(Minghui.org) I started cultivating in Falun Dafa in 1998. For many years, I have paid attention to my demeanor. I believe this delineates whether or not sentient beings can be saved. Therefore, I always treat myself as a practitioner and have strict demands on myself. That is why my fellow villagers give me high compliments. I also kept doing the three things, and I felt that I was keeping up with the progress of Fa rectification.
Two practitioners who I am close with were arrested and illegally sentenced in 2016. Many practitioners in our local area were also persecuted. This resulted in my developing an attachment to fear and protecting myself with human attachments. I did not look within, cultivate myself and look for attachments. I thought that I was still doing quite well. I was also not proactive in doing the three things. Unknowingly, my cultivation state gradually worsened.
However, benevolent Master awakened me again and again, making me understand my responsibilities and mission.
Letting Go of Selfishness
Once those practitioners were arrested during our small Fa study group session, the group broke up. That was in 2016. Five years later, a few practitioners came to our village and discovered this problem. Through exchanging cultivation experiences, I realized that this was not the correct state. So the next day, I discussed this with my fellow practitioners and set up two small Fa study groups.
Our small group was comprised of three people. One practitioner read the Fa very quickly. However, his pronunciation was not clear, and he also said many words incorrectly. Seeing that, the other practitioner and I slowed our reading speed and patiently corrected him. This practitioner changed a lot, and he also experienced the benefits of studying the Fa with a serious attitude.
One day five months later, a kind neighbor told me that his son saw a police car stop outside my house when he was returning from school in the evening, and he asked me to be careful. I was once detained when I went to a practitioner’s house to get the Minghui Weekly in 2008. Therefore, when I heard this news, my heart was a bit moved. But studying the Fa in a group is the format that Master Li (Dafa’s founder) left for us, and it has nothing to do with the evil. It also has no right to control sentient beings to commit crimes against Dafa. However, China is still an environment that is being persecuted by the evil, so we still need to be careful of our safety.
As such, the three of us decided to change the Fa study venue to the vegetable shed where I planted vegetables. Then, winter came and daytime became very short. Not only did I need to study the Fa, I also had to harvest the vegetables, but there was not enough time. So I thought: Fa should be of the utmost importance and fellow practitioners’ improvement in cultivation should be the priority. This means to say that it is a choice of choosing between my own needs or thinking of others first. Therefore, every day, I would carry a head torch after replacing the shed blanket and pluck the remaining chilies which I had yet to harvest.
After a year of group Fa study, the practitioner’s reading speed went back to normal and he no longer read the Fa incorrectly. The three of us also realized that we had improved in our cultivation.
One day, I discovered 20 Udumbara flowers growing on a chili. The little white flowers were growing on the surface of green chili. Master was encouraging me.
Thinking of Others’ Needs First
A practitioner dreamed that I was in danger in May 2022. She immediately took a cab to my house to share with me, asking me to let go of my selfishness and think of others’ needs first. Her words hit my heart and my head felt congested at that time. I am a passive person and I would rather cooperate with others than show off. I am afraid of many things and I have many worries. I knew in my heart that thinking of others’ needs first is based on the Fa. However, fear and the unwillingness to sacrifice and take hardship kept enveloping me and I could not share these thoughts.
After the practitioner left, I asked myself: Do you want to cultivate? If you want to cultivate, you will need to progress forward. I offered incense and said to Master, “Master, I am willing to think of other’s needs first.”
After a few days, the local practitioners sent forth righteous thoughts to get rid of the evil interference. A fellow practitioner said that the energy is strong when everyone sends righteous thoughts together. Therefore, I went to the houses of each of the five local practitioners and everyone sent forth righteous thoughts together; we also studied Master’s new lecture “Wake Up” and exchanged our cultivation thoughts.
This was the first time that everyone had sat together and exchanged our cultivation thoughts openly and sincerely in the last five years. Everyone’s hearts were together and we formed one body.
That night, I had a dream. There were five big lice in my pants which I had killed. I knew that Master was enlightening me that my selfishness had disintegrated a lot.
Studying the Fa Online
Once, I had a very clear dream. In the dream, I was walking along, but I had little strength. On the other hand, the people beside me were walking very steadily, using big steps. I understood that only by cultivating based on the Fa to get rid of my selfishness can I walk steadily and be strong and firm.
A practitioner in the neighboring village has been delivering the Minghui Weekly to us for eight to nine years. Although I know that waiting, relying, and wanting are not correct, but in the past, due to my fear of inviting problems, I was not willing to do it. I realized this was due to my selfishness. So, to reduce that practitioner’s burden, I suggested we use a small memory card for our village practitioners to read the weekly publication instead.
