider and think, truth be told, in terms of overall value I think there have only ever been maybe three or four movies which had any real big impact on my worldview. Therefore the hard thing is trying to filter all of it.

Bitcoin Power

I’ve been following bitcoin ever since I lived in Vietnam off the grid, around 2016 2017. I still will never forget, when I was in my junior year living with my roommate Kevin, in our UCLA studio apartment housing, I think my friend Kevin was already, and told me about the whole bitcoin thing and the whole pizza thing, and he said –“Hey Eric, we should just buy $100 worth of bitcoin and see what happens to it.” I remember I think I was doing something else, slightly distracted and shrugged and said “Eh… let’s not bother… it’s probably a scam”. I think at the time bitcoin was worth a fraction of a cent, so in theory me and Kevin both could’ve just bought hundreds maybe even thousands a bitcoins, while we were still in college, I think this was 2009. Before either of us even owned a smart phone. I actually think the original iPhone 3 came out my junior of college.

Anyways, fast forwarding a bit when living in Vietnam, at one of my beloved coffee shops, I remember seeing bitcoin at around $300 a bitcoin, seeing at least spike beyond $1000, which the mind of anybody following it. I think other fantastic Limits included when it broke $10,000 a bitcoin, $20,000 a bitcoin, $50,000 a bitcoin, now over $70,000 a bitcoin. My personal thought is once it breaks $100,000 bitcoin, it is only uphill from here.

“If it is not going to zero, it is going to a million” – Michael Saylor

Real Power?

How to gain more power How to gain more power and ascendancy?

In America and much of the western world, we make the wrong mistake and we have the wrong idea that more US dollars currency means more power.

In truth, US dollars, currency is only an intermediary to other stuff.

Real estate?

It seems that the traditional person, the baby boomer, the millennial, the General why whatever, the thought is that real estate is true wealth. However, there are many downsides of real estate:

First, taxes. Property taxes. I think the problem is you never really own the land; rather, it is more like a privilege loan or borrowing or leasing from the government or the local city municipality.

For example, let us say that I buy a house or property for $3 million or $5 million. Whether I’d like it or not, I must pay $7,000-$8,000 in property taxes, month, perpetuity, even if I don’t do anything with it.

Liability or real asset?

Michael Saylor talks about “trophy assets”; your Picasso, your classic Ferrari, whatever.

However, all these things are not appreciating assets, rather they are liabilities.

For example, let us say that you get that brand new Lamborghini with the scissor doors, and you accidentally get a flat tire. Boom, you’re out $12,000.

Or, let us have that expensive; slowly overtime, the value of that thing bleeds; and also, maintenance costs.

Physical laws

Also a big consideration is physical laws; rust, erosion, mold, termites ants whatever.

Another big downside of physical property, owning a house or whatever or a home, regardless of how good the materials you build it with, slowly overtime, the thing will slowly rust and rot away.

I think if you think about the laws of entropy, it is simple; as time goes on, the durability of the thing goes down.

For example, any home sooner or later, will get some sort of mold, and will be needed to be torn down and reconstructed. I’m shocked even in the year 2024; a lot of wood actually is going into building these homes.

If you have your ideal glass, it seems like a pain to keep all of the windows clean!

Life?

Philosophers have grappled with issue of the purpose or the end of life, for millennia.

I think for me, the most interesting set of ideas comes from Nietzsche in his unpublished manuscripts, “The will to power”. The wheel to power, is not a true book in the sense that he didn’t want it to be published, it was just like a set of his ideas started down, and eventually he brought up the project at the very end. I believe that I read a footnote that You found out that his concept of the world to power was flawed, as it was an all encompassing idea, ended up just using the last pages of his manuscript to write out a shopping list of groceries or whatever.

However, I think the basic concept ring is true. What is it that man desires? More power, more ascendancy, more dominance.

In today’s world, what is the most dominant for economic power. Perhaps above that is military power, as it is the underlying asset which supports economic power, but for most of us typical individuals, it is monetary economic wealth and power.

Quit buying those dollars

In Los Angeles, if you work in McDonald’s the minimum wage is now point dollars USD an hour! This is insane. It seems that economically rational thing for most people to do is quit their traditional minimum wage jobs, and never to just get a job at Shake shack, In-N-Out, or McDonald’s. Maybe even Taco Bell?

The reason why I find this so alarming is that slowly but surely, we are going to see a massive devaluing of the US currency. Truth be told, globally, the US dollar is still probably the most valuable currency, worth 1 trillion times more than the Chinese yuan, the euro or whatever… But still, this is scary.

For example, a shock now if you just want to get a single hamburger patty, just a patty no bun no nothing, a shake shack it is $2.50! This is insane, literally two weeks ago it was only $1.49.

Mathematics economics perspective the price of this food commodity has almost doubled!

What this means is that in the long run, I think we will see the prices of everything close to double in terms of rent prices, food prices, even Costco and Amazon and Amazon Amazon prime and Whole Foods is trying their best to keep prices down, but still… This inflation is getting out of control.

I was just doing some basic math in my head, let us say that you work at McDonald’s for $20 an hour, and you work eight hours a day. That is $160. Let us say that after taxes you’re making about $120 a day. Let us say that, you’re working 30 days a month, your take-home salary might be close to $4000! For working at McDonald’s?

Solutions?

First, a paradigm shift. I think the first to big realization that I made is that currency, US dollars is not money.

For example, Fernando Galliani wrote his treatsie on money, nearly 500 600 years ago, talking about the history of money,ducats, gold, silver and the like.

Some interesting things:

First, there have been periods of history in which silver was actually worth more than gold! Also I wonder, in the past, in that infamous scene in the Iliad in which may be Ajax and the other hero on the Trojan side exchanges arms and armor, apparently They trade golden shield for a bronze shield, and apparently the value of the gold shield was worth 100 times more than the bronze shield. But I wonder if maybe… even back then, bronze was worth more than gold? Because of war?

I think most Americans are stupid with money

It seems that 99% of the fascination of Americans has to deal with automobiles and cars and vehicles.

