(Clearwisdom.net)
To the honorable Teacher and fellow practitioners,
Having read the articles from "The Third Mainland China Falun Dafa Practitioners Cultivation Experience Sharing Conference on the Internet," I was deeply touched by the cultivated realms of the mainland practitioners and realized my own shortcomings. Though I knew that the Australian Fa Conference needed experience sharing articles, I only wanted to come to Sydney and listen to other practitioners' sharing to improve further because I knew that I was not diligent enough and had lots of attachments. I later came to realize that this was a selfish mentality of only wanting to gain from others.
The following is part of my cultivation experience from the past seven years. Please kindly point out any shortcomings.
I am a teacher. I started practicing Falun Dafa at the end of 1998. My wife and I attended the 1999 Sydney Fa Conference. Revered Master taught the Fa to the disciples and explained the Fa in a question and answer format. My question was taken out because it was too simple, but Teacher still explained the Fa to answer my question while addressing other people's questions. A message came to my mind and said to me, "Pay attention, the following is for you," while I had a feeling that Master was looking at me. Master knew who raised that insignificant question and where that person sat. From then on I made up my mind to firmly cultivate in Dafa.
Not long after that conference, the evil Communist regime started the nationwide persecution of Falun Gong. At that time, I did not quite understand the difference between individual cultivation and Fa rectification period cultivation. My cultivation practice was not at all diligent. I couldn't sit with my legs double-crossed, and my attachments were numerous and obvious. During my cultivation of the past few years, I gradually became mature amidst tribulations. I gradually came to understand my mission and duty through Master's lectures during the Fa rectification period.
During the past seven years, I worked at two schools and clarified the truth to about one thousand students, teachers and some parents, and they were given the chance to be saved by Dafa. I remember one day during lunch time, when I was reading the career section of a newspaper at my previous school, one school's name caught my attention. I realized that there seemed to be no practitioners in that state. I then suddenly had an intention to go there to promote the Fa and clarify the truth. But this job was a part-time one, and that state was an isolated island state. My wife and I both had some worries, especially considering that I was the only bread winner of the family of four and I had a permanent full-time job at the time. Plus, there were so many practitioners in Sydney, why did we have to go there? But somehow, the desire to go there to promote the Fa and clarify the truth became stronger. In the end, I sent an application for the part-time job.
The school quickly bought me a round-trip plane ticket for the interview. My wife reminded me a couple of times that I should not clarify the truth during the interview and that I should remain rational, as a job was a job, etc. On the interview day, the principal went to the airport to receive me and had a good chat with me on the way to the school. Falun Gong was a topic of conversation. He did not know the truth and was misled by Chinese government propaganda. After I clarified the truth to him, he was very happy and offered me the job right after the interview. Considering the fact that I was a permanent full-time teacher at my school in Sydney, he included the higher years of junior school for me to teach, as well as teaching the senior school, and made it permanent as well. Furthermore, knowing that my salary was higher than that in Hobart, he and the deputy principal, after discussion, gave me a position in charge of a certain program and made me a special senior teacher. This way, my salary was even higher than the one in Sydney.
As soon as I began teaching at that school, I used every opportunity to clarify the truth to the students and staff. Once I shared my cultivation experience and clarified the truth to Year 10 students and staff during their weekly assembly. The result was very good. The Year 10 teachers told other teachers about it, so I was asked to explain Falun Gong and reasons for the persecution, etc. to other year-level students at their gatherings. Afterwards, some students wrote letters to John Howard, the U.N. and the Chinese leaders.
I later held a Falun Dafa picture exhibition at the school library. The librarian was so impressed that she chose the banner with Zhen-Shan-Ren on it as the homepage picture for the library. Many students and staff came and viewed the exhibition. As it is a very prestigious school, most students came from a more privileged background. Some of the parents included federal MPs, state MPs, lawyers, etc. I made good use of the break time during parent-teacher conferences to clarify the truth to these people. In the end, the whole school's students and staff, as well as some of the parents, came to know about Falun Gong and the persecution. Some teachers also began practicing Falun Gong. A practice site was established in Hobart and a small Fa study group formed.
Three years later, in order to participate in more Dafa related activities, I applied for the present job I have now in Victoria. It was also a part-time job when I applied. I naturally talked about Falun Gong in a rational manner at the interview with school leaders. I got the job quickly and was offered a full-time position the next year with a better salary than the last two schools.
Once a delegation of twenty Chinese students from our sister school in China visited for two weeks. The teacher of the delegation stayed with us, and we continuously clarified the truth to him during that time. He was also able to watch NTDTV programs. As other Chinese students stayed with my students' families, my students clarified the truth to them at appropriate times, as they know pretty well the facts about Falun Gong. I also talked about it to the Chinese students in class. The result was very good.
Later, an account told to me by that teacher shocked me and made me think further about my responsibility and duty as a practitioner.
