I Walked Out of a Brainwashing Center in Nine Days

(Minghui.org) The practitioners in my county, including myself, have been slacking off in our cultivation and struggled to keep up with the progress of Fa-rectification. The old forces were well aware of this and used it as an excuse to escalate the persecution. The CCP (Chinese Communist Party) set up brainwashing centers and launched a “zero-out” campaign to coerce practitioners into renouncing their belief in Falun Dafa.

Bombarded with threats and intimidation, many practitioners compromised due to human notions and their attachment to sentimentality. It caused great losses in our area and I was very sad to see it.

Having cultivated poorly myself, I made a big mistake out of fear. After Master published three articles, “Stay Out of Danger,” “Cultivation in Dafa Is Serious,” and “How You Should Regard and Act Toward Master’s Family Members,” I realized what I did. I felt consumed with guilt and regret and I was in great mental agony.

Refusing to Renounce My Belief

The evil didn’t let up on me. Seven people including town officials, county police officers, and the village Party Committee members, barged into my home one day in October 2023. They said they needed me to sign another guarantee statement renouncing Falun Dafa (commonly known as Falun Gong in China). They claimed what I signed previously was no longer sufficient. This time, I had to be video taped making my renouncement.

I didn’t give in to their demands, instead I clarified the truth to them. Because I refused to cooperate, I was taken to a local brainwashing center that night. The next day, my non-practitioner son came to visit. He pleaded, begged, and tried to pressure me into signing the statement. Otherwise, he was going to involve all my children and have them take time off work to visit me in our hometown. It was an old tactic the evil repeatedly used to get me to comply, which I almost did again.

My attachment to sentimentality and fear were at work and my righteous thoughts were weakening. But my daughter, a practitioner, whispered to me, “Dad, keep strong righteous thoughts. We cannot cooperate with the evil. Tear up the paper.” I remembered a passage of Master’s Fa:

“No matter what the situation, do not cooperate with the evil’s demands, orders, or what it instigates. If everyone can do that, circumstances will change.” (“Dafa Disciples’ Righteous Thoughts Are Powerful,” The Essentials of Diligent Progress II)

Master’s words sent a jolt through me and I instantly became clear headed. I tore up the paperwork and declared I would stay resolute in my belief. Seeing they could not transform me, the brainwashing center officials left. A guard was assigned to monitor me.

Forming a Strong One Body

My wife, also a practitioner, had a long discussion with all my children that night. They each looked inward to find their own shortcomings and decided to rectify themselves in the Fa. They formed a plan to work together and petition for my release.

My wife and daughter were to visit the brainwashing center every day and clarify the truth to guards and center’s officials. My children who lived in other cities were to send righteous thoughts every day, search online for information on the perpetrators and send it to the Minghui website to expose them. My family also decided to write an open letter to the deputy mayor of the town, who is in charge of the Political and Legal Affairs Committee and a key official at the brainwashing center.

Every day when my wife came to visit, we clarified the truth to the deputy mayor and the guards. We told them our cultivation experiences, and how Dafa teaches people to be good. We urged them to not follow the persecution policies put in place by Jiang Zemin (the then head of the CCP who launched the persecution). We explained that blindly participating in the persecution of practitioners is not going to do them any good and may even harm their families. Only when they treat Falun Dafa practitioners with kindness can they receive blessings.

Everyone in my family carried out their assigned tasks. We cooperated with each other and formed a powerful one body. After the key center officials’ information was published on the Minghui website, they each received an influx of truth-clarification phone calls and letters from overseas. This had a huge impact. The deputy mayor stopped coming to the brainwashing center. I sent righteous thoughts every day and continued to clarify the truth to guards and members of the village Party Committee. Most of them learned the truth and were sympathetic towards practitioners.

My wife and daughter visited every day to petition for my release. We worked together to clarify the truth. We called the deputy mayor at his office but he gave different excuses not to come to the brainwashing center. The evil seemed to be weakening. To Dafa practitioners, the process of clarifying the truth and saving sentient beings is the process of validating the Fa and resisting the persecution, as well as the process of our eliminating human notions, attachments and sentimentality.

Staying Resolute in My Belief

My wife and daughter showed up as usual on day seven, when I went on a hunger strike to protest the arbitrary detention. The guard on duty made a number of phone calls and urged the town officials to deal with the situation. The deputy mayor promised he would come with the police chief the next day. When I found out, I immediately sent the open letter to the police chief’s cell phone so he would not take part in persecuting Dafa practitioners.

When the deputy mayor didn’t show up the next morning, the guard called him and was told that the plan had changed because the police chief was out of town. The deputy mayor said he would come the following day with members of the Political and Legal Affairs Committee. I believe the police chief made the right choice after he read the letter.

The deputy mayor told the guard, “This practitioner’s family seems to have powerful foreign connections. I’ve received countless phone calls from overseas in the past week. We’ll have to make an example of this case and we cannot let him go easily.” We knew it was a test targeting our attachment to fear, therefore we were unmoved.

It was my eighth day there. All eight guards on the team already had a turn monitoring me and thus had heard the truth. I felt my job there was done and the brainwashing center was longer where I should be. It was time to go home. I told my wife and daughter, “I am going home tomorrow. Let’s all send righteous thoughts tonight and I’ll be out of here tomorrow.”

Since the deputy mayor and members of the Political and Legal Affairs Committee were coming the next day, I figured I would put in writing my intention to stay resolute in my belief and declare whatever I said or agreed to previously was no longer valid. I also wrote, “Master is good. Falun Dafa is good.” My heart felt light and bright when I finished the letter.

