Friday, July 11, 2008
Brightwind is back!
Brightwind returns today! For a long time I haven't been sure where to go with this site. Ever since my mother got cancer way back in 2005, I've had all sorts of ambiguous feelings about what I should do with my life and even more ambiguous feelings about how in the world I could write about it. But now, that ambiguity is just floating away like so many clouds; I've been learning so much, talking to really interesting people, and most importantly rejuvenating my spiritual life through a series of journeys, prayers and meditations. Some of this is very personal of course, but much of it is on subjects I think lots of people can understand and appreciate.
So from now on, I'm going to start sharing thoughts and pictures and whatever comes to mind more. I might do various updates or changes or whatnot, but really my main purpose is that I can keep in touch and share ideas with my friends scattered about the world, who can also leave comments and share their ideas and thoughts too!
The few minutes you spend here on Brightwind should be very bright indeed, I hope, though not necessarily very windy.
Wednesday, January 18, 2006
You know what? What do you know? hmmm....
A strange thing has happened! I’ve suddenly realized why I haven’t updated this website since February.
I’ve changed.
That’s to say: the things that have happened to me, the questions I’ve asked, and the truths I’ve been exploring in my life this year have made me understand that the previous Brightwind no longer fits my mould. I have to reframe this website’s management and organization to do things in a rather different way.
So. It is with some amount of mixed sadness and relief that I tentatively announce to the thronging millions who have been checking my website for the last 11 months each and every day that David Bowers will no longer write for Brightwind. Instead it will be taken over by a small cast of fictional characters (created, scripted, and copyrighted by a mysterious group of 1 to 10 people and/or demi gods).
May your life, dear reader, be eternally blessed with interesting questions.
Wednesday, April 06, 2005
another change of direction...
I haven’t known how to say this, so I haven’t said anything for a long time. I suppose I still don’t know how to say this, but I should really say something… My fear is that I’m going to sound depressed and upset and I’m going to make other people feel that way as well, so let me state for the record that I am not depressed at the time of writing this entry. Life just threw another curve-ball, that’s all.
I was in China just about a month ago. I had a great time in Macau in February, saw lots of great friends, even met up with a few great friends in Nanjing and Shanghai in the end of February and the beginning of March. And then I got a phone call from my family back in the States saying that my mother was in the hospital.
Turned out that she had a brain tumor, and that the surgery would take quite some time for her to recover from, and that I was needed back in Colorado Springs, Colorado to help take care of her during the next few months. Of course when she told me this I was more than happy to come help my mother! Who wouldn’t?
So the long and the short of it is that I’m not in China anymore. I’m deeply sorry to all my Chinese friends that I missed while I was there for about two weeks. I swear I miss you even more now. Of course I’m very happy to be here with my mother, and I’m grateful for the chance to help her out, but I won’t pretend that my heart doesn’t cry out with longing to return to China, be with my friends, and continue my graduate studies.
Mom and her doctors and everybody are all hoping that I’ll be able to come back to China in September. I think I’ll wait a little while before thinking about it too much. I hate it when I get my hopes up for something and then I have to change plans again. That’s been happening a lot over the last few years, so I’m taking a break from plans of any sort as much as I can.
So that’s the latest on my whereabouts and current condition and all. If you’re concerned about my mom, you can find out the latest on her health at her own personal website: nancybowers.com/updates
Please keep her (and me too, while you’re at it) in your prayers, if you’re the praying sort. If you don’t pray, you could always just send us loads of money instead…
Ha ha… just joking. I know that’s not very funny, but hey… one ought not to be serious all the time. God loves laughter, you know…
Brightwind News • David's Life • Family • (8) Comments • Permalink
Friday, December 31, 2004
The Bright Wind Blows...
My time in America has been fulfilling and good for me, but I've been learning that it's not the place I need to be right now. On one hand, coming back here was like a kick in the face, while on the other, it was like a sweet honey.
