(Minghui.org)
Greetings, compassionate Master!Greetings, fellow practitioners!
I am a Dafa practitioner from Taiwan, and I am here to share with everyone my experience of promoting the 2015 Shen Yun shows in Taiwan.
I come from the southern tip of Kaohsiung in Taiwan. Last year, our city’s Shen Yun ticket sales were not ideal. The week before opening night, there were still quite a number of unsold tickets in the medium and low price ranges. Practitioners from cities where Shen Yun had already finished performing came to assist us one after another. Even though in the end the tickets were almost sold out, the leftover empty seats really filled us with deep regret and created barriers between the practitioners as a whole. When reviewing what happened, everyone always discussed how we can do better.
Master said:
“By leading you all in doing Shen Yun, Master is in fact giving you a model. I have made Shen Yun the best show in the world. At the very least, in the performing arts, in the field of the arts, it’s playing the lead role. So how about our other projects, then? When what you do has just a little bit of success, you’re so pleased with yourselves. But are you playing the lead role [in your field]?” (“Fa Teaching at the 2013 Greater New York Fa Conference”)
When we thought of our past forms of promoting Shen Yun, whether it be contacting mainstream associations or other organizations to host presentations introducing Shen Yun, it seemed that we were always playing the supporting role. This is coupled with the fact that last year, after watching the show, many members of the mainstream audience told us one after another, “Shen Yun’s performance was so moving. Can we find opportunities to learn more about it?”
These reasons prompted us to hold tea parties for VIPs at a suitable venue, and mainstream society would be invited to attend. We would plan the entire 2.5-hour event. Everyone would gain a deeper understanding of Shen Yun through our presentations and videos, entirely putting us in the lead role.
When planning the event, whether it be deciding who to invite or what form the tea party would take, everyone had great differences in their ideas. After discussing it again and again, we gradually came to a consistent course of action. From Dafa, everyone can understand that our goals are all to save people, and in the end we overcame many obstacles to set the date for the tea party on July 10th. Everyone sent out mass invitations and worked hard to carry out their duties for the project. My responsibility this time was to host and plan the program and event proceedings.
However, the week before the event, I encountered a huge tribulation that I had never experienced before beginning cultivation: my husband suddenly passed away. At the time I did not know what to do, but I quickly realized that I am a Dafa disciple. I asked Master to give me wisdom and allow me to have the ability to take care of this sudden change of events.
Very quickly, a large wave of energy covered me. Unpredictably, the energy systematically guided me, but sometimes my mind would blank out again. Everything seemed to be a dream. Sometimes I couldn’t even figure out if the past or the present was a dream, until a fellow practitioner posed an exploratory question, “I know it’s not convenient for you right now, but I have to ask. Should we postpone the tea party?” The general coordinator also thoughtfully told me, “Don’t worry about the tea party. We can postpone it.”
I suddenly remembered Master always telling us, “...whatever it is you encounter--good or bad--it is a good thing...” (“Teaching the Fa in San Francisco, 2005”)
Master’s words surfaced in my mind, “To tell you the truth, the entire cultivation process for a practitioner is one of constantly giving up human attachments.” (Zhuan Falun)
I strongly realized that sorrow and remorse are all attachments to sentimentality. In the presence of Master and the Fa, there is no need to fear anything. Thus I firmly told the fellow practitioner, “Everything will go according to the plan.”
Due to my having to go on stage and host the tea party, at the time it really was an enormous test for me. When I did not have strong righteous thoughts, sentimentality would attack me like a wave that moves mountains and drains the seas. It would almost drown me. Overnight, my life had changed. Overnight, the life of a happy family in ordinary society was destroyed. Compassionate Master would always borrow the mouths of fellow practitioners or my daughter to remind me in a timely manner and guide me to correct every thought. I also increased my Fa study to constantly immerse myself in the Fa.
During this period, as I watched my son and daughter, who were also fellow practitioners, I sincerely admired the power of Dafa. Those two were always children in my eyes, yet they always act according the standards of Dafa. Their righteous thoughts and righteous actions were like two large pillars supporting me in my time of need. I also have to thank fellow practitioners for taking on some of the work in hosting the tea party at the last minute.
