(Clearwisdom.net) I was born in the 1980s to hard-working, blue-collar parents. My mother used to suffer from numerous illnesses, but nothing seemed to really help her. One day on her way home, she saw a group of people practicing Falun Gong. After hearing about its health-improving benefits, she decided to give it a try. Soon my whole family began to practice Falun Gong.
In the winter of 2004, the local police launched a massive arrest of practitioners in our area. Another young practitioner (TT) and I managed to escape, thanks to Master’s protection. After much hardship, we arrived in a city in northeastern China and began our destitute life.
Later, we went from relying on fellow practitioners for support to making around one million yuan a year. Our financial success is a manifestation of Dafa’s boundless might.
1. Destitute Life
Not long after we arrived in the northeastern city, some practitioners found us a shelter. It was an empty room with nothing in it, and we had to sleep on the cold cement floor. There was no heat, and we had to to wrap our comforters around ourselves, even during the day, just to keep warm. The place also lacked storage, and we ended up scattering all of our belongings on the floor, including clothes, pots and pans, and other daily necessities.
Since the police in our hometown had confiscated our IDs, we couldn’t go anywhere, let alone find a job. TT and I often quarreled because of our money issues. All year long we wore the same set of clothes, since we couldn’t afford to buy clothes.
Back then we didn’t understand the concept of breaking through the evil’s economic persecution. We thought that this hardship was either a tribulation for us to pass or a consequence of our karma. To be honest, we were even content with ourselves, thinking that we were still cultivating pretty well in such a harsh environment.
Of course, we knew that we still had to validate Dafa, regardless of our circumstances, so TT and I began to make desk calendars with truth-clarification messages on them. Later we made some other materials as well. After a practitioner gave us a computer, we made covers for Zhuan Falun and Master’s portrait. At that time, we only contributed our labor, and fellow practitioners provided all of the materials for us to use. Once I saw a male practitioner peddling his rickshaw under the scorching sun. He earned only 2 yuan for each ride, but gave all the money he made during the day to make truth-clarification materials. I was deeply moved and will never forget his perspiring face.
2. Breaking Through the Economic Persecution to Validate Dafa
TT and I began to think about how we could change our situation and become more financially independent. After all, we couldn't always rely on fellow practitioners to provide everything for us.
We also felt that living in such poor conditions wasn't fit for Dafa disciples. Such desire to change ourselves was the beginning of our effort to break through the evil’s economic persecution.
Once, by chance, a non-practitioner friend asked me to accompany him to a mall to buy some imported goods at a discount. He then sold them in other cities and pocketed the price difference. I was inspired by this business model and wanted to try it myself. As fate would have it, when I later chatted online, I met a person who planned to sell imported goods, and he asked me to be his supplier. This is how TT and I started our small business.
We were both elated when we made 5,000 yuan the very first month. We gave 4,000 yuan to the local coordinator to make truth-clarification materials. But the evil took advantage of our zealotry, and that online friend suddenly dropped us as his supplier. We again lost our source of income.
Then we figured that we could open an online shop, since there were no fixed costs associated with that. Moreover, we could work from home and still have plenty of time to study the Fa and make truth-clarification materials. Our first online client was very satisfied with our goods and our service, so he continued to buy from us and also referred a lot of his friends to us.
We went through a lot of hiccups with our online sales. Since we needed to deliver the goods first, we ran the risk of not getting paid by our clients. Some people squarely denied receipt of goods and refused to pay. We also encountered people who would bargain online with us for hours on end. Sometimes we got angry phone calls from clients who kept swearing at us. It was hard to remain calm, but as cultivators, TT and I were able to remind each other, and with Master’s help we smoothly resolved many issues with customers. We decided we shouldn’t argue with our clients; we should instead treat them with a cultivator’s xinxing standard.
From late 2004 to early 2007, we moved numerous times just to have a roof over our heads. Whenever the landlord decided not to renew the lease, we had to find a new place. We gradually got the idea to purchase a house of our own, so as to have a stable living environment to better validate the Fa. However, some fellow practitioners couldn’t understand why we wanted to do this now that the Fa-rectification process had come to the final leg. We were a bit overwhelmed by their response, but we were determined to have a place of our own. We felt that we could no longer afford to let our living arrangements affect our efforts to do the three things well.
Thus, we bought a house together. We still owed the bank several hundred thousand yuan after the down payment. We worked hard to improve our online business and convey goodness to our customers. We compiled our clients' contact information and forwarded it to practitioners skilled at clarifying the facts about Falun Dafa over the phone. Whenever we had a chance to talk to a client, we used wisdom to help him or her know the truth about Dafa and the evil nature of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Our business got better and better.
TT and I worked as a team. I was in charge of the online business, and he took care of coordinating with fellow practitioners to make truth-clarification materials. He also helped to enter into the computer the names of people who agreed to withdraw from the CCP and its affiliated organizations, and to send them the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party. We received piles and piles of names of people wanting to withdraw from the CCP every week.
