(Minghui.org) I started to cultivate Falun Dafa (Falun Gong) when I was born and I am now ten and a half years old. In mid-May, my father, who is also a practitioner, made a “chart for doing the three things.” The chart had four sections: “studying the Fa,” “practicing the exercises,” “sending forth righteous thoughts” and “clarifying the truth”.
The chart uses tally marks to keep track of what I do. I get one tally for studying the Fa for two hours, one tally for practicing the exercises for two and a half hours, one tally for each of the four daily global sending forth righteous thoughts, an extra tally for sending righteous thoughts by myself for 15 minutes, a tally for printing and binding the truth-clarification materials, a tally for distributing the truth-clarification materials, a tally for distributing truth-clarification materials to my grandfather, and two tally for printing paper bills with Falun Gong information printed on them and using them.
If I completed one section of the chart in one day, I would get a full tally mark making a “正” (zheng) character. Four “正” characters would mean I accomplished each of my four tasks beautifully.
Before creating this chart, I did not realize the importance of studying the Fa and practicing the exercises. My father created this chart to get rid of my attachment of being sluggish. I started to study the Fa and practice the exercises every day to get a “正” character. Because of my online classes and the temptation of playing with toys, I was only able to accomplish eight full days of getting a “正” character during the last two weeks of May. I thought to myself that I should work harder during June.
When June came around I did not do so well in studying the Fa and practicing the exercises, since I had final examinations. I thought that since I had already done quite a lot of studying the Fa and practicing the exercises, it was enough already. As a result, I made excuses for not practicing the exercises every day. My parents accomplished everything better than I did. Even my grandmother, who had just started to put her name on the chart, did better than I did. I felt very remorseful for not studying the Fa and practicing the exercises well enough. I was determined to do better the following month.
During summer vacation in July I thought I would make use of my time to study the Fa and practice the exercises. Our whole family was very diligent during this month and we increased our Fa study time to two and a half hours. Everybody had a breakthrough in doing the three things and I improved a lot as well. Although my chart wasn’t perfect, I did do better than in May and June.
In the past, I had dreams that I was falling from high buildings. Now, I started to dream about clarifying the truth and helping people quit the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its youth organizations. In my dreams, I would also pull people up with them flying on my back. My father said I was not diligent in the past, so I would dream about falling down. Now that I am diligent, I am starting to fly up high.
I realized that I should not study the Fa and practice the exercises to compete at being first on the chart. I needed to study the Fa and practice the exercises from the bottom of my heart. I started to eliminate my competitive mentality. Since it was summer vacation, I had more time to study the Fa and practice the exercises. I decided to practice the exercises and then study the Fa in the mornings so I would have time to do my homework in the afternoons. My father suggested that I complete all my summer vacation homework and help him with truth-clarification materials in the afternoons.
I started to complete all my homework and had a lot of time left to distribute truth-clarification materials with my parents. Sometimes I would stay home with my grandmother to help send righteous thoughts for my parents or help my father put truth-clarification materials in bags.
In August, my teacher required everyone to submit a video of ourselves reading aloud. My classmates started to read what was in Chinese textbooks. Deep down inside I know that these textbooks are nothing but “false, evil and struggles” that the CCP advocated. I did not like the idea of spreading videos like this, so I started to send forth righteous thoughts. With the help of my parents, I downloaded articles about Chinese history from the website pureinsight.org and recorded myself reading them. I dressed up very nicely in skirts and dresses and tried my best to enunciate clearly with different intonations according to the scenarios I was reading. I wanted my audience to feel immersed in what I was reading, and I wanted to leave a good impression.
The head teacher started to follow what I was recording and reading. She asked my grandmother about my studies during the summer and also praised me for reading books. I motivated my classmates and they started to read Chinese history books and classical Chinese literature instead of reading the evil Communist Party’s textbooks.
By the end of August, my family and I started to send righteous thoughts for a total of two hours every day. I’ve also managed to accomplish studying the Fa and practicing the exercises beautifully. I am really happy and feel that I have reached the standards that I have set for myself.
I increased my time for studying the Fa and practicing the exercises. I also sleep after sending righteous thoughts at 12am and wake up at 5 a.m. I used to sleep for more than 10 hours, but now I am only sleeping 5 hours. What a big difference!
Though it is only a chart, it helped me see what I was lacking in cultivation. I need to cultivate well and return home with Master.