For example, it don’t matter if you’re in the Midwest, the coasts, if you’re liberal, support Donald Trump or whatever… Everyone is being suckered by some sort of car and vehicle.

For example, let us say that you are a true patriot, you’ll probably want to buy some sort of Ford or Chevy truck, and wave some sort of American or confederate flag from it.

Or let us say that you’re a proud American liberal, you might drive a Tesla because Teslas are sexy and cool and they are built in America. This is where I find cyber truck to be so fascinating and disruptive because traditionally we think about people who drive trucks is being some sort of hillbilly rednecks Republican from the south, not liberal. Elon Musk has disrupted all of this; now it is cool to drive a truck, because it literally looks like something out of a video game, Like a cyberpunk universe. Maybe for marketing purposes, the new cyberpunk video game should make the cybertruck the official vehicle.

Economic power?

After World War II, in the toppling of the Hitler Nazi regime, I think for most practical purposes, Germany has been castrated. I think America has position things in such a way that even if shit hits the fan, Germany will never have enough military power to overtake or even challenge America.

So what did Germany do instead? She shifted all of her power resources and energies towards economic production, economic might. A consequence, Germany now has become a economic powerhouse, on the planet. It seems that even Americans now, we are still obsessed with German good; much of the American population still desires to drive “foreign“; which is some sort of Mercedes-Benz, AMG, BMW, Rolls-Royce, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Porsche, etc. And let us not forget that almost all these luxury car brands are owned by the Volkswagen VW group.

Are people stupid? Don’t they know that a Porsche 911 is just a Volkswagen beetle on steroids? And that a Porsche 911 GT 3 RS is just a turbo beetle with a body kit?

Or that an Audi is just like an upgraded Volkswagen Passat?

And that a Rolls-Royce Cullinan is just a BMW times seven with a facelift, and that even a Rolls-Royce ghost is just a BMW seven series with different doors.

Power for the sake of what?

Power wars?

Going back to ancient Greece, I still find the Iliad to be the best book and cultural document, of all time.

for example, what was the power struggle in the Iliad? King Agamemnon, just wants to keep gobbling up more land, whereas the hero Achilles, just wants to retire from battle, take Breisis his prize, and just chill out on his own home pasture.

The second best book, the Odyssey with Odysseus as the hero, what does he want? He just wants to sell home back to his wife, back to his kingdom, take back the throne with his son, and just chill out.

Modern day society is much more greedy?

It seems like a lot of people, either people are foolish, or greedy.

I don’t necessarily think greed is a bad thing, maybe it’s just a foolish thing?

For example, people just want to keep accumulating more property, more cars, more cash dollars, whatever… For the sake of what? Nobody gives this anycritical thinking.

Jobs?

A big realization: also job are bad because they are closed ecosystems.

For example, let us say that you work at Apple or whatever, and it seems that the impetus of your whole life is to keep climbing the corporate letter. But the critical problem and the flaw here is that it is all a closed ecosystem.

For example, that one position that you want, to get that upgrade, that salary bump or whatever… If you are in a corporation or a company, it is very zero sum.

Think the open free market?

Free enterprise!

Free enterprise means freedom enterprise.

I think the only real way to thrive today’s modern day capitalist world is to build your own capital, for you to become a capitalist, and to start your own company, your own corporation, your own sold for prior ship or whatever.

Also a new ones; I wonder if it is actually superior to be a private corporation, rather than a public one.

It seems that the big problem about being a publicly treated company, even though you might get more flows of capital, the major downside is that you lose control, you have to sit on the boring board of trustees or whatever, you become enslaved to boring meetings.

If you’re private corporation, you could just do whatever you want and not have to report to anybody.

Solo, sole proprietor?

My ambition for Seneca is for him to build his own capital, for him to do his own thing, learn how to wisely leverage economics in his favor, and not be be bedridden to any BS in modern day society.

Free school

Seneca is currently three years, one month old, and this is my great pride:

For his whole existence, from conception until now, he has never watched any YouTube, Netflix Netflix, Disney Disney+, etc.

He really has no idea what Spider-Man or Batman is, he has no notions of superheroes, he has never watched Moana or whatever.

My sister Anna always jokes that “We must not send him to public school, or private school, because all these kids are bad!”

It is true. Even private school kids, they all get hooked on weird designer drugs, etc.

Not only that, the parents are bad. It doesn’t matter if they’re rich and affluent, or poor and or working class. It seems that all modern day parents are foolish.

Have I ever met another wise parent? No. Only myself.

Power and kids?

I am 36 years old, born at 1988. It seems that for my generation, the new modern day flex is children. Having children, kids, and to some extent, the more kids you got, the more successful.

For example, seems that the majority of people nowadays either have zero kids or one kid. They would rather have dogs, go to festivals, engage in degenerate things.

Even amongst my real friends, I think I’m the only one who is married and has a kid, and at most, the most kids I have witnessed is maybe two kids. Three kids in my age group is almost unthinkable. Four or five kids? Forget about it.

I think the reason why kids were the number of kids you have is the new social status is that the number you got is kind of a proxy of how rich you are.

For example, the traditional family must go to work, send their kids to daycare or whatever. This is very expensive.

Also part of it, not really sure why people pursue career; for the sake of what?

Still at the end of the day, I think the duty of the parent is to take care of the kids. And also maybe the duty of a grandparent is to help take care of the grandchildren?

Lineage?

I think when you think about it long enough, eventually you want to live a life and do things which is beyond yourself. Which means that after you die, some part of you will remain and continue and ideally last into perpetuity?

For example, a simple one is your kids, thinking about your kids kids kids.

Most Americans don’t think this way because the typical Americans is too individualistic; they think only about themselves, their own personal life etc.

I think the reason why a lot of people don’t have kids anymore is that they think it will positively happiness. That is if you have a kid, your life will positively become negative happy.

But is this true? No. There is literally no breeder joy and happiness on planet earth and beyond then seeing the face in the laughter of your own blood child.

Grandparents without grandkids?

Another very very sad side; seeing the elderly without either any children or grandchildren?

