Falun Gong Made Me a Better Person

(Clearwisdom.net) I started practicing Falun Gong in 1997. Since I started practicing Falun Gong, I have been studying the Fa daily. Little by little, I started to follow what Teacher says in Zhuan Falun. I learned that cultivation practice is about returning to one's true self and eliminating selfishness. I gradually let go of my attachment to fame, self-interest and sentimentality and am no longer fighting over fame or self-interest. It is Falun Gong that has made me a better person.

Avoid Cheating Others

In 1998, I opened a dry cleaning store after I was laid off. We rented the store from the local government agency. The small store was quite profitable. We got along very well with employees of the government agency and they had a good impression of us. One day, my husband and his friend treated the electrician of the agency to dinner. The next day the electrician stopped our electricity meter. He made the arrangement to stop the electricity for two weeks every month so that we could save more than 100 yuan on our electricity bill. Once I found out about this, I talked to my husband about my understanding of the Fa related to the subject of "no loss, no gain." I asked my husband to talk to the electrician and to ask him not to steal from the government again.

My husband accepted what I had told him, but he was embarrassed to talk to the electrician. I also found it difficult to talk to the electrician. After all, it was my husband that asked him for a favor. On the other hand, I felt horrible that I, as a cultivator, might fail to follow the Fa. I felt so terrible that I could not eat or sleep.

I discussed the matter with several fellow practitioners and they all told me that a cultivator must not steal from the government and a cultivator must conduct herself strictly according to the Fa. They encouraged me to approach the electrician, and with their encouragement, I did approach him. I explained to him how wonderful Falun Gong is and how Teacher requires us to be good people. I decided that I must strictly follow Teacher's Fa to be a genuine cultivator or I would not be worthy of being a cultivator. I told him, "For the past few days I felt terrible about this. Please don't take it as an offense." He was very touched and said, "You have my support to practice Falun Gong and to be a good person. Rest assured that I won't take it as an offense. I will fix the electricity meter shortly. You have my support." Since then, he respected me and often asks if we need any help.

Finding 2,400 Yuan and Returning the Full Amount to the Owner

Another notable incident took place in 1998. One day I found 2,400 yuan in a garment. Two days later the lady asked me with a smile when she picked up her dry cleaning, "Did you find any money in my laundry?" I asked, "How much?" She said with a smile, "2,000 yuan." I said, "It's not the right amount." She asked, "Is it less than or more than the amount you found?" I said, "I will give you the money back only if you tell me the right number." She smiled, "I was worried that you didn't want to give me the money back, so I told you 2,000 yuan to let you keep the rest as a reward."

I said with a smile, "The money is enough for a year's rent, but I cannot take your money. Had I not started practicing Falun Gong, I might have kept the money. But now I am a Falun Gong practitioner. My Teacher requires me to be a good person and I must not steal. Teacher requires us to be thoughtful of others and to become selfless and altruistic." I explained to her the magnificence of Falun Gong.

She looked very touched. She stuffed 400 yuan in my hands and hurried out of the store to prevent me from returning the money to her, but I stopped her and returned the 400 yuan. She finally realized that I wouldn't accept the money and left. A few days later, she brought gifts with her and said, "This time you must accept them." I didn't want her to feel beholden, so I had no choice but to accept them.

I estimated that the gifts must have cost about 250 yuan. I had a discussion with my husband and decided to return 250 yuan to her in some other form. At the time, I remembered that Teacher had told us in Zhuan Falun that Falun Gong practitioners returned pieces of towels back to their factories and another practitioner who donated the cost of a child's bicycle after his child won a prize in a lottery. I decided to put 250 yuan in the pocket of her dry cleaning. There have been many such instances, but I courteously declined their tokens of appreciation.

