(Minghui.org) One day my mother-in-law smiled at me while we talked and said, “A few days ago, I visited a cancer patient in our village and gave her some money to help her out. Because her husband used to denounce me during the public denouncing sessions in the Cultural Revolution, her family was surprised and touched. I no longer quarrel with your father-in-law and can tolerate his shortcomings. When the neighbors give us presents during the Chinese New Year, I always return the favor and give them presents. I have opened up my heart so much and I'm now very happy.”
Seeing my mother-in-law's tremendous changes, I was filled with emotion and I recalled so many memories.
“One-in-a-Million” Mother-in-law's Life of Suffering
My mother-in-law used to be selfish and narrow minded. She treated others with hostility and was always suspicious, thinking that everyone was talking about her behind her back. Her life was filled with anxiety and paranoia, and she yelled at everyone around her. She used the stick for rolling flour to beat her five-year-old grandson. Whenever she was not happy with the way her daughters handled things, she would throw a rope at them and tell them to hang themselves.
She often chased her husband around with a hatchet in her hand, and she also cursed and beat her own mother-in-law. Before I started practicing Falun Gong, I could not understand her behavior when my husband told me these stories about her. My child described her as, “She's impossible and one in a million.” After I began practicing Falun Gong, I realized it was the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) culture that made her that way and had distorted her life and personality.
When my mother-in-law was a child, the Party seized her family's property and shot and killed her father. She had to beg for food on the street in order to feed the other family members. She even ate pig feed.
When she was young, she had no choice but to marry a man from a landowner's family. During the Party's countless public denouncing sessions, she was beaten until her whole body was covered in bruises. At home, she could not get a thread of warmth or happiness. She attempted to commit suicide many times.
When she became an adult, her favorite child developed a severe disease. Because her family had been landowners, she was not allowed to take leave from work to take the child for medical treatment. After her beloved child died from lack of proper medical care, she became irrational and distraught and it took her a long time to calm down.
When she was middle aged, her husband was framed and arrested by the authorities. She had a relapse of her mental illness and then developed another severe illness. She was waiting to die since she was too poor to pay for any medical treatment. Fortunately, a Chinese medicine doctor cured her illness and saved her life.
When she became elderly, one of her sons broke away from the family and refused to help take care of her.
My mother-in-law's life was filled with pain and unhappiness for more than 60 years under the CCP's rule. As a result, her personality was distorted. Her femininity, kindness, and virtues disappeared completely. They were replaced by dishonesty, ferocity, struggle, selfishness, and hypocrisy. She would bully those who were weaker than her and at a disadvantage.
In order to find someone to do the farm work for her, she married one of her daughters to a retarded man who would be easy to manipulate. In order to protect the family, she married another daughter to a fragile and illness plagued man, who had a distant relative who was a high-level government official. One can only imagine how miserable her daughters were. To make things worse, she kept demanding that her daughters buy her gold necklaces, rings, and earrings. If they refused, she would go to their homes to threaten and harass them.
Frosty Relationship
Her eldest son followed her example and grew up to be selfish and callous. She would curse at her eldest son and refused to even talk to his wife for years. She pocketed the gift money from my wedding guests and bought herself gold earrings, leaving my husband and I with a large debt for the wedding ceremony. She pressured my husband to give her a monthly stipend of 40 yuan, when my husband was making no more than 100 yuan per month.
When I was vomiting and having nose bleeds during my pregnancy, she was indifferent but only cared whether it was a boy or girl. She told me to give the baby away if it was a girl. She kept inciting conflict between my husband and I. After my child was born, she took advantage of the occasion to profit by pocketing the gift money and selling the other valuable gifts our friends and relatives gave us. The only gifts she agreed to give me were the baby clothes.
After that, I loathed her beyond words and refused to talk to her or even eat at the same table with her. She took advantage of my husband's filial piety. When she came to my home, she would never help with any household work. If a meal was a little late, she would go out and eat at a restaurant.
One day during the lantern festival, my husband and I were busy with something and returned home after 1 p.m. She was sitting at our home impatiently waiting for us to cook for her. I wondered why she didn't go out to eat and then realized it was only because no restaurants were open for business that day.
We once invited some relatives and friends over without my father and mother-in-law. She became infuriated and came to our home threatening to commit suicide, and sever her relationship with my husband. Helpless and eager to calm her down, my husband together with our child knelt down and begged for her forgiveness.