I should find a really really sad, I see this already my family is that my cousins don’t want to have kids, and now that my uncles and aunts are older and they’re 70s, they are Baron and don’t have any grandchildren. Seneca is almost like proxy grandchild for them; and the amount of happiness and joy he brings to them is astounding.

Even me, I’m quite certain that that will decide to have kids, but if I was a grandparent in my 70s or 80s, and Seneca didn’t have his own child, or even worse he said that he’ll never have kids… This might be the most sad and miserable thing of all time.

Maybe this is also why people or parents decide to have multiple kids; the chance that one of your kids will not procreate?

Bitcoin and economic power

The more research I do on bitcoin, the more I think about it so yet and philosophies about it, the better and better of an idea it seems.

First, I spent a lot of time thinking about it by myself, solo. Then I started listening to a lot of interviews and lectures and writings from Michael Saylor, one of the great bitcoin proponents. I really delight in the wisdom and experience of Michael Saylor, as he ran his own software company for over 30 years, I would probably trust the opinion of a CEO, who has real life world experience, rather than the average guy on the street.

Trust no man over the age of 40?

I’m currently at 36, I’m going to be 40 years old soon.

Apparently the guy who discovered that blood was pump through your heart and recirculated back into your heart, when he discovered this, he famously said that no doctor over the age of 40 would believe him. Because they were too set in their ways of thinking.

Even amongst my age group, I’m starting to see the nihilism in the blaze kick in. The ones optimism hope joy and foolish knives optimism has become overshadowed by drugs, festivals, marijuana, sports, video games, etc. Living towards no ends.

This is even happening in the “zillenial” or “Gen Z” age group — the world is inequity injustice whatever, so what is the point of all of it? Do a bunch of drugs, go to festivals, lose yourself in nonsense.

The feeling of power?

What is power? I think ultimately, power is a feeling — a physiological feeling.

For example, it don’t matter if you got $1 billion, if the guy next to you has $1 trillion, and has 10 yachts while you only have one yacht, you might feel poor by comparison.

Therefore the first idea is wealth power abundance whatever is all comparative.

For example, it is very different to own $1 million in Culver City, than own $1 million in Cambodia.

Portable wealth

You cannot take your Lamborghini with you to Cambodia. But, you could take your bitcoins with you!

Also, you cannot take your single-family home in Los Angeles with you to Thailand. But you could take your digital property, a.k.a. your bitcoin to Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam Korea etc.

Human capital

Out of all the forms of capital, certainly there is no greater wealth than human capital, let us not forget that the notion of capital comes from the notion of “kaput“, or “caput” or “cap”– which literally means head.

For example, back in ancient Greece, before money was invented, you would actually count your wealth by how many heads of oxen you had. For example, if if you wanted to make a libation or a sacrifice to the gods, to Zeus, he would sacrifice the heads of 100 oxen and cattle,… Certainly a very expensive endeavor considering that oxen are useful for many things; plowing the land, and also, food. Let us say that the average male ox is at least 2000 pounds… 2000 pounds of meat, that is a lot.

Even if you do modern economics, 2000 pounds of meat, assuming that meat is five dollars a pound… That is $10,000 a head of oxen?

Then, 10,000×100 … 1,000,000– I had to come was like 1 million bucks?

Anyways, I think the most enlightening thing about going to Asia Southeast Asia etc. is how cheap labor is. In America, I think the great downside is that labor is so expensive, and the people are so lazy and entitled.

Also, the thing which is really bizarre America is that a lot of these men labor jobs, are being run by adults… Whereas they could easily be run by teenagers, or college kids. Even apparently back in the day minimum wage was a means of pink highschoolers to do random Jobs like restaurant work, fast food work, coffee shop barista. Imagining a 35 year old man working at Shake shack, or a coffee shop to pay rent and support his family… Seems bizarre?

Keep stacking those bitcoins

20 bitcoins matte black

Is bitcoin a gamble? Probably. But, if you have a once in a 10,000 year lifetime opportunity, don’t you want to seize it?

ERIC

Bitcoin Futures

Thinking beyond—

LA THOUGHTS

Being antisocial is anti manly?
Where are all of the real men in LA?
Transform and turn your body into the cybertruck !
Your car shows who you truly are

Bitcoin innovations?

The more people who join the bitcoin ecosystem better; like institutions and institutional investors.

How long until Harvard or Yale will put some of their endowment into bitcoin?

Bitcoin messaging? To send verifiable messages, inscribed with a Satoshi?

Bitcoin Photos,,, ordinals?

Is bitcoin open source?

Quality of market data — chainlink

Exaggeration of trading volumes?

Big deal:

every Bitcoin trade is added to the blockchain ledger and that entire ledger, including the history of every transaction ever made in the ledger, is available to any user running a node on that network.

Issues solved?

Bitcoin cons solve issues of money laundering?

Think B’s

You gauge danger and risk by yourself

4 year time stamps

Always think four years ahead

The North Star

Signal vs Noise

Think about yearly snapshots, just check prices once a year; a lot less noise, better signal.

Traditionally year over year, 73% of the time it will always go up

100 Bitcoins

Economic thoughts

Stimuluses, stimulus checks don’t work!

What is the big problem here?

It seems that the big problem is people sign up for jobs, but they don’t show up for work!

Market capitalization

the market capitalization of Bitcoin hit $1 trillion on February 19, 2021, whereas gold’s market capitalization was approximately $10 trillion.

Market cap for bitcoin is now higher than that of gold?

Property?

OK, some basic observations:

First, it looks like the desire of most Americans or many Americans is to one day own property, own a home, a single-family house, property, a condo or whatever, or like my British friends like to call it… “flats”–

Some problems here:

1. First, this issue of property taxes:

Let us say you buy that $2.99 million house, all in cash, one thing you forget is that for the rest of your life, into perpetuity, you’re going to have to pay property taxes on that! This might be around $6000-$7,000 USD a month, just in property taxes… which goes all to your local city government, which is essentially lost money.