This teacher said that when he was marking the 2004 University Entry Examination papers, in the Chinese section, he saw an excellent essay. According to the standard criteria, that paper should have been given full credit. But since the essay touched upon the topic of religion, it was given 19 points out of 100. Government policy says clearly that any exam essay that talked about the issue of Falun Gong or religion cannot be given a passing score. This teacher later found out that this student did very well in the other exam subjects and his parents were university professors, but this student couldn't get entry into college because of this. I later told my colleagues about this, and they were all shocked and found it incredible.
In contrast, one of my students here gained a perfect mark for her formal English oral assessment last month and her topic was Falun Gong. When her presentation was over, the whole class was silent for quite some time and then asked in succession what they could do to help. She told them to let their friends and relatives know about Falun Gong and the persecution.
When the organ harvesting issue was exposed in the media, fellow practitioners in Australia decided to take petitions to the federal Parliament. Realizing that I only had one small Year 12 class, I thought about going to the other Year 12 classes that had ties to China, such as world history, geography, etc. I clarified the truth to the head of the geography department, and she agreed to let me talk to her Year 12 class and asked me to talk to all of the Year 9 students about China's one-child policy. She stressed that I could use this opportunity to talk in depth about the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). I gladly agreed. Several entire Year 12 classes signed petitions to help stop the persecution after I clarified the truth to them.
I met with some difficulty when I approached the head of the history department. As he came to the school last year, he seemed to have a rather negative view of Falun Gong. He told me that I could only go to his class if I had the principal's approval. A colleague told me that the principal would probably regard the organ harvesting issue as political and that he had once asked the principal for a certain kind of petition but was rejected. I did not feel frustrated or worried about it, but instead I thought it would be a wonderful opportunity to further clarify the truth to the school's leaders. I had to do it in a dignified way. I went and clarified the truth to both the principal and the assistant principal, and they both agreed. All of the Year 12 history students signed the petition, and the head of the history department also changed his attitude.
I then talked about Falun Gong and the organ harvesting issue at the staff meeting for all teachers. This was roughly what I said as an introduction: "What I am going to talk about today might not seem that relevant to the daily operations of our school, but in fact it matters very much to each one of us here and to our region. Given that one of the school's aims is to educate our students to become responsible citizens who have a set of righteous moral values, all of us must face this new form of evil of organ harvesting and make a correct moral choice." I talked about the key content of the Matas-Kilgour report and the latest developments regarding the issue. The teachers applauded my speech at the end.
When former Canadian Secretary of State for Asia Pacific David Kilgour and Vice President of the European Parliament Edward McMillan-Scott were on their way to Australia, I asked the assistant principal for leave, as I wanted to go to Canberra. I told her the reason and gave her a copy of the report. She said that she would read the report and then talk to the principal. That evening I received an email from her, allowing me to go and saying that she did not need to ask the principal. The next day she said to me, "I support you, but you must be careful. Your family members are still in China and the Chinese Embassy is in Canberra. I don't want anything to happen to you." I told her, "Thank you for your concern and care. Nothing will happen to me."
On another occasion, an expert on organ transplantation from Victoria talked to a small group of us on how the organ harvesting charges were impossible. He spoke in an authoritative manner for about half an hour, talking about how he often went to China's hospitals, saying that he knew the Health Minister of China personally, etc. We were very calm and did not interrupt his talk. He even said that it was impossible for the doctors in China not to know the source of organs and that they would openly refuse to operate if that was the case. I wrote down his main points and began to clarify the truth to him point by point. I said, "Professor Chen Zhonghua, one of the authors who drafted the new regulation on organ transplant, said in a Sydney Morning Herald article this March that the new regulations failed to address three key problems. The first one is the source of organs and the third one is the corrupt organ market. Even the new regulations cannot address this issue, let alone the situation before the regulations were put in place."
He was speechless and felt a bit embarrassed. He said that we obviously know more about China and the regime.
This prompted me to realize that no matter what kind of experts, famous people or politicians they might be, in terms of clarifying the truth, we are the real experts. We don't pursue fame, yet we are the main characters of this play. We don't seek profit and we are not politicians, yet what we do is truly for the wonderful future of this nation and its people.
My experience is that whatever we are doing is always about the need of Master's Fa rectification and about the need of saving sentient beings. As long as we keep Dafa and sentient beings in our hearts, Master knows fully well what we would like to do and will arrange it for us. During this process, Master has also arranged xinxing tests for me to overcome and I can overcome them when I am in a righteous state. A lot of situations are actually an illusion, but they are there for you to deal with. Whether you are going to approach it as a cultivator or as an everyday person often makes the difference between success and failure. Actually Master only looks at our hearts and everything is under the care and watch of our Master. During these years, I came to understand a layer of the Fa principles of "what is yours won't be lost" and "being responsible for people and society." I also came to know better the implications of face to face truth clarification.
