My Path of Cultivation

(Minghui.org)

Greetings, Master!Greetings, Fellow practitioners!

Years before obtaining the Fa, a vision was shown to me one day: while sitting in a house, I was simultaneously a very large being, hovering above the world and covering a very large expanse of it. Beneath me, a large number of smaller beings were on the surface of the Earth. I knew that I was responsible for them.

The vision ended, and I did not understand what it meant and thought perhaps I was going crazy and maybe even forming delusions about myself. Most peculiarly, those beings I was responsible for were mostly concentrated in one geographic region of the world, an area I had never been to and had previously felt no connection with.

A couple of years later, I was in a used bookstore with my cousin. A certain book cover amused him, and he pulled it off the shelf to show me. It was a small booklet introducing qigong, written by a Westerner. I was very interested and bought the book. After reading it I became even more interested and decided that I needed to find a “real” qigong practice to learn. A few months later, while reading the news, an article caught my attention about Chinese-Canadians being harassed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The article mentioned Falun Gong, and I thought “Falun Gong, this must be a qigong practice.”

At first, I found Lunyu hard to believe, but I decided to keep reading and was soon amazed to find every question I’d ever had about life clearly answered. From things religions taught, to the celestial eye, remote vision, the assistant consciousness, energy channels, enlightenment, one after another, these were explained clearly. I was amazed to find that I no longer had any questions about life and only had questions about Falun Dafa itself, and how I could learn more and take up this great practice. I was most impressed by the Fa principle:

“Cultivation depends on one’s own efforts, while the transformation of gong is done by one’s master.” (Lecture One, Zhuan Falun)

I began practicing on my own for a period of around six months, because I lived in a city with no practitioners. Through Fa study, I came to understand the three things that practitioners must do. Fa study and sending forth righteous thoughts seemed doable to me, but I did not understand how to clarify the truth. I wasn’t clear either about how simply explaining facts about the persecution could save people. But Master said it was something practitioners must do, so I printed flyers and petitions that I found on practitioners’ websites and began distributing them. However, because I didn’t understand the fundamentals, I was not able to persist or do much. Also, being on my own, my only contact with practitioners was experience sharing on the Minghui website. While this was very crucial and helpful for me at that time, most of the articles were from mainland practitioners, and the society there was very different from here. I really struggled to understand what I needed to do and doubted myself.

It was around this time that I was offered a good job in another city. The city, interestingly, was in the same region that I had seen in the vision before I obtained the Fa. Perhaps Master arranged things this way to strengthen my faith.

After moving to this city, I was able to join the local group there. I was very excited to see them. At the first Fa study in particular, I could feel a lot of mental interference as evil beings in the field of my mind were removed by Master over the course of the study. This happened each time I attended the group study, and I would feel greatly purified afterward.

I still did not understand the fundamentals of clarifying the truth and saving sentient beings, and it weighed on my mind. However, as I was now in the group, I gradually joined many projects and entered the current of Fa-rectification. My understanding gradually deepened.

Career Change

I was soon given the opportunity to help produce our local English Epoch Times newspaper. I was trained on how to do page layout and was very grateful to be provided with this opportunity. I felt a strong connection to the project.

Around this time, I had trouble balancing my cultivation, volunteer project work, and my ordinary job. I was often tired in my office and would even fall asleep at my desk. I also lacked confidence in my abilities, was attached to feelings of inferiority, and had a strong mindset of relying on others.

Things eventually came to a head, and my managers let me know they were not happy with my performance and put me on probation. I was going through a training program, as did all new employees at this company, and in the next phase of this training, I was to travel to another city and complete a two-week technical project. It was made clear to me that I needed to do well on this project if I wanted to continue in the company.

For those two weeks, I took a break from most of the truth-clarification project work I was doing (though I still made the weekly newspaper) and focused on this training. It was an eye-opening experience. My colleagues, whom I had previously had feelings of inferiority toward, found the training extremely difficult and complained it was the hardest thing they had ever done. I, on the other hand, without the pressure of the various project work weighing down on me, felt like I was on a vacation. It was very relaxing. Also, because I could not rely on others in this project, I was forced to do all the work myself. The training supervisors said my project was the best work they had seen in all the years they had done the training.

This experience helped me a lot. It raised my confidence in my professional abilities, but it also was a strong reminder that the work practitioners do, which can be seemingly simple on the surface, is indeed a battle in other dimensions. Master said,

“They might seem ordinary, but all the things Dafa disciples do are the most magnificent, and they’re unprecedented.” (“Fa Teaching Given at the Metropolitan New York Fa Conference,” Collected Teachings Given Around the World: Volume III)

I also understand that perhaps some practitioners might have left cultivation because they got a taste of this comfort after leaving the battle and didn’t want to return.