Call me naïve, but, I had no notions of property taxes before –. for example, already renting a really really nice apartment in Culver City California is $3200 a month,… assuming property taxes could be in the four to $7000 range a month, doesn’t it make better financial sense to just rent?

2. Maintenance?

Another big property issues; the physical laws of where in tear, rust, mold, things breaking.

For example, the other day I spent maybe 30 minutes just cleaning up my bathroom, scrubbing the bathtub, wiping the floors, cleaning the toilet bowl etc.… I cannot imagine having to maintain more space!

Also, looks like all of my millennial friends who have purchased homes end up secretly regretting it; they never realize how big of an issue it is to change the hot water boiler, replacing the roof, which could easily cost you $50-$70,000 USD, Price of a cyber truck, or other things breaking, having to call the plumber, etc.

I think the hard thing about us millennials, or people like me, we were born in 1988… we like to live, we don’t like to maintain. We prefer going out, being nomadic, traveling to Japan and stuff like that.

I think there is a big cultural shift.

You could take your bitcoins to Mars!

I was randomly watching the Elon Musk talk about to making earth an interplanetary species, the most recent video on spacex.com. Very cool.

I think maybe the interesting thing is once we humans colonize mars and other planets… Yeah, you could take your bitcoins with you! Assuming that there will be some sort of really slow rudimentary Internet on Mars or in space… The transfer speeds for bitcoin don’t need to be that fast.

Can you imagine, buying Mars property for a bitcoin?

Why?

People say bitcoin is not real money, this is true. But neither is the US dollar, fiat currency, or the little green and blue Benjamin’s in your wallet. Neither are the ones in zeros in your JP Morgan Chase bank account, or your checking or savings account.

Commerce?

Somebody big news here in Los Angeles or California; the minimum wage for working at a restaurant or shake shack or McDonald’s is now $20 USD an hour! This is a massive jump from the previous $16 USD an hour, almost 4 dollar increase out of thin air overnight!

To me this is a really really big deal, underlying idea of helping people pay rent is a good one, but the financial monetary policy is a bad one.

For example, the other day Seneca and I just went to Shake shack, to get our iconic single burger beef patty, which used to only cost $1.49 USD. When we ordered it, and I handed Seneca two one dollar bills to pay, the guy working there said it was $2.50. I told the guy that he clearly must be mistaken, maybe he punched something in wrong, because it is always $1.49. He then told me, about the minimum wage increase, is a consequence, the businesses all raised the cost of the food items on the menu to accommodate the increased cost.

No this is very bad because it is going to discourage me from eating out now. Which is also bad news for the minimum wage workers go there, and work there. Because more people are going to get laid off, or more robots and automation is going to be innovated, because businesses don’t like paying high wages for workers. I am pretty certain that you will start to quickly see a lot more innovation in terms of robots at McDonald’s flipping your burgers etc. Maybe the business will be insulated in and out, which people don’t seem to mind paying higher prices for.

What are we truly searching for?

First, I think the average person would prefer not to have a job, not to work. It’ll matter if you work at Apple, Facebook, Amazon whatever… It don’t matter if you’re being paid $1.2 million a year, nobody likes to have to show up for work.

First desire is freedom, freedom from a boss, freedom from work, freedom to have to check our email in our phones, freedom of schedule time life and focus.

If anything, my new definition of success:

Name no man successful until he go two years without checking his email!

Brand — we buy the brand, we buy the brand name

Bitcoin has the best brand

1000 bitcoins?

Becoming a bitcoin whale?

Blackrock — #1 asset manager

> Sentiments such as those expressed by billionaire investor Bill Miller of Miller Value Partners in an investor letter dated January 21, 2021 may draw even more traditional investors into the Bitcoin domain. He writes that “almost every long-term holder of Bitcoin has earned a higher rate of return in Bitcoin than in anything else, and those that understand it see little reason to put their excess marginal liquidity into other assets at this point. The world is ruled by fat tail events, or seemingly improbable occurrences that have an outsized impact, and all indicators so far point to Bitcoin as being one.”138

The funny thing with graphs and data is that you could always make it tell whatever story you want, based on the day, month, or the year trend

What really is Bitcoin?

In my line of thinking, perhaps what bitcoin really is is optimism for the future! Also, long-term thinking, and obvious thinking.

For example, even Fernando Galliani said on money –

True money … the materials which are used to make it must be scarce.

Like gold!

21 million… A number which is easy for anyone to remember, 21, like being 21 years old before you legally drink alcohol or whatever… If there will only be ever 21 million bitcoins, it is almost like if there were only 21 million humans That will ever be in existence for the rest of existence?

Imagine if there was a mass extinction, and only 21 million people on the whole planet earth, out of around 8 billion… Will be saved. Wouldn’t you want to be one of them?

1 Bitcoin = 1 Child?

Thinking about this further; once you enter the 10+ bitcoin club, maybe you could think to yourself that if you wanted to, you could have at least 10 children. When your kids grow up, each kid will receive one bitcoin as an inheritance. Like each kid Inheriting a house, or $1 million or whatever.

stable coins?

I wouldn’t be surprised if the US government will start adopting US dollar coin?

governments and crypto

One grand thought is that perhaps, if governments end up adopting crypto or bitcoin or whatever for their balance sheets, taxes, expenditures or whatever… It would build a lot of public trust. For example, imagine just being able to look up the wallet, the online Blockchain wallet address of the US military and see what she really spent money on.

It could be good for nonprofit organizations, if I donate $100 to a charity cause, how do I know that that money is really being provided to help poor kids in Africa some office manager spending $100 for a new office chair?

I have never met a woman taller than me?

We gotta make moving money easier!

Currently, moving money is a huge pain in the fucking ass. Especially with larger mountains, Zelle ain’t good enough.

Why do these banks make it so hard to wire moderate money amount like $100,000, $125,000 etc.?

My personal theory is they want to make it difficult because they are currently hoarding your US dollars to invest it for them to make more money. Rather than release her funds to you the rightful owner.

digital yuan?

a world without borders?

