(Minghui.org) I am a countryside woman. My parents-in-law practiced Falun Dafa first. Then my husband, his brothers, and his sisters began to practice, one after another.
My husband used to suffer from icteric hepatitis, pneumonia, gastritis, a duodenal ulcer, and rheumatism. He could not do any farm work, so I ended up taking care of the family greenhouse, and had to do all the work on two mu [about 0.3 acres] of land by myself.
One day my mother-in-law said to my husband, “You can’t do any farm work, so you may as well go do cultivation practice.” Thus, my husband started to practice Falun Dafa. I did not really understand why he had to go out to study the Fa, until our daughter came home for vacation. She suggested that I study the Fa with my husband. It was the first time I was tempted to learn Falun Dafa.
My husband left his Dafa book on the bed one day, and I picked it up. As soon as I opened it, a shiny golden lion jumped out and pounced on me, scaring me so much that I quickly put the book down. Not long after, this happened again. I asked my husband what it was. He asked a local Dafa practice site assistant, who answered, “That was interference to stop you from learning Dafa. There should not be a third time.” True enough, when I picked up Zhuan Falun for the third time, it did not happen.
After I saw that the book teaches people to be good, I started reading Zhuan Falun every day. I witnessed my husband become free of illness after practicing Dafa, and miraculous incidents involving other family members.
Before the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) launched its persecution of Falun Dafa practitioners in July 1999, every village had practice sites, and almost every family had practitioners. After the persecution started, many practitioners went to Beijing to appeal for Dafa.
As I was working in the greenhouse one day, my husband’s second younger brother passed by. He asked, “You are still here working? Look around, everyone went to Beijing to appeal.”
“Why didn’t you go?” I asked him.
He replied, “All the roads have been blocked, and the train station is full of police. How can I go?”
“If you really want to go,” I said casually, “you can get there by foot.”
The next morning, family members discovered that the young man was gone. It turned out that he packed some cakes and headed to Beijing on foot. When thirsty, he drank water from the canal. At night, he slept on cornstalks piled on the roadside. After walking for three days and nights, he arrived in Chengde City, Hebei Province. He was very tired, his shoes were broken, and he was out of food. When he was at his wit’s end, he looked up to the sky and shouted, “Master! I don’t know where Beijing is! What should I do?”
Not long after, a van drove up the road. The driver stuck his head out and asked, “Would you like a ride?”
At that time, Beijing had very strict inspections, and no one was allowed to enter the city without an ID. My brother-in-law said helplessly that he didn’t bring any ID with him. The driver said bluntly, “You are going to Beijing, right? I’ll take you there.”
So the driver drove my brother-in-law all the way to the fifth circle road of Beijing. No guards at the checkpoints along the road asked for his ID. My brother-in-law understood that the van had been sent by Master.
Simply recalling this story made me feel a flood of emotions. I miss the cultivation environment we had at that time. I sincerely hope my fellow practitioners will regain the cultivation state we had when we were going to Beijing to appeal for Dafa, and that we had when we first started practicing.
A Serious Test
I started practicing Falun Dafa in 1998. At that time, I did not have a deep understanding of the Fa. After my two daughters moved to Shenzhen City, I went there to look after their children for five years. Without an environment for group Fa study, I gradually fell behind in cultivation. This lasted until 2009. After I returned to my hometown, we established a Fa study group at my house. I began doing the three things, distributed truth-clarification materials, and clarified the truth to people face to face.
I then went through a serious test earlier this year.
I visited a relative one day to give her an audio player so she could listen to a truth-clarification recording. That relative’s daughter said, “You sent your daughters to a place far away. What will happen when you get old? Who will take care of you?” Hearing this, my heart skipped a beat. I thought, although my only son lived in the same city as me, he had not come to my house for several years. We haven’t had much communication, even during New Year dinners. While thinking about this, I couldn’t help but resent my daughter-in-law. As a result, this resentment brought me a tribulation, the illusion of illness. My vision suddenly became blurry, as if my eyes were covered by a film. When I looked at things, the images had blurred edges and double images. I had excessive tearing, which consistently wet the front of my clothing. This situation lasted for more than a month, and it was so serious that I couldn’t sleep well at night.
