(Minghui.org) I was a drug abuser and dealer for six years. I can’t remember how many times I tried to quit using, but I didn't succeed, and so I felt life was not worth living.
Fortunately, I learned about the power of Falun Dafa in 1998 from another drug abuser who successfully quit drugs by following Dafa's tenets of Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance. He told me, “I have fully changed in both body and soul. After reading the paragraph about smoking in Zhuan Falun, I easily quit smoking and using drugs.” I didn’t really believe it was possible, but then he read that paragraph to me.
From then on, drugs and cigarettes had a burnt smell and so I, too, easily quit both. Before that, I had smoked for dozens of years.
I went to learn the exercises the next morning. The people who taught me were all very kind, and they didn't charge me a penny. I studied Zhuan Falun with them in the evening. I understood that Falun Dafa was teaching people to do good things, and to understand the true purpose of human life.
From then on, I started being a good person. I began doing business legally and never made fake items or cheated people anymore. I used to curse and blow up at my wife and children when I got drunk; but after I began cultivating I never drank alcohol again even though I had been drinking for over 10 years. I also quit other bad things like soliciting prostitutes and gambling.
Actually, it wasn't hard to quit those addictions. Master Li Hongzhi said:
“Because our practice is one in which the Fa refines practitioners, this means that some situations will arise from gong and the Fa. In the course of practice, different levels produce different situations.” (Lecture Seven, Zhuan Falun)
Just as my friend had said, I also fully changed myself both in body and soul. I felt so good!
I was arrested when I went to the stadium to practice the exercises with others on July 20, 1999. I was jailed in the county detention center for over 50 days and fined 4,000 yuan.
I used to be a scumbag and engage in all kinds of bad deeds. However, I quit them all through practicing Falun Dafa. The government failed to educate or change me; yet it banned me from following a good qigong practice that successfully purified me. It was obvious to me how extremely ridiculous the regime's logic was!
Then I went to Beijing to appeal for the right to follow my faith. Just as I was meeting a fellow practitioner in Beijing, we were both arrested. The officers tortured me and took me to a detention center.
I used my experiences as an example when clarifying the truth to the guards and inmates. Some of them understood and accepted the facts and showed sympathy toward me. I went on a hunger strike, and the guards force-fed me using a nasogastric tube. I told them that prison is a place for jailing bad people, but I was a good person, therefore, I should be released right away.
I told the guard in charge of drug rehabilitation that I had abused drugs for many years and tried many times to quit, but had failed. It was Falun Dafa that helped me get over my addictions. The guard told me he tried to help many drug abusers quit, but was never successful. Only one person managed to stay away from drugs for over a month, but he heard that the person later died of a drug overdose. I told the guard to read Zhuan Falun and see if it helped him in his work.
I was taken back to the detention center in the city in which I lived and forced to do slave labor. One time, four guards tortured me for about a week. They deprived me of sleep, handcuffed me to a chair used for death row prisoners, and only allowed me to wear light clothing in winter. When I was made to stand for long periods of time, I was so exhausted that I would fall asleep. The guards would then hit me or douse me with cold water to wake me up.
They tortured me to try to get me to confess to the lies they fabricated. I told them I just followed the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance and didn't engage in any illegal activities. I also told them about my life before and after I began practicing Falun Dafa.
When they couldn’t force me to admit to lies, they returned me to the cell. My body was out of phase by then, but they still didn’t allow me to sleep. I had to continue doing labor along with other inmates.
One night, I got up to do the exercises at midnight. The guards shackled my hands to my feet using a very heavy contraption. Because I couldn’t move, I had to rely on others to feed me. Sometimes, if the inmates who fed me were in a bad mood, they refused to keep feeding me even though I hadn't eaten very much.
Inmates had to carry me to the restroom. One time, I fell onto the toilet when they loosened their hands, which increased the pain in my hips and feet. My ankles were all bruised and swollen from the shackle. The head inmate found some balm and smeared it on the bruises. He also found a towel to cover my ankles to lessen the friction.
I tried to drink as little water as possible so I would use the restroom less. At night, I could only sleep sitting up. I don’t remember how long this torture lasted. When they took off the cuffs and shackle, I was unable to stand up and move. The excruciating pain caused memory loss.
My sentence was extended by 18 months in a forced labor camp, under the condition that they didn’t have reason to hold me for longer. I was subjected to brainwashing and forced to watch TV programs slandering Falun Dafa every day. Finally, they succeeded in “transforming” me.
After I was released and gave up cultivation practice, my temper became bad again. I indulged in drinking and gambling, and I also began to be inconsiderate of my wife and children. My health became so poor that I had to rely on medicines. The pharmacies even offered me discounts because I was such a regular customer. My life became miserable, and I lost my soul again.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had changed me back into a bad and suffering person after Dafa had saved me. I felt I was unqualified to practice Falun Dafa anymore. But when I behaved badly, I remembered Dafa's principles and felt very guilty.
Later, through the help of fellow practitioners, I let go of those heavy mental burdens and returned to cultivation practice. After resuming cultivation for about a month, the bone overgrowth on my neck disappeared, as well as my other illnesses, and I again quit smoking, alcohol, and other addictions.
From then on, I continued to tell people stories about how Dafa changed me and helped me become a good person, how the evil CCP destroyed me, and how Dafa saved me a second time and got me back on the righteous track!
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