I love America, but, the US government will not last forever. It will probably last for Seneca‘s lifetime, maybe after his kids, but beyond that, I am very very dubious. I think America will be around for 300 years, but I doubt America will be around 1000 years from now. As a consequence, The funny thought though is bitcoin will continue to last, forever?

All graphs and diagrams are fake, don’t trust them

The funny thing with graphs and diagrams that when we look at them, we assume that they are real because they are a graph or a diagram. But in truth, they are not real.

becoming a bitcoin bum in Thailand?

Imagine that you could live in a really really nice apartment or hotel in Thailand, by the beach or whatever, only for a few Satoshi a day. You could live there forever for the rest of your life, without ever spending a single bitcoin.

Burn the tokens for Bitcoin?

Eventually, bitcoin is the endgame, the final thing you really want, not the USD.

The philosopher Schopenhauer once remarked that “All truth passes through three stages. First it is ridiculed. Second it is violently opposed. Third it is accepted as being self-evident.”

Keep buying those bitcoins

How much can you tow?

become a bitcoin troll?

Becoming the Bull

Manly Thoughts

Who Has the Biggest Dick in the Room?

I think for us men, much of life, modern day life is just a massive dick measuring contest. But the question is, if indeed and in fact, you do have the biggest dick, so what?

The first question is, is your joy or your desire to just swing it around, and joy in throwing it all around? Probably one of the hottest moments of my life was when some guy at the gym, tried to pump me, when I was stretching my leg saying that I look like Jackie Chan or almost kicked him and made some kung fu sounds, I approached him afterwards, and I pretended to swing my dick at him, and then I just joked around with him and had a chat with him.

Cyber truck

This is where cyber truck is so fastening to me, truth be told, it seems that out of all of the cars in LA, if you’re driving a cyber truck, you certainly have the biggest dick in town, the biggest, the most grand, the most stainless steel dick on the planet.

I think this is where the whole Overlanding movement and trend is so fascinating; the name of the game is who could be the tallest, the most dominant on the road? So it seems like on a basic trend, he is tallest, shall win.

This is where things become funny because there are lots of inconsistencies here.

First, it seems that traditionally, if you live more in a cosmopolitan area or city, Apex and manliness, having the biggest dick is having some sort of Lamborghini, or Ferrari, or maybe Porsche close to the ground. This is where the cyber truck is so disruptive; You just break out of the whole categories, you break out of the segment. You’re no longer trying to flex your sports card, but you have a whole new invention and concept; a truck.

I think what is so fascinating about cyber truck, if you look at the overall profile, it almost looks like a Lamborghini cage, but even more angular.

Also, I’ve seen a handful of cyber trucks now, out in the wild, in the real world, and what is so impressive is that the stainless deal when you see it in the bright Los Angeles light is actually very very impressive.

No more loser Rivian

For a hot minute, it looks like the hot car to have in Los Angeles is the Rivian R1 S SUV– honestly I think it’s a really cool car. Essentially it’s almost like the new Range Rover of Los Angeles; it seems that both men and women like to drive it.

First, I think it is built on a similar chassis to the R1 truck, which means that it has superior height, which seems that everyone in Los Angeles loves. I think the whole ethos is you want to treat your car like an armored vehicle, or a tank. The general idea is that in Los Angeles, because the place is such a concrete cluster fuck, people feel protected in their armored vehicles, a.k.a. their Mercedes-Benz AMG wagons, and even the whole notion of getting all black everything murdered out car with full tents is that people want to feel like Batman, Ready to take on the world.

How to get that big D energy

I think there is a meme going around on the Internet, something like big energy, big D energy, whatever. The basic ID I think is that he who has really really high levels of testosterone, essentially big dick confidence energy, is calm, masculine, Tall and strong, dominant, and cheerfully confident. ERIC KIM.

I think the reason why I am so disruptive is that typically people do not equate masculinity with Asian, Asian American guys. In the past, I think an Asian American man or an Asian man, was never masculine per se; he was kind of more of a sorcerer. For example, if you think about Bruce Lee, maybe even Jackie Chan, their strength and their power is almost comedic, and is based on meta physical principles like Kung fu or knowing some sort of magical trigger point, which would cause their heart to explode or something.

However, ever since I was a kid, I wanted to be masculine, a tank, like or no Schwarzenegger, with seeing the huge muscles, indomable. In fact, when I was a kid back in New York, Bayside Queens, certainly I was known as being the strongest out of all my friends, and then growing up, I continued this trend. in high school, I wanted to take on the most hard-core manly sport, which in America is currently American football. So I join the team, my sophomore year I was outside linebacker, and then junior year I became middle linebacker. Essentially in defense, the middle linebacker is the head honcho. We called the calls, and we are also the last line of defense.

What women will never understand about men

I think nowadays the modern day trend is for me to understand woman… But, there doesn’t seem to be any effort either way, woman seeking to understand man.

It is true… Man is dominant in society, man holds the power, the true power. Even if you put the clog forward 1 billion years, as long as men are physically and physiologically taller, more muscular and dominant, you’ll never see women becoming superior to man.

So the philosophical question:

Should those empower seek to understand those with less power, or vice versa?

In other words, the trend is according to Christian modern day ethics, notions of equality, the overall trend is that those who are privileged, rich, upon high should seek to understand the poor, the lowly, the disenfranchised. Yet there is not an opposite case in which the poor the lonely the powerful made to understand the rich and the powerful.

My case?

So my case is unique and interesting and so far much as technically I come from a family of privilege, on both sides–

Yet, having both my family members, my dad and my mom coming to the states, was almost like a hard reset. As a consequence, even though we had a lot of social economic support back home in Korea, in the states we were quite poor.

Fast-forward a bit, now that I am now 36 years old, being born in 1988, then moving back to LA… I’m an interesting position, I guess I’m a full-blown adult now. As a consequence, there becomes a new battle, a new Contest for manliness and masculinity, which has to do more with social economic power. For example, who is the richest in the room, whose Ferrari has the biggest dick?

