(Minghui.org) I started practicing Falun Dafa before the persecution began on July 20, 1999. I made it through trials and tribulations and come to where I am today due to Master’s constant care and protection. I’d like to share my cultivation journey with you.
I Begin Practicing Falun Dafa
My husband, son, two daughters, and I lived in a remote mountain village. We got along well, and the children were well-behaved. However, I suffered from poor health, including stomach problems, gynecological diseases, frequent anemia, heart palpitations, and I felt weak. I was unable to do farm work, and when my symptoms flared up, the pain was truly unbearable. In those moments of suffering, I longed to find relief.
My dream came true in September 1997, when a young man brought Falun Dafa to our mountain village. He offered me a book and asked, “Would you like to read this?” When I asked what Falun Dafa was, he replied, “It’s a cultivation practice that teaches people to be good. You’ll understand once you read it.”
Feeling curious, I took the book and I had my children read it aloud to me. We learned about Falun Dafa together, and the more we read, the more we wished to know. This is how my children and I started practicing Falun Dafa.
Before long, all my illnesses disappeared, and I felt light and energetic. I thought, “This practice is truly wonderful!” Having benefited from Dafa, I felt I should share it with others so they could benefit too. I joined other practitioners who were introducing Dafa.
I set out to promote the Fa with the sincere wish to help others. I taught the exercises to people who wanted to learn them. If someone came to my door wanting to learn, I taught them in my own home. Sometimes, I went with practitioners to other villages to let people know about Dafa. We also established Fa-study and practice sites in those villages, so many people were able to practice. I felt that doing these things gave true meaning to my life, and our family lived in harmony and happiness.
Time flew by. In the first half of 1999, my husband began to read the Fa and he learned the exercises. But this period of happiness was short-lived, as Jiang Zemin, the former Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader, initiated the persecution of these kind-hearted people, who were simply cultivating their hearts and striving to be good.
Overcoming Family Tribulations
In July 1999, the CCP launched a brutal crackdown on Falun Dafa. Overnight, the media was filled with lies and right and wrong were inverted; countless people who were unaware of the truth listened to the regime and thought Dafa was bad. Families were torn apart. Deceived by these lies, even practitioners’ relatives turned against the practice, and interfered with practitioner’s cultivation—my husband was one of them. Before the persecution began, he witnessed the benefits Dafa brought to our family and he even practiced for a while. However, after the persecution started, he believed the CCP’s lies and turned against Falun Dafa.
Despite the onset of the persecution, practitioners continued to study the Fa and do the exercises together. One evening, I went to my Fa-study group. Shortly after, several officers from the town police station arrived at my home and asked my husband, “Where is your wife?”
When he told them that I went to study the Fa one of the officers said, “People aren’t allowed to practice Falun Dafa. Take us there.” My husband actually took them to our Fa study site. That night the police seized everyone in our group and illegally detained us in the town government building for a week.
When I returned home, my husband’s expression darkened the moment he saw me, and he snarled, “You are forbidden to practice from now on. Practicing is against the law.”
“You know the practice improved my health,” I replied. “How can I possibly stop?”
“If it’s illegal, you can’t practice it.”
I said again, “Practicing Falun Dafa helped me become a good person and improves my health. What law does it break?”
He angrily declared, “I said you aren’t allowed to practice, and that’s final.” From then on, he tried to stop me from studying the Fa and doing the exercises. He often spouted the absurd phrase, “I am a true executor of Jiang’s will.”
Once, while I was studying the Fa, he spotted me and charged over aggressively to snatch the book away. I struggled with all my might to hold onto it, but he managed to take it. He tore it up, and burned it. I was heartbroken and extremely angry with him, but there was nothing I could do. At that time, we did not know how to send forth righteous thoughts.
Whenever I tried to practice, my husband tried to interfere. He would shove or pull me, hit me, or burn me with cigarette butts. Although I was angry and resentful toward him, I had no other recourse. Yet I still resolved in my heart, “No matter how you interfere, I will persist in studying the Fa and doing the exercises.” My determination never wavered. Even in such an environment, I never once stopped.
One morning, while I was doing the exercises, my husband woke up and saw me. He stormed over, shouting nonsense while striking me. Then he dragged me out the front door. Slamming it shut, he said, “Just do your exercises outside, then.” It was raining, the ground was muddy and the air was chilly. I felt a surge of anger and resentment. However, I gradually calmed down, thinking, “How could I, a cultivator, give in to anger? Aren’t anger and resentment human emotions? I need to let go of them.” Since he locked me out I would do the exercises outside. I didn’t care about the mud on the ground. I just sat down in the meditation position. About half an hour later, the door opened, and he said, “Don’t catch a cold, come inside.”
The next day, I went upstairs to do the exercises. While I was meditating, my husband came, stood in front of me, watched for a few minutes, and then left without saying a word. After I did the exercises, I went downstairs to study the Fa. He approached me again, but I remained unperturbed. He stood there for a moment and then walked away. That night, as I lay in bed, not yet asleep, I heard a voice say, “I can’t control her anymore.” From that moment on, under Master’s compassionate protection, I was able to study the Fa and do the exercises openly and freely at home.
I Was Safe
One day, my husband was transporting bags of harvested rice on a three-wheeled cart, and I was sitting on top of the load. Just as the cart reached a steep slope leading into the village, it suddenly overturned, crushing me and the rice beneath it. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. My insides were churning, yet I remained conscious. I heard my husband shouting frantically, “Oh no! Help! Someone help!”
The villagers rushed over. One person who knew I was a practitioner said, “She practices Falun Dafa. She’s protected by Master, so she’ll be fine.” I thought, “I’ll be fine!” As the crowd pushed aside the mounds of rice and the cart, I climbed to my feet, brushed off the dust, and found I wasn’t injured. Those villagers witnessed the miraculous nature of Falun Dafa and realized that practitioners truly are protected by Master.
Another time, I was drying grain on the rooftop. While spreading the grain, I stepped backward and got too close to the edge of the roof. I lost my footing and fell. I landed on a pile of loose stones. My son heard me fall, rushed over, and asked if I was okay. I quickly replied, “I’m fine!” and slowly got up. However, I felt excruciating pain in my lower back, but I endured the pain and persisted in studying the Fa and doing the exercises. Within a few days, the pain had gone and I was back to normal. Had a non-practitioner fallen from that height, the consequences could have been fatal, but for a cultivator, it was a different story. I understood from the Fa that it was Master who, time and again, dissolved tribulations for me.
Negating the Persecution
One time, while I was cooking, several police officers burst in and, without a word of explanation, forced me into a police car. I calmed myself and asked why they were arresting me, “What is wrong with being a good person, and having good health?”
One officer replied, “Fine, fine, go to Tiananmen Square and set yourself on fire.”
I responded, “The Tiananmen self-immolation was a hoax. Tell me, how could a Sprite bottle filled with gasoline survive the fire without melting? And since when do police officers patrol Tiananmen Square carrying fire extinguishers?” I then recited Master’s Fa,
“Living beings have turned demonic—endless calamities,Dafa rescues and saves in a chaotic world;Not distinguishing between righteous and evil,slandering heaven’s Fa,People of Ten Evils wait for the autumn wind.”(“Good and Evil Are Already Clear”, Hong Yin)
One officer repeated, “Wait for the autumn wind... wait for the autumn wind.” The others fell silent. I told them what Falun Dafa is.
After we arrived at the police station they offered me food, but I said, “I want to go home and eat.” I thought, “I absolutely would not allow people to commit crimes against Dafa and practitioners.” I knew I did not belong ther so I asked Master to strengthen my righteous thoughts. I knew I would not cooperate with anything they demanded, and I firmly denied the persecution.
That afternoon, they took me to a hospital for a physical exam. I refused to cooperate, and several of them forcibly lifted me onto the examination bed. As I struggled I thought, “I will not allow the doctor to commit a crime against a practitioner.”
At that point, the doctor said, “It’s impossible to examine you like this.” The police let me go. I was panting heavily from struggling, and my face was pale.
One officer exclaimed, “Forget it!” And so, the examination did not take place.
I was taken back to the police department, where they wanted to question me and record my statements. I did nothing wrong, so I declined to answer any of their questions. They demanded that I sign a document, but instead, I wrote on the paper, “I didn’t do anything wrong.” When they insisted I sign my name, I wrote my name right before that statement.
Upon seeing this, one of them questioned, “What kind of document is this?” The officer handling the case then handed it to their leader.
I calmed my mind and focused solely on preventing the leader from committing a crime against a Dafa practitioner. I then quietly recited the Fa. After a while, the leader came out and said, “We are letting you go home this time. Be more careful in the future.”
The atmosphere felt like the sun came out after a storm. Their expressions changed and became kind, a complete contrast to how they were at the start. The officer escorting me out said, “We’ve all been transformed by you.” I knew that, with Master’s strengthening, righteous thoughts triumphed over evil and negated the persecution. As soon as I stepped outside, I saw my family and fellow practitioners waiting for me. Dafa practitioners are one body, and this outcome also reflected the cooperation and righteous thoughts of my fellow practitioners.
Studying the Fa and Doing the Exercises As a Group
The group Fa-study site in our village was severely interferenced with during the CCP’s persecution. However, guided by Master’s teachings, we understood the importance of studying the Fa together, and so we persisted.
In the second half of 2007, due to the changing circumstances, I moved to a small town to work—cooking and doing housework for a family. I was separated from my original Fa-study group. I found it difficult to adjust to studying the Fa and doing the exercises on my own, so I silently asked Master to help me find a local Fa-study group as soon as possible. One day I ran into a practitioner I knew and asked if there was a Fa-study group in the area. He said there wasn’t one at the moment, and suggested that we could start a group for Fa-study and exercises.
Before long, we met a few other practitioners and quickly established our Fa-study and practice site. Our routine was to study one lecture of the Fa and then do all five of the exercises together every evening. We started Fa-study promptly at 8:00 p.m. began the exercises at 9:50 p.m., and sent righteous thoughts at midnight. We have kept this up without interruption for over a decade. Additionally, we hold regional experience-sharing meetings twice a month, allowing practitioners to encourage one another in their cultivation. This has created a supportive cultivation environment that fosters collective improvement.
In this environment, I improved rapidly, and I actively participated in group projects to help Master save people, regularly posting and distributing truth-clarification materials on a large scale. We went to surrounding areas, neighboring counties, or even places over dozens of miles away to distribute materials. When no vehicle was available for use, we distributed the materials on foot, walking through the night until dawn to distribute them. Along the way, I encountered many tribulations and dangers, yet under Master’s compassionate protection, I safely overcame every obstacle.
I routinely talked to people face-to-face and told them the facts about Dafa. I clarified the truth about the persecution and encouraged people to quit the CCP and its affiliated organizations. As a result, many people learned the truth about Falun Gong, memorized the phrases “Falun Dafa is good” and “Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good,” and quit the CCP’s organizations. Many received blessings. Master said,
“Cultivation depends on one’s own efforts, while the transformation of gong is done by one’s master.” (Lecture One, Zhuan Falun)
In reality, it is Master who does the work of saving people, while we practitioners merely do the legwork and speak the words. Here, on behalf of all sentient beings, I offer my gratitude to Master!
