Greetings everyone!
My name is Chuan Hongda. I am a small business owner in South Korea.
It is very fortunate for me to be here and listen to your cultivation experiences. This is a very precious opportunity for me to improve myself in my own cultivation. Following are my cultivation experiences in the past two years. Please feel free to correct me if you find anything inappropriate. The topic
of my speech is: I have been waiting for this Dafa for my whole life.
Since I started building my own business when I was young, I was busy during the first half of my life. After entering my forties, I felt human life meaningless. I was born in a very traditional Catholic family. I also had some knowledge of Buddhism. But both of them could not get my mind off of the negative thoughts about human life. I tried to study calligraphy, play the short flute, practice Tai Chi and Chi Gong, also
learn some Taoist related practices. Good as existent religions are, none of them were what I really wanted. After searching for more than ten years, I still could not find the answer. Maybe the truth that I sought for was not on the earth. So I gave up, and devoted myself to running the business. I spent all my spare time on entertainment, smoking and drinking alcohol.
In April 1997, I met a foreign student from China. He came to visit his uncle who worked in my factory. That evening I had dinner with him. At the table I talked about the traditional values for more than ten minutes, since I always thought that I was knowledgeable about religions and moral values. My
friend listened to me quietly. Then he interrupted me with his own comment: China had this kind of thought as well, and currently there was a Dafa in China, which superseded all religious theories. He started introducing Falun Dafa to me. I was so moved by his introduction. Isn't this what I have been searching for? I was so excited that I put my knees down, kowtowed towards him, and addressed him "master". He quickly dragged me up and said: "we only have one master. If you are to start the cultivation, we can learn together. We both are
practitioners". That was the first time I heard Master Li and Falun Gong. The student also told me the key of cultivation is to upgrade xinxing. He also said he would bring me books on Dafa in the Korean language a month later.
One month later when the Chinese student came back to my office with the book, all my hope and excitement for the whole month disappeared immediately. I Was really disappointed at the sight of the "wan" symbol on the Falun emblem. I yelled: "Woe, this is a book on Buddhism." I said to his face: "Please take it away, I don't want to read it." But my student friend smiled and said that you could just have a glance at it even though you don't want to practice it. He went away and left the book on my desk. For more than a month I had believed that I had found what I had been tirelessly searching for my whole life. But the hope disappeared quickly. I was so depressed that I tried to use alcohol to release my stress. I got totally drunk and lost consciousness that day.
I went back to my office the day after and sat on a sofa. The book lay in front of me. I even did not know why I held it in my hands. Master Li's "On Buddha Law" came into my eyes when I opened it. After I finished reading its first paragraph, I was just like being awakened from a dream. I was very exited. I felt deeply sorry for my rude behavior the day before. I phoned the student and made my apologies. Then I read through "On Buddha Law" without stopping. After I finished reading it, I said to myself from the bottom of my heart: "This is a true Fa. This is the Fa that I have been searchingi for". No words could really express my excitement at that moment. I started reading the book "Zhuan Falun" from lecture one. Every words from Master Li opened my heart. All my questions to life were solved. The more I read the more I believed that Master Li had introduced to us a true fa, which superseded all things introduced by other great enlightened human beings in history. This is the fa of the universe. After I finished reading "Zhuan Falun", both my values to life and to the world were entirely changed.
After a month's cultivation, when I went outdoors to welcome my wife home from a long trip at night, I felt something above my head. I saw a colorful wheel spinning in the night sky when I looked up. At first, I thought perhaps there was something with my eyes. So I looked at it again. It was still there shinning and spinning with all beautiful colors. I told myself that it was an illusion and ignored it. Later I told the student about it. He said what I saw was a falun (Law Wheel). Wasn't that an encouragement to me from Master Li? Master Li said that Buddha school talked about predestinated relationship. Didn't this phenomenon mean that I was related to Master Li and Falun Dafa? From then on I told myself in my heart that I would be working hard on my cultivation until I achieve my perfection.
Cultivation is to give up everyday people's attachments. With the true fa that I had been seeking for a long time, I was so enthusiastic and thought that I would start making progress immediately. But after I really entered cultivation, every step was a cultivation of xinxing, and every step was full of contradictions and miseries. Master Li asked us never to forget that we were a cultivator. He also said: "Zhen-Shan-Ren (truthfulness, benevolence, and forbearance) is the only standard which determines the good and the bad in the universe. Your gong can rise only if you assimilate yourself with this characteristic of the universe. Your gong could never rise if your are not able to do so".
Since then I have kept Zhen-Shan-Ren in my heart as the only standard to judge my own behavior and everything else in the world. But it was not easy to get rid of those existent unhealthy thoughts in my mind. Here I can give you a few examples. I am running a factory in Daqio now, and of course social activities are inevitable. Therefore I smoked, drank, and was a little lustful. After finished reading "Zhuan Falun" and starting my cultivation, I tried to get rid of these unhealthy hobbies. But because of business, I could not totally avoid them. Most of my friends think that all these behaviors are natural. So did I. As a businessman, I took them for granted. After I started my cultivation, I understood all these behaviors got karma for me. I knew I should give them up. But once together with my friends in social activities, I was out of control. Master Li taught us in "Zhuan Falun": " To tell you the truth, the entire cultivation process for a practitioner will be one of constantly giving up the human attachments". I told myself: I was so lucky to find this true fa, which I could not get even in thousands of years. If I could not even quit smoking, drinking, and lust, how would I achieve my perfection. Although I realized my problems, It still took me a long time to give up these attachments.
