(Minghui.org) Master Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Gong, sent a greeting to the attendees of the Mid U.S. Falun Dafa Cultivation Experience Sharing Conference in Chicago on July 31, 2016, which was attended by practitioners from ten states.

In the greeting, Master Li reminded practitioners, “Dafa disciples’ ensuring your daily cultivation practice is essential; clarifying the truth and saving people is Dafa disciples’ mission. On the path to Consummation, neither of these two things can be lacking. How well you do them reflects your cultivation state, as to whether or not you are diligent.”

The conference hall

Practitioners share their experiences.

Maureen from Wisconsin started practicing 16 years ago, and has experienced many miracles during her practice. Falun Gong healed her Meniere's syndrome, and helped her daughter's learning disability. Maureen also talked about how she eliminated attachments while promoting Shen Yun.

Nate from Missouri, who has practiced for four years, told the audience how he realized the preciousness of cultivation through a miracle that happened to one of his coworkers. He also talked about his understanding of the difference between “looking inward” and “self-examination.”

He said, “What I have enlightened to is that self-examination is merely realizing problems on the surface, and then attempting to correct them, as opposed to recognizing an attachment, and then looking inward to understand what is at the core of that specific attachment, so as to dig it out at the root.”

Several young practitioners talked about almost leaving cultivation during the persecution, but after realizing that the opportunity to cultivate was very precious, they tried their best to catch up.

Cultivation experience sharing conferences offer great opportunities for practitioners to learn from others and improve themselves. The first conference in mid-U.S. was held in 1999, and has since become an annual event.

One practitioner who spoke said that the process of writing a speech was also a process of cultivation. He could feel the changes happening within him while writing the draft.

Ms. Liu from Chicago said, “I was very touched by fellow practitioners' speeches. They are so diligent in cultivation, trying their best to balance the everyday work and telling the public what Falun Gong really is. Their speeches encourage me to do better and be more diligent.”