(Clearwisdom.net) Greetings Master, greetings fellow practitioners
I'm a practitioner from Poland, and I started practicing Dafa a few years ago. I wish to share with you about one of the periods of my cultivation.
Making a step to clarify the truth
During my cultivation I often wondered what is the best way to clarify the truth and reach the largest possible group of people. Up to this day in our country we haven't had our own Dafa media outlet, art exhibition or marching band, so there was no project that I could join and make a systematic effort in clarifying the facts to people. Through Fa study I realized that in the current situation the best approach to take was to explain the facts to people near metro stations on a daily basis. At the beginning I didn't have a clear idea on what to do, but then I took a petition and flyers and just tried to reach people and talk with them. My first impression was that people were indifferent, everyone was busy and no one wanted to stop and talk for even a moment.
I remember that the biggest thing to break through was the issue of supressing attachments like irritation, impatience or the feeling of lust when talking with pretty women. I also had to conquer human thinking which contained a lot of notions, had an obstructing effect when I talked to people and sometimes got me caught in a heated debate or endless discussion. I started doing solid Fa study before I went out to clarify the truth each day, and through this, my thoughts and words had sufficient energy and were without interference from notions or attachments. I tried to explain the situation to individuals in a dignified and open manner. The facts I gave them were naturally accepted.
After a while, I realized that the best way to makes the facts easier for people to understand and get them to sign a petition to support Dafa was through maintaining a benevolent heart and serene expression, whilst making sure that every word I spoke came from a kind heart and the thought that I want to save this person. This approach worked well. People began to stop to talk to me and I collected between 10 and 15 petition signatures every time I went out.
After a while I learned how to use righteous thoughts in such moments. If I saw a person on the other side of the road, I sent righteous thoughts in their direction and tried to create an energy field to isolate the person from bad factors that may not allow them to hear the facts and sign the petition. After a while I began to see a unique phenomenon. It seemed that the people who passed by would send various non-verbal signals showing me exactly which person I should approach to explain the facts. This method was effective, but the whole time I was thinking about what I could do to save more people.
After a few weeks, an idea came to my mind that I should try to do exercises near the subway station. I knew that the exercises could produce a strong energy field, which can also cleanse the surroundings from bad elements. So I decided to try it. At the beginning, the biggest difficulty to overcome was the attachment of fear, which manifested in my body like pulsating matter, causing great physical and psychological discomfort and making it difficult to breathe. And also I experienced a whole mass of human thoughts and notions like, "It would be a strange thing for people to see. What will people think of me?" A sense of shame and a whole range of emotions flowed out. But amidst this tangle of human thoughts was a little righteous thought: "All people are here for the Fa and waiting to learn the truth. They are lost in delusion and if your conduct is right, there will be some beings who can help you." It seemed that this thought emanated a golden light, so I decided to keep it in mind and not pay attention to the negative thoughts, because I knew that it was only a matter of time before they would be eliminated. Indeed, after I’d done this three times, everything went naturally, without interference from these old thoughts.
Gradually, while improving in this method, another idea came to my mind telling me how I could clarify the truth to larger groups of people. Along the pavement I placed a roll of informational banners about the practice and the persecution in China and I put out some materials in different languages, the petition and information on why people should sign the petition. I tried to do two hours of exercises and after each session, the petition had between 30 and 50 new signatures. Many people took leaflets and even more of them read the banners. Many people later browsed the Faluninnfo website and signed our petition online. I really appreciate this period of cultivation at the metro station because I learned how to clarify the truth better, get rid of attachments in an accelerated manner, and develop a compassionate heart. I felt that Master always supported me and often helped me to enlighten to various attachments, or things that should be improved in my cultivation, by giving hints from the mouths of different people with whom I spoke.
For example, once I talked to a writer who talked about his book. He was a wise man and he understood that both the world and society operates according to certain rules. I started to tell him about Falun Gong and its main principles. I had just finished when the man suddenly looked at me. I felt as if his look pierced through my soul, and I felt a strong benevolent field. The man said, "You talk about the principle of Forbearance, but I see that you are patient only at the surface." Next, the whole string of sentences he spoke formed a logical description of my attachment, aiming at the core, and thus allowing me to understand it. After he finished speaking, I was speechless. I knew that it was Master who mercifully pointed out where I should improve. This kind of thing happened quite a lot.
