(Minghui.org) I stepped into Falun Dafa cultivation in August 1998. Prior to that, I suffered from a very poor health, including a headaches, rheumatism, stomach ulcers, and other ailments. After I began cultivation in Dafa I recovered from all my illnesses. I truly came to feel light because I was illness-free. I felt that Dafa was wonderful, and wanted to study the Fa and do the exercises.
Back then, studying the Fa was rather difficult as not everyone had access to Dafa books. When some practitioners read Zhuan Falun, the main book of Falun Dafa, we others would just listen. A few months passed like that, and we still didn’t quite understand what Master was saying in Zhuan Falun. We only knew that Master said that in order to cultivate, one had to be a good person, which meant following Dafa’s principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. As soon as I obtained the Dafa books, I began to seriously read them. At that time, there were six of us in the Fa-study group. I gradually came to understand some Fa-principles.
I am a quasi illiterate woman who grew up in the countryside. Therefore, it was difficult for me to study the Fa alone, as I didn’t recognize many of the characters in the Falun Dafa books. Nonetheless I kept studying the Fa and doing the exercises every day. I understood through Fa-study that Master was teaching us to be good people, and that’s how I could recover from my illnesses.
Master opened my wisdom, so with help from others I gradually became able to read Zhuan Falun on my own. I also learned to read other Dafa articles, and studied the Fa every day. As long as I had time, I studied the Fa and recited On Dafa. With that, I improved quickly.
Stepping Forward to Validate Dafa
Jiang Zemin launched the persecution of Falun Gong (also called Falun Dafa) on July 20, 1999. The bad propaganda incited hatred in people toward the Falun Gong cultivation practice. All means were exhausted to persecute Falun Dafa, including defaming Master Li (the founder of Falun Dafa) and Dafa. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) fabricated lies, which were repeated on the news. It was as if the heavens were about to collapse. Could we stop practicing such a wonderful cultivation? Of course not. A few of us had made up our minds to be practitioners all the way to the end.
Our local practitioners later understood that Master wanted practitioners to go out to assist Him in rectifying the Fa. After we understood this, Mr. Jia and I started to hang banners, post truth-clarification notes, and hand out informational materials. We went from household to household and put the Dafa informational materials on entry doors. Every time we finished handing out a copy, we recited deep down, “We came to save you, please read what we have left.” Sometimes it wasn’t raining when we first went out, but soon enough, it suddenly started to pour. In the summer, the rain could be very heavy. When we couldn’t find a place to shelter, our clothes became thoroughly soaked.
I remember one day in November which was very cold. Shortly after Mr. Jia and I began distributing materials, I noticed that there were walls across from me on which I could put up sticky notes. But just as I was ready to cross the road, and took the first step, I fell into a smelly ditch. Even though I was soaked to a large extent, the informational materials that I had with me were not damaged. It was truly amazing. At that time, Mr. Jia suggested that we go back home. I said I wanted to stay a bit longer since we had only been out for a short time. About two hours later we headed home after distributing all of our Dafa materials.
Both my hands and feet were very cold and had become numb. I felt cold and smelly from falling into the ditch. As soon as I arrived home, I took a shower and changed my clothes. It was winter, so I ended up taking off a lot of clothes. Out of concern that my daughter-in-law would see the smelly clothes, I decided to wash them before I went to bed. By the time I finished, it was almost dawn. Yet I felt delighted deep down and didn’t mind this hardship.
Mr. Jia and I once went out of town to hand out fliers. After we walked into a compound, we left information at each household door. After reaching the end, we headed back the way we came. Before we got out of the compound, a person walked towards us and asked me what I was doing. I didn’t reply and just walked away. Since Mr. Jia was behind me, the person then blocked his way.
It was past 2 a.m. Suddenly about a dozen men and women appeared and surrounded Mr. Jia. They asked him what he was doing there and whether he was trying to steal something. Mr. Jia told them that he practiced Falun Gong. It was 2003—a time when the persecution was rampant. Upon hearing that, they said they would report him to the police right away. Mr. Jia tried to reason with them at great length. I had hidden in the field. Almost an hour passed, and even though I sent righteous thoughts, the situation didn’t change. I was so worried. When I heard that they would call the police, I became even more concerned.
At that time, I thought, “I must help Mr. Jia get away. They shouldn’t take him to the police station.” With this thought, Master empowered me and gave me strength. I jumped out of the field and quickly walked into the crowd. A young man holding a three-foot-long stick asked me, “Who are you?” I didn’t say anything. I quickly went to Mr. Jia, and grabbed his arm to go with me. I said, “We came to the wrong place today.”
When I turned around, I saw that the crowd of people was rooted there. Only when I spoke was I no longer worried, although my heart was still pounding. I suddenly recalled what Master said,
“If you have fear, they will grab youOnce your thought is righteous, evil will collapse...”(“What’s There to Fear,” Hong Yin II)
I then calmed down. We continued to hand out informational materials, hang up banners, and put up sticky notes, until we were finished. We returned home safe and sound.
