(Minghui.org) Greetings, revered Master. Greetings, fellow practitioners.
I have practiced Falun Dafa for 28 years. I know I am no longer the person I was before I learned Dafa. I am a new life made of the Fa. The following is my understanding about my cultivation journey.
Several years ago, around the time of the annual Fahui (experience sharing conference), the practitioners in New York City (NYC) needed people to participate in the anti-persecution exhibits that were staged throughout the city. I wanted to go, but had no one to look after my children, and I couldn’t afford to bring them with me. My job paid very little. A practitioner who knew my situation offered me money, but I didn’t think it was appropriate for me to accept it.
As a practitioner, I needed money to print informational materials and travel to clarify the truth to people. My financial situation limited my ability to do these things. I wondered why I could only find low-paying jobs. Master Li said that Dafa practitioners are blessed, yet I was financially restricted and couldn’t do what I needed to. I realized that something wasn’t right, and the old forces were persecuting me financially. I asked my older brother to send me the money my parents left me so I could go to NYC. I decided I would look for a better job after I returned.
Things changed as soon as I realized that the old forces were persecuting me. Before I left for NYC, a night shift position that paid 1.25 times more per hour became available. I took it and started the new role after my trip. Things were much easier—I could clarify the truth during the day and work at night.
However, my hours made it difficult to properly take care of my children. I thought about finding a new job. Soon after, a friend told me about a job in a lab that required only basic English. I applied, and the interview went well. The new position paid 1.6 times my initial hourly rate. This happened only a few months after I woke up and negated the old forces’ persecution.
Ten years after I left school, I had not spoken any English before I went to NYC to help with the anti-persecution exhibit. I was there for two weeks, and often took my young children to the designated places. Gradually, I was able to talk about Dafa and the persecution with passersby in English. I asked them to help end the persecution and explained what was in the flyers. The English I learned at school came back to me. This experience helped me succeed during the interview for the lab position, and I was offered the job.
Nine years ago, I transferred to a different branch in the company, which required me to communicate in English with the overseas subsidiary and factory. It also required me to translate documents and reports into either English or Japanese. My English skills weren’t good enough, and I needed to improve, but I didn’t have the time. One day, I read the English translation of Zhuan Falun and realized that it contained new vocabulary that could help me at work. I began studying the English Zhuan Falun. Because I read English very slowly, I began hand-copying the text from the book instead. My English language skills improved afterwards. Not only could I handle the translations at work, but I was also able to help translate Dajiyuan’s (The Epoch Times) videos on YouTube and news articles. Indeed, Dafa provides me the skills I need as a practitioner.
I am not good at memorizing text. In March, a practitioner suggested that we memorize Zhuan Falun over Sonant. To avoid making mistakes and interfering with others, I stayed very focused during the sessions so I could quickly memorize every word. After a while, I noticed that it took less and less time to memorize the text. Not only that, I could memorize other things more quickly as well. As a member of the Tianguo Band, I had to memorize the music score for each song we played. I wasn’t able to do that, so I always used sheet music when I played my instrument. Now, I have no problem memorizing the notes. The band played in Guam this year, and it only took me a few hours to memorize a long piece—“The Stars and Stripes Forever.”
The practitioners at the exercise site helped me a lot when I first started. Later, I wanted the site to operate smoothly and to assist others. It was hard when the practitioners couldn’t be considerate or let go of self. After the persecution started, there were many tasks to be completed, but I studied the Fa less and blamed others whenever conflicts occurred. Although I knew I should look within, I felt that I had put so much effort into Dafa work, yet other practitioners didn’t appreciate it. The situation got so bad that I didn’t want to go to the practice site and even considered leaving. I tried to overcome these thoughts but couldn’t make a breakthrough until a fellow practitioner fell ill.
An elderly practitioner became very ill. Although she lived nearby, we hadn’t studied or exercised together. After hearing about her condition, I didn’t want to visit her, thinking that I wasn’t cultivating so well myself and that my sending righteous thoughts for her wouldn’t help. At one point, I wondered why I didn’t want to help her even though we lived so close. I had convinced myself that I wasn’t doing well and couldn’t have helped even if I tried. But when I dug deeper, I realized that I was worried that helping her would cause interference and I didn’t want trouble. I wasn’t compassionate, and I used Dafa work as an excuse for not helping a fellow practitioner.
