(Minghui.org) I was born into a family of farmers and was in poor health from the time I was little. After I grew up, I developed more health problems, including a heart condition. I kept quick-acting medication with me at all times in case I had an attack.
When I turned 36 in 2003, my mother visited me and suggested that I practice Falun Dafa (also known as Falun Gong). I knew hospitals couldn’t help me, so I decided to practice Dafa diligently. Before I began to study the Fa teachings and learn the exercises, I tossed out all my medications, saying, “From now on, I won’t see you anymore.” Shortly after that, Master cleaned up my body. I felt very light and was illness-free. I truly appreciated Master for renewing my life!
My husband has five brothers and three sisters, and they often had conflicts. The first conflict was about supporting their parents. When my father-in-law could still take care of himself, my eldest brother-in-law said, “Let’s each of us give him 500 yuan a year to cover his living expenses.” My second oldest brother-in-law did not want to give him anything. Later, my oldest sister-in-law told me, “The second oldest brother-in-law didn’t want to pay, do we still have to?” I said, “He doesn’t want to pay, that’s his choice. We’ll just do what we are supposed to.” A year later, she stopped contributing as well. I thought, “No matter who doesn’t want to pay, I’ll carry on.”
Master said,
“Of course, we go about our practice in the secular world, and so we should still be devoted and respectful to our parents and care well for our children; we should be good to others, not to mention our own families, in whatever setting we may be, and treat everyone with kindness.” (The Sixth Talk, Zhuan Falun)
When my father-in-law was in his 80s, he became unresponsive and couldn’t take care of himself. We discussed it among the siblings and came up with a plan to take turns caring for him: He would stay with each family for half a month. After we reached a consensus, the next question was who was going to look after him first? We were all farmers and this was the autumn harvest. We are very busy, so everyone refused to offer to take him in.
I thought, “I’m a practitioner. I should be the one who takes him first,” so I agreed to take him. From interacting with these siblings these past few years, they all know I practice Falun Dafa. They knew I wouldn’t take it to heart if my own interests were infringed on, so they were not surprised that I was the one who offered to take my father-in-law home first.
The first issue I encountered was how to prepare meals for my father-in-law. He had lost all his teeth, so he could only eat very soft food.
One time, my nephew and his wife visited. While we were talking, my father-in-law started coughed and phlegm came up. I quickly used a tissue to catch it and wiped his mouth.
When my nephew saw it, he frowned right away and looked disgusted. His wife also appeared to be uneasy. When I ran into my nephew’s wife later, she said, “That time Grandpa spit up phlegm and you caught it with a tissue, didn’t you feel sick? If it were me, I couldn’t stand it.” I said, “I’m a Falun Dafa practitioner. Our teacher tells us to treat everyone nicely, let alone our own elderly.”
My husband went out to clarify the truth and was falsely accused. He was arrested and detained for three years. When he wasn’t around, I had to take care of my father-in-law on my own. At first, I felt a little embarrassed about changing his diaper. When he was wet, I called my third brother-in-law to come over and change him. But in no time it was soiled again. After a few times, I felt I couldn’t keep bothering my third brother-in-law anymore, so I changed my father-in-law’s diapers myself.
I also prepared nice meals for him. I made him dumplings and wontons and bought him all kinds of desserts. In between breakfast and lunch, I gave him fruit. Since he had no teeth, I peeled some pears, put icing sugar on them, and steamed them. They were so tasty that he could eat almost a full bowl each time. Out of concern that he would have constipation, I gave him fruit like bananas and peaches. I also knew that, when he stayed with his other children, most of the time he was only given plain congees and no vegetables. So I added tofu, eggs, eggplant, and other things to make the food more palatable. I kept changing the menu.
When he ate well, then here was the problem of his defecating. One morning, while I was doing the exercises in the room next to his, I suddenly noticed him sitting on the edge of the bed naked. I quickly turned off the music player and went in to him. I saw excrement everywhere—on his duvet, quilt, and bed. I quickly got a basin of warm water and soap to clean him up.
One time, my nephew came to pick him up to stay with them. My father-in-law, who never spoke, suddenly said, “I won’t go!” When my nephew grabbed his pillow, he grabbed it back and held onto it tightly. I knew that, although he didn’t speak, he was clear deep down.
The hardest part was helping him dress and undress. He didn’t know how to use his own strength to work with me, so it was a struggle every time and I ended up sweating. Then I transferred him from the bed to his chair, made the bed, and washed his face and hands. After that, I would feed him one bite at a time. He ate very slowly. Although I had my own work to do, I tried my very best to serve him well first before taking care of my own things.
Sometimes on Sundays, I asked my son to take him to the courtyard to sit out in the sun. When it was too hot, I had my son stand behind him with an umbrella. Sometimes my son ended up standing there for an hour. When my son was tired or had to do his homework, I helped him bring my father-in-law back inside.
After my husband was released from prison, he helped my father-in-law shower, shaved his head, cut his beard, and cut his finger and toenails for two months before my father-in-law passed away at the age of 90.
I did what I was supposed to do. I wasn’t afraid of hardship or filth but did my best to take care of the elderly, which all came down to the fact that Dafa has changed me for the better. It was Dafa that taught me how to behave and to be a better person. We should not only treat our family members well but also be kind to others. We also need to look inward whenever we run into a conflict.
