I Truly Began Cultivating After I Changed My Notions

(Minghui.org) After I was arrested in 2001 I understood that only through reading the teachings (Fa) and letting go of my human notions, could I snap out of tribulations. I recalled an experience sharing article published on the Minghui website: A practitioner was arrested, but he was able to find the key to the police station entrance and was able to escape that night.

When the police went to sleep, I began looking for the key, thinking I could escape like that practitioner did. A police officer came in and asked, “What do you want?” I had to abandon the thought of escaping. I realized: “Merely following what other people did wouldn’t do.” I was later taken to a detention center. I regretted not treasuring Dafa and all the time I wasted, when I could have read the Fa.

Luckily, a practitioner who was my cellmate could recite the entire book of Hong Yin. I followed along as she recited, and I memorized it. I was able to recite Hong Yin. As a result, my righteous thoughts were strengthened and my mind became much clearer.

I constantly thought about how to get out of the detention center. One night I dreamed that the small windows in our cell opened. Then, someone climbed out, followed by many people who climb out. When I looked at the window, it was so small that one could only stick an arm or leg out. I wondered: “How could they get out of that small opening?” I remembered a western religious painting in which the angel tells Mary that she conceived Jesus. The main idea was that one should not use ordinary people’s knowledge and notions to think about things.

I realized that Master was giving me a hint to let go of my human notions and use Dafa’s principles to break through this tribulation. After I got up in the morning, a young female practitioner, who was my cellmate, whispered to me, “I have Master’s new articles.” I said with excitement, “I want to read them!” The cell had a surveillance device and the police often searched the cells. But when I held a thick roll of Master’s new articles, I wasn’t scared. I was grateful to Master for allowing another practitioner to pass on his new articles to me. I knew he was helping me have more Fa in my mind and he was showing me how to walk my cultivation path without using human notions.

Each time we were told to sit down, I’d recite Master’s new articles. There were 19 articles in total, which were written on napkins by practitioners who already left the detention center. When I flipped through the pages, they didn’t make any sound. They were also very easy to keep. I thanked Master for his painstaking arrangements! Thank you practitioners, whom I never met, for leaving Master’s precious new articles.

I dedicated myself to memorizing and reciting these articles.

Master said,

“In the several years of your cultivation, I have not only borne an incredibly great deal for you, but also constantly given you hints for your improvement, looked after your safety, and settled the debts that you owed at different levels so that you could achieve Consummation.” (“Drive Out Interference,” The Essentials of Diligent Progress II)

Each time I recited this passage, the other practitioners and I were always moved to tears. I felt grateful for Master’s benevolent saving grace, and I also regretted not cultivating diligently.

I was transferred to a forced labor camp in July 2001, where I was held for two years. Master’s lectures helped me to remember I was a practitioner. At the labor camp, I received one more of Master’s new articles, entitled “The Effect of Righteous Thoughts”. When the guards weren’t around, I recited it passage by passage, which helped me gain a clear understanding of the issues that I encountered in Fa-rectification cultivation. As my understanding of the Fa deepened, I no longer wanted to passively endure the persecution, and I went on a hunger strike. Two weeks later, in December 2001, the guards from the labor camp took me home.

I enlightened to the fact that no matter what kind of tribulation we run into, Master has arranged for us to pass the trial. No matter whether I was imprisoned or elsewhere, Master is by my side and compassionately enlightening me. But if I didn’t have a deep enough understanding of the Fa, I would fail to get his hint.

My Mission Is to Save People

I took legal action to prosecute the former Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader, Jiang Zemin, for persecuting Falun Dafa and its practitioners by filing a complaint in my area's Supreme Procuratorate and Supreme Court. After that, people from the Domestic Security Division had the local police officers arrest me and take me to a detention center. I refused to cooperate. After I went on a hunger strike I was sent home.

Even though I resisted the persecution, I had strong fear. I was afraid that I’d be illegally held again. But if I were to leave home, it wouldn’t do. When I couldn’t figure out what to do, I decided to stay home to read the Fa.

In the beginning, I studied the Fa just to study the Fa. After I read one lecture, I still didn’t know what Master was talking about. I just carried on and kept reading. When I read Lecture Three in Zhuan Falun my mind stopped wandering. When I was on Lecture Six, I enjoyed reading. By intensively reading the Fa each day, my fear of being arrested vanished.

A practitioner from the countryside visited me, and told me how she clarified the facts to the local police officers and talked about bringing Jiang to justice. I felt so inspired, I felt Master sent her to encourage me. I began to clarify the facts to local police officers.

First I went to talk to those who arrested me. Unexpectedly, they said they admired those practitioners who did not cooperate with them. They said, “You did very well. Otherwise you’d have been sentenced.” They were not against my clarifying truth to them either. They kept explaining that they followed orders to make a living, but, they did not agree with the persecution. I got to know more police officers, and they also heard the truth about Dafa from me.

In the end, the director and deputy director of the police station read our informational materials. The director told me, “Falun Dafa is good, you go ahead and practice. But please mind your own safety and don’t get hurt.”

A deputy director who arrested me before saw the photos on the Minghui website of the local practitioners who'd been persecuted and was shocked by how they upheld their belief. He said, “You go home and practice.” When another deputy director saw regular people arrested for fighting each other, he said, “This is a lack of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance!”

