Shared at 2004 Chicago Falun Dafa Conference
(Clearwisdom.net) Master told us in "Teaching the Fa at the 2003 Atlanta Fa Conference" that,
"Clarifying the truth during these gigantic changes has already become the major way of saving all beings and the world's people, so in doing this, the wisdom that Dafa has given you and the enormous capability that the Fa has provided you with are manifesting."
Master also said,
"You have to clarify the truth rationally and in line with people's logic and ways of thinking. If you talk about it in a strange, otherworldly way, not at all based on people's logic and way of thinking, and not considering whether people can accept it or not, then you're doing harm and the result is opposite what was intended. Make sure you do it rationally and clearheadedly. When you clarify the truth to people you have to consider their level of acceptance. .... Don't just go to talk for the sake of formality. Whenever you talk to someone you need to have him understand."
Here Master not only told us the reason for clarifying the truth -- saving people, and also told us the right way of doing so -- "in line with people's logic and ways of thinking" and "whenever you talk to someone you need to have him understand." If we truly follow Master's Fa, we will do very well in clarifying the truth.
I am clarifying the truth by making phone calls. I tried to make several phone calls at the beginning of 2001. I prepared a short message and read it once I got through the line. I made my first call to Beijing City's "610 Office" and chose to leave voice mail message. When I finished reading my pre-written message and hung up, I was extremely happy that I finally said what I wanted to say. My next phone call was to the former Public Security Minister, Jia Chunwang's office. I read my message to his secretary. But the following phone calls were not as easy. I called Beijing's Dongcheng District police station and the Xicheng District police station, but neither one wanted to listen to my pre-written message. They said, "If you don't talk to us, I will hang up." I kept on reading and they hung up. At that point, I was a little scared to talk directly to the evildoers.
After this failed trial I did not call for almost a year. At end of 2001, Master lectured at the Fa Conference in Florida, U.S.A and told us to do "three things" well. Master said,
"Currently the most important thing is clarifying the truth, because this is directly saving sentient beings, it's directly saving the people of the future, and it also demonstrates the magnificence of Dafa and Dafa disciples--in such a difficult environment you're still managing to save sentient beings." Master also told us, "Do it on a large scale, do it with all the wisdom that you can, and as long as something can save the people, go do it." ("Fa-Lecture at the Conference in Florida, U.S.A.")
After studying Master's Fa-Lecture, I assessed my own situation. I don't know English, I am not a computer expert, I don't know how to drive. Making phone calls suits me the best. Thus, since the beginning of 2002, I picked up the phone one more time to clarify the truth to the precious Chinese people. I did not give up this time. In the 365 days of each year, on average I made phone calls on 350 days. The other days I was out of town attending Fa experience sharing conferences. Every night I made phone calls from 10:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m. or 11:00 p.m. to 3:00 a.m. during the daylight savings time period. To avoid interrupting my family members, normal life, I stayed in a bathroom with the door closed to make the phone calls.
At the beginning, I copied phone numbers from the Internet during the daytime and called those numbers at night. For every call I made, I kept a simple record, which I organized into three categories: the ones that listened to the facts well, not so well and not well at all. After a period of time, I would take out those numbers that did not listen very well or not at all and called the numbers one more time.
Another way for me to find Chinese phone numbers to call is through friends and relatives living in China. I would ask one friend or a relative to give me numbers of other friends and relatives he knows of, and kept asking everyone I called. Like rolling snow balls, I found more than a hundred of friends and relatives' phone numbers, including the ones that I lost contact with for dozens of years. I called them one by one, to tell them the facts about Falun Dafa. For the ones who could not understand the facts at first, I would not push them; at least I sent them the message that there are lots people overseas practicing Falun Dafa.
At beginning of 2003, I started to call phone numbers of remote Chinese remote. It was a coincidence that a fellow practitioner gave me a list of phone numbers for remote townships. When I called these numbers, almost every call was answered. Unlike phone numbers of the evildoing organizations, people who answered the phone were willing to listen to the facts; lots of them never heard the truth about Dafa. There are over a thousand remote townships in each province in China; this is a big population, waiting to be saved. Since then, I called these remote townships province by province. So far, I called all the townships in 12 provinces - Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Anhui, Jiangsu, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Hebei, Shandong, Heilongjinag. I also worked with fellow practitioners. Together we called all the townships in Henan and Jilin province. These townships are the connections between cities and villages. Once people there understood the truth, they could spread the truth to more people in more areas.
I realized the process of making phone calls is a process of cultivating and improving myself. From 2002 till now were my busiest two years since I started practicing. I have to baby-sit my grandson for ten hours during the daytime, make phone calls at night, teach at Minghui School on Saturdays and introduce Falun Dafa at public locations on Sundays. In the meantime, I have to study the Falun Dafa teachings, practice the exercises, send forth righteous thoughts, search the web, etc. Though there is a lot to do, I could do everything well as long as I am thinking about the Fa and melting myself into the Fa.
In ordinary people's society I am a grandmother. I must play this role well, to show my non-practicing yet very supporting family members the greatness of Dafa. Because of my efforts, I am a very good grandma. My grandson is very active, smart and healthy. Everyday I recite "Lunyu" twice and also recite lots of Hongyin poems to him. When he naps, I study two Falun Dafa lectures daily. Every night I spend four hours making phone calls and sleep for four hours. In the mornings I do the sitting exercise for one hour and the standing exercises for half an hour, yet I feel very energized. I knew Dafa gave me this energy, otherwise how could a 67 year old woman keep up with such a schedule?
