(Minghui.org) Greetings, Master! Greetings, fellow practitioners!

Some of you might remember my sharing during the European Falun Dafa Conference in Warsaw, Poland, in 2022. I said that starting in 2006, I had the honor of supporting Shen Yun performances every year in the backstage area during shows throughout Europe. I saw local practitioners in other countries coordinating, and working hard to assist Master in saving sentient beings during Shen Yun shows. I was very happy to see that they had this opportunity to assist Master, but at the same time I felt sad. I was the main coordinator in Poland for years, but I wasn’t able to invite Shen Yun to perform in Poland. I wasn’t able to provide my Polish fellow practitioners with the possibility of being part of this greatest of projects, which is personally led by Master.

Things changed at the end of 2021. While venues in other European countries still had many COVID restrictions, the situation in Poland was more relaxed. There were many openings in the European Shen Yun tour, and those dates were approaching quickly. I saw this as a chance to finally have Shen Yun perform in Poland again after many years in which we kept being told, “Please wait for bigger cities to find a venue,” and then that there were no available dates left. I saw this as a chance for Poland to really help out Shen Yun in those difficult times. We started searching for a venue, but because those dates were just 2.5 months away, most theaters had no availability. We managed to find one venue, but it was quickly rejected because of technical issues. Some of you might remember how at the European Falun Dafa Conference in Warsaw, I talked about not taking no for an answer and working hard between Shen Yun and the venue to convince both sides that Polish practitioners could really host a successful show.

This time I want to tell you about my cultivation experiences. Time was tight as we started promotion and sales just 46 days before the show. Practitioners in other countries that previously hosted Shen Yun said we must be crazy to start sales and promotion just 1.5 months before the show.

For me this was the beginning of a really difficult cultivation period. Let me add that I am a co-owner of a mid-size company, and I have to be directly involved in it more than full time. Also I have 3 children who require my time and focus.

Since the last time Shen Yun performed in Poland was 7 years ago, I was the local person who had the most recent experience with promoting and making arrangements for the show. As time was tight, I had no time to pass the experience and knowledge to other practitioners. So even though I was the main coordinator for the Shen Yun project, I had to quickly and personally take care of contacting the venues concerning technical issues, and it took a lot of time of going back and forth between the Shen Yun production managers and the venue technical team. At the same time, I had to set up all aspects of the sales system with Shen Yun Ticketing from scratch. Also, although I asked our group if anyone could coordinate promotion, no one volunteered. So, at the same time as arranging the technicalities and setting up the sales system, I had to plan the promotion and the budget, and then manage the promotion including the online promotion. I was in constant daily contact with the marketing team in the U.S., who managed our online promotion.

The other practitioners helped by distributing leafleting and putting brochures into mailboxes, and thanks to Master’s arrangements, the tickets sold well—we even had to add another show.

But for me this was a time when, because of too much regular everyday work, family responsibilities, and making arrangements for Shen Yun, I started to neglect Fa study. I was studying less and less: as soon as I picked up Zhuan Falun and began to read, I immediately remembered some important things concerning Shen Yun in Poland that I was supposed to do, or I should have finished the day before: things that could not wait, and I would stop Fa study and do those tasks.

I thought: “It’s okay, it’s only one month more. Shen Yun will be over in Poland, and then I will catch up with my Fa Study.”

When Shen Yun finally came to Poland in January, we learned there would be another gap in the tour in 4 months’ time, and we were asked if we could find some theaters.

The whole story repeated itself: we found a not so perfectly qualified venue, and by going back and forth through negotiations with Shen Yun and the venue, we finally signed the contract. Again, the general coordination, all technical aspects and promotion were on me. This time tickets were not selling as quickly as before, so my promotion duties required even more time, because this time the war between Russia and Ukraine broke out at our Eastern border.

The day we started the promotion for Shen Yun, Russia invaded Ukraine. During the first few days of the war, the Russian army was making rapid progress. People in Poland were all in shock and no one was sure about their future. The city where Shen Yun was to perform was only 75 km (or 45 miles) from the border of Ukraine, and no one bought tickets to see Shen Yun.

We received a phone call from the European Logistics coordinator and Shen Yun management. They wanted to know how ticket sales were going in Poland. I held my breath and said: “No tickets were sold.” Then I heard, “Cancel the show!”

I froze and thought: Shen Yun hadn’t performed for so many years in Poland and we had to overcome so much to bring Shen Yun back—we can’t give up. So, when I heard “Cancel the show!” I said, “Please, give me a moment to quickly share this with Polish practitioners and I will get back to you.” I hung up and quickly discussed this with the key practitioners involved – all of us felt the same – no one had the slightest thought that we should give up. We must not surrender no matter what, not even because of war.

I called and said, “Please give us a week - and we will show you we can still sell tickets.”

The response was: “No, there is a war!” I didn’t give up and responded, “The real war is in another dimension. Please, we are asking just for one week to prove that we can do it.” The response was: “Okay, but you have only 3 days! We can only wait for 3 days, then we have to cancel the show.”

Although there were no practitioners in the city where Shen Yun was supposed to perform, we immediately organized additional promotional activities. The tickets started to sell, and in the end the shows were a huge success. Actually, since this was a new venue that was built in 2015, no other show that had performed in this venue managed to reach even one full house. But, Shen Yun managed to have 3 full-house shows.