Mr. Jia was very quiet on the way home. The next day, he told me that the night before, he thought that I had already left. He didn’t expect that I would help him escape such danger and save him from being persecuted.
Suffocating Evil
I was illegally held at the local detention center in November 2004. After I was released, the secretary of the village CCP committee and the team leader began monitoring me. The team leader had been watching me for a few years. She watched where I went when I left my home. She also followed me closely. However, she always failed to keep track of me as I still managed to do what I was supposed to do. For instance, every Saturday I was supposed to pick up materials at a practitioner’s home five miles away.
One day, the team leader asked me to take her to a certain place to buy some meat, and it was the place where I went to pick up the Falun Dafa materials. When we arrived there, she said she’d let me do my thing. I said there was nothing I had to do there.
Soon enough, she asked me to go with her to the same place again to buy some sausages. I said that’s fine. When we were at the intersection of the main road, I saw the head of the village waiting there. I told her the person was following me. She said that wasn’t true. Even though I told her that I saw her car, I still went with her. When we arrived there she told me to do my thing, as it would take her a while to load the sausages. I responded the same way. Thus, on both occasions, they didn’t get the results they wanted. They wanted to undermine our materials production center, but were unable to entrap us.
One day, when the evil persecution was most rampant, three people came to my son’s restaurant when I was also there. I asked them to check the menu and tell me what they wanted to order. They didn’t say anything. There were two men and one woman who claimed they were Falun Dafa practitioners and asked me for some Dafa materials. I asked them where they were from. One of the men said that he was a local person and from such and such team. But when I asked a few more questions, he couldn’t answer them. The woman was sitting across me, and I saw that she looked at me as if she was feeling a little panicky. I realized that they had come to find out something they could hold against me, but again, they didn’t succeed.
The Secretary of the village CCP committee once told my son that they’d pay me 50 yuan per day if I went to the brainwashing center run by the evil CCP. My son thought they meant what they said, and told me, “You should go, they’ll pay you 50 yuan per day.” I said I wouldn’t go and I didn’t want any money from the evil CCP.
A few days later, the secretary came to talk to me, and asked me to go there to “study.” I asked him what I needed to study. Wasn’t it good for me to study Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance? I said that he was asking me to study something that was fake, evil, and that wanted me to struggle and be a bad person, and I wouldn’t do that. He then said he would force me to go. I said if he were to do that, then I’d have to expose him by adding him to the list of evil people on the Minghui website. Upon hearing that, he left.
The next day, the secretary pulled his vehicle in front of me. This time, his wife stuck out her head and said, “My sister, you should go, it’s for your benefit.” I said, “Those high-ranking CCP officials had to step down and ended up being imprisoned, let alone you, a village CCP secretary.” The secretary drove away. After that, he never harassed or monitored me.
People often came to harass me before that happened, and my home was ransacked three times. But every time they came I wasn’t home, and my son hid the Falun Dafa books and pictures of Master Li. Therefore, they didn’t find anything other than a few Minghui Journals and truth-clarification DVDs.
Dafa Displays Its Miracles
I have experienced Dafa miracles since I began to cultivate. I live in the countryside and need to burn a wood fire. I once bound four stacks of tree branches and put them under the roof in a room in the old school. At that time, a farmer was using the old site to raise pigs. He put a big electric box under the roof of one room, and I put the wood stacks right beside it. The wood in the stacks turned dry, then, spontaneously started burning. But after one stack was burned, the fire suddenly died. This was truly miraculous… Why did it stop burning? Also, there was a busy sidewalk in front of the building and passersby could have been injured by the fire.
I wasn’t home when the fire occurred. When I got home, someone told me, “Please quickly and take your wood stacks home, they were burning.” So I quickly went there to check the situation. I realized it would have been dreadful if all the wood had caught on fire. All twelve rooms in the old school were made of wood. I wouldn’t have been able to save my house that was next to the building. The loss would have been huge. I still have flashbacks about the situation. When that stack was burning, without pouring any water on it or having the fire extinguished, it went out by itself. Wasn’t that miraculous? I kept thanking Master. Master protected his disciple and prevented a catastrophe from happening.
I have been a Falun Dafa practitioner for over 20 years and have been doing the three things Master asked us to do. I study two chapters of Zhuan Falun every day. When I have time, I also read Master’s new articles. Sometimes I copy other books, such as, Essentials for Further Advancement and Hong Yin.
I do the exercises every morning, and send righteous thoughts a few times a day. However, my xinxing improvement has been fairly slow. I feel uncomfortable when things don’t go my way. When I look inward, I realize that it comes down to my selfishness, jealousy, lack of cultivating my speech, and show-off mentality. I need to work harder at eliminating my attachments to fame, self-interest, and sentimentality, and keep looking inward for other attachments. I will follow Master’s requirements to do things, so as not to let down his compassion.
Views expressed in this article represent the author's own opinions or understandings. All content published on this website are copyrighted by Minghui.org. Minghui will produce compilations of its online content regularly and on special occasions.
