Dialogic

It’s Monday morning here in Santa Cruz, getting close to the end of March, spring is here, the sun is out the grass is as green as it will ever be, the fields are full of mustard flowers, the people are enjoying being outside getting fresh air, the puddles are drying up it’s been a wet year and California is out of drought. So things are proceeding apace here in the Golden State as all around the...

True News It’s the middle of winter, approaching spring. We’ve been experiencing some significant weather, what they call an atmospheric river. Rainbows, green grass, clean air and lots of healthy people doing healthy things. We also have our own problems here in Santa Cruz, as I imagine exist everywhere. We’re only human and everyone has room for improvement. Everyone has a space they can grow in...

Personal branding or building your reputation and name? The secret to photography. Timing is everything.

Today, I’m going to talk photography, as it is core to who I am and key to what I do. When people ask me what my podcast is about, I say it’s about photography, digital media, culture in the digital era, art and literature. It’s a form of questions, an inquiry. There’s a certain mysterious element to it as well, because it’s kind of unable to be forced. I feel like if I tried to come up with a str...

New Year’s Eve in Santa Cruz, pushups done, drinking beer, doing podcast, listening to said podcast and writing about that very podcast. Thanks for listening, thank you for following along. Just gonna have a little fun with the whole thing if I can, if I may, if I must: oh yes all three of the above, because I’m a content creator and I’m creating a cloud of thought that I’m going to distill it lat...

Hello Folks,  This is Jake J. Thomas bringing you another episode of Dialogic two days before the end of the year, going to be easing into 2019. What kinds of challenges will we face, what kinds of opportunities? Now is a time for reflecting about that. I said last podcast how good I feel about going into 2019. From being a dad to working with creatives, I really enjoy my life and love how I make...

Dialogic podcast, holiday check-in with the meme-savy people about the week between Xmas and NYE, the taint. Taint nothing but a weird little chunk of surreal time. It’s also a time of mass-reflection, people are pretending to get introspective; it’s resolution time. I want to think about it in a way that could be useful to myself and if it helps me it will help someone else. Upon reflection, I ha...

Thoughts about Dorothea Lange's photograph Migrant Mother in relation to the images coming from the escalation of tension at the border with the arrival of the caravan of refugees.

I discuss self-discipline: what it is, how to build more of it, and why it is important. I also delve into Dale Carnegie's methodology for working with people by being positive. Finally, I give some thoughts about the situation at the border, and what a future could look like if we changed our relationship to other countries could look like. Thanks for listening. Peace!

What can we learn from the recent California fires? How can we create a more civil public discourse? What does Turkey Day have to do with the Camp Fire? All these questions and more are discussed in this episode.

In this episode, I share some thoughts about the history of racism and my own personal experiences with it. I draw from this smart article: https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/01/05/260006815/the-ugly-fascinating-history-of-the-word-racism Racism is a huge problem in our culture and understanding its roots is part of how we get rid of it. Thanks for listening to the podcast. Peace.

In this episode I discuss Plato's allegory of the cave from The Republic and talk about how philosophy and self-help books can go together to great effect and why. Excuse my voice, I've had a cold, but been staying with the pushups, baby. I hope you enjoy your listen.

A brief interlude to talk about fitness, sweaty selfies, commitment to exercise, waking up early, and sharing your grit and resolution on social media. Shouts out to Jocko Willink, who is the greatest show your sweat waking up early dude on the Interwebs.

In this episode, Jake opens up the topic of sexuality and honesty in the digital age. Sure to be a recurring topic, he sketches out the history of social media to provide an explanation for why we are in our current situation. He also suggests embracing the concept of self-help and recommends Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People as a starting point for getting better at living a pri...

In this episode, Jake does some freewheeling thinking about cultural sensitivity and being overly sensitive in the social media outrage culture era. Using the Rosanne Barr incident as an example, he discusses our need to be culturally sensitive when talking about culture and race, and also makes a case that we also should be better at accepting apologies and looking deeper into the issues than the...

In this podcast I start my read and riff series, where I read from books I think will be valuable to you and then riff on what they mean to me. In this episode, I begin to read and discuss Susan Sontag's famous book of essays On Photography. I delve into Chapter 1 "In Plato's Cave" and discuss how these issues are relevant to today's photo-crazy world. Thanks for listening, I hope I give you somet...

Tired of boring art? Want to help create the change you want to see? How about: be aggressively creative. Life is too short to not make kickass art. Listen to me rant about how I want to live and create. I didn't mention them in the podcast, but I was inspired by Jocko Willink's podcast when he talks about the necessity of hard work, with Robert Hughe's characterization of modern art as creating t...

Jake strives to give his friends encouragement about how to navigate the perilous world of digital media. We all need some constructive criticism, but how do you manage the feedback you're encountering. Jake's answer is to be your own best critic. Know your faults, own your mistakes, and be kind enough and encouraging enough to keep up the will to continue working. We don't want to be delusional,...

Jake explains how he got to Joshua Tree for Bhakti Fest, why it’s sometimes good to do some work for free and he discusses the desert scene a bit.

Jake takes a slightly different approach by ranting against drugs. He believes that you don't need anything more than a couple of beers and Cannabis. He understands that being an artist comes with a lot of baggage but he wants to stress to you that your best work is only going to come from hard work and never the influence of drugs. Peace!

Jake reflects on meeting and photographing one of his favorite young rappers, Maliibu Miitch. He shares some thoughts about how to offer and provide value as a way of opening doors to creative collaborations, reminds you to keep the desire of your audience or client first, and discusses what good management is and can do when it comes to the arts. Not only was he super happy to meet Maliibu, but h...

Jake discusses three people who inspire him: Jocko Willink, Anthony Tashnick, and Gary Vaynerchuck. Hopefully he inspires you to think about how you're using social media, how you balance your digital life with a physical one, and to find people who inspire you to be your best. Jocko's Podcast: http://jockopodcast.com/ Anthony Tashnick on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anthonytashnick/ and F...

Further discussion of Ta-Nehisi Coates' Between the World and Me, thoughts on the controversy of Cornel West's critique of Coates, and a meditation on the power of art and the power of criticism.

In this episode, Jake discusses the first part of Te-Nehisi Coates' powerful book The World Between Us, pays tribute to the activism of his friend Michael Jolson, meditates on the power of art and literature, and asks the question: "How would it feel to have a black son."

How do you get out of a stagnant phase? Inspired by my friend Bonnie Sultan I meditate (rant) about how to change patterns in your life.