(Minghui.org) Greetings Master! Greetings, fellow practitioners!
I saw a Falun Dafa booth at the San Francisco Whole Life Expo in April 2000. Someone handed me a flyer explaining that the practice could enhance one’s morality. I learned the exercises at a practice site in Golden Gate Park, and I was later introduced to a practitioner who would study the Fa with me in English. I’m truly grateful to Master for these meticulous arrangements.
There was this one incident that seemed to hint at my obtaining the Fa. In June of 1994, while climbing a mountain in Lake Tahoe, I got stuck between some rocks and had nothing to hold on to. Without any climbing gear, unable to move up or down, I was trapped. Taking off my sneakers and socks, I jammed my toes into some cracks and pressed my palms against the rock. My legs began to cramp, and my body trembled. I thought I was going to die.
On the verge of falling, I wanted to scream for help, but no sound came out. Instead, I heard a voice from within that said, “Balance.” Then the cramp disappeared, and my consciousness became unusually clear. The soft voice continued, “Love the rocks. They are not here to hurt you. They are simply part of nature. It’s not your time to leave yet. You’ve got something to do.” At that instant, a thought occurred: I should jump sideways. Then, I leaped over a large rock, landing safely on the other side. I leaped over again to the next rock. My memory fades after that. I can’t recall whether I jumped again or not, but I vaguely remember finding a branch to grab onto. Later that day, a doctor at the nearby hospital told me. “Three or four people die there every year. You lucked out.”
The voice: “You’ve got something to do” comes as a stick warning at times, reminding me of the reason why I was rescued that day. A lot has happened over the years. Some things I’ve forgotten, and others I can’t quite articulate. Let me share a couple of incidents that include some recurring themes throughout my cultivation.
Overcoming Interference
In the mid-2000s, I participated in an event in Manhattan to raise awareness of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) persecution. Practitioners from around the world came together and clarified the truth at major spots throughout the city. We raised awareness of the persecution through re-enactments of the CCP’s torture and photos, while showcasing the five sets of exercises. Interacting and cooperating with practitioners from different regions and countries, talking with people about the goodness of Dafa and the brutality of the persecution, I was so happy to be part of the project. During this time, I encountered a brief yet intense interference from the old forces.
One day in the summer of 2005, I couldn’t eat or drink due to extreme pain in my throat and esophagus. So, I skipped meals, thinking that I would eat when the pain stopped. I went about my routine and ignored the unusual symptom. About the second day or so of not eating, I felt something was not right. Getting up in the morning and walking to the subway, I had to drag my body. During the day, the pain spread to the upper abdomen; it was so severe that I could barely continue standing at the site.
The next day, the pain continued. Although I tried my best to function normally, ignoring the pain while looking within and working on my shortcomings, a fellow practitioner noticed the seriousness of my condition. “You need to eat right now, even if it’s so painful to do so. Old forces, you don’t have the right to torment a Falun Dafa practitioner like this.” When she said that, something clicked, and I instantly got it. I drank a bottle of juice she offered, and we did the third and fourth exercises and sent forth righteous thoughts together. The symptom was completely gone.
In the evening, when I was about to eat a bowl of soft rice, the pain returned; as I was swallowing, the excruciating pain returned, but I knew what was going on. Despite the pain, I managed to finish the entire bowl. After that, it went away.
This experience stands out for me because it was the first time I vividly felt what the old forces were up to. As the pain was getting worse and worse, I was able to clearly sense that the factors of the old forces were not just testing me; they were set on destroying me, desperately grabbing at just about anything to interfere.
I was mistaken in accepting the abnormal symptom in the first place. Trying to function as usual, despite the pain and without eating, was a kind of denial, but it was a denial based on acknowledging the interference. In the initial phase of it, I should’ve firmly taken the abnormal condition as an illusion.
In hindsight, the main factor that caused the interference was the attachment to comfort. Several months into the project, it was quite a challenge to have a fresh mind every day, every moment. So, occasionally, I found myself wanting to get away from the city. It was not during the activities onsite, but afterward, when I was alone, these selfish thoughts would pop up, leading me to browse and read some ordinary things online.
The cases of the attachment of comfort bringing interference have occurred multiple times throughout the years. Cultivation is like navigating upstream. If we stop paddling and relax a bit, we’ll automatically slide downward, especially with distractions and temptations a click away these days.
We are immersed in such subtle and complex designs of the old cosmos, inside and out. Unless we constantly rectify our thoughts and actions in light of the Fa, our mental and habitual tendencies arranged by the old forces are bound to control us. We are given a choice every moment, to go through the motions like puppets or break out of the old conditioning. Cultivating the ability to choose and maintain righteous thoughts in everyday settings is an ongoing process.
