(Minghui.org) I am a female Dafa disciple who started cultivation in 1996. I'm 54 this year.
In my 20-odd years of cultivation, I lived through the painful elimination of human notions on April 25, 1999, and the darkness of July 20, 1999.
Over these years, I was arrested several times, had my home ransacked, and have been inside various detention and forced labor camps. I have grown from having a perceptual understanding of Dafa to a rational one, from immaturity to maturity, never wavering in my belief in Master and Dafa.
A Dafa Disciple's Dignity
On July 20, 1999, the CCP began to persecute Falun Dafa and spread rumors discrediting Dafa and Master. As a practitioner, I went to Beijing to petition for the right to practice Falun Dafa on July 21. I wanted to tell the government the real situation of Dafa, how I learned to be a good person, and how I benefited both physically and mentally.
For this reason, I was illegally detained three times and sent to forced labor camps twice, totaling more than four years.
At the police station, the officers pressured me to give them other practitioners' names so that they could handle the so-called “big cases.” Because I did not cooperate, they resorted to violence and torture.
I was not allowed to eat, drink, or sleep for eight days and nine nights. They poured ice water over me from head to toe and left the window open at night to let the cold winter wind blow on my wet body. They hung me up by my handcuffs poured vinegar essence into my nose, burned my thighs with mosquito coils, pushed my head into a bucket of dirty water, covered my head with a plastic bag until I almost suffocated, and force-fed me.
The scars this torture left on my body are still visible. But despite the torture, I never “confessed.” I was sentenced to two years of forced labor.
As soon as I was admitted to the labor camp, I was ordered to write a letter denouncing Dafa. The captain slapped me and kicked my inner thighs until they turned black. It didn't hurt at the time; Master bore the pain for me. I told her that I wouldn't write the letter even if she killed me. Suddenly, she deflated like a balloon and slumped onto the bed.
Because I did not cooperate with the wardens and did not give up cultivation, the labor camp quarantined me for 40 days, forced me to stand for a long time, deprived me of sleep and food, and wouldn’t let me bathe. Designated officers talked to me every day. People who had deviated from Dafa tried to brainwash me. They insulted me and threatened to increase my detention time. When that didn't work, they shook my head and said, “Why don’t you give it up?”
At that time, I held a firm thought: “I am a Dafa disciple. I am the first to be persecuted here and I will also be the last; I must not let any other practitioners be persecuted here.” I used the rationality, perseverance, and compassion I gained from Dafa cultivation to stop the persecution, and several people who had deviated from Dafa declared that the guarantee statements they’d written were invalid.
When an officer started to read a book slandering Dafa and Master aloud in the workshop, I knew I could not let her spread such slander. So I took out a pen I had hidden and wrote on a piece of paper “Falun Dafa is the righteous Fa,” “Master is innocent,” “Dafa disciples are persecuted” and gave it to her.
My legs were shaking I was so scared, but I knew this was what I should do to defend Dafa. The officer stood up, shouted hysterically, and told me to return to my seat. Then she said, “I will stop here today and continue another day.” She never read that book again.
A few days later, the officer set up a TV to play a video that slandered Master.
I stopped her and said, “This is all false.”
She insisted on playing it, so I wrote down the words for sending righteous thoughts—“Dafa rectifies the universe; evil is completely eliminated”—on a piece of paper and put it under the TV with the help of other practitioners. The TV stopped working.
I realized that Dafa disciples should not be persecuted. We aspire to become the best people. Everyone benefits from cultivating Dafa and it causes no harm. Dafa is righteous, and all practitioners carry a positive energy field and can suppress all factors that do not conform to the Fa. Righteous thoughts originate from the Fa. Master taught us the phrases for sending forth righteous thoughts, and we now have the ability to protect ourselves and save sentient beings.
Validating Dafa in the Family
My mother-in-law didn't like me at first and always wore a long face when I was around. Once, when I came home from work, my mother-in-law was talking and laughing with my sister-in-law. When she heard me come in, she stopped smiling and closed the door to her room. When I gave her money during the holidays, she was not happy either. So I grew to really resent her.
After cultivating Dafa, I understood that Master removed most of my karma accumulated during many generations. The portion I endured was arranged by Master for me to improve in cultivation. I began to think kindly of my mother-in-law and truly cared for her. I even washed her from head to toe every time she took a bath.
Gradually, she changed. She praised me in front of everyone she met and asked me to keep her salary card. At the age of 70, she passed away naturally, without illness.
One of our neighbors downstairs said, “I've lived more than 80 years and was never jealous of a soul except for your mother-in-law. What did she do to deserve such a good daughter-in-law? There was no conflict between you two. You cared about each other like a true family.”