The process of making phone calls is a process of improving and cultivating myself, a process of purifying my thinking and assimilating into Dafa. In the very beginning, my attachment of fear was very strong. I could only read the pre-written messages; without that I did not know what to say. Even when I started talking, as soon as the other side interrupted me or asked a question, I wouldn't know how to continue. Very often I found myself shaking from nervousness in the unheated bathroom after my phone calls.
Later I became more fluent carrying on a conversation, but found my attachment to competitiveness very strong. Sometimes I found myself arguing with the other side, trying to win the argument. The result was that the other side hang up on me. The tone of my voice was not nice either. It sounded like a teacher scolding students. I often started my sentence with "let me tell you..." Several times the other side said back to me, "I don't need you to tell me anything, let me tell you..." This forced me to realize how unpleasant such a tone was. In addition, when I could not answer the other side's question well, I just tried to force them listen to me, thinking it was their fault...
Every phone call is a process of correcting myself, a process of better understanding the Fa. With one call after another, in my process of feeling sorrow, regret and self-criticism I improved myself. I found that my tone became more and more calm; the compassion in my heart became stronger and stronger. I answered the questions better and better, clarified the truth more and more clearly; even my voice became more and more pleasant. Finally one day, after answering over a dozen of one young lady's questions on the phone she said to me sincerely, "You did great and answered all my questions. Thank you very much. Falun Dafa is great!"
There are always difficulties and interruptions when making phone calls. Sometimes I dialed more than a dozen phone numbers but none was answered. Other I was so tired that I could hardly keep my eyes open. My brain felt empty and I really wanted to go to sleep. At these moments, one thought always kept me continue to make the phone calls, that is "saving people, it is better to save even just one more." I insisted to myself to keep calling.
Gradually, I learned some better ways of clarifying the truth to different types of people. Since there had been lots of changes to the township phone numbers, very often I called residential homes. Children love to answer the phone, so I often met some children over the phone. Whenever I heard a young voice from the other side I would say happily, "How are you? Are you an elementary student? Which grade are you in?" When he told me that, I would tell him I am a teacher and would like to teach him three characters today. I said I believe you are a smart child and you will remember them. When a child hears me saying he is smart, he will be happy to learn. I would tell him, "The first character is "Truth;" it means telling the truth and never lie. Do you think Truth is good?" The child would say yes. Then I would teach him the second character, "Compassion. It means be nice to everyone, and care for others. Is Compassion good?" "The third character is Forbearance. Be patient when encountering difficulties, be tolerant when others are not nice to you. Do you think it is good?" When the child said yes, I would teach him, "Truth, Compassion, Forbearance is good." Then I would tell him Falun Dafa teaches us to be good people according to "Truth, Compassion and Forbearance" so he should remember "Falun Dafa is good." When the child repeated after me several times, I would tell him to write them down and read them every day. I also would tell him to tell his friends about it.
Sometimes housewives answered the phone. Then I told them, "Falun Dafa is great! It is the righteous Fa and teaches people to be good. Reciting 'Falun Dafa is great,' 'Truth, Compassion, Forbearance is good' everyday is much better than reciting 'Buddha Amitabha' each day." Then I would tell them true stories that a senior citizen suffering cancer recited "Falun Dafa is great," "Truth, Benevolence, Forbearance is good" and miraculously recovered; a 89 years old senior citizen broke his legs and fully recovered in half a month by reciting "Falun Dafa is great," "Truth, Compassion, Forbearance is good." Seniors citizens and housewives were very interested in learning about these cases.
When calling evildoing organizations and evildoing individuals, I emphasized the facts that Jiang Zemin was sued in international courts for three types of crimes; that nine top Chinese government officials (increased to 18 now) were sued in international courts; told them of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) list of Chinese officials not allowed to enter Canada; of the U.S. Congressional House Concurrent Resolution 188, and of the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Dafa. These facts greatly shocked the evildoers and helped to change their minds.
When people who answered the phone did not know the truth about Dafa, I told them the three types of crimes Jiang Zemin committed, the cruel persecution against Dafa practitioners, the truth about the Tiananmen Self-immolation incident, and how Falun Dafa is widely spread around the world. To expand their concept of Dafa, I described to them how great and sacred Dafa parades are, and told them about the Global Chinese New Year Gala. I told them the story about the song of "Coming For You," and described to them how 80 European practitioners sang the song in five different languages. Sometimes I would sing the song for them; normally, people would change their perception about Dafa as soon as they listened to the song. The song is so moving that it could break through all the barriers in people's minds and change people's hearts; it could be more powerful than any spoken language.
Master told us at the 2003 Atlanta Fa Conference,
"Right now every minute and every second is crucial. If you miss out during this period of time, you miss out on everything. History won't recur. The history of the cosmos and the Three Realms have gone through so many, long, long years--what have all the beings been waiting for? What are they all here for? For exactly these few years! Yet there are [Dafa] students who are squandering their lives during these few years, not seizing the time. And yet you are shouldering such huge responsibilities for all beings and for history!" ("Teaching the Fa at the 2003 Atlanta Fa Conference")
Master's Fa often reminded me to be more diligent. I often see my shortcomings and how far away I am from Master's requirements. Sometimes my heart was not pure when studying the Fa, my mind was not powerful enough when sending forth righteous thoughts, I was not clear enough when clarifying the truth, my attachment to self is still strong, and my thoughts were not pure enough ... These are all the weakness that I need to overcome in future cultivation.
Finally, let us encourage each other with Master's poem,
"Rest and self-checking for a little while to enforce righteous thoughts; Keep forging ahead once recognizing the weakness." (unofficial translation)
Thank you revered Master, thank you everyone.