The night before the event, I contemplated how to elicit from the audience the feelings of their ancient mission, and to give them the chance to position themselves correctly. The recent developments in my life drained me both physically and mentally. My mind was blank, and it was nearing the depths of the night. I turned on my computer and put on my headphones to watch the Shen Yun introductory video over and over. I listened over and over to the part of the video where it says, “pure beauty, pure energy, pure wisdom, pure spirituality, pure traditional Chinese culture.”
I understood that we need to become purer and purer in order to remove our human desires. Only this way can we be the pure vessel that follows Master’s arrangements to save everyone. I suddenly felt the substance of sentimentality stripped from my body layer by layer, which gave me a feeling of rebirth. The tears that I so strongly suppressed during this period poured out without stopping, but the tears I shed were ones that endlessly thanked Master’s grace.
When I had watched the video nearly 30 times, I suddenly saw a scene of Dafa disciples reincarnating lifetime after lifetime, making connections with compassionate and mighty Master, so that at the last stage in history we can assist Master to save everyone. I understood everything clearly. It is the last stage of Fa-rectification, and I must steadfastly finish walking this path. Immediately, I felt a clarity in my heart that I had never felt before. Unknowingly, from the depths of my heart came a pure and untainted smile. I sincerely promised, “From now on, this disciple will completely follow Master’s arranged path and completely believe in Master and the Fa.”
The day of the tea party, the fellow practitioners present that day gathered and aligned their righteous thoughts to create a gigantic energy field. The people in attendance quietly enjoyed and shared in the beauty and goodness of Shen Yun, as if they were immobilized until we announced the end of the event. Everyone was reluctant to leave.
A touching story was that that although at the time nobody knew when Shen Yun was coming to perform in Kaohsiung, we presold over 400 tickets for the 2015 Shen Yun shows, and raised nearly $30,000 USD for Friends of Shen Yun. We were all very clear that everyone had chosen their positions, and we sincerely felt happy for them.
The entire process of hosting the tea parties made our promotions team more cohesive in our thoughts and our hearts. About eight months before the performance, we completely had no idea what the actual dates were for the performance. Under these circumstances, audience members bought tickets in advance and paid on the spot. This completely shattered my notions of promoting Shen Yun. While sustaining righteous thoughts, everyone continued to work hard on promoting ticket sales. Unexpectedly, before Shen Yun’s advertisements went out, we had already sold nearly 4,000 tickets.
We maintained a weekly Fa-study and discussion, and shared bits and pieces of our experiences in promoting Shen Yun. Everyone discussed how to increase our effectiveness and organization in our promotions, and we reflected on how to help the fellow practitioners who hadn’t already stepped out to help us. We categorized the different professions and created windows of opportunity for people to get to know Shen Yun. Fellow practitioners voluntarily undertook the various duties and thoughtfully designed it so that practitioners can more conveniently participate. As a result, these windows of opportunity flourished all over the place. During this period, the elderly and the young assisted each other, and the experienced led the inexperienced. We did not leave behind anyone with a predestined relationship. Even more so, we did not leave out any fellow practitioner.
I remember my first time working with young practitioners to attend mainstream social functions to promote Shen Yun. Because most of them attended graduate school and had relatively few chances to attend formal occasions, they were very nervous before our departure. Thus, we encouraged one another: it is to help Master rectify the Fa and to save everyone that we came, so no matter how impressive the title of the person you are talking to, whoever you meet must have a predestined relationship with you. Don’t feel pressured, and just remember to be compassionate and pure. In the presence of Master and the Fa, there is nothing to be afraid of. Thus, the young practitioners were able to make it through, and the practitioners who don’t come out and participate that often were also able to make it through. We are one body. We have to save sentient beings together. This year, these young practitioners became one of the main forces in Shen Yun promotion.
Cooperation among us as a whole has no barriers. We pass the baton from one person to the next. From cold calls to coordinating presentations, to the actual hosting of an event, technological preparation, and the open overall coordination, every person did their best to fulfill their role. Nobody played the lead role or supporting role, creating one body that is indestructible. This is also my deepest impression from this year’s experience.
In past years, whenever I was the host, I would always feel very nervous. I would always put all the pressure of ticket sales on myself. More or less, it contained an attachment to validating myself. This year, when I was on stage giving the presentation, I always strongly felt that I was one body with the fellow practitioners present at the event. Everyone was a particle of Dafa. Each particle looks ordinary, but all are critically important.