"You Are a Good Person"

I have been arrested and sent to a detention center, a forced labor camp and to a brainwashing center for clarifying the facts about Falun Gong in my area and in Beijing. As a result of the imprisonment, the dry cleaning store was closed. In 2005, I started the dry cleaning business again. Many of my old customers found me and told me that they would only trust me with their clothes and that I was the only dry cleaner they trusted. One customer even said she had been looking for me for many years and went to many different dry cleaners to look for me. I thought, "They were not looking for me. They were looking for Teacher's salvation." These customers knew I had been practicing Falun Gong to be a better person. I had told all of them important facts about Falun Gong, and they all knew that I had suffered from the persecution of Falun Gong. After a short conversation, my old customers all agreed to quit the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

One day, the aforementioned electrician approached me at my new dry cleaning store. Shortly after I started to talk him about quitting the CCP, he said, "I have been working at a government agency, and I know the CCP is corrupt and it is about time that it faces its doom. It is bound to be doomed. I have witnessed the righteousness in Falun Gong. I have never trusted any of the propaganda on TV. Help me quit the CCP." I also helped several of his colleagues from the same agency to quit the Party.

In the fall of 2007, a customer came by my store to pick up five garments that had been dropped off by her husband. She didn't have the ticket with her. When I explained that she could not pick up anything without a ticket, she started shouting. I explained to her, "I am doing this to be responsible for his clothes and to be responsible to my business. This is a standard procedure that I hope you will understand."

But she started throwing a tantrum and insisted on picking up the clothes. Then she shouted that she would not do business with me again. I reminded myself of Teacher's Fa and told myself not to be stirred up by her emotions. I must save her.

After about 10 minutes, she started to calm down. She asked me to talk to her husband if I didn't believe her. I talked to her husband and verified the items he had dropped off and then I agreed to let her pick up her husband's dry cleaning. After I wrapped up her clothes, I produced over 400 yuan that I had found in a garment. She was shocked and didn't take the money. I added, "This is your money." She hardly believed that she had left so much money in the clothes.

I put the money in her clothes. She blushed and said, "I am so embarrassed. Thank you. You are truly a good person. I will continue to do business with you." I said, "It's my Teacher that has taught me this."

She asked in astonishment, "Who is your Teacher?" I replied, "My Teacher is very famous. I practice Falun Gong. Now you know who my Teacher is." She nodded with a smile. I added, "In the past, I would have never agreed to let you pick up anything without a ticket. And when you yelled at me I would have started bickering with you."

I added that Teacher requires us to become better people and told her the truth about the CCP's persecution of Falun Gong. I advised her to recite, "Falun Gong is good" and "Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance is good." Since then, she has been coming to my store more often. She added that we do a better dry cleaning job than any other store. She even applied for a dry cleaning membership card.

There have been many customers who left money in their garments. I always returned the money I found and clarified the truth about Falun Gong to them. They all remembered that Falun Gong is good. Some customers would even say "Falun Gong is good" when they enter the store. A customer I had clarified the truth to for the first time refused to quit the CCP. Later he realized that I am a good person. He then wrote "Falun Gong is good and good and good" on a new 20-yuan bill. When he picked up his dry cleaning, he handed me the 20-yuan bill and said, "I wrote this on the bill. What do you think?" I asked him, "When did you realize that Falun Gong is good?" He said, "Since I realized that you are such a good person." I told him that it might be better to simply write "Falun Gong is good." When I gave him the change, I gave him a few bills with facts about Falun Gong on them and told him that he would be rewarded by Heaven for spreading the truth about Falun Gong. He took the bills and said with delight that he would add "Falun Gong is good" on his bills too. At the end of last year, I displayed traditional Chinese couplets with the truth about Falun Gong on them. He and several other customers asked me for a copy of the couplets and said they would post them on their doors.

In April 2009, I sold the dry cleaning store because of personal reasons. All of my customers asked me to open a new dry cleaning store when they ran into me because they trusted no one else. When I owned the dry cleaning store, I hired eight employees at different periods of time. All the eight employees learned and accepted the truth about Falun Gong and asked their families to quit the CCP. Some of them took a copy of Zhuan Falun home and started studying it. To this day they keep in touch with me. They said that they had never had a better boss. They told me that I had been very good to them and promised to come back and help me no matter what when I start a new business, whatever it may be. Some of them call me and asked me what to do when they have personal problems.

The best benefit of practicing Falun Gong, in my husband's opinion, is that I stopped fighting over fame or self-interest and I have gotten rid of my foul temper.

I am not writing this article to show off. As a matter of fact, I am lagging behind what Teacher requires of me. I feel ashamed of myself in comparison to fellow practitioners. The only point I am trying to make is that we must display the goodness of Falun Gong to save more sentient beings.