I used to enjoy a harmonious relationship with my husband. But whenever he went to visit his mother, he'd return in a bad mood and quarrel with me. I knew my mother-in-law must have said bad things about me. I was often furious and thought of getting a divorce many times to escape such a horrible mother-in-law. My husband was sandwiched between his mother and I. Whenever we fought, he often cried while telling me how his mother suffered in her early life, hoping I could forgive her and tolerate her.
However, I was also deeply influenced by the CCP's poisonous culture and held the concept of “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” Therefore, my family relationship was in ruins. After years of unhappy marriage and a miserable life, my health quickly deteriorated. My mother-in-law also suffered from all kinds of illnesses including hypertension, emphysema, heart disease, gastroenteritis, cholecystitis, and rheumatism. Since she was extremely stingy on money, she wouldn't even spend it on her own medical treatment.
Cultivating in Dafa, Bury the Hatchet
I began practicing Falun Gong. After reading Master's books, I reflected on the past 18 years of my behavior towards my mother-in-law. I could not help feeling regret and shame. Practitioners are asked to be kind and considerate of others, look inward during conflicts, and repay ill intention with kindness. I knew I had been deeply influenced by the CCP's culture and would not take a step back in the conflict with my mother-in-law. Sometimes I felt I was not even up to the standard of an ordinary person who had the ancient Chinese cultural values and virtues.
One day I declared solemnly to my husband, “From now on, I will treat your mother with sincerity and respect.” He was so happy and said, “I'm so lucky to finally see a day like this. I'm curious how did you become so kind?” I told him, “Because Falun Gong teaches Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, and asks practitioners to be sincere, kind, and tolerant of everyone, not to mention that she is my mother-in-law.” He said, “As long as you treat my mother well, I will never interfere with your practicing of Falun Gong.” Prior to that, he had believed the CCP's propaganda and held a negative opinion of Falun Gong.
Soon afterwards, I went in person to invite my father and mother-in-law to live with us for a while so that I could take care of them. While they stayed at my home, I prepared delicious meals, bought clothes for them, and gave my own gold jewelry to my mother-in-law as gifts. I sent all kinds of daily necessities to their home.
At the change of seasons, I would go to their home and wash their seasonal clothes. When I noticed my mother-in-law's bed was not comfortable, I bought her a brand name mattress. When I learned they did not have easy access to fresh water, I spent my own money to hire people to fetch water for them. When they traveled out of town to the relatives, I prepared gifts for them to bring.
My husband was moved by my kindness and said, “How can I have such good fortune to have you as my wife. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.” I told him, “If you want to thank someone, you should thank Master Li, the founder of Falun Gong. You know how I was before I practiced it.” He smiled in agreement.
In the beginning, my mother-in-law was suspicious and did not accept my kindness wholeheartedly. I started by telling them about my practicing Falun Gong and the teachings of it. I watched truth-clarifying videos and Shen Yun Performing Arts DVDs with them. I also listened to Master's lectures with them. But after so many years of grudge and conflict, she remained suspicious of me and Falun Gong. I knew it was because I had not done enough.
One winter, I learned that my mother-in-law suffered a relapse of an illness and was bedridden. I took a taxi cab to take her to the hospital in spite of the extreme cold and dangerous road condition. Along the way to the hospital, I had to get out constantly to shovel the snow and break the ice. A one-hour trip took us three hours. I was exhausted. She was finally moved and said, “You are really tired today.”
Seeing her nice gesture, I took out a Falun Gong amulet and handed it to her. I then told her the miraculous healing power of Falun Gong and told her not to believe the CCP's propaganda. She accepted the amulet and said, “The CCP is evil. I have personal knowledge of that. But I did not know Falun Gong is good. However, now I have seen your positive changes after practicing it. I now know that Falun Gong is good.”
That day she did not take any medication and just kept reciting “Falun Dafa is good. Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good.” The next day, she recovered and could walk by herself and do some simple chores. After that, she has been very proactive in doing all kinds of household work. I smiled and told her, “You have changed.” She replied, “Didn't I just follow your example?”
My mother-in-law and I finally resolved our bad blood and developed an intimate mother and daughter relationship.
Changed Mother-in-law Led to Changed Children
Unfortunately, due to the deep poisoning by the CCP culture, she still held grudges against those villagers who used to denounce her in the public denouncing sessions during the Cultural Revolution era. She also could not let go of the resentment towards her husband and eldest son for their cruelty, selfishness, and disrespect. At the same time, she feared another round of a movement like the Cultural Revolution and was worried.
