(Minghui.org) I started doing the one hour long Falun standing stance exercise when it was published in November 2018. After more than half-year, I came to some new understandings.
1. Quiet Without Thinking
While holding arms in a wheel, I reminded myself to not think of anything.
Master said,
“When you practice you should take virtue seriously. So while you're doing the exercises, if you don’t have good thoughts, at least you shouldn’t have bad thoughts, and the best is to have no thoughts at all. The reason is, you need to build a foundation while you’re practicing at low levels, yet that foundation serves a critical function, and that’s because your thought process has some effect. So let’s think about it. When you add stuff to your gong, how could the things your cultivation produces be good? How could they not be dark? … When you do the exercises you always put in some bad thoughts. So are you going to get good things out of it? That’s the problem. That’s unknowingly practicing in an evil way, and it’s common.” (The Fifth Talk, Zhuan Falun)
Maintain a serene expression on the face. (Chapter II, The Great Way of Spiritual Perfection)
So I reminded myself to be “quiet without thinking,” (In the Dao. Hong Yin)
Fortunate for Learning the Great Way of the Universe
I practiced daily and kept reminding myself to have “a serene expression on the face.” But one day, I heard a voice in my mind, “How can I be happy? Not only have I not cultivated to the perfection, nor have I saved enough people – I wasted so much time.”
Then another voice answered, “It is said that if one hears the Dao in the morning, there shall be no regret if one dies in the evening of the same day. You heard of the great Way of the universe, Falun Dafa, a very fortunate opportunity happens once in million years. How fortunate and lucky you are!”
“Even if you were to die soon after hearing about the great Way, you are already much luckier than those who have no opportunity to hear of the Way. It's not expressible in human language. This is the true glory of a life.”
The conversation pulled me out of the misunderstanding that I was suffering – that is that my life was miserable.
Listening to the exercise music, all lives in my universe, levels high or low, are immersed in the joy and glory of the Fa. The joy filled my heart, my entire body, and my entire universe.
The miserable feeling of being persecuted for 20 years was gone, just as if it had never happened. The tribulations, torture and imprisonment in this human world were no longer a passive suffering, but rather a sacred and victorious mission.
For more than a decade, I faced my family with a miserable expression and couldn't show them the merit and glory of Falun Dafa, because I myself was feeling hopeless and unworthy. It is because I never had the feeling of the happiness of a life immersed in the Fa, like many other practitioners talked about.
I had been practicing the exercises for more than a decade, but I was merely practicing without understanding what Master required of us. I truly had missed so much of the happiness Master gave us – opportunities to cleanse myself.
After that understanding, I no longer looked down on fellow practitioners, and felt self-pride and unworthy at the same time. I no longer felt that the Fa was too profound and too difficult for me. Instead, I now respect fellow practitioners who use their lives to safeguard and validate the Fa. It is majestic and solemn.
Cultivation is actually so simple. We only need to listen to and follow Master's teachings, without adding our own attachments and human notions – Master will guide us.
One day, after completing the exercises, I looked out of the window and saw a clear sky and an abundant landscape that gave me an experience of “The heavenly bodies pure and clear, Heaven and Earth made right,” (After the Calamity, Hong Yin)
Thank you Master!
Category: Improving Oneself
