(Minghui.org) When I was a child, I was reticent and fond of learning. At parent meetings, my parents were quite proud and happy about my good grades.
When I grew up, like my peers, I unconsciously absorbed the evil elements and declining moral standards of modern society. At the university, I was addicted to cigarettes and alcohol. I was hospitalized once for drinking too much. My father in my hometown was very worried about me.
After graduation, I borrowed money from my father and aunt to buy a motorcycle to go to work. But a friend got me drunk, took my license and motorcycle, and never came back. After studying Falun Dafa, I understood I was repaying a debt I owed him in a previous life. I didn’t hate him anymore; instead, I thought that was how it should have been.
I was unemployed a year after that incident and stayed at my aunt’s house. Then I got an office job. Working and living in a tense environment with many co-workers made me take up smoking again after I'd quit cigarettes for a period of time.
Encountering Dafa
I quit the job and searched for a new one on the internet. In July 2011, I came across the book Falun Gong on the internet and became a practitioner. Because I didn't have a hard copy of the book, I saved the e-book onto my smartphone and read it.
I was excited when I read the book for the first time, but my human notions also came into conflict with the Fa. Yet, I still read it through because I knew this was an exceptionally wonderful book.
After one or two days, Master purified my body, and I vomited a whitish substance. After that, my body was very sensitive and comfortable. My body had never experienced such a comfortable, light, and natural feeling before. I felt that my mind and body had been revitalized with compassion and peace.
I used to suffer from stomachaches and would become light-headed when I stood up after sitting for a long time. I also suffered from backaches and lack of strength. However, after studying Falun Dafa and doing the five exercises, all the symptoms disappeared without my noticing.
I was diligent about studying the Fa and doing the exercises. At first, I put more effort into doing the exercises rather than reading the books. My xinxing improved gradually during this period.
After that, I found a job as a dock worker for a seafood factory. We started at 6:30 a.m. and didn’t finish until the evening, sometimes as late as 9:00 p.m. We had to work overtime during holidays due to increased demand. I had a small build and wasn't used to hard labor. I was lethargic on the first day and intended to quit, but I also knew it was not easy to find a job. Perhaps this was Master’s arrangement, and I should not be afraid of hardship and difficulties.
Master said:
“Among everyday people, it is also discussed. How should our practitioners treat losses and gains? It is different from ordinary people. What everyday people want is personal gain and how to live well and comfortably. Our practitioners are not this way, but exactly the opposite. We do not seek what everyday people want. Instead, what we get is something everyday people cannot obtain—even though they want to—except through cultivation practice.” (Zhuan Falun)
Living by Dafa Principles
In my company, I based my behavior on the Dafa teachings. Once, an elderly woman yelled at me for no reason. I knew this was an opportunity to improve my xinxing, so I thanked her in my heart and looked at her benevolently.
When I found an accounting job that was more suited to my bachelor's degree, the chief accountant cried. She asked me why I did not wait for a while. She understood that I had just graduated and wanted to find a suitable job, but the company was fully staffed. She wanted me to stay and wanted to find an opportunity for me. I believe she liked me because I was a Falun Dafa practitioner and I made a good impression on people.
At my new company, I behaved like a cultivator. I always tried to do good things and helped others in the cloth sample cutting department or the delivery department. I was not in charge of this work, but the company was short-handed.
At first, I didn't feel comfortable doing things like that, but I gradually understood that these tasks were related to me and that I needed to improve my xinxing. I helped them when they needed me and when I had free time. In this company, everyone knew I practiced Falun Gong, and they had a good impression of me because they saw that I was calm and kind.
I worked there for almost two years and did not ask for a pay raise. Many times my director promised to give me a bonus if I completed a task as she wished. After that, she would forget about the bonus, but as a cultivator, I did not ask for it because it would be mine if it were supposed to be mine.
Master taught us:
“... a practitioner should follow the course of nature. If something is yours, you will not lose it. If something is not yours, you will not have it even if you fight for it.” (Zhuan Falun)
Even though my salary was not high, I shared my accommodation with a peer from my hometown who later invited four people to share the apartment with us. Our apartment became more lively. Many times I paid the rent, electricity, and water bills in advance and claimed the money from my roommates afterward. My roommates were students and part-time workers, so they were often short on cash. Many times they forgot to pay me back or were unable to. I did not ask them for the money in that case.
Overcoming Difficulties
Once I was driving in fast, heavy traffic. The commuter in front of me suddenly made a turn. In the chaos, I lost control of my vehicle and did not know what to do. I heard a scream behind me, as it looked like I would be injured terribly. Suddenly I found my hands holding the wheel firmly and I got my vehicle under control. I knew Master had protected me.
After that, I returned to my hometown and worked at a stone workshop. My workplace was near an economic zone that teemed with people from different areas of my country. The work environment was quite complicated with lots of conflicts, and the workers often swore.
I did not cultivate myself well at that time. I fell in love with a female co-worker, and she liked me in return. But we often had conflicts. I found it really hard to accept her, and I thought that we would not make a good match if we married. Although we did not date, we knew that we liked each other. However, we often argued. That situation went on for a long time, and sometimes I found it miserable because of love and wasn't able to end it.
After that, my company went through a reorganization. The new manager did not like me, and he fired me without informing the company. I thought that it wouldn’t be good if I stayed and worked for them because we couldn’t cooperate. Later when I calmed down and studied the Fa more, I realized that I did not cultivate well based on the Fa principles and that things did not go well because of interference from the old forces.
Being a Good Worker
I moved to the south and worked for a company of an acquaintance who used to be my co-worker. Because he liked me, he asked me to come and work with him. I did simple tasks and mostly helped with production and delivery. When I came back, I jotted down the payments, and he paid me. Sometimes he wanted to give me more because I always wrote down the correct amounts and did not inflate the figures like others did.
In my heart, I did not want the difference. I just wanted to do a good job because I am a cultivator. (Later he often called me and asked me to work with him, but I already had a job in my hometown and had no intention of returning to the city.)
After I worked there for a while, my mother asked me to come home because there was a new job there. Coincidentally, my acquaintance hired his brother from his hometown, so it was overstaffed where I was.
I worked as an accountant for the new Chinese-funded company. The workload was lighter. The Vietnamese director liked me because I knew English and worked carefully. When the company ran into difficulties and it was difficult for him to give me a raise, I was okay with it. He later wanted to give me a raise, but I declined because I thought that I didn't do much and I was happy with my current salary.
Sharing Dafa with Others
In this new workplace, I did the Dafa exercises and talked to more people about Dafa. Because I didn't know much Chinese, I read some articles in Vietnamese on the Minghui website with suitable content and then found their equivalent links in Chinese. I printed them out and gave them to my Chinese employer when he paid a visit to my company. He told me that he had read the book several times and knew that “Falun Dafa is good.”
I also contacted another local practitioner, and we studied the Fa together. I sometimes socialized with people and helped new practitioners in my area. I told people about the goodness of Dafa and its persecution by the Communist Party in China.
On my cultivation path, I found I still have many human attachments and did not do many things well. I've promised myself that I will do the three things better based on the requirements of Fa-rectification and return home with Master.
Thank you, Master. Thank you, fellow practitioners. Please point out anything inappropriate.