My ordinary career then took off, and I obtained several promotions in several years. I enjoyed the work and was planning to progress further in my career. However, I always had a slightly empty feeling and felt that perhaps I was not given my abilities to have an enjoyable ordinary career, but so that I could assist Master. However, leaving my job for a Dafa project did not seem realistic.

One year my company changed its policies and no longer allowed employees to accrue vacation time year to year. I had several months of vacation saved up and was told I needed to take it soon or lose it. So I took two months of vacation and traveled to New York to work at the headquarters with the English Epoch Times design team.

I was impressed by the quality of the work the practitioners there were doing, and I also felt that I could be of help to their team. Most of all, I wanted to work at the media full time and fulfill our mission. At the end of the two months, they offered me a position and shared deeply with me about the importance of the project and how it would help my cultivation. I made up my mind to quit my job and move to New York.

I felt a lot of anxiety about how to explain my decision to my ordinary colleagues, friends, and family. I was leaving a high-paying senior professional job and promising career to start over in a completely different career in a completely different industry. However, I just explained to them that I was given a great opportunity to work in New York and it was what I really wanted to do. They were all understanding and supportive.

Unexpectedly, it was my practitioner wife who least supported my decision. Despite her doing the same thing several years prior (leaving a professional job to work full time at the media), she could not accept my decision. She was worried about the financial burden it would place on us, and she was also going through a very difficult tribulation of her own during this time. I felt a large amount of pressure and hatred from her, but felt I still needed to go through with my decision. Master said:

“Your spouse would not care much if you were to do something else. Qigong practice should actually be a good thing, but she always finds fault with you. In fact, your spouse is helping you eliminate karma, though she does not know it herself. She is not fighting with you only superficially and still being nice to you in her heart—it is not so. It is real anger from the bottom of her heart, because whoever has acquired the karma feels uncomfortable. It is guaranteed to be this way.” (Lecture Four, Zhuan Falun)

Upon arriving in New York, I was informed that I would be on probation for six months and receive only half my salary during this time. I was shocked; no one had explained this to me before, and financially things were already very tight. I felt betrayed, angered, and strongly considered quitting. After reflecting, I reminded myself of my true purpose, my commitment to our mission, and that while a pay cut wouldn’t alter this, quitting would. I came to see the issue as a test. Did I really want to work in the media?

I also tried to be understanding of the management’s situation. So I put down my grievances, became determined that I could still make it work financially, and continued on.

Encountering Severe Physical Tribulations

After many years of practicing and working in the media, I encountered the most intense test on my path up to that point in 2019. Once, while visiting the New York office, I needed to go to a large group study in Flushing, because I needed to meet someone there (normally I’d study in the office with the English group). I was the only Westerner there, in an auditorium of hundreds of Chinese practitioners. When the coordinator saw me, ignoring my protests, she marched me to the front of the auditorium and gave me a microphone. We would read one paragraph in English (just me) and one paragraph in Chinese (hundreds of Chinese practitioners). After a few minutes, I began to feel strange. I felt as though I was going to lose consciousness. I had the impression that the old forces were forming a partition between my main consciousness and my surface body, and I couldn’t dissolve the karma as normal. I felt scared and in danger. I thought, how can this be happening, in front of hundreds of practitioners. We were reading Lecture One of Zhuan Falun. At this moment, a passage stood out to me.

Master said,

“We emphasize one point: If you cannot relinquish the attachment or concern for illness, we cannot do anything and will be unable to help you.” (Lecture One, Zhuan Falun)

I truly felt the seriousness of cultivation. How could one give up the attachment or concern for illness when one was being suddenly threatened with a severe tribulation like this? Nonetheless, I had to try. I tried to focus on the text of Zhuan Falun and let go of my concern about the tribulation. After all, how many times had I died in previous lives, while I had only this one chance to obtain the Fa. I wasn’t able to completely achieve letting go of my concern, but by focusing on the Fa, I managed to make it through the study. I met up with the practitioner I was supposed to see and went home.

About a year later, the CCP Virus hit the world. At this time, I began to have serious karma elimination. By focusing on Fa study, I again made it through. During these experiences, I came to solidly understand that illness was indeed caused by karma. I don’t think I deeply believed this before, because I was affected by notions of modern science.