The practitioners were very cooperative and voluntarily got the laptop ready. They even found a technical practitioner to help us install the device.
This practitioner was very patient while teaching me. Initially, as I was close to being computer illiterate, my mind seemed to have been affected by something. Such that I would forget whatever was being taught to me. To make things worse, I was also afraid that my non-cultivating husband would see what we were doing when he came home after work. However, just as the practitioner was packing up and was about to leave, my husband came home. The practitioner spoke to him but he did not reply. This was because when I was being persecuted in the past, my husband was also illegally detained at the police station for a whole day. Therefore, he is very scared when we have a computer and anything that has to do with Dafa.
After the practitioner left, I went to make dinner. My husband was angry and turned on the television. However, no images appeared on the television, which operated normally every day. This made him even angrier and he just fell onto the bed without getting up. He is an introvert who speaks very little. As I did not know how to make the television show images and did not know what to do, I thought to look for someone to repair it. However, I was afraid of damaging the accessory which the practitioner had just installed.
Just then, Master helped me. I plucked up my courage, went to the television, and unplugged the power plug. After the red light turned green, I put the power plug back in, and wow! Images appeared on the television screen! I quickly said to my husband, “Get up, don’t be angry anymore, the television is working again, and dinner is also ready too. You can watch the television programs as you eat dinner.” He got out of bed and watched television while eating his dinner.
I understood in my heart that it was because of my unrighteous thought of fearing that my husband would see it that caused the problem. Master said, “...if your mind can be imperturbable there will be nothing you can’t handle.” (“Eliminate Your Last Attachment(s),” The Essentials of Diligent Progress II)
My righteous thoughts also became solid. What I am doing is the most righteous thing so nobody has the right to interfere. Sentient beings have no right to do so, divine beings also have no right to do so. Whoever does so has committed a crime.”
Later, that practitioner came two more times. My husband spoke to her normally too. He even voluntarily asked the practitioner to come for a visit whenever she had time.
Unknowingly, I discovered that my ability to understand the Fa is changing. I will voluntarily understand a matter based on the Fa, cultivate solidly, and correct myself.
Remembering the Mission to Practice
As fellow practitioners exchanged thoughts with me, I learned my responsibilities and mission. Therefore, I cooperated with the practitioners in my village and voluntarily visited practitioners who were going through illness tribulations or who had stopped cultivating so as to attain the state of improving as one body, as Master wants. I also changed the notion of wanting to coordinate, into a notion that thinks of others first.
A veteran practitioner nearby has not been in a very good cultivation state ever since she was released from prison. She was getting a bit sleepy when she studied the Fa. I broke through my notions and voluntarily went to study the Fa with her.
As there was work to be done in the shed at that time, I had originally planned to work in the morning and study the Fa with that practitioner in the afternoon. When I learned that the veteran practitioner studies Zhuan Falun, the main book of Falun Dafa, in the morning and the lectures from the other regions in the afternoon, I let go of myself and thought of helping her. Therefore, I went to study the Fa with her in the morning and went home to do the work in the shed in the afternoon.
During the process, I got rid of the attachments of not wanting to send righteous thoughts for others, and not being willing to stay for a prolonged period of time in that veteran practitioner’s house. This is because, that year, I sent righteous thoughts for an elderly female practitioner who was hospitalized. While sending forth righteous thoughts, I dreamed of a group of small black people who were chasing after me with big bottles and big needles. In the end, they did not catch me and I woke up. I was afraid that I would not be able to overcome that evil by myself and be hurt. Another reason was that the veteran practitioner was arrested while she was studying the Fa at home. I heard that a few years back, the police installed tapping devices and I was afraid that they may target me as well.
When I realized all of this, I cleared out all those unrighteous thoughts. That negative thinking is not me, and all those attachments stem from selfishness.
Master said, “Your true self is pure and clean. Dirty things are postnatal contamination. That’s why they have to be removed and discarded in cultivation, and this is rejecting them.” (Teachings at the Conference in Europe)
Whatever bad thoughts appeared, I would reject them. We sent forth righteous thoughts for half an hour and the effects were really very good. During those few days, there was howling wind with heavy rain, but I never arrived late for the small Fa study group. Although it was hard, I felt very comforted. I got rid of my selfishness and I was willing to think of others first!
The above are just some details from my cultivation process. In actual fact, Master enlightened me on many more things and fellow practitioners helped me a lot. If not for Master’s benevolent protection and not giving up on us, if not for that practitioner’s timely reminder, I may still be stuck in my own selfishness, and feeling satisfied with myself.
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Category: Improving Oneself