Cases

A few months ago, I was walking around Culver City, near one of the fancy hotels, is that always do, topless. And a dude at the hotel checking up on his Ferrari comes out to me, in his Playboy looking Paisley flower dress shirt, noticeably shorter than me, Comes up to me and tries to jab at me and says “What is this, no shirt Thursdays?” — essentially, signifying in highlighting the fact that he indeed was insecure about his own masculinity, and he felt bad that he saw a dude way more jacked than him, his own body being much more impressive than his loser Ferrari. Of course, I didn’t let this loser guy punk me, and then actually stepped closer to him, showing him in the flesh that I was indeed much taller bigger stronger and more dominant than him, and then I started to tease him about his loser Ferrari.

So in LA, I’ve actually found that most of the successful guys, the rich guys, are all pretty short. They all look like actors in the face, strong piercing eyes, masculine looking forehead and eyebrows, strong jawline, big head, but once they pop out of their loser Range Rover or their loser AMG G WAGON, they are like 5‘6“ tall. For reference I am about 5‘11“ tall– 180, 182cm.

The contest for dominance

I recall, back in middle school, even a little bit of high school… Some of the kids were the biggest bullies were actually very very small and short, but for some reason had a lot of self-confidence?

Something that never really made sense to me was that they would punk on kids almost 2 feet taller than them, and may be also weighing about 100 pounds more than them. If they both gone to a fistfight, certainly the bigger, fatter, heavier kid would be able to take on the shorter and smaller bully. But, they didn’t. Why not?

I think nowadays, despite what you see in these fake movies, bowling is not predicated on physical size or dominance, but rather, some sort of coolness clout? Like who is richer, who comes from crater social privilege etc.

For example, in high school, the really cool brand was Ecko– they were really expensive, I think a T-shirt was about 35 $40, and a hoodie was almost maybe 70 or $80! No way in hell I could afford that.

So anyways, it seems that modern day times, masculinity is measured by dollars. He who has more money is considered more masculine and more dominant.

The body as the ultimate toy?

This is where weightlifting, powerlifting, bodybuilding is a little bit productive; it posits that the body, the human body is the ultimate thing of admiration and worth.

But obviously the number one issue is taking steroids, injections, weird hormonal things testosterone etc.

But, detaching yourself from nonsensical supplements, steroids, whether they be “natural, or not… The body is the ultimate toy, the ultimate tool and instrument.

“Life without music would be a mistake” – Nietzsche

The human body could be seen as music, a musical instrument and dance. In fact, to dance in public, or to dance in front of other people might be wanting the most courageous things that one could do.

Pet peeves?

I don’t like making eye contact with emasculated, emasculated, low testosterone men.

If anything I wonder… man with low testosterone, or with no masculinity… is he even a man anymore?

Perhaps I am the great hater and tyrant?

Sometimes, I have this moral indignation that somehow I’m the good guy, and that whenever I treat people nicely and they do not reciprocate, it infuriates me. But maybe a more productive way to think about this is that actually impact, I am the bad guy, I’m the tyrant, I’m the asshole, and I act… Maybe I should delight in being the bully or the bad guy?

The notion of the bull, bully it literally comes from the notion of bull, typically seen as the strongest, the most dominant animal with the most strength. Even Lamborghini, what is the logo and emblem? The raging bull.

Become more bull-like

Also in regards to finances, maybe a simple fitness soft shift is that we should only be long or bullshit about certain things, instead of being bearish, or shorting things.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong about shortselling, I think it is another market dynamic which makes the market work. There needs to be short sellers, and also sellers, or buyers and sellers, some people who are bullish and optimistic about things, and other individuals who are bearish or pessimistic about things.

But maybe in terms of philosophy, a good idea is to become more like a bull — insane, extreme optimism!

What else?

The mass and the strength and the power and ferocity of the bull?

“I’m a bull just like the hometown!” – Ye

Why is it that Michael Jordan, the Chicago Bulls, the Bulls will always be number one in history?

First, the colors. I think the color red is and will always be the most dominant color. For example, when it comes to looking at traffic lights, what is the most important color? Red. They call it a stoplight, not a “go” light. Also, there’s a reason why really really important critical things are in red, stop signs, the color of blood, firetrucks, etc.

Also, if you think about this long-term, apparently the Apex outfit or dress for anybody to wear is all red. For example the woman with the beautiful red dress, or even better yet in modern day times, if I ever buy a new tuxedo or outfit, I will want an all red blood red tuxedo. Or think about the infamous red leather jacket of Tyler Durden and Brad Pitt fight club.

This is also why Ferrari will always be superior to Lamborghinis, because the official color of a Ferrari is red, whereas Lamborghini is yellow. Yellow is good, and also very attractive, but red is better.

Ultra red

Sometimes I think I spend a lot of time thinking about nonsense, superficial things, but ultimately, I think this all matters.

For example, cars. What is the best car color? The new Tesla ultra red is phenomenal. If you see in real life, on the new Tesla model three, or even the Tesla model S plaid, ultra red is the most attractive, brilliant and beautiful color.

How to Live a Better Life

People have the wrong thought and assumption that somehow… having more money will make them live a “more” better life. This is not the case.

Here this is where critical thinking, physiology, practical thinking comes into play. I think if your true goal is to live a better life, you gotta think about physiology, environment, life in general, not money.

The sun?

Probably the greatest realization and discovery that me Cindy and Seneca had recently was the discovery of the California science center, taking the metro, and being able to access it all simply while jumping on the metro, not having to drive at all. The reason why this is such a big deal is that Truth be told, this life workflow has brought 1 million extra joy to my life.

Why?

First, there is all this talk about cities of the future etc., and the truth is taking the metro, will indeed provide you with a “better” life.

How and why?

First, contrary to the traditional antisocial behavior modernist line of thinking, the truth is people are actually much happier when they are kind of surrounded by people, or at least adjacent to other people.

For example, when you’re on the metro, being able to just be surrounded by other human bodies is actually strangely comforting, fun, and even the last few times that we have all taken the metro together, we had discovered some really cool people! Small talk, meeting new folks has been extremely uplifting.

