Past the winter solstice, everything feels ready to begin again. After dropping my child off at school at eight in the morning, I watered the plants on the office windowsill and then sat down to write.
This independent blog was started in December 2008. It has now been with me for a full fifteen years. From age twenty-five to forty, it has accompanied me through the most youthful stretch of my life. Sometimes I go back through old entries and laugh at that angry young man I used to be. Sometimes I look at old photos and see how green and unformed that younger version of me was. At times it even feels unreal, as if that person could not possibly have been me. Then I smile to myself and return to the present.
The feeling this year
The blog has changed as I have changed, swaying with the wind, shifting from place to place, everything in motion and everything unfolding on its own. Once you learn to settle into circumstances and accept change, what comes begins to feel like the best arrangement possible.
Life, after all, is ordinary and full of trivial details. Yet the heart itself is capable of release; it is naturally open, unburdened, and free. Little by little this year, I found myself trying to look at the world the way one looks at lakes and mountains, and to handle the mess and variety of daily life with the breadth one feels while gazing at a night sky. More than anything, I wanted to meet everything in life with calmness and a quiet sense of gladness.
What I write about now
What I write has drifted farther and farther from my work, though it never fully leaves it behind. I no longer feel the urge to document my job with the same care and seriousness I once did. These days I would rather do the work, let it go, move on to the next thing, and then let that go too.
When I look back at work from earlier years, it feels much like looking back at my former self: there is a strong sense of unreality. As if it were someone else. As if I were watching that earlier person from above, observing the things he once did.
The blog's style, still changing in place
In recent years, things have mostly stayed like this. Every now and then I open up the template and tinker with the CSS, changing one thing and then changing it back. In truth, I may not be moving forward at all, yet I still enjoy it. By now that cycle itself has become part of the pleasure.
A blog is a bit like clothing. I used to buy different styles more often. Even now I still buy things from time to time, but in the end I realize they are all more or less the same. The differences are not that great. Perhaps that is what comes with age: consciously or not, one starts leaning toward stability. Then it feels enough to let some soft music play, drink tea, and read in peace.
Fewer updates, a tighter rhythm
Both posting and interaction have become less frequent. Especially in the second half of the year, the rhythm of work has felt like a clockwork spring wound tight. Even if you do not want to keep bouncing forward, the turning spring pushes you onward anyway.
I still try my best to update every week, but in all of November I wrote only a single post, which was packed tightly with all kinds of things I wanted to record. Perhaps this is only the beginning. Perhaps the spring will be wound even tighter in the days ahead. Or perhaps I need to step out of that mechanism altogether and become the one winding the spring, instead of the one being driven by it.
Gratitude for those who keep showing up
Many friends have continued to visit and leave comments over the years. That has given me strength, and just as importantly, it has given me new ways to think.
On the days when I missed my father the most, those words brought encouragement and warmth. In times when I felt confused or lost, they brought insight and guidance. When I was happy, there were joyful congratulations. When I felt low, there were blessings quietly planted like seeds.
That may be one of the most beautiful things about an independent blog. Again and again, it reminds me that I am not alone. There are so many of you, some known to me and some not, saying nothing, asking nothing, simply accompanying me in silence.
I have grown especially fond of one thought: a free state of mind comes from not dividing and judging every single moment. In each present moment, life is allowed to bloom on its own, the way grass and trees grow—without purpose, fully, completely.
If I had to choose one word for this year, it would still be natural. The things I did, the people I met, the thoughts I kept turning over—natural, and quietly joyful. I moved through the years after the pandemic, worked in a practical and grounded way, went through a change in position, and found heavier responsibilities settling onto my shoulders. I passed through Wuhan and Zunyi, arranged meetings in Shanghai and Beijing, and traveled through Qinghai and Xinjiang. Each of these was part of a gradual process, and each in its own way brought a kind of sudden clarity.
The heart is always in motion, and at the same time it remains rooted in its own nature, still and unmoved. Joy and sorrow, good and bad—these distinctions do not have to govern everything.
Fifteen years of an independent blog. Time for a selfie—cheese.