I finally quit smoking and drinking after coming back from the conference in Singapore in August 1998. Prior to my cultivation I always went home at about 1 or 2 am, and smoked 3 cases of cigarette everyday. After cultivation, I have kept Master Li's instruction in mind, and always reminded myself that I am a Falun Dafa practitioner. I try to control myself and to make convenience for others. Master Li taught us that we should always be good people no matter where we were. I used to go home after midnight everyday. But now I go home on time and behave myself at home. I used to be very demanding at home, and often yelled at my wife for very tiny things. But now no matter how long my wife keeps talking, and even insults me in front of my employees, I can keep calm and explain things in a nice way. My wife feels really happy for these changes. She knows all of my changes are due to cultivation of Falun Dafa. Therefore she changed her attitude towards Falun Dafa from being unbelieving, emotionally against, to now being very supportive to my promoting Dafa activities.
Early in this year we held an experience shearing conference in Shueiyen. We also held another conference in Daqio on October 10 with practitioners from nation wide. My wife was very active in participating in all the preparation works for the conferences. She told everybody: My husband practiced Falun Gong. Falun Gong was so good that it could even change around somebody like my husband.
The news about my quitting smoking and drinking became a hot topic among my friends. Many of them asked me directly to make sure the news was true. Some even came to my factory to verify it. I used all these conversations as good opportunities for promoting Dafa to others. When the Korean version of "Zhuan Falun" was published, I purchased 100 books so I could give to people who would like to learn it.
Here I can give you a simple example. Nowadays pursuing money is the only purpose for lots of people. Some people even compete and fight for it. My factory was affected a few times. I tried to keep Master Li's teaching in my mind when this kind of problems occurred. I used them to upgrade my xinxing instead of treating them as accidental incidents. Therefore I did not fight with others even when my factory suffered big losses though my employees could not understand my behavior. Before cultivation, my purpose of running a business was to support my family. But now it is different although I still don't know what is benevolence. But I have entirely changed my viewpoint on money and others.
I had a serious contradiction with my wife early this year because of my employees' independence. Of course from the side of everyday people who were not in cultivation, the way that I tried to solve the problem could not be understood at all. If it had happened before my cultivation, I would have made the decision myself and nobody could have said "No". But I could not do that since I was a practitioner. I tried to make my points by explanations. As a result my wife left home angrily, which had never happened since we married. I could have never imagined that such a kind of thing would happen to me. I was about to be out of control. Immediately I remembered Master Li's teaching. This was a test to my xinxing. So I labored to find reason within myself whether I overreacted. If this thing had occurred before my cultivation, I would have dragged her back into the house and beat her. But I did not. Keeping calm was really difficult. Such was the feeling when I cultivated my xinxing in other circumstance. I did not forget that I was a cultivator. We solved the problem by communication after my wife came back home.
Compared with other practitioners, I am still green who just get started. Master Li taught us that making progress in cultivation depends upon two things. One is being capable of enduring hardships. Another is enlightenment. I was capable of enduring some hardships. But I was slow when it came to understanding Fa deeply. Sometimes even when I understood the Fa to a certain level, it still took me a long time to give up the attachments. I should look for every answer from the Fa. Especially when there were contradictions among practitioners, many times we blamed others instead of looking inside ourselves.
One point that I realized on my low cultivation level was that although some unhealthy thoughts or hobbies could not be gotten rid of right away, at least one should have the will to do so. I realized I have been changing constantly. Another point is that it is entirely different between doing things based on Dafa's high standard and excusing oneself for the reason of still being a person in cultivation. It is also the key whether one can make fast advancement and move up towards higher levels.
Now to me life is meaningless without cultivation of Falun Dafa. It was Master Li who gave me such a precious Fa, and directed me to start my cultivation. Dedicating myself into the cultivation is the only way not to let him down. As long as I keep improving myself based on Master Li's teaching, trying to upgrade my xinxing, and giving up all the everyday people's attachment, I will eventually succeed in my cultivation.
I would also like to take this opportunity to briefly introduce currently in South Korea how dissemination of Dafa goes. Falun Dafa has been introduced to South Korea for about four years. Because practitioners in South Korea did not emphasize enough on dissemination, also with other factors, so far dissemination has not been as well as expected. I myself realized this problem pretty late too. Now I have been in contact with practitioners in other areas. We also have formed a commission in charge of all preparation work to establish a national Falun Dafa research institute. We have built some web sites on the Internet to introduce Dafa, and Dafa books to people who are interested in learning. This year because of the situation in China, everybody in our country knows of Falun Dafa. As an example in Daqio Park, where I do my exercises, four practitioners including my daughter started a practice site there in May of this year. The first day there were more than ten people, more than twenty on the second day, about thirty on the third day, and now usually about fifty to sixty. Practitioners in all areas including in Hancheng have been active in dissemination. But thereare still not enough practice sites. We are still in the preliminary stage. With Master Li's fa, we are confident that all Koreans who are interested in learning will eventually get the fa. We will be more active in dissemination . We are hoping that next year we will have an experience shearing conference just like this one, in South Korea. We are waiting for practitioners all over the world to share their experience with us.
At last, I would like to appreciate the work that Japan's practitioners have done to hold this conference. Study hard on the fa, and make a lot more progress.
Thank you.
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Category: Experience Sharing Conferences