I spent several days studying the Fa before visiting the practitioner’s home and sending righteous thoughts with her. One day, she asked if I had noticed any attachments in her that the old forces could have exploited. I told her, “I haven’t seen anything because we haven’t spent much time together. However, when we send righteous thoughts, I noticed that your hand doesn’t stay upright. This indicates that when you meditate, your mind is also filled with a lot of random thoughts. I say this because it happened to me some time ago. The random thoughts that interfere with us during righteous thoughts and meditation come from our attachments. You can strengthen your main consciousness. As soon as a random thought arises, you should feel your heart move, and that is the moment to catch and eliminate the thought. Once it’s gone, you can send righteous thoughts and meditate with less interference. That’s what I did; why don’t you try it?” She said she would.
That day, I went home and began the exercises. Random thoughts surfaced as soon as I started. I remembered what I said to the practitioner and paid attention to my thoughts. I eliminated them as soon as they emerged. A few minutes later, my mind cleared, and my body felt light as I did the exercises. That was a wonderful feeling. At that moment, I knew I had exited the low point of my cultivation and returned to the state of purity I had when I first started practicing. My one kind thought of helping a practitioner brought me to this point. In my mind, the practitioner had lifted me up when I needed it.
As a coordinator at the local practice site, what bothered me most was not having enough helpers when I organized an activity to clarify the truth. When manpower was short, I had to step in. Sometimes I had to be present at an event from start to finish. When practitioners were late or didn’t show up at the last minute, I felt that no matter how hard I tried, they just wouldn’t make an effort or keep their promises. It also didn’t help that I became anxious when things didn’t go as planned. I spoke in an aggressive tone, thinking that I was in the right.
These negative thoughts stemmed from my selfish notions: I didn’t want to work too hard or suffer, and I didn’t want my plan to fail because it would reflect badly on my cultivation. It didn’t occur to me that usually when someone couldn’t make it to an event, there was someone else who was able to help. Master has always been helping me while letting me see my attachments.
I made significant improvement when I studied the Fa. After that, when negative thoughts emerged during Dafa events again, I didn’t let them bother me. Instead, I seized and eliminated them. The negative thoughts grew weaker and weaker and eventually stopped affecting me. Once the negativity was gone, I began to see that the practitioners were the ones who made the event happen; I merely coordinated it. They all worked hard to do the three things Master asks of us and did well in different areas. For instance, I once thought a practitioner couldn’t do much physical work. One day, she realized she hadn’t been exercising enough and started doing the second exercise for an hour each day. I could only manage that occasionally. Another practitioner gave me the impression she didn’t cultivate diligently because she rarely attended our events. Later, I learned that she had neatly hand-copied all of Master’s lectures and memorized Zhuan Falun three times. I felt embarrassed to have had that opinion of her.
Last October, my workload doubled, and I had to put in extra hours. As a morning person, I was often exhausted and sleepy by 9 p.m., sometimes falling asleep during the evening Fa study sessions. This March, we started memorizing the Fa in the evenings, and my state was completely different—I became more alert and clear-headed during the sessions. As a result, I gained an extra hour each day to memorize the Fa and was able to study it on my own until midnight.
When I memorized the Fa, I felt that Master was right beside me. Sometimes, the feeling was so strong that I wept. Our Fa study memorized one paragraph each day. As we continued, my main consciousness grew stronger, as did my self-discipline. I made sure to do the five sets of exercises every day.
I never liked doing the Falun Standing Stance because it was hard for me to hold the positions for 30 minutes. I often skipped this exercise. Four months into memorizing the Fa with other practitioners, I was able to do the second exercise for an hour.
My personality also changed without my noticing after I began memorizing the Fa—my first thoughts become altruistic when facing conflicts. One day, I told my son not to lie on the carpet. He snapped back, “You are so bossy.” My first thought was that I should stop nagging him because he would say bad things to me and create karma, which would make it harder for him to cultivate in the future. I noticed the change when I returned to my room. Before, I would have felt wronged and resented my son for talking to me that way.
Sometimes, I became arrogant and self-righteous, allowing my notions to lead me in making poor decisions. Also, under the influence of modern science and the Chinese Communist Party culture, my thoughts and actions often weren’t aligned with the Fa principles. After I began memorizing the Fa, I was able to recognize such deviated thoughts and worked diligently to eliminate them. Sending righteous thoughts is no longer just a routine formality for me.
We are Dafa disciples here to assist Master in rectifying the Fa. We should study the Fa well and assimilate to the Fa’s principles so that we will genuinely believe in Master, follow his instructions, and become altruistic.
Thank you, Master. Thank you, fellow practitioners.
(Selected article from the 2025 Falun Dafa Experience Sharing in Japan)