Our family made a living growing and selling vegetables. At the end of every day we sold at the market, I handed in the sales tax we owed while other vendors ran away. I put the money aside, and when the tax collector came to me, I just handed it over to him.
Since I did this every day, the tax collector got to know me. One time when I saw the tax collector walking towards us from a distance, the other vendors near me began to leave as usual. When I started to hand what we owed over to the tax collector, he looked at the vendor stand on each side of mine and then at me. Then he turned around and walked away and didn’t collect any money from me.
One time, another practitioner was selling mushrooms next to me. When it came to time to pay the tax, we each handed in our share. After the tax collector left, the vendors who’d run away started to trickle back. One of them was my neighbor. She said, “Do you have too much money? Or do you have trouble spending it?” I asked, “Why?” Seeing that I didn’t get it, she said, “Between the two of you, couldn’t one of you have left?” What she meant was why didn’t we just pay tax for one of us instead of two?
I said, “How could one of us leave? If I did, she’d have to claim my vegetables were hers and if she left, I’d have to claim her mushrooms were mine. We practice Falun Gong and follow the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance. Wouldn’t that have been lying?” My neighbor said, “True, true. I’m convinced by you! I’m convinced!” I had awakened her conscience again.
One time, I was selling grapes in the market and a customer tried all the kinds of grapes I had. She said, “I want these dark grapes, but I want to buy more.” I didn’t have many left, so I said, “I’ll bring more of this kind tomorrow and you can come get them.” She said okay and I asked for her number. The next day at the market I called and asked her to come pick up the grapes. She said okay.
Another customer wanted to buy the same kind of grapes but I asked her to wait. When she asked why, I explained that the black grapes were reserved for someone, but I didn’t know how many bunches she wanted. “She will come shortly,” I told her.
She was a bit unhappy and said, “I don’t want all your grapes. I can just pick up some that have fallen.” So I thought that would be fine and gave her a plastic bag to pick them up. As she was doing that, the first lady came. Seeing someone else picking her grapes, she was upset. She put her bicycle away and shouted at me, “How could you do that? You promised me! Why are you selling them to her?!”
I said, “Please don’t be upset. All she wants is some fallen grapes.” She said, “That doesn’t matter! You promised me, so you can’t sell them to someone else.” Then she began to put grapes into her bags.
Because she was so upset, she crushed some of them as she stuffed them into her bags. I said, “Let’s do it this way. Please don’t be mad at me. I don’t want you to pay for these grapes. I’ll give them to you.” She grunted and said, “I have money!” No matter how much I explained, she just wouldn't relent. Finally, in a fit of pique, she said, “I want to kick all these grapes out of you!”
Right then, I suddenly calmed down. I began to recall what Master said,
“How many of you seated here can keep at ease when someone points at you out of the blue and berates you? How many of you can stay unruffled and search for the reason on your part when faced with others’ criticism and chiding?” (Teachings at the Conference in Los Angeles)
I said to her, “I’m so sorry. I was wrong.” As soon as I said that, she was stunned and looked at me blankly. I said, “I practice Falun Gong. My master teaches us to treat everyone nicely, to look inward in a conflict, to be kind to others, and to practice forbearance. I have practiced for quite some time, but no one has ever treated me like this in front of so many people. This is the very first time.” I smiled and began to clarify the facts to her. In the end, I said, “These grapes are not very good. Please take them home. I’ll bring some more tomorrow for you.” She said okay and left. The next day, I saved a box of black grapes for her. When I called her to come pick them up, she said she didn’t want them anymore, as she was still eating the ones from the day before.
Later, whenever she came to the market, she swung by my place for a chat. She said, “Every time I come to the market, if you are here, I want to come have a chat with you.” She stopped being upset with me and thought that practitioners were very nice, unlike the propaganda she heard from the CCP.
One time, I went to buy a tape recorder. The salesperson put a cassette in the player so I could hear it. It sounded good, so I paid for it and took the tape recorder home. The next morning when I was ready to do the exercises, I opened up the tape recorder and saw the cassette. Right away, I realized the salesperson had forgotten to take it out, so I took it back to the mall to return it.
The same salesperson asked, “Do you practice Falun Gong?” I said, “Yes, I do, but how did you know?” She said, “Yesterday after you left, I remembered that I’d forgotten to take out the cassette. Darn! Right then, a coworker said, ‘If someone who practices Falun Gong took it, then she will return it for sure.’ See, you came to return it, so I figured you must practice Falun Gong.”
In my day-to-day life, I hold myself to the standard of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. For instance, when I sell vegetables, I always give the buyer the amount they pay for. Sometimes I give the buyer more vegetables than they pay for. Some people said, “Other vendors try to bargain with us and don’t even give us our change. You not only don’t bargain, you always give us the correct change.” I said, “I practice Falun Gong. I cannot take advantage of anyone. Plus, life isn’t easy for anyone.”
Every single time I said, “I practice Falun Gong,” I always felt very proud. Through practitioners’ words and actions, people have witnessed just how wonderful Falun Dafa is. Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is wonderful!
Master not only gave me a healthy body, but also purified my heart, improved my moral values, and brought me blessings. My gratitude to Master is beyond words!