(Clearwisdom.net) Greetings to Great and Compassionate Master! Greetings to fellow practitioners!
I feel very honored to be able to once again participate in this Internet sharing conference. As a Dafa disciple, participating is our responsibility because it is an act of assimilating to Dafa, rectifying ourselves, and thereby becoming able to better accomplish the mission of Dafa disciples.
1. I Obtained the Fa Miraculously
I formally began cultivating in Falun Dafa while attending high school. From my youth I was always extremely interested in the world's unsolved mysteries. I also read a lot about various religions. During the wave of qigong popularity, I yearned to cultivate to high levels. After hearing of Falun Dafa, I didn't begin to practice initially. About six months later, fate came knocking on my door.
One summer, I had a dream that my elderly neighbor next door showed me a tangerine yellow Falun spinning on the palm of his hand, and I heard beautiful heavenly music playing in the background. The Falun was as large as his palm and it was very beautiful. I vaguely remembered him saying, “This is the highest Fa.” As if I clearly understood what he meant, I replied proudly in my dream, “I have one too and mine is bigger than yours.” With that, I raised my head and a huge, colorful Falun was spinning on my head. Just then, I woke up. It was 5:00 a.m., and the lovely heavenly music was still sounding in my ears, so I got up and went to the courtyard. I heard many people practicing Falun Dafa next door, along with the heavenly music I heard in my dreams – the Dafa exercise music. At that time, I started to cultivate in Dafa.
Right from the beginning, Dafa showed me many miracles. I saw the characters and punctuation marks in the book Essentials for Further Advancement appear in gold and purple. I was able to continue reading the book without turning on the lights when it became dark. When Master opened my celestial eye, I felt a strong force drilling inward at the spot between my eyebrows. I also saw Falun in many colors spinning in the sky, as well as other scenes. I could hardly contain my joy at obtaining the Fa, and could not stop reading the Fa. Every day I felt myself progressing by leaps and bounds. I was strict with myself and knew how to look within when encountering tribulations. I acted in accordance with the teachings of Dafa when conflicts arose between myself and other practitioners. Because I behaved well at home, my family noticed the changes and regarded Master and Dafa very highly.
2. Validating Dafa
The persecution began in 1999. I knew that what was broadcast on TV was all lies and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) propaganda, and I tried to explain things to my friends and relatives. However, after witnessing the CCP's many horrific “movements,” the majority of them felt they were powerless to go against the regime's propaganda machine. I was very sad.
Our language teacher was placed in charge of our class. He once mentioned Falun Gong in class, and said he felt the situation was similar to the Boxer uprising or Taiping rebellion. After class, I went to him and said, “Sir, Falun Gong is a way of self-cultivation. What's going on in China since July 20, 1999 is nothing like the Boxer rebellion or the Taiping uprising. The Chinese Communist Party is wrongfully slandering an innocent group of people who just want to raise their morality and cultivate themselves. You are an educated man. Please objectively consider the facts and make a correct judgment.” He asked me to repeat what I said three times because he could hardly believe that I, who was usually very quiet, had the courage to speak out. Finally he smiled and nodded his head, saying he would follow my suggestion and objectively talk about the persecution. Later, when I was attending the university, I frequently sent letters clarifying the facts about Falun Gong to my teachers.
While I attended the university, compassionate Master arranged for me to be the only student on the judging panel for a speech contest organized by the university. The other judges were high-ranking officials. One of the contestants was a senior in the school's journalism society. She gave a speech slandering Dafa and nearly all the judges gave her a high score. I gave her a lower score because her opinion was wrong and her performance was mediocre. I thought I was very fair in my judgement. Another contestant was a new student. Her topic, content, expression, and other aspects of her speech were natural and refreshing. Everyone was touched. Yet in the end, the judges gave her a score of 9.98 points. However I gave her 10 points. Consequently, the final result was very just. The contestant who slandered Dafa came in second with an average 0.2 points less than the winner because of the score I gave her.
On the way back to the dorm, many classmates who watched the competition told me I had done a good job. They said I truly made them proud and I was a very impartial judge.
During my university days, I clarified the truth to predestined people, and to my surprise I discovered that many of my classmates' relatives were diligent Dafa disciples. Hence my classmates were very mindful of protecting me. When I did the exercises, they drew up the curtains and locked the door. When I sent righteous thoughts, they took care not to disturb me. When I wrote letters clarifying the truth or copied Master's teachings, they didn't stop me. They informed me when the police conducted searches for surfing banned websites.
I was most moved by the support I received from my classmates on one occasion. There was a classmate to whom I had always offered a lot of help. She wanted to be the next class monitor, but I was regarded by the teacher and fellow classmates as the best choice to be the next monitor. Hence she treated me as the greatest obstacle in the contest. She secretly sought the opinions of other students as to whether the school would expel me if she told them I was practicing Falun Gong. My classmates persuaded her to just give up the idea. I only learned of this just before I graduated. My friends were still angry when they talked about this, “We gave her a warning then. If she did something like that, she would be ostracized in class, both by the faculty and the school.”
When I was at the university, I knew two other practitioners who were studying at a different university. I often mailed them Master's new lectures and truth clarifying materials. The lectures were handwritten by me. Protected by compassionate Master, we disciples remained safe at all times. In school, I often gave out brochures and posted truth clarifying materials in public places. I also posted letters clarifying the truth to save people.
During the first few years of the persecution, everyone was scared. When Master's new teachings were published, fellow practitioners didn't trust me, as they felt that I was too young, so they didn't give me the new lectures. However Master was looking out for me. He told me in my dreams that there were new scriptures and I could go to a fellow practitioner's home to ask for them. While I was home during school holidays, I did whatever I could to help fellow practitioners. If I was needed to pass on information, I would help. If they needed to report something on the Minghui website, write articles, or produce truth clarifying materials, I would access the Internet and do as I was asked. Initially, I had to go to Internet cafes, but later on, I had my own computer. By cooperating with fellow practitioners, I expanded my capacity and identified and eliminated many attachments.
There was something that I didn't do well however. On several occasions, I came across books slandering Dafa and Master at the book fair organized by the school. I was too scared to clarify the truth in the presence of so many students. Instead, I slipped brochures into these books, hoping that people would read them and make their own judgment. However it seemed that no one bought these books, and they were subsequently taken off the shelves.
There was another incident when my school was told to hold a meeting in each class to defame Dafa. I looked at the students on stage chairing the meeting as I sent righteous thoughts. Actually they all knew that I was a practitioner and they had a good impression of me. Perhaps Master saw my righteous thoughts, as in the end an unexpected thing happened. As the chairperson went on stage, he took a look at me and said, “There is no need to debate over what Falun Dafa is since everyone knows about it already. Instead let's talk about things that are bothering us.” Throughout the auditorium the students and faculty laughed and applauded. A student from the southern region of China stood up and shouted, “No water, no electricity, no phone!” Thus, the meeting turned into a discussion on school issues and ended on a positive note. I realized that whatever incidents we run into, it is most important to have righteous thoughts. As long as we have the right understanding, Master will arrange everything.
During my days as a university student, I did a lot of writing and editing work. This gave me a good foundation for my future involvement in producing articles that exposed the local persecution. Everything was arranged by Master. In the process of editing truth clarifying materials, I also ran into many situations where my ideas were different from fellow practitioners, which created conflicts and misunderstandings. I realized that all these were precious opportunities Master arranged for me to improve myself.
(To be continued)
