Intro

Hello, my name is Tim. Some people know me as Cliff (college nickname). I've learned that I tend to have a lot of thoughts about a lot of things and nowhere to put them. Though I'm personally not really a master at anything, I love sharing ideas and teaching people. The purpose of this blog will really be to document the things that I've learned and am currently learning. At the same time, I hope that by sharing, I can gain feedback, incite discussion, and also help others in their own journey. So.... here goes.

Focus

The primary focus, at least for now, is to document what I'm learning about AI development. Here and there I'll do a "Brain Dump" of all the topics and technologies that I used or learned about during that day (or whatever period of time) as a means to review the information. But for now, this will be an AI focused blog, detailing my personal AI learning journey.

TIM.md

If you've been using Claude Code, you should know that you can store longer term context memory in the CLAUDE.md file. So, without going too deep into my full history, I want to provide a little context about myself.

What am I good at

My 3 core hobbies in life are: Table Tennis (ping pong), cooking, and gaming... probably in that order. These hobbies drive my every day and are a core part of my identity. Eventually, I'll make a random post diving deeper into table tennis and cooking, but for now just know that those two are my greatest passions. To quote myself, "If money wasn't a thing, I'd be a chef". At this point, I'd also consider being a table tennis teacher.

What do I want to be good at

Initiative, commitment, and responsibility. I always thought that I would just continue flowing through life, accepting that I've already reached my proverbial peak. As a result, I never took the initiative to create something new, never committed to any long-term goals, and tried my best to assume as little responsibility as possible.

My pitfalls

I'm extremely disorganized and unstructured; I envy anyone who has a fully built out schedule with tasks and has a habit to keep up with all of it. When my train of thought gets too deep and complex, I end up in an infinite loop of thinking and eventually just give up. I put off important tasks and decisions, feeding back into my failure to initiate, commit, and assume responsibility. I believe it's this failure to organize and create routine, that leads to my inability to truly master a skill. I've always been aware of my bad habits but have never dedicated effort to fixing them.

Current thoughts and principles to live by

Conscious Decisions

Make conscious decisions and act immediately. A simple interjectory thought can really have a huge impact. Whether it be doom-scrolling before bed, being stuck in decision paralysis, or even playing too passively in table tennis, these are all a result of subconscious reversions to bad habit. I've realized that if I immediately execute on conscious thoughts during periods of subconscious action, I'm able to stop myself... to an extent. Still work in progress.

Consumption vs. Production

Don't fall to consumerism. Maintain or develop a sense of self production, regardless of what is produced. I've been trying to catch myself from falling deeper into the depths of consumerism, but technology has made it so easy: watching endless YouTube, scrolling Reddit, 1-click shopping on Amazon, and non-stop gaming sessions. I believe that all of these, coupled with an uninteresting 9-5 job, destroyed my passion for life; I was doing nothing at my job and mindlessly wasting all of my time outside my job. Thinking of my days in terms of production rather than consumption has given me a new angle on life. Even if my drawings suck or my app looks like poo, it doesn't matter. I created something.

Roadmap

• Develop better habits (better routines, sleep schedule, initiatives and commitments) through task management and conscious decision making
• Develop deeper understandings of Software Development and AI Tooling
• Finish DeFi Buddy App (transaction categorization and portfolio management)
• Publish the real blog site
• Find a new job

Summary

I feel like I embody the phrase jack of all trades, master of none. I have such a vast breadth of, sometimes random, sometimes focused, knowledge but I generally lack depth. I pride myself as a quick learner, picking up beginner to intermediate concepts and foundations in a relatively short amount of time. But I always hit a mental block: if I want to develop mastery of a skill, I'll need to dedicate 10x more time to learning increasingly harder concepts and techniques. My brain doesn't get motivated enough to dedicate that time, especially if it isn't in my core hobbies bucket. As such, I've identified myself as a "Fundamentals" expert; extremely proficient at picking up and understanding the core basics, but never enough to break out of mediocrity. My hope is for this blog to push me towards continuous learning, experimentation, and self-expression—to break free from imposter syndrome and self-doubt.

Outro

If you've gotten to the end here, you're a real one. Given the era of AI that we're in now, I have to mention that there was no AI assistance in writing this post... can't say the same about my code. I did a lot more introspection than I had planned for, but that's just my life, I guess. There's still a long way to go and a lot more for me to learn, but for the first time since graduating college, I feel like I'm not living mindlessly. Though AI does enable us to use less brain power, it also enables us to be more curious and forces us to reevaluate what it means to be human. I'm hoping that by blogging about my experiences with AI, as well as my personal philosophies about living in an era of AI, I'll be able to discover more about my own humanity.