Early this year, the Melbourne Epoch Times moved to a new suburb, where more Chinese people reside. Once two fellow practitioners asked me to go along to visit a federal MP in that area to talk about the recent harassment and attack on ET. We asked for her attention and support, but she complained to us about the activities Falun Gong practitioners have been doing in Canberra. She said, "At the beginning you people were distributing pamphlets, later you held up torture pictures and now you have a simulation with real people painted with blood. A lot of our MPs drive through that area every day and some of us have children. They really wanted to see beautiful scenes in the morning on their way to work. You have been here many years and we already know about the persecution of Falun Gong. We have received a lot of materials from you, and what you have been doing might cause us to think negatively of you."
I calmly and kindly said, "Yes, everyone would like to see beautiful scenes, flowers, and listen to birds singing or nice music on their way to work. I can fully understand that and we are the same. I think those Falun Gong practitioners in Canberra also wanted to take their children somewhere for a holiday. But you are our representatives and we are your constituents. What you saw is only pictures or a simulation, but in our eyes, they are not just pictures. Falun Gong practitioners in China and the relatives of Australian Falun Gong practitioners in China have been subjected to such real torture for over seven years, and many of them were tortured to death. You said that you already know about the persecution and implied that there is no need to tell you about it anymore, right? I think what those Canberra Falun Gong practitioners wanted to ask you through their simulation is, you have known about the persecution for seven years, so what have you done about it? We are all Australian citizens, and you are our political representatives. Have you really represented us? If we don't come to you, who should we go to? If we don't do it in Canberra, where should we go do it? The reason we came to see you today is because we have moved to your electorate and we want to tell you that if our ET office is attacked and harassed, you should know the reason."
She immediately said that she would write to federal Attorney-General and the Victorian police minister about it. Soon we received a copy of the letters she wrote to them. The head of the local police station called us one day, telling us that they received the letter from the minister asking them to take care of ET and protect us. He and his wife attended Chen Ruibian's Piano concert recently and had a very good impression of ET.
I came to understand through the past seven years of cultivation that the one body is made up of individual particles. If one particle does well, it will lay a foundation for the one body to do well. If the overall result of the one body is not good or not good enough, it is a sign that individual particles within that one body have not done well. In fact an individual particle is one body, and the one body is an individual particle on a bigger scale. They depend on each other. So when we do something as one body, it needs all of us particles to cooperate with and harmonize each other.
If the visit by David Kilgour and Edward McMillan-Scott was successful, it was because we have met certain requirements of Dafa in terms of cooperation and harmonizing the whole as one body. Key coordinators have tirelessly organized experience sharings for the whole country and local coordinators have held smaller scale sharings on the Fa, so that we as a whole have elevated our understanding and are able to cooperate reasonably well.
Now the Australian branch of the Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong will soon be established. It will apply for visas and deal with other practical issues. This is a special opportunity for us Australian practitioners.
The investigation delegation is a strong, direct external force. It will force open the doors of the Chinese labor camps, and is a very good channel to pressure the Chinese regime. It is of vital importance that Australian practitioners are directly involved in this mission and give it righteous support. It is known that for the past few years, whether it is Amnesty International, the United Nations or various governments, their impact on the issue of Falun Gong has been limited, despite the fact that they have the financial and human resources to be effective. When the investigative report by David Kilgour and David Matas came out, it created a huge global impact. How could just two individuals create such an immense impact? Apart from their own role, I think it is mainly because of the righteous support and participation of Dafa practitioners.
In "Expounding on the Fa," Teacher said,
"You should also be clear that 'natural' does not exist, and 'the inevitable' has reasons behind it."
Australian practitioners are very busy with all kinds of Dafa related activities. They are all very important, but if we can't move forward and have the investigation delegation enter China, we have not made good use of the good opportunity created by the successful visit of David Kilgour and Edward McMillan-Scott. Master is waiting for good news from Australia, so are we ready? Have we put our righteous thoughts as one body behind it? Do we have perseverance and determination? Do we truly believe in the mighty power of Dafa?
I realize that in order to do the three things well as required by Master, it is fundamentally important to firmly believe in Master. When Shakyamuni asked his disciple to clean the bathtub, his disciple understood it as taking lives, not only failing to accomplish the requirement of his Master, but also having different ideas. Actually this is a crucial question. After Master's Fa rectification began, some saw going to Tiananmen Square to validate Dafa as being political and some saw participating in a parade, spreading the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party and quitting the CCP as getting political. Human beings are just human beings. They will use their notions to judge things rather than harmonizing what Master requires of us.
Teacher told us in Zhuan Falun,
"The person measures Buddha's xinxing with an ordinary person's criteria. How can that comparison be made? How can it work if a person views high-level things with the standard of everyday people?"
In closing, please allow me to share with everyone Teacher's Fa from Zhuan Falun:
"The enlightenment that we actually refer to is a matter of whether in the course of cultivation practice one can enlighten to and accept the Fa taught by the master or the Tao taught by the Taoist master, whether one can treat oneself as a practitioner upon encountering tribulations, and whether one can adhere to the Fa while practicing cultivation." (From Zhuan Falun, Lecture Nine: "Enlightenment")
Thank you compassionate Master.
Thank you fellow practitioners.