For a long time, I had been planning to spend a long time in China - maybe my whole life - learning about the Chinese, living among them, becoming friends with them, and sharing my life with them. This has always exhilarated me -- from every word I breathed in the Chinese language, to every night I spent in a Chinese bed, I knew that my life was growing and expanding in ways I could not predict.
But some things tempted me to come back to America, and to find out if maybe it wouldn't be better for me to stay here for a while. Suffice it to say that even though I always intended to go back to China, I considered being here for a year or so. Then, those temptations which had lured me here suddenly became unhealthy for me and they left me wondering what I should do. I felt ashamed that I had even left China in the first place, when it had been such a great home for me and held so much promise, and I thought maybe I needed to stay here for a while, just in order to become worthy of going back.
But things don't work that way. Worthiness doesn't come from outward measurements: degrees from western universities, or years of experience in some profession. Somehow I realized that if I'm going to be worthy to go back to China, I have to embrace the worthiness I was born with.
You see, I know so many people there in China, who are to me like stars shining in the sky of humility and friendliness. I hear some foreigners complain about problems they have with Chinese people, but somehow I think that they live in a different China from the one I have known for 4 years. Truly, the Chinese friends I am blessed with make me feel awed. They are so different from me, and yet, in every way that counts, not different at all. None of these dear people ever looked at me and thought I was not worthy.
For me, the word I made up for this website, "brightwind," has taken on a real meaning. It is that mysterious wind which blows you where you need to be in life. It may blow you onto a certain path, then off it, then on it again, but all the time it is blowing you in the right direction. It is the force behind "Yuan Fen," as the Chinese love to call it -- the way people come into your life just when you need them, and the way you come into their lives, just when they need you.
This brightwind whispered in my ear that China was not waiting for me to be worthy. The reality was something else. When you hear the brightwind calling you, soothing your heart, you can't really put into words the message you hear. But suddenly, it makes you feel warm and content with your life as it is, with the plans as they were before you tried to fix them -- unbroken, whole, and worthy.
I hold in my hands a plane ticket to Nanjing, arriving February 26. (Happy New Year)
China • David's Life • Love • (21) Trackbacks • Permalink
Tuesday, September 14, 2004
The Only Thing We Have to Fear...
Probably the most noticeable change since the last time I lived in the U.S. is the heavily charged environment of public fear. The experience of 9/11 has so traumatized the country of my birth, that it leaves many Americans in the constant fear that something like this could happen again. Usually this fear rides at a low level of consciousness; it still allows us to go to work, make stupid jokes, and go to sleep at night, but it influences the world of public thinking and decision-making so much that hardly any topic is covered in the news which does not betray some kind of fear motivating its discussion.
In this election season, the fear seems to be projected less onto various terrorist organizations and more onto whichever presidential candidate one dislikes most. The sense is that if that politician you dislike is elected then the country is in real danger, and this feeling is stronger now than in any other election I can remember in my life.
If I didn’t know better, my tendency would be to become deeply afraid of the way the media corporations continually reinforce this fear in American society. I often look around me and notice varying ways in which some individuals and organizations bend this fear to their advantage. It would appear that they are inflaming this fear in order to achieve multiple ends, from improving their ratings to influencing the election.
But I do know better. Having been away for so long, I can sense that my own fear is likely a response to the public fear all around me rubbing off on me too. Whether the American media really is horribly corrupt or not, my being afraid of it doesn’t do anyone any good. I must work hard not to be afraid of that, or other negative possibilities. While each part of the American community seems more and more eager to blame a certain group or segment of society for all the horrible things that could happen to us in the future, I would like to work hard not to succumb to the need to blame others that fear inspires.
At times like this, each person has a choice to make: whether to be a force for unity and agreement between individuals and groups around you, or to be a force for disunity and attacking whichever group you direct your fear at most. To feel afraid is natural, but when we allow that fear to control our actions, we must take it as a sign that we all have a lot of growing up to do—both on our own and as a society.
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