Gokuism – The Church of Goku
Dear friend, have you accepted Goku as your personal lord and savior? If not, then please listen to my Good News! The Church of Goku can help you increase your power level to Over 9,000 and follow in the sacred footsteps of lord Goku by training with King Kai, hallowed be thy name.
That’s right, there is now a Dragon Ball religion. It is called Gokuism, also known as The Church of Goku.
Gokuism is the belief that the principles of Dragon Ball provide a moral compass for one’s life, and that Goku is an ideal role model and moralistic person. By some definitions, it implies that Goku provides personal, global, and universal salvation, and that his death and resurrections were for our sake.
With so many religions already existing, why create this one based on Dragon Ball?
In today’s blog post you’ll learn where Gokuism came from, what its practitioners believe, and explore some thought provoking questions about this new faith.
continue …
Work In Progress
2011 has been a year of changes.
In spiritual cultivation communities, the master’s teach that understanding and improvement comes through conflict, either with ourselves, with others, or with our environments. This year I’ve experienced all three, continuously.
At the end of 2010 and start of 2011 I had a high paying job at an internet startup. I thought it would be great, but unfortunately I wasn’t happy and the job consumed every aspect of my life. I decided that I wasn’t happy there, and chose to quit.
This decision had a lot of ramifications. A few negative, but mostly positive, such as figuring out what I really want to be doing with my life.
Also, I started dating, and on May 1 I proposed to Deborah Yun.
Deborah’s a really great person who is always striving to be better in life. She has taught me a lot, and helped fill in the gaps and missing pieces on the road to fulfilling my potential. Plus she’s cute and funny.
You can see her photography at www.deborahyun.com.
But very quickly we both found out that living the freelance life (me a website developer and her a photographer) in Los Angeles can be very difficult and tiring.
We decided to move in together for a lot of reasons, including saving money and being closer to one another.
Attending Anime Expo
I’ll be attending Anime Expo from July 1 to July 4, in Los Angeles, CA.
If you’re going to Anime Expo this year and want to get together, then drop me a line on the contact form or via facebook.
I’m going as a journalist for The Epoch Times, and also because it’s a good opportunity to be nerdy and have some fun.
For those who don’t know, Anime Expo is the largest anime and Japanese pop culture conference in North America. Hundreds of thousands of people come every year during the 4th of July weekend. Next year I want to be there to promote my Dragon Ball book.
I’d love to meet with you so we can talk about Dragon Ball or simply hang out, play games and become friends.
And it will also be interesting to see what type of a presence Dragon Ball has at this years conference. The last two years have been rather sparse, aside from an occasional cosplayer.
Hope to see you there!
Goku’s Simple Life
Goku lives a simple life.
Like a wandering pilgrim, Goku’s only possessions are a martial arts uniform and occasionally the nyoi bo staff.
Goku is almost single mindedly focused on his martial arts cultivation.
Chi-Chi handles all of the domestic affairs, including the caring of their house, the monetary concerns, and the raising of children.
This reminded me of my own life and how it is a bit too complicated.
By an average person’s standard my life may seem rather simple: An average guy with an apartment and some stuff. There are also career, family, social relationships, time, personal projects, and trying to achieve many things simultaneously. Perhaps too many.
In regard to physical stuff in particular, at times all of the external content can feel a little heavy, because each one of those items is connected to my emotions. Each material item, when picked up, transports my memory back 5, 10, in some cases even 15 years. They all carry emotional weight. An outsider cannot see or feel this.
I recently read a book called The Power of Less, by Leo Babauta, and it emphasized the importance of simplifying our lives.
I also read a blog post on Man vs. Debt that presented the idea of taking inventory of all the items in your possession, one by one, and the benefit of the process.
So that’s what I did.
Refocused
Goku Meditates
Hey everybody. Quick update.
I recently quit my web development job as a UX Engineer in an attempt to refocus my life.
My goal is to spend more time working on the Dragon Ball book and to publish it as quickly as possible. I’ll be living on savings and occasional freelance gigs while I dedicate my time to the book and some other endeavors. Overall I am working on simplifying my life through the power of “less is more.”
It was a big decision for me as I realized that web development is not what I want to do with my life. Definitely a good skill to have, but not what I’m passionate about.
Progress update on the DBZ book: The editors are working on their draft now and I’ll take their notes and apply it during my next wave of edits. In the mean time, I’m cleaning things up and getting ready. I’m also working on trying to get the book to be officially approved by TOEI in Japan. This would have huge ramifications for both the book and the entire Dragon Ball community!
How to Change Others for the Long Term
Piccolo and Gohan - Master and Disciple
You cannot force someone to change their heart. The most effective long-term way to change others is to change oneself.
A common way to change someone is to directly inform, persuade, or force another person to align themselves with the way in which you desire them to change. Barring any personal reasons for resistance, a willing and intelligent person will usually comply with the requirements of the request.
However, this direct method is primarily one of short-term change, because it is only the external behavior that has changed, not the underlying mindset or mechanisms that led to such a behavior. Usually it will take 3 or more applications of such a method for it to ‘stick.’
In order for a person to truly change for the long-term they have to change their mindset, be willing to let go of their current notions or methodologies and make a conscious effort to change on their own behalf because it is what they want, for themselves and for others. continue …
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