We were able to pay off our mortgage in just one year, but during the 2008 Summer Olympics, the CCP tightened its grip on imported goods. Because we were no longer able to receive the products, we couldn’t supply them to our clients. We had no choice but to close our online shop.
In 2009, both TT and I realized that we should continue our efforts to break through the economic persecution, but we lacked strong righteous thoughts and relied too much on non-practitioners. As a result, we ended up owing tens of thousands of yuan to other people. We felt extremely burdened by our debt. After numerous discussions, we decided to build our own brand, instead of importing goods from overseas. We had to admit that it was almost impossible for people like us to succeed in this industry. We didn’t have the money, nor did we have the advanced technology to make the products. But we had the heart to break through our economic condition. We made our first batch of sample products and mailed them to some customers. To our surprise, they liked our products and decided to work with us, instead of the well-known brands. We knew it was Master helping us. After all, all the wealth in today’s human world is supposed to exist for Dafa.
We kept refining our products and improving our brand. Now we work only three days a week, yet we make about one million yuan a year. Even though we are earning more and more money, we've become less and less attached to material interests. We still live a simple life. We take public transportation and try to eat at home as much as possible. Master has helped create a more relaxed environment for us, but the purpose is to enable us to better validate Dafa so we don’t have to worry about making a living and thus can focus on doing the three things.
We feel that we should help more practitioners change their notions and work together to validate the goodness of Dafa. We cannot let Master worry about our making ends meet.
Back in our hometown, more and more friends and relatives have come to respect us because of our improving economic condition, and they have become more respectful when we clarify the facts about Falun Dafa to them. It is truly the manifestation of Master's and Dafa’s compassion and wisdom.
Once a practitioner told me about his experience. A policeman tried to extort money from him, but he had one thought: “The money I earned is to save the sentient beings. How can I allow you to take it away from me?” With this one thought, the policeman failed to get any money from him.
There was a female practitioner in our hometown who did very well in validating the Fa, but remained destitute because of the persecution. Once TT talked to her husband, who said: “I admire Dafa disciples’ courage and am supportive of you. But seeing that you have to hide and move from place to place [because of the persecution], I no longer want to be like you.” We felt very ashamed. What kind of impression were we giving people? If we had to live a destitute life, how could we show Dafa’s goodness? We understood that we needed to change the public’s erroneous perception that Dafa disciples all led poor lives.
3. Sharing with Fellow Practitioners on How to Break Through the Economic Persecution
Many practitioners tend to overlook the evil’s economic persecution. When they are in a difficult financial situation, they often think that it’s something they’re supposed to endure or a result of their own karma. Such a mentality may not be wrong if we are just looking at personal cultivation, but during Fa-rectification, we should really break free from this notion if it negatively affects our efforts to do the three things well.
During the final moments of history, everything should give way to saving sentient beings. Many practitioners feel that it is enough to just have something to eat, unwittingly helping the evil to impose economic persecution on us. Some disciples do have the capability to change their situations, yet they hesitate to take actions for fear of becoming attached to fame and money during the process. In my understanding, the ancient style of cultivation is not a path fit for today’s Dafa disciples.
I’ve run into many practitioners who once passed up opportunities to take better jobs or get promoted. There are two major reasons involved. First, these practitioners fear that spending too much time on everyday jobs may jeopardize their cultivation achievement. Second, they worry that they may fail to resist the temptation of money and fame once they are presented with the opportunity to make more money. So, they feel that they may be better off in their cultivation if they just stick with their current job with lower pay. In my opinion, such seemingly diligent behavior is in fact a result of lack of confidence in Dafa and Master, and in their own cultivation.
Master has instructed us to cultivate in the complex human world while facing all kinds of distractions and conflicts. If we can remain unmoved and truly elevate ourselves, then we are validating Dafa’s extraordinary nature and wisdom. We cannot always count on non-practitioners to support us, nor can we rely on certain Dafa disciples’ limited income to get by. We are Dafa disciples. It is time for us to break through our own notions.
Master has made it clear that Dafa practitioners are blessed. Whatever Master wants is what's needed for Fa-rectification and what Dafa disciples need to validate. We should abandon the notion that only if we lose material interests and suffer hardships are we truly cultivating. Taking advantage of our loopholes, the old forces have made numerous troubles and created countless obstacles for Master, yet still claiming they are assisting Master with Fa-rectification. Manifested in the human world, the CCP has tried everything to ruin practitioners financially. We must work hard to change our own thinking and validate the concept that Dafa disciples are blessed.
Without Master’s suffering for sentient beings, they’d all have been destroyed. We cannot allow the old forces to exploit our omission and use the wealth that’s supposed to be spent on validating the Fa to commit crimes against Dafa and disciples. Breaking through any economic constraint and utilizing the financial resources to save sentient beings is our responsibility.
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