I clarified the facts to eight police officers from this police station individually. I explained why one needed to quit the CCP to ensure one's safety. Each time, after I finished talking, I always asked, “Is that okay if I help you quit the Party?” Some said, “Sure!” Some said, “Great!” Some said, “Falun Dafa is wonderful! Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is wonderful!” In the end, all of them quit the CCP and its affiliated organizations.

In the summer of 2016, a deputy director told me that the Domestic Security Division wanted me to go to the Procuratorate to deal with a pending investigation. I said I wouldn’t go. He said, “Since I have told you, my task is done. Whether you go or not is up to you. If the Domestic Security Division sends me, I’ll have to knock on your door again. I’ll just take a picture in front of your entrance to show that I came here.” He also told me, “A pending investigation means that the case will move forward. If you have to go to the procuratorate, you’ll have to go by yourself, because we won’t take you.”

What he was trying to say was that I shouldn’t go to the police station for the pending investigation and that the local police would not get involved.

After he left, I thought just going to the police station to clarify the facts wasn’t enough, I should also go to the Police Sub-Bureau to talk to the Domestic Security Division officers. I then went there to look for the team leader. Unexpectedly, he was very scared and afraid of being exposed. He only talked to me over the phone and refused to meet with me.

He later sent a young police officer to talk with me. I told him about the staged self-immolation incident on Tiananmen Square and how it was orchestrated by the CCP with the purpose of framing Falun Dafa practitioners, in order to justify the brutal persecution. I also told him about the cruel persecution of practitioners at the forced labor camps and in prisons, and how Falun Dafa is a beautiful high-level teaching.

He quietly asked me, “Why don’t you go to the United States? You can practice freely there.” I said, “Because so many people in China still don't know the truth about Falun Dafa, why would I leave? If I were to do that, who would tell you the truth!” He smiled, said that he had other things to do, and left.

After I returned home, I wrote a short truth-clarification letter to both the Domestic Security Division team leaders, truly hoping that they would not participate in persecuting Falun Dafa again.

In the spring of 2018, the deputy director said to me, “The Domestic Security Division team leader was transferred. Your case is closed.”

Thinking From Other People’s Points of View

I often had the words “Putting myself in other people’s shoes” in my mind. I saw that I had a certain amount of selfishness and I wasn’t considerate of others. This needed to be rectified, so that I could clarify the truth and save people.

With the onset of the COVID pandemic, the residents in our building went through nucleic acid amplification testing. When my throat was poked with the cotton swab, I gagged. However, in order to conform to ordinary society I went ahead and did it. The staff was a young man. He said, “Can you open up your mouth, for five seconds?” I replied, “I wish I could.”

In fact, I could only hold it open for one second. I was in great pain and wanted to vomit. But, I told him, “Good job!” After the testing was done he was very tired and he held his lower back in pain.

He said with embarrassment, “Don’t worry, I’m fine!” His colleague asked, “What’s the matter?”

I looked inward and wondered why I saw this. His behavior was my mirror. It seemed that in my day-to-day life, I usually acted like I understood people, when in fact it was all from my own self-serving point of view, as opposed to truly thinking for others. For example, when hearing a practitioner say that the machine for producing materials broke, instead of quickly figuring out a way to fix it, I thought, “He needs to enlighten and look inward.” I had no sympathy or compassion.

When I look inward and let go of a bit of selfishness, Master helps connect me with predestined people.

One time, I clarified the facts to a middle-aged man on the bus. He said, “The CCP leaders think all day long about how to embezzle, eat, drink, whore, and gamble. Who cares about ordinary people?”

I felt that the reason the man said that was because he was constantly confronted with unfairness in society and at work. He felt dissatisfied and helpless within a society ruled by the CCP. I told him that the root cause of the social corruption was the evil CCP. I said, “When you go to the hospital to get treated or go through surgery, you’ll have a good outcome if you're a good person. Living the same lifestyle, someone can live up to 99 years of age, but someone else can only live to 79 years of age. This is determined by destiny. To be a good person, remember Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, and remain kind. Follow this heavenly mandate and your life will be extended. So being a good person is for yourself.”

He nodded his head in agreement. Not only did he let go of his negativity, he began to carefully listen to me as I talked about Dafa. He said that he joined the Party when he was in the army and agreed to quit the Party. When I was about to get off the bus, he said to me kindly, “Thank you! Take care!”

Since I started paying attention to being considerate of others and always put myself in their shoes, I realized that while clarifying the truth, it was easier for me to understand them.

From Master’s recent lectures, I came to understand that we were transitioning into the Fa-rectification of the human world. While clarifying the truth, I realized that the knowing side of people anxiously want to know the truth and be saved by Dafa. As a practitioner, studying the Fa well and eliminating my attachments, are of utmost importance for saving people.

Last spring, due to the pandemic lockdowns, public transport stopped running. Sometimes there were no pedestrians on the streets, and only epidemic-prevention posts one after another, flying the Party’s red flag. I went to visit six epidemic-prevention posts and talked to the people on duty. All of them agreed to quit the Party.

I found that none of them were Party members, even though they wore red vests with the logo of the Party and red armbands. They all said in unison, “This is to fool the CCP!” They found this job through their connections and only came for the money. In a post by the entrance of the hospital which received COVID patients, after the guard on duty understood the relationship between the pledge to the CCP and ethics, he wanted to hear more about Dafa, and said, “If you have time, please come back and tell us more!”

Thank you, Master, for always looking after me!