I sent righteous thoughts for a few hours and felt my entire body enveloped in a warm current. Tears streamed down my face as I knew Master was strengthening me. That night, I dreamed a large being was laying inside of a big wok. It was lying on its back with all four legs pointing upward and its skin had been peeled off. I thought about this dream when I woke up and thought maybe it meant an evil being from another dimension had been eliminated by Master. I thanked Master for protecting me.

Denying the Old Forces’ Arrangements

On day nine, my wife and daughter came in the morning as usual. They pleaded for my release and clarified the truth to the guards.

My daughter shared with me my son’s dream from the night before. In his dream, he saw a big tree surrounded by a few small trees uprooted and lying on the ground. The trees had human faces. Believing that they were all going to die, the trees pointed fingers and blamed each other. My son thought this meant that the brainwashing center was going to be abolished, since “tree” has the same pronunciation as “lose” and could imply the brainwashing center was going to lose. I told my wife and daughter about my dream and they were all happy for me. We all believed it was encouragement and Master’s way of telling me that it was time for me to go home.

I told my family we’d stick to the plan no matter what happened, “Master is calling the shots and I am going home today.”

By noon, no one came. The guard was anxious—he called the deputy mayor and asked when he’d be coming. The deputy mayor was impatient, “We’re in a meeting this morning and will be there in the afternoon.” It made sense that they would be scared to come during the day as evil cannot stand sunlight or anything positive, therefore anything they do has to be in secret and in the dark. Sure enough, the officials didn’t show up until the evening.

As soon as they arrived, my wife asked them, “My husband has been held here arbitrarily for nine days. He has not eaten for a few days. If anything happens to him, you all will be held responsible. He has to go home with us today.” The deputy mayor said, “You’ll have to talk to the secretary of Political and Legal Affairs Committee about this.”

I turned to the secretary and tried to clarify the truth to him. He cut me off, “Falun Gong is a cult. Why do you still believe in it?” I asked him, “If you say it’s a cult, then please show me the evidence.” He was silent so I continued clarifying the truth. He threatened me, “If you don’t cooperate with us, we’ll have to take you to the detention center. I’ll compile all the evidence and file a case against you.” I told him, “You don’t have the authority.” Infuriated, he stormed off and slammed the door shut.

I handed the letter I wrote earlier to the deputy mayor and asked him to pass it on to the secretary after he finished reading it. The secretary read my letter and was even angrier. He shouted, “I’m sending people to arrest you right now.”

Two men came and said they were from the Domestic Security Division. They said the secretary of the Political and Legal Affairs Committee sent them to “transform” me. My wife said, “My husband has been arbitrarily detained here for nine days. He hasn’t eaten and does not feel well. He needs to see a doctor right away. But instead of letting him see a doctor, you’re here to do what? Transform him? You’re law enforcement but you’re breaking the law.”

They ignored my wife and claimed that they were top experts in “transforming” practitioners. They said they transformed many practitioners and hoped I’d work with them.

I told them, “If you’re here to transform anybody or anything, then in theory, aren’t you supposed to change wrong into right, evil into good and lies into the truth? If that’s what you’re here to do, then we can talk. If not, then you can leave.” They were quiet for a while, then they started repeating the CCP’s lies which I debunked one by one.

Seeing that they were not going to change my mind, one said, “Then you should stay here.” I told him, “You don’t make the decision. I did not break the law or commit any crime. You arbitrarily detained me. It’s against the law and you’ve already broken the law.” I started walking out of the room as I talked and they tried to stop me. I told them whoever stopped me was committing a crime and they reluctantly let me go.

My wife and daughter followed right behind me. We walked straight to the entrance of the building but the gate was locked. We asked Master for help and came up with a great idea. We dialed the emergency number 120 and an ambulance came in a few minutes. When the medical responders knocked on the gate, the deputy mayor seemed completed defeated. He had someone open the gate for them and gestured for us to leave. The evil elements behind him were eliminated. The evil elements behind the brainwashing center were also eliminated. I walked out of the brainwashing center with Master’s help after nine days.

Conclusion

Through all the ups and downs in my cultivation journey, I’ve learned that the biggest road block to us clarifying the truth and saving sentient beings is fear. Scared of being persecuted, scared of losing our family life, scared of losing monetary possessions, status, and fame, we just have so much we can’t take lightly and let go of. This is why some practitioners feel like they are stuck in a tribulation that seems like an impasse, and they are persecuted relentlessly.

Those who have cultivated diligently and have done all three things well have had a relatively smooth cultivation journey. It is because they don’t have fear. We can’t achieve the state of having no fear by just talking about it—it is achieved by cultivating ourselves solidly, letting go of our human notions, attachments, sentimentality, and even life and death, keeping strong righteous thoughts and having absolute faith in Master and the Fa. Only then can we eliminate fear. Powerful righteous thoughts only come from the Fa.

Master said,

“That’s why I say that in your personal cultivation it’s extremely important that you keep persevering with Fa-study. If you don’t study the Fa well, when you do Dafa work there will be a lot of things that are hard for you to handle correctly or do well. But if you do study the Fa well, you’ll find many things a lot easier to do, and at the same time, problems will be less apt to occur. That’s why I’ve said that no matter how busy you are, you must study the Fa.” (Teachings From a Tour of North America)

It is clear how important Fa study is—it is essential to us doing the three things well.

If we don’t move forward in our cultivation, we will fall behind. I still have many human notions and attachments that I need to eliminate. We have to take Fa study seriously and study the Fa well. We have to truly cultivate and cultivate solidly. We have to strive forward vigorously and do the three things well. We have to do as Master asked of us and not let Master down—compassionate Master has done so much to save sentient beings.

Thank you, Master. Thank you, fellow practitioners.