The Path I Walked (Part 6)

(Minghui.org) Ms. Li Li was a native of Heilongjiang Province. She had a difficult life, losing her mother to an unknown illness in 1992, and her brother to a brain tumor in 1994. She got married in 1981 and was a victim of domestic violence through most of her marriage. Her husband had extramarital affairs, eventually divorced her in 1996, and soon married the widow of her late brother.

Despite the hardships and heartbreaks, Ms. Li held to Falun Dafa’s principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, and even her ex-husband protected her after the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) began the persecution of Falun Dafa in 1999. A TV reporter, a friend of his, intended to interview him and have him blame Falun Dafa for breaking up his marriage with Ms. Li. He firmly turned down his friend's request for an interview. While Ms. Li was being detained for her faith, he kept her Falun Dafa books in a safe place. After she was released but forced to live away from home to avoid further arrests, he took good care of their son.

Ms. Li later died as a result of the persecution. This 10-part series was her own account of her story.

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Although I experienced misery and unhappiness, I remained cheerful, and was kind to those that mistreated me.

(Continued from Part 5)

Karma Elimination

As I began true cultivation, I experienced tribulations. It started with karma elimination. Although I had to teach students in the afternoon, I had a severe stomach ache in the morning. I thought: How could I teach a class like this? But I had no choice, because the time could not be wasted by students without a teacher in the classroom. It was still painful on my way to the classroom. But as soon as I went in and started the class, the pain stopped. The class went well. The pain started again as soon as the class was over. I immediately hurried home. It was so painful that I could not greet people I knew on the road. After climbing up to my home on the sixth floor, I was already sweaty and rushed to the bathroom. 

In my mind I said, “Master, I made it today.” I knew it was eliminating karma. Plus, Master had arranged everything well so that I could teach classes normally, all the while understanding that this was not not an illness, but karma elimination. 

When I had tonsil inflammation in the past, I would have a swollen throat with suppuration [formation of pus] and fever. This time, I had a swollen throat as well as suppuration. Or I just had fever, which was so severe that I could not sit up. But there was no swollen throat. One time the fever lasted two entire days and I could only eat some rice soup. But, on the third day, I was full of energy. I was clear that this supernatural reaction that looked like illness was no illness. For a person like me who had been through sickness and pain for a long time, I did not treat this as something out of the ordinary. Probably I had suffered a lot physically before beginning to cultivate, so there was not much karma elimination after I started to cultivate. Instead, it was mainly related to xinxing improvement.

Increased Husband Problems

Upon hearing that his mother was sick, Lu came back from Wuhan. By then his mother had already recovered, so he urged her to go back home. Since I had prepared 3,000 yuan for her medical treatment, I gave the money to her anyway. Lu had a big fight with me for giving the money to his mother. Remembering that I was a practitioner, I decided not to argue with him anymore. I did not think it was a big deal, plus I gave it to my mother-in-law. I did not consider that doing so was wrong, and felt very calm. But I would not have handled it this way had I not been a practitioner – I would still give his mother money, but I would not accept it if being wronged this way. “Is there anything wrong giving money to your mother?” I would think. 

It was not accidental for Lu to pick on me everywhere or easily get angry for no reason. On the surface, it was because we did not get along for many years, leaving the family unstable all the time. Before I began to cultivate I nearly collapsed because of him in 1991, so I asked for a divorce and he agreed. One time he had a letter for his work unit when coming from Wuhan University, so we went to file for divorce. When this case was processed, a document was missing and he had to go back to Wuhan University for it. Somehow my coworkers heard about this and officers at my workplace intervened. They wanted us to go for reconciliation. Thinking Lu would graduate soon, we decided to wait until his graduation. Although the divorse was suspended like this, our relationship was not harmonious. But, now I am a practitioner, so I had to change and would not bring up the divorce again. Plus, I wanted to do well, as I did not want him to say bad things about Falun Gong because of me. 