In the period of metro station activities, I tried to impose strict requirements on myself and develop stronger righteous thoughts, because I've seen that improvement in cultivation was reflected in the quality of clarifying the truth and being less prone to interference. There was a time when I got up in the early morning before work and listened to the Guangzhou lectures, then I went to the metro station to do the exercises and clarify the truth. I read other lectures in the evening. It was a time when progress in both understanding the Fa and noticeable changes on the surface of the body took place almost every day. The state of tranquility was easy to achieve a few minutes after starting the meditation and gradually I've seen more and more touching scenes in other dimensions, where the vast amount of evil that tries to block people is quickly eliminated by many righteous elements. For example, while sending forth righteous thoughts, the emitted thoughts assumed a shape like swords of different sizes, decimating the evil beings. I felt as though the layers of hard material that surrounded my heart were crushed and the attachments that existed in different parts of my body were dissolved, each time getting smaller and smaller.
Of course there were also cases when I didn't maintain my xinxing well, or I lacked sufficiently strong righteous thoughts. Almost immediately, according to the law of mutual-generation and mutual-inhibition, interference would pop up thwarting my completing the exercises and clarifying the truth. From the very beginning of my cultivation the greatest difficulty was the attachment to lust. I felt it as a cluster of degenerate matter, which got stimulated when I saw a pretty girl, experienced the smell of women's perfume, or looked at a billboard featuring ladies dressed in a provocative manner. Once, when I meditated and lacked the strength to dissolve this kind of thought that tried to drill itself into my head, a few young girls gathered around me and giggled, interfering with my performing the exercises. They sat near me for half an hour and then took the petition and began to write on it. I finished the meditation, in order to validate the Fa to them. I went to the petition, and they’d written in big letters "I love you." I knew that the evil factors used my loopholes and thwarted all efforts to clarify the truth that day.
There were other similar manifestations. For example a group of drunken young people would suddenly appear from nowhere, or several people would show up trying to get money from passers-by, or some street band started to play right nearby. Once I was even battered by a drunk guy. From these experiences, I deeply realized that to be able to do a good job in saving people, the most important thing is to have an unshakable righteous thought in your mind – to validate the Fa and help Master. With this, everything goes well and the results are very good. But if we are going to validate oneself or when the attachment to elation or showing off appears, or if we fail to supress bad thoughts, the results are the opposite and interference appears in the blink of an eye.
However, every time I went home after being at the metro station, I thought about what could be done to save more people and it often made me sad. One day, after I finished the meditation, a young man came over to me and we started chatting. The guy signed the petition, had a very positive view about Falun Gong, and expressed his willingness to help in improving the banners so that they could be displayed in a vertical position. We talked a little bit and finally he said something which forced me to think seriously. He told me the parable of the starfish. The story goes as follows:
“One morning an elderly man was walking on a nearly deserted beach. He came upon a boy surrounded by thousands and thousands of starfish. As eagerly as he could, the youngster was picking them up and throwing them back into the ocean.
Puzzled, the older man looked at the young boy and asked, "Little boy, what are you doing?"
The youth responded without looking up, "I'm trying to save these starfish, sir. They’ve been washed up on the beach and cannot survive long out of the water."
The old man chuckled aloud, and said, "Son, there are thousands of starfish here and only one of you. You are never going to be able to help them all!"
Holding a starfish in his hand, the boy turned to the man and said, "I may not be able to help them all, but I can make a difference to this one!"
After he told me this story, he shook my hand, said, "Good luck in saving another starfish," and walked away. I knew that Master was giving me a hint, but at the beginning I wasn't clear on how I should understand it. I thought to myself, "Maybe Master is satisfied and is giving me a hint that activities at the metro station really are having an impact in saving people?" but on the other hand I thought that such activities didn't save many people, and in addition, there are only a few practitioners but so many people in the whole country. This made me sadder and I again started thinking about what could be done about it. Shortly after this event, the main coordinator suggested that we could open a Polish edition of the the Epoch Times newspaper. We had a thorough discussion about it. I remember that every time we talked about it, my heart was filled with enthusiasm and a smile appeared on my face. I knew that I had received a response to a major dilemma in cultivation that had bothered me.
Although it is a complex project that requires systematic work and making many sacrifices, the force of the newspaper in saving people and the extent to which it can influence society are great. Moreover, the project is based on cooperation, which creates the perfect cultivation environment for the group and is the best way to quickly improve oneself. Master said that the power of one practitioner is equal to the power of many ordinary people. I realized that the strength which comes from two practitioners cooperating together is more than a force two times stronger but is multiplied. Master said in “Fa Teaching Given at the Epoch Times Meeting”:
"If you can find a way to cooperate well, to be of one mind, and apply all your strength together in one direction, then, with the abilities you have, you will really be an unstoppable force. So what I’m wondering is, do we have to wait until you’ve cultivated better before you get close to that and increase your [collective] strength?"
With these words I wish to finish the essay and kindly ask you to point out if my understanding is not in accordance with the Fa.
Thank you Master, thank you fellow practitioners