I talked about this at our Fa study group. Some practitioners said that I should look inward. They said I always looked at others without looking within, and that was why the false appearance of illness came about. Some practitioners stopped coming to my house for Fa study, fearing this false illness appearance could be “contagious.”
Going through the illness karma test, my righteous thoughts were not very strong. It was hard for me to accept that fellow practitioners were so indifferent. They either ridiculed me or stood by and watched. The Fa study group had been at my house for more than ten years, and I always tried to help others with whatever they needed. But when I needed them, no one gave me any help! In the end, the practitioners stopped coming, except one, who came every week to study the Fa and send forth righteous thoughts with me. She encouraged me, “These are nothing. You should believe in Master.” Looking back, it was Master who sent this practitioner to help me when I was unable to break through this illusion of illness.
As I did not let go of my attachment, my eyes did not improve. My son was worried and took me to the hospital and to Beijing for examinations. The diagnosis was glaucoma and cataracts. But strangely, every time an operation was scheduled, my intraocular pressure was too high, and the surgery could not be performed. I realized that this was Master’s arrangement. I thought, “The heart and eyes are connected. My eyes were not the problem. The root cause is in my heart.” Then what was the point of surgery? So I decided to no longer go to the hospital. Instead, I decided that I would firmly cultivate Dafa, and I would then definitely be able to dissolve the false appearance of the illness.
I calmed down and studied the Fa. I realized that the reason practitioners left was because of my attachment to relying on them.
My house has had a Fa study group for the past ten years, and it should continue. I will persist in maintaining it even if I am the only one left. It came to mind that I should help former practitioners in the family to return to Dafa.
Helping Former Practitioners Get Back on Track
When Falun Dafa was spreading in my area, at one point there were as many as nine people in my husband’s family practicing. But they gradually slacked off in their cultivation for various reasons.
I called the sisters-in-law to my house and discussed it with them. I said, “Master gave us the form of group Fa study and group exercises. When we study the Fa alone, we may not even notice if we read the words wrong. If we study the Fa as a group, we will improve faster. And we can also go out together to clarify the truth. We will all be cultivating more diligently.” They still had Dafa in their hearts, and were not happy with their cultivation states. After our discussion everyone was excited.
So the Fa study group was re-established at my house, though with different practitioners. Within two weeks, three of them who had been slacking off and lagging behind returned to actively cultivating.
My third sister-in-law said, “I can feel a strong energy field when we study the Fa and do the exercises as a group. I can feel we are all improving.” She was having difficulty sitting in the full lotus position during the sitting meditation. She can now sit in the lotus position for an hour without a problem. After every Fa study, she took some of our Dafa keepsakes with truth-clarification information on them to give to people. She was a salesperson and often sold snacks to supermarkets. She took the opportunity to clarify the truth to various people face to face, and then give them the truth-clarification keepsakes. She often talked to them from the view of a third person and advised people to quit the CCP and its affiliates. Oftentimes, some of those overhearing her echoed along, while others happily took the keepsakes and said, “Falun Dafa is good!”
My fourth sister-in-law, who had not studied the Fa for three years, now began to distribute truth-clarification materials and help people quit the CCP organizations. She also helped with the cost of making the materials.
Through helping former practitioners in our family get back on track, I realized the importance and urgency of Fa-rectification and cultivating as one body. With strong human attachments and selfishness, I once intensely longed for practitioners to come to my house, discuss things with me, and help me overcome my illness karma. As a result the fellow practitioners left me one after another. When I wanted to help former practitioners in the family get back on track, I did not think of myself, and as a result practitioners came, and we formed one body. Dafa is extraordinary!
I saw how I had taken many detours in my cultivation. I hope that sharing my experience can help other practitioners who are in a similar situation, and they can walk on their cultivation path more steadily.
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Category: Improving Oneself
