(Clearwisdom.net) While reading Zhuan Falun at night, I would hear the Falun Gong exercise music coming from somewhere. The music was very low, but very clear and pleasant. I thought that the next day, I would remind the woman who lives downstairs to lower the volume when she practices the exercises. After the music for the fifth exercise finished, it started again. I was surprised. Why was the music playing all over again? Could it be that the music wasn't coming from downstairs? Perhaps it was my wife who forgot to switch off her cell phone before going to bed. I found the cell phone and switched it off.

I told my wife about this the next day. She said she had not used the cell phone to play the exercise music the previous night. I was perplexed. What was happening? My wife frequently hears exercise music from other dimensions, but I had no such prior experience. No incident a practitioner encounters is by chance, as Master tells us. This matter really disturbed me. I thought about it and I understood. No matter who switched on the cell phone, the exercise music is divine music and originated from the heavens. It was Master who was making use of this opportunity to enlighten this often not diligent practitioner.

I do not practice the exercises regularly, feeling it is unimportant. Although I know this to be an excuse for my laziness, I did not have the willpower to overcome this. After I returned from the place where I had been imprisoned and persecuted, I seemed to be a changed person. I became hot-tempered and impatient. I was not diligent in my Fa study and practice of the exercises. I was worried for myself, but could not break through the arrangements the old evil forces had made. I remember the cultivation environment before the persecution started in 1999, when everyone would study the Fa and practice the exercises together in a peaceful and calm environment. Whenever I thought of that I would feel a sense of happiness. But during this present period, when it is important to offer sentient beings salvation, and each minute and second is precious, I let myself get by in the human world in a relaxed manner that is far from the requirements of success in my cultivation.

Merciful and Great Master did not give up on this sub-standard practitioner. Today when I read Zhuan Falun, Master's words struck me,

"Falun Dafa is a practice that cultivates both your nature and longevity, so it has to have some movements to do. For one thing, the movements are for reinforcing abilities. And what's "reinforcing" about? It's about using your mighty potency to fortify your abilities, and it makes them stronger and stronger. And secondly, your body needs to evolve a lot of living things. When they reach a high level of cultivation, Daoists talk about "the Cultivated Infant coming to birth," just as Buddhists talk about "the Indestructible Adamantine Body," and lots and lots of technical things need to be evolved, too. All of these things need to be evolved through manual techniques, and they're what the movements are for. Looking at it this way, a complete system of both nature and longevity cultivation needs to have cultivation, and it needs to have exercises." (The First Talk, Zhuan Falun, the 2003 translation version)

Omitting the exercises would prevent our abilities from being strengthened. When we send righteous thoughts, the power would be minimal. If we don't do the exercises, the Cultivated Infant and many other life forms would not fully evolve, and my own future world would not be abundant. Merely cultivating but not practicing the exercises, or only doing the exercises and not cultivating does not make us true Falun Gong practitioners. The book Zhuan Falun Fajie - The Law of Zhuan Falun Explained, "Teaching the Fa and Answering Questions in Guangzhou" contained this question:

"Question: What if we only cultivate our xinxing but don't do the exercises?

Teacher: Then you are only a good person, and not a cultivator. In the future you can only be a good person and be rewarded with good fortune in your next life."

If we don't listen to Master, and we do things our own way because of our attachments or under the control of evil, how could we still be considered true practitioners?

After thinking about it deeply, at length and painfully, I thought if I still would not do well with such a predestined relationship, an opportunity that comes only once in thousands of years, and with Master's never-ending compassion, I would only have myself to blame for my laziness when the time of consummation comes, when I watch the great and sacred sight as an onlooker only. I might be forgiven for being really busy with truth clarification tasks and temporarily lacking time to do the exercises. This is perhaps understandable and forgivable. But if it is because of a relaxed and comfortable environment I seek, then this is a problem with my cultivation and thought processes. Then it is an obstacle before me, like a mountain. If I don't overcome this, then I am just an ordinary person.

When I think of our compassionate and great Master, who has endured so much to save us, how can I not forbear the hardship of doing the exercises? The incarcerated practitioners in China have paid a huge price in order to appeal for a lawful environment to practice the exercises. The exercise music originated from the heavens. I hope that fellow practitioners and I will treasure this predestined relationship and the opportunity to cultivate.