I knew that ordinary reasoning could not resolve her problem from the root. I must help her see through the CCP's evil nature and understand the root cause of her sufferings in life. So I started watching the videos of the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party. I told her that other villagers who persecuted her before were instigated by the CCP and they were in fact worth her sympathy. I told her she should let go of her grudges and forgive those people, and only then could she get rid of her pain from the past.
She gradually came to realize it and said, “Indeed, people should not do bad deeds. Look at all the people who persecuted me in the past. None of them had a good end. They are as poor as before. Their children are not outstanding in society unlike my children and grandchildren. Nowadays, fellow villagers have started to envy me. I think I should forgive them.”
I also encouraged her to let go of her grudge towards her husband and eldest son. I told her, “Under the CCP's high pressure rule, being callous and cruel is your helpless husband's way of protecting himself. Being selfish is your son's choice out of ignorance.” I then told her a story, “Remembering other people's mistakes is like carrying one more potato on your back. The more you remember, the heavier your burden becomes.”
I urged her to think about the strengths of her husband and son instead of their shortcomings, “Look at me. I don't remember others' hurting me. So I'm happy all the time.” She said, “I cannot do that. You're a practitioner but I'm not.” I said, “It's easy. Once you have bad thoughts, just recite 'Falun Dafa is good. Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good.' After reciting a few times, the bad thoughts will disappear.” She agreed to give it a try. Afterwards, her family relationship improved a lot.
However, she was an ordinary person. Decades of Party cultural poisoning could not easily be eliminated. Furthermore, the pollution from society is tremendous. Sometimes, as soon as she returned home, she would return to her old habit of cursing at her husband and others. She did recite the words when she felt ill. Once she felt better she would forget it completely.
At the end of last year, she had a relapse of her old illness. My husband and I took her to the hospital and spent two weeks and thousands of yuan taking care of her. However, she suddenly became angry over 500 yuan that she gave my husband to cover part of the medical cost which he forgot to return. She started throwing plates and bowls. I was very angry at her at the time, because none of her other children would step up to take care of her yet she threw a tantrum at the only people who selflessly helped her.
I told myself to endure it without blowing up. Afterwards, as my husband comforted me, I told him, “Don't worry. I'll treat her well just like before. Because I am a practitioner and I have my standards and requirements.” From then on, my mother-in-law returned to how she was before, but I continued to take care of her. In the latter half of last year, she suffered a relapse of emphysema, and no medicine was effective. I told my husband to bring her to our home. We spent thousands of yuan on a comprehensive medical examination and proper treatment in order for her situation to stabilize and improve.
At the end of last year, I invited her to come celebrate the Chinese New Year at my home. I saw her taking medication in large quantities and said to her earnestly, “Any drug has some harmful effect. They cost a lot of money and don't really cure diseases. If you sincerely recite 'Falun Dafa is good and Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good', your diseases will be cured. Look at your condition. I can tell you have not been doing it with a sincere heart.” She admitted it.
I then told her several examples of patients being cured after reciting the words sincerely. She was moved. I said, “Secondly, you should work on your quick temper. Don't stubbornly defend your own views. Otherwise, it will damage your health. Think about all your illnesses. Which one of them was not caused by your temper and anger? If we could hold gratitude in our heart at all times, our health is naturally maintained. On the other hand, if we are filled with all kinds of emotions like worry, anxiety and grudges, all kinds of illnesses will come find us. Without a healthy body, you won't have a happy life even if you have a lot of money.”
She was touched and said to me, “I am willing to listen to you and only you. I can accept what you say. I know you are earnest and sincere and have my best interests at heart. For my health, I will start to change my temper.” And she really did.
Seeing me treating her so well, the other children have started to follow my example. Her eldest son now prepares water for her to wash her face and helps cut her nails. Her eldest daughter-in-law has started to sit with her for a chat and helped her repair her shoes. Her grandchildren often take her to travel to different places.
Now she cannot stop smiling and often says to her children, “Very few villagers here are happy like me. Look at how well my daughters-in-law and granddaughters-in-law are treating me! Who knew after suffering for half of my life I would enjoy such great happiness at my age!” Her daughters said, “We have such a harmonious and prosperous big family. It's all because our sister-in-law practices Falun Gong. She has tolerated so many of our shortcomings. If it wasn't for her, you would not recite 'Falun Dafa is good and Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good'. And your health would not be so great.” She would tell them, “That's true. You should learn from your sister-in-law!”
Category: Improving Oneself