But, I had to devote even more time to it and I neglected Fa study even more. I kept thinking, “As soon as Shen Yun performs here and goes to the next city, I will catch up with my Fa study.”

But after the Shen Yun shows in May, we applied for Poland to host the European Falun Dafa Conference, so I had to jump in and coordinate this. I neglected my Fa study even more. I thought, “Okay, as soon as the conference is over, I’ll catch up with my Fa study.”

During the conference in Poland, my family heard amazing stories about Northern Academy in Middletown, New York, and one of my daughters decided she wanted to go there to study. I was surprised at how much effort was required to go through the 14-step application process, and how many documents and efforts were needed to pass through this process and get her admitted to the school, including obtaining a visa. Of course, it was totally worth it – but I had to spend lots of time managing this.

After the European conference, unfortunately we had to change the CEO of the Polish language Epoch Times, and as no one wanted to take the job, I felt that as the main responsible person for Poland I had to take on this task, otherwise The Epoch Times in Poland would cease to exist. Once I took up this position, I felt another big chunk of pressure was added to my shoulders.

At the same time, we started working on next year’s Shen Yun. I also coordinated the Polish dragon dance team. In the last few years we participated in over 75 parades and events across Europe, and coordinating this required quite a lot of time.

Then my oldest son said he would like to follow his sister and apply for Fei Tian College in Middletown, and again I had to spend lots of time to make that happen.

Every year I coordinated our local Falun Dafa conference in Poland, big main meetings, some big activities and many other tasks. I had difficulty getting other practitioners to help take on the responsibility of coordinating these activities. I treated all of this as my responsibility, and I simply did it.

Then my youngest daughter said she would like to follow her siblings and apply for Northern Academy in Middletown. In addition, my business partner’s son (they are not practitioners) decided to attend Northern Academy in Middletown, so I spent quite a lot of time helping to make that happen.

Every year we kept increasing the number of cities Shen Yun performed in, as well as the number of shows. Although I managed to involve other practitioners in technical issues, I was still the promotion coordinator, and I personally managed the online marketing as well.

At the end of 2024 I reached my limit. My Fa study had become almost non-existent. I sent a message to the Falun Dafa Association to report my inadequate cultivation state. I called for a coordinators’ meeting in Poland and I openly shared with them. I said, “I am basically not studying the Fa, and I really feel squashed and smashed by too many responsibilities. I have completely lost all enthusiasm to assist my fellow practitioners. Actually, I don’t even want to see other practitioners.” I shared how I felt there were two scenarios: the old forces are getting the upper hand in eliminating me from being a practitioner and soon I would be gone, or this is the time for other practitioners to take up the responsibilities. I said the only way I would survive as a practitioner was if others took over different responsibilities. Either way—even if I was replaced and we had a new main coordinator, other practitioners should still get involved, as this is all too much for any one person.

I was happy to see that practitioners took my words seriously, and they started to take on these tasks.

I said the first thing we needed to do was to have someone else take the position of CEO of the Polish Epoch Times. So one practitioner said to another practitioner who was heavily involved in The Epoch Times: “You have to take over as CEO, as you are the only person who can take it, and you are actually the best person to do it.” That person hesitantly agreed.

Then I said, “Shen Yun marketing—we must find another person to do it.” Actually – there had always been a person we all thought would be good for this job, but he always avoided it. Someone told him: “You have to take over Shen Yun marketing, as you are the best person to do it,” and he hesitantly agreed.

Then I said we had to do the same thing with the upcoming Polish Falun Dafa Conference. I said if other members of Poland’s Falun Dafa Association thought that we should have our local Polish conference, then this time they had to arrange it and coordinate it. They agreed.

Then I said I could not do the Polish dragon dance team coordination, and for this job someone actually volunteered. Then we talked about other tasks. Of course, passing on the tasks was a process, and it lasted months, but the more things were taken off my shoulders, the easier it was for me to study the Fa.

And the real breakthrough came during the next 4-day Polish National Fa Study a few months later. During that meeting I felt how my body and my thoughts were being cleansed. That meeting gave me so many righteous thoughts and so much strength that, since that meeting until Shen Yun’s arrival months later, I was reading one full lecture of Zhuan Falun every day. If I missed one day, I caught up by reading two lectures the next day. I felt my righteous thoughts becoming stronger and again I felt very enthusiastic about assisting my fellow practitioners, and in general very enthusiastic to see practitioners, and to share and collaborate with them.

After my cultivation state started to improve, I looked inside to find the attachment: I understood that for too many years I actually had an attachment to doing things and to coordinating too many projects by myself, and that the truth was I actually doubted that other practitioners could do those tasks as well as me, or I was even afraid that they could do a better job than me. All those notions were connected to my attachment of jealousy.

Once I saw my jealousy, I felt ashamed that I had to almost fail in my cultivation to see this deeply hidden attachment. So recognizing it was the first very important step in removing it. Since then I’ve watched my thoughts carefully, and when I notice those thoughts again, I am able to eliminate them quickly.

Please point out anything that is not in line with the Fa.

Thank you, Master. Thank you, fellow practitioners.

(Presented at the 2026 European Fa Conference)