I also often swept the public stairs of our residential building. When one of the neighbors said, “You are the only good person here” and a woman opposite him said, “You bring good luck to your family,” I always said something like:
“It was Dafa's Master who taught me to follow the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance to be a good person. He taught me to emphasize virtue and to do good things. We are fated to be neighbors. Please remember ‘Falun Dafa is good’ and you will be blessed.”
Another time, my husband’s eldest sister was sick and I went to visit her. When I saw her, she was crying. “My mother came to visit me and I didn’t cry. I didn’t even cry when my sister came. But I wanted to cry as soon as I saw you,” she said.
I told her, “You're suffering now, but you will be fine once it’s over. You have already quit the Chinese Communist Party and its organizations. Recite ‘Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good, Falun Dafa is good,’ and you will be blessed.”
I knew that the part of her that understood the truth was grateful to Dafa. Because of that, she has hope.
Now, I want to talk about my husband. He endured a lot of pressure from society and the family when I was arbitrarily detained. But I know that he received blessings from Master that were much more valuable in return, something ordinary people couldn't understand on the surface.
Once, when he was using a saw, his pant leg was dragged into the saw. Two large tendons on his ankle were severed, but no bones were injured. My son and niece happened to be home that day. After it happened, my husband called my son immediately. When my son saw it, he told my husband to recite “Falun Dafa is good, Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good.” My niece wrapped a towel tightly around my husband’s ankle. They took him to a hospital and only notified me after my husband had surgery.
My husband returned home that night, did not take a single painkiller, and silently recited every day, “Falun Dafa is good, Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good!”
As the saying goes, “It takes a hundred days for a bone to heal.” My husband recovered in only 29 days. All of this fully proves that Dafa's power is boundless.
I often tell my husband that Chinese hospitals today don't exist to save the dying and heal the wounded but to make money. No money, no treatment; in the end, money still can't save lives. But if you believe “Falun Dafa is good, Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good” and hold on to the kindness in your heart, you can witness Dafa's miracles.
My husband has run into danger many times, but because he agrees with Dafa he has been safe. After the movement to sue Jiang Zemin began in 2015, the police came to arrest me many times. My husband tried his best to resist. I was taken to the police station twice, and I avoided danger each time under Master's protection.
Here, I thank Master for protecting me and my family.
Not Forgetting My Mission to Save People
My son got married in 2017 and had a daughter a year later. By then I was retired, so the duty of taking care of my granddaughter naturally fell to me. At that time, I was not sure whether to help my son or not. I was afraid that he and his wife would not understand me. I was also afraid that looking after my granddaughter would affect my cultivation.
I calmed down and thought about it. Wasn't that being selfish? Fellow practitioners told me that the relationship between a mother-in-law and daughter-in-law is hard to deal with, so I thought, “If I can’t get along with my daughter-in-law, then I have a problem. And if there is a problem, I should fix it myself! I can't arrange my own cultivation path.” I considered others first in everything, looked within myself when I felt uncomfortable with conflicts, and corrected what I said and did.
Even though I thought I was doing that, in fact, I had been reluctant to. I felt tired, bitter, and helpless. In addition, I wanted to do things well. I loved to keep things clean and can't stand a mess. I'd rather suffer physically than emotionally. Wasn't that an attachment to seeking fame? I was afraid that others would not be satisfied with me. On the surface it was to validate Dafa, because if I fell short, it would affect others' salvation. Behind it, however, was a mind that sought fame and tried to validate me and wanted to hear only good things.
In terms of money, I felt that we’d given him too much. After my son graduated from college, he bought an apartment in the provincial capital. Then we had to pay for his apartment renovation, his wedding ceremony, and his car, which used up all of our savings. Now I had to help him look after his child. I was unwilling to do that, but couldn't find an excuse not to.
It has been 20 months since my granddaughter was born. Indeed, a lot of my human notions were exposed during this time, such as looking down on others, speculating about others, and seeking repayment for good deeds. I didn't feel good about my daughter-in-law's parents not helping out financially or practically. I was jealous of my son whom I’d raised but who didn't understand me.
In fact, these were all my attachments that arose from intense jealousy.
Master said: “...for if someone is doing well, instead of feeling happy for him or her, people’s minds will feel uneasy.” (Lecture Seven in Zhuan Falun)
I had to let go of human notions and let go of the concepts of willingness and unwillingness. Without a selfish mind, I can be free and comfortable everywhere.
From now on, I will cultivate myself well and save more people within the remaining time for Fa-rectification. I will follow with determination the path to return home that Master arranged for me.
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