(Minghui.org) I am 76 years old and have been practicing Falun Dafa for 23 years. With our great Master's compassionate guidance and protection, I’ve managed to walk on my cultivation path to return to my true home. I am taking this opportunity to express my gratitude to Master, who has helped me through the trials and tests I have experienced along the way.
Master Saved Me
I worked in an office for 34 years before I retired. Since elementary school, I was immersed in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) culture of atheism and its philosophy of “struggle.” So I have been fighting an uphill battle in my quest for fame and wealth, and thought that all beliefs in Buddhas and Gods were superstition.
Yet, I was also fortunate to be born in a mountainous area, where customs are still taught. So since childhood, I was taught to be a good person, to emphasize virtue and conscience, and to follow those who behaved well. This sowed a seed in my mind to be good.
I contracted meningitis in my high school years, and was in a coma for over ten days. My condition became serious because of delayed treatment. I often had headaches and memory loss. As I aged, I developed many ailments, such as hepatitis, rheumatoid arthritis, Meniere's disease, tumors, and irregular heartbeat.
All this eventually developed into me vomiting when I took medicine, my blood vessels rupturing when I had injections, my inability to tolerate strong light, and my being unable to walk due to the pain in my legs. I tried various types of treatment, but my health was getting worse and worse. I struggled day after day in great suffering.
In July 1994 I was very fortunate to attend the lecture series taught by Master Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Dafa, which completely changed my life.
My legs were in great pain due to rheumatoid arthritis and I couldn't walk. Yet, while Master was giving the lecture I slept very well. After Master finished speaking, I woke up. After waking, I no longer felt pain. I felt very well physically and was very happy.
After the lecture had finished I suddenly remembered that my children would be home from school and waiting for something to eat. Without thinking, I stood up and rushed back home. I didn't realize it at the time, but I simply started running without even thinking about the pain I had in my legs before the class.
But my legs no longer hurt after the lecture, and my pace was quite fast. I had run for about a mile to get home. My headaches, which had afflicted me for more than ten years, had also disappeared. This extraordinary phenomena amazed me and my family. I felt the miraculous nature of Falun Dafa, and was very excited. I was grateful for Master's great compassion, and made up my mind to follow Master in cultivation.
After practicing Falun Dafa, all my symptoms of illness quickly disappeared one by one. I felt very light when walking and my face was radiant. Master gave me a new life. Since then I have also come to understand the meaning of life.
When I told acquaintances around me about Falun Dafa many of them believed that Dafa is good after seeing the physical and mental improvements in me.
It was Master who saved me and gave me the best of everything.
Dafa Shines in My Heart
Master gave me a hint to study the Fa well and strengthened my righteous thoughts. When I took the precious book Zhuan Falun home, I read it until late into the night.
I couldn't see the characters on the page, but I still wanted to read. At that moment, the characters became larger and the print darker. Each character appeared clearly in front of me.
Master said,
“And in order to enable you to do cultivation practice and improve, I've infused this Fa throughout with every element that can enable a person to improve and ascend through cultivation. As long as you study, any problem can be solved. As long as you cultivate and as long as you're able to understand the Fa from the Fa, there's nothing you can't achieve.” (“Fa-Lecture at the Conference in Florida, U.S.A.” from Teaching the Fa at the Conference II)
“No matter how difficult your environment is, no matter how busy you get, you cannot forget to study the Fa. You must study the Fa, because it is the absolute, most fundamental guarantee of your improvement.”
On my path of cultivation, I always asked myself to persist in studying the Fa every day, to try to assimilate to Dafa, to cultivate my xinxing according to the principles of 'Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance', and to be a selfless person who always considers others first.
Appealing for Dafa With Righteous Thoughts
After the CCP started its persecution of Falun Dafa on July 20, 1999, Dafa was slandered and Dafa practitioners were brutally persecuted. In order to seek justice for Dafa, I went to Beijing to appeal four times but was arrested and detained.
After I returned home, I was under surveillance for a long time. However, all of their attempts to persecute me did not scare me. With Master's protection, my mind became stronger and stronger, and I became firmer in my belief in Dafa.
In March 2001, I was incarcerated in the Provincial Women’s Labor Camp. It was very evil there, and Dafa practitioners were often tortured by various means, including being shocked with electric batons, hung up, injected with dangerous substances, and being force-fed.
The guards tried to force us to do their morning exercises, but we refused to cooperate. Over a dozen male guards and several female guards holding electric batons, dragged us back to different wards to torture us.
One guard forced me to stand up straight against the wall and then used the electric baton to shock my hips and thighs. There were a lot of sparks and noise, and my feet lifted up off the ground many times due to the shocks. It was truly horrible.
At the time of being shocked, I remembered Master’s Fa, and recited,
“It’s hard to endure, but you can endure it. It’s hard to do, but you can do it.” (Zhuan Falun)
“Rotten demons abound in the last phaseOperating beneath the human skinBut once the partitions are cleared awayOn earth the boiling cauldron is in place” (“Retribution” from Hong Yin Vol. II)
After a while, my heart calmed down. I saw that the guard was sweating all over, but I was still standing and my heart was calm. I seemed to have gotten rid of the pain and fear.
I started to clarify the facts to the guard. I told him that Falun Dafa teaches people to be good and that the Tiananmen self-immolation was staged, but he didn't listen and continued to torture me.
He finally became tired and short of breath. Seeing how I was calm as if nothing had happened, he seemed to feel helpless and said that he was “just doing his job.”
“You treat me like this, but I don't hate you. You are also deceived by the CCP,” I replied. “I understand you. However, you must not persecute Dafa practitioners again. Please remember that Falun Dafa is good. Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good. You will then have a bright future.”
He waved his hand and asked someone to take me back to the ward. There were only three small red dots on my left leg after the electric shocks, and it wasn't painful. I knew that Master had protected me and suffered tremendous pain for me. Tears of gratitude rolled down my face.
I did not forget to clarify the facts to the other people there. I kept sending forth righteous thoughts, disintegrating the old forces, and thinking that I also must save people outside the detention center by getting released earlier. I also sent out a thought that this was not the place for me. I was released one month later.
Continuing to Clarify the Facts and Save People
I went out all year round to talk to people about Falun Dafa. I did not relax in this effort, even during the sensitive dates when the CCP's monitoring was very strict. There were typically three or four people monitoring me, but I went out quickly when they weren't paying attention. No one could stop me from going out to let people know about Dafa.
In order to help people learn the truth about Dafa I have given away at least 100 DVD players, and other broadcasting equipment at my own expense. Some of those people have even started practicing Falun Dafa.
I understood from the Fa that I must clarify the facts with compassion and righteous thoughts, and with no human notions.
One rainy day in December 2016, I went to a market in a rural area. I saw a group of people around a fire under the sheltered eaves. I went up to tell them about the persecution of Falun Dafa and gave them some New Year's desk calendars and couplets. They listened to me and happily accepted them. Five of the people there quit the CCP and its affiliated organizations.
However, one man threw the calendar on the ground and said that he wouldn’t quit the CCP. I got angry and asked him to return the calendar back to me. He picked it up and gave it back. Then I went to other places to clarify the facts.
After I distributed all the materials I had taken with me I suddenly found a large hole in the corner of my bag. I was surprised and wondered if Master used this to give me a hint that there was a hole in my effort today. Not only did I not save that man, but I also pushed him away. Thinking of this, I quickly went back and wanted to make up for it.
The man was still sitting there, as if he was waiting for me. I told him, “I'm sorry! I shouldn't have treated you that way. If you still want a desk calendar I will bring you one the next time I come back, okay?”
Unexpectedly, that man's attitude had changed. He was sad, and said, “I am a bad person.”
I quickly replied, “How can you be a bad person? If you learn the truth in this life and withdraw from the evil CCP, you will be a good person.”
Hearing this, he smiled and agreed to quit the CCP.
If I hadn't corrected this omission in my truth-clarification that day I may have regretted it. I also realized that I cannot be selective about saving people when clarifying the facts.
During my 23 years of practicing Falun Dafa and 18 years of persecution by the CCP, Master has protected me and suffered tremendously for me. I thank Master for his compassion. Looking inward, I still have a lot of human notions and attachments to eliminate.
Master urged us in “What is a Dafa Disciple” in Teaching the Fa at the Conference XI:
“The only path that lies before you, the disciples of Dafa, is one of real cultivation. There is no other path.”
Cultivation in Dafa is serious and tough, but it is also joyful. Now that we have reached the final stage of cultivation I will cherish the opportunity Master has granted us, maintain the enthusiasm and state that I had at the beginning of my cultivation, practice as usual with righteous thoughts, truly cultivate my xinxing, finish the final leg of my path.