Eliminating Negative Thoughts
I used to be plagued by secondhand smoke in my apartment complex. My next-door neighbor is a heavy smoker. When he smoked indoors, the extremely concentrated smell seeped through the walls, vents, and drains. It happened since the ventilation system of our units is connected.
He was furious whenever the issue was brought up. Communicating with him was impossible, so I contacted the apartment management.
Looking within, I realized that my thoughts were not in line with the Fa. I was judging the man based on what I saw and felt through human notions. My rational side was telling me that this was an opportunity to repay karmic debts and improve my xinxing, and that the mechanism of cause and effect must be at work. But human emotions such as anger, hatred, and contempt were acting up.
When the manager’s office told me that there was nothing they could do and the guy had the right to smoke indoors, I couldn’t take it and tried to convince them to do something about it. My words and actions lacked kindness and forbearance.
When I identified my negative thoughts and shortcomings, I focused on getting rid of them and stopped dwelling on the issue, trying to ignore the smell altogether.
Then, it hit me one day that smoking was just like thinking bad thoughts. The man was smoking indoors and the smoke particles traveled through the air, letting the neighbors know what he was doing behind closed doors. Likewise, even though we generate negative thoughts in our minds, they are living substances in other dimensions, spreading and lingering. They must smell horrible to sentient beings there.
Choosing to view smoking as a metaphor, I was reminded of how toxic negative thoughts were. And, it prompted me to attentively work on removing negativity about anything and anyone that I could pick up in my field.
When I quit human approaches and tried to think as a cultivator, gradually my judgments and bad thoughts about him were replaced with empathy. Over time, the smell has drastically lessened, and it has mostly disappeared.
Treating Shortcomings Rationally
After studying Master’s articles “Stay Far Away From Peril” and “Cultivation in Dafa Is Serious,” I was determined to tackle any remaining grudges and resentments. While I was talking about this resolve with a fellow practitioner, a long-forgotten scene unexpectedly resurfaced.
It happened in a group Fa study many years ago. A practitioner asked, “Please let me know why some of you think that I’m a spy.” Immediately, a senior practitioner responded with some derogatory words. I thought his choice of words, tone, and attitude were secular and inappropriate. So I said something to him; I don’t recall the exact wording. What I said led to bickering. We went back and forth, basically repeating the same points. If I remember correctly, I pointed out his unreasonable manner of communication; he criticized me for being self-righteous. The coordinator also jumped in and chastised me.
At that time, I thought I was having culture shock. A practitioner asking a question in front of a group, two veteran practitioners ending up attacking a third party, and the rest of the group not saying a single word, the whole scene felt surreal to me. I knew I was wrong for being indignant, but I didn’t bother to look deeper.
When I later reflected, I was arrogant. I looked down on the coordinator and the senior practitioner because their xinxing seemed terrible.
I forgot this teaching and judged them based on the conventions of etiquette and the personal notion of justice. Looking down on practitioners and persecuting them because they have attachments, that’s exactly what the old forces have been doing. By looking down on fellow practitioners for their uncultivated parts, I unwittingly aligned with the very quality and behavior of the old forces.
We’re all in the process of cleansing, shedding layers upon layers of impurities accumulated throughout the ages. We’re not done cleansing ourselves yet. So we should be able to see each other’s imperfections in context. What would be the proper way to look at the shortcomings of others and mine?
Master taught us:
“In fact, other than a person’s innate purity and innocence, all notions are acquired postnatally and are not a person’s actual self.” (“For Whom do You Exist?” Essentials for Further Advancement)
All the things that we’re supposed to eliminate are acquired impurities, not intrinsic to our true selves. They are not who we really are; we should not identify ourselves with them. They are the products of the setting of the old cosmos, Formation-Stasis-Degeneration-Destruction. Some of them are like dust and dirt stuck on us; others are like trash in our backyards. They are not us, but we do have a responsibility to clean them up. As I consciously chose to distinguish our true selves from the acquired impurities, the substance of disdain seemed dissolved.
Master sees our true selves. He cherishes the decision we made when we chose to come down for Fa-rectification. That’s why he doesn’t want to give up on us, extending the time again and again and giving us chances to do better next time. We should treat each other the way Master treats us. I choose to view the flaws of our character in a rational and compassionate way.
Looking down on others also belongs to looking outward, which is one of the key culprits that hold us back in cultivation. Looking outward is a deeply ingrained mechanism that operates almost automatically within us. Unless we consciously undo it, it will just keep running. We need to stop this old machine and replace it with a mechanism of looking inward.
The above are limited thoughts of mine at the moment. Please point out if there’s anything not in line with the Fa.
Thank you, Master! Thank you, fellow practitioners!
(Selected article presented at the 2025 San Francisco Fa Conference)
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