(Minghui.org) Greetings, Master. Greetings, fellow practitioners.
My name is Ileana. I'm from Argentina. Today I want to share with you some cultivation experiences I had related to my daughter, as some of the biggest tests in my cultivation are related to her. I think they could be useful for other practitioners with and without children.
My first big test was related to her birth. My due date coincided with the first shows that Shen Yun would ever perform in Argentina back in 2009. I first thought my pregnancy was actually interference because it wouldn’t allow me to actively participate in the promotion and organization of the Shen Yun shows. With time, I calmed down and understood that the baby was a Dafa disciple as well, so she would understand and cooperate. I asked her to wait until the shows were over to be born.
That indeed happened, and I was able to participate in some tasks and help with Shen Yun reporting for the Spanish Epoch Times.
Once the shows were over, I told my baby, “Okay, now you can be born.” After all, it was already one week after the due date. But she wasn’t born yet, and a new series of shows in another South American city was getting close. I participated in the reporting for those shows too. It was now two weeks after the due date, and she still was not born.
At this point, I became worried–not only for her but also about how I would deal with the doctor; I was supposed to visit him in those weeks but didn’t because of the preparations for the Shen Yun shows. I thought that if I went to see him, he would want to perform a c-section. On a certain level, I understood that as a practitioner I shouldn’t have to undergo such a procedure. However, I also feared the idea of going through such an operation, as I never liked doctors and always considered them quite primitive in their methods.
I feared both the operation and losing face in front of him. It was also too late to find a new doctor. My family urged me to go to the doctor to be responsible for my daughter's life and so on. So, my mentality went from “it's all right, everything will be fine” to “I need to go to the doctor to conform to society” and finally to ‘but if I go, he’ll force me to do a c-section, so I can’t go.’ I also worried that not going to the doctor would harm my baby or even endanger her life.
Another week went by with shows in another South American city. That was the last city in the region to hold Shen Yun shows, so I thought that maybe she would be born after that. Three weeks after the due date, there was still no sign of labor.
Throughout this time, I looked within and found numerous attachments. Apart from the previously mentioned ones, I found the attachment to reputation, as I was worried about what other practitioners would think of me if I lost the baby. I also tried to accept that maybe I had a huge amount of karma to pay off and I had to lose my baby at that stage. I also had moments when I was clear that Master was taking care of me and the baby, that I had nothing to worry about. But all the fears and worries would quickly come back.
I spent all my time thinking about it, studying the Fa, sending forth righteous thoughts, and looking within. Even though on a certain level I knew I had to have faith in Master, reaching the realm where I had no worries or fears wasn’t easy.
Master said in “Teaching the Fa at the 2004 International Fa Conference in New York,”
“If you can truly cultivate, when you can truly let go of your attachment to living or your fear of death--and not just act that way for others to see while constantly thinking about it inside--then no matter what kind of illness you have, it will be cured. In cultivation, the difference between humanness and godhood is just the difference of one thought. This difference of one thought sounds easy, but it can be achieved only with a deep and solid foundation in cultivation. If you can really devote a lot of effort to studying the Fa, you will be able to achieve that.”
One morning, it just happened. I woke up, still laying in bed, and my first thought was, “She’s still not born...” I then suddenly reached that realm of having total faith in Master, without fear or doubt, whatever happened. At that moment, I had a vision of Master in the image of a Buddha, with an orange kasaya and blue hair, a figure of about four inches tall. By his side was a female enlightened being, wearing a lavender robe and with reddish, wavy hair. They held hands and descended to my belly. Three days later–almost four weeks after the original due date–my daughter was born in a natural delivery and with no complications.
During this period of time, several manifestations showed me that she was no ordinary child and how little disciples have their own way of assisting Master in Fa-rectification. But I’ll focus this sharing on the big tests I had to go through in this regard.
A few years went by with no major issues. But then, my relationship with her father got worse and worse. At a certain point, my daughter started to have manifestations of sickness karma. At first, they weren’t very serious, and I always dealt with it by sending forth righteous thoughts, and she would be fine. But with time, it got more serious. At one point, her father would have the same sickness manifestation, and I was tired of having to deal with it alone.
A particularly strong episode occurred when my daughter began having coughing fits that wouldn’t let her breath normally. Her father had the same sickness karma manifestation. So I blamed him and decided on my own that this time he should be the one sending forth righteous thoughts to rectify the situation.
That, of course, was wrong. Two weeks went by, and my daughter was still coughing. It even got to a point that she sometimes spat blood from all the coughing. I felt it was not fair for her to go through that just because we adults could not solve our problems, so I started sending righteous thoughts to eliminate the interference. It took me a whole week of sending forth righteous thoughts almost constantly, and in the end, the manifestation of karma disappeared, and she was fine.
Less than a month later, my daughter again had a manifestation of sickness karma. One night, she began to complain that her ears hurt. She writhed in pain and could not sleep.
I decided to send forth righteous thoughts. It was already late at night, and I was very tired, but I was determined to send forth righteous thoughts through the night if necessary. I saw that I did not have the support of her father. However, this time it did not bother me, and I decided to take charge of the matter on my own.
Within the same second, I felt a huge indignation and anger, and I thought, “How long are you going to keep doing these things?! Again with the same thing?! How many times are you going to come with the same thing?! This has nothing to do with me!”
At that moment, I also realized that this was not a good reaction. But when I looked at my daughter, I saw that she had stopped complaining about the pain and had fallen asleep on the bed.
I was stupefied. I thought that perhaps the pain had calmed down for a moment but would start again after a while, so I started sending forth righteous thoughts. But after a few minutes, I realized that she was still sleeping peacefully.
All of this happened in a split second. The tribulation had dissolved with that single thought of mine, even before I actually started to send forth righteous thoughts.
I later realized that the anger and indignation had been directed not at my daughter but instead at the evil that was causing the interference. That thought was a way of denying the old forces' arrangements.
This was a clear example of the principle Master teaches in “Beyond the Limits of Forbearance” from Essentials for Further Advancement II:
“Forbearance does not mean tolerating evil beings—that no longer have human nature or righteous thoughts—defying both human and divine laws as they corrupt sentient beings and Dafa’s existence at different levels”
After that episode, my daughter didn’t have any more manifestations of sickness karma. That was also a turning point in our lives and eventually led me to come to New York with her.
In this environment, she is able to attend Minghui school on weekends. As we live with other practitioners with kids, she has the opportunity to be more diligent by doing the exercises and studying the Fa with other little disciples on a daily basis.
I really thank Master from the bottom of my heart for giving my daughter and me this opportunity of coming to New York and cultivating in this environment, which has been positive for both of us.
Please let me know if anything in my experience sharing is not in accordance with the Fa. Thank you, Master, and thank you, fellow practitioners.
(Presented at the 2018 New York English Experience Sharing Conference)