After returning home this time, he continued to be upset with me on a daily basis, but I did not know why. Plus, he often went downstairs to pick up the phone. I only felt it a little strange, but did not think much about it. Seeing that I could not figure things out, he started to talk about what he was doing each day. He had met an old classmate at Wuhan University, and they got along well with each other. Later on, he told me everything. He said he was in love with this person and the relationship was already deep. However, the woman was already married. Upon hearing this, I had all kinds of feelings. I thought: how could you do this to me? How could you hurt me like this? Then realizing that I was a practitioner, I knew I should not react like that. I tried hard to hold back my tears, and did not want to talk. But I felt bad in my heart. All the things that happened in the past appeared vividly in front me. I had sacrificed everything for him and now I have exchanged my entire life for his success. But, I did not expect I would be treated like this in return. This was painful. 

Dealing With Family Health Issues

Before this was resolved, I faced something else. My brother in Heilongjiang Province wrote a letter to me saying he had a brain tumor and it was malignant. So he asked me what to do. My mother had passed away at a young age, and my brother’s sickness this time was a heavy blow to my father. He is the third child of my parents and the only boy in the family. 

After graduating from Harbin Normal University, he worked as a foreign language instructor at a teachers college. By age 33, he was already the youngest Associate Professor at the college. At that time, he had just come back from Japan as a visiting scholar, young and talented. He also had a lovely daughter, who was only five or six years old. Since childhood, my younger brother and I were the closest. I watched him grow up. 

He also trusted and respected me. Upon hearing about the incident about my brother, I decided to drop everything to fully support him. My father, sisters, and I took my brother for a medical examination in Beijing in the summer of 1993. By that time, Lu had graduated from Wuhan University and taught Constitutional Jurisprudence at National Prosecutors College under the Supreme Procuratorate in Beijing. He did not have an apartment and lived in the college dorm. After picking us up at the Beijing Train Station, Lu took us to Tiantan Hospital. Image analysis confirmed it was a malignant tumor. Everyone in the family felt bad at the news and my father wept in private. Already a practitioner, I knew I could not behave like them. I also planned to pass this test well. 

My brother had surgery at Tiantan Hospital and they removed most of the tumor. After recovery, my father was afraid that the illness would come back. So he took my brother for Gamma Knife surgery in Zibo City, Shandong Province. 

Openly Practicing Infidelity

I did not go this time, but stayed in Beijing facing my tribulations with Lu. That woman constantly wrote him using the college dorm address, and I lived in the college dorm too. Lu showed me her “love letter” and had me listen to the audio cassettes from that woman. Why on earth are there such things? How could he share this with me? Sometimes he told me details of what he and the woman did when they were together. I realized that all of this was targeting my heart. It was a needle that taunted me over and over again. He used it to see how I reacted and handled it. The illness of my brother and what Lu did targeted me almost at the same time. If this was not enough, Lu often scolded me and did that in front of my family. Looking at him, I was quiet and reminded myself to forbear. I am not an everyday person anymore and what he did was helping me, I thought. Still, I had tears in my eyes and bitterness in my heart. 

Since the matter about my brother came to an end temporarily, I only stayed in Beijing for a few days before returning to Changchun. Other teachers had been covering my class in my absence, and now I had to continue teaching. 

Master Discusses Cultivation Issues

In my spare time, I often visited Xu, where I could do the sitting meditation or exchange sharings with other practitioners. Sometimes I also saw Master. 

Once, Master brought a video titled The Biography of Shakyamuni for several of us to watch. It was filmed overseas, and talked about how Shakyamuni spread the Fa and saved people. The video was long, from Shakyamuni’s abandoning the throne to becoming a monk, as well as arduous cultivation in the deep mountains, to enlightenment under a Bodhi tree and saving people. This was the first time I saw a film about a Buddha. Several days later, Master came and several of us sat around him. 

“How was it?” Master asked. He asked about our feelings and understandings from watching the movie.

At that time, I knew very little about a Buddha and did not understand much. But, I did have deep understanding in one aspect. 

“It was so difficult for Buddha Shakyamuni to cultivate during his time,” I said to Master.

My understanding was that, our cultivation nowadays was not so difficult since our life hardly changed. We have food to eat and clothes to wear, similar to an everyday life. 

Practitioners Facing Family Tribulations

In those early days, many practitioners in Changchun had family tribulations. We had not cultivated for a long time and passing the tribulation was not easy. Taking the coworker in my Teaching and Research Office as an example, her husband treated her very well before her cultivation. After she became a practitioner, however, he always quarreled with her. 

