Philadelphia Fahui: Trusting Master and Finding My Compassion

(Minghui.org) Greetings Master! Greetings fellow practitioners!

My cultivation path has been challenging; I’ve been stuck since the beginning, and unable to break through shame, resentment and bitterness. It recently occurred to me that perhaps the biggest obstacle in my cultivation journey has been not trusting Master.

I began practicing Falun Dafa in 2001. A practitioner suggested that I try Falun Dafa due to my constant headaches and other illness symptoms, so my main focus was on getting healed through Dafa. I had two experiences when I first began practicing, during which I was symptom-free. The first time was when I experienced guanding and the next time was when I was reading in a small Fa study group.

Each episode lasted about 30 seconds. I was amazed and assumed that at some point I’d experience this again and it would be permanent. After I had a miscarriage I stopped practicing for about two years. During that time I had some intensive integrative treatments to restore my health. I was put on a strict diet because I was not metabolizing fats and carbohydrates. I lost so much weight that my period stopped for four months.

I ran into a practitioner one day and she noticed how frail I looked. We talked and I was inspired to take up the practice again and really cultivate this time. I thought that I had eliminated the attachment to getting better, but I really just put it on the back burner.

I did feel better once I started really cultivating, but some issues were still present. After weeks and months went by, and then years, I still wasn’t able to get pregnant and I still suffered from illness karma. The attachment of resentment towards Master continued to build but I didn’t realize it. I knew I had resentment—plus jealousy and bitterness and I was trying to work on eliminating these attachments, but with this serious block, I didn’t make much progress.

In fact, every one of my attachments, fear of abandonment and rejection, grief over not having children, resentment over suffering from intractable sickness karma, and my husband not working, all seemed to stem from the notion that I was alone and uncared for. Underlying this was the notion that Master did not care for me and wasn’t looking after me. But as a Falun Dafa practitioner, how could this be possible?

A Breakthrough

During the American Transplant Congress in June, I suddenly enlightened to something when I heard the words, “You are not allowing Teacher to help you.”

The enlightenment came shortly after I started reciting passages of Zhuan Falun for a practitioner from out of town who was staying with me during the conference. He asked me to recite for him, as he was impressed that I had memorized so many pages. I kept saying I didn’t feel comfortable, I was having bad sickness karma and was just not up for it. But a few days later I decided I would try. I stopped after about two paragraphs. My mind went blank and I felt self-conscious.

Later that day, after this practitioner left for the airport, I was reciting “Realms,” [from Essentials for Further Advancement] which I recite 10 times almost every night before bed, and a thought suddenly came to me after I heard that I did not allow Master to help me. I realized that I was deliberately blocking Master from helping me so there was nothing he could do.

Master said,

“The body purification will be done only for those who come to truly learn the practice and the Fa. 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)

When I was very young, my mother was jealous of our father’s affection for us. She was angry and abusive towards me and when I was three years old, and had an affair to get the attention she craved. My parents divorced two years later. So from this, I learned that I could not and should not accept love from someone who my mother believed was not giving her the love she needed. The message I absorbed was even bigger than this: I could not be happier than my mother.

When my father remarried a few years a later, he withdrew his affection for us for fear that he would alienate his new wife. I hated my father for this, although I wasn’t aware of this hate until many years later.

I lived my life with the unconscious notion that I could not allow myself to have joy and success. I sabotaged myself in many ways and believed for years that I may be holding onto this sickness karma, accepting the old forces’ arrangement to keep me from fully cultivating and saving lives.

I realized that day that I saw Master as the father I couldn’t get close to. He could help others, but not me. I formed the notion that Master abandoned me and this reinforced the idea that I should not be happy and was not allowed to get love from him. This was the old forces’ arrangement, preventing me from fully immersing myself in the Fa.

Master gave me so many gifts to allow me to save lives. But instead of accepting these gifts, I followed the old forces, rejected these gifts and, on top of that, I was resentful towards Master for supposedly not giving me these gifts! For example, Master gave me a beautiful singing voice, but because of my sickness karma, I cannot get a full breath and this made singing virtually impossible. He gave me the ability to memorize the Fa, but the attachment of self-consciousness prevents me from sharing this with others. The same was true for public speaking, whether at government meetings or talking at our events, I worry because of past sickness karma that I will make a mistake, not be able to think of the right words and say something stupid, so I’m not relaxed and I’m not able to feel compassion towards those I’m trying to reach.

Isn’t all of this a result of not trusting Master and accepting the old forces’ arrangements? If I trusted Master, I would not worry about how I appear to others. Without being so self-absorbed, I would be able to have the necessary righteous thoughts and compassionate heart to save sentient beings. Selfishness is a product of the old forces! I am a divine being, made up of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.

I notice that when my thoughts are not in line with the Fa and I forget who I am, but instead I’m absorbed in shame, resentment or other selfish attachments, I don’t hear back from sentient beings that I’m trying to reach for our projects, or I hear bad news from these people—but as soon as I correct my thoughts, I hear back and often hear something very positive.

I’ve often thought that I hold my husband back because of my resentment. He is unhappy, irritable and he keeps himself isolated and closed off from the world. When I have compassion for him and let the resentment go, he is cheerful and optimistic.

Master said,

“When you truly have righteous thoughts as you save him, his true thoughts will be able to tell, and he won’t be mired in ordinary people’s feelings anymore.” (Teachings at the Conference in Los Angeles)

Several months ago, a practitioner who has been struggling with long-standing sickness karma, sent me this passage from Master’s Teaching the Fa at the Fa Conference in Australia: “…today you are the luckiest being in the cosmos. You are a Dafa student, and even gods in the heavens envy you. So what’s there for you to feel self-pity about?”

I feel immense gratitude to Master and great compassion when I recite this passage. I’ve been reciting this several times a week but my goal is to recite this several times a day.

I am so fortunate to be a Falun Dafa practitioner. I will trust Master and know that he is with me, helping me all along the way. How can I ever feel alone when Master is always with me? How can I believe the old forces and not Master?

I’m so grateful to all of my fellow practitioners for helping me on my cultivation path. I apologize to those with whom I’ve been irritable and impatient. You’ve helped me so much. I no longer want to accept the old forces’ arrangements and will only follow Master’s arrangements.

Thank you Master! Thank you fellow practitioners!

(Presented at the 2024 Philadelphia Fa Conference)