A few months later, I felt unusually tired one night. I decided to go to sleep and woke up only 30 minutes later, feeling extremely uncomfortable all over my body, dizzy, and in danger of losing consciousness. At this moment, I had a vision. I could see my body in another celestial dimension, and beside my body was a large, dense ball of karma. Two beings who seemed to be wearing ceremonial robes were pushing it toward my body. When this karma ball even slightly touched against my body, its field would mix with mine and I would feel very uncomfortable all over my body (as I felt at that moment). I could also see that if it was pushed further onto my body, my body would become severely disabled or even destroyed. I remember thinking it would take a couple months to dissolve that karma.

I think perhaps I was shown this scene because I had been enlightened to the real cause of sickness. Though alarming, it was an encouragement to me to see that although the karma was large, I could get through it. But it also reminded me of the seriousness of the situation.

For the next couple of months, I felt this extreme discomfort every day and a danger of losing consciousness. I persisted in Fa study, even one night staying up all night studying Zhuan Falun. Eventually, after a couple months, the tribulation passed.

Reflecting on why this happened, there were many reasons, but partially, I think, it was because I was working at home remotely for a number of years. This combined with not diligently practicing the exercises, led to a buildup of karma on my body. The daily grind of going into an office or workplace can help a person remove karma, in my understanding. Also, the tribulation helped me to improve my character, faith, and understanding of the Fa. One day, when the tribulation was the most intense and I was feeling sorry for myself, I read a sharing on Minghui where a practitioner went through something much worse. Another day I found myself lamenting “when will this end” and realized I needed to focus on improving my xinxing regardless of how I felt.

It’s also possible that I didn’t do enough to reject this tribulation. Indeed, it didn’t start to completely clear up until I started sending extended righteous thoughts.

Another time, more recently, I woke up in the middle of the night with pain in my lower back. It started slowly but soon increased to an extremely excruciating pain. It hurt so much that I didn’t want to endure it and even had thoughts of dying. I gradually calmed down and began to read Zhuan Falun and found I was able to focus on the words. I asked myself, what if this pain never disappears? Would I still cultivate and do what is needed? I kept studying, and after a few hours the pain went away. I woke up the next morning feeling wonderful in my body. This helped me to get rid of the fear of pain.

Cultivating At Work

A few years ago, I was working remotely for a project that had spun off from the media. That project had been fairly successful, but I did not feel comfortable staying there and thought I needed to return to the main media project.

I called the main coordinator of the Canada English Epoch Times and joined the team there. After working there for over a year, different resentment started to build up in my heart. Things related to fame, gain, and jealousy. I started to have negative thoughts toward my daily work. Master said,

“If you want to use them to make money or make a fortune with them, or if you wish to achieve your personal goals among everyday people with them, this is prohibited.” (Lecture Two, Zhuan Falun).

I realized that this was a fundamental attachment for me, being motivated by self-validation, rather than Fa validation.

I was scheduled to have a meeting with the managers one day. I was meditating beforehand, and a lot of resentment was interfering with my mind. I was even thinking over which of the issues I would raise in the meeting. Catching myself, I asked myself if it was right for a practitioner to be this way. No, it wasn’t. I didn’t want to be one of the people who get full of resentment and anger and then leave their project (and maybe even cultivation). With Master’s help, I cleared all those thoughts out and then went and had a normal meeting. To this day, I can’t even remember what it was I was upset about. I think those were just different entities trying to destroy me.

Very soon after this happened, Master published “Dafa Spiritual Practice Is Serious.” Master said:

“Those who are most apt to concur with [the individuals who are stirring up trouble] are people who harbor attachments, resentment, or even those who got expelled from a Dafa project meant for saving people on account of mistakes they made, or who are disgruntled. And when these people talk together and air their grievances, it is a massive display of their human thinking. We can see that the kind of people I’m referring to never evaluate things based on our teachings, the Fa, and ask themselves: is it right for me to be resentful like that? Is it befitting of a person committed to self-cultivation? Is it in line with our teachings?” (“Dafa Spiritual Practice Is Serious”)

I was grateful to have passed this test and to have been given an opportunity to do so before the jingwen was published.

Closing Remarks

Reflecting back on my path, it’s clear to me that I would not have made it through without Master’s help. I feel it goes beyond protection or guidance. Master has remade me and continually uplifted me, even when I didn’t cultivate well, and has continued giving me cultivation opportunities. I know I need to be more diligent and walk well the rest of my path.

Thank you, Master!Thank you, fellow practitioners!

(Selected Sharing Article Presented at the 2025 Canada Fa Conference)