Second, physiology. Thought to myself; we know that is bad, and that is good… I thought of this invention of a standing car. We have standing desks, walking treadmill desks, why not the equivalent for transportation?

Surprisingly, it exists! The metro!

When you’re riding a metro, you could be straight up, and even walk around the cabin. The reason why this is so useful is that your physiology has improved by 1 billion x.

Also, thinking about your kids; kids love the metro! Actually which is funny; adults, we all dream about owning a certain type of car, but, kids don’t really care about ownership; they care more about experiences.

For example, the first time we jumped on the metro from the Culver City station, it was probably the most joy I’ve ever seen in Seneca’s face and his life.

Why? When we are walking around the metro, he always sees the metro going around, but I don’t think he actually really knew you could actually go on it. And once he is on it, it is so exciting and fun!

First, it is actually really really fast. A lot faster than driving, even if there is no traffic, which is an impossible in Los Angeles, even on Saturdays and Sundays.

Second, you get a really really cool elevated view of Los Angeles. I find it actually really exciting to jump on the metro, because what we have going for us in Los Angeles, is that our metro is above ground, which means that we are not trapped underground like the mold people in New York City. I think the reason why people don’t like the metro in New York City is that you have to go underground, in Los Angeles, it is all above ground, which means that you get lots of natural light, and great view of the city.

what is the purpose of human beings?

I think this is the question which has pled flossers for thousands of years. The truth is that we are here, this is a fact. Now what?

A lot of these loser existential philosophers wonder, why are we here?

I believe that this line of thinking is a waste of time. Much more productive to consider, now that we are here, what should I do with my life?

I think most people approach life the following way:

How do I progress through life with a minimal amount of pain, sorrow, and suffering… and maximize my base pleasures?

For example, people do the pain in the sorrow of modern day living with painkillers, antidepressants, marijuana, television and media, music, podcast, going to festivals, going to burning man, psychedelics, alcohol, drugs etc. Modern day soma.

Ideas

First, the simple thought is in regards to transit, getting around, tried to figure out whether you could do it all while standing, or walking, etc.

Even my critique about riding a bicycle is that it forces you to sit. Anything which forces you to sit is bad.

Second, think the sun. I watched this insanely inspiring IMAX film at the California science center with Santa and Cindy, called deep space, and the general thought about it was that the sun was the epicenter of all life at least in our galaxy.

And then the turbo thought I had:

Think Heat.

We also saw the Leonardo da Vinci exhibit, and he attempted to create a perpetual machine, but as we all know, it is impossible and it doesn’t work and it feels because much of motion is actually lost to heat.

Which made me think, is motion, power, life, just heat?

Even one of the easiest modern day ways to make your life better is to crank up the heat! I find that people have this foolish optimization in life in which they subject themselves to terrible cold in order to “save money”. But don’t these fools realize that converting your money into heat, for your home is probably the wisest trade?

Therefore, ways to heat up your life include creaking up the heat at your house, doing hot yoga, or investing in insulation for your home, or just wearing insulated clothes. For example set up buying a new BMW or Tesla, just buy a brandnew Canada goose jacket!

Food?

The difficulty with prices is that it is all framing.

For example, the big issue with apps, digital things that nobody wants to pay money for an app. Or a game. Because it is digital, we all think and hope and wish that it should be free. Why? The reproduction of digital things are technically free, but The big issue here is that the cost of production and maintenance is high. As a consequence, nobody likes to pay for digital things.

This is here where the subscription model has become interesting; I think people are actually more willing to pay for a subscription than to actually pay for a digital good.

The halving!

The bitcoin halving is happening very very soon, on April 20. Don’t be left behind.

Finance thoughts?

What is it that people in Los Angeles, the Bay Area, California, or whatever like to complain about or comment on? The cost of living.

For example, rent, rent prices, as well as buying a house, homeownership, single-family homes, condos etc.

As of now, I still think it is wiser to rent a more expensive place in an insanely desirable neighborhood, with the ultimate 100% walk ability score, then on a home, even a very good home in a non-walkable area.

Why in terms of your personal happiness, walking is insanely positive for your happiness. The more you walk the happier you will be.

Food

Grass fed beef, grass fed ground beef, they sell them at Costco for really cheap! Get the grass fed ground beef patties, in the frozen owl at Costco. Probably the best deal on the planet. Why breast fed beef? From a practical perspective, naturally cattle consume grass, not corn. Therefore, the real thought is if you consume cattle that was naturally fed grass, as nature intended it, shouldn’t it have superior nutrition, which will better nurse issue in terms of your overall health, well-being, how will you sleep, your energy levels etc.? Don’t be like one of these foolish people “calories “, consuming 2000 cal of Twinkies is different than consuming calories of ribeye steak or bone marrow.

Scientism

True science is critical thinking and first principles thinking.

For example, a true scientist is not foolish enough to believe calories in calories out, the insanely foolish idea that somehow the average human being “burns” 2000 cal a day, and if one keeps their calorie consumption to below 2000 a day, somehow he or she will not get fat.

The reason why most scientists are foolish is that they think scaler, numbers in numbers out, rather than dynamics.

The truth about that, getting fat, pudding on post fat tissue is it has to deal more with hormones, insulin levels, sugar and starches then it does with calories.

Also, I think the whole thing about protein overblown. I think actually, if you’re true goal is to put on muscle mass, and to become more muscular and dominant, the true goal is actually cons more dietary cholesterol, and beef liver, organ meats, etc.

For example, loser Bill Gates is trying to get all of us to eat less meat, to consume more of a “plant based” diet“. But let us consider what he looks like, just google it, Google images what Elon Musk tweeted “the quickest way to kill your Boner”– (picture Bill Gates, with his obese morbidly obese stomach jutting out. )

Sleep

What is my definition of maternity, or the modern day man?

Somebody who trades his or her health for money and productivity.

For example, anybody who sacrifices their sleep in order to finish their work relay tasks, or to be more productive, is a slave to this system.

My very very very simple suggestion is when you get home after work, or when the sun goes down or whatever, turn off your devices 100%. Turn off your phone, all the way off, turn off the iPad etc.