I realized that after I let go of the attachment to self, the environment becomes more pure. In that pure environment, all the practitioners present were like unhindered vessels through which Master’s compassionate message can flow out, passing through the layers upon layers of substances of fame, profit, and sentimentality that covered people, to reach the depths of their hearts, the part where they understand clearly what’s going on. It is to awaken their memories from a far, distant time, and let everyone become aware that in this troubled world, Shen Yun is their only hope of salvation.
Just like this, one presentation after another, as long as we gathered our righteous thoughts, tickets were sold on the spot, just like how a Shen Yun Performing Arts dancer once said, “When I am the one leading a dance, everyone else on the sides are all supporting me and inspiring me to do even better, so the power comes from everyone together.”
Promotion for the 2015 shows started in the summer of last year and lasted through autumn, winter, and now through performance season in the spring. We never stopped. Everyone is closely tied, like a large family. Sometimes when I’m paying a visit to someone, I would by chance find a fellow practitioner’s silhouette rushing about across the street. We would wave and cheer each other on before pushing forward on our paths.
Sometimes, multiple groups made presentations on the same day, and we would immediately pass along this information to keep one another updated. Whenever there is news of successful sales, everyone would cheer for one another but also spur themselves to work hard, do better, and catch up. In the process of promoting Shen Yun, everyone was so happy. Our deepest impression from this year is to happily promote Shen Yun.
This year, Kaohsiung’s promotion began relatively early. Since we had accumulated experience in hosting tea parties, when we had the chance we went to other counties to assist in their promotion efforts.
Furthermore, we were again the first city in Taiwan on the show schedule. After the shows ended in our city, we went to provide support in other cities. Everyone was very happy and thankful for all the other cities that gave us opportunities to continue to happily promote Shen Yun.
Fellow practitioners from the north said we brought sunshine and hope. Perhaps it was a coincidence, but twice in a row, whenever we arrived the sun would come out. When we left, the rain would start.
In the process of coordinating a presentation in the city of Keelung, one attendee raised his hand and said, “You people from Kaohsiung are really like General Yue Fei’s army from the Southern Song Dynasty! Battling from the south to the north.” Everyone smiled knowingly.
We sometimes encounter situations that aren’t ideal, but we would all encourage one another: “We can only be sad for a little while. Let’s wipe away our tears and take up the flag to battle again.”
One time, our team was on our way back from assisting the Penghu Islands when I thought of how in a few days we would have to give another presentation to hundreds of people and then travel a long way back to the north for another presentation. I suddenly felt extremely exhausted. A young practitioner walked over and joked with me, “We can only be tired for a little bit. After a nap, we have to take up the flag to battle again.” I immediately felt energetic. At once, a scene floated into view: on the dusty battlefield, no matter what happened, everyone encouraged and supported one another, holding their battle flags and charging forward without ever stopping. This is our divine mission.
In a short amount of time, we formed one body with the promotion teams in other cities. From this, we gained a lot of experience promoting Shen Yun and learned from others’ experience sharing. Everyone focused on their cultivation and broke out from the box they were in to improve together as a whole.
To me, the past year was filled with strange events. Before this, I often thanked Master for giving me the best of everything, including going to the U.S. to get my doctorate degree, then to the envy of many, coming back to Taiwan to be a University professor. I had two adorable children, a son and a daughter, an attentive husband, and my entire family cultivated in Dafa. I always thought that having all of this was life’s greatest happiness.
Now, I have a new definition of happiness. It turns out that when on the surface it appears that all has been lost, my heart was able to stay unmoved, peaceful, and free, in the face of what is considered the largest misfortune, because Master and the Fa are here. I think this is what true happiness is, and I sincerely thank Master and Dafa.
I deeply felt the transience of life on earth. Everything in the human world may suddenly disappear. This also made me feel the urgency in saving people. It is like what one practitioner wrote in an article on the Minghui website: “Did you use all of your power to do it?” I believe our Kaohsiung Shen Yun promotion team has the same belief: “In 2016, let’s use all of our power to promote Shen Yun, assist Master in Fa-rectification, and save all sentient beings.”
If there is anything improper, please compassionately point them out.
Thank you, revered Master!Thank you, fellow practitioners!
(Presented at the 2015 New York Cultivation Experience Sharing Conference)