(Clearwisdom.net) Before the New Year [of 2007], I was interfered with by my attachments to comfort and laziness. Every day I went to sleep again after waking up in the morning. When I got up, I would feel dizzy and short of breath. My body felt heavy and weak. The more I slept, the sleepier I became. I regretted many times that I slept in so much, but I couldn't help making the same mistake again and again.
When I sent forth righteous thoughts, I fell asleep in the first five minutes when I was supposed to cleanse myself. When I practiced the sitting meditation, I got drowsy and fell asleep after I performed the hand signs. When I studied the Fa, I became dizzy after reading one sentence, and before I finished the second sentence, I had already started to dream and dropped the book. It took me three or five hours to read one lecture, and I didn't even understand what I'd read. My righteous thoughts were not strong enough, my character dropped, and I was less effective in clarifying the truth. I also became resentful. The evil took advantage of my gaps, and my home was ransacked and I had money extorted from me. I was illegally detained.
Why did I suffer from such persecution at the final stage of Fa-rectification when the evil factors have become less and less? Apparently it was because I had done the three things very poorly. And the reason why I'd done poorly was because of my stubborn postnatal notions and habits. I didn't like to have contact other practitioners. I knew this notion was not me. It was something formed in the Party culture. I wanted to stick to my own ways of doing things, make arbitrary decisions, take unilateral actions, and stay selfish. I thought that it was chaotic to have many people around. I didn't want to trouble other practitioners. My notion conformed to the old force arrangements. The old forces wanted to separate Dafa practitioners and to break our one body of practitioners into parts so as to persecute us one by one. It's so dangerous. My original life was created in the space of the universe. It had the same nature as the universe--Truthful, Compassionate and Tolerant. It was willing to save sentient beings. As Dafa practitioners, we will cultivate to be Kings and Lords, and manage the beings in our worlds. How could I dislike contacting other practitioners? I must fundamentally change my ordinary person's way of thinking, jump out of the box created by my own ignorance, break the dial placed in me by the old forces, break the layers of separations, walk my path arranged by Teacher Li Hongzhi, form a whole body with fellow practitioners, and assimilate into the group environment of Fa study, exercises, sending forth righteous thoughts, and harmonic sharing.
I went to my local Fa study group. Every day, we practiced the five sets of exercises together, read one lecture of Zhuan Falun, sent forth righteous thoughts every hour, shared and discussed whenever necessary, shared and exchanged experiences of clarifying the truth, and used our own skills to save the sentient beings. We also memorized the Fa that's specific to our attachments, corrected each other's movements in the exercises, and reminded each other to get out of our incorrect conditions.
With the help of my fellow practitioners at the Fa-study group, I was able to disintegrate the sleepiness demon which had interfered with me doing three things. Practitioners helped to find Teacher Li Hongzhi's Fa on this issue, and told me to memorize it. It was very effective. I have recorded Teacher's Fa here for practitioners who may have similar challenges.
"You fall asleep while studying the Fa, you fall asleep while reading the book, you also fall asleep while doing the exercises. You haven't even broken through the beginning stage yet. It's about willpower! As you know, during your cultivation, not only will all elements that constitute your humanness try to stop you from breaking away from being a human, but also everything that constitutes the human environment won't let you leave. You have to break through everything and overcome all kinds of ordeals. The biggest manifestation is the suffering they create for you. Suffering comes in different forms, and sleepiness is one of them. Those people who aren't able to cultivate or who aren't diligent don't realize that this is a form of hardship. You are unable to attain the Fa it doesn't let you study the Fa and yet you aren't even aware that it's an ordeal. Unless your heart isn't with the Fa or you don't want to cultivate, why not overcome it? Strengthen your willpower. If a person could become a Buddha simply by overcoming sleepiness, I'd say it would be too easy. How will you cultivate yourself if you can't even pass a small hurdle like this one?" (Falun Buddha Fa - Teaching the Fa at the Assistants' Fa Conference in Changchun)
"Don't you get sleepy? Don't you feel sleepy as soon as you read the book, or become drowsy once you study the Fa? Let me tell you that those are gods at a level in this human dimension. If you can't break through them, you remain a human. They aren't intentionally doing anything to you--they treat everyone like that. That's why people feel tired and sleepy. If you want to break away from being a human, you have to break through everything before you can make it. If you go along with them they'll think you are just a human." (Falun Buddha Fa Teaching the Fa at the Assistants' Fa Conference in Changchun)
"You all know about enduring hardship. Yet you haven't realized that your sleepiness, too, is a demon tormenting you and trying to stop you from cultivating! Isn't this when your willpower should take control? I don't believe that if you keep your eyes open you'll still fall asleep! Open your eyes during the exercises if you can't control it. You have to pass this hurdle." (Falun Buddha Fa Teaching the Fa at the Assistants' Fa Conference in Changchun)
"What those evil specter factors of the vile Party want is precisely to make you drowsy, and the drowsier you get, the more they reinforce that drowsiness. They just won't let you send righteous thoughts, because by doing so you are purging them. When you send forth righteous thoughts to destroy them, they interfere." ("Teaching the Fa in the City of Los Angeles")
"However, you should not fall asleep or lose consciousness, otherwise good things might be practiced by someone else." (Zhuan Falun)
"Sleep itself isn't a demon. It's a factor such that humans must rest. This is also one of the things, the factors, that make up the universe. But as a cultivator, if you sleep during cultivation it can play the role of a demon, keeping you from cultivating. It isn't a demon itself, but it can play that role. But on the other hand, it also has the effect of strengthening your will. Don't you need to cultivate your will? You need to strengthen your will, and restraining it is strengthening your will--it's also cultivation. Feeling sleepy while doing the exercises is itself also an effect of thought karma." ("Teaching the Fa at a New York Meeting" in Falun Buddha Fa Lectures in the United States)
"Some people say, 'I fall asleep whenever I do the exercises.' That too is something you need to overcome with your own will. Although it's not a demon, it can have a demonic effect on cultivators. It will effect you if you can't conquer it." (Falun Buddha Fa -- Teaching the Fa at the Conference in Switzerland)
"All the same, some people indeed fall asleep when listening to the Fa. Why does that happen? How could you not treat what makes you fall asleep and not hear the Fa as a demon? And if it is, why don't you defeat it?" (Falun Buddha Fa Teaching the Fa at the Eastern U.S. Fa Conference)
Other Teacher's Fa include the section "Your Main Consciousness Should Predominate" in Lecture Six of Zhuan Falun and Teacher's recent article "The Closer to the End, the More Diligent You Should Be."
After I adjusted my conditions, I was able to do the three things smoothly again. Other practitioners in our Fa-study group also experienced great improvement, especially one practitioner. He had practiced Dafa for ten years but still suffered from the problem of shortness of breath. Now, in a few days it was cured. He used to practice the sitting meditation for only half an hour and could hardly tolerate the pain. Now he can do it for an hour in group practice, and feels very comfortable without much pain. He used to feel scared even when other practitioners hung banners, recently he calmly hung eight banners without fear. He met only one person as he was doing it, and the person didn't even notice him. Not long ago, he practiced the sitting meditation for two hours and felt great. He had never had such an experience before. He said that one day of group Fa study worked better than studying the Fa at home by himself for a year. He may have just been exaggerating, but he said this after truly appreciating the power of group Fa-study. From the changes in practitioners, we have witnessed Teacher Li Hongzhi's benevolence and the power of Dafa.
I've shared my experiences here to encourage all practitioners to come and join group Fa study. Let Fa study groups bloom like flowers everywhere. If all practitioners form a whole body, and Fa-study groups bloom like flowers everywhere, the evil will have nowhere to hide.
March 6, 2007