She told me that her husband once even took out a knife as if to kill her. She did forbear at the time and calmed her husband down. But she could not take it in her heart, thinking it was too hard. She said to me, “Li Li, the two of us could move out later and live together. We could avoid these things and take care of each other.” I said, “We cannot do that. It does not work like that.” Once, several of us practitioners met Master, and that coworker asked the same question. Without thinking, I said, “We cannot dodge conflicts.” I knew Master agreed with me on this. 

With his title of Ph.D. and associate professor, Lu received a three-bed apartment in Beijing. It was a large apartment located at 410, Building 84 in Yongle Community of Shijingshan District. When I did not have classes, I would go to Beijing to renovate the apartment. After the renovation was completed, Lu took his mother and our son to live there. Because my work could not switch to Beijing in a short time, I continued staying in Changchun. Occasionally, Lu also came from Beijing to visit me. 

During that time (about 18 months), I attended some activities in Changchun including the first seminar held by practitioners. When listening to the speeches, I noticed that many practitioners talked about Buddhism. I immediately realized that these things were not part of Falun Dafa teachings. That is, it was an issue of “no second cultivation way.” Since I had serious lessons on this in the past, I was sensitive to this. After identifying this issue, I shared my thoughts with the practice site assistant. 

The First Falun Dafa Fahui [Experience Sharing Conference]

After practitioners in Changchun cultivated as one body for a while, coordinators decided to hold an experience-sharing conference (Fahui). This was the first time. Practitioners all realized its importance and called it the “First Gathering of Falun Gong Practitioners.” Although it was already evening, we were still preparing the title by cutting and piecing together large characters, “Experience-Sharing Conference of Changchun Falun Gong Practitioners.” 

We also did the same with Master’s poem,

Cultivating gong has a pathmind is the wayOn the boundless sea of Dafahardship is your ferry”(“Falun Dafa,” Hong Yin)

Practitioners came with a smile to the first Fahui, which took place at Jilin University. They arrived early and it looked like people were attending a major celebration. The sky was a beautiful blue. Standing at the back door of Jilin University auditorium, I looked at the blue sky and my happiness was beyond words. Then practitioners came on stage to talk, some read articles that were prepared in advance, while some did not bring anything, and others spoke without having prepared anything. The talked about the changes they experienced after they began to practice Falun Gong. 

There was a practitioner surnamed Guo. He shared how his wife was carried into Master’s class, and could stand up and walk out that day. He also described how his wife had karma elimination after attending class. The couple practiced together and encouraged each other. When his wife felt a lot of pain when eliminating sickness karma she rolled on the floor, Guo said to her, “Your father used to kill pigs and you had accumulated lots of karma too. Without such suffering, how could you eliminate it? You must hold on.” His wife was clear on the great improvement she experienced after attending Master’s class. Thus, she could make it through the remaining difficulties and tribulations despite the pain. 

The conference was very inspiring and many practitioners were moved to tears. The entire Fahui was also video recorded. When we watched the video later, I could see supernatural scenes. When practitioners entered the auditorium, from high above in the sky came an array of patterns like straw hats. They quickly flew in through the northern entrance and came inside. A thick pillar of light appeared in the center of the auditorium, which shot up all the way to the sky and cosmos. 

Several days later Master came back from a lecture session at another place, and he watched the video. According to Xu, when watching the video, Master said that all who should have come to the Fahui had been there. Everyone was there except for Master. 

Xu’s wife told me in private, “Master was in tears when he watched the video.” I was also moved when hearing this. I felt this Fahui was extremely special and sacred. 

During that time, several of us, including Xu’s family and two practitioners that I did not know, drove to Master’s hometown in Gongzhuling. The house Master used to live in was in the center of Gongzhuling. It was was a gray tile house like a suite. Neither the outside nor inside rooms were big. Each of them had a small heatable brick bed, typically seen in northeast China. With rulers we measured everywhere in the house from inside to outside, which was the main purpose of the trip. Touching the bricks on the wall, I observed everything in great detail. I thought, this is the place where Master used to live. Everything here is meaningful and will be recorded. At that time I did not have a better understanding of Master, or a better understanding from the Fa perspective. But somehow I could sense that this house and this place would be very meaningful in the future. We took a group photo in the house. When the picture was printed, I saw a strings of white light circling around us. A practitioner said they were falun. 

(To be continued)