Doing the Second Exercise for One Hour

(Minghui.org) New music for the Falun Dafa exercises was released on the Minghui website about two months ago, which included a one-hour version of the second exercise.

My first thought was that the standard for practitioners was going up and that we needed to do the second exercise for longer to break through to higher levels, but I turned my attention to Shen Yun and other matters. I didn’t really think about trying it because I was too busy. I also thought it might be too difficult and would take a lot of time to reach that level.

About a week ago, a practitioner that I work with mentioned to me that he was visiting Switzerland to help with Shen Yun, and the practitioners there were doing the full hour of the second exercise. He had tried but couldn’t make it all the way through. I could only imagine the pain because when I started practicing, it took six months of practicing to get all the way through the 30-minute version. Even after practicing for eleven years, it’s hard for me to make it all the way through the fifth exercise, and I often can only do 35 or 40 minutes. Doing a full hour of the second exercise would be a challenge, and I expected that it might take months before I would able to achieve it.

I received another hint at our Fa-study group last week. A practitioner there shared his experience of doing the second exercise for an hour for the first time. He said, “It’s about your state of mind,” referring to whether or not you can do it. He managed to make it all the way through the first time he tried.

I decided to try it.

In the past, my notions about the expected pain and difficulty of doing the second and fifth exercises had prevented me from completing them. I wasn’t sure if I could avoid this trap.

As I started the exercises, I felt a light breeze and felt very comfortable. I recalled Master’s teaching:

“Throughout history, the issue of whether matter determines mind or vice versa has been constantly discussed and debated in the world of philosophy. In fact, let me tell everyone that matter and mind are one thing.” (Lecture One, Zhuan Falun, 2000 translation)

I knew that completing this exercise would be entirely dependent on my state of mind, so I focused my thoughts. The first and second movements went well, but the third movement of holding the arms over the head became very difficult. My arms felt a lot of pain, so I sent righteous thoughts to eliminate any interference and gritted my teeth to get through it. The fourth movement offered only a slight relief but was still quite difficult. If my mind wandered even a bit, my arms started to shake. I had to maintain focus in my mind. That was critical. In the end, I made it all the way through the full hour, though it was not easy.

Master said:

“When it looks impossible and is said to be impossible, give it a try and see if it is possible. If you can actually do it, you will indeed find: “After passing the shady willow trees, there will be bright flowers and another village ahead!” (Lecture Nine, Zhuan Falun, 2000 translation)

This was really how it was!

I hope all practitioners will give the one-hour second exercise a try and make a breakthrough.