Instead, the best way to wind down in the evening is take a really really hot bath, or take a really really hot shower, read a book or whatever. Try to hit a new meat PR, a new meat personal record, how many pounds of grass fed ground beef can you consume in one sitting?

Media is toxic

I’ve also found that one should have a strict cut off time for consuming media. My funny thought is actually the best time to consume me any sort of media, watching a movie or Netflix is actually first thing in the morning. Why? Media is insanely stimulating, and will disturb your sleep, Because a lot of these plot lines in these shows and boobies keep your brain running even late at night.

If you want to watch a movie or show, do it while drinking or consuming your morning coffee.

Anti screens?

The other day Cindy Seneca and I visited the Tesla store in Santa Monica, and some thing I never realized:

Looking at the touchscreen LCD display in a Tesla at nighttime really hurts your eyes.

That alone made me think, because sensitive to light, never buy a Tesla.

Even one surprising thing that I personally love about my 2010 Prius is that there is no glaring LCD screens. And also you could easily turn off the display if you want to. I am a tech whiz, but I couldn’t intuitively figure out how to dim the screen of the Tesla LCD screen; Not good.

iPad is bad for kids?

Send because now three years, one month old, and I am actually very very happy that ever since he was born, he has never watched YouTube, any of these dumb shows or whatever. As a consequence, he is not subjected to any media.

The only apps I consider good for the iPhone or the iPad is GarageBand, switch playgrounds on the iPad, and more recently, I’m a big fan of the poly bridge 2 app; Seneca loves the physics.

However ultimately, at times I’m considering just throwing away my iPad Pro in the trash. Why? Even when he is doing something “educational”, like learning about physics on the iPad, he is static and still, and actually a big problem about kids on an iPad is when they are so focused on it, they will often pee in their pants, they forget their bodily controls.

Airport, my suggestion is if you’re going to be a new parent or whatever, the simple thoughts:

Never buy your kid an iPad, a stupid Amazon tablet, whatever.
on your iPhone, never install the YouTube app, uninstalled it immediately. It is like giving your kid heroin.
On the iPhone, the only app you should let them play with is GarageBand.

The real world

At the age of 36, looking back at my childhood, my only regrets is how much time I wasted watching TV, and playing video games. The truth is only reason why I played so many video games to watch so much TV was that my mom was at work all day, and my dead dad was just watching TV all day, so I had no parental supervision, overseeing, Nobody to guide me in real life.

As a consequence, my number one tip is the best way to be a good parent is when you’re with your cat at the park, turn your phone all the way off, and just lock it in the glove compartment before you go out to play. Or when you’re at home, once again turn your phone all the way off.

One idea I am actually very committed to is I will never buy Seneca an iPhone, not even in high school. If you ever wants one, I’ll just tell him to get a job and buy one himself.

Maybe if he somehow doesn’t need a phone down the line, I will buy him a phone. Or just try to schedule in such a way that he doesn’t need a phone.

The future is physical

whenever Seneca plays well at the park, is running around good, going on hikes with me etc.… I feel overjoyed. The days I feel bad is when it is raining outside, and we can’t go out.

Ultimate privilege of any child or human being or adult is the privilege of being physical. The privilege of walking 30,000 steps a day, the privilege of interacting in the real world. Let us think, if you’re real life was an RPG, would you want to be stuck in your apartment all day, or conquering the real world?

ERIC

Only cowards spend money?

Propaganda

Born into consumerism

We like to treat our kids the way we wish we were treated as kids

The matrix

Does man live to make money, or does money exist to serve man?

Minimum viable income

Drugs are bad

Don’t skip leg day

Legs = Testosterone

A life beyond women

Tall dark and handsome

Why do we desire to purchase certain things?

The goal is to shoot more!

You cannot hide an M-16 in your front right pocket.

Your word is your sword ￼￼

The best compliment

“I am a god”

Ethics is the future, not technology

What or which concepts are absent in the past?

Spartan philosophy

Men and women must be trained alike

Only purchase digital things? ￼

Putting your money where your mouth is ￼

I bought all my Ricoh and LUMIX cameras with my own real money

Trust?

Independently wealthy with Bitcoin

Why bitcoin is the future

Economic theory

The next generation of comments on the internet

EK PHOTO SUPPLY

EK WORKSHOPS

New books, new media?

Forward the ideas

Only cowards spend money?

Propaganda

Born into consumerism

We like to treat our kids the way we wish we were treated as kids

The matrix

Does man live to make money, or does money exist to serve man?

Minimum viable income

Drugs are bad

Don’t skip leg day

Legs = Testosterone

A life beyond women

Tall dark and handsome

Why do we desire to purchase certain things?

The goal is to shoot more!

You cannot hide an M-16 in your front right pocket.

Your word is your sword ￼￼

The best compliment

“I am a god”

Ethics is the future, not technology

What or which concepts are absent in the past?

Spartan philosophy

Men and women must be trained alike

Only purchase digital things? ￼

Putting your money where your mouth is ￼

I bought all my Ricoh and LUMIX cameras with my own real money

Trust?

Independently wealthy with Bitcoin

Why bitcoin is the future

Economic theory

The next generation of comments on the Internet

EK PHOTO SUPPLY

EK WORKSHOPS

New books, new media?

The Spartan Investor

Skin in the game

Are toys bad?

Weapons & armor & shields

Defense?

All debt is bad debt

The goal

Creating your own new Sparta

How to raise your kids

When to attack?

The stoic Spartan investing strategy

Perhaps foolishness is a virtue?

what type of money would Spartans prefer?

Your word is your sword

Only purchase digital things?

Putting your money where your mouth is

Your word is your sword

Only purchase digital things?

Putting your money where your mouth is

Election cycle predictions

Where to get your news?

Don’t opine about something you’re not invested in

2. It is never too late

3. Do you remember blockbuster?

a) Inflation

b) History of money

Death & immortality

Spending money?

Quit buying those dollars

Modern day society is much more greedy?

Power and kids?

Keep stacking those bitcoins