(Clearwisdom) Tides come and go, up and down. The land that lies under the waves are lifted up while those above the waves go under. All the power, glory, and wealth are turned into dust. What is eternal? What is worthy of pursuit? Mankind has never given up searching for the answer to this question. Coming up on the 19th anniversary of Falun Dafa's public introduction, Mr. Li Xun reviewed his own cultivation practice experience, and shared his understandings of the meaning of Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance to life during an interview with a reporter for the Clearwisdom website.
Mr. Li Xun at a news conference in the Parliament of Canada
A Turning Point in My Life
“That night, I realized what Dafa is, and I was extremely moved and could not stop my tears. I could not believe what I had been diligently searching for was fully exhibited in front of me, and I could not believe that I could obtain such a treasure in such a chaotic world.” When he talked about his experience of learning Falun Dafa 13 years ago, Mr. Li was still deeply moved.
Mr. Li Xun graduated from the Department of Computer Science, Tsinghua University in 1986. He later earned his master's degree in Computer Science from the University of British Columbia (UBC). In 1992, he joined Northern Telecom as a senior engineer.
He credited his motivation for cultivation practice to his wife's miraculous recovery from a car accident, “My wife had an accident when she was pursuing her master's degree in Vancouver. She had been suffering from lower back pain since then. She worked for IBM in Toronto after graduation. Her lower back pain was getting worse since she worked in front of a computer and sat for a long time every day. She finally could not even stand a trip from Toronto to Ottawa by car. She tried everything, including massage, bone-setting (a unique massage skill passed down from a family of a renowned Chinese traditional doctor) but nothing worked. She began practicing Falun Gong following a friend's recommendation at the end of 1996, and all her problems miraculously went away in two weeks. She was amazed by how she had totally changed.”
Mr. Li practiced different types of qigong while he was in college. Although he witnessed his wife's changes and considered Falun Gong a good practice, he treated it as just another qigong and did not think about doing it himself. He was healthy and busy with work. A year passed. “It was Christmas break at the end of 1997 that my wife had a Falun Dafa activity in Toronto, and I went as her companion. Those three days became the turning point in my life.”
Falun Dafa began being widely spread overseas after Mr. Li Hongzhi was invited to teach it in France in March 1995. The same year Falun Dafa was introduced to Toronto, and the Falun Dafa Association of Canada was registered as a non-profit organization. Students frequently hosted group Fa-study, exercises, and experience sharing at their homes during weekends and holidays.
"I met dozens of practitioners from different walks of life, and felt that I was in a piece of pure land. Each of them had a touching story about their practice. All of them, men and women, young and old, had a common characteristic, which was considering the interests of others in all situations, and they disciplined themselves following Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. It was an unaffected grace that I was drawn to but could not reach. While most people were focused on their own benefits, practitioners were discarding self interest and thinking about how to be good to others. I saw the greatness of the teachings that they had by looking at them. My desire for cultivation emerged."
Mr. Li read Zhuan Falun three times in a week right after he went back to Ottawa. He also devoured other books written by Mr. Li Hongzhi. He felt that his mind was open, and many of his questions regarding life and the universe were answered.
“I persistently sought the answer to the eternal question and tried to be a good man, but I fell far short while I was in pursuit of fame and fortune and competing with others. I kept climbing toward goals one after another that I set for myself in the secular world. When I reached them, I felt so-so, and saw many higher mountains far away. Along the way, I felt tired both in my body and in my mind, and had a sense of being lost. In addition, I felt life was unpredictable. A healthy person might suddenly die in an accident, and who knew what was next in life? Could a person really get something by pursuit? Who could be certain about it?” Many looked up to him, but his heart was lost.
He experienced a joy that he had never known after he obtained the Fa. It was a joy coming from the bottom of the soul after finding the truth and understanding the meaning of life and how to face life.
Person to Person, Heart to Heart
After assimilating into the practice, Mr. Li found cultivation practice was no longer an abstraction, or a theory. He experienced and understood various extraordinary phenomena and the truth of Dafa.
"After understanding the fundamental truth of life, my attachments became weak. My heart was full of light and peace that I never experienced before. I used to push myself pretty hard. I got second place in the Tianjin Mathematics Competition when I was in Nankai Middle School. I got top evaluations every year when I was working at Northern Telecom. One year I found out my raise was about the same as other colleagues. I felt lost and confronted my boss, and the result made me more depressed. After cultivation practice, I understood the truth of gain and loss--to let things happen naturally. I no longer worried about these things. My heart quieted down, my physical health improved, and my wisdom increased. I made better contributions in my job and I got the pay and bonuses that I deserved.”
His mother began practicing in early 1998 after she witnessed the tremendous changes in her son and daughter-in-law. “My mother had suffered from sinusitis and heart disease. All her diseases disappeared after three months of practice. She and my wife had constant conflicts when we were living together, but since practicing, we all had bigger hearts. Now when there is a conflict, instead of blaming others, we look within and think of others. Our family has become more and more harmonious, and my son also began to practice. We became a family of cultivators.”
Deeply touched by the grace that Dafa brought to a practitioner, a family, and society, sharing with others became their biggest desire. In 1998, they and other practitioners set up practice sites in Ottawa and promoted Falun Dafa on various occasions.
“I remember there were 40 to 50 people who showed up on our first two days of teaching the class in the Ottawa Library. Local media also reported the mind and body benefits of students. In a local community activity in March 1999, the Chinese ambassador in Ottawa came to our booth and encouraged us to keep promoting the essence of Chinese traditional culture. The last introductory class before the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) persecution was held at our house. Our four rooms were full of people. Both easterners and westerners loved the profound and powerful exercises.”
Standing Firm in the Persecution
On July 20, 1999, the former CCP General Secretary Jiang, for his own power, began slandering Falun Dafa and started the brutal persecution of practitioners.
“The CCP seized and destroyed Falun Dafa books in China, and blocked websites. The People's Daily published over 340 false statements, and fanned hatred towards Dafa among the people.” He felt pity for those who had not experienced the preciousness of Falun Dafa, and sorrow for those who were blinded by lies, did evil against Dafa, and endangered themselves. “It is my duty as a Dafa disciple to tell the truth to the world.”
“None of us had the experience of dealing with mainstream society and media. We wrote to the media with a sincere heart to clarify the facts after they reprinted the CCP lies. The media published our first hand experiences. They were more than just reports.”
The Globe and Mail published an article entitled "Canada Condemns Crackdown of Falun Gong” on July 26, 1999. Canada became the first country in the world which publicly condemned the CCP's persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) followed. They interviewed practitioners, produced and broadcasted a seven minute documentary about practitioners who benefited in mind and body. Many people learned the facts of Falun Gong from that program.
Facing the unreasonable persecution, practitioners initially thought that it was a misunderstanding. They tried to communicate with the authorities through various channels. “The persecution kept escalating. The first death case happened two months later. A practitioner was beaten to death for not giving up the practice. We were shocked, and wanted to hold a press conference in parliament to call for help from the Canadian government. We did not know how to do this, so we just did the exercises quietly in front of the capitol. "
Parliament member Mr. Rob Anders was moved by the practitioners' steadfastness to the principles of Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance. He wrote down those three words, and solemnly pointed out that persecuting the believers of Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance destroys the foundation of human morality, and is a persecution of all mankind. With his help, we successfully held the first Falun Dafa introductory session in parliament, and more people learned the facts.”
One year later, in August 2000, Canadian practitioners organized the first "Falun Dafa Week." The Canadian Governor General, the Deputy Prime Minister, cabinet ministers, parliament members, and more than thirty politicians declared their support of Falun Dafa and their disapproval of the persecution. Canadian Governor General Adrienne Clarkson wrote that practitioners “cultivate the will to live in peace with themselves and in harmony with the universe, thus learning compassion for others and helping to create a more open and tolerant society.”
The CCP was scared by the Canadian government's open support of Falun Gong. The Chinese Consulate sent slanderous statements around, and threatened the politicians to withdraw their proclamations. Canadian politicians thought the lies of the CCP were ridiculous. Why did the alleged self-immolations, suicides, and homicides happen only in mainland China, and not in any other country? Even in mainland China, why did they happen only after the persecution started, and not before the persecution. You could learn what Falun Gong is by observing the practitioners. Some parliament members threw the slanderous statements into the trash can, some gave them to us, and others replied to expose the lies. One parliament member wrote, “As a response, I would again proclaim Falun Dafa week.”
Mr Zhang Kunlun, a professor in the Department of Art in McGill University, was arrested in China on November 15, 2000. Canadians launched an unprecedented rescue operation. State radio and television (CBC), Canadian Television (CTV), and Multi-Cultures TV (OMINI) and newspapers followed the case. People from different backgrounds formed a rescue committee. Mr. Zhang was released in two months and came back to Canada.
"In February 2001 in Beijing, the Prime Minister of Canada raised the issue of the persecution of Falun Gong. In October 2002, the Canadian Parliament unanimously passed Bill S-236 which supported the rescue of Falun Gong practitioners. Dozens of practitioners were rescued to Canada after that."
"So far about half a million Canadians have signed our petition to ask the government to urge China to stop persecuting Falun Gong. In 2005 before the CCP's high-level officials visited Canada, we submitted to the Canadian Prime Minister a petition with nearly 50,000 signatures. In 2006 before the election, the Canadian Press reported that according to statistics on the number of letters to the Prime Minister's Office, the persecution of Falun Gong was one of the three things that Canadians are most concerned about.”
Falun Gong used to be passed from person to person, mouth to mouth. Practitioners, with no desire for fame or personal gain, quietly practiced in society. The CCP's "ruining of practitioners' reputation, cutting off of their finances, killing them physically" did not destroy Falun Dafa, but instead pushed it onto the world stage.
The Eternal Road
On the occasion of the 19th anniversary of Falun Dafa's public introduction, Prime Minister Harper wrote a letter to the Falun Dafa Association of Canada in honor of Falun Dafa month, “This month-long celebration is an opportunity to reflect on the introduction of Falun Dafa and its adherence to the values of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.”
Mr. Li said, "The Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance principles of Falun Dafa is an eternal way of returning to your original, true self or to your original nature. Falun Gong has spread the world over to 110 countries. This miracle reveals the mighty virtue of Dafa, and